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ISRAEL THE BEAUTIFUL
Posted by Yehoshua Halevi, April 30, 2008. |
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Yehoshua HaLevi writes: "HOW I GOT THE SHOT: Light, form, color, texture, pattern: Take any one of these and you've got the foundation for a great photograph. In my classes, we learn to identify these design elements, single them out, and then advance to images built around two or more of these concepts. The wild irises of Mt. Gilboa are famous enough to merit a trail in their name in Beit Alpha National Park, located along the scenic route that winds from the Beka Valley up to Afula. I finally managed a visit there in the early spring of 2006. While there was plenty of seasonal color, to my dismay I only spotted this single iris which happened to be at the peak of its flowering. When I encounter a subject with potential, I'll often walk full circle around it to study the light, but here it was immediately obvious that a backlit angle would provide the greatest drama. I fiddled a bit more with my camera, mounted on a tripod with a macro lens, to create a background that would both complement the colors in the petals while isolating the flower from anything overly distracting to its form. Back in my digital darkroom, I applied a few quick finishing touches. I cropped the bottom so the stem would appear shooting upward from the lower right corner and I darkened the background just slightly to add emphasis to the backlit petals." Contact him at smile@goldenlightimages.com |
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THE DIPLOMATIC DANCE WITH HAMAS
Posted by JCPA, April 30, 2008. |
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This was written by Professor Efraim Karsh. |
No sooner had former U.S. President Jimmy Carter emerged from his Damascus meeting with Khaled Mashaal to declare Hamas' readiness to accept the Jewish state as a "neighbor next door" than the radical Islamist group demonstrated what its vision of peaceful coexistence meant by making the most ambitious attempt to kidnap Israeli soldiers and detonating two car bombs at a border crossing used for the introduction of vital foodstuffs and humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip. Meanwhile, Hamas' foreign minister, Mahmoud Zahar, reasserted the organization's commitment to Israel's destruction through demographic subversion (i.e., the "right of return") and vowed to continue the "armed struggle" against "the foundational crime at the core of the Jewish state." Attalah Abu Subh, Hamas' culture minister, amplified this assertion. "Everything we see in the Arab region and around the world –– the evil of the Jews, their deceit, their cunning, their warmongering, their control of the world, and their contempt and scorn for all the peoples of the world," he argued, "is based on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion –– the faith that every Jew harbors in his heart." The notion that Hamas' co-option into a political process aimed at stifling its overriding goal of destroying Israel will make it more hopeful and less despairing is a contradiction in terms. Yet the hope that Hamas could somehow be lured away from its genocidal agenda seems to be gaining wider currency. A bipartisan group of former U.S. officials, led by Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft, have been calling for "a genuine dialogue" with Hamas.[1] Former Secretary of State Colin Powell told National Public Radio last year that some way must be found to talk to Hamas.[2] Some Israelis have also joined the chorus calling for talks with Hamas. "Before we are dragged into Gaza, we must exhaust the other possibility," wrote journalist Ari Shavit. "We should offer Hamas a deal: an Islamic republic in Gaza in exchange for full demilitarization. A full and fulfilling life for a Muslim community of brothers, in exchange for giving up violence and arms altogether." Shavit is aware that his proposal is likely to be rejected, as Hamas "tends to prefer the deaths of Israelis over the lives of Palestinians." Yet he believes that "if there is any chance of a frank negotiation with Hamas, this is the path the talks should take. Not a Carter-style illusion, not the temporary tactic of a passing tahdiye (truce), but a tough deal with tough terms. A street deal. A deal with thugs. A deal meant to give those who live on the other side of the fence a genuine opportunity to lay down the sword, pick up the Koran and become real neighbors." But why should Hamas pay a price, any price, for something it already has? It needs no Israeli consent to establish an "Islamic republic" in Gaza. It did precisely that in early 2006, to Israel's abhorrence, and is probably in a position to replicate this success in the West Bank, the only inhibiting factors being considerations of political expediency and Israel's effective counterinsurgency measures. It can likewise obtain peace and quiet for its Gaza subjects at any given moment if it stops the rocket attacks on Israeli towns and villages and sends no "holy warriors" to blow themselves up among Israeli civilians. Nor is Israel in a position to reach "a street deal," given the steady erosion of its deterrent prowess since the Oslo years, and especially after the hurried flight from south Lebanon on May 24, 2000, which was instrumental in triggering the so-called "al-Aqsa Intifada" and in inaugurating Hizbullah's military buildup, and numerous provocations, along Israel's northern border, that culminated in the 2006 Second Lebanon War. This war, and the thousands of rockets raining down on Israel's southern localities during the past eight years, despite countless Israeli threats of harsh retribution, afford a foretaste of Palestinian and Arab abidance by a "peace of the thugs." Above all, not only is the destruction of Israel not a bargaining chip, it is the heart of the matter. Hamas, which is the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, sees the struggle for Palestine as neither an ordinary political dispute between two contending nations (Israelis and Palestinians), nor even as a struggle for national self-determination by an indigenous population against a foreign occupier. Rather, it sees Palestine as but one battle in a worldwide holy war to prevent the fall of a part of the House of Islam to infidels. In the words of Mahmoud Zahar: "Islamic and traditional views reject the notion of establishing an independent Palestinian state....In the past, there was no independent Palestinian state....[Hence], our main goal is to establish a great Islamic state, be it pan-Arabic or pan-Islamic." Hamas' charter not only promises that "Israel will exist until Islam will obliterate it," but presents the organization as the "spearhead and vanguard of the circle of struggle against World Zionism [and] the fight against the warmongering Jews." The document even incites anti-Semitic murder, arguing that "the Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight Jews and kill them. Then, the Jews will hide behind rocks and trees, and the rocks and trees will cry out: 'O Muslim, there is a Jew hiding behind me, come and kill him.'" There's more. According to its charter, Hamas was established not merely to "liberate Palestine from Zionist occupation" or to wipe out Jews, but to pursue the far loftier goals of spreading Allah's holy message and defending the "oppressed" throughout the world: "The Islamic Resistance Movement will spare no effort to implement the truth and abolish evil, in speech and in fact, both here and in any other location where it can reach out and exert influence." Hamas' extreme belief that a perpetual state of war exists between it and anyone, either Muslim or non-Muslim, who refuses to follow in the path of Allah does not permit it to respect, or compromise with, cultural, religious, and political beliefs that differ from its own. Its commitment to the use of violence as a religious duty means that it will never accept a political arrangement that doesn't fully correspond to its radical precepts. As the movement's slogan puts it: "Allah is [Hamas'] goal, the Prophet its model, the Koran its Constitution, Jihad its path and death for the cause of Allah its most sublime belief." Hamas certainly sees itself as part of the larger network of jihadi movements struggling with the West. Mahmoud Zahar has expressed the hope that Hamas' victories in Gaza will inspire the mujahideen in Iraq and Afghanistan. Moreover, Khaled Mashaal declared in a Damascus mosque in early 2006: "We say this to the West, which does not act reasonably, and does not learn its lessons: by Allah, you will be defeated." He added: "Tomorrow, our nation will sit on the throne of the world." He has lashed out at Western powers for helping the persecuted Christians of East Timor and for opposing Sudan's genocidal campaign in Darfur. Thus, Hamas identifies with global Islamist causes.[3] All this raises the question of how a Western diplomatic embrace of Hamas would impact on the larger war on terrorism. Legitimizing a jihadi group of this sort would undoubtedly undermine the broader struggle against Islamism, and deepen the doubts of many people in the Middle East and South Asia about the determination of the West to neutralize the current threat they all face at present. Hamas is plainly not an organization whose ideology can be integrated into any political process without undermining democracy and poisoning the norms of civil society. Hamas is not interested in peace with Israel; indeed, Mashaal has plainly stated that any tahdiye, or state of calm, is really "a tactic in conducting the struggle."[4] Unfortunately for Israelis and Palestinians alike, that is not something the wishful thinking of well-meaning pundits and even former U.S. presidents can change. Notes 1. Glenn Kessler, "Mideast Players Differ on Approach to Hamas,"
Washington Post, March 16, 2008,
2. Ibid. 3. Lt. Col. (res.) Jonathan D. Halevi, "Understanding the Direction
of the New Hamas Government: Between Tactical Pragmatism and Al-Qaeda
Jihadism," Jerusalem Issue Brief, Vol. 5, No. 22, April 6, 2006,
4. "Hamas Chief Sees Truce as a 'Tactic'," Associated Press, April 27, 2008. Professor Efraim Karsh is Head of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern Studies at King's College, University of London, and a member of the Board of International Experts of the Institute for Contemporary Affairs at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. His most recent book is Islamic Imperialism: A History (Yale University Press, 2007).This article was published as a Jerusalem Issue Brief by Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (http://www.jcpa.org). |
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THE MYTH OF PALESTINIAN MODERATION
Posted by Michael Freund, April 30, 2008. |
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Even for a region awash in fable and legend, this one is a real whopper. It is the myth of Palestinian moderation, and US and Israeli leaders continue to buy into it. They embrace Mahmoud Abbas as a reasonable person, and base their policy on the belief that most Palestinians abhor violence and terror. But as I demonstrate in the column below from the Jerusalem Post, there is ample evidence indicating that neither of those assumptions is at all correct. This article appeared in the post and is archived at
Comments and feedback may be sent to: letters@jpost.com or to me directly. thanks,
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Even for a president prone to misusing the English language, George W. Bush outdid himself last week. Sitting next to Mahmoud Abbas at the White House, Bush gushed and swooned over the visiting Palestinian leader, describing him in terms usually reserved for heroes and saints. "The president is a man of peace," Bush assured the gaggle of reporters who were present. "He's a man of vision. He rejects the idea of using violence to achieve objectives, which distinguishes him from other people in the region." While Bush's grammar may have been uncommonly accurate that day, his description of Abbas was anything but. For even a cursory glance at some of the Palestinian president's outbursts in recent months reveal a man wholly undeserving of such praise. On March 1, Abbas had the gall to insult the memory of the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis when he declared that Israel's counter-terror operations in Gaza were "worse than the Holocaust" (Jerusalem Post, March 2). And in an interview with the Jordanian newspaper Al-Dustur on February 28, Abbas boasted that he had been the first Palestinian to fire a bullet at Israel after the birth of the PLO in 1965. This ostensible "man of peace" then took pride in the fact that his Fatah movement had trained Hizbullah terrorists, and he did not rule out a return to the "armed struggle" against Israel in the future. And just two weeks ago, Abbas was planning to confer the Al-Quds Mark of Honor, the PLO's highest award, to two female Palestinian terrorists who took part in the killing of Israelis (Israel Radio, April 16). The event was cancelled only after it was publicized widely in the media. Need we also mention the Palestinian president's refusal late last year to recognize Israel as a "Jewish state"?
THIS OF course puts the lie to Bush's stubborn embrace of Abbas as a reasonable and judicious leader that can be counted on to forge a peace deal. If anything, the Palestinian president has repeatedly shown himself to be an intemperate hot-head. Nonetheless, that doesn't seem to stop Washington and much of the media from bestowing upon him the coveted title of a "moderate" leader that Israel can do business with. "Abbas's moderate and Western-backed government rules the West Bank," the Associated Press (April 25) helpfully explained in a recent report. According to Reuters (April 24), Abbas is "a pro-Western moderate," while Agence France-Presse referred to him on Monday as "moderate Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas," as though the appellation "moderate" was an integral part of his title. All of this shameful fawning on the Palestinian thug-in-chief raises a simple, yet rarely-asked, question: why is there such a widespread insistence on deluding the public into thinking that Abbas is a "moderate" leader who epitomizes the majority of Palestinians? The issue is more than academic. In fact, it goes directly to the core of current US and Israeli government policy. After all, the entire intellectual basis for the notion of granting the Palestinians a state rests on the dubious assumption that a majority of them are actually reasonable, peace-loving people. Too bad that all the available evidence appears to indicate otherwise. Last week, for example, the Palestinian-run Jerusalem Media and Communications Center published the results of a survey revealing that a majority of Palestinians (50.7%) support suicide-bombing attacks against Israeli civilians. This was in line with previous polls, which have consistently shown overwhelming Palestinian backing for anti-Israel terror. Indeed, just last month, the Ramallah-based Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found that an astonishing 84% of Palestinians supported the gruesome execution-style murder of 8 Israeli teens by a Palestinian terrorist at the Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva in Jerusalem. And by a margin of 64% to 33%, or nearly two to one, Palestinians were in favor of continued rocket attacks against Israeli towns and cities.
THESE COLD, hard facts present supporters of the peace process with a major problem, if only because they confirm that the very idea of Palestinian moderation is a myth. It is a figment of the imagination, a flight of fantasy that bears little resemblance to reality. After all, it is not as if a tiny minority of Palestinians support the murder of Jews. The bulk of them do. And wishing it were otherwise simply doesn't make it so. So let's stop fooling ourselves. Giving the Palestinians a state when a majority of them want us dead is both reckless and irresponsible. It is a recipe for disaster, and will only serve to create yet another radical, terror-sponsoring state in the region. And let's cease calling Mahmoud Abbas a "moderate." Anyone who refuses to recognize Israel as a "Jewish state," makes a mockery of the Holocaust, and threatens a return to violence, is certainly not deserving of such a characterization. Instead, let's call Abbas what he really is. For if he looks like an extremist, sounds like an extremist, and acts like an extremist, chances are that he is one. And more importantly, let's start treating him as such. Michael Freund served as an adviser to former Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. |
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JEWS ARE UNDER SIEGE: A CALL FOR ACTION
Posted by Avodah, April 30, 2008. |
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This was written by Charles Jacobs and Seth A. Klarman and it
appeared June 18, 2006 in
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A rush of shocking events is creating a "tipping point" in Jewish consciousness. Increasingly, Jews feel our situation has substantially changed, and for the worse. The events include Iran's nuclear threats and Holocaust denial, Hamas' electoral victory, the torture and murder of Ilan Halimi in Paris by a Muslim gang, the "discovery" by a Harvard dean that Jews actually do conspire to control Congress and American foreign policy in the service of Israel and to the detriment of U.S. interests, and the British academic boycott. All of these demonstrate for many that there is a new assault on the world's Jews. The hostility is based on a unique and intense hatred of Israel and deep resentment of its supporters, accompanied by a growing willingness to use violence. As though in a "perfect storm," two global ideologies, rooted in different radical critiques of the West, have suddenly aligned against us: 1. Islamic anti-Semitism. Fueled by Saudi petro-dollars and Iranian revolutionary zeal, a global campaign in mosques and madrassas (Islamic schools) teaches hundreds of millions of Muslims that Jews are the sons of monkeys and pigs, and killing them is a holy deed. The internet and television embellish the message: docudramas in Iran, Egypt and Jordan depict Jews harvesting the organs of Muslim children, killing non-Jews to make matzo, and plotting to rule the world. This poison reaches Muslims in the West. Europe's Jews are besieged and violently assaulted –– on the streets and in the no-longer varnished rhetoric of polite society. In America, Freedom House told Congress it found Saudi-produced hate literature aimed at Americans, Christians –– but mostly Jews –– in mosques across the U.S. 2. In the West, "Palestinianism" –– the notion that an innocent, indigenous people suffers a senseless, cruel oppression by the Jews of Israel (who ought to know better) threatens to become the standard view. It is the basis for an attack by Western radicals on Zionism, Jewish national self-determination, and by extension on Jews everywhere. The "oppression" of an Arab people by Westerners is, for the far Left, morally and politically more consequential than the massacres, enslavements, beheadings, bombings, and ethnic cleansings committed by Arabs and Muslims from London to Sudan, from Spain to Indonesia. These are treated by radicals as distractions from (even caused by) the deeper Zionist evil. Rooted in separate critiques of the West, Islam and the radical left are now allied –– in Europe and increasingly in segments of America's professoriate, media, human rights community, and the leadership of certain Protestant churches. In America, Jews fret as a vicious anti-Israel movement has taken root on American campuses, and Jewish organizations reeled last summer when five mainline Protestant denominations passed anti-Israel resolutions. Most Jews don't yet know the extent to which public high school texts –– and teachers –– are delegitimizing Israel. Anti-Semitism is a virus that morphs. In the West now, hostility to Jews has little to do with the familiar hatreds –– of Judaism or the Jewish "race." Today's antipathy makes Israel "the Jew" and its "crimes" the old "Jewish crimes" –– killing of the innocent, theft (this time of land), arrogance, and the control of business, finance, government and the media by international cabals. As before, "Jewish crimes" stand out as uniquely, even cosmically evil. And as such, they call for correction. We were unprepared; we remain confused. Arab and Muslim Jew-hatred was misread as mere "street talk" that would dissipate when Oslo brought peace. Instead, Jew-hate is an engine of the global jihad. We are flummoxed by the new breed of Western adversaries. After centuries of attack by brutes, illiterates, right wing lunatics, and Christian anti-Semites, antagonism to the Jewish collective is now generated by soft-spoken moralists with high ideals, by "anti-racists" –– some of the most articulate of whom are Jews. Set to defend against thugs yelling "kike," we are attacked instead by college professors –– today a far more insidious enemy –– who berate us for supporting "immorality." No one wants to think that sixty years after the Holocaust, a new storm threatens Jews everywhere. But reality cannot be avoided or minimized. Confused, with our defenses down, Jews need to consider the profound impact of losing the ideological battle that can destroy the Jewish state. This new time requires courageous and talented leaders to grasp these new realities and create strategies to defeat the latest defamations, grounded in a libelous portrayal of the Arab-Israeli conflict. A leadership correctly prioritizing the threat would convince us to lay aside our furious left-right debates, and teach us instead to make Israel's basic case –– from the left as well as from the right. It would gather the support of non-Jews and distinguish clearly friends from enemies. Most important, a new leadership would bravely and tirelessly tell us the truth about our new situation and recruit our talent and resources to the task. If current Jewish leaders –– in this country which has been so good to the Jewish people –– can't or won't do these things, then this small but enormously talented people will have to get new leaders. For in this, the Jewish community cannot and must not fail. Contact Avodah at avodah15@aol.com |
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GOV'T DESTROYS SWIMMING POOL IN SMALL SAMARIAN TOWN
Posted by Hillel Fendel, April 30, 2008. |
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Civil Administration and police officials swooped down on the small Jewish neighborhood of Havot Yair, located in Samaria 14 miles east of Herzliyah, and destroyed a small unauthorized swimming pool. The pool was about seven feet wide and 28 feet long. Though word of the impending law-enforcement operation was received early, dozens of youths who made their way to Havot Yair in order to stop the destruction were blocked by police vehicles, and the destruction was carried out without incident. A similar attempt was made to destroy the Hazon David synagogue in Kiryat Arba on Monday night, but was thwarted when hundreds of people arrived in the area. It is not clear why the police targeted only the swimming pool and not the other structures of Havot Yair, which is considered an "unauthorized illegal outpost." However, the pool's owner, Attorney Doron Nir-Tzvi, has an idea. "There are 22 families here," he told NRG-Maariv, "and the fact that they hit only the pool and not the other houses is because they are trying to terrorize a lawyer who has been representing [right-wing] anti-establishment causes for ten years." "An even worse reason for what they did today," Nir-Tzvi suggested, "is simple narrow-minded envy, according to which the settlers [Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria] are not allowed to live comfortably." "I am comforted by the fact that at this very hour, dozens of houses are being built in Jewish towns all over Judea and Samaria," he concluded, though he did not provide documentation for this statement. About Havot Yair Havot Yair [Yair's Farms, named for the story at the end of Numbers 32] is located between the city of Ariel and the community of Nofim. It was first established in 1999, was later destroyed by the government, was rebuilt in 2001, and now has 22 families and six permanent buildings. It is built on state-owned land. The community's website lists its hiking sites, as follows: –– The ancient winepress, near the synagogue Hillel Fendel, who is Senior New-Editor for Arutz Sheva
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SUPPOSE OLMERT WERE LYING; WHO IS COMBATTING IRAN; HAMAS' MILITARY
GROWTH
Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 30, 2008. |
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BUSH SHUNS WESTERN WALL Pres. Bush wants to visit some symbolic part of Israel but rules out the Golan Heights and the Western Wall in favor of Masada. Masada is where the Jewish defenders committed suicide, not an uplifting symbol. At least Israeli paratroopers vow there “never again” to be conquered. The Western Wall is where Israel recovered its patrimony from centuries of Islamic and British oppression. It, like the Golan, legally was made part of Israel. What Israel may negotiate about it is one thing, but meanwhile, it is part of Israel. If the President of the US, whose Congress declared Jerusalem part of Israel, and whose law requires him to relocate the US Embassy to Jerusalem, boycotts the Western Wall as “controversial,” because the aggressor Arabs want it only now that they don't have it, let Israelis boycott Bush. He is no friend. He wants Israel to concede Jerusalem and whatever else it needs to survive. His ostensible closeness to Israel and to PM Olmert is phony. He is striving to leave office with another peace agreement. It would render Israel helpless. How does he think the agreement would be judged by historians? Would they be taken in by the hoopla of the agreement, followed by war and the destruction of Israel thanks to that agreement? Won't he be thought of like Neville Chamberlain, whose peace agreement led to war? SUPPOSE OLMERT WERE LYING ABOUT NEGOTIATIONS PM Olmert says he can reach an agreement with the P.A., but that agreement depends on the P.A. stopping terrorism, which he does not think it can do. Therefore, he says, he does not expect to implement the agreement. Suppose he is lying, the way his predecessor Sharon did about getting all the steps fulfilled except the last one, for which he would seek approval, and then disregarding disapproval of and taking the last step and expelling Jews. The US would say that this great agreement is being held up only because Israel is stubborn about it. It would suggest that Israel does what it always had done –– continue meeting its obligations under the agreement, and ask the Arabs to fulfill their part of the agreement, which they never do. Olmert would find an excuse. INCONSISTENT IN SUSPICION Democrats dismiss statements by Pres. Bush as those of a liar. Meanwhile, the Clintons and Obama lie continually about their past positions on the issues. Democrats take them seriously. However ridiculous the negative news about Israel, Internet antisemites take it seriously, even if from sources they otherwise don't believe. People are inconsistent in their suspicions but not in expediency. SUPPOSED CEASEFIRE Hamas is not firing rockets at Israel, at present, but its allies are. It launches other attacks. Israel does not deter Hamas. Hamas attacked a border crossing through which Israel lets in humanitarian supplies. Apparently Hamas wants Israel to shut the crossing so that a real humanitarian crisis will result, leading to condemnation of Israel and demands that Israel keep the crossing open to Hamas all the time (IMRA, 4/10). How callous Hamas is towards its own people and cynical about the world's response! It knows that the world is looking for an opportunity to condemn Israel. How can Israel deter Hamas? Israel won't bombard Gaza so as to force residents to rise up against Hamas, which they otherwise respect if not adore for making holy war. Israel won't wipe out Hamas and keep Gaza under control thereafter, largely because the Olmert regime is appeasement-minded, anti-Zionist, and cooperating with Bush in the hope of making a (farcical) peace agreement. How callous Olmert is towards his own people, whom he endangers by inaction! How cynical Bush is, in hoping to make an agreement in name only, though it obviously would lead to war and to Israel's destruction! How foolish are the Democrats, criticizing Bush for everything else but missing this victory he is handing jihad! Why are the Republicans silent about it? At least the pro-Israel Evangelicals object. WHO IS COMBATING IRAN? Iran's strategy is to destabilize and control via armed proxies, itself safe from retaliation. Sunni regimes threatened by Iran's looming shadow don't know how to counteract Iran. Having taught their people jihad, they can't oppose Iran's championship of it. They are as anti-Israel, anti-American, anti-Iraq as is Iran. The US hasn't figured out that Syria, Hamas, and Fatah now take orders from Iran. It thinks it can wean Syria from Iran. It gives money to Fatah, which shares it with Hamas. (It holds Israel back from dealing a fatal blow to Hamas and to Fatah, thinking it can arrange a peace between Fatah and Israel, instead.) The US has no comprehensive strategy. Iran does (Caroline Glick in IMRA, 4/11). HOW COLUMBIA U. OPERATES Arab professors were prominent in picking an anti-Zionist Jew to head the new Israel & Jewish studies. Prof. Yinon Cohen accepts the false story of the Palestinian Arabs about refugees, etc., and thinks that settlers should not be defended from attack (Prof. Steven Plaut, 4/11). SYRIAN SURPRISE Syria was investigating the assassination of a leading terrorist. Iran alleges that S. Arabia provided the car used by Israeli agents to perform the act (IMRA, 4/10). This pits Syria against S.Arabia. It's a standard tactic in the Middle East to blame Israel in every attack, including attacks one's own secret police instigate, and to accuse one's opponent of the day, in this case, S. Arabia, of helping Israel. S. Arabia rarely cooperates with Israel, against which it is in a state of war. HAMAS' MILITARY GROWTH We'd already heard that Hamas has formed large-scale military units, has improved their command structure, and gets them trained by Iran. Israel finds that they are importing heavier weaponry and have doubled their numbers to 20,000 in Gaza. They dug bunkers underground and planted bombs along the roads they expect the IDF to reach them on (IMRA, 4/10). Security officials and commentators warned that this would happen. Now it has, and Hamas would inflict much greater casualties on the troops and, by means of its accumulated rockets, on Israeli civilians. These high casualties are due to the Olmert regime's dithering or treason, not sure which. Israel can defeat Hamas, but it isn't clear that Israel can survive a full assault from Hamas, the P.A., Hizbullah, Syria, and Iran, likely to be joined by Egypt, S. Arabia and, if opportune, Jordan. Olmert is responsible for allowing the Hizbullah build-up and for failing to punish Syria so as to deter its intervention if not cause its overthrow. IN BAD TASTE Two men from Nablus, in Israel illegally, nevertheless worked in a restaurant in Ramat Gan. They were recruited into a terrorist plot to poison customers. They were foiled, but some members of the gang remain at large (IMRA, 4/10). In the Middle Ages, Jews were accused of poisoning the wells, when plague struck Christians but sanitary practices largely protected Jews. In our era, Palestinian Arabs accuse Israel of trying to poison them. No evidence adduced. The intercepted plot, however, is of an actual case, and it is of Islamic terrorism by poison. As I say, the Muslim Arabs usually do the terrible things they falsely accuse the Israelis of, because thinking up such charges is consistent with Arab culture and the charges are not consistent with Jewish culture. Israel doesn't poison Muslims. Witnesses against Peres, however, have died mysteriously. Thousands of Sephardic Israeli children died or suffered mysterious radiation poisoning when he was in charge of nuclear testing. OLMERT THREATENS UNFRIGHTENED HAMAS He is threatening to put Hamas out of business (Arutz-7, 4/11), How long have Israeli leaders threatened the terrorists, without acting? The threats have no effect upon the terrorists. Do the threats impress any Israelis? DISCRIMINATION Israel made two goodwill gestures, at the behest of the US. It prohibits much Jewish building in Judea-Samaria. It approved of houses for 30,000 Arabs in Judea-Samaria (Arutz-7, 4/13) in addition to the tens of thousands living there and in Israel illegally. The US did not press the P.A. to cede anything. The P.A. made no goodwill gestures to Israel. It praises terrorists and some of its men commit terrorism. ANOTHER DAMAGING “GESTURE” The US pressed Israel to let in 5,000 more P.A. laborers. Up to now, as the number of P.A. construction workers in Israel diminished, Israelis replaced them. 15,000 Jews did, last year. Industrial officials urged the government to reject the US request (IMRA, 4/11). Israel does not do what is in its own people's interest. Its interest is to employ its own people, impoverish P.A.. DON'T COUNT ON IT A week or two ago, the NY Sun laughed about how short-sighted experts were, decades ago, warning about food shortages. Now we have plenty, the Sun explained. This week, the news has been about shortages causing mass-starvation. Shortages do it directly and also by boosting prices beyond what poor people can afford. Conditions change. Don't take them for granted. The use of corn for car fuel gets the major blame for shortages. The falling dollar has inflated prices. They say that hedge funds have been buying crop futures, pulling food out of circulation. HOW UNIFIL CHECKS CARGO FOR ARMS
UNIFIL inspects the manifest, not the cargo (IMRA, 4/11). If the manifest is false? The Palestinian Arabs ship arms under false manifests. Richard Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. His comments and analyses appear often on Think-Israel. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at richardshulman5@aol.com |
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SYRIA, THE NPT, AND THE IAEA
Posted by Bryna Berch, April 30, 2008. |
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This is INSS Insight No. 53, April 29, 2008. It was written by Ephraim Asculai. http://www.inss.org.il/research.php?cat=6&incat=&read=1778 |
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Given the official US statements, backed by extraordinary visual evidence, there is little doubt that the Israeli Air Force raid on the night of September 6, 2007 destroyed a building housing a nuclear reactor. There are many political and military ramifications both of the facts themselves and the way they were brought to light. However, one of the longer term effects is the impact of the revelations on the nuclear non-proliferation regime in general and on the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in particular. What did the new information reveal? that the installation that was destroyed was a nuclear reactor, probably still under construction; that the reactor was similar to the North Korean reactor at Yongbyon that produced plutonium (subsequently used in an underground nuclear test explosion); and that Syria, despite its NPT obligations, concealed the very existence as well as the purpose of the installation and repeatedly denied the facts to the world and to the IAEA. Syria has been trying to buy a nuclear reactor from several sources for a long time. It had sought to buy a research reactor from Argentina in the mid-1990's, but this failed when Argentina's foreign minister told Syria that it would not sell it a reactor unless Syria signed a peace treaty with Israel. Syria then tried, unsuccessfully, to buy a reactor from Russia. Apparently, Syria then concluded a secret deal with North Korea for the construction of a Yongbyon-type reactor in Syria. The extent of the North Korean involvement is not yet publicly known and is not that relevant, except for the fact that North Korea acted in breach of its NPT obligations. There can be little doubt as to the purpose of the ill-fated reactor. Had it been intended for truly peaceful uses, it would have been declared to the IAEA. In addition, Syria's repeated denials give credence to the claims that the reactor was part of a clandestine weapons development program. Furthermore, Syria acted with astounding speed, razed the stricken installation, and is putting up a supposedly military installation on the old foundations, making it almost impossible for any investigators to reveal the original purpose of the site. There are five members of the NPT that have seriously reneged on their treaty obligations –– Iraq, North Korea, Iran, Syria, and Libya. Iraq's project came to an end as a result of the 1991 Gulf War. Libya agreed to a rollback, probably as a result of the American invasion and toppling of Saddam Hussein in 2003. The remaining three may still be conducting illegal activities aimed at producing nuclear weapons. North Korea has long been suspected of having a clandestine uranium enrichment project. Iran has an ongoing nuclear weapons development program. And there is no guarantee that Syria is not going the same route, given the rumors about the connection with the Pakistani scientist A. Q. Khan, the biggest proliferator of all. The nuclear non-proliferation regime suffered an additional blow with the uncovering of Syria's misdeeds. The extent of the damage will be only known over time, and the prospects for the future need a much more elaborate discussion. In any case, if there will be no substantive change in the manner of the oversight and the application of regime, and if the NPT PrepCom and review conferences continue to become bogged down in secondary issues, the situation can only deteriorate further. The reaction of the IAEA to the information that came out of the Congressional briefing was astounding. An Associated Press report quoted the IAEA: "The Director General [DG] views the unilateral use of force by Israel as undermining the due process of verification that is at the heart of the non-proliferation regime." In addition, "The Director General deplores the fact that this information was not provided to the Agency [by the U.S.] in a timely manner, in accordance with the Agency's responsibilities under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), to enable it to verify its veracity and establish the facts." With regard to these statements, it should be noted first that verification is not a substitute for the demise of the reactor, which removed the potential for and the danger of plutonium production. Second, one should ask what would have actually happened had the facts been verified by safeguard inspections? Given the historical precedents, the IAEA DG would likely have deplored the fact that the reactor had not been declared in a timely manner, accepted Syrian assurances that hitherto the reactor would be safeguarded, and stated that Syria had the right to build and operate a nuclear reactor, as long as it was safeguarded. In any case, the IAEA could not have prevented the continuing construction and later operation of the reactor, which would have resulted in the potential for the production of plutonium, as was demonstrated by this reactor's sibling –– the Yongbyon reactor. It is easy to understand the DG's wrath –– he probably did not figure in any of the decision making process prior to the bombing. At present, Syria signaled that it would be willing to let the IAEA search for the truth. It is a "no win" situation for Syria if the inspectors uncover the remains of a nuclear reactor. It is a "lose" situation to the IAEA if it does not. One cannot escape the conclusion that the IAEA has continuously failed in its missions, notably in Iraq, Iran, and Syria. The IAEA has set up an extensive organization, including a Division of Information, which is really a Division of Intelligence, within its Department of Safeguards. The Syrian episode clearly demonstrates that the division has failed in its task. One does not need such a division if the DG states that he has to rely on external information and chastises the Member States for not providing the information in a timely manner. This may be an appropriate time for the Board of Governors (BOG) to contemplate a much more thorough oversight of the operation of this organization. Given the political realties, however, it is highly questionable whether the IAEA Board of Governors will indeed do so. |
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FROM ISRAEL: YOM HASHOAH
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 30, 2008. |
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Holocaust Day, or, as it is more properly known in Israel, Day of Remembrance of Martyrs and Heroes –– the feeling being that those who were brave and did fight back should not be forgotten. This is one of those times when I feel that my 'regular' posting material can be put aside. Observance began at sundown, and, as I do every year, I watched the televised ceremonies at the Holocaust Memorial, Yad Va'Shem. And, as I do every year, I wept. The core of the ceremony is the lighting of six flames, by six survivors, to represent the six million. Each of those who lights has been filmed telling his or her story, and that film runs before the flame is lit. One story is more painful than the next. ~~~~~~~~~~ But today was, somehow, different. For each of the magnificent people who told his/her story has made a significant contribution to the State. One, for example, was recruited by the Mosad, and sent into Germany, where he broke into an office and photographed the documents that convicted Eichmann. And one helped found a yishuv, a settlement, in the north in the early years of the State. His face lit with pride as he spoke of his contribution. And –– oh! –– the lessons to be learned from this. Lessons of bravery and hope and meaning in life. And, of course, I thought once again that this all hasn't happened to come to naught, and that whatever the horrors of what we are dealing with, we must come through at the end. There is an honor guard on the stage for the ceremonies, and I watched them with their military precision and prayed for all of our army to be strong, strong. ~~~~~~~~~~ Tomorrow at 10 AM a siren sounds and everyone stands still wherever he or she is in memory of the six million. People stop their cars and get out to stand. It's a moving and uniting experience. Except, of course, that Arabs don't stand still. And that's a story for another day. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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A NEW YAHOO GROUP INVITATION –– ATID YISRAEL
Posted by Sasha F., April 29, 2008. |
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Dear Friends, please join a newly created online forum focusing on Atid Yisrael. Atid Yisrael translates as Future of Israel. This group is dedicated
to forming a new group of representative local governments for Yehuda
and Shomron communities.
Several months before the destruction of the Jews of Azza Prof., Dr. Shlomo Lev-Ami, a person now in his 90th yr. of his life called a meeting in Tel Aviv of all the "activist " right wing groups. Its purpose was to organize and unify these groups into a potent force to challenge the forces of suicide that rule the Jewish people. This meeting and several others over the next year attended by approx. 80 people, ultimately led to nothing and the effort was a total failure. When describing this failed attempt Prof. Lev-Ami explains "Initially when I began this attempt to unify I knew the fears and egos of the human psyche. That is why I presented myself as the figurehead, to allay all fears and concerns since I was above suspicion not asking anything for myself in the way of money or power. I was shocked to discover that although given the urgency of the hour no one was willing to cooperate on a unified level. They were only interested in promoting themselves and maintaining their individual businesses". Who is Shlomo Lev-Ami? Shlomo Lev-Ami is a fifth generation Jew in Israel who is 90 yrs. old. He was the commander of the Irgun and Lechi's operations during the days leading up to Israel's Independence. He now lectures at five universities weekly, traveling on his own using public transportation. His physical and mental condition is better than most 50 yr, olds and he devotes his time and energy, totally, to preventing the next Holocaust, which he believes is well on its way. He is not the sort of person to sit around, lecture, write and generally complain how terrible things are. He also is not one to endlessly proclaim if it was up to him or had he been in charge he would, could or should handle this or that problem the 'right' way. What he has set out to do with the last energies in him is the establishment of a movement "Atid Yisrael" (The Future of Israel) whose eventual goal is a complete change of the leadership of Israel. How? By influencing and proving to the public that there are individuals able and worthy of doing the job. Rather than attempting to make a futile mad dash for the prime ministers job the idea is to gain access to as many municipalities and communities by competing with our candidates for their top offices and the very least gain entry to the various town councils. The first such election is to take place this Nov., just imagine if we were able to replace the mayor of Sderot with a real leader, even in the opposition he could effect change. The second part of the plan involves the establishment of national committees covering every aspect of life (transportation, environment, defense. education, etc.) that would draft the most capable people in every field. While they would draft various papers and prepare realistic plans for each sector, most importantly, they would enact programs and projects in every realm that would begin a cycle of change and have a positive effect on bettering the quality of life. This double pronged plan of action would be accompanied by ongoing press coverage which would be manipulated to provide maximum coverage for the "Atid Yisrael" movement as they progress on both fronts –– representation (hopefully heads) of towns and cities throughout the country actively challenging and confronting the encroaching holocaust, activating the national commitees that will work intensely to implement change on the ground. This is believed to be the only real chance of involving and activating large sectors of the population by creating momentum, believing there is a chance for change and that there are serious people who are capable, willing and able to take the reins of leadership. A great deal of time of effort is going into this movement. Your comments would be appreciated. This will of course require a great deal of funding if it is going to be successful. Contact Sasha F. by email at alex@fliegler.net |
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EGYPT: BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA
Posted by Barry Rubin, April 29, 2008. |
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Egyptian President Husni Mubarak is 80. After over a quarter-century in office he is ready for more. But how much longer will his rule--or regime--continue? And under him, Egypt has not done so badly, or has it? Well that depends. He has kept Egypt stable and out of war, no mean feat, and even delivered a bit of economic development, though recently there have been bread riots. But there has been no big improvement. One is reminded of the old Egyptian joke where the president's chauffer explains the difference among his last three bosses. Gamal Abdel Nasser (1952-1970) always turned left; Anwar al-Sadat (1970-1981) always turned right. Mubarak ordered: signal left, signal right, then park. Has Egypt been parked for the last 27 years? In some respects, yes. Being parked is better than getting run down by a speeding auto, though not better than making steady progress. Rights have been limited and suppression periodic. Yet this falls well short of the police states ruling in Syria and, formerly, Iraq. Corruption is astronomical. I can't talk about the ambiguity of Mubarak's regime without thinking of that great old Harold Arlen and Ted Koehler song, first recorded by Cab Calloway's orchestra in 1931. It begins: "I don't want you, But I hate to lose you, You've got me in between the devil and the deep blue sea." For his own people, Israel, and the United States (or the West in general), Mubarak's government is most unsatisfactory in very many ways. Egyptians face mismanagement and limits on freedom. Israel has a peace but a cold one. The United States and the West gets nominal cooperation from Cairo coupled with the government's lavish use of anti-Americanism, radical Arab nationalism, and even Islamist rhetoric to keep the masses mobilized on its side. Still, what's the alternative: violent instability or a radical Islamist revolution? Or is there a realistic hope of something better, of a moderate democratic state? Here, good intentions or wishful thinking should never be given precedent over realistic appraisal. In assessing a political situation, one should always remember politics is the art of the possible. Egypt is a country with "too many" people and not enough resources. There are no easy solutions. "I ought to cross you off my list, But when you come knocking at my door, Fate seems to give my heart a twist, And I come running back for more," sang Calloway. After all, that heart-twisting fate involves things like Hamas's takeover, Iraq's internal war, Hizballah's aggression, and Iran's expansionism plus nuclear weapons' drive. We are used to thinking of Egypt as the most important of all Arab countries, and that's still true relatively speaking though far less than a decade or two or three ago. By the force of realpolitik, the foreigners conclude about Mubarak's regime (Calloway again): "I should hate you, But I guess I love you, You've got me in between the devil and the deep blue sea." Thus, the West and Israel keep hoping. Maybe Egypt will restrain Hamas in the Gaza Strip and give vigorous backing to a serious peace process. Or possibly Cairo will lead a moderate Arab coalition against the forces of the Iran-Syria led HISH (Hamas-Iran-Syria-Hizballah alliance. A Muslim government official recently told me he calls them, the Addams family). After all, these actions are in Egypt's own interests, aren't they? Egypt's interests, though, are in playing both sides simultaneously to the greatest extent possible. An Egyptian diplomat actually told me not long ago that he had advised Israeli Arabs to pretend to be good citizens and demand to join the army so they could better subvert the country. State-owned Egyptian newspapers blame all the terrorism in Iraq on American conspiracies. Meanwhile, though, the Muslim Brotherhood is going to top-quality tailors to design its sheep's' clothing so that it can better wolf down Egypt. Credulous, or ill-intentioned, Westerners are all-too-willing to accept that the country's Islamist brothers are really moderates. It's easy to do that, just ignore their program and everything they say in Arabic. Just because they don't like the competition--al-Qaida or Iran--doesn't make them moderates. There is a decent, moderate, democratic-minded opposition. But it is far too weak and poorly organized. Even the main "reformist" group has now been taken over by the Brotherhood.Who would you bet on in a showdown? No contest. So what comes next? Gamal Mubarak, the president's 45-year-old son, who is deputy secretary-general of the ruling National Democratic Party? Perhaps some ex-general turned provincial governor or another official? In social terms, the country is becoming increasingly "Islamic" according to the more restrictive standards demanded by Islamists. Does that mean a political swing as well? Not necessarily but the danger bears close watching. Egypt is famous for muddling through. That's the most likely outcome but nobody should be too complacent in assuming that's the way things have to be. Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center http://www.gloriacenter.org and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs Journal http://meria.idc.ac.il. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), with Walter Laqueur (Viking-Penguin); the paperback edition of The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan); A Chronological History of Terrorism, with Judy Colp Rubin, (Sharpe); and The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East Contact him at profbarryrubin@yahoo.com |
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NY TIMES VS. ISRAEL, AGAIN; DON'T BASE POLICY ON "IF"; HOW TO ASSESS & DEAL WITH IRAN
Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 29, 2008. |
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“WQXR Radio, a New York City station owned by The New York Times, has refused to air a 15-second radio spot by the American Jewish Committee (AJC) because of descriptions "outside our bounds of acceptability." AJC Executive Director David Harris said the spot was aired on hundreds of stations in the United States, including CBS. The commercial stated, "Imagine you had fifteen seconds to find shelter from an incoming missile. Fifteen seconds to locate your children, help an elderly relative, assist a disabled person to find shelter. That's all the residents of Sderot and neighboring Israeli towns have. Day or night, the sirens go on. Fifteen seconds later, the missiles, fired from Hamas-controlled Gaza, hit. They could hit a home, a school, a hospital. Their aim is to kill and wound and demoralize. " New York Times Radio president Tom Batunek explained to AJC that the spot did not make it clear that the missile attacks were taking place outside of the New York City area. He added, "The description of the missiles as arriving 'day or night' and 'daily' is also subject to challenge as being misleading, at least to the degree that reasonable people might be troubled by the absence of any acknowledgement of reciprocal Israeli military actions." Harris commented, "In other words, according to Bartunek's logic, the only way to broadcast the plight of Sderot's residents over the airwaves is to equate Israel's right of self-defense with Hamas's and Islamic Jihad's right to strike Israel at will." The cancelled radio spot continued, "Imagine yourself in that situation. The sirens blast. 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. The time to seek shelter has ended. The missiles hit. This is what Israelis experience daily. But, amazingly, they refuse to be cowed. Help us help those Israelis." Bartunek countered, "Finally, in my judgment the 'countdown' device and the general tone of the message do not meet our guidelines for decorum." The AJC executive director, also revealed that the same radio station, after the September 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States, refused another AJC commercial. The 2001 spot stated, "Recently, The New York Times reported that in Saudi Arabia, 10th graders are warned of 'the dangers of having Christian and Jewish friends,' and in Pakistan, a million children attending religious schools are taught to "distrust and even hate the United States." The radio station manger cited the paragraph, which was quoted from the parent company's newspaper, as not meeting the station's standards. Harris also said that last month, the Bloomberg radio news station rejected an AJC segment citing hate literature in children's textbooks in the Palestinian Authority (PA), Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Iran. "Everything written in this spot was verifiable," Harris said. "Yet, all this was not good enough for the station, which, without putting anything down on paper, asserted that there were some questions about what was being said." (Arutz-7, 4/7 verbatim.) Friends sometimes query me suspiciously about my sources. Their source is the NY Times, whose mendacity is obvious. The first ad clearly mentioned that the attacks are on Israel, but the WQXR, owned by the Times, whose reporting leaves much culpability unclear or falsely implied against Israel, claims the ad doesn't make it clear that the attacks are on Israel. False. The Times also objects to the ad's not mentioning Israeli retaliation. What has that got to do with it? Then there is the general ad about not meeting standards as of decorum. That sounds fishy. The real problem with the ad is that it doesn't meet the Times standard for anti-Zionism. The Times editorializes a lot about freedom of the press, but denies it to Jewish advertisers. JIMMIE CARTER EXPOSES HIMSELF Jimmie Carter presents himself as saintly but acts devilish. He praises many dictators and endorses their unfair elections. Now has exposed his evil core by a combination of vicious defamation of Israel for self-defense, studious obliviousness to Hamas terrorism against Israel, and his physical embrace of Hamas' leader. That embrace removed any doubt about Carter's moral bankruptcy. His was a repulsive performance. WHAT KIND OF PRESIDENT IS U.S. READY FOR? Some people tell me they would support high taxes if they got good services in return. “If?” But they don't and won't. One should not base policy on an “if,” the way the media and the US try to get Israel to. That is, polls ask Israelis whether they would sacrifice a lot of strategic territory for genuine peace, if the Arabs really were sincere. The Arabs are not sincere, and Israelis don't expect to have to seriously consider the sacrifices. Nevertheless, the media distorts the polls to indicate that Israelis are willing to sacrifice the land, without stating the “if.” Sec. of State Rice, for whom no Israeli sacrifice is too great and no Arab failure to meet agreement deserves rebuke, cites the misstated poll results. What she demands, Israel concedes, and Israeli policy is born. In the US, Social Security seemed to be an example of high taxes producing good service. The system was financially solvent, but the politicians looted it for various subsidies. Thus even a good service got undermined. Many other services or programs are not good. Welfare was well intended but created welfare dependency and had to be cut back. The misconceived subsidy of corn ethanol has helped raise food prices and a hundred million people abroad are starving, without the intended result of conserving much oil. Senators Obama and Clinton propose giant bureaucracies that would consume the economy and deprive people of choices. Is the US ready for an unscrupulous, big government, black radical President or an unscrupulous, big government, female radical President? ABBAS' SUCCESSOR In Israel again there is agitation to free the serial-terrorist leader Barghouti, sentenced to several life sentences for crimes committed after the peace agreements. I believe that he would be trotted out as the next great hope for peace after Abbas falls. He has made clear that he believes in jihad. Ah, they say, he is strong and can make an agreement that Abbas lacks strength for. Arafat already made an agreement. What good is a liar's agreement? “MISUSE OF WEAPONS?” The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) complained about a mortar shell's killing an Arab boy in Gaza and wounding his brother. It condemned the “misuse of weapons.” (IMRA, 4/8.) The news brief didn't describe what really happened. Probably one of the many mortar shells now being fired at Israeli civilians fell short. What would stop the misuse of such a weapon, firing them more accurately and killing Israeli children? If the PCHR were decent, it could condemn the Islamic terrorism. LATEST FAILED GOODWILL EFFORT PM Olmert agreed to an amnesty for 10,000 of the estimated 50,000 illegal Arab residents of Judea-Samaria. This is in addition to about 12,000 it gave permanent residency to, before. This is supposed to be a goodwill effort, but the P.A. does not thank Israel for anything, just complains about other demands (Arutz-7, 4/8). Then Olmert pretends he has to give Judea-Samaria to the P.A. because there are too many Arabs in it. ISRAELI POLICY ON HEBRON TANTAMOUNT TO MURDER Israel is considering allowing P.A. police to patrol most of Hebron. The Jewish community there reminds us that the P.A. police force largely is composed of terrorists, its members commit terrorism, and it cooperates with terrorists. While preparing for an imminent war, the government should not be collecting guns from settlers and letting armed terrorists near them. Settlers will be dependent upon the government for protection (IMRA, 4/8) but the troops come late. Is the object to help the Arabs drive the Jews out, so that the government can more easily relinquish historical and sacred territory to the enemy? I think the government is disarming the settlers in order to sacrifice them. A decent and prudent government would let the P.A. prove it could successfully patrol the other cities, before extending patrols to Hebron. The government seems to be racing to make enough concessions to enable a desperate Pres. Bush's seem to have resolved the Arab-Israel conflict, in his remaining tenure. U.S. MISLEADS ABOUT WAR IN IRAQ The US has pretended that Syria and Iran share an interest in ending the war in Iraq. Actually, the US government knows that Syria and Iran are financing and helping to wage that war. If Syria and Iran ceased their wartime efforts, the US and Iraqi government soon would win (IMRA, 4/8). QUOTED FROM THE KORAN The Koran quotes Allah as urging followers to terrorize and torture non-believers, mentioning the Jews specifically and infidels generally. The Koran calls warfare against non-believers “Jihad.” (Steven Shamrak, 4/8.) OIL GETTING DIFFICULT TO EXTRACT IN MIDEAST The Gulf Cooperation Council states face a shortage of fuel. Big companies offer technology for injecting carbon dioxide into existing wells, in order to drive out more petroleum (IMRA, 4/9). That means that the cost of oil production is rising. Some oil fields are declining. HOW TO ASSESS & DEAL WITH IRAN David Wormser advises the US to weigh how its policies will be perceived by Iran, not just how we intend them. Otherwise, policies may backfire. When the US means to be reasonable, Iran perceives it as weak. Contrary to most reports, Mr. Wormser finds that the President of Iran is gaining politically, the way Hitler did after he bluffed his way through his crises. The leadership is aligned with the President, and the President replaces officials with hardliners. The line is “theofascist." Iran is taking over leadership of Islam. To do this, it needs Syria. To defeat Iran, defeat its proxies, such as Syria, Hizbullah, and Hamas (MEFNews, 4/9) and Fatah. WHO SOLD IRAN EQUIPMENT FOR MONITORING ISRAEL? The German company, Siemens sold Iran the capability of listening to Israeli phone calls (IMRA, 4/9). OLMERT FIGURES OUT HOW TO SHORTEN THE CONFLICT According to a newspaper report, he has agreed to cede to the P.A. Atarot airport just north of Jerusalem. This would strengthen the Abbas regime (IMRA, 4/10). It sure would –– the P.A. would fly in armaments and make war sooner, shortening the conflict. ISRAEL BUDGETING 5 YEARS TO GIVE OUT GAS MASKS Israel found the country's gas masks obsolete. It plans to take 5 years to distribute new ones to the whole country (IMRA, 4/10). War is coming sooner. Richard Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. His comments and analyses appear often on Think-Israel. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at richardshulman5@aol.com |
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SWITZERLAND SIDING WITH IRAN?
Posted by Olivier Guitta, April 29, 2008. |
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This was published in Middle East Times
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Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter went to Damascus last week to meet with Hamas' Khaled Meshaal, a man accused of terrorism by the United States, Israel and the European Union. Carter's initiative was criticized by the leadership in Washington and Jerusalem as appeasing terrorism. As damaging as some people, such as U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, say Carter's freelance diplomacy is to the United States, another visit by a Western dignitary to another Mideast leader, also accused of supporting terror, may have even greater repercussions. I am talking about last month's meeting between Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey. In fact that meeting was a blessing in disguise for Tehran. Everything Calmy-Rey could do to please the mullah's regime was done. First, let's start with the symbolic; meeting with an individual bent on destroying another country, denying the Holocaust and lately also questioning the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks constitutes a major diplomatic faux-pas. Especially for a country which cherishes its legendary "neutrality." Indeed while the United Nations Security Council has passed three resolutions condemning and sanctioning Iran for its nuclear program, Swiss diplomacy seems totally unfazed by what the international community is trying to achieve. Switzerland has now publicly fissured the more or less united front against Iran and Tehran loves it. Ahmadinejad was beaming during his meeting and Calmy-Rey could not stop smiling, obviously charmed by the attention of the Iranian president. Realizing the diplomatic coup, the images of the meeting were broadcast on Iranian networks around the clock. Interestingly, the Swiss minister was wearing a white veil while nothing required her to do so. This symbolic attire is far from a detail and Iranian feminists were appalled that a Western woman would play so blatantly in the hands of the regime. Shirine, a student at the University of Tehran told the Swiss daily La Liberté: "By wearing the veil, Micheline Calmy-Rey did not help us, Iranian women are fighting everyday to free our heads from these symbols of domination." She ironically added: "[We] believed that women were free in Europe." Ismahane, a MD in Tehran, seconded this view, adding that she was ashamed that now "Western female officials are coming to play the pious in front of the 'devil of Tehran' as (Ahmadinejad) is referred to by Iranian feminists. But her behavior may be understandable. Calmy-Rey put water in her gas by showing a good face with her veil." To understand this last sentence it helps to know that the Swiss foreign minister traveled to Tehran to ink a gas contract. Indeed, a $20 billion gas deal was signed on March 17 between the Swiss EGL and the National Iranian Gas Export Company (Nigec). After the controversy regarding her visit grew louder, Calmy-Rey gave an interview on April 15 to the Swiss daily Le Temps where she tried to justify her trip by stating that the gas contract does not violate any of the U.N. sanctions against Iran (though it might violate the U.S. Iran Sanctions Act). Furthermore, the Swiss minister added that other European countries are doing business with Iran and don't get blamed for it. Unfortunately (for the Swiss), this explanation does not hold water: in fact, some major European countries have been recently curbing business with Iran (especially France and Germany) and advising executives of large companies of the risks associated with doing business with Tehran. Incidentally, the largest Swiss bank, UBS decided over two years ago to break all business ties to Iran. Calmy-Rey explained that she wanted to protect Switzerland's strategic interests by diversifying energy providers. She added that the goal of her ministry is to insure the security and the well-being of the Swiss population. Unfortunately, Calmy-Rey was caught lying when Le Temps revealed the next day that none of the gas from the Iranian contract would end up in Switzerland. This revelation sparked much controversy regarding Calmy-Rey's trip to Tehran. Interestingly, even within her own Socialist Party some people expressed concerns about her twisted explanation. Roger Nordmann, an energy expert with the Socialist Party said: "Mrs. Calmy-Rey's justification, that this agreement directly profits Switzerland, is not credible. On an energy level, it would be better to sign import contracts with Germany or France. But not to buy gas that won't reach Switzerland." Also tellingly, Swiss gas officials have joined the fray of Calmy-Rey critics. Eric Défago, the managing director of Gaznat and vice president of the Swiss Association of the Gas Industry, told Le Temps that "this contract is beyond understanding and totally contrary to usual practice." One interesting fact makes this Tehran's visit even more puzzling: for decades Switzerland has been importing oil and gas from Libya, but never ever has a Swiss official visited Libya. So why did Calmy-Rey really travel to Iran to meet with Ahmadinejad? Couldn't she meet with the energy minister or any other high-ranked officials other than Ahmadinejad? Christophe Darbellay, president of the Christian Democratic People's Party, thinks that Calmy-Rey had a hidden agenda. Interestingly, Calmy-Rey, who boasts about her high moral standards and her defense of human rights, said she also went to Tehran to address the human rights situation in Iran. This seems like a very long shot, especially in light of Calmy-Rey's pedigree. Indeed, the current Swiss foreign minister and fixture on the Swiss political scene has earned a reputation of blatant anti-Americanism and anti-Israel. She will rarely miss an opportunity to criticize Israel. This may explain why Switzerland was the only European country to recently vote for an anti-Israel resolution at the U.N. Human Rights Council, which incidentally is Geneva-based. There is more. Roger Koppel, the owner and chief editor of the Swiss weekly Die Weltwoche wrote in a recent Wall Street Journal Europe piece, entitled, "Somebody Stop Calmy-Rey": "It is a miracle that her most disastrous act so far went almost unnoticed. In December 2006, she received an Iranian delegation for talks on the nuclear program. To the horror of her closest colleagues, she came up with the idea of improving relations by holding a seminar on differing perceptions of the Holocaust. "One must understand the enormity of this: Ms. Calmy-Rey suggested a debate in Switzerland with Iranian Holocaust deniers on whether the murder of 6 million Jews actually happened. Fortunately, nothing came of this idea. It would not only have been outrageous, but also illegal, since genocide denial is a crime in Switzerland." So, maybe Calmy-Rey wanted to address the Holocaust issue with Holocaust denier Ahmadinejad. Nonetheless what seems the most likely reason of her Iranian trip and her lying about it could be the Iranian nuclear program. Indeed, one should not be surprised if Swiss diplomacy is trying to find a solution to help the Iranians one way or another. With such actions, it would appear that Switzerland has abandoned its long-cherished "neutral" label to the detriment of the West. One should not underestimate the potential nefarious effects of Switzerland's foreign policy, in particular when it comes to the Middle East. In light of this development Washington might want to reconsider having the Swiss represent U.S. interests in Iran. Now that relations with the French have improved, Washington should consider dropping Berne for Paris. Olivier Guitta, an adjunct fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and a foreign affairs and counterterrorism consultant is the founder of the newsletter The Croissant (www.thecroissant.com). |
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WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE
Posted by Isi Leibler, April 29, 2008. |
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This article appeared in the Jerusalem Post
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It's disconcerting and sad to see American Jewish "progressives" frenziedly lobbying the American administration to pressure Israel for further unilateral concessions to the Palestinians. To make matters worse, they understate –– even obfuscate –– their real game plan. They describe themselves as "pro-Israel," "Zionist" and "moderate." They lay claim to being the true custodians of peace, portraying other Jewish leaders and AIPAC as neoconservatives and extremists. While tempting to dismiss their behavior and Orwellian doublespeak as naïve and inconsequential, recall that the sham Soviet peace fronts succeeded in duping many gullible well-meaning liberals into endorsing campaigns promoting totalitarianism. It's all the more bizarre because no one would suggest that the current Israeli government is "hawkish." On the contrary, the Olmert government has lost the confidence of its people precisely because of unilateral concessions which undermine Israel's security and embolden terrorists. His government is an amen chorus which capitulates to every demand imposed on it by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. It has provided weapons to the Palestinians which will almost certainly once again be redirected against Israel; it has released and granted amnesty to terrorists; and despite bitter opposition from the IDF, it has closed checkpoints and acceded to demands compromising security which have already resulted in Israeli casualties. Yet like a replay of the odious behavior of Haaretz editor David Landau, who told Rice that it would be his "wet dream" for the US "to rape Israel" for its own good, American "progressives" are urging their government to exert pressure on Israel for further unilateral concessions. This is not a new phenomenon. For years the Israel Policy Forum (IPF) has been lobbying the White House to get tougher with Israel. They claim that in 1993, prime minister Yitzhak Rabin appreciated their support for his efforts to reach a peace settlement with Arafat. They fail to mention that in contrast to Olmert, Rabin did stand up to US pressure. Rabin would have exploded had he encountered Jewish organizations exploiting his name as a means to justify lobbying the US administration to exert pressure on Israel. As far back as 2005, IPF president Seymour Reich boasted how his organization had successfully persuaded Rice to force Israel to make concessions on the Gaza border crossing –– concession that have since resulted in the loss of Israeli lives. More recently the IPF shamelessly lobbied the White House to press Israel to negotiate directly with Hamas. Reich wrote to Rice on March 21 that "no progress can be made if Hamas –– the governing body in Gaza –– is totally excluded from the process." M.J. Rosenberg, IPF's policy director, urged the U.S. to "be extending carrots and not just slapping them [Hamas] with sticks". The Progressive Jewish Alliance, another self-styled "pro-Israel" body, promotes exhibitions on US campuses of photo montages alleging the dehumanization of Palestinians by the Israeli army. They insist that their demonization of the IDF represent an expression of their love for Zion. Now with great fanfare and endorsement by much of the US liberal media, we have a new "progressive" initiative: an amalgam of various far-left organizations and individuals spearheaded by "Americans for Peace Now" and "Brit Tzedek V'Shalom" to establish "J.Street," a political action committee. Although proclaiming their intention to espouse "moderation" and bring "balance" into American Jewish leadership, their actual intent is to further US pressure on Israel and to undermine AIPAC, the highly effective pro-Israel lobby. Such behavior is especially unconscionable since –– aside from permits for extra housing to cope with natural growth in the densely Jewish populated settlement blocs implicitly endorsed by President Bush –– the Olmert government has conceded to all US government demands. It has even discouraged AIPAC and American Jewish leaders from trying to neutralize State Department pressures on itself for fear of antagonizing the administration. J Street also publicly opposes the use of force to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear capabilities, which undermines Israel's campaign to pressure Iran from going nuclear. In addition, J Street supports a swift withdrawal of US forces from Iraq, calls for direct dealings with Hamas and urges Jews to boycott Christian Zionists –– Israel's strongest allies. J Street intends to raise funds to provide $50,000 for selected Congressional candidates supporting these aims. Aside from a number of respectable personalities under the illusion that they have associated themselves with a "moderate" body seeking to promote peace between Israelis and Palestinians, J Street is mainly supported by prominent far-left Americans and Israelis like Ron Pundak, architect of the Oslo Accord. One of its principal theorists is Daniel Levy, a former adviser to Yossi Beilin who trivializes Palestinian incitement to murder Israelis. Former Jewish Agency chairman Avrum Burg, who has compared Israelis to Nazis and has urged the former to follow his lead and obtain European passports, is another notable J Street supporter. Burg's ranting against his country is so vile that even most of his Israeli associates distanced themselves from him. Writing this week in Haaretz, Burg pushed the envelope further and provided a gift to anti-Semites everywhere by accusing AIPAC of imposing "dual loyalties" on American Jews and of "institutionalizing near-treason and turning it into an enormous octopus of a political mechanism with enormous dimensions and numerous victims." Another key Israeli supporter is David Kimche, a leading figure in Israel Policy Forum. Kimche was director general of the Foreign Ministry under Yitzhak Shamir, where I had regular dealings with him. In those days, not only was he a hawk, but he even had the reputation of savagely roasting any Jewish leader who dared question Israeli government policies. "We live and die by our decisions, while you sit and pontificate from your armchair," he would say. Today he identifies with the extreme left. The Israel Council of Foreign Relations, which he heads, recently hosted a meeting in Jerusalem for ex-president Jimmy Carter, obliging the sponsor, the World Jewish Congress, to formally dissociate itself from the event. The "progressives" will also try to capitalize on the fact that the Barack Obama campaign has embraced former ambassador to Israel Daniel Kurtzer and appointed him Obama's adviser on Middle East affairs. Kurtzer, a Jewish dove, previously urged the Administration to take a tougher line with Israel. In his just-released book –– Negotiating Arab Israel Peace –– Kurtzer refers to the withholding of loan guarantees from the Shamir government by the first President Bush as an example of how an American government can effectively bring Israel into line. He accused Dennis Ross –– the Clinton-designated Middle East representative –– of having been biased in favor of Israel. He even castigates the Clinton and Bush Administrations for not employing sufficient Arabists in the State Department. The US is the only country capable of withstanding pressure from Arabs and their allies to isolate and delegitimize Israel. Thankfully, US public opinion and Congress has never been more favorably disposed towards Israel than today. Yet over the past year, the Bush Administration has tilted from its former policy. Nor can we exclude the possibility of a future US administration distancing itself further from Israel. It is therefore imperative that American Jewish leaders not underestimate the damage "progressive pro-Israel" groups can inflict, especially in light of the mainstream liberal media support J Street has enjoyed at its launch. In the face of existential threats, Israel needs the support of America Jewry more than ever. While all are free to express their opinions, "peaceniks" who have the gall to call on the US to put the heat on Israel to act as they believe best, rather than what the citizens of that democracy have decided is, must be exposed as fringe groups outside the Jewish mainstream. Contact Isi Leibler at his website http://www.leibler.com/article/328 or write him at ileibler@netvision.net.il |
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FROM ISRAEL: "THAT HUDNA"
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 29, 2008. |
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A correction: When I wrote about the US case against Kadish recently, I indicated that we had friends in Congress, the Pentagon and other places in the US, but that we also had enemies, in State, the Intelligence community, and the Justice department. I had secured my information from what I thought were reliable sources. Now I have heard from Sarah Stern, who heads the lobby group Emet, in Washington DC. She tells me that we have some very good friends in Justice, and that she has personally worked with some of them. I stand corrected and apologize. ~~~~~~~~~~ I wrote last about the proposed ceasefire (technically a hudna) for Gaza and indicated that since Hamas political head Mashaal had referred to it, with honesty, as a "tactic" this clearly wasn't going anywhere. A hudna buys them time to strengthen before they hit us again. Well...that was a foolish assumption on my part, altogether too rational. The news that broke yesterday was that Bush wanted to see us go for that hudna, with it in place before he arrived here in two weeks. There was some notion that this would help the "peace process." And, obviously, helping the peace process is all that really matters. Some of you already know how infuriated this made me –– this meddling by Bush into our security affairs. I still suspect that in the end this may go nowhere (and I'll explain a bit about why), but there are now several factors that it's worth examining. ~~~~~~~~~~ The "inspired" notion of Bush, or his advisors, is that Abbas feels constrained with regard to dealing with Israel when Israel is shooting at Palestinians in Gaza –– terrorist Palestinians, but for Abbas that is beside the point. It makes him look as if he's consorting with the enemy. And so stopping the shooting would presumably make it possible for Abbas to negotiate more freely. Abbas is giving good lip service to this idea of a truce. After meeting with Mubarak in Sharm el-Sheikh, he intoned, "The truce is a national interest of all Palestinians. A truce will alleviate the suffering of our people and pave the way for the reopening of the border crossings." However, reports Khaled Abu Toameh in the Post, the PA is actually quite anxious about this, because it would be a step towards legitimizing Hamas's takeover of Gaza, something Abbas is trying mightily to reverse. At a minimum, Abbas is insisting that the PA must be present at all opened border crossings, but if the crossings are opened in a deal between Israel and Hamas as part of a truce, exactly where does that leave the PA? An analysis in Haaretz carried this theme even further, saying that a truce that opened the crossings would render the PA almost irrelevant. According to this thinking, people would get the message that concessions are more likely to be drawn from Israel when there is shooting than when there are negotiations. ~~~~~~~~~~ It is truly ironic, and not at all surprising, that the US government, meddling in Middle Eastern affairs in an attempt to make things better, might, from their perspective, end up making them worse. Were they to push that truce down our throats, in an effort to strengthen Abbas, they might actually make him weaker. ~~~~~~~~~~ Egypt, still working towards that hudna, has invited four terrorist factions to Cairo for meetings in an attempt to convince them to cooperate: Islamic Jihad, the Popular Resistance Committees, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) . The serious question as to whether they will all be on board is a major factor getting in the way of what Egypt is attempting to accomplish. At a minimum, these groups are seeking commitments by Israel not to do any operations in Gaza, and to extend the truce to Judea and Samaria within six months. Problematic, to say the least. ~~~~~~~~~~ Then there is the issue of Egypt's commitment to blocking the smuggling of weapons into Gaza. Head of the IDF Southern Command Maj.-Gen. Yoav Galant is fiercely opposed to a ceasefire, in part because he's convinced smuggling would increase. He's also concerned about strengthening of the terrorist infrastructure inside of Gaza. ~~~~~~~~~~ Today 15 Kassams and 20 mortars were fired at Israel. A home and a clinic were hit, and five people in Sderot were lightly wounded. Said Defense Minister Ehud Barak: "This is not the right time for a ceasefire with Hamas." ~~~~~~~~~~ The comment of Hamas's Mahmoud Zahar, speaking today at Islamic University in Gaza, was that, "If Israel says no, it will pay a heavy price. We are a besieged people and we will have to use all our tools to defend ourselves against Israel...Hamas has 200,000 people who want to blow themselves up inside of Israel." ~~~~~~~~~~ And, indeed, we may be in for some tough times. Head of Military Intelligence Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin told the Cabinet today that terror groups are planning a major attack for our 60th Independence Day, next week. While Hamas may be planning to breach the border between Gaza and Israel, as they did at Rafah not long ago. They would likely aim towards Israel this time because Egypt has gotten very serious about its response to a new attempt to break through at Rafah. And when the Egyptians get serious, they shoot to kill. ~~~~~~~~~~ According to a new report from YNet, a serious blowout has erupted between Israel's chief negotiator, Tzipi Livni, and the PA chief negotiator, Ahmed Qurei. Qurei reportedly exploded when Livni presented a map that showed Israel retaining Jerusalem, major settlement blocs in Judea and Samaria, and the Jordan Valley (essential from a security perspective). In addition, Qurei is said to be furious because Barak has indicated that there would have to be special security arrangements at a high point in Samaria that directly overlooks the airport. If this report is accurate, and if the quarrel is even half-way serious, then Bush can forget trying to push Israel into a truce in order to get the PA to negotiate faster. I'm waiting for confirmation. ~~~~~~~~~~ It's very good news being reported by the Post regarding sanctions with teeth against Iran. Apparently the EU is set to blacklist one of Iran's top banks –– a bank through which Iran conducts considerable business. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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GUSH KATIF REFUGEES ASK COURT TO ERASE DEBTS
Posted by Buddy Macy, April 29, 2008. |
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This was written by Avi Tuchmayer and it appeared in
Arutz-Sheva
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(IsraelNN.com) Refugees from destroyed communities in Gush Katif have appealed to the Supreme Court to force the government to enforce a pre-disengagement decision to erase refugees' debts to the World Zionist Organization. The decision to erase debts incurred by Gush Katif pioneers when they established their communities was made by the Knesset Finance Committee in 2004. As with other areas around the country, Gaza communities benefited from long-term loans from the Jewish Agency in order establish farming infrastructure, but when the Sharon Administration decided to pull out of Gaza, it became clear that local residents would be unable to repay the debts. Because the Finance Committee had supposedly "taken care" of canceling Gush Katif debts to the World Zionist Organization, the Knesset Laws Committee did not enshrine the debt erasure in the 2005 Evacuation –– Compensation Law. As a result, Gaza residents were left with little legal protection and saddled with debt for farming equipment and farm land they can no longer access. According to Anita Tucker, formerly of Netzer Hazani, the debt repayment is an especially sore point for pioneers who built up Jewish Gaza soon after the area was liberated from Egypt during the Six Day War. "When we came to Gush Katif over 30 years ago, the World Zionist Organization gave a package of benefits to encourage agriculture in development areas. We received various essentials to start a farm. I was a farmer in Gush Katif for 29 years. We were in the process of paying back those initial benefits, when the government threw us out of the land, that it had originally encouraged us to develop." Three years later, still refugees Three years after the government forcibly removed Gaza's Jewish residents from their homes, expellees continue to be scattered in a variety of temporary housing arrangements, and most remain without suitable employment options. Most refugees survive on compensation payouts they received at the time of the eviction. To raise funds to build a new dairy infrastructure in order to create a post-disengagement source of economic stability, some former Gush Katif communities sold shares in Tnuva, Israel's largest dairy product manufacturer. There is now a foreclosure order for approximately 3 million shekels on that money in order to cover the debts the refugees owe to the Zionist organization. The lawsuit names as defendants the government, World Zionist Organization, the Finance Ministry, the accountant general, the agriculture minister and the Sela Disengagement Authority, and asks the court to force the above-mentioned bodies to enforce the government's decision. They say the plaintiffs' real ability to restore and rebuild their lives has suffered, and due to the huge sums involved (which is more than the sum total of the payout they have received to date), it has impaired their abilities to repair their lives in the future. Contact Buddy Macy by email at vegibud@gmail.com. Or call him at 973-785-0057. |
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PASSOVER AND POLLARD: AN OPEN LETTER TO BUSH, OLMERT
Posted by Justice For Jonathan Pollard, April 28, 2008. |
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This was written by Kenneth Lasson and it appeared April 25, 2008 in The Baltimore Jewish Times. Kenneth Lasson is a law professor at the University of Baltimore specializing in civil liberties and international human rights. He is a frequent contributor to the Baltimore Jewish Times. |
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Dear Mr. President and Mr. Prime Minister, I am very proud to be an American, to be Jewish, and to be a supporter of Israel. That pride is borne of the great national character reflected by both countries –– an ingrained commitment to freedom, democracy, and humanitarian values –– which in turn nourish our charitable impulses, our natural heritage, our melting-pot psyche. But it is also a requirement of good citizens everywhere to reflect upon their nations' failures, never to cease trying to correct them –– and always to understand the consequences of silence toward them. Thus must we acknowledge that the American system of justice, so genuinely principled in concept and gently noble in purpose and generally fair in practice, has failed badly in the case of Jonathan Pollard. While the former Navy intelligence officer acted wrongly in violating the law by passing classified information, the average punishment for that kind of activity is four years' imprisonment. Mr. Pollard's life sentence is so grossly disproportionate to the offense that it should shock the conscience of all fair-minded people. He is the only person in the history of the United States to receive an unlimited life sentence for passing classified information to an ally, a misdeed for which he has amply expressed remorse. He caused no actual harm to any individual or group. Were they asked their opinion, the majority of Americans would likely agree with the sentiments expressed by a federal judge in one of Mr. Pollard's appeals (all of which turned on technical procedural issues and not on substance), that the handling of his case was "a fundamental miscarriage of justice." And the government of Israel, which in the past has offered refuge to millions of people oppressed by genocidal regimes and rescued hundreds of thousands of children starved by Third World famine and sought to save other nations' victims of natural disasters, appears to have totally abandoned one of its acknowledged agents –– and not because it is unaware of his whereabouts. Pollard has been imprisoned for the past 23 years; he resides in a jail cell in North Carolina. Despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of Israeli citizens would strongly support an honest effort by their government to bring about his release, their leaders blindly ignore his plight. Even a virtually unanimous resolution by the Knesset to act on Mr. Pollard's behalf brings nothing but disingenuous platitudes. Israel has had many opportunities to press the issue with the United States –– to request, for example, that Mr. Pollard be returned to Israel in reciprocity for the many gestures made by the Jewish State at the behest of the U.S. in pursuit of its peace initiatives –– and by all accounts has failed genuinely to do so. While some might argue that for a simple citizen to tell his President or the Prime Minister of Israel the right thing to do is an act of chutzpah, those same governments have an obligation to respond to the voices of their people. Mr. Bush and Mr. Olmert, with all due respect, your silence has been deafening. In this season of redemption, it is wholly appropriate once again to make one simple entreaty: Let Jonathan Pollard go. At this, the time to celebrate freedom, the opportunity is upon you. On this Passover, do not pass over the chance to act. With this small gesture of leadership, please act now. Sincerely,
Reach Justice for Jonathan Pollard by sending an email to justice4jp@gmail.com |
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US PRESSES ISRAEL TO ALLOW HAMAS TO PREPARE TO ATTACK ISRAEL UNDISTURBED
Posted by HaDar, April 28, 2008. |
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This comes from Dr. Aaron Lerner, Director of IMRA, who writes: "US presses Israel to allow Hamas to prepare to attack Israel undisturbed" is certainly a harsh description of the situation.This is called "US presses Israel on Gaza cease-fire." It was written by Yaakov Katz and Herb Keinon , and it appeared today in The Jerusalem Post www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1208870506449&pagename= JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull |
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Pressure is picking up on Israel to reach a cease-fire deal with Hamas in the Gaza Strip ahead of US President George W. Bush's planned visit to Jerusalem in two weeks, defense officials told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday. Maj.-Gen. (res.) Amos Gilad, head of the Defense Ministry's Diplomatic-Security Bureau, has been holding intensive talks with Egypt on a proposed cease-fire in the Gaza Strip being brokered by Egyptian Intelligence Minister Omar Suleiman, according to the defense officials. There was increasing pressure from the US and Egypt to reach a deal before Bush's visit on May 14, the officials said, and Israel was making every effort to move forward with the deal, even though Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Ehud Barak had yet to formulate an official position on the matter. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is scheduled to visit Israel next week. "There is a push to wrap up the deal before Bush's visit," a top defense official told the Post Sunday. "The hope is that quiet in Gaza will enable Israel and the PA to focus on reaching a peace deal by the end of the year." Suleiman has in the meantime postponed a planned visit to Israel until the beginning of next week, after he receives a final answer from the various Palestinian factions on whether they accept the terms of the proposed cease-fire together with Hamas. Suleiman is scheduled to receive a final answer from the factions on Wednesday and will then update Israel. "Assuming the factions accept the terms, Suleiman will likely visit Israel in the beginning of next week to finalize Israel's position," the top defense official said, warning that if Israel rejected the deal it could damage relations with Egypt and be interpreted as a blow to Suleiman's prestige. While the Defense Ministry is pursuing the cease-fire talks, senior IDF officers have voiced opposition to halting military operations against Hamas in Gaza. On Sunday, two Kassam rockets struck Sderot. One scored a direct hit on a home, causing extensive damages but no injuries. One of the more dominant voices comes from OC Southern Command Maj.-Gen. Yoav Galant, who, the Post has learned, recently expressed fierce opposition to a cease-fire with Hamas, warning it would be used by the terrorist organization to rebuild its damaged infrastructure and to increase its arms smuggling under the Philadelphi Corridor from Sinai. Egyptian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hossam Zaki, who held talks in Jerusalem Sunday with Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and ministry director-general Aaron Abramovitch, said in Cairo a day earlier that Israel's "latest statements" on a cease-fire with Hamas should not be considered Israel's final word. In a statement, Zaki said that Israel "will make its position [on the proposed cease-fire with Hamas] clear following a series of closed-door meetings that will take place later." The government's position, repeated as a mantra by Olmert's spokesmen over the last week, is that Israel is not negotiating either directly or indirectly with Hamas, and that if Hamas wants a cease-fire it knows what it needs to do: stop all firing of Kassam rockets into Israel; stop terrorist attacks on Israelis anywhere; and stop the arms smuggling into the Gaza Strip. Zaki, according to the Egyptian statement, "played down Israel's initial rejection of the cease-fire as some sort of propaganda." Zaki, who is a close confidant of Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit, said, "The cease-fire that Egypt has been seeking to achieve between the Palestinian and Israeli sides requires cooperation and real desire from the two sides." A senior official in the Foreign Ministry said Abramovitch told Zaki that it was essential to prevent Hamas's buildup in Gaza, and the terrorism emanating from the Strip. The official said that Zaki's visit was a reciprocal visit to one Abramovitch paid on him a few weeks ago. Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz is expected to meet with Rice in Washington on Monday, a day before he takes part in the quarterly Israeli-American strategic dialogue. That daylong dialogue is once again expected to focus on the Iranian threat, and the ramifications of Teheran's nuclearization on the region. Mofaz will head the Israeli team, and his counterpart on the US side will be State Department Counselor Eliot Cohen, who has stepped in for Nicholas Burns, the recently retired under secretary for political affairs. Sergio Tessa can be reached at Hadar-Israel@verizon.net. |
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DOES THE US SPY ON ISRAEL TOO?
Posted by Avodah, April 28, 2008. |
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This is from the website of Carl of Jerusalem:
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Shavua tov –– a good week to everyone. For those who are wondering how an Orthodox Jew can be on the computer on what is the eighth night of Pesach (Passover) in much of the world, please go here. Does the US spy on Israel too? And why does it seem that instances of people spying on behalf of the Jewish state are a much bigger deal in America than spying on behalf of Russia or China, for example? Two Jerusalem Post columnists devoted their weekend columns to this issue in the context of Ben Ami Kadish's arrest this past week. Both Herb Keinon and Caroline Glick take it for granted that the United States spies on Israel. But the Israeli reaction to the spying is very different from the American one. For the record, both Keinon and Glick were –– like me –– born in the United States. Here's Keinon: The surprise arrest in the US this week of 84-year-old Ben-Ami Kadish for allegedly spying for Israel a generation ago highlights a fascinating little point: One never hears about the US spying on Israel. Why not? Is Washington not interested in inside info on what Israel is up to? Is the CIA, with agents spanning the globe, not keen on securing pre-knowledge of Israel's technological advances in defense and security fields? Unlikely. Rather, the more probable reason is because when US spies are uncovered here, as they surely have been over the years, it never hits the news. Yossi Alpher, a former senior Mossad officer, cited former US officials as saying that the CIA spies on Israel, just as it spies everywhere else. "But when someone is caught here, he receives a wrap on the knuckles, and is declared persona non grata," Alpher said. "The fact that you never hear that someone was tried and put in jail for spying for the US reflects a different approach on Israel's part. It is not that we are not worried about sensitive information falling into other hands, it's just that when those hands happen to be friendly ones, we deal with it differently –– unlike the US Justice Department." And Glick: As for espionage, as the late Yitzhak Rabin once noted, every few years Israel discovers another US agent committing espionage against the state. Rather than make a big deal about it, and in spite of the fact that some of the information being stolen is deeply damaging to Israel's national security, out of a sense of comity with Washington, Israel keeps the scandals quiet and generally deports the spies. So why does it create such headlines in the US when someone is arrested for spying for Israel? Does the US target Israeli spies? Both Keinon and Glick argue that it does, although Keinon places the blame with the Justice Department and Glick places it mostly with the State Department and US intelligence agencies. Here's Keinon again: Alpher, who now co-edits the Israeli-Palestinian on-line dialogue magazine bitterlemons.org –– and is most definitely not a conspiracy theorist seeing an anti-Semite lurking under every US government desk [That's an understatement. I have a subscription to Bitterlemons.org. It's a newsletter that presents two Israeli views and two 'Palestinian' views on each issue. Most of the Israelis lean left. CiJ] –– said he can't escape the conclusion that the US Justice Department is looking for Israel. "When you take this case, together with the refusal to release [Jonathan] Pollard, even when spies working for the Soviet Union and China who caused death to other agents have been released, when you take into account the AIPAC case [the 2005 arrest of two senior AIPAC staffers on espionage charges], and attempts to recruit Israelis [to spy here for the US], it seems the Justice Department is targeting Israel. I don't know why, but we are being treated pretty roughly." Alpher said it is not unheard of in the annals of espionage, both here and abroad, that when someone old and frail is caught having spied may years ago, the charges are just dropped. But not this time. "The Justice Department is targeting Israel," he said. "They have been looking for additional Americans spying for Israel for a long, long time." Indeed, one senior government official said Kadish's arrest may finally shed some light on why the US has been so adamant for so long in holding Pollard, even though other spies who have spied for hostile countries –– not friendly ones –– have been treated more leniently. I doubt that we're going to learn why Pollard is being held. Many years ago, I had a meeting with someone who was in the intelligence unit in the IDF that was 'handling' Pollard. He claimed that the issue with Pollard is not what he did but what he knows. He claimed that the Americans will never let Pollard go free because what he knows remains explosive to this day. Obviously, he couldn't tell me anything about what Pollard knows. Glick places some of the blame at the Justice Department's doorstep too, but she places most of it with the Intelligence agencies and at the State Department: Tuesday was a banner day, a proud day for Jewish conspiracy theorists in America. People like Joseph E. diGenova smiled with glee as they watched 84-year-old Ben Kadish carted into the Manhattan Federal District courthouse on charges of transferring classified information to Israel 25 years ago. He's just like Jonathan Pollard, they whooped. Another Pollard! At last, we have proof that Israel operates spy rings and SLEEPER CELLS in America! They bragged and bragged and smiled and smiled as their terrorist metaphors got wilder and wilder. Sleeper cells? You mean agents sent to a country to lay in wait for the command to attack? Well, not exactly. DiGenova made his name as the federal prosecutor who railroaded Pollard into a life sentence for crimes that generally should have netted him no more than a few years in the slammer. Obviously he has a way with words. And when he told The New York Times "sleeper cells," apparently he was referring to the FBI agents who went to sleep for 23 years and then suddenly woke up and decided to cart an old man out of his nursing home and charge him with capital crimes. ... Most Israeli commentators and unnamed government officials angrily allege that the timing of Kadish's arrest was chosen to damage Israel's relations with the US at a key moment. In two weeks President George W. Bush is scheduled to visit Israel to participate in its 60th Independence Day celebrations. It has been widely presumed that during his visit, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government will seek to secure Bush's agreement to commute Pollard's sentence and release him from prison before Bush leaves office. Kadish, it is alleged, was arrested to block any possibility that Pollard will be released. Given the vindictiveness that has marked the US intelligence community's attitude toward Pollard since his arrest, it is possible that fear of a presidential pardon did inform the decision to arrest Kadish now. And yet, it is far from clear that an agreement on Pollard's release was ever in the cards. Bush has expressed no willingness to consider Israeli appeals for his release and neither the Sharon government nor the Olmert-Livni-Barak government has made any real efforts to secure Pollard's freedom. Indeed, in a sign of their contempt for Pollard, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government has Pollard's former handler, Pensioners Affairs Minister Rafi Eitan, sitting in the security cabinet. ... Kadish was arraigned the same day that the Los Angeles Times broke the story that CIA Director Michael Hayden would be briefing Congress on Thursday about Israel's September 6 air strike in Syria. For the past six months, the administration did everything it could to prevent any information on the Israeli air strike from getting out. In the end, Hayden was compelled to inform Congress about the details of the raid after the legislature conditioned its approval of the intelligence budget on receiving a full briefing on the air strike. According to the Los Angeles Times report and subsequent stories, Hayden's testimony would acknowledge that US intelligence agencies failed to recognize the dangers of the North Korean-built plutonium reactor that Syria had constructed not far from its border with Turkey. It was Israeli, rather than American intelligence agencies that penetrated the facility, brought back video and physical evidence of its character, and then effectively destroyed it in a complicated air strike and commando raid. So according to US media reports, Hayden's testimony would demonstrate two basic truths that the Jewish conspiracy theorists in the US intelligence community and the State Department are uninterested in having the public or Congress notice: Israeli intelligence is superior to US intelligence; and the US alliance with Israel is vital to US national security. Since Israel's independence 60 years ago and especially since US-Israel strategic ties blossomed after the Six Day War, Washington has been of two minds about the Jewish state. The first, public mind is that Israel is the US's strongest and most reliable ally in the Middle East, and that the US-Israel alliance is strong because it is based on shared values as well as shared interests. The second view is that Israel is a burden. As purveyors of this view see things, Israel is the national "Fagin." It is underhanded, pushy and untrustworthy. Indeed, as far as the anti-Semites in Washington are concerned, Israel is the source of all the US's difficulties in the Arab world and even in Europe. For years, the purveyors of the second view have carried out an independent foreign policy regarding Israel that is completely at odds with the official US policy of embracing Israel as an ally. Indeed, the State Department has undermined every presidential attempt to treat Israel well since 1948. As I argued last week, both Keinon and Glick see a connection between Kadish's arrest and President Bush's impending visit to Israel for the 60th Independence Day celebration. Here's Keinon again: However, the proximity of the arrest to US President George W. Bush's visit to celebrate Israel's 60th anniversary next month does have some Israeli officials wondering whether the two events might not, indeed, be connected. "They could have waited and done this after the Bush visit," the official posited. He speculated –– and at this point it is all speculation –– that there were some in the US intelligence community who wanted to keep Bush from coming here, and either announcing the release of Pollard, something that has been whispered about for the last few months, or giving Israel too many birthday presents before he leaves office, something that had been discussed more seriously. The official pointed out that it was the same intelligence community that last year produced the National Intelligence Estimate that said Iran had ditched its nuclear weapons program in 2003 –– conclusions which Jerusalem largely viewed as politically motivated to keep Bush from taking military action against Iran. Among the "gifts" reportedly on the table and being discussed as Bush's parting gift to Israel are linking Israel to the American worldwide radar system that provides early warnings of any ballistic missile fired anywhere in the world; advanced models of the Joint Direct Attack Munition smart bombs, or JDAMs; the possibility of selling Israel the F-22 Raptor, a stealth fighter; integrating Israeli defense industries into the production of the Joint Strike Fighter; and the possibility of upgrading the US-Israel strategic alliance to include some kind of defense pact. As a result of the Kadish case, there will now be those who will ask whether these types of "goodies" should be given to a country that spies on the US. Glick argues that Israel needs to be a lot more aggressive in its relations with the US, and notes with bitter irony that Nada Prouty, who penetrated both the FBI and the CIA on Hezbullah's behalf, is likely to get off with a six-month sentence. By arresting an 84-year-old World War II veteran in an effort to place Israel under a cloud of suspicion as its military triumph in Syria is exposed to the American people, the US is sadly showing Israel once again that nice guys finish last. If Israel wants to be treated with respect by the US, the lesson of the Kadish affair, of the Syrian raid and of the Pollard affair is that Israel had better start pushing back. The first thing it should do is arrest officials suspected of transferring classified materials to the US without authorization. It should then publish the names and details of US spies whom Israel previously caught and treated with kid gloves. Then it should publicly demand that Bush release Pollard from the prison where he rots, while the likes of Hizbullah agent Nada Prouty –– who penetrated both the FBI and the CIA –– is expected to receive a six-month prison sentence for her crimes. When Bush arrives to celebrate Israel's 60th birthday, Israel's leaders would do well to show him that at 60, Israel is a grownup country. And as such, it demands to be treated with the respect due to the US's most reliable ally in the Middle East. I agree with Keinon and Glick. There is no doubt that Israeli spies are treated differently by the US –– and with disproportionate harshness –– as compared with spies for anyone else. As Glick points out, the ridiculous arrest of two AIPAC lobbyists –– which has been hanging over our heads for four years now has been used by the US to avoid Israeli demands that it do anything concrete to stop Iran. I know that some Americans are going to react with hostility to this post –– I have seen enough of that on LGF this week. I'm not advocating that Israel spy on the US. I'm advocating a uniform standard of justice for those caught spying for Israel as compared with those caught spying for other countries and entities. It's clear to me that standard does not exist. Read the whole thing.
Contact Avodah at avodah15@aol.com
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COMMANDER OF LEGENDARY SHIP EXODUS DIES AT 90
Posted by Shaul and Aviva Ceder, April 28, 2008. |
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This appeared yesterday in the Jerusalem Post
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Yossi Harel, commander of the illegal Jewish immigrant ship Exodus, immortalized in the Leon Uris novel and Otto Preminger movie, died Saturday at the age of 90. His daughter Sharon said Harel suffered cardiac arrest at his Tel Aviv home. The ill-starred voyage of the Exodus, which sought to bring thousands of European refugees to Palestine after World War II, became a potent symbol of the Jewish struggle for statehood. More than 4,500 Holocaust survivors packed the ship in 1947 when it tried to run the British blockade of Palestine, meant to severely limit the immigration of Jews. The British Navy seized the vessel off Palestine's shores in July 1947, and after a battle on board that left three people dead, turned the ship and its passengers back to Europe. The Exodus' fate later inspired a fictionalized account by Uris and a movie directed by Preminger and starring Paul Newman. In all, Harel commanded four expeditions that brought thousands of refugees to the shores of Palestine, his daughter said. "He was an extraordinary, unusual man, very brave, very modest and very lucky because he was able to touch the lives of so many people," she said. The Jerusalem-born Harel is to be buried in Kibbutz Sdot Yam on Monday, she said. The communal farm was headquarters of the naval force of the Palmach, Israel's pre-state military. "History has proven that you cannot defeat refugees," Harel was quoted as saying two decades ago by the now-defunct Israeli newspaper, Hadashot. "It starts now with one boat. After that, dozens more will come," he said.
Contact Shaul and Aviva Ceder by email at ceder@netvision.net.il
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WHY POLLARD DID IT; ANIMALS, WATER, & PROPAGANDA; REFORM JUDAISM POLITICALIZED?
Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 28, 2008. |
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JORDAN DEVELOPING Jordan is developing its armaments industry. It also is setting up a school against terrorism. It has offered to train people from other countries in the region at that school (IMRA, 4/5). How much anti-terrorist training should dictatorships have? The P.A. gets such training, but uses that training to thwart Israeli anti-terrorism. WHY POLLARD DID IT? Years ago, Jonathan Pollard explained to a rabbi why he revealed US intelligence about the Arabs to Israel. The major piece of intelligence was that the Arabs were planning to poison-gas Israelis. Contrary to agreement with Israel, the US withheld that intelligence from Israel. Pollard tried protesting through channels, but was rebuffed. If he had tried going through the media, Russia might have gotten valuable intelligence. Neither could he do nothing to save the hundreds of thousands of Jews who otherwise might get killed if he complied with US law and done nothing. He had to warn Israel, though it cost him much of his own life (IMRA, 4/5). Since the people had protection against the gas, Saddam withheld it. He did the ethical thing. It took great courage. Who of us has such courage? P.A. MEDICAL OFFICIALS VS. P.A. FARMERS A farmer was killed in Gaza near the border with Israel. P.A. medical officials said the death was from an Israeli tank shell. The victim's neighbors told Associated Press that the death was from a rocket that terrorists had fired at Israel, but which fell short (IMRA, 4/5). Jihadists reap propaganda by attributing more deaths to Israel. This would not be so if Westerners were more understanding about warfare and casualties. ROCKET WARFARE Hamas claims that it doesn't intend to kill women and children. This was contradicted by "...al-Qaida's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, who said Hamas' random rockets kill women and children in violation of Islamic law (IMRA, 4/5). What do they expect, when they fire at civilian areas? This is like the Nazi blitz of London. Some call them cowardly, but I think that they just are bloodthirsty. ELITE IN IDF & ULTRA-ORTHODOX The IDF has formed a special commando battalion of 600 Ultra-Orthodox and Orthodox men to serve in the Jordan Valley. Pleased with them, the IDF would like to set up another such battalion. It is an experiment in integrating a religious life style within military life (IMRA, 4/6). ARE THEY REALLY CONCERNED ABOUT ANIMALS? An animal rights group in Israel lost a suit against the Jewish Temple movement's planned sacrifice of a sheep in anticipation of reconstructing the fallen Temple. The complaint likened the exercise to animal fighting. The judge disagreed, because there would be one sheep, slaughtered in the humane Jewish manner. The movement is exercising freedom of religion (Arutz-7, 4/6). I think that the stated concern for animals was a pretext for an action against Judaism. It is like the movements against Jewish slaughter and circumcision. Bigots usually find high-minded principles to cite in favor of repressing Jews. WATER & PROPAGANDA Foreign water experts accuse Israel of having started the 1967 war in order to gain water sources, and a German water consultant for the P.A. accuses Israel of barring Arabs from water in the Territories for selfish reasons. Israel has completed a study that shows that Israel is using less water from natural sources. How so? It desalinates and recycles much of its water, uses less, and there is a drought. Per capita consumption is just over a third of what it was in 1967. Israeli water authorities conclude that the results disprove the accusations (IMRA, 4/6). I don't see logic to claiming that Israel didn't want territory based on improvements in water processing that had not yet occurred. Proof is first of all in the fact that the Arabs started all of Israel's wars. Second, the Territories are part of the Land of Israel, to which Israel, as heir to the Mandate, and needing security from proven aggressors, is entitled. Third, Israel was ready from the start to relinquish conquered territory, if the Arabs would make peace. The Arabs weren't ready. Fourth, if Israel wanted more water, it would have seized part of Lebanon. Fifth, when the Palestinian Arabs get their hands on aquifers, they draw them down fast, as happened twice in Gaza and is happening in Judea-Samaria. HEBRON MASSACRE INVESTIGATION Barry Chamish further reviewed the investigation into the Hebron massacre, for which Dr. Goldstein was scapegoated. Most of the military and Arab testimony, which contradicted the official theory of the incident, was rejected by Judge Shamgar. Shamgar also made up timing for events to suit his theory. (He took the same non-judicial approach later with the Rabin investigation). Some Arab witnesses indicated they were eager to dispute the official theory, but then conformed to it. There were many loose ends and discrepancies. Witnesses obviously lied. Shamgar failed to check the loose ends, discrepancies, and lies. Soldiers whose testimony implied perjury were not, themselves, put on trial. Contradictions and anomalies surround the attack on the yeshiva in Jerusalem recently. Also unexplained is the failure of police to arrive for 30-40 minutes. Chamish concludes that these events, which demean the Right and religious Jews are perpetrated or planned by the Left. He calls this "peace by murder." (Chamish, 4/7.) HURVA SYNAGOGUE TO BE REBUILT The Jordanian conquerors of the Old City in the 1940s demolished all the synagogues there. The demolition was an example of Islamic intolerance. (That's Islamic, not just Islamist.) The Hurva synagogue's arch remained. It was just decided to rebuild that synagogue (Arutz-7, 4/7). I suppose the Arabs now will complain that the decision is an attempt to judaize the city. Probably the State Dept. will second the motion. REFORM JUDAISM POLITICALIZED? Rabbi Eric Yoffie, the head of Reform Judaism in the US, criticized prominent Christian Evangelist, Pastor John Hagee, who donated $6 million to Israel and declared that letting the P.A. take over parts of Jerusalem would be like turning it over to the Taliban. Hagee's organizations eschews efforts to convert Israelis. He urged Israel to reject Evangelist support, calling Hagee an "extremist" who opposes "territorial compromise" and who has made anti-Catholic statements. Hagee denies the alleged statements (IMRA, 4/7). I didn't hear statements on Catholicism, but read Yoffie name-calling over policy. He would deny Israel valuable support because of a difference over how to solve the Arab-Israel conflict. So far, Yoffie's solution has failed. Giving strategic land to fanatical enemies makes war likelier (and gets synagogues destroyed). Richard Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. His comments and analyses appear often on Think-Israel. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at richardshulman5@aol.com |
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ALL IN A DAY'S NEWS...
Posted by Gerald A. Honigman, April 28, 2008. |
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Along with other related articles, three covering the Middle East and North Africa caught my eye on April 26th. The first was written by a journalist whom I have long admired--and I don't admire many in the mainstream media. I met Tom Teepen, now a syndicated columnist for Cox News, some three decades ago. I was visiting Cincinnati for a few days out of my Columbus office and had assorted media, university, and other visits, lectures, and televised debates scheduled. We have, on occasion, briefly touched base afterwards over the years. Tom was editorial editor, I believe, for either the Cincinnati Post or Enquire. We spent a good deal of time reviewing the Middle East. Unlike too many others in the liberal camp, Tom still has maintained clear vision when it comes to Arab-Israeli politics. The real surprise was that my local newspaper published his op-ed. After many years of batting heads with the paper brass (first on my own, then with others), I'm finally noticing a bit more balance. So, Tom's Blaming Israel, Freelancing On Hamas –– What Is Jimmy Carter Thinking? made it into the Daytona Beach News-Journal. He recapped Mr. Peanut's recent hot date with Hamas in Syria, where Carter tried his best to make the deliberate disembowelers of Jewish babes and other innocents look good by getting it to provide him with some foggy cover for his non-stop assault on Israel, but Hamas--to its credit--wouldn't let him. Headlines soon claimed, anyway, that Mr. Peanut achieved a breakthrough, with Hamas offering to 'accept' Israel. When will they learn? Tom exposed Carter's nauseating comedy act. While an allegedly 'born again' Carter evidently doesn't put much value in honesty, Hamas does. It has no –– and will never have--any intention of granting Jews in one tiny state what Arabs demand for themselves in some two dozen others on over six million square miles of territory...including one already created from almost 80% of the original 1920 borders of Mandatory Palestine renamed 'Jordan.' The new state Arabs insist on creating on the ashes of Israel, not along side it, would be their second –– not first –– in 'Palestine,' the name the Roman Emperor Hadrian gave to Judaea after the Jews' second costly revolt for freedom in 133-135 C.E. He renamed the country after the Jews' historic enemies, the Philistines--a non-Semitic sea people from around Crete. Contemporary Roman historians such as Tacitus, Dio Cassius, and others wrote extensively about this themselves. To most Arabs, the whole region is simply purely Arab patrimony...in their own words. As for the scores of millions of non-Arabs who have been conquered, massacred, and suppressed, Egypt's past Uncle Tom Copt Foreign Minister, Dr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, perhaps said it best...accept forced Arabization and /or dhimmi status (like he did) or else. Copts were the native Egyptians conquered by Arabs after the 7th century C.E. along with numerous others. As Mr. Peanut also knows, regarding the above, Hamas is no different than the alleged moderates of Abbas's latter day Fatah Arafatians –– regardless of how much whitewash he, Washington, and others throw upon them both. In order to force the Jews to play ball, a supposed Arab good cop had to be created to counter the State Department's Arab bad cop. Fatah (with as much, if not more, blood on its hands than Hamas) is simply more willing to play the Arabs' well-known destruction in phases 'diplomacy' game vis-à-vis Israel to use petrodollar greased-international pressure to force Israel back to its pre-'67, 9-mile wide, armistice line--not border--existence to set it up for a combined Arab/Iranian final blow...something that UNSC Resolution 242 expressly stated was not to happen in the aftermath of the 1967 War. But, Honigman, you say, you keep repeating these same points in many of your articles. Yes, I do. And as long as Arabs keep on repeating their lies and distortions, and morons or deliberate accomplices like Mr. Peanut do the same, those of us who care must repeatedly answer them. Their approach is if they repeat a lie often enough (and it goes unanswered), it will be accepted as truth. Teepen did a good job with his short op-ed, especially since he has been a fan of Carter in the past. But let me continue to pick up yet a bit more where he left off. With a new Presidential election approaching, I'll never forget the last televised Democratic National Convention featuring 'Apartheid Israel' Mr. Peanut chasing 'Israel is one of the top three evils in the world' Michael Moore all over the convention floor. Closer soul brothers do not exist--unless you want to throw in a more slick Obama and the company he keeps to make a trio. It was befitting that Carter visited Hamas in Syria, for Syria--not 'Palestine'--was indeed the birthplace of Hamas's patron saint, Sheikh Izzedin al-Qassam (for whom its 'militant' wing and rockets are named )...Latakia, to be exact. Of course, back then, many if not most Arabs in the area considered themselves to be southern Syrians, espousing one version or another of a Greater Syria plan. 'Palestinians' were the Jews. Along with scores (if not hundreds) of thousands of others who poured into the Palestine Mandate (after the break up of the over four century old Ottoman Turkish Empire) due to its economic development by Jews, the Sheikh joined numerous other 'native Palestinians' who entered relatively recently from the latter 19th century onwards from Syria, Egypt, and elsewhere in rejecting the rights of Jews to do the same thing in any part of the 'purely Arab patrimony,' the Dar ul-Islam. Recall that half of Israel's Jews were refugees from so-called 'Arab' and /or Muslim lands. Moving on. Article # 2, in the same paper, quoted Mahmoud Abbas complaining that, in his recent Washington visit, no one was talking about forcing Israel back to the ''67 borders.' I do admit, that was a pleasant surprise. While the State Department (and President Clinton and President Bush off and on) has tried its best to ignore 242's call for the establishment of secure and recognized borders to replace Israel's absurd 1949 armistice lines (which simply marked the point where Arab invading armies were halted upon Israel's rebirth in 1948), Israel, despite the weakness of Prime Minister Olmert and his crew, has evidently made it clear that it took President Reagan's words seriously when he stated on September 1, 1982: In the pre-1967 borders, Israel was barely 10-miles wide...the bulk of Israel's population within artillery range of hostile armies. I am not about to ask Israel to live that way again. Not only were there mostly no Arab-Israeli 'borders' back then, but the Abbas/Arab claim that Israel is setting up settlements on Palestinian land has the same amount of truth in it as does the '67 border claim. When Transjordan (army led by British officers)--created from most of the Mandate of Palestine in 1922--attacked Israel along with a half dozen other Arab states loaded with arms left over by the Allies in World War II in 1948, it seized Judea and Samaria...British imperialism's west bank (of the Jordan River) as opposed to the Trans('across')jordanian east bank. Sir Alec Kirkbride, the Brits' East Bank rep, wrote extensively about this in his A Crackle Of Thorns: Experiences In The Middle East. The Arab land grab was illegal, only two nations recognized it. Still, Transjordan renamed itself Jordan, since it now held both banks, and saw to it that no Jews could reenter lands where their ancestors had lived and owned land for thousands of years until their massacres by Arabs in the 1920s and 1930s. At the same time, huge numbers of Arabs continued to pour in...more Arab settlers setting up Arab settlements. All together, so many Arabs were recent arrivals themselves into the Palestinian Mandate that the United Nations Relief Works Agency--UNRWA--had to adjust the very definition of the word 'refugee' from its prior meaning of persons normally and traditionally resident to those who lived in the Mandate for a minimum of only two years prior to 1948 when counting those who fled the fighting Arabs started upon Israel's rebirth. Contrary to the Arabs' claim that these were 'occupied Palestinian lands,' Judea and Samaria were non-apportioned parts of the Mandate, and leading international legal authorities such as Eugene Rostow, William O'Brien, and others have stressed that these areas were open to settlement by Jew, Arab, and other residents of the Mandate alike. How could you occupy lands taken from an illegal occupier? The territory in question is indeed disputed...not occupied Arab lands a la Abbas, Hamas, and Mr. Peanut. When Israel captured Judea and Samaria in the '67 War as a result of a bad decision by Jordan to join Egypt's Nasser, Syria, and others in the Arabs' latest attempt upon its life, it came to hold territory of the Mandate officially apportioned to no one...not 'Palestinian' land. The Arabs themselves rejected a proposed 1947 partition of the remaining 25% of the Mandate left over after the creation of Transjordan in 1922. While I do not advocate Israel holding on to the entire area, certainly a reasonable territorial compromise which corrects the travesty of the '49 armistice lines--a la 242--is a must. And Judea –– land of the Jews –– must never become Judenrein again...unless Arabs are prepared to see the one-fifth of Israel itself who are Arabs –– many hostile –– get the boot as well. Such population transfers have indeed already occurred elsewhere. Consider those involving Turks, Greeks, and Bulgars, Israel's Jewish refugees from 'Arab' lands, and India and Pakistan for starters. Now, about those Jewish settlements Abbas complains about in that second article. If Jews are to return to Judea and Samaria in the context of a 242-type territorial compromise, then how and where else will this come about if not by establishing/reestablishing Jewish towns and so forth--'settlements?' Without the latter, Israel doesn't get the former. Article # 3... The News-Journal finally gave the genocide in Darfur some of the attention it deserves...large front page article with maps and big pictures. Unlike the Arab-Israeli mess, however, the perpetrators might as well have come from Mars. No where was the word Arab mentioned. After the Arabs burst out of the Arabian Peninsula in the 7th century C.E. and forcibly Arabized millions of non-Arab peoples in the process, the Sudan (Nubia, etc.) held out for quite some time. In other parts of North Africa, native Jews aligned with Imazighen ('Berbers') to resist this conquest as well. We'll revisit this a bit later. Back in the '60s, the first modern civil war broke out between the non-Muslim black African south and the Arab and Arabized (remember Dr. Boutros-Ghali's comments above?) north in the Sudan. Sudanese President Nimeiry's stated during the slaughter of over a half million blacks at this time (and over a million more ever since) that... 'the Sudan is the basis of the Arab thrust into...black Africa, the Arab civilizing mission (Arabism and Pan-Arabism in Sudanese Politics, Journal of Modern African Studies, Vol. 11, #2, 1973, pp. 177-78).' Rudyard Kipling's late 19th century poem, 'The White Man's Burden,' supposedly typifies Western colonialist and imperialist attitudes towards the Third World. If that's the case, then what does Nimeiry and the other example below, expressed in the Syrian Arab Constitution of the Ba'th, typify? '...The Arab fatherland belongs to the Arabs. They alone have the right to direct its destinies...The Arab fatherland is that part of the globe inhabited by the Arab nation which stretches from the Taurus Mountains, the Pacht-i-Kouh Mountains, the Gulf of Basra, the Arab Ocean, the Ethiopian Mountains, the Sahara, the Atlantic Ocean, and the Mediterranean Sea.' Yet, the more recent full scale outbreak of violence in the Sudan in the 21st century has an even more revealing twist. While earlier bloodshed there and elsewhere could largely be seen as modern extensions of the fourteen century-old clash between the Dar ul-Islam and the Dar al-Harb, the one in the Sudan's Darfur (as those in Arab-occupied Kurdistan and much of the rest of North Africa) is mostly about Arab racism and chauvinism...pure and simple. You know, those folks who like to scream about 'racist Zionism.' Over a thousand years earlier, this led to the overthrow of the Syrian-based Arab imperialist Umayyad Caliphate. So, in Sudan's western region of Darfur, it's Arab and Arabized versus black Africans...regardless of religion. Ditto for Arab versus Kurd, Amazigh, and so forth. These victims are mostly Muslims. In Sudan's largely non-Muslim south, it's a combination of both Arab racism and the conquest of the Dar ul-Islam--as exemplified also in the expected subjugation and dhimmitude of Egyptian Copts, Lebanon's Christians, Near Eastern Assyrians, and Israel, Jew of the Nations, and home to whom Arabs call 'their' kilab yahud... Jew dogs. An Amazigh (Berber) publisher friend ( http://www.north-of-africa.com/ ) recently sent me a video produced by the highly respected Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). Its contents http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XROAu1cTcQ8 showed a debate on Al-Alam TV (Iran) on July 21, 2007over a new Berber-Jewish Friendship League set up in Morocco. Even more recently, Morocco has outlawed the creation of an Amazigh political party...especially since it espoused good relations with Israel. Keep in mind that Morocco has had, relatively speaking and as an 'Arab' country, reasonable relations with Israel itself. Hundreds of thousands of Israeli Jews had their roots there. But the prospect of former and current fellow victims of forced Arabization getting together has implications for Arabs that even the Moroccans can't allow. Much if not most of North Africa is of Amazigh--not Arab--descent. Among other comments in that debate, the Amazigh spokesman pointed out that both Jews and Berbers predated the Arab conquest by thousands of years, fought long and hard against that conquest, and want nothing to do with Arab identity and forced Arabization. Keeping in mind that in modern times many Berbers have already been killed by Arabs for less, very brave words indeed. To sum things up, those three news articles on April 26th were loaded with important material. The problem is that, without further extensive explanation such as what I've attempted here, the issues are too complex for many readers to grasp. Having said this, journalists and folks like ex-Presidents shoulder huge responsibilities and should therefore dig much deeper before commenting and pontificating a la Carter on such issues. By the way, when's the last time anyone heard Carter comment on any of the above non-Arab civil, political, and humanitarian issues? If they don't involve Arabs, he doesn't want to know. And a look at the contributors to his library and such may explain at least some of Mr. Peanut's Arab-colored vision. Gerald A. Honigman, a Florida educator, has created and conducted counter-Arab propaganda programs for college youth, has lectured on numerous campuses and other platforms, and has publicly debated Arab spokesmen. His articles and op-eds have been published in both the print media and on websites. Contact him at honigman6@msn.com or go to his website: http://geraldahonigman.com/blog.php |
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IN MEMORY OF THE HERO; DELUSIONAL IN POWER ; JNF, WHOSE LAND IS IT?; DUPLICITY OF OCCUPIED LANDS
Posted by Steven Shamrak, April 28, 2008. |
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Gloom of the Next War. 1. Iran has, openly and bluntly, threaten to destroy Israel and actively pursues development of nuclear weapon. In Memory of the Hero: Yossi Harel the ship commander, whose attempt to bring Holocaust survivors to Palestine aboard the "Exodus" 1947 built support for Israel's founding, died on Saturday. Olmert in Need of Intensive Psychiatric Care. At the same time when CIA officials tell US Congress that North Korea had been helping Syria build a plutonium-based nuclear reactor, which Israel destroyed last September, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert gave the 'life line' to Syria by his decision to put the Golan Heights, Jewish land, on the negotiating table in exchange for a 'promise' of peace with Syria. Even Kadima members in Knesset, rebelled against this stupidity and treachery. Only two years ago Olmert said: "As long as I serve as prime minister, the Golan Heights will remain in our hands because it is an integral part of the State of Israel." (It is time to resign and find a good psychiatrist!) Another Delusional in Power. American President George W. Bush welcomed PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas as "a man of peace." President Bush added: Abbas is "a man of vision," "He rejects the idea of using violence to achieve objectives." Food for Thought. by Steven Shamrak Why must Israel provide health care to the enemy population, which supports bombing of Jews with rockets and destruction of Israel? Why must Israel open her borders and give them job? Most countries, even Muslim ones, don't! Leadership of so-called Palestinians has been using the international aid to buy rockets and bullets. So why Israel must care about terror-infested mob! JNF, Whose Land is it? The Jewish National Fund (JNF) owns 2,250 dunams of land in Gaza that is being illegally squatted upon by so-called Palestinians –– with Jews forbidden to live on it. The JNF purchased the land in the 1940s, with money donated by Jews worldwide seeking to redeem the Land of Israel for a Jewish national home. The JNF also has 53,000 dunams of land in Syria, which was purchased in the 30s. (Why is JNF silent about Jews land? The organization betrays the memory and trust of Jews who paid to secure future of Jewish people on Jewish ancestral land!) Quote of the Week: "America did not want Israel to go and fight the Six-Day War. America did not want Israel to go and bomb the nuclear reactor in Iraq... I respect the United States a lot, but I expect that kind of respect back... People who respect themselves, get the kind of respect they deserve from others." –– Moshe Feiglin, the head of the Jewish Leadership faction within the Likud party. Please, Call Exterminators. Over sixty-five percent of Arabs in Gaza support continued suicide bombings against Israeli civilians. Nearly 50 percent of Gaza's civilians feel that launching rockets at Israeli civilians is a "useful" means of terrorism. Meanwhile, Israel is allowing the transfer of hundreds of truckloads of food and supplies per week into Gaza. (When a house is infested with termites or rats, exterminators are called. The same approach must be applied to terror-infested population. Enemy must be resolutely removed from Jewish land!) Delusional and Jew-hating Bigots Who Rule the World. Former US President Jimmy Carter failed in his self-appointed mission to seek information about Ehud Goldwasser, Eldad Regev and Gilad Shalit. Carter claimed that Hamas is willing to be Israel's neighbour even after Hamas boss in Damascus, Khaled Mashaal, refused Carter's request to halt the rocket fire on Israel for a month, without preconditions, to gain some international goodwill. (Hamas has immediately issued denial of any intention to recognise Israel!) Duplicity of Occupied Lands. There are many lands around the world that have been occupied not so long ago by other countries. Many of them are still subjugated to the rule of an occupying power. They were conquered during offensive or defensive wars, throughout the process of establishment of statehood or as a part of colonial and imperial policy. The following is a far from complete list of the currently occupied lands: Great Britain still occupies 17 provinces of Ireland, Gibraltar and is holding on to the many residual symbols of her former colonial glory around the world. France is still holding on to many overseas territories like New Caledonia and French Guinea. France and Spain divided and have no intention to give independence to the Basque people, the oldest indigenous living group known in Europe. China –– The international community has done nothing to stop occupation of Tibet by China. Eastern, predominantly Muslim, provinces of China are still under 'imperial' communist rule. Chile –– From the 1840s, heavy Anglo-Chilean investments were made in nitrate mining on the Bolivian coast. Bolivia lost its coastal region after the war of 1879-1884. Since then, Bolivia has been economically stifled by Chile with limited access to the sea ports. Panama proclaimed its independence after the US expressed interest in obtaining the rights to the canal, which Colombia refused. US marines landed in Panama the same day when independence was declared. Russia has no plans to return the eastern part of Poland it has occupied since before WW2 and end occupation of eastern Prussia, the Kuril Islands and Southern Sakhalin. Russia still retains its status as an imperial power by holding on to Chechnya, Dagistan, North Ossetia, Tatarstan and many other national enclaves which were occupied by Tsar. USA –– The biggest and leading democracy of the world is one of the biggest occupiers as well. There is no intention of even talking about compensation for, never mind returning, the occupied land which used to be, not long ago, a part of Mexico. What about Puerto Rico, Hawaii and other 'strategic interests'? The United Nations maintains a list of territories that do not govern themselves. The list was initially prepared in 1946 and adopted in 1986. It has officially endorsed control of these lands by their former colonial powers! It should be remembered that most countries around the world (including USA, UK, France, Germany, China and Russia) were forged and established their current borders during the last 300 years. Their creation was accompanied by dramatic conquests and destruction of unique and independent cultures. In a Russian play one character asked the audience: "Look, who are the judges?" Yes, who are they to tell Jews what is their land and to force Israel to give away Jewish land to Arab scoundrels? Israel is the only country that can claim its statehood and ownership of the land. Jewish people have over 3,000 years of spiritual and historical connection with the land. Israel is the only state, which withdrew from the Sinai Peninsula after it was conquered during a defensive war. In exchange, Israel received the worthless piece of paper, which is called the Peace Agreement with Egypt. And yet, Israel is the only country under international pressure to surrender her own land to the enemy, a recently forged people –– called Palestinians, whose only goal, they are not even hiding it, is to destroy the Jewish state. There are three reasons why Israel is under such an international onslaught –– Traditional international anti-Semitism, a desire to sell out Israel in exchange for a steady supply of oil, and an appeasement of Islamic terrorists in order to defer attacks on the West! Does it make sense? What definitely takes place and make sense is that the world's economic and political powers ("Puppet Masters") apply pressure on Israel and use any means at their disposal, including manipulation of international law. An example of this is how it was done after Israel won the War of Independence. Immediately the Fourth Geneva convention ruled out population transfer as a legitimate way of resolving conflicts –– but only when it suits their economic and political interests, with complete disregard to historical, spiritual and even legal rights of any people, not just Jews (remember ongoing dismantling of Yugoslavia and non-existence of Kurdistan –– the homeland of 35 million Kurds, divided and occupied by five countries). The multitude of international organizations –– including the UN, IRC, Amnesty International etc –– are at full disposal of the international "Puppet Masters" and only too eager to assist by generating and manipulating public opinion –– creating the illusion of propriety. The bottom line: it is all about power, control and beyond doubt money! Contact Steven Shamrak at stevenshamrak@gmail.com and visit his website at www.shamrak.com. |
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DAYENU
Posted by Evelyn Hayes, April 28, 2008. |
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Shocking "Pesach Pogrom" by IDF against young Jewish family guided by rich liberal apartheid supporting jihadists, stifling the voices and votes of the democratic law abiding middle class. If they would have offered peace and pieces of the 22% left after the unilateral divide by the British Guardians of the Balfour Mandate for the Jews of Eretz Yisrael to terrorists it would have been too much. If they would have offered peace and pieces and suicide bombers replaced Intifada I with Suicide-fodder II it would have been too much. If they offered good will gestures of releasing Jihad murderers and they still do bad will and murder, it would have been too much. If they enlist terrorists into the PA Authority and they shoot and kill Jews, it would have been too much. If they arm the enemy, the suicide hate-mongers and Jew Killers and give them 2,000,000 bullets, military vehicles and night vision glasses it would have been too much. If almost 2,000 Jews are murdered by Oslo "dip-lunatics" who take the position of their enemies after "after is a deadly end", it would have been too much. If the Jews were evicted from Gush Katif and they burned the Magen David Synagogue and more imported terrorists occupy Gaza and shoot thousands of rockets at the Jews of Sderot , Yad Mordechai and Ashkelon, it would have been too much. If they shattered the dream of Jewish survival after the Holocaust, it is too much.
If they imprison security guards who save Jewish lives and take the guns away from trained IDF soldiers and pardon murderers, Jihadists with blood on their hands and in their minds and give weapons for mass murder of Jews to the Fatah and Hamas, Iranian supported genociders, it is much too much. If they destroy Jewish owned and occupied homes to please anti-Semites any day it is too much but Erev Pesach it is being the slave drivers and not the freed from Egypt slaves. The Jewish identity crisis is not just a lost identity, it is taking on the identity of the abusers and abusing our Jewish survivors.
Stop this "diplunacy" and save Israel. Release our patriots the Halamish brothers. Oslo has unleashed a plague of world "the rich liberal apartheid" stifling the voices of truth and opposition and anti-Semistism and it is getting worse because Israel abuses its protectors and patriots and gives license to unsettling hate, lawlessness, lies, stealing, murder, genocide. Release our patriots the Halamish brothers. It is much too much. Evelyn Hayes Pidion Shvuim Alert:
We are sorry to interrupt your Passover holiday but we turn to you with very disturbing news of how the Israeli army has been violating the religious and human rights of Jews in Judea and Samaria. On the eve of Passover, the army sent troops to throw out a Jewish family with five young children and a pregnant mother from their home in the community of Negohot in southern Judea. Imagine you and your family are preparing for the Passover Seder and the Sabbath as Israeli soldiers, equipped with American weapons, American vehicles and even American-made uniforms throw you out from your home, throw out all your prepared food and pots, turn off your gas and electricity and throw out your refrigerator, cooker and oven just hours before the festival. The crime of the family is not clear other than they entered into a new home built on their property in an established community approved and financed by the government. But these are difficult times when the government of Israel has to prove to the United States the commitment by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to destroy Jewish life through out Judea and Samaria and parts of Jerusalem. As those who serve and whose children serve in the army, we recognize the need for the defense of country and homeland but what is happening increasingly and the Israeli army is being used against Jews and to defend our enemies. We ask you to telephone your protest to the Israeli embassy in Washington and to raise this issue with your member of congress. Call the Israel embassy [telephone 202-364-5500] and ask to speak to the military attache. Stress that you are an American citizen whose support for the Israeli military is based on its protection of Jews. Say that you also plan to discuss this case with your member of Congress who decides on U.S. military aid to Israel. The Olmert government, with an approval rating of near zero, has refused any accountability to the Israeli people and fears only the Bush administration. Unless we act now, there will be many more young Jews in jail. The Jewish holiday of Passover is about redemption. Let's work to redeem our fellow Jews. With Love of Israel,
Evelyn Hayes is author of "The Eleventh Plague, Twins, because their hearts were softened to accept the unacceptable" and "The Twelfth Plague, Generations, because the lion wears stripes." Contact her at haze@rcn.com. |
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SELECTIVE OUTRAGE ON HUMAN RIGHTS
Posted by David Meir-Levi, April 27, 2008. |
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Sh'lom Y'all, Joel Brinkley deserves Kudos and letters of thanks for getting it right about the UN and its hypocrisy regarding Israel. Mr. Brinkley does not delve in to the reason for the UN's perverse and irrational focus on Israel, and for its endless litany of lies and distortions and decontextualizations which underlie its endless anti-Israel resolutions, while it ignores bona fide violations of human rights in many Arab and Muslim countries, Sudan, Somalia, Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea, China (to name a few). Y'all may recall my essays of some years back, in which I demonstrate that the UN was hijacked by the Arab bloc in 1973. Between the Arab bloc, the USSR, the Asian Muslim nations bloc, and the Black African nations bloc, the Arab oil-mega-wealthy wheelers-and-dealers at the UN could muster enough support in the General Assembly to rubber stamp any and every anti-Israel resolution that the Arab propaganda-warriors could invent. The USA could veto Chapter VII resolutions in the Security Council, but Chapter VI resolutions could be easily moved through the General Assembly with unveto-able majorities. The first undeniable manifestation of the successful hijacking of the UN was Arafat's speech on Nov. 11, 1973. The UN willingly and enthusiastically violated the rules of its own charter by permitting him, a self-proclaimed terrorist and mass murderer with no legitimate status as representative of any sovereign state, to speak before the General Assembly in his military fatigues with what looked like a pistol in his holster (actually it was a pipe). Since then the Arab bloc has turned the UN General Assembly in to its own private sand box/play ground for anti-Israel and anti-American and anti-West resolutions and proclamations, and for pro-Palestinian and pro-Terrorist and pro-Muslim resolutions and proclamations. And that is what is happening now. The old Human Rights committee, co-chaired for years by Libya and Syria (remember my description of the "black slave" –– al-"abd al-'aswad? that's a Syrian invention –– we never hear about that, but we hear plenty of complaints about abu Ghuraib!) was so egregious in its hypocrisy that even supportive UN members had to agree to have it replaced by a new committee which would clean house, so to speak, and start focusing on real human riots violations (Sudan being the first and foremost and most urgent...where by now almost 3,000,000 black africans have been slaughtered by Arab sudanese –– now that's genocide!). But no...as Mr. Brinkley informs us...it is very much business as usual at the UN. So write him a note to congratulate him on his eye-opening and tragically very accurate article. Joel Brinkley is a professor of journalism at Stanford University and a
former New York Times foreign policy correspondent. E-mail him at
insight@sfchronicle.com.
His article
appeared today in San Francisco Chronicle
David Meir-Levi |
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The world's foremost human rights organization has ordered its envoys to begin investigating people or groups around the world who abuse freedom of speech by violating certain "moral" standards. The envoys would rely on individual governments to define morality in their own states. Imagine what would happen if Washington, London, New Delhi –– even Moscow –– tried to pass laws forbidding public discussion of "moral" issues like religion, alcohol or sex. What organization is setting up this absurd investigation? The United Nations Several years ago, the United Nations found itself embarrassed by its Human Rights Commission because of its unremitting attacks on Israel and light regard for other human rights malefactors. It "cast a shadow on the United Nations system as a whole," then-Secretary-General Kofi Anan lamented at the time. In 2006, the United Nations abolished the commission and replaced it with the Human Rights Council, charging the new group with reform. During a quarterly meeting three weeks ago, this new "reform" council passed the resolution ordering its envoys, or "rapporteurs," to set off on the feckless investigation intended to repress freedom of expression. Not surprisingly, that prompted a torrent of complaint. As an example, the World Association of Newspapers called the council's action "intolerable" and "part of a dangerous, backward campaign." But a close look at the new Human Rights Council shows that its effort to suppress freedom of speech may be the least of its failings. The council works by sending envoys to world trouble spots. These people are supposed to bring back reports for council consideration. Its choice of nations for study offers a clear picture of its priorities. Last year, it decided that neither Cuba nor Belarus had human rights records worthy of interest. At the meeting just ended, the council ruled that the Congo deserved no further attention. An article in the current issue of Foreign Affairs magazine notes that "Congo is now the stage for the largest humanitarian disaster in the world –– far larger than in Sudan." Might that crisis engender a human rights concern or two? Speaking of Sudan, I would hope the council considers genocide a genuine human rights problem. It does have an envoy working there, Sima Samar. At the recent meeting, she told the council that "technical assistance by the international community is needed in Sudan." Good work! That set off an interesting discussion. The Malaysian representative said he "welcomed the progress achieved by the government of Sudan in improving legislation and the rule of law." Saudi Arabia praised Sudan "for the positive steps it has taken to improve the situation in the country." China's representative, too, heaped warm words on Sudan for recent "positive developments." We can hope he wasn't referring to the scorched-earth campaign under way in Darfur as he spoke. Sudanese military aircraft bombed clusters of villages and, in coordinated ground attacks, looted and burned homes. Hundreds of people were killed; tens of thousands fled to Chad. The United Arab Emirates representative congratulated Sudan for "making great efforts to resolve the Darfur conflict." If Sudan is not worthy of a serious human rights inquiry, then who is? Israel, of course. On its founding two years ago, the council declared that scrutiny of "human rights abuses by Israel" would be a "permanent feature" of every council session. But what of Palestinian rocket attacks and suicide bombings? Not interested. Since then, all but three of its 16 condemnations have been directed at Israel. The United States ceaselessly criticized the old Human Rights Commission for its "pathological obsession with Israel," as Alejandro Wolff, a U.S. representative to the United Nations, put it. Perhaps to assuage those concerns, the new council fired its permanent envoy for Israel, John Dugard. He had repeatedly compared Israel to South Africa's apartheid regime. In his place, at the meeting just ended, the council appointed Richard Falk, a retired professor of law at Princeton University. He is infamous for his penchant to equate Israel's treatment of Palestinians with Nazi Germany's treatment of Jews. Falk's views should play well in the council chambers. Discussion there seems to be dominated by Arab states and their sympathizers, including Cuba, Angola, Pakistan. The Arabs were the ones, after all, who persuaded the council to enact that detestable resolution to restrict freedom of speech. Arab states argued that the world too often disparages Islam –– equating the religion with terrorism. Rather than finding ways to discourage their citizens from strapping on suicide bombs, the Arab states want to prosecute people for talking about the problem. The United Nations wisely shut down the first Human Rights Commission. It's time to abolish this one, too. David Meir-Levi is an American-born Israeli, currently living in Palo Alto. His expertise is in Near Eastern studies and the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. He is Director of Peace and Education at Israel Peace Initiative (www.ipi-usa.org). Contact him at david_meirlevi@hotmail.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: ISRAEL AND IRAN
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 28, 2008. |
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This evening the Israel Law Center, Shurat HaDin, sponsored a talk by Brig. Gen. Yossi Kupervasser, former head of Military Intelligence, on the subject, "Does Israel have a Response to the Iranian Nuclear Threat?" The topic of his talk not withstanding, the General was quick to say that this should not be considered an Israeli problem, but rather a Western problem. Nor is the threat "simply" Iran, but rather the radical Islamic movement, with Iran at its fore, and its goal of changing the world order. The Iranian regime is confident that it will succeed in its goal of achieving nuclear weapons because the West's threats to date have been empty. One red line after another has been crossed by Iran over the last few years and there have been no repercussions. Pressure via the international community is not possible because Russia and China, on the Security Council, have not been cooperative. This is because they are not entirely unhappy with Iran's progress, as each has a desire to upset the current world order in its own way. ~~~~~~~~~~ What is frequently ignored is that Iran has been doing R&D on its nuclear weapons program for some 15 years. There is currently some disagreement as to precisely how far Iran has come to date, but what is clear is that the window of opportunity for responding is closing –– there is perhaps a year remaining before Iran has nuclear capability, perhaps two years. The Iranians are prepared to endure hardship for the sake of their long term goals. Deterrence will work with them only if they believe that continuing with their nuclear development will endanger the Islamic revolution. Any pressure placed on Iran must be backed up with a convincing threat of military action. As to that action, should it be necessary, far better that the US should take it. Should this not be the case, Israel is capable of military action that will set back Iran's nuclear program for perhaps five years. (General Kupervasser suggests that the memory of what Israel did might well remain for far longer than five years and act as a deterrence to rebuilding.) The military action would be difficult for Israel because multiple sites are involved, but it would be doable. The General, of course, was not at liberty to speak about how this would be done, nor would he address actions that might be taken by Israel should Iran go nuclear before that military operation was put into place. (He has genuine concern about delays that might end up bringing us to that point –– in essence action should have been taken yesterday.) ~~~~~~~~~~ Coincidentally, Haaretz reports just today on a statement by Commander of the Israel Air Force, Major General Eliezer Shkedi, who said in a television interview that "in Nazi Germany, people didn't believe that Hitler meant what he was saying. I suggest that we refrain from repeating that line of reasoning and prepare ourselves for anything." According to Haaretz, Shkedi, who is soon to retire from his position, spent much of his service "dedicated to the preparation for a possible mission that was never discussed in public: an Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear facilities, should international economic sanctions prove to be fruitless." ~~~~~~~~~~ Looking back over the past week, we see the following, which merits at least passing mention: Talk of a "truce" (technically a hudna) in Gaza. First it came from Carter, when he met with Hamas officials, and then from the Egyptians, who were speaking about a six-month lull. The big breakthrough was ostensibly that Hamas was willing to have this hudna just in Gaza, with hopes that it would eventually extend to Judea and Samaria as well, but with no demand that it be inclusive from the start. No point in revisiting all of the details or statements, because in the end it is not sincere on the part of Hamas and (presumably) it is not going to happen. Yesterday Mashaal told al-Jazzeera that there might be a ceasefire but that: "It is a tactic in conducting the struggle. ... It is normal for any resistance that operates in its people's interest ... to sometimes escalate, other times retreat a bit...the battle is to be run this way and Hamas is known for that. In 2003, there was a cease-fire and then the operations were resumed." That, to a tee, is the description of a hudna –– an official lull that allows Arabs to regroup and strengthen towards the time of renewing "the struggle." We must hope that Israeli officials do understand this. Hamas, which is hurting, is seeking a lifting of the blockade of Gaza in exchange for the ceasefire, but at a minimum would have to get other groups such as Islamic Jihad on board. ~~~~~~~~~~ It made big news this past week when it was revealed that Olmert –– using the Turks as a go-between –– allegedly made an offer to Syria to return the Golan Heights in exchange for peace. That it came just when the details about Syria's nuclear reactor were being made public seemed to many as more than a little strange. There are claims that the connection in timing was not incidental –– that there was some intention on Olmert's part to allow Syria to salvage some dignity at a time of embarrassment, so that it would not overreact precipitously. (I am not sanctioning such an approach –– merely reporting on it.) At any rate, this will in the end also be talk that comes to nothing. For what was not emphasized in most media reports about Israel's willingness to give up the Golan was what was expected in return –– cessation of assistance to Hezbollah, a break with Iran, throwing Mashaal of Hamas out of the country, etc. This is simply not about to happen. In a statement to the Qatari paper Al Watan, today, Assad said that the time has not come for direct talks between Syria and Israel. ~~~~~~~~~~ The Golan is not only a significant strategic asset to Israel because of its height, it is also a much loved and strikingly beautiful area where vineyards thrive and recreational facilities have been established. Not insignificantly, it is the watershed for a good deal of Israel's water. Considered by Israeli law to be fully a part of modern Israel (civic and not military law applies), it is a region that according to Jewish law was also part of the ancient land of Israel (religious laws of the land, such as shmitah, apply here). Most Israelis are much opposed to surrendering this area and a measure is being brought to the Knesset that would require approval within a national referendum before the Golan could be relinquished. ~~~~~~~~~~ At the beginning of Pesach, three disguised vehicles, carrying a considerable volume of explosives, was driven towards the Keren Shalom crossing between Israel and Gaza and detonated. Thirteen IDF troops were wounded. Keren Shalom is a crossing through which humanitarian supplies are driven. This is one of a series of events in which terrorists attempt to do damage to the very facilities that make life more bearable for the people of Gaza. To many this is simply incomprehensible, but that's because we're not thinking like terrorists. The guess in most quarters is that the terrorists believe it is better that the people suffer than that Israel look good for helping. In fact, suffering Gazans makes great PR. In the case of Keren Shalom, 200 trucks laden with humanitarian supplies are permitted by Israel to enter Gaza each week. According to Maj. Gen. Yoav Galant, head of the Southern Command, "Hamas is exploiting the compassion and generosity of the State of Israel by targeting humanitarian crossings. This is a deliberate attack against aiding the Palestinian population." There is a further speculation that humanitarian compassion demonstrated by Israel is perceived by the terrorists as a sign of our weakness. ~~~~~~~~~~ A similar action took place just today, when Hamas gunmen inside of Gaza attacked trucks on their way to Nahal Oz in Israel in order to receive fuel. The trucks, which had to turn back, were scheduled to bring fuel to UNRWA and to hospitals in Gaza. ~~~~~~~~~~ While on Friday, Shimon Mizrachi and Eli Wasserman, two Israeli security guards at the Nitzane Shalom Industrial Zone, were shot dead by a Palestinian terrorist coming out of nearby Tulkarm. The complex houses nine factories that provide jobs to Palestinians. Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah's Al-Aksa Martyrs Brigades all claimed responsibility. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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SAGAMORI ON "PALESTINIANS"
Posted by Yuval Zaliouk, April 27, 2008. |
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Dear friends, On too many occasions these days you hear the name "Palestine" as if such a country exists. Arabs in Judea Samaria and Gaza are called "Palestinians" as if such a nation has existed for centuries. All my efforts to find on the map a place called "Palestine" (except of course on Arab "Palestinian" maps) have failed. The mere fact that Arabs in Judea Samaria and Gaza decided in 1964 to call themselves "Palestinian," does not make them a nation. Ignorance, stupidity, chutzpa, or malice are the reasons behind those who dare distort history to such an egregious degree. Here is a reprint of a poignant article on the subject by the inimitable Yashiko Sagamori See what you think. |
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"A View Of The Palestinians"
If you are so sure that "Palestine, the country, goes back through most of recorded history", I expect you to be able to answer a few basic questions about that country of Palestine: When was it founded and by whom? What were its borders? What was its capital? What were its major cities? What constituted the basis of its economy? What was its form of government? Can you name at least one Palestinian leader before Arafat? Was Palestine ever recognized by a country whose existence, at that time or now, leaves no room for interpretation? What was the language of the country of Palestine? What was the prevalent religion of the country of Palestine? What was the name of its currency? Choose any date in history and tell what was the approximate exchange rate of the Palestinian monetary unit against the US dollar, German mark, GB pound, Japanese yen, or Chinese Yuan on that date. And, finally, since there is no such country today, what caused its demise and when did it occur? You are lamenting the "low sinking" of a "once proud" nation. Please tell me, when exactly was that "nation" proud and what was it so proud of? And here is the least sarcastic question of all: If the people you mistakenly call "Palestinians" are anything but generic Arabs collected from all over –– or thrown out of –– the Arab world, if they really have a genuine ethnic identity that gives them right for self-determination, why did they never try to become independent until Arabs suffered their devastating defeat in the Six Day War? I hope you avoid the temptation to trace the modern day "Palestinians" to the Biblical Philistines: substituting etymology for history won't work here. The truth should be obvious to everyone who wants to know it. Arab countries have never abandoned the dream of destroying Israel; they still cherish it today. Having time and again failed to achieve their evil goal with military means, they decided to fight Israel by proxy. For that purpose, they created a terrorist organization, cynically called it "the Palestinian people" and installed it in Gaza, Judea, and Samaria. How else can you explain the refusal by Jordan and Egypt to unconditionally accept back the "West Bank" and Gaza, respectively? The fact is, Arabs populating Gaza, Judea, and Samaria have much less claim to nationhood than that Indian tribe that successfully emerged in Connecticut with the purpose of starting a tax-exempt casino: at least that tribe had a constructive goal that motivated them. The so called "Palestinians" have only one motivation: the destruction of Israel, and in my book that is not sufficient to consider them a nation" –– or anything else except what they really are: a terrorist organization that will one day be dismantled. In fact, there is only one way to achieve peace in the Middle East. Arab countries must acknowledge and accept their defeat in their war against Israel and, as the losing side should, pay Israel reparations for the more than 50 years of devastation they have visited on it. The most appropriate form of such reparations would be the removal of their terrorist organization from the land of Israel and accepting Israel's ancient sovereignty over Gaza, Judea, and Samaria. That will mark the end of the Palestinian people. What are you saying again was its beginning? You are absolutely correct in your understanding of the "Palestinians" murderous motives. I am afraid however that you, along with 99% of the population of this planet have missed the beginning of WWIII (the enemy call it Jihad) quite a few years ago. The siege of the US embassy in Tehran in 1979, an event to which the latest Nobel Peace Prize winner had somiserably failed to respond, can be very well used as the day WWIII stepped out of the pages of the Koran and into the current events. I pray the United States and Israel lead the world to victory in this war. Come to think of it, there is no choice, be you a Christian, or even, believe it or not, a Muslim. Yuval Zaliouk writes the Truth Provider columns. To subscribe, send an email to ynz@netvision.net.il |
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SHAKIRA POLITICKING UNDER THE GUISE OF SPOKESPERSON FOR YOUTH ADVOCACY GROUP
Posted by Carrie Devorah, April 27, 2008. | |
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Media was called to cover a press conference on youth and education (as per Press Release.) Unexpected was how a global youth advocacy group could use congressional time and money to advocate for "palestine." Of immediate note upon entering the room was the young man pic left wearing the kafiyah, holding it on his shoulders, it being the accepted symbol for "palestine/supporters." Two youth were invited to speak –– the young woman and a young man. The young woman, in listing the countries represented listed few countries –– one of which was PALESTINE as she said and gestured when speaking. Much later I was told Shakira will not perform in Israel. Her father is or has family connections in Lebanon. Shakira was a guest of Nita Lowey D-NY and Gene Sperling, former Clinton staffer and currently serving on Council of Foreign Relations, also affiliated with Angelina Jolie, unabashed in her affiliations with similar groups. Of concern is the fact congressional reps are advocating global programs to benefit one side of a political divide. Should a congressional person or congressional real estate be used to advocate against Israel? My guess is C-span covered the whole of the event.
Carrie Devorah is a Washington DC-based photographer. Contact her at editor@carrieon.com |
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166 EDUCATIONAL WEBSITES ABOUT THE HOLOCAUST
Posted by Jacob Richman, April 27, 2008. |
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Shalom. Holocaust Remembrance Day is Thursday, May 1, 2008. I posted on my website 166 links to learn about the Holocaust. Site languages include English, Hebrew, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish. All 166 links have been reviewed / checked this week. The web address is: http://www.jr.co.il/hotsites/j-holoc.htm The top of the page should display the 2008 date. If the page has an older date, hold the control key and press the F5 key to refresh your browser with the updated page. Please forward this message to relatives and friends, so they can benefit from these educational resources. We must not forget. Contact Jacob Richam by email at jrichman@jr.co.il |
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60 YEARS ON THE MAP
Posted by Gerald M. Steinberg, April 26, 2008. |
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This is due to be published in the next few days in the Jerusalem Post. |
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Israel's major accomplishment in 60 years of independence is surviving –– staying on the map as a sovereign state, with equal status among the nations of the world. The many economic and cultural achievements have helped to contribute to this survival, and the desire for peace with our neighbors remains unfulfilled, but the triumph is that we are here. The primary goal of Zionism was and remains the re-establishment of sovereignty and self-determination for the Jewish people in our homeland. In addition to fulfilling the 2000 year old desire to return to Eretz Yisrael, the history of persecution (particularly in Christian Europe), expulsions, and pogroms culminating in the Holocaust demonstrated the dangers of dependence on others. In the modern world, the Jewish people could only survive, both physically and culturally, by regaining and maintaining national independence, equal to the Christian nations of Europe, the Moslem nations of the Middle East, and the others across the globe. The alternative was to disappear from the stage, along with the richness of the Hebrew language, and the heritage of 4000 years of Jewish history and tradition. 60 years ago, as the British prepared to leave and the Arab armies planned their invasion, most observers and policy makers predicted disaster for the nascent Jewish state. Arab leaders, such as Azzam Pasha, who was the Secretary-General of the Arab League, boasted: "This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades." American and European military officials and diplomats looked at the apparently overwhelming Arab advantages in weapons, population size and territory, and urged the Jews not to declare independence. Against these predictions, the tenacity and motivation of Israelis, aided by the intense identification and support from the Diaspora, have ensured the independence of the Jewish state. For the Arab and Moslem "rejectionists" (including the Iranians, who are claiming leadership of this group), the idea of Jewish sovereignty in the "Moslem Middle East" was and remains unacceptable. This fundamental conflict, and not differences over borders, post-1967 settlements and occupation, is the core of the conflict and has led to the wars of aggression and mass terror attacks against Israel. This rejectionism is often expressed through proposals for the "one state solution", the nullification of the Jewish symbols of the Israeli state (including the calendar and flag), and the demand that millions of Arabs who claim refugee status from 1948 have a "right of return", and thereby create an Arab majority. Similarly, the attempt to deny the 4000 year history of Jewish Jerusalem, as expressed in Palestinian textbooks, and by Yasir Arafat at the Camp David summit with President Clinton in 2000, also reflects this effort reverse Israel's status as an independent Jewish state. The campaigns in Western Europe and elsewhere that use labels such as "apartheid" and "racist" in reference to Israel and Zionism, and the strategy of boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS) are part of the efforts to deny the legitimacy of Jewish sovereignty. The same is true for the blanket condemnations of Israeli responses to terror attacks and the attempt to deny Israel the right to self-defense that is enjoyed by all other sovereign and independent nations. Similarly, the false claims of "war crimes" and "collective punishment" are used constantly to demonize Israel in the United Nations and by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that exploit the rhetoric of morality to demonize Israel. This was also the main objective of the infamous 2001 Durban Conference, and the planned 2009 Review Conference, to be led by Iran, Libya and Cuba. The delegitimation and demonization of Zionism, and the singling out of Israel for special treatment, while erasing the context of Palestinian terrorism and other violent attacks, have become the modern form of antisemitism. In many examples, particularly among some of the leaders of the boycotts in British churches and universities, the themes of classical Christian anti-Semitism, including blood libels, have been revived as part of the intense anti-Israel propaganda. The few outspoken Jewish academics who confront this form of racism are themselves subject to antisemitic attacks. In the face of this intense and ongoing hostility, Israel's ability not only to survive, but to thrive, is the main story marking 60 years of independence. With 6 million Jewish citizens of Israel, ten times the population in 1948, the Hebrew language has been reinvigorated, and the Jewish culture has been preserved. At the same time, progress towards the acceptance of Jewish sovereignty equality among the nations of the world is painfully slow, and the struggle has been and will continue to be exhausting. But there are no better choices –– without the State of Israel, the remnants of the Jewish people, history, and culture will disappear. Gerald M. Steinberg is the Executive Director of NGO Monitor and chairman of the Political Studies Department of Bar Ilan University, Israel |
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THE TELEGRAPH BUTCHERS THE TRUTH ABOUT GAZA
Posted by Dave Nathan, April 26, 2008. |
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This is from Camera. |
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An April 23 Telegraph (UK newspaper) article by Tim Butcher, "A portrait of life and death in Gaza," butchers the truth about Gaza with distortions, prejudicial language and one-sided reporting. According to Butcher, Gaza's economic woes are due to Israel's actions and it's only natural that Gazans would resent Israel. Nowhere does he mention the rampant anti-Israel incitement or any responsibility the Palestinians themselves might have for the lack of jobs and investment in Gaza. He fails to connect Gaza's poor economy with the Gazans' wanton destruction of the multi-million dollar greenhouse industry given to them after the Israeli withdrawal, the extremism and lack of the rule of law that make it unlikely that any large corporations would feel safe investing millions to turn Gaza's beautiful Mediterranean coastline into a tourist destination, or the relentless bombing of Israel from Gaza, which requires Israel to respond militarily and to close its borders to Gaza's workers and goods. While noting that Gazans are "without a meaningful economy," Mr. Butcher also never broaches the fact that enormous amounts of international aid have been squandered by the Palestinian leadership on weapons and terrorist training camps in Gaza. There is no focus on Hamas ignoring the basic needs of its electorate, in favor of unrelenting rocket attacks on Israeli civilians. Indicative of Butcher's partisan slant, he writes: "The Jewish state insists it fires only at confirmed military targets, but the death toll among Gazan civilians dwarfs the number of civilian Israelis killed." So, according to Butcher's odd logic, if the Palestinians were successful in murdering more Israeli civilians, and the numbers of civilians killed on both sides were more equal, somehow that would convince him that Israel really does aim at military targets? Does Butcher really see no difference between a Palestinian terrorist deliberately striving to bomb Israeli civilians versus an Israeli soldier deliberately striving to strike only terrorist targets, but inadvertently hitting civilians? Since Palestinians from Gaza launch rockets at Israeli civilians on a daily basis, it's certainly not for lack of trying that they haven't murdered scores of Israeli civilians. Butcher omits the fact that it is Palestinian war crimes that are responsible for the death of civilians on both sides. Palestinians launch rockets at Israeli civilians from within heavily populated Palestinian civilian areas, knowingly inviting Israeli fire at the launch sites, which will unfortunately sometimes result in death and injuries to innocent Palestinian bystanders. Contact Dave Nathan at DaveNathan@aol.com |
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FROM ISRAEL: PICKING UP AGAIN
Posted by Arlene Kushner, April 26, 2008. |
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After a Pesach recess it would be lovely to return to good news, but that is hardly to be expected. The most "optimistic" information I've encountered is the report, today, that Abbas, returning from a visit with Bush, is not upbeat about the chances for "peace" by the end of Bush's term. Seems the US won't pressure Israel enough for Abbas's satisfaction. Abbas –– upright fellow that he is –– says he's going to keep negotiating to the end; that happens to be the only way to keep getting all those international perks, it should be mentioned. Hamas officials are urging him to give it up and turn back towards mending fences with them. ~~~~~~~~~~ What I'd like to focus on here is the arrest this past week of US citizen Ben-Ami Kadish, for alleged espionage. Much ado is being made of this, but it is not quite what it appears. The charges involve transfer of classified information by Kadish, who was a US army mechanical engineer, to someone in the Israeli consulate, between the years 1979 and 1985. The level of information was not high, as Kadish did not have a high clearance, and the number of transfers of data was relatively small. Most significantly, it is my understanding that the US KNEW about Kadish's activities since 2004, at which time he was questioned by the FBI. So why arrest him now? The answer is political. Quite simply, while we find firm friends in the Congress and the Pentagon, there are also anti-Israel forces at work in the US –– in the State Department (which is self-evident) and in the Justice Department and within the Intelligence community. Seeing Israel as a burden that gets in the way of US relations with the Arabs, rather than a critical ally, they are seeking to undermine Israel's position at a critical juncture. There are various theories as to precisely what the goal of this arrest is, but the guessing is that this may involve either pressure on Israel for more concessions to the PA, or Bush's up-coming visit here for Israel's 60th Independence Day. Bush has tentatively planned a variety of "gifts" for Israel that involve military cooperation and sale of cutting edge military equipment. ~~~~~~~~~~ Caroline Glick has yet another theory about what may be going on. Kadish's arrest, she points out, happened on the same day that the news broke that Congress was going to be briefed about Israel's strike on the nuclear reactor in Syria last September. It seems that Israel's absolute silence on this matter was at US insistence. Stories regarding American concern that this news would cause unrest aside, Glick points out that there were other US motivations for keeping this quiet. Israeli intelligence acquired the information on the reactor while US intelligence had missed it –– thereby exposing the superiority of Israeli intelligence and Israel's value to the US as an ally. Then, too, there is the fact that the reactor was put together with N. Korean assistance, even as Rice continues to delude herself regarding her diplomatic success in getting N. Korea to abandon nuclear efforts. Embarrassing for the US. So, a good time to embarrass Israel.
~~~~~~~~~~ A regular pattern of attempts by the US Intelligence community to go after or embarrass Israel can be traced. Remember the AIPAC officials who were charged four years ago with passing information to Israel? The case, which has shown itself to be weak to the point of the ridiculous, has never come to court. And there are similar other instances of such actions. ~~~~~~~~~~ What is particularly galling is the fact that some spying is "routine" even between presumed allies, and most of the time not much is made of it. On several occasions, Israel has caught Americans spying here, but these spies receive no more than a slap on the list and banishment from the country. There are no arrests and no PR spectacles. Glick suggests that this should chance, and I very much concur. Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info |
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TERRITORIAL INTEGRITY: AMERICAN MIDDLE EAST POLICY AND WHAT IT MEANS FOR ISRAEL
Posted by Avodah, April 26, 2008. |
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This is an article by Ami Isseroff and it appeared
on the Zionism and Israel Center website:
This article points out it has always been US policy to force Israel to trade land for peace. |
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Sometimes we fail to notice the most important and obvious facts, precisely because they are right before our eyes, or because they are unpleasant to acknowledge. There is one overriding fact about American policy toward Israel that has been ignored in this way. In 1975, US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger told the Iraqi foreign minister, in a secret meeting: We can't negotiate about the existence of Israel, but we can reduce its size to historical proportions. I don't agree that Israel is a permanent threat. How can a nation of three million be a permanent threat? They have a technical advantage now. But it is inconceivable that peoples with wealth and skill and the tradition of the Arabs won't develop the capacity that is needed. So I think in ten to fifteen years, Israel will be like Lebanon –– struggling for existence, with no influence in the Arab world. (see Kissinger tells Iraqis, "We Can Reduce Israel's Size") Revelation of this cynical conversation produced confusion among Zionists. Kenneth Stein was unable to say if this represented United States Policy or Kissinger's opinion or if Kissinger was simply trying to entice the Iraqis back into the US orbit. Stripped of some of the "icing," Kissinger was expressing what was no more and no less than US policy, and had been US policy since 1967 if not before and what remains US policy today. That is, to barter Israeli land for a peace deal, and to use US influence on Israel as a lever to gain influence in the Arab world. It was always the public policy of the United States, through administrations of both parties and under every presidency, and there was absolutely no reason to be surprised by Kissinger's promise to the Iraqis. Kenneth Stein agonized somewhat over whether or not Kissinger really meant what he had said: Kissinger's statement to Hammadi that the U.S. envisioned Israel as becoming small and non-threatening like Lebanon may have been U.S. foreign policy, or his personal view, or ingratiating diplomacy, or some combination of the three. Regardless, Kissinger's comments were what Hammadi wanted to hear. Stein also quoted a statement by Nixon to Syrian President Assad: President Richard Nixon told Syrian president Hafez al-Assad that Washington was committed to seeing an "Israeli withdrawal from all the occupied territories" (cited by Stein as taken from "Letter from President Ford to Prime Minister Rabin, September 1, 1975," reproduced in Michael Widlanski, Can Israel Survive A Palestinian State? (Jerusalem: Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies, 1990). For some reason, Stein is doubtful if this was the policy of the United States. The reason for his doubt is hard to understand. Both secret and public documents have made it clear that United States policy regarding Israel since the Six Day War was centered around the idea that the United States must get Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories in order to satisfy the Arab states. U.S. diplomats and legislators, beginning in 1967, bemoaned the fact that Israel had achieved the Six Day War victory without U.S. aid, and therefore the United States had no way to force its withdrawal. This is revealed, for example, in Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee hearings held on June 9, 1967: It is a fact, is it not, that neither Soviet Russia nor the United States has given any material amounts of arms to Israel, and, if that is true, are they not relatively independent in their thinking at this point? It should be clear that "reducing the size of Israel" was always a goal of the United States since June 1967. On May 23, 1967, President Johnson had made a statement regarding US commitment to the territorial integrity of all nations, seemingly with the intention of reassuring Israel.. Following the June war, this statement was repeated, but now that Israel had conquered chunks of Jordanian, Egyptian and Syrian territory, it took on a new meaning: The US would pressure Israel to withdraw from the conquered territories in return for peace. In a State Department telegram sent on June 12 to the US Embassy in Israel, the following wording was included: As far as the attitude of the US is concerned, our principal points of departure are (a) President Johnson's reaffirmation on May 23 of long-standing American policy that "the United States is firmly committed to the support of the political independence and territorial integrity of all the nations of the area"; ...(c) the vital interest of the United States in its own relations with the Arab and Muslim world, a relationship in which Israel itself has an important stake... Ambassador Barbour replied on June 13 that he had in fact apprised Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban of these positions: As to United States points of departure I mentioned President's reaffirmation on May 23 of our commitment to support the political independence and territorial integrity of all nations in the area, the necessity to establish a regime of peace eliminating claims by either side of the right to infringe on the rights of others because of belligerency, U.S. vital interests in relation to the Arab world, and the overriding necessity that through magnanimous and imaginative policies, the foundations laid for a genuine reconciliation among peoples of the area. Yet again, from the same file, in response to Saudi and Aramco pressure on the U.S. regarding Israeli withdrawal, the following text was included in a telegram sent, also on June 13, from the U.S. State Department to the U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia: 3. In connection problems growing out of recent Arab-Israel hostilities, you may call attention addressee governments to long-standing USG support for territorial integrity and political independence of all states of the Near East. This position was re-stated by President Johnson today./3/ The USG desires the maintenance of friendly ties with all the countries of the region. In our view it is of the first importance for all to take steps now to assure that there is an end to the periodic hostilities and the state of belligerency which have marked Near Eastern history in the last two decades. The USG is fully prepared to join the other states to work for lasting arrangements which will serve permanently to reduce tensions in this region. And, from a later file of declassified documents, we have this statement: The tough question is whether we'd force Israel back to 4 June borders if the Arabs accepted terms that amounted to an honest peace settlement. Secretary Rusk told the Yugoslav Foreign Minister: "The US had no problem with frontiers as they existed before the outbreak of hostilities. If we are talking about national frontiers--in a state of peace--then we will work toward restoring them. But we all know that could lead to a tangle with the Israelis. There was, therefore, every reason for both President Nixon and Henry Kissinger to make the statements they had made about Israeli withdrawal, and they were by no means expressing their private opinions, but rather the stated policies of the United States government. The Johnson administration was unable to fulfill its ambition of forcing Israeli withdrawal. The Arab states under the leadership of Nasser were too intransigent to make even a show of peaceful intentions, and adopted the Khartoum resolutions. At the same time, the United States had no leverage whatever on Israel, since it had not supplied the arms with which the Six Day War was won, and had in fact, reneged on its promise to support Israel's navigation rights when it was put to the test. In order to force Israeli withdrawal, the United States would first need to gain some leverage on Israel. The US adopted a two fold approach to regaining its standing in the Middle East. The first part was to make Israel dependent upon it for arms and diplomatic backing, while at the same time working for a permanent peace settlement and Israeli withdrawal. The "peace settlement" part would be satisfactory to the pro-Israel faction that was generally in charge in the White House, while the Israeli withdrawal part would satisfy the rank and file career diplomats of the State Department, who never had excessive love for Israel or people of the Jewish persuasion. ... The US supports Israel in order to use return of the territories conquered in the Six Day War to gain leverage with Arab states. This policy worked admirably for many years. By 1975, the US had purchased the leverage on Israel by its role in the Yom Kippur War, in which it had agreed to resupply Israel through the air-lift. The Yom Kippur war made it clear to Israel that the scale of military engagements in the Middle East had changed radically since 1967, and that it could therefore no longer be militarily independent. The quantities of armaments and materiel consumed in a few short days of fighting necessitated a replacement capacity that could not be provided in a practical way by increasing the capacity of the Israeli military industries, and the technological innovations required were beyond the capabilities of Israel. Kissinger persuaded Nixon to resupply the Israelis in 1973, and Kissinger then used the leverage purchased by resupply to push for Israeli withdrawals in Sinai. The fruits of this policy for the US were the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty and US displacement of Russian influence in Egypt, and eventually, the Jordanian –– Israeli peace treaty and the Oslo process. In a masterly stroke, President Carter cemented both Israeli and Egyptian dependence on the US with large foreign aid deals. It has been very important for the United States to maintain this dependence. The torpedoing of the LAVIE interceptor project in the 80s was a great victory for US policy and another nail in the coffin of Israeli political independence. Thanks to that defeat, every time Israel attacks Palestinians or Hezbollah, it must use US aircraft, allowing anti-Zionists to point out that the "Zionist war criminals" are using US supplied weapons. In any case, what Kissinger told the Iraqis was apparently, a slightly "adapted" version of actual US policy. If it was shocking to some people, it is because they never understood and didn't want to understand what had been declared plainly many times. The same policy has been spelled out again quite recently by George Bush in his speech on the Middle East, and more recently by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in an interview with Sawa television. Israel will have to withdraw from the West Bank. ... Zionists in Israel and abroad who want Israel to keep the territories of the West Bank, and who sometimes label Israeli politicians as traitors because of concessions to Palestinians, need to understand that these concessions are concessions to the US government. In reality, the results and aftermath of the Six Day War are the full length novel version of the little episode of the 1956 Suez Campaign. After that campaign, President Eisenhower forced a precipitate Israeli withdrawal in return for "guarantees" that turned out to be worthless. Following the Six Day war, Israel has a better chance of getting guarantees that will not be worthless in return for withdrawal, but the withdrawal is evisaged by the US as equally inevitable.... Acute analysts will note that if Israel ever does return all of the conquered territories, then Israel would be of no further use in American attempts to ingratiate itself with the Arabs. At the same time, America would have very little leverage with the Arabs unless it pressed Israel for further concessions. Without doubt, there are those in the US diplomatic corps who would not be averse to exerting such pressure. Israeli politicians therefore have to think ahead to what American policy might be two days after the peace treaty is signed, when some Arab states, or Muslim groups, inevitably, nonetheless declare their objections to the presence of Israel in the Middle East. From the Israeli point, we will have no more territory to concede, but that may not necessarily be the American view. After all, in the early 50s, the US was behind a plan to get Israel to make concessions to Egypt in the Negev. Contact Avodah at avodah15@aol.com |
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"WE CEASE, THEY FIRE": ANATOMY OF LAST YEAR'S CEASEFIRE DISASTER THAT EVERYONE'S FORGOTTEN
Posted by Noam Bedein, April 26, 2008. |
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"Hamas could learn both positive and negative lessons from the last round of escalation. On the positive side, it succeeded in consistently and systematically launching rockets at Israel, extending the rockets' range to Ashkelon, and it had victories in the battle for hearts and minds." –– from the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center's (ITIC) summary of the recent escalation of rocket terror There is talk circulating about the opportunity to communicate and reach an understanding with Hamas, to give Hamas a chance to foster a ceasefire with Israel. How many people remember that there was, in fact, such a 'ceasefire' with Hamas-controlled Gaza only one year ago? How many people remember what occurred during that 'ceasefire'? Well, the people in Sderot and the western Negev remember. Even if no one else does. Let us refresh out memories. >From November 26, 2006, until May 15, 2007, a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel went on for almost six months. One cannot ignore the statement made by Hamas five days before the ceasefire: "Hamas's military wing will stop the rocket fire when residents evacuate the city of Sderot." (from November 21, 2006) During that 'ceasefire', Gazans launched 315 missiles targeted at Sderot and the western Negev, according to an IDF spokesman. There was not one IDF response to the rocket fire during that ceasefire period. During a recent presentation at the IDC in Herzliya, to the cream of the crop of students of Israeli intelligence, the audience reacted with disbelief when they heard that there already was a 'ceasefire' last year, and that it wasn't kept in the slightest. Mecca Agreement During that 'ceasefire' period, on February 27, 2007, there was an agreement reached between the Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal and Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen). The agreement took place three months after the ceasefire went into effect; after 160 missiles had been fired at Israel since the day the 'ceasefire' commenced. Mashaal promised, in Moscow, to stop the Kassam rocket attacks. Two days later, seven missiles were launched from the Gaza Strip towards Israel. The question begs to be asked: What kind of Western democracy in the world would allow for a one-sided ceasefire? What other state would allow for a rocket to explode within its territory? Israel is going to celebrate 60 years of its independence in a few more weeks, as for the first time in 40 years a significant portion of its population are living under rocket threat. In the north, Hizbullah threatens with rocket fire from southern Lebanon. In the southern area of Israel, Hamas continues to fire from Gaza at Sderot, the western Negev and now Ashkelon. Hamas is also developing rockets that will reach Ashdod. At this point, up to half a million Israelis will be under rocket fire. No family in the state of Israel should have to live under rocket threat. At 60 years of independence, Israel's goal should be to end the rocket terror upon its citizens. It all starts with Sderot. Also, what most people forget is that Israel's adversaries are not advocating a 'ceasfire'; they promote a hudna. A hudna means no more than a temporary respite in the war between Islamic forces and non-Islamic forces. The authoritative Islamic Encyclopedia (London, 1922) defines hudna as a "temporary treaty" which can be approved or abrogated by Islamic religious leaders, depending on whether or not it serves the interests of Islam; and a hudna cannot last for more than 10 years. The Islamic Encyclopedia mentions the Hudaybia treaty as the ultimate hudna. Yasser Arafat also talked about a hudna in his speeches when he would refer to the Oslo Accords. In the words of the Islamic Encyclopedia, "The Hudaybia treaty, concluded by the Prophet Mohammad with the unbelievers of Mecca in 628, provided a precedent for subsequent treaties which the Prophet's successors made with non-Muslims. Mohammad made a hudna with a tribe of Jews back then to give him time to grow his forces, then broke the treaty and wiped them out. Although this treaty was violated within three years from the time that it was concluded, most jurists concur that the maximum period of peace with the enemy should not exceed ten years, since it was originally agreed that the Hudaybia treaty should last ten years." Noam Bedein is Director of the Regional News Service for Sderot & the Western Negev, a project of the Sderot Information Center for the Western Negev, Ltd, www.sderot-media.com |
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WHAT HAS BECOME OF THE MYRICK PLAN?
Posted by David Meir-Levi, April 26, 2008. | |
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The Myrick plan, enunciated in Congress by Rep. Sue Myrick (NC), is a powerful new approach, at the national Congressional level, to dealing effectively with the threat posed to our nation and to our civilization by islamo-fascist jihad terrorism, including both terror threats from abroad and the growing threat of jihadist terrorists already safely ensconced inside of our borders right now. Yet her work in the House of Representatives has merited almost no coverage in our press, and only some tepid responses from her colleagues. I urge y'all to write to your congress-persons and urge them to support Rep. Myrick in activating her plan (see summaries below). David Meir-Levi | |
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From the Sue Myrick website:
Sue is also leading the charge nationally on issues related to terrorism. She is the founder of the Congressional Anti-Terrorism Caucus, which has more than 120 Members. This caucus meets with experts on terrorism and works to educate the public about the dangers we face from Islamofascism. "Myrick Aces, D.C. Flunks 'Jihadism 101'"
Reading U.S. Rep. Sue Myrick's "Wake Up America" agenda –– a 10-point plan targeting potential jihadist infiltration into this country's military, security, educational and financial institutions –– triggers mixed emotions. First, relief. Finally, there is an elected official who understands the urgency of these festering national security threats. Virtually every other elected U.S. official, up to and including the president (and presidential candidates) has shockingly ignored these same threats. Which leads to a flash of panic: How could our leaders have allowed so many years go by without taking action? Then comes, for me at least, a sense of resolve to help Myrick accomplish her goals by trying to boost a much-needed national conversation about the jihadist threat at home. The North Carolina Republican's plan warms up with two calls for investigations into those U.S. chaplains, in both the US military and the prison system, who were approved by Abdurahman Alamoudi, the convicted terrorist and Muslim Brotherhood (MB) member now serving 23 years in prison. In the early 1990s, back when he was something of a Washington power broker, Alamoudi helped set up the Pentagon's Muslim chaplain corps in conjunction with the Institute of Islamic and Arabic Sciences in America, a Saudi-funded operation that specializes in what you might call Jihadism 101. Alamoudi went to prison back in 2004, but no one since, in the military or the prisons, seems to have taken a second look at what his prodigies might be preaching (terrorism? treason? whatever?). Myrick plans to check into it herself. Next, she plans to ask the Government Accounting Office (GAO) to examine the process by which the FBI and Defense Department select Arabic translators. Of particular concern to Myrick –– but not, incredibly, to the FBI or the Defense Department –– is these two agencies' mind-boggling practice of advertising for recruits in what can only be described as pro-terrorism publications. Next on the congresswoman's to-do list is a call for an Internal Revenue Service investigation into the nonprofit status of the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). Such status restricts "lobbying on behalf of a foreign government," but, as Myrick notes, plenty of foreign funds have found their way into CAIR's coffers to beg the question. Another Myrick plan is to introduce a bill to make preaching, publishing, distributing or financing calls for the death of Americans or American troops an act of sedition or solicitation of treason. She also wants to ask the GAO to assess total sovereign wealth fund investment in the United States. Such massive funds, owned and controlled by governments, first came to many Americans' attention with the recent purchase by the United Arab Emirates of a large stake in Citigroup; in recent years, however, there has been a spike in such foreign government investment in the United States. This raises concerns (that is, it should raise concerns) about the political goals of such funds –– for example, the spread of Islamic law through "Sharia-compliant banking." Thankfully, Myrick is concerned. The last few points on the Myrick agenda focus on the appalling lack of reciprocity and common sense in our nation's dealings with Saudi Arabia. Regarding the student visa program that is supposed to bring 21,000 Saudi students to this country, Myrick would attach the condition that the Saudis rewrite their textbooks to omit incitement against non-Muslims; regarding religious visas for imams, she would require of Islamic countries reciprocal visa arrangements for non-Muslim clergy; and regarding U.S. training of Saudi security forces, she would insist that the Saudis prosecute known Al Qaeda financiers and stop releasing repatriated Guantanamo Bay terrorists in exchange for their pledges not to attack ... Saudi Arabia. She will also be introducing a bill to block the sale of state-of-the-art offensive munitions to Saudi Arabia, especially Joint Direct Attack Munitions or JDAMs.
Contact information The Honorable Sue Myrick
The Honorable Sue Myrick
The Honorable Sue Myrick
David Meir-Levi is an American-born Israeli,
currently living in Palo Alto. His expertise is in Near Eastern
studies and the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. He is Director
of Peace and Education at Israel Peace Initiative (www.ipi-usa.org).
Contact him at david_meirlevi@hotmail.com
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HIZBULLAH GAINING MILITARY STRENGTH; AGITATION SUBSIDIZED; UNO VS. FREEDOM OF SPEECH
Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 25, 2008. |
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CIVILIAN VS. MILITARY VIEWS PM Olmert now is considering letting the P.A. control the P.A. side of the border between Gaza and Israel. The IDF strongly opposes that. PM Olmert says he would take the step if violence subsided and if European monitors played a greater role than just observing (IMRA, 4/2). The usual course is that Israel's conditions either are not met but Israel gives in anyway, perhaps lying about whether they are met, or the Arabs change those conditions, as when they chased Europeans away, or continued negotiations and US pressure erodes the conditions. Some of the conditions announced in advance may sound prudent, but the final result is reckless. Violence may subside, but jihad does not end. Basing concessions on a temporary reduction in violence rather than on specific anti-terrorism steps is self-deceiving. HIZBULLAH GAINING MILITARY STRENGTH Hizbullah has been moving rockets into Lebanese villages south of the Litani River, contrary to the armistice agreement. UNIFIL can intercept Hizbullah installations only after coordination with the Lebanese Army. The news brief implies that the Lebanese Army does not authorize UNIFIL to intervene (IMRA, 4/2). The armistice agreement was much touted by PM Olmert and his Foreign Minister Livni, who arranged it. It has turned out, as predicted by their critics, to be a poor substitute for victory. The poor Israelis! Their government does not protect them from enemy rockets and does not keep the enemy from rebuilding military forces for further attacks. IMPLICATIONS OF REINFORCING ROOFTOPS IN ISRAEL One of Israel's defensive measures against rocket attacks is to reinforce roofs. That measure implies that Israel can tolerate the attacks. It emboldens the enemy to attack more (Uzi Landau in IMRA, 4/2). Imagine what it does to Israeli morale! The people want to replace the Olmert regime with one dedicated to defending them, but they can't. As the enemy widens the rockets' range, the cost of reinforcement becomes prohibitive. As the enemy makes missiles more lethal, reinforcement becomes useless. EU FUNDING ARAB-ISRAEL CONFLICT The EU has spent tens of millions of Euros from 2005 –– 2007 on NGOs in Israel and the Territories. Those NGOs have a political agenda on the Arab-Israel conflict. They ignore Arab terrorism and promote boycott, divestment, and sanctions against Israel and only Israel. They defame Israel in the most vicious manner and undermine human rights and Jewish identity, as most of them did at the Durban conference. The NGOs aggravate hostility and the problem. The EU subsidies are not transparent, have vague criteria, are subject to decision-makers' discretion, and there is little accounting for them (IMRA, 4/3). The donations are a source of foreign exchange Israel could do without. If it were a self-respecting country, it would ban subsidies for subversion. Well, if it were self-respecting, it would do a lot of things, such as not let Arabs steal public land or bombard Israeli cities or beat up Jews in mixed cities. HAARETZ' TWO VOICES Arab leaders describe their actual policies to their own people (actual, because they act on it), but describe fanciful policies to the West, in order to gain acceptance there as moderate. Also using two voices, the Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, is much more anti-Israel in its English-language translations than in its Hebrew editions, read by Israelis, who know the issues better. The English edition mis-described Pisgat Ze'ev, a Jewish neighborhood of northern Jerusalem as a "Jewish settlement surrounded by Arab towns in the W. Bank." Actually, it is not surrounded by Arab towns. Only the most extreme leftists describe Jewish neighborhoods of Jerusalem as settlements. The original, Hebrew version did not give those false impressions. The Far Left wants to give away that neighborhood, in which tens of thousands of Jews live. Haaretz subverts Israel's position, abroad. Editor David Landau was asked about his suggestion to Sec. Rice that the government of Israel wants to be "raped." He confirmed that he meant what he said and said he understands that Rice took his advice (Arutz-7, 4/3). LEFT'S UNDERHANDED WAY TO EXPEL SETTLERS The Left is said to have proposed compensation for any "settlers" who evacuate, to: (1) Shortcut a democratic decision on which areas to retain; (2) Get Israelis to resent being asked to defend those who don't accept the money; and (3) Make a pretext for reducing defense measures for those who are left. So far, the Jewish population of the Territories grows faster than in the State (IMRA, 4/3). WHAT RESPONSIBILITY HAVE ARABS FOR EACH OTHER? The higher fuel prices that are enriching oil exporting Arab states are helping to raise food prices beyond what many Arabs and foreign workers in other Arab states can afford. Some Arab governments subsidize food or offer other financial support to their people. Others don't. Riots occur. What responsibility have the enriched Arabs for the impoverished ones? (IMRA, 4/4.) Arab states use the Arab-Israel conflict to divert attention from real domestic problems, but they don't assist the impoverished Palestinian Arabs whom they claim to care about. They don't care about them. Most of them deny Arab refugees citizenship. The 140 million other refugees in modern times resettled, but the Arab world keeps its refugee problem seething. Then it looks for sympathy from foreign cultures. AGITATION SUBSIDIZED The Mukhtar of Silwan negotiated with Israeli authorities over archeological excavations. Nevertheless, Arabs there protested, some, violently. They were paid to by a German news agency looking for excitement and by S. Arabian and P.A. agents wanting strife. The Mukhtar said that Islamists threaten any Arab who works with the government of Israel at solving problems (Arutz-7, 4/4). UNO VS. FREEDOM OF SPEECH Muslim and other African members of the UNO Human Rights Commission passed a resolution against expression of opposition to Islam. They call such speech bigotry, but the member states are known for wanting to control speech. The US, which is not a member of the Commission, opposed the resolution. The European members abstained. They have been opposing freedom of expression against opposition to Islam. They censured and censored the Dutch film that expresses serious objections to the hatred espoused by Islam. Europe's opposition to freedom of speech undermines democracy (and defense against jihad). Some of the Europeans are afraid for their lives. The issues raised in the Dutch film are serious and proved. The leftist European officials won't discuss that. British politicians are trying to pass laws banning criticism of Islam (Caroline Glick in IMRA, 4/5) but not Islamic criticism of others. Again we find Bush's US a voice for decency and the European officials, whom Bush is urged to work with, a voice for surrender. The UNO remains evil. Richard Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. His comments and analyses appear often on Think-Israel. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at richardshulman5@aol.com |
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HARDBALL WITH WASHINGTON
Posted by Justice For Jonathan Pollard, April 25, 2008. |
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This was written by Caroline Glick and it appeared yesterday
in Jerusalem Post
"The first thing [Israel] should do is arrest officials suspected of transferring classified materials to the US without authorization. It should then publish the names and details of US spies whom Israel previously caught and treated with kid gloves. Then it should publicly demand that Bush release Pollard from the prison where he rots, while the likes of Hizbullah agent Nada Prouty –– who penetrated both the FBI and the CIA –– is expected to receive a six-month prison sentence for her crimes." |
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Tuesday was a banner day, a proud day for Jewish conspiracy theorists in America. People like Joseph E. diGenova smiled with glee as they watched 84-year-old Ben Kadish carted into the Manhattan Federal District courthouse on charges of transferring classified information to Israel 25 years ago. He's just like Jonathan Pollard, they whooped. Another Pollard! At last, we have proof that Israel operates spy rings and SLEEPER CELLS in America! They bragged and bragged and smiled and smiled as their terrorist metaphors got wilder and wilder. Sleeper cells? You mean agents sent to a country to lay in wait for the command to attack? Well, not exactly. DiGenova made his name as the federal prosecutor who railroaded Pollard into a life sentence for crimes that generally should have netted him no more than a few years in the slammer. Obviously he has a way with words. And when he told The New York Times "sleeper cells," apparently he was referring to the FBI agents who went to sleep for 23 years and then suddenly woke up and decided to cart an old man out of his nursing home and charge him with capital crimes. Both the fact that Kadish was released on a paltry $300,000 bail and the details that have been reported about his case make it pretty clear that Kadish was not a very serious spy. The sum total of his alleged actions, which occurred between 1979 and 1985, reportedly involved taking documents out of the library at the Picatinny Arsenal in northern New Jersey where he worked as a mechanical engineer and giving them to an Israeli consular official. The documents weren't highly classified because Kadish had a low security clearance. Out of the 50-100 documents he transferred over six years, three are mentioned in the indictment. He allegedly transferred a document relating to nuclear weapons –– weapons of which by the early 1980s Israel was widely believed to already have its own full arsenal. He allegedly transferred data relating to the F-15 fighter jet, which Israel already owned. And he allegedly transferred information about the Patriot missile defense system –– which the US gave Israel five years later. There is a reason that Israeli commentators are crying foul with the Kadish episode. According to the media reports, in 2004 –– a period in which US-Israeli strategic ties were in turmoil due to Israeli weapons sales to China, US weapons sales to Saudi Arabia, and US adoption of the anti-Israel road map –– the Bush administration pressed the Sharon government to acknowledge that 20 years earlier, when Pollard was transferring documents at a rate of hundreds per week to his Israeli handlers, Israel fielded another agent as well. Presumably, it was then that Israel was forced to divulge Kadish's identity to the Americans. According to the Israeli media, subsequent to Israel's confidential statements to US officials, Kadish was questioned by the FBI and admitted to having transferred documents to Israel. He then left the country, traveled to Israel –– where he could have stayed –– and came home to the US. Most Israeli commentators and unnamed government officials angrily allege that the timing of Kadish's arrest was chosen to damage Israel's relations with the US at a key moment. In two weeks President George W. Bush is scheduled to visit Israel to participate in its 60th Independence Day celebrations. It has been widely presumed that during his visit, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government will seek to secure Bush's agreement to commute Pollard's sentence and release him from prison before Bush leaves office. Kadish, it is alleged, was arrested to block any possibility that Pollard will be released. Given the vindictiveness that has marked the US intelligence community's attitude toward Pollard since his arrest, it is possible that fear of a presidential pardon did inform the decision to arrest Kadish now. And yet, it is far from clear that an agreement on Pollard's release was ever in the cards. Bush has expressed no willingness to consider Israeli appeals for his release and neither the Sharon government nor the Olmert-Livni-Barak government has made any real efforts to secure Pollard's freedom. Indeed, in a sign of their contempt for Pollard, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government has Pollard's former handler, Pensioners Affairs Minister Rafi Eitan, sitting in the security cabinet. It is also possible that Kadish was arrested to try to force Israel to make massive concessions to the Fatah terror group in order to secure a "peace agreement" between Israel and the PLO before Bush leaves office. In the past, the US has used allegations of Israeli espionage to cow Israel into toeing its line of appeasement towards the PLO. In 1997, the Clinton administration let loose hysterical headlines about a high-level Israel mole named "Mega" who had supposedly penetrated the highest levels of the US intelligence community. The story was a complete fabrication, but it came after a suicide bombing in Jerusalem had caused then-prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu to cut off contacts with Yassir Arafat. In 2004, the US indicted two senior AIPAC lobbyists in a transparently political move, claiming that they were trafficking in classified documents to try to force the Bush administration to do something to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. The lobbyists are still awaiting their trial, which is looking more and more like a farce every day. But in the meantime, the US has been free from Israeli pressure to take the Iranian nuclear program seriously for four years. Kadish was arraigned the same day that the Los Angeles Times broke the story that CIA Director Michael Hayden would be briefing Congress on Thursday about Israel's September 6 air strike in Syria. For the past six months, the administration did everything it could to prevent any information on the Israeli air strike from getting out. In the end, Hayden was compelled to inform Congress about the details of the raid after the legislature conditioned its approval of the intelligence budget on receiving a full briefing on the air strike. According to the Los Angeles Times report and subsequent stories, Hayden's testimony would acknowledge that US intelligence agencies failed to recognize the dangers of the North Korean-built plutonium reactor that Syria had constructed not far from its border with Turkey. It was Israeli, rather than American intelligence agencies that penetrated the facility, brought back video and physical evidence of its character, and then effectively destroyed it in a complicated air strike and commando raid. So according to US media reports, Hayden's testimony would demonstrate two basic truths that the Jewish conspiracy theorists in the US intelligence community and the State Department are uninterested in having the public or Congress notice: Israeli intelligence is superior to US intelligence; and the US alliance with Israel is vital to US national security. Since Israel's independence 60 years ago and especially since US-Israel strategic ties blossomed after the Six Day War, Washington has been of two minds about the Jewish state. The first, public mind is that Israel is the US's strongest and most reliable ally in the Middle East, and that the US-Israel alliance is strong because it is based on shared values as well as shared interests. The second view is that Israel is a burden. As purveyors of this view see things, Israel is the national "Fagin." It is underhanded, pushy and untrustworthy. Indeed, as far as the anti-Semites in Washington are concerned, Israel is the source of all the US's difficulties in the Arab world and even in Europe. For years, the purveyors of the second view have carried out an independent foreign policy regarding Israel that is completely at odds with the official US policy of embracing Israel as an ally. Indeed, the State Department has undermined every presidential attempt to treat Israel well since 1948. Yet both the Israeli attack against the Syrian nuclear program and Israel's attitude toward espionage show how ridiculous and counterproductive that unofficial –– yet consistent –– US policy toward Israel actually is. In the case of the operation in Syria, protestations of the Israeli Left about not wanting to embarrass Syrian dictator Bashar Assad aside, Israel had a clear national interest in exposing the nature of the target as quickly as possible. Moreover, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had a political interest in exposing the details of the raid to the Israeli public as quickly as possible. And yet, bowing to US demands, Israel placed draconian censorship regulations on media reports of the strike. To please the likes of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who still clings to the notion that her brilliant diplomatic skills will enable her to convince the North Koreans to give up their nuclear arsenal, Israel agreed to hide information of its vital mission and massive success from both its own people and from the global audience. As for espionage, as the late Yitzhak Rabin once noted, every few years Israel discovers another US agent committing espionage against the state. Rather than make a big deal about it, and in spite of the fact that some of the information being stolen is deeply damaging to Israel's national security, out of a sense of comity with Washington, Israel keeps the scandals quiet and generally deports the spies. By arresting an 84-year-old World War II veteran in an effort to place Israel under a cloud of suspicion as its military triumph in Syria is exposed to the American people, the US is sadly showing Israel once again that nice guys finish last. If Israel wants to be treated with respect by the US, the lesson of the Kadish affair, of the Syrian raid and of the Pollard affair is that Israel had better start pushing back. The first thing it should do is arrest officials suspected of transferring classified materials to the US without authorization. It should then publish the names and details of US spies whom Israel previously caught and treated with kid gloves. Then it should publicly demand that Bush release Pollard from the prison where he rots, while the likes of Hizbullah agent Nada Prouty –– who penetrated both the FBI and the CIA –– is expected to receive a six-month prison sentence for her crimes. When Bush arrives to celebrate Israel's 60th birthday, Israel's leaders would do well to show him that at 60, Israel is a grownup country. And as such, it demands to be treated with the respect due to the US's most reliable ally in the Middle East. Reach Justice for Jonathan Pollard by sending an email to justice4jp@gmail.com |
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WE ALREADY HAVE PEACE WITH SYRIA
Posted by Guy Bechor, April 25, 2008. |
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Quiet that has prevailed on Syria-Israel border for years may be better than peace There is not much difference between the peace we have with Syria today and the peace with have with Egypt, with the exception of the written agreement whose exact details nobody remembers. Bashar Assad has not traveled to Jerusalem, but when did Hosni Mubarak visit Israel? Only once, for the funeral of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, when the Americans forced the Egyptian president to do so. Moreover, our border with Syria is quiet and stable and no clash has taken place there for dozens of years, as opposed to the "border of peace" with Egypt, which is replete with criminal and terror infiltrations, as well as other troubles. Compared to Syria's border with Jordan and Iraq, its border with Israel is an asset: Damascus is enjoying the quiet and security too. Syria lost its hold on the Arab world, most of which boycotted her by not sending top leaders to the last summit meeting in Damascus. Today, Syria is isolated, lacks legitimacy, and a peace treaty with Israel would only serve to isolate it even more and further reinforce the Syrian leadership's illegitimacy among Arabs. A peace agreement with Israel will turn Iran into Syria's greatest enemy: A dangerous enemy that has a hold on Iraq and Lebanon, Syria's neighbors. Syria lost Lebanon, and therefore a peace treaty with Damascus does not mean a peace deal with Lebanon as well. On the contrary, there will be elements in Lebanon that would do everything to undermine an agreement between Syria and Israel. On the Golan Heights, IDF and Syrian forces are separated by a buffer in the form of UN forces. Each side knows its place, while an effective and powerful Israeli deterrence system exists. It must remain powerful in the future has well. Both our prime minister and the Syria president admitted that in recent months they created a system of signals, clarifications, and possibly even deterrence, for fear of misunderstandings. The Syria front is again stable, after a period of disquiet in the wake of the Lebanon War. What else can we ask for? Peace threatens Assad regime And no less important: As opposed to the old model of peace with Arab states, Israel continues to hold on to territory here, that is, the Golan Heights. This is the only case of "peace" between us and our neighbors where we hold on to both territory and stability. This is a much more advanced model for us than the Egyptian or Jordanian model. Paradoxically, at this time it appears that the only element the Syrian regime can rely on may be Israel. As opposed to the hatred it faces in Lebanon, Jordan, and Turkey, quiet with Israel is a supreme interest for Damascus. When will we realize that the peace we seek threatens the Syrian regime? Just like we frighten it with war, we do the same inadvertently with our desire for peace. This peace phantom threatens to sink Assad's regime. Yet our media outlets have continued to numb us with this conditioned peace reflex for dozens of years now, and the sense around here is that absolute happiness is right around the corner. If only we cede the Golan Heights, the Mideastern heaven will open its gates to us. Today, the Golan Heights stabilizes the Galilee and northern Israel in an existential manner. What will be our fate should we make the mistake and evacuate the Golan? The peace will end, the stability will end, and the quiet will end. Moreover, the Syrians will immediately dispatch a million Syrians to settle the area, just as they did in Lebanon, and with the option of a "resistance movement" just like in Lebanon. This was written for Ynet News
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ISRAEL RELATIVELY SECURE ON SIXTIETH BIRTHDAY
Posted by Barry Rubin, April 25, 2008. |
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Israel is Safe and Strong. Really. Let's face it, after almost 2000 years in exile and only 60 years of Israel as a sovereign nation, it still feels funny for Jews, especially those outside Israel, to have a state. That, along with other factors, makes it easy to underestimate Israel's success and security. However, though at first glance it might seem counter-intuitive to say so, Israel today is stronger, more secure and in a better strategic position than at just about any time in its history. Before dealing with this point directly –– by examining the very real threats the country continues to face –– let's talk about how these very real problems are magnified even further in the prism of Jewish thinking, especially outside Israel. There are a few factors to keep in mind when assessing Israel's situation and future. First, the long-term Jewish experience has been one of persecution, suffering, and often defeat. That is why a sense of pessimism linked with humor is so intertwined with Jewish culture. What does a Jewish telegram say? "Start worrying. Letter follows." What is the oldest Jewish joke in history? "The recently freed slaves in Sinai said to Moses: What, there weren't enough graves in Egypt that you have to bring us here?" Strength, victory, well-being and success; all are viewed (on a collective though not individual level) with suspicion. That Israel has provided such things is a major reason for its popularity with Diaspora Jews. But there is also a sense that things will not last. Second, no people are more obsessed with relentless self-criticism than are Jews. There are obvious biblical references here as well, in the prophetic tradition, and it has continued down to today. The great Israeli humorist Ephraim Kishon described his own arrival in the country shortly after independence in these terms: as the ship approached the coast it became very hot and we began criticizing the government over the weather. Every day in Israel, every conceivable failing (real or imagined) is relentlessly dissected. The negative is usually highlighted, though afterward people feel optimistic at having been able to vent their pessimism. The best example of this I ever experienced was walking down the street in Tel Aviv one day and running into a friend. "How's everything?" he asked. "Great," I answered. "How can you say that!" he exclaimed. "Don't you read the newspapers?" On the other hand, when annual quality of life polls are taken, the positive scores from Israelis are through the roof. In no small part, the culture of complaint and pessimism is a posture, an imposture that should never be mistaken for reality. Third, there is an obsession (this applies more outside Israel) with non-material factors. Because Diaspora Jews have often been powerless, and even when they have power it is indirect rather than institutionalized, they have always depended on the kindness of strangers. Hence, the obsession with what the media says about Israel, for example. However, Israel does not stand or fall on whether The New York Times likes it or whether former presidents write nasty books about it. Fourth, debates over political viewpoint and attitude toward Jewish identity play a role. Those who want to view Jewishness in the most narrowly traditional religious terms, who want to be totally assimilated, or who seek a leftist utopia have no place for Israel in the world they want. Wishing it would go away is an element of wishful thinking, an idea that it is unnatural influencing their perceptions of the actual situation. In circles friendlier to Israel's existence, those on the left may like to believe that Israel will collapse if it doesn't make peace with the Palestinians. Unfortunately, the Palestinians, and Arab states in general, are not so inclined and any way a bad deal is far more of a risk for Israeli security than no deal at all. Similarly, on the right, concessions over Jewish settlements or other matters are seen as bringing the sky down, though these have relatively little impact on Israel's interests and may have a positive effect regarding strategic needs. Finally, how do we define "security?" People in North America have a very exalted, even perfectionist, view of security being total. Still, I can only say that I will walk anywhere in Israel at any time of night without fear and let my children wander around to an extent unthinkable when on a visit to the United States. A very tough guy, my number-one choice as foxhole companion, was robbed on a Washington D.C street. Another Israeli friend walked three blocks in the wrong direction in that city and landed in the hospital after a brutal mugging. As for Europe, those societies face a more serious internal Islamist threat than does Israel, especially given their loss of purpose and self-confidence. Antisemitism is rising, both from new immigrants and in some case indigenous populations as well. In France, for example, Jewish life is becoming increasingly insecure. Finally there's the existential threat to security posed by assimilation, conversion, and intermarriage. And now to the aforementioned very real threats that the country does face, including terrorism. What has changed, though¾despite Iran¾is that the existential threat to Israel has declined sharply over the decades. From the 1950's through the 1980's, Israel could have faced an attack by the regular armies of all its neighbors on any given day. Egypt, Syria, and Iraq were fully backed by the Soviet Union, a superpower, capable of checking or matching any U.S. assistance. Those days are gone. There's no more U.S.S.R. The United States is, despite limitations, the world's only superpower. America's alliance with Israel and overwhelmingly pro-Israel public opinion remain strong, despite minor fluctuations. Arab regimes need U.S. help more than ever before and are less likely to cross Washington on substantial issues that go beyond rhetoric. Whatever bloodthirsty talk comes from various Arab regimes and media, they're not interested in direct conflict with Israel. For starters, because of Israel's military and technological superiority, they know they will lose. They also worry more about such immediate threats as radical Islamism, massive poverty, economic breakdown, Iran and Sunni-Shia conflicts. Egypt and Jordan have peace treaties with Israel that, though cool, inhibit confrontation. Most Lebanese see their main enemy as Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran. Syria's government, the only Arab regime bent on actively pursuing the conflict, is militarily weak and knows a full conflict with Israel would spell the end of its rule. The Saudis and smaller Gulf states are chasing after high living standards. Iraq is preoccupied with internal conflicts. Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia are trying to succeed at economic development and fending off Islamist oppositions. This isn't to minimize the rhetoric of hate that flows like a tidal wave every day across the Arabic-speaking world, nor is it to ignore the financial contributions to terrorist groups. But this is a far cry from the kind of total, high-priority opposition that Israel faced for so many decades, at times when it was far weaker than today. As for the Palestinians, in the best of all possible worlds, they would have a moderate leadership ready to make a compromise peace. The worst-case situation would be if they had a united leadership eager to make all-out war. The reality is somewhere in between. The Palestinians are badly divided, more so in fact than at any time in modern history. Gaza is ruled by Hamas; the West Bank by Fatah. And both of these groups, though especially Fatah, have serious internal splits. Peace is out of the question but so is an effective war effort backed by Arab regimes and a superpower. However many terrorist attacks are attempted, and sometimes succeed with dreadful result and however many rockets are fired at Israeli towns near the Gaza border, this does not pose an existential threat to Israel. And even if the world wants to prettify Fatah and make it seem more peace loving than it is, Hamas is going to remain outside the pale. Iran's nuclear threat is a very real one. But Tehran does not yet have these weapons and it still might be blocked from getting them. At any rate, Israel will have to decide on appropriate action if necessary to ensure this continues to be true. While this issue is being fought out in the present, the risk still lies in the future. Iran may never get a nuclear capability and even if it does so, it is unlikely to use such weapons on Israel. Of course, Israeli leaders must plan for the worst-case outcome but in terms of analysis Tehran has several major considerations to keep in mind, despite the inflammatory rhetoric of some of its rulers. Israel can defend itself and inflict huge damage on Iran, something which Iranian leaders are quite aware of despite their words. The regime, which has now been in power for 30 years, has been quite cautious about risking its own downfall. There are also many softer targets, including the entire Arab world, which have no nuclear defense of their own, and more anti-missile defenses, too, when that day comes. The greatest value of nuclear weapons for Iran is not their actual firing but their use as strategic leverage, to intimidate the West and its neighbors. Iran with nuclear weapons is a very big potential threat but the idea that Tehran will get the bomb and use it against Israel the next day is not the most realistic assessment. But I have left for last the factor that may be the most critical of all: Israel's strength as society and state. Israel has maintained its critical edge on the military side. Casualties from terrorism are down 90 percent from four years ago. In political terms, Israel is more united on the basics than it has been in many years. The economy is booming; immigrants in large part are being successfully absorbed. Despite short-term fits of pessimism and often-justifiable self-criticism, the people are confident. And that's part of the key to understanding what's going on here. In a conflict between a pragmatic, constructive, democratic society and ideologically fettered, violence-obsessed dictatorships, the former will ultimately win out. For one thing, the Israeli system permits progress, the correction of faults, and the far fuller use of human resources. For another, the country simultaneously defends itself and builds itself. What's most important, to paraphrase Israel's founding prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, is not what its enemies say and seek but what its people do. Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center http://www.gloriacenter.org and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs Journal http://meria.idc.ac.il. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), with Walter Laqueur (Viking-Penguin); the paperback edition of The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan); A Chronological History of Terrorism, with Judy Colp Rubin, (Sharpe); and The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East Contact him at profbarryrubin@yahoo.com This article is from May 2008
World Jewish Digest,
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STILL NO HOMES FOR GUSH KATIF JEWS
Posted by Buddy Macy, April 24, 2008. |
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"Disengagement" from the Gaza Strip was completed on August 22, 2005 and from northern Samaria a day later. It is now 1,000 DAYS since our fellow Jews were expelled from their homes, yet inconceivably, and tragically so, building of permanent houses for most of the expellees HAS NOT EVEN BEGUN! Please write to Joseph Kanfer –– joseph.kanfer@ujc.org Malcolm Hoenlein –– malcolm@conferenceofpresidents.org June Walker –– jwalker@hadassah.org John Ruskay –– ruskayj@ujafedny.org Russell Robinson –– rrobinson@jnf.org Ronald Lauder –– rlauder@jnf.org (And send a copy to me: vegibud@gmail.com) Ask them what they have done LATELY to address the ongoing tragedy of the expellees from Gush Katif. Ask them what would happen to the up to 250,000 Jews who would be expelled from their homes should Olmert agree to "Palestinian" demands. Demand immediate, SIGNIFICANT ASSISTANCE TO THE EXPELLEES. Demand that they publicly say "NO" TO THE TWO-STATE "SOLUTION." Thank you so much. Buddy Macy
Contact Buddy Macy by email at vegibud@gmail.com. Or call him at 973-785-0057.
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THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT REDEFINED
Posted by Lawrence Uniglicht, April 24, 2008. |
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How ironic! Israel abandons state of the art greenhouses in Gaza, indeed research laboratories that someday, using Israeli brainpower, could have developed methods to counteract the ominous effects of climate change now battering food production worldwide, thoughtlessly allowing those laboratories to merge with the surrounding rubble and despair permeating a Hamas governed dysfunctional population of hand wringing Jew-despising Arabs, little able to fend for themselves let alone carry the baton of agricultural research bequeathed to them. Neighboring Egypt, another Jew-despising pro-Palestinian brainwashed Arab regime albeit tenuously obligated to remain civil by a once negotiated peace treaty with Israel, in better days the bread basket of the Roman empire, begins to burst at its ever widening fissures forming along the surface of a once tightly sealed pressure cooker, its desperate population fulminating while standing in endless lines to purchase lower priced government subsidized foodstuffs, seething at the autocratic regime that heretofore has held it in check. Might angst over a shortage of reasonably priced primary sustenance supersede tough guy President Hosni Mubarak's Machiavellian tendency to divert the frustration and anger of his exploited populace toward scapegoat Israel and Jews in general? After all, scientifically gifted Israeli Jews could very well be an asset to a third world little industrialized nation like Egypt, perhaps help him as well as other desperate despots find a way to grow crops efficiently. Might Israel serve the needs of regimes in the throes of potential starvation and consequential rebellion more as a research partner than a shlamazal scapegoat? World leaders, both Muslim and non-Muslim, must rid themselves of the bash Israel syndrome, stop skewing their rhetoric in favor of non-productive Arabs still psychologically poisoned by the 'Scarlet R', an inexcusable refugee status embraced for so many decades, still unwillingly to pick themselves up by their bootstraps albeit gifted a land of their own called Gaza. Enough! The very fact state of the art Israeli greenhouses now fester, perhaps serve as ammo repositories, while Gaza maniacs continue to fire deadly missiles into Sderot more than suggests it was a grave mistake for Israel to cede Gaza in the first place, a fact the world should loudly acknowledge forthwith! Might one (or more) of the candidates now vying for the U.S. presidency and presumed leadership of the free world loudly acknowledge what should be obvious, that a more propitious interpretation of the 'greenhouse effect' would indeed be an asset to the world. Alas, if Israeli citizens a/k/a scientists still retained greenhouses in Gaza, perhaps they would utilize them to discover a way to increase crop yields efficiently and cost effectively, combating the scourge of world hunger afflicting so many third world (and perhaps someday first world) Muslim and non-Muslim nations. Surely, Israeli greenhouses exist elsewhere within that cerebral nation, yet the ones morphed to a wistful memory, painfully wrecked within the dysfunctional enclave of Gaza, stripped of all vitality, symbolically represented a stark contrast between the self-defeating behavior of their surroundings and what human beings are capable of achieving when highly motivated to perform tasks that will advance their species. Imagine what Israelis could accomplish if they weren't forced to waste time as well as human and monetary treasure on defending their besieged state! Imagine those discoveries put on hold while Israeli brainpower must divert so much attention defending the Jewish homeland from Arabs besot with jihadist passions. So-called Palestinians, falsely cast as victims of Israeli aggression for so long by manipulative Arab leaders as well as a host of non-thinking Westernized anti-Israeli pundits and their minions, have no incentive to reexamine their unfulfilling non-productive lives. Indeed, this is a lose lose scenario for all involved parties as well as their future generations. Indulging those who refuse to recognize and improve their futile stagnant lives, born of a refugee psychology, while condemning those who cherish the notion of advancing mankind, makes no sense, thwarting the progress of our dysfunctional species heaped in ever greater challenges, faced with the very real possibility that billions of its members will ultimately directly die of starvation or diseases related to improper nutrition. Indeed, mankind seems to possess a masochistic tendency of not promoting a nation blessed with imaginative scientists who can truly lead the way in combating a crisis in progress. How can say former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, a well-educated and presumably brilliant soul, break bread with a terrorist Hamas organization yearning to destroy the Jewish homeland? Furthermore, while legitimizing the devil, how can he not insist that Hamas revise its despicable charter, i.e. its raison d'etre, in effect defined by the following statement? ...nevertheless, the Hamas has been looking forward to implement Allah's promise whatever time it might take. The prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim! there is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him! This will not apply to the Gharqad, which is a Jewish tree (cited by Bukhari and Muslim). The unintended consequence of Carter's pie-in-the-sky attempt to negotiate a truce between Hamas and Israel, however, was to demonstrate yet again the true colors of the Arab jihad junkies, still refusing to recognize the land of Israel as a sovereign Jewish nation. Might the former U.S. President now concede even he cannot craft a silk purse out of a sow's ear, or will he still ignore the obvious, sugar coat his failure, and continue bashing the 'apartheid nation' defined by his delusional Arab apologist mind-set? It boggles the mind that world movers and shakers still don't get it. It boggles the mind they refuse to heap praise upon the gifted nation of Israel, endowed with the intellectual potential ever so necessary to combat a planet threatening catastrophe in the making. Lawrence Uniglicht is a career civil servant. He advocates for the State of Israel with an American perspective. He writes, "Advocating for the disrespected underdog has been my passion, no doubt Israel falls into that category." Contact him by email at larose@snip.net |
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HOW MUCH IS "ENOUGH"?; W.H.O. ACCUSES ISRAEL, IS REFUTED; ROADBLOCKS REMOVED, JEWS DIE
Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 24, 2008. |
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FATAH LOSING POPULARITY IN JUDEA-SAMARIA Day after day, a major scandal about corruption by top P.A. officials emerges in Judea-Samaria. Much of the news is prompted by personal or factional rivalry. Fatah is losing credibility. It could not win an election there, now (IMRA, 3/31). The Sunday NY Times features a Hamas attack through the Gaza-Israel border, using armored vehicles it seized from the P.A.. Nevertheless, Israel just approved shipment of more armored vehicles for the P.A. in Judea-Samaria. Sec. Rice keeps demanding that Israel open up its border more. Seems to me it should seal it until the Arabs leave. HOW MUCH IS "ENOUGH?" Egypt occasionally blew up the entrances to a few of the 150 arms smuggling tunnels from Sinai to Gaza. The terrorists simply constructed a new tunnel. Israel said Egypt did not do enough. Now Egypt says it will blow up the whole tunnel. It has a special unit that will employ US tunnel-detecting equipment. Dr. Aaron Lerner asks the key question. How many of the 150 tunnels will Egypt seek out? Just enough to get favorable publicity, but not enough to curb arms smuggling? (IMRA, 3/31,) MOVE TO BLOCK CASE AGAINST MOUNT DESTRUCTION The Muslim Waqf has been illegally destroying ancient Jewish artifacts on the Temple Mount, for years. The government has not intervened. A private organization, Shurat Ha-Din brought suit against the Waqf. Under Israeli law, the Attorney-General has 15 days to adopt the prosecution, itself, or let the private parties proceed. Attorney-Gen. Mazuz instead has urged the court to squelch the case on the grounds that it is not in the "public interest." No details forthcoming (IMRA, 4/7). "Not in the public interest" is the government's standard excuse for not prosecuting Arabs and police who attack Jews in the Territories. It used to be said that the government let the Waqf operate illegally because it was afraid that otherwise masses of Arabs would riot. (Then squelch the lawbreakers!) Then, however, the government turned heavily to appeasement of the Arabs and to anti-Zionism. Another reason is that a trial would expose government incompetence, adding another black mark to PM Olmert's dark record. It is typical of Israel (and of Jewish organizations in the US) to try to repress opposition rather than to convince it. JEWISH-ARAB DEMOGRAPHICS Israeli demographers failed to foresee heavy Jewish immigration, the decline in Israeli Arab birth rates, and the incline in Israeli Jewish birth rates. Whereas PM Olmert says that he favors withdrawals because of an alleged increasing proportion of Arabs in the area, there is an increasing proportion of Jews in the area. The Jewish birth rate in Israel surpasses the Arab one, as the Arab population ages. Arabs are emigrating from Gaza (Arutz-7, 4/2). Now imagine if Israel further reformed its economy and stopped coddling the Arabs and mistreating patriotic Jews, how many Jews would return to Israel! CONGRESS RECOGNIZES JEWISH REFUGEES Congress asked the President to mention Jewish refugees from Arab states, in international forums mentioning Arab refugees from the Jewish state (Arutz-7, 4/2). HAMAS PLOT Hamas organized a supposedly peaceful demonstration near the Gaza-Israel fence. It planted among the demonstrators some terrorists using the protest as cover for attacking Israeli soldiers. Israeli security officials foiled the plot and arrested one of the terrorists (Arutz-7, 4/2). W.H.O. ACCUSES ISRAEL; REFUTED The World Health Organization accused Israel of letting P.A. Arabs die by denying them access to medical care or making them wait for it. W.H.O. cited specific cases. Israel checked those cases. It found that most of the patients were granted permission to enter Israel for medical treatment, but some did not act on it. Deaths were from the diseases. Nine-tenths of applicants are granted permission, and the rest may go to Egypt or Jordan for treatment, if they wish. Since a number of Arabs apply in order to commit terrorism in Israel, Israel must check the bona fides. Any delay is the jihadists' fault (Arutz-7, 4/2). This is an old canard, like the one accusing Jews of poisoning wells (which the Arabs do and Arafat once tried to do). W.H.O. forgets that Israel is not obliged to offer medical services to an enemy population. One wonders why Israel does. It is too humane for its own good. JOINT PATROLS & PRISONER RELEASES A P.A. policeman on joint patrol with Israelis murdered one and kept shooting at others. Although sentenced for life, he anticipates early release in some deal with Israel, after which, he said, he would resume killing Israelis (IMRA, 4/2). Joint patrols with one's unscrupulous enemies? Release prisoners dedicated to repeating their crimes of religion? The folly is all the worse by its repetition. OLMERT REGIME DID NOT LEARN FROM LEBANON WAR PM Olmert led the country into a war for which his country was not prepared. After the war, the country's anti-chemical warfare kits were deemed obsolete. The government is in process of gathering them up to be refurbished. Meanwhile, the country is unprepared for chemical attacks, which Syria is likely to be contemplating making. Since the Cabinet voted to have the kits refurbished without scheduling the work, extensive delay is possible (IMRA, 4/2). Refurbishing should have begun after a reasonable amount were collected. That way, an increasing number of people would have gained protection during the process. The way the government is doing it, nobody is protected during the collection process. ISRAEL'S PASSIVE DEFENSE AGAIN SHOWN UP Israel does not root out the terrorists who fire rockets at Israel. Instead, it has a warning system that gives people 15 seconds to race into bomb shelters, let the devil take the hindmost. The shelters do not prevent property damage. The jihadists have been extending the range and accuracy of their rockets. Now Iran has been shipping mortars to Gaza, thanks to Egyptian failure to block the smuggling. The mortars are faster, leaving insufficient time to hide. They also wreak more damage (IMRA, 4/2). ROADBLOCKS REMOVED AGAIN, MURDER THERE, AGAIN ""Each removal of any roadblock is tantamount to gambling with Israelis' lives," he said. "No roadblock was positioned where it was without a very cogent reason. No roadblock is without clear security value. Each roadblock is there only because it's necessitated by indisputable security contingencies." So PM Olmert, told the Knesset Defense Committee two weeks before removing dozens of them. Where one had been, an attempted murderer got through, as, when it had been removed before, a murderer got through (IMRA, 4/2). Israelis die because Olmert doesn't say no to Rice and he fears international condemnation. Richard Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. His comments and analyses appear often on Think-Israel. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at richardshulman5@aol.com |
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REASONS TO BRING OLMERT TO TRIAL FOR TREASON
Posted by Emanuel A. Winston, April 24, 2008. |
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Recently Israeli Intelligence discovered that Syria, with assistance from North Korea, was building a plutonium nuclear reactor. Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was confronted with the evidence but, delayed a response as long as possible. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and the CIA were presented with irrefutable evidence but, she used her power of office to delay Israel from eliminating the Syrian/Korean reactor, lest it spoil her sophomoric plans for peace in a region that has never known peace. Despite the immediate danger to Israel and the region, Rice pressured a weak Olmert NOT to respond and to save an empty legacy for herself and President George W. Bush. Israel submitted evidence to the CIA, Bush and some Congressmen. The evidence was so overwhelming that Rice had to withdraw her childish plans for Israeli "restraint" even as she was protecting the Bush failed deal with North Korea –– in addition to the under-the-table talks with President Bashar Assad of Syria. Rice is an untrustworthy, dangerous liar through and through. But, there is a greater betrayal than merely a lying U.S. Secretary of State or a President hungry for recognition. It is the Prime Minister of the small State of Israel who has been thoroughly briefed on the hostile State of Syria building a plutonium-yielding nuclear reactor. Olmert's own generals had to force him to allow them to plan and carry out an attack to destroy the Syrian plant. After the Israeli Air Force completed its mission, Olmert and America dropped into total silence. The "secret" was miraculously NOT breached or breathed by any official or media source for the past 8 months. We now know that Olmert was in back-channel discussions to surrender to Syria the entire Golan Heights. These discussions continued by Olmert, Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Tzippi Livni in a greater frenzy, knowing that Syria was building a Plutonium Nuclear Reactor for no other reason than to destroy Israel. Olmert and his gang were hell-bent on assisting Syria recover the Golan, even at the almost certain risk of having Syria renege on any agreement reached. Olmert, Barak, Livni and the entire Kadima and Labor Parties have betrayed Israel's vital security to the greatest degree possible. At this very moment CIA Director Michael V. Hayden is briefing the American Congress on the perfidy of the North Koreans as Rice and Bush try to pretend that North Korea is living up to the terms of a badly flawed and failed agreement. While the U.S. can be harmed if such nuclear capability reaches Syria as well as other Muslim and Arab States who are rapidly becoming more Islamo-Fascist, the U.S. will not disappear in a radioactive cloud as could the minuscule Jewish State of Israel. Olmert, Barak, Livni and, no doubt, Shimon Peres seem to be prepared to sacrifice Israel for a mess of potage. If ever a Government should be tried for Treason, it is now. Knowing Syria's intent and then announcing that he (Olmert) was working to abandon the Golan Heights, Israel's largest water resource, Israel's security and sovereignty, is surely an act of betrayal and treason of the worst kind. This could be considered a "hanging offense" and such a trial should be implemented before any more damage can be done or any more Israeli blood spilled. 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). Contact him at gwinston@gwinston.interaccess.com |
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ISLAMOFASCISTS, FASHIONISTAS AND EUROTRASH
Posted by Moshe Phillips, April 24, 2008. |
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It is understandable if you have never heard of the Metro group of daily newspapers. What you do need to know is that there is yet another chain of newspapers whose biased coverage of news related to the Mideast conflict and the wider war on terror is just as disturbing as that of their well heeled cousins such as The New York Times, The Washington Post or The Philadelphia Inquirer. Additionally, you need to know that Metro papers reach more than 20 million daily readers worldwide and the number is growing rapidly. Metro is a 10 year old import from Sweden. Its U.S. editions are in Boston, New York and Philadelphia. Combined Metro's US Editions have a larger circulation than The Washington Post or the Chicago Tribune. Metro produces about 100 papers in 20 countries and has seven local editions in Canada. Metro's newspapers are free and aimed mainly at a commuter audience using mass transit. This is largely due in part to the questionable agreements between public mass transit agencies and Metro. It is not uncommon to see a large majority of readers on a bus or train in one of Metro's American cities reading the paper rather than a traditional paid daily. The Metro tabloid newspapers are reminiscent of the magazine-like format and content originated by USA Today. The March 25, 2008 U.S. Metro editions featured an article about the Arab headscarves widely known as keffiyehs. Harmless enough, right? In the hands of Metro the subject became a propaganda effort to romanticize Arab terrorists. The Philadelphia Metro used photos of Yasser Arafat and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terrorist Leila Khaled wearing keffiyehs to accompany their story. As background, Khaled was a leader the PFLP terrorist unit that hijacked TWA Flight 840 on August 29, 1969 and later blew it up. The PFLP it must be noted introduced hijacking to the Mideast conflict in 1968 with the taking of El Al Flight 426. Khaled, the terrorist, is introduced to Metro readers as a "fighter" with the PFLP and the article states that the keffiyeh gave her a "girl gangsta edge" and that photos of her "with a rifle in hand" became "part of feminist iconography." Arafat's picture and write-up do not include any background information at all on the PLO terror chief. Perhaps we should be thankful that the Metro's editorial staff seems to consider Arafat enough of a celebrity that no explanation was needed. The March 25, 2008 article is a part of a strange pattern by Metro of publishing one sided human interest stories that ignore the Israeli victims of Arab terror. Here are some other examples culled from February editions of Metro Philadelphia: February 6, 2008 A one paragraph snippet on the opinion page ran with the headline "Gaza love that falafel." It was about Egyptians buying falafel in Gaza after Hamas terrorists destroyed the border fence. There was no mention of Hamas in the snippet and the violation of international law was described as "the fall of a border wall." February 14, 2008 A photo showing sheep eating carnations was given the title "Gaza Strip Eat your heart out." The explanation with the picture read in part "Palestinian farmers had to dispose of their flower crop due to the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip..." No explanation of why Israel has "blockaded" Gaza is given. There is no mention of the deadly Kassam missile attacks on Israeli towns. February 15, 2008 An article titled "Despite Muslim law, Valentine's still a go" told how Gazans celebrated Valentine's Day despite a closed border with Israel. Hamas was benignly described as simply "militant" and the reason the border is closed was left unsaid. Another headline on the same day and page read "Israel prepares for vengeful violence." The article was actually about an Israeli security alert following the killing of a Hezbollah leader. From the headline you would think Israel was going on the offensive. The article itself leads the reader to assume that Israel assassinated Imad Mughniyeh, the Hezbollah leader. Israel formally denied responsibility for the killing. As the above example shows even "hard news" in Metro is shockingly distorted. Another example is a ridiculous March 7, 2008 Metro headline that told readers "Seminary Shooting kills 8 in Jerusalem." A casual reader may have been led to believe that the attack was a "school shooting" and not a terrorist atrocity. In the article the terrorist was termed simply "an attacker" and a "gunman" His terrorist attack was labeled a "militant attack." And the Hamas terrorist organization was called "Hamas militants." Metro refused to call a terrorist a terrorist and define his murderous attack. The subtle agenda of the Metro is clear: The bashing of Israel and the dissemination of an Orwellian view of terrorists. Who owns America's newspapers? What agenda do these foreign owners have? What does it mean for Israel that 1.2 million people in the United States are reading a daily newspaper with a twisted view towards Israel and Islamic terrorists? These are just some of the questions raised by Metro's bias. Moshe Phillips is a member of the Executive Committee of the Philadelphia Chapter of Americans For a Safe Israel –– AFSI. The chapter's new website is at: www.phillyafsi.com. |
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THE GOLAN, HERE WE GO AGAIN
Posted by Batya Medad, April 24, 2008. |
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It's hard to comprehend, but Olmert has joined Rabin, Barak and others of similar infamy in using the crucial Golan Heights as a "bargaining chip." Israel liberated the Golan Heights in the 1967 Six Days War. Until then, the Syrians used the Golan as their base of active terror operations against Israel's north. The victims of Syrian terror were the agricultural kibbutzim, the heartland of the Zionist Left. That's why immediately after the war, the Golan was rapidly settled with more agricultural communities. If I'm not mistaken, the Golan Heights and "eastern" Jerusalem were legally annexed to be considered sovereign Israel by the Knesset. That makes the use of them as "bargaining chips" illegal/seditious. Previous campaigns to cease Golan talks were successful, but the fact that Pandora's box was opened has left us in constant danger. Just because the previous anti-Golan Withdrawal campaigns were successful does not mean that we can relax, not at all. Each time it's brought up, it's more and more dangerous, like a cancer which returns, G-d forbid. The confidence of the gamblers grows with each attempt, and now they're hitting us on more than one front. The campaign against the division of Jerusalem has hit a stone wall, and nothing is done, besides powerless blogging like mine, stop the amputation of our Holy Biblical Land. So it's really no surprise that Olmert feels invincible. Don't give up. It's another test, and we have to pass. Remember: Issac wasn't sacrificed. He lived to marry and father children. We are descended from those children. Chag Kasher v'Sameach and Shabbat Shalom May You Have A Kosher and Joyful Holiday and A Sabbath Complete With All You Need Batya Medad lives in Shiloh.
She can be reached by email at
Shilohmuse@yahoo.com or visit her website
http://shilohmusings.blogspot.com/ or go to http://www.shilo.org.il
This article is archived at
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WHITE HOUSE STATEMENT ABOUT SYRIAN NUCLEAR REACTOR BUILT WITH N. KOREA
Posted by Shoshanna Walker, April 24, 2008. |
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"The Syrian regime supports terrorism, takes ac tion that destabilizes Lebanon, allows the transit of some foreign fighters into Iraq, and represses its own people. " (Dr. Aaron Lerner –– IMRA:) But there are all kinds of Israeli lefties with security backgrounds urging Israel to leave the Golan ASAP in return for a piece of paper. |
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For Immediate Release
White House News
Today, administration officials have briefed select Congressional committees on an issue of great international concern. Until Sept. 6, 2007, the Syrian regime was building a covert nuclear reactor in its eastern desert capable of producing plutonium. We are convinced, based on a variety of information, that North Korea assisted Syria's covert nuclear activities. We have good reason to believe that reactor, which was damaged beyond repair on Sept. 6 of last year, was not intended for peaceful purposes. Carefully hidden from view, the reactor was not configured for such purposes. In defiance of its international obligations, Syria did not inform the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of the construction of the reactor, and, after it was destroyed, the regime moved quickly to bury evidence of its existence. This cover-up only served to reinforce our confidence that this reactor was not intended for peaceful activities. We are briefing the IAEA on this intelligence. The Syrian regime must come clean before the world regarding its illicit nuclear activities. The Syrian regime supports terrorism, takes action that destabilizes Lebanon, allows the transit of some foreign fighters into Iraq, and represses its own people. If Syria wants better relations with the international community, it should put an end to these activities. We have long been seriously concerned about North Korea's nuclear weapons program and its proliferation activities. North Korea's clandestine nuclear cooperation with Syria is a dangerous manifestation of those activities. One way we have chosen to deal with this problem is through the Six Party Framework. Through this process we are working with our partners to achieve the verifiable denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. The United States is also committed to ensuring that North Korea does not further engage in proliferation activities. We will work with our partners to establish in the Six Party Framework a rigorous verification mechanism to ensure that such conduct and other nuclear activities have ceased. The construction of this reactor was a dangerous and potentially destabilizing development for the region and the world. This is particularly true because it was done covertly and in violation of the very procedures designed to reassure the world of the peaceful intent of nuclear activities. This development also serves as a reminder that often the same regimes that sponsor proliferation also sponsor terrorism and foster instability, and cooperate with one another in doing so. This underscores that the international community is right to be very concerned about the nuclear activities of Iran and the risks those activities pose to the stability of the Middle East. To confront this challenge, the international community must take further steps, beginning with the full implementation of the United Nations Security Council resolutions dealing with Iranian nuclear activities. The United States calls upon the international community to redouble our common efforts to ending these activities and preventing the spread of weapons of mass destruction in this critical region. Contact Shoshanna Walker by email at rosewalk@concentric.net |
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MAYORS ASK PERES TO PARDON JEWISH PRISONERS
Posted by Hillel Fendel, April 24, 2008. |
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(IsraelNN.com) The campaign to free Jewish "nationalist" prisoners is heating up. The Honenu civil rights organization has organized 11 mayors –– so far –– to ask Pres. Peres to pardon them. Eleven mayors of towns and local councils in Judea and Samaria have signed a letter to President Shimon Peres asking him to pardon some 20 Jewish prisoners convicted of nationalist crimes. The letter states, "We are nearing the 60th anniversary of the founding of the State of Israel," the letter states. "These are days of unity and appeasement... We know that various requests have reached your table to pardon prisoners to mark the 60th anniversary milestone, and we assume that your honor is likely to respond positively to at least some of them." "It is no secret that for years, Jewish nationalist prisoners have been held in jail for various crimes they committed during periods of security crises, out of deep personal and communal distress. We are of the opinion that in the framework of the atmosphere of national reconciliation of this 60th year, and given that they have expressed regret for their actions, these prisoners should be pardoned, permitted to return to their homes, families, and small children, and to thus rehabilitate themselves." The letter has thus far been signed by: Dubi Tal, Jordan Valley Regional Council
The letter also alludes to the imbalance between Arab and Jewish prisoners, in that thousands of the former have been freed early over the years: "It is no secret that even in the past year, hundreds of terrorists have been freed. We oppose the release of terrorists from prison, but now that they have been freed, we ask that the Jewish prisoners be released as well, in order to correct the discriminatory policy against them." Last week, six of the prisoners submitted a request to be pardoned. One of them, Shlomi Dvir, Earlier this week, two women –– the wife of one of the prisoners (a mother of seven) and the fiancée of another –– met with Public Security Minister Avi Dichter and asked him to support their request for a pardon. They reported afterwards that Dichter told them straight out, "We have a political interest in releasing the Arabs, but we have no such interest in making similar gestures towards the Jewish prisoners." The women said they left the meeting feeling "humiliated."
Shmuel Medad, head of the Honenu was established several years ago to help citizens whose spontaneous acts of self-defense in life-threatening situations had embroiled them in legal trouble. In addition, Honenu hired lawyers, at group-discounted rates, to represent the hundreds of youths who were charged with crimes related to their protests of the Disengagement/expulsion.
Medad explained in a letter that this governmental attitude is much more harmful and corrupt than stealing money or the like: "It is an attitude of abandonment –– an attitude that produces the abandonment of Pollard, the release of terrorists, the removal of others from the list of wanted terrorists, the giving of weapons and uniforms to [Fatah], the abandonment of the MIA's Katz, Feldman and Baumol from the [1982] battle of Sultan Yaaqub, the forsaking of Ron Arad, Madhat Yusuf, Shalit, Goldwasser, and Regev, and many more in the past and –– if there is no change –– in the future as well. Not only that, but the government is now continuing this approach by negotiating the expulsion of Jews on a scale of 12 times larger than what happened in Gush Katif. And all because there is no 'interest...'"
Among the prisoners are two brothers who planned an
anti-Disengagement road blocking in 2005 using a burning car; three
who were convicted of conspiring to attack an Arab girls' school,
though the bomb never went off and they claimed that they had only
intended for it to be a scare; Haggai Amir, who had four years tacked
onto his Rabin-assassination related sentence for planning partisan
attacks against Arabs in defense of Yesha towns; David Emouyal of
Rishon LeTzion, who is serving an 18-year prison sentence for having
shot and wounded two Arabs in response to the murder of 8-month-old
Shalhevet Pass in Hevron; Ami Popper, who killed 7 Arab workers in
response to a series of Arab terrorist attacks (he was originally
sentenced to life, but the late President Ezer Weizman reduced this to
40 years; Popper's wife and son were recently killed in a car
accident, and his two remaining sons, with no parents to look after
them, have been given over to the foster care of a generous Jerusalem
family); and others.
Hillel Fendel, who is Senior New-Editor for Arutz Sheva
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CHESED CHESED CHESED: MI KI'AMCHO YISROEL?
Posted by , April , 2008. |
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This was written by the editor of Yeshiva World and it
appeared April 18, 2008 on
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Mi Ki'amcho Yisroel! That's all the words I can find to describe my feelings about the amount of Chesed that is going on around the world right now. There are organizations delivering packages to the needy. These packages include: potatoes, eggs, apples, oranges, lemons, grapefruits, onions, matzoh, grape juice, wine, and anything else needed to make Pesach. Depending on the family size, they receive different amounts. No one is left hungry! Trucks are being driven, and boxes are being shlepped by hard working Yeshiva Bochurim (giving up time from their three week Bain Hazmanim). There are organizations who give out vouchers to the needy for suits, shaitels, shoes, shirts etc. There are organizations giving out huge amounts of money throughout the world. There are organizations who can send girls to your home to babysit your children, or to clean your home. There is a person in Eretz Yisroel who purchased a matzoh bakery to be able to supply families with matzoh for $8 dollars a kilo, as opposed to the regular $50 a kilo. The list is endless.... I am no Rov, Rabbi, Teacher, Preacher, Rosh Yeshiva, Rebbe. I am just the YWN Editor, and I'm not giving a Shabbos Hagadol Drasha. I just wanted to express my Hakoras Hatov to the thousands of Chesed organizations, Baalei Tzedakah, and ordinary Yidden throughout the world, who are helping make the Yom Tov of Pesach go a little easier for others. Instead of the negative, lets think of the positive. In this Zechus, let us hope that THIS year will in fact be the Z'man Cheiruseynu! YW Editor. Contact Shoshanna Walker by email at rosewalk@concentric.net |
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JERUSALEM: FIRST, NOT THE LAST
Posted by Shoshanna Walker, April 23, 2008. |
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Samson Blinded has posted a new item, 'Jerusalem: first, not the
last'. You can leave a comment at
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Israeli conservatives act like ostriches: Olmert soothes their conscience by promising to relegate the Jerusalem issue to the last stage in peace talks with Palestinians. It's not even important that Olmert lies and, as Palestinians never fail to announce, negotiate Jerusalem now. Leaving the core issues for the last stage in negotiations is fundamentally wrong. Would you discuss a delivery time for the furniture set if you don't agree with the seller on price? In our situation, the seller doesn't even want to sell. Leaving the core issues for the later assures that Israel would give way on them, as the entire pressure now dispersed over several subjects will be concentrated on the issue of Jerusalem. The story would go thus: "Okay, we have agreed with Palestinians on just everything else, the peace is so close. Should we refuse peace because of the Arab-populated Jerusalem areas which we the Jews cannot live in, anyway?" Once all other issues are settling, partitioning of Jerusalem will be passed automatically. Neurotic Jews can rebel and refuse such peace, sublimating into the issue of Jerusalem all the distrust they feel to their government, but if counting on that, then what the peace process is for? Israeli policy of piecemeal concessions is devastating. Jews give away their bargaining chips one by one, lose bargaining power, and have the international pressure on the "leftover" issues increase. Back in 1972, Israel rebuffed Sadat's peace offer (whether realistic or not) of comprehensive peace with Arabs in return for Sinai; the Palestinians were ignored. Four decades later, Israel will find herself without the Sinai, the Golan Heights, and the West Bank –– but still not at peace with Arabs. Almost every Muslim leader have already declared that even ceding the West Bank and Jerusalem to Palestinians would not lead to immediate peace with Arab countries. And even where Israel has peace, there is no normalization: common Egyptians and Jordanians hate Israel now just as before we signed the peace treaties. Iraq and Kuwait, two countries under the US foot, flatly refused peace with Israel. Iran cannot be expected to sign peace with the Zionist entity even if Palestinians get a state. Saudi Arabia is the last country Israel wants to be at peace with, as the flow of Saudi oil money into Israel, already considerable, will skyrocket as Saudis buy out the Holy Land. Hezbollah-dominated Lebanon cares not a bit about the Palestinians and would not embrace Zionists even if Arafat is re-buried on the Temple Mount, as he might be if the Palestinians get Jerusalem. Peace with Syria would spell a military fiasco for Israel, as Syria will upgrade its arsenals under the protection of peace agreement like Egypt does –– to strike later with vengeance. Negotiations over Jerusalem with Fatah are puzzling. British hunted down Jewish terrorist groups Etzel and Lehi instead of negotiating with them. Fatah members continue attacking Jews, Fatah pays salaries to Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades with the money dutifully transferred by Israel, and in especially odd occurrence, a bodyguard of Ahmed Qurei, a top Palestinian negotiator, was killed in a firefight with IDF. The peace process is fraud. Israel is not at war with Palestinians –– or if we are, then bomb them out of existence rather than supplying them water and electricity. Palestinian threat to Israel is laughable: just ban the Arab migrant workers, and suicide terrorism, already happening just once a year, would almost cease. At any rate, Arab terrorism claimed many times less Jewish lives than ordinary car accidents. Ending Kassam and Katyusha rocket fire is also a no-brainer –– not with the absurdly expensive Iron Dome system, but with the common police measure of invading Gaza once a year or so, killing a couple of thousand Palestinian guerrillas, damaging their infrastructure to the Bronze Age level, and enjoying calm for another few months. Banning the UNRWA and other aid sources from Gaza and the West Bank would be a much greater service to peace than ceding the Arabs Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and Haifa together: Palestinians should care about employment rather than live on foreign aid and use the ample idle time for radical activities. Paupers in search of food won't have time for terrorism. Contact Shoshanna Walker by email at rosewalk@concentric.net |
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GOING NOWHERE FAST
Posted by Sergio Tessa (Hadar), April 23, 2008. |
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This is by Rabbi David Bar-Hayim of the Machon Shilo organization –– Torah La'am VeLaaretz |
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Clueless Leaders Israel is lost and directionless. Its political leaders lack vision and aspire to nothing. Judaism is lost and directionless. It rabbinical leaders lack vision and aspire to nothing. Revisionist leader Ze'ev Jabotinsky once illustrated his criticism of mainstream Zionism with the following analogy: "I see a man limping down the street, using only one leg, even though it is apparent that nothing is wrong with the other one. I turn to him and ask: 'Why don't you walk on both legs?' He replies: 'Is there something the matter with the one that I am using?'" Jabotinsky referred of course to the policy of "one more dunam, one more goat", whereby the Zionist Establishment focused on building up the land piecemeal, living from day to day, all the while refusing to enunciate its vision, the goal for which it was ostensibly striving: a sovereign state for the Jewish people in their historical homeland within clearly defined borders. Thus the most fundamental issues –– what kind of state were the Jewish people demanding, where would its borders be, and within what time frame? –– remained unaddressed. Jabotinsky's insight was that the leadership preferred it that way, like a man who opts to use only one of his legs. The result of this (lack of) policy was that the typical Zionist spoke fervently of the Jewish people's right to the Land of Israel but could not explain, even to himself, where the borders of his beloved homeland lay or on what basis he defined that territory. In the end, observed Shabtai Ben-Dov, it was the acceptance of the armistice lines of 1948 that "clarified" for most Zionists where the Land of Israel for which they had fought actually was. It was only "logical", therefore, for one time Education Minister Shulamit Aloni to refer to Hebron as "Hutz Laaretz" (overseas), and for the post-Six-Day-War Left to view a return to the very heart of our homeland as an "occupation". I once came face to face with the results of just such a Zionist education. The year was 1993 and I was doing reserve duty on the Jordanian border. Four of us were in a command car patrolling the border, and the discussion turned to then Prime Minister Rabin's stated willingness to negotiate with the Syrians about relinquishing the Golan Heights. The driver announced that he supported handing over the Golan for peace, at which point I asked him: "Tell me, all other considerations aside, to whom does the Golan belong, us or them?" He thought for a moment and replied truthfully "I have no idea." Why would he? Was he, a product of the State school system established by Ben-Gurion, ever taught what territory the Jewish people claimed and why? Israel's political leaders are just like that driver: they truly don't know where we belong or why, nor where we are supposed to be headed. Everything is negotiable, nothing is clear, the future is a black hole. Israel lost its way not in 1967 but in the 20's, 30's and 40's, before there was an Israel, by thinking small, by refusing to see the big picture, by denying the Jewish nation's destiny. By choosing mediocrity over greatness. Israel and Torah Judaism: Missing in Action The same can be said for Judaism. Have you ever noticed how some religious Jews refer to themselves as "Lithuanians"? Or that there is a Jerusalem suburb named "Poland Heights"? Treat the reality of over 5 million Jews living as a sovereign nation in their homeland for the first time in 2000 years as a continuation of Dvinsk, Minsk or Pinsk; insist that Jews in the Land of Israel must all behave, in terms of their customs and Halachic practice, as if they were still in Warsaw, Sanna or Marakesh; preach that the divisions of the Diaspora must be maintained today and for all time, thus perpetuating a seriously flawed Galuth mentality indefinitely; convince yourself that the Judaism of the Galuth is the real McCoy, that there is nowhere to go from here –– and that's precisely where you'll go. Nowhere. No greater purpose. Nothing. When the Beth HaWa'adh beth din (Jewish court) of Machon Shilo announced last year that all Jews in Israel may consume kitniyoth (rice, corn, legumes etc.) during Pesah, some thought that it was all about doing whatever is convenient. Not so. It's about getting Torah Judaism back on track. At the core of any authentic conception of Torah Judaism is its Halachic system. Halacha is the practical implementation and realization of those values and concepts that the Torah teaches and that the Jewish nation holds dear. An Halachic system always reflects the philosophy and vision that a particular ideology aspires to actualize in the real world. Halacha is never neutral; it is either a help or a hindrance. It either drives the Jewish people upwards and onwards, or it weighs it down and holds it back. One who refrains from eating rice, or soy beans, or corn starch on Pesah is not a better Jew than one who does. Halachically there is no question that it is permissible. On the other hand, one is not required to consume these items on Pesah, or at any time during the year. So what's the problem? It focuses the mind on a non-issue. And the more meaningless Pesah stringencies are promoted, the more meaningless Judaism becomes. Galuth Mode or Geulah Mode? Human beings are limited. We cannot be different people at one and the same time. A Jew can function in either Galuth mode or Geulah mode; you can't have both. If we concern ourselves with maintaining our Galuth-based identities, we have no time or inclination to wonder how it is that each Pesah we beseech Hashem that next year we might participate in the Pesah sacrifice and yet do nothing whatever to actualize this deep-seated aspiration in the real world. We have to make a choice: authentic, full-flavoured Torah, or a pale, watered-down substitute. Judaism's rabbinical leaders are just like that reserve duty driver: they truly do not know who and where we are or where we are supposed to be headed. They have no clue how to move on to the next stage. They are unsure of themselves, vague and uncertain about everything, preferring the familiar, downtrodden Galuth version of the Torah for the majestic, vibrant and uplifting Torah of the Land of Israel, the Judaism of Abraham, Moses, David and the Maccabees. Little wonder that when Jews once again controlled the Temple Mount in 1967, the rabbinical establishment had nothing to say other than to forbid all Jews from going there. If the truth be told, they breathed a sigh of relief when it was tossed back to the Moslems like an unwanted bone. Judaism lost its way not in 1967 but 2500 years ago when the Jewish nation declined to take up the offer of the Persian emperor Cyrus to return to its homeland. By thinking small, by refusing to see the big picture, by denying the Jewish nation's destiny. By choosing mediocrity over greatness, Galuth over Geulah. From that day to this, as R. Yehuda HaLevi wrote in his masterpiece The Kuzari (2:24), "our prayers for redemption are like the mindless cawings of rooks and ravens". If we think small, we shall indeed be so, particularly in the eyes of our enemies. If we think big, we shall indeed be great –– in the eyes of Hashem, in our own eyes, and in the eyes of the whole world. Sergio Tessa can be reached at Hadar-Israel@verizon.net. |
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NEW SPY CASE SEEN AS ATTEMPT TO DELAY POLLARD RELEASE
Posted by Hillel Fendel, April 23, 2008. |
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Following the news that an 83-year-old former US Army engineer, Ben-Ami Kadish of New Jersey, had been arrested on charges of spying for Israel 25 years ago, the Justice for Jonathan Pollard organization feels abandoned by the Israeli government once again. Speaking with Arutz-7's Yedidya HaCohen, Esther Pollard said, "I feel great disappointment at the Government of Israel. Everyone in the media comes to me and hears what they should be hearing from Ehud Olmert –– namely, that this entire [Kadish] case has nothing to do with Jonathan Pollard, that it does not cancel out the fact that Pollard deserves immediate release, and that the government of Israel is obligated to work for this goal." A statement released by the Justice for Jonathan Pollard organization states that the U.S. "has put Israel on the defensive once again, with breaking 'news' in the American media accusing Israel of running a spy in the US prior to the Pollard case... It is not clear for how many years the U.S. has been sitting on this 'breaking news' story waiting for the right moment to hurl new accusations against Israel, and thus falsely and unfairly target Jonathan Pollard by association." The statement notes that "unlike other espionage cases in the US, which are dealt with on a case-by-case basis, every accusation against Israel is yielded like a club against Jonathan Pollard –– as if the 23 years he has served is somehow not enough to make up for all of the sins of Israel." "It's Up to Olmert" When asked by Israel's Channel One TV News what impact this latest story will have on chances for her husband's release, Esther Pollard responded, "It will have whatever impact Prime Minister Olmert chooses for it to have. To date, Olmert has still not made an official request for Jonathan's release. It is time for the Prime Minister to discharge his legal and moral responsibility to save the life of an Israeli agent in peril, who has already served a grossly disproportionate sentence." She noted what she said was the "suspicious timing of the breaking 'news' story," just prior to President Bush's anticipated visit to the region for Israel's 60th anniversary. Several news analysts have made this connection as well, seeing the release of the story as an attempt to prevent Bush from possibly pardoning Pollard in time for the upcoming Presidential visit. "There is solid support for Jonathan's release," Mrs. Pollard said. "Every senior American official familiar with the case and the secret files –– people like James Woolsey, former head of the CIA, and Senator Dennis DeConcini, former head of the Senate Intelligence Committee at the time of Jonathan's arrest –– have been on record for years saying it is time to release Jonathan Pollard. There is no excuse that trumps the 23 years that Jonathan has already served in American prisons." "My husband should not have to pay the price for this latest case," Esther told HaCohen. "What, 23 years in prison are not enough? Olmert should say clearly that the cases are not connected. It is hard for me that after 23 years, we are once again abandoned, and that no one stands up for him." Mrs. Pollard urged the Prime Minister not to be deterred by this "blatant attempt to put Israel on the defensive, and to simply do the right thing: Bring Jonathan home now, alive, in time for Israel's 60th anniversary!" Hillel Fendel, who is Senior New-Editor for Arutz Sheva
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FREE SPEECH UPHELD AGAINST JIHAD; MEDIA DISTORTION; ARABS WON'T STOP IRAN
Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 23, 2008. |
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P.A. CORRUPTION Different top P.A. leaders are accused of massive corruption. They stole public funds. (That was Arafat's #1 Or #2 goal for setting up the P.A.) One replaced medicine with placebos and sold the medicine at high prices (Arutz-7, 3/30). Where do they think they are, in China? Are these the people Rice and Olmert think will defeat Hamas? WHAT TACTIC IS LEGITIMATE? B'Tselem, a pro-Arab "civil rights" organization in Israel, has condemned terrorism. It did not condemn Arab attacks on Israeli soldiers (Arutz-7, 3/30). After all, the P.A. has signed peace agreements with Israel. The Arab could negotiate. Before the wars over it, the Land was set aside for Jewish development, but the Arabs committed aggression against it and attempted genocide. The Arabs have no right to fight. NEW YORK LEGISLATURE UPHOLDS FREE SPEECH Foreign Muslims in favorable jurisdictions, such as London, sue Americans for libel, to squelch their revelations about Muslim aggression. Many defendants cannot afford the legal costs, so they give in. The rules are stacked against defense, so although the sued authors and publishers are not libeling, they may lose anyway. Dr. Ehrenfeld is a New Yorker who did not seek the British market for her book, but when two copies showed up there, an Arab whose avocation is suing to repress criticism of Islam sued her. He won a sizeable judgment. She petitioned a US court. It found that current law does not protect American Constitutional rights from foreign jurisdictions. The court suggested she appeal to the State legislature. The Legislature unanimously passed a bill that finds foreign defamation judgments unenforceable here unless the foreign system allows the same rights of freedom of speech and press as America's. The bill allows the American defendant an appeal to court here. This protects Americans from false charges and unfair legal procedures abroad. It permits Americans to proclaim the truth, an important weapon in defense against Islam's drive to conquer. Will Gov. Paterson sign the bill? (Ehrenfeld, 3/31.) ISRAEL REVEALS MORE ABOUT RAID ON SYRIA PM Olmert revealed that Israel's raid on Syria destroyed a nuclear facility that N. Korea was developing. N. Korea had promised not to proliferate its nuclear technology. When asked, it lied about the facility (IMRA, 3/31). TRAVEL RESTRICTIONS Sec. Rice keeps demanding that Israel ease travel restrictions on P.A. Arabs. She knows that terrorists will take advantage of the changes to attack Israelis. One solution is to place travel restrictions on Rice. It would save innocent lives. MEDIA DISTORTION The NY Times seems to turn every national issue into an opportunity to condemn Pres. Bush, right or wrong. A recent editorial noted that he was dickering with N. Korea over how much of its nuclear activities it must disclose, in order to get subsidies in return for dismantling its nuclear weapons facilities. The editorial said he had wasted the prior six years by refusing to negotiate with N. Korea. What about that editorial is true? It is true that Bush once said it didn't pay to negotiate with N. Korea. Considering that it has a maniacal leader who breaks all his agreements and promises in order to pursue nuclear weaponry while his people starve, Bush is right. On the other hand, Bush did undertake negotiations with N. Korea. As with Iraq and Iran, N. Korea used the negotiations to gain time. It also used them to get subsidies while evading its own commitments. When the US wasn't itself negotiating, the US was prompting other countries, friendlier with N. Korea, to negotiate. Viz. the six-party talks in 2005. The editorial is misleading. The newspaper's political bias distorts the news. National security should be more important to it than dissembling in order to make political points. In my opinion, military strikes must be an option, or negotiation with fanatical regimes cannot succeed. We cannot persuade fanatics against their course of aggression. They have no scruples about agreements. We are fools to take their word for anything. Bush is aware of this in regard to Iraq, Iran, and N. Korea, though perhaps not in regard to the Palestinian Arabs. The Times appears to be naïve about them all. The Times has a record of being duped by dictators (Hitler, Stalin, Castro, Ortega, and Muslim ones). It sometimes sympathizes with them. Oddly, it thinks of itself as having principles. WESTERN MISUNDERSTANDING OF ISLAMISTS Western commentators often don't understand totalitarianism. When Iran and Hizbullah say they want to eliminate Israel, the commentators treat the statements as if mere propaganda. They don't understand that the Islamists are fanatical, take ideas to their ideologically extreme, and mean the worst of what they say. RICE WRESTS ANOTHER CONCESSION FROM ISRAEL She pressed Israel's Defense Minister to stop opposing P.A. control of the Gaza-Egypt border, if the P.A. officials are not associated with militias (IMRA, 3/31). Being not associated with militias is a fig leaf. The P.A. police and the leaders are as jihadist as Fatah and Hamas. When Abbas controlled the border, he let arms be smuggled in. Rice knows that. She doesn't care that her policy will bring more war. She relentlessly presses Israel for fatal concessions to the Arabs. She wants Israel shrunken and weaker. If Bolton were Sec. of State, it would be different. Liberals maligned him, leaving the anti-Zionists firmly entrenched in the State Dept.. CAN'T EXPECT ARABS TO STOP IRAN Egypt and S. Arabia oppose Iranian hegemony. They also oppose Israeli existence. Given a choice between the two, they support Iranian proxies against Israel. Hence they snub Syria at an Arab summit for its subservience to Iran, but let arms into Gaza and Iranian influence be exerted over Hamas. The US wants Arab help in checking Iran. It seeks their approval by getting Israeli concessions for the P.A., including Hamas, with which the US negotiates indirectly. Sen. Clinton concurs. She claims that the Clinton Administration's Oslo accords quieted the Arabs down. The facts prove otherwise. By empowering terrorists, Oslo revived terrorism and poverty, leading to the Oslo wars. Indeed, the Oslo and Annapolis processes made the Palestinian issue more prominent among the Arabs, and sentiment turned against the US. What should the US do? Stop helping Palestinian Arab terrorists. Stop relying upon Egypt and S. Arabia. Instead, the US should strengthen Lebanon and Iraq so they can oppose Iran and its proxies. It should make sure that Israel is prepared for its next war with those proxies (Caroline Glick in IMRA, 3/31). The problem with getting the US to stop helping terrorists against Israel is that, like Egypt, the State Dept. would rather weaken Israel than Iran. Sec. Rice devotes herself almost entirely to that. The world has other problems. WORLD ASSEMBLY OF MUSLIM YOUTH The Assembly demanded censorship of a Dutch film against the Koran for "insulting" their religion (IMRA, 3/31). Can't take it? Why don't they show any errors in the film? Why must be become censorious like them? Who will judge such films? ISRAELI ARABS PICK ON JAFFA JEWS Arabs in Jaffa have been bullying Jews there for years, without police intervention. An old woman said it got worse for her recently when an Arab first started spitting on her and then beat her up badly. The assailant comes from a criminal family that controls parts of the city and somehow gets police complaints removed without investigation. "The attack on Lilian Vaknin is just one story in a growing number of Arab attacks on Jews and Jewish property in recent years. The number of Arab Israelis involved in the attacks has grown exponentially. Throughout the Negev in the south and the Galilee in the north, and in mixed Arab-Jewish cities like Haifa, Lod and Yafo, Jewish cars are attacked with rocks, Jewish women are molested, Jewish farmers are terrorized, and police and firemen are attacked." A cattleman said, "While the IDF defends the country's borders from enemies, the country's land is being taken away from us –– and no one is doing anything about it, including the government..." (Arutz-7, 3/31.) There is no excuse for the government's failure to protect its Jewish citizens. MA'AN NEWS AGENCY BIASED The Ma'an news agency, run by Arabs, calls itself independent. However, it described the case of the Arab with two knives attacked Jews at a hitchhiking post in Judea-Samaria, without mentioning his knives or his attack. Ma'an gave as biased a report as the PLO news agency (IMRA, 4/1). OLMERT IGNORES CRITICISM "MK Netanyahu gave an excellent, detailed presentation citing both Olmert and Barak's disastrously wrong predictions regarding the consequences of policies they have advocated in the past while noting the warnings Netanyahu and others made that proved to be true. He explained how the very same mistakes in analysis of the past were being repeated at this time and outlined what actions he believes are needed in order to address Israel's challenges. Netanyahu also protested the absence of any serious substantive reply by the Olmert team to the arguments raised against their doomed and destructive policies." PM Olmert and his coalition did not reply. Olmert earlier had said discussion was pointless (IMRA, 4/2). ARABS WANT TO CLOSE SECURITY COUNCIL MEETINGS Council and Arab condemnation of extremists embarrasses Arabs (IMRA, 4/2). Richard Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. His comments and analyses appear often on Think-Israel. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at richardshulman5@aol.com |
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SUPPORT FOR A PALESTINIAN STATE IS SOFT AND RELUCTANT
Posted by Yoram Ettinger, April 23, 2008. |
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1. Support –– among Israeli Jews –– for the proposed Palestinian state ("Two States Solution") is soft and reluctant, according to a March 31-April 1 poll conducted by the Tel Aviv University Center For Peace Research. 2. The establishment of the proposed Palestinian state is supported by 68%, many of whom –– other than the Israel's traditional Left –– subordinate their security and historical concerns to their demographic concern. However, the demographic scare has been debunked by the Bennett Zimmerman-led American-Israel Demographic Research Group (AIDRG), as summarized below. 3. 55% of Israeli Jews define Judea & Samaria as "Liberated Territory," compared with 32% who consider it "Occupied Territory," in defiance of a 15 year old Political-Correctness promoted by Israel's government, media, academic and k-12 education systems. 4. 57% of Israeli Jews do not accept the "Green Line" as Israel's border, compared with 23% who accept it. 5. 49%:43% oppose an agreement, which entails painful concessions –– a code name for substantial withdrawals. 6. 47%:40% of Israeli Jews consider the 1993 Oslo Accord a mistake. 7. 75% of Israeli Jews don't believe that negotiation would lead to an agreement with the Palestinians. 75% believe that even if an agreement would be concluded, the Palestinians would not consider it an end to their conflict with Israel. 8. Most Israeli Jews oppose the tangible –– potentially lethal –– consequences of the "Two State Solution." Their soft & reluctant support of the "Two State Solution" has been based on unfounded demographic fatalism. It has benefited from the absence of a systematic, full scale educational media campaign, highlighting historical, security and demographic aspects of Judea & Samaria mountain ridges (the "Golan Heights" of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and the 9-15 mile sliver along the Mediterranean, surrounded by the conflict-ridden, volatile, violent, non-compliant Arab Mideast, which is yet to experience inter-Arab peace). Happy Passover,
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 |
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FRENCH JEWS –– WHAT IS HAPPENING IN FRANCE
Posted by Avodah, April 23, 2008. |
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This was written by Brenda H. Mitchell, Executive Assistant to the Rabbis, Temple Sinai, Atlanta, GA 30327. Contact her at bmitchell@templesinaiatlanta.org |
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I received this post from a friend in NY. One of his friends is living in France and posted this to him with the request that he distribute it to his American friends. My friend prefaces with: "Once again, the real news in France is conveniently not being reported as it should. To give you an idea of what's going on in France where there are now between 5 and 6 million Muslims and about 600,000 Jews, here is an email that came fr om a Jew living in France. Please read!" "Will the world say nothing –– again –– as it did in Hitler's time?", he writes, "I AM A JEW –– therefore I am forwarding this to everyone on all my e-mail lists. I will not sit back and do nothing." Nowhere have the flames of anti-Semitism burned more furiously than in France: In Lyon, a car was rammed into a synagogue and set on fire. In Montpellier, the Jewish religious center was firebo mbed; so were synagogues in Strasbourg and Marseilles; so was a Jewish school in Creteil –– all recently. A Jewish sports club in Toulouse was attacked with Molotov cocktails, and on the statue of Alfred Dreyfus in Paris, the words "Dirty Jew" were painted. In Bondy, 15 men beat up members of a Jewish football team with sticks and metal bars. The bus that takes Jewish children to school in Aubervilliers has been attacked three times in the last 14 months. According to the Police, metropolitan Paris has seen 10 to 12 anti-Jewish incidents PER DAY in the past 30 days Walls in Jewish neighborh oods have been defaced with slogans proclaiming "Jews to the gas chambers" and "Death to the Jews." A gunman opened fire on a kosher butcher's shop (and, of course, the butcher) in Toulouse, France; a Jewish couple in their 20's were beaten up by five men in Villeurbanne, France The woman was pregnant; a Jewish school was broken into and vandalized in Sarcelles, France. This was just in the past week. So I call on you, whether you are a fellow Jew, a friend, or merely a person with the capacity and desire to distinguish decency from depravity, to do, at least, these three simple things: First, care enough to stay informed. Don't ever let yourself become deluded into thinking that this is not your fight. I remind you of what Pastor Neimoller said in World War II: "First they came for the Communists, and I didn't speak up, because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up, because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up, because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me. Second, boycott France and French products. Only the Arab countries are more toxically anti-Semitic and, unlike them, France exports more than just oil and hatred. So boycott their wines and their perfumes. Boycott their clothes and their foodstuff s. Boycott their movies. Definitely boycott their shores. If we are resolved we can exert amazing pressure and, whatever else we may know about the French, we most certainly know that they are like a cobweb in a hurricane in the face of we ll-directed pressure. Third, send this along to your family, your friends, and your co-workers. Think of all of the people of good conscience that you know and let them know that you and the people that you care about need their help. The number one bestselling book in France is...."September 11: The Frightening Fraud," which argues that no plane ever hit the Pentagon. Please Pass This On, Let's not let history repeat itself, thank you for your time and consideration. Contact Avodah at avodah15@aol.com |
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MUSLIM ANTI-SEMITISM 'STRATEGIC THREAT'
Posted by Shoshanna Walker, April 23, 2008. |
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This was written by Haviv Rettig and it appeared yesterday in the
Jerusalem Post
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Muslim anti-Semitism is growing in scope and extremism, to the point that it has become a credible strategic threat for Israel, according to a 180-page report produced for Israeli policymakers by the semi-official Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center (ITIC) and obtained exclusively by The Jerusalem Post ahead of its Tuesday release. According to the report, by educating generations of Muslims with a deep animus toward Israel and Jews, this anti-Semitism, actively promulgated by many states in the region, holds back the peace process and normalization efforts between Israel and Muslim countries. It also forms the intellectual justification for an eliminationist political program. "This isn't ordinary prejudice," explained ITIC director Col. (res.) Dr. Reuven Erlich, formerly of the IDF's Intelligence Directorate, who heads the team of researchers that produced the report. "This prejudice is evil because it isn't theoretical. It is ideological incitement by states and organizations with the practical means of translating it into action." Following on a similar study produced in 2004, the report is a comprehensive examination of anti-Semitism in the Muslim world, with emphasis on Iran and Arab states. It is also an insight into the perception of the threat within the Israeli intelligence establishment. The ITIC operates under the aegis of the Israel Intelligence Heritage and Commemoration Center (IICC), the official commemoration agency for the fallen of Israel's intelligence services. The IICC is chaired by former Mossad head Efraim Halevy and maintains close contact with Israel's intelligence community. The ITIC's reports are widely read among Israeli policymakers. Among the report's most worrying findings is the growth over the past three decades of uniquely Muslim roots to older European versions of anti-Semitism. Without discounting classical Christian Europe's canards regarding secret Jewish conspiracies, the ritual slaughter of non-Jewish children and other allegations of Jewish evil, anti-Semitism in the Muslim world increasingly finds its own, Islamic reasons for anti-Jewish hatred through new interpretations of Islamic history and scripture. From the Koranic story of a Jewess who poisoned Muhammad, to the troubled relations between Muhammad and the Jewish tribes of Arabia, radical Islamist groups and thinkers have been using extreme anti-Semitic rhetoric that has grown increasingly popular with the Muslim public, particularly in Iran and the Arab states. Using well-known Koranic texts, these groups have been mapping out the Jews' "innate negative attributes" and teaching a paradigm of permanent struggle between Muslims and Jews. The goal of this "Islamified" anti-Semitism, according to the report, is to transform the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from a national territorial contest which could be resolved through compromise to a "historic, cultural and existential struggle for the supremacy of Islam." The study examined books, newspapers, television and radio broadcasts and Internet sites, along with studies of groups following anti-Jewish discourse in the Muslim world, such as MEMRI and the ADL. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, rising anti-Semitic sentiment in Europe was injected into Muslim lands through commercial and diplomatic ties. Spurred by opposition to Zionism and ideologically strengthened by Nazi rhetoric and support, Muslim anti-Semitism grew in the 20th century into a phenomenon so widespread that blatantly anti-Semitic texts can be purchased on street corners of Arab cities, even in countries where almost no Jews remain. The research team did not deal with "anti-Israel incitement," according to Erlich, "only with anti-Semitism. But when you read an article or listen to a speech, the terminology is confused and intertwined. You can't distinguish the anti-Zionism from the anti-Semitism." According to the report, the past decade has seen a veritable explosion of anti-Semitic literature in the Muslim world which intentionally confuses Israel and the Jewish people and is broadcast worldwide through books, radio, television, newspapers, caricatures and Internet forums. This discourse reaches outside Muslim lands to a large Muslim audience in the West. "Until about 10-15 years ago, anti-Semitism was imported into the Muslim Arab world from Europe," says Erlich. "They translated The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Mein Kampf into Arabic. Over the past 10-15 years, there's been a deep change. Today it isn't an import, but an export. This needs more research, since we don't have access to European mosques, but we're convinced that the export of anti-Semitic myths and politics to Europe is having an effect on European Muslim communities." The hundred-year-old Czarist forgery The Protocols, which accuses the Jews, among other "crimes," of fomenting liberalism by masterminding the American and French revolutions, is being published in new editions in Egypt, Syria, Iran and other countries. The report finds little government action either in the Muslim world or in the West to curb this phenomenon, citing restrictions on viewing Hizbullah's Al-Manar television station as an exception that proves the rule. At the heart of this surge in Muslim anti-Semitism lies Iran, with the regime's support for Holocaust denial and hosting of anti-Semites from around the world, along with formal calls for Israel's destruction by many of the country's leaders. "Iran is the first example of its kind since Nazi Germany in which a state officially adopts an active policy of anti-Semitism as a means to further its national interests," the report notes. It goes on to say that while Iran does not deny that Jews were massacred during WWII, the current regime seeks to minimize the scale of the Holocaust in order to reduce support for Israel's very existence in the West, which it believes comes from feelings of guilt over the world's inaction while Jews were murdered during WWII. On March 3, during fighting in Gaza, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told his country's Channel 1 that "the real holocaust is happening in Palestine." Similarly, Palestinian groups, including the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, now regularly refer to Israeli-Hamas fighting in Gaza as a "holocaust." Anti-Semitism finds governmental sanction, and often support, in Islamic as well as secular states, among those who are at peace with Israel and those still in a state of war with Israel, the study finds. In countries such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt and Syria, daily promulgation of anti-Semitic messages are carried out through media that are under the supervision and censorship of the regimes. While the report's release is slated for Tuesday, Israel's cabinet minister in charge of anti-Semitism issues, Isaac Herzog, had already been briefed on its contents when he spoke to The Jerusalem Post on Monday. "There's a dissonance between the anti-Semitism that takes on the form of a religious clash and the regional coalition of moderate states, from Morocco to the [Persian] Gulf states and Turkey, that believes in peace and a two-state solution," according to Herzog, who belongs to the Labor Party. "Unimaginable and unacceptable expressions of anti-Semitism are somehow permitted among members of the coalition," he said. Part of the problem, he said, is that the rest of the world has simply grown used to Muslim anti-Semitism. "We respond to anti-Semitism only where large, vibrant Jewish communities exist. This is a mistake. It is incredibly dangerous that young Muslims are brainwashed with anti-Semitism. It starts with the Jews, but it won't end with the Jews." While the report notes that there are Muslim intellectuals who have rejected the growing anti-Semitism, they are in the extreme minority. They neither enjoy the support of the regimes nor possess enough influence or numbers to reverse the trend, says Erlich. Other Muslim intellectuals have explained the phenomenon as a side effect of justifiable anti-Israel sentiment. According to the report, however, while anti-Zionism feeds the growing anti-Semitism, specifically anti-Jewish sentiments are intentionally spread by religious and intellectual leaders in many Muslim societies, whose statements do not distinguish between Israelis and Jews. Finally, the report recommends the establishment of a well-funded international task force that will tackle the problem not only through diplomacy and information campaigns, but through legal measures. "We need a serious body of researchers and legalists, representatives of Israel, the Jewish communities and the nations of the world. Give it funds and send it to war on the diplomatic front, in the media, and with lawsuits," Erlich says, summarizing the recommendation. "Sue publishing houses that print The Protocols. It's a libel. The Syrian government still publishes [writings claiming] that Jews use Christian blood on Passover. You can't say this is anti-Israeli, or caused by the [Israeli-Palestinian] conflict." The report makes clear that the phenomenon of Muslim anti-Semitism is now widespread, popular and expanding. "The anti-Semitism that fed the Holocaust isn't dead," Erlich says. "It is prospering." Contact Shoshanna Walker by email at rosewalk@concentric.net |
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WHO KNOWS... WE DO
Posted by Shoshanna Walker, April 23, 2008. |
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This is from Samson Blinded
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Jews believe in the peace for various reasons. Some Jews are plainly self-hating, and just want a trouble for the Jewish state. Others are too tired of war, and just want to close their eyes to see the ivory tower of peace and happy relations between Jews, Egyptians, Iranians and whoever else. Some are primitive rationalists –– look at the numbers of Jews in the utopian movements such as the communist one –– and believe that every human problem, however immensely complex, can be reduced to a formula, discussed, and settled. Some politicians are crooks who use peace process to fool the masses into electing them. Some, notably the security establishment officials, see clearly that military methods fail to solve the problem, and opt for peace settlement. They just don't realize that even in mathematics, and surely in social relations, some problems are inherently unsolvable. Or it may be the other way around: the leftist Israeli establishment appoints the brainwashed ultra-leftists for security positions, and naturally they support the hollow peace. So instead of seeking an immediate solution, which ought to be wrong, Jews must accept the reality of intermittent low-level conflict which would drag on for the foreseeable future. We really don't know what would happen in a few decades. Improvements in nuclear power generation can devaluate oil, causing immense poverty and hunger in overpopulated Arab countries. Such a scenario would increase the number of desperate terrorists but diminish the threat by impoverished regular Arab armies. Arabs might get nuclear weapons, and surely leak them to terrorists who might or might not detonate them in Israel. That threat would only increase if peace agreements are signed, as Israel will find it diplomatically hard to preempt against friendly Arabs' nuclear facilities. Arabs might breed in Israel to the third of voters, join coalition with Jewish ultra-left and non-Jewish parties, and vote Jewish state out of existence, thus solving the problem of coexistence with Arabs. Or Jews might drive the hostile elements out of Israel. There are so many unknown variables in the peace process that trying to predict it amounts to nonsense. Some things, however, are easy to understand. The Arabs don't need peace with Israel: both peace and its absence are fine with them. They don't need Israel's assistance and don't fear her attacks. Peace treaty won't change the Arab behavior: they will continue supporting anti-Israeli terrorists if only to drain their countries of radicals and won't entrust Israel to be a vizier of Muslim funds (economic cooperation). The only substantial economic feature that would come out of Israeli-Arab peace is heavy investment by Muslims in the politically sensitive Israeli real estate, the process which is well underway now and only waiting to be legalized. Arabs, being completely indifferent to the peace process, offer Israel no concessions: Judea and Samaria must be abandoned, Jerusalem divided, and the refugees –– compensated, with some of them allowed returning to Israel. That's not really a peace plan, but an odd demand for capitulation of a victorious power to the defeated aggressors. Israel, on the contrary, gives way continuously and receives nothing in return. Arabs did not reciprocate the evacuation of Jewish settlements from Gaza, a major step which divided Jewish nation and left a scar for decades. Rather, Arabs intensified their attacks on Israel. Superficially, that applies to Palestinian militants only, but they enjoy support of every major Muslim state: Syria (weapons), Iran (money and training), Egypt (logistics), and Saudi Arabia (money and diplomatic support). Back in 1972, Sadat offered Israel peace with all Arabs in return for the Sinai and the Golan Heights, with no heed paid to the Palestinian state. Recently, Saudis offered Israel peace with all Arabs in return for Judea, Samaria, and Jerusalem. Now Israel negotiates with the Palestinians minute details of transferring them Judea, Samaria, and Jerusalem without expecting reciprocal peace with Arabs countries. The terms become progressively worse. But the real peace problem, it's not without, it's within Israel. Israeli Arabs form a third of Israel's young and absolute majority in several regions. The Jewish state now abandons religiously, historically, and strategically important lands to the Palestinian state so as not to be swarmed by two million Arabs living there. Reduced to the nine-mile-wide beachside state, Israel will be swarmed by her own Arabs –– who accept no peace process. It is an official policy of the PLO –– indeed, a democratic maxim –– that the Palestinians will breed to majority in Israel and then vote to unify it with the West Bank Palestine. Moderates among Palestinians proclaim they have no problem with Jews living in the resulting Arab state. Time solves the insolvable problems. Communism vanished from the book of time, leftist terrorism of 1970s ran to the end, and Islamic terrorism won't be eternal. Radical ideas do not last long as burning societies fall back into tranquility. The current levels of Palestinian terrorism are artificial, entirely propped by Beilin-Peres policies which brought the defeated PLO from Tunisia to the West Bank, enthroned it, subsidized heavily, and promoted internationally as a peace partner. So a shabby cat felt itself a lion. Palestinians support fighting Israel for two reasons: hope and hopelessness. A hope to prevail, and daily hopelessness of their lives. Both can be solved, by the overwhelming force and emigration, respectively. The Muslim Brotherhood, PLO, Hamas, in turn became political organizations; other guerrillas will follow the same road. Palestinians will always remain hostile to Israel, as Jews took over what the Palestinians think is their land. Such hostility would translate into low-level sabotage, but not a meaningful war. The peace process lacks a historical precedent. Never did hostile states negotiated peace for decades under fire. Peace never came through negotiations, but only through one side's defeat. America negotiated with Vietnam for decades, but Vietnam was not at war with America; North Vietnam was at war with the South –– and utterly defeated it. So the peace process failed in Vietnam, like elsewhere. Peace process is a leftist fallacy, a primitive rationalist approach to immensely complex problems which in fact can be exhausted, but never solved. Exhausting the Palestinian problem is easy, and Israel did it with success: behead the national organizations, expel their leaders, everyone of the slightest stance in Palestinian society. No great numbers are involved: ousting a few thousand top members of Fatah, Hamas, and other popular organizations would do. When Israel kept systematically expelling PLO associates in 1960-80s, everything was quiet on our Western Front. Even though the PLO tried ruling Palestine through its Department of Popular Organizations which oversaw everything down to students unions, it was nothing compared to the electrifying fact of Arafat's presence in the West Bank. Beilin-Peres clique brought Arafat from Tunisia to the West Bank, literally let the jinn of terrorism out of the bottle. They meant good, they meant Arafat to be their peace puppet. So they were wrong. As usual, societies pay in blood for leftists'crumbling projects. The majority of the Netherlands' population was good to Jews during Holocaust. But the problem is, the Dutch were also good toward their minority who collaborated with Germans. The minority hunted us, and so 75% of Jews were murdered. The majority of Israelis are decent Jews who wish their country well. But unless they stand up to the vicious leftist minority, too few Jews would survive in Israel. |
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WHAT'S REALLY BEHIND THE SCREAMING HEADLINES ABOUT THE ARREST OF AN OCTOGENARIAN SPY FOR ISRAEL?
Posted by Avodah, April 23, 2008. |
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This was written by Lenny Ben-David and comes from his
website: I*Consult
Ben-David is a former diplomat. Washington consultant to foreign embassies, lobbyist, writer and editor. |
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American engineer Ben-Ami Kadish was arrested on Tuesday for allegedly providing to an Israeli "handler" classified data on nuclear weapons, F-15 fighter jets, and the Patriot missile air defense system. A few important points of perspective are vital: Kadish is 84 years old. The alleged crime took place some 25-30 years ago (!), between 1979 and 1985. Today Mr. Kadish lives an open, active life in a New Jersey retirement village where, according to a community newspaper, he and his wife open their sukka every year to raise money for local charities and for Magen David Adom. According to the New Jersey Jewish News, "Ben-Ami grew up in what was then Palestine and fought with the Hagana. He also served in both the British and American military during World War II and is an ex-commander of the Jewish War Veterans Post 609 in Monroe." News accounts suggest that Kadish's handler was the same man who directed Jonathan Pollard. Probably to avoid any issue of statute-of-limitations, the indictment alleges that this Zayde maintained ties to his handler until last month. Why now? Do federal prosecutors really see octogenarian Kadish as a major criminal? More likely, Kadish is being used by American officials as a means to loosen support for Israel as the two countries enter a tenacious period of negotiations. This is a pattern of American pressure that repeats itself. The tactic is geared to embarrass American supporters of Israel, particularly Members of Congress, who oppose weapons sales to Israel's foes, dangerous concessions to the Palestinians, or the abrogation of previous commitments to Israel. During the last 30 years, particularly, in times of tension, American officials claimed that Israel stole plans for the Sidewinder air-to-air missiles, diverted nuclear material from a U.S. plant in the 1960s, illegally obtained krytron triggers for nuclear weapons, pilfered computer components from Patriot missiles, and used American technology on the Lavie aircraft that was later transferred to China. The 2005 arrest of two AIPAC staffers is more of the same, and they were charged under the creaky 1917 Espionage Act statute older than Kadish. For years, unnamed American spy-hunters have been looking for an accomplice to Jonathan Pollard. Leaks on these stories almost always took place on the eve of some contretemps with the U.S. State Department. Today's case against 84-year-old Kadish reflects more the impatience of the U.S. Secretary of State with Israel's decision to continue building in Jerusalem and in settlement blocs and to retain security roadblocks. To push ahead in the illusionary Annapolis process at all costs, the State Department must de-emphasize President Bush's letter to Prime Minister Sharon stating that it is "unrealistic" to seek a "full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949." With President George Bush on his way to Israel to celebrate Israel's 60th anniversary, what better way to deflate the goodwill and cut-down the gifts the President is supposedly bringing? Lastly, in the twilight of George Bush's administration, a presidential pardon for Jonathan Pollard is again being discussed, at least by Jewish and Israeli sources. Disclosure of another Pollard-like spy would be an effective tool to keep Pollard locked up for good.
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Contact Avodah at avodah15@aol.com
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CAN ISRAEL REALLY STAND UP TO THE WORLD?
Posted by Michael Freund, April 23, 2008. |
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With Israel coming under increasing pressure to make additional, far-reaching concessions to the Palestinians, the question has arisen once again of whether the Jewish state is capable of standing up for itself and its interests. Interestingly, there is another small Mediterranean state –– namely Greece –– that recently created a major diplomatic furor, all because of a question of semantics. And as I argue in the column below from the Jerusalem Post, Israel would do well to learn from their example. Comments and feedback may be sent to: letters@jpost.com or to me directly. thanks, and Happy Passover, Michael Freund |
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Once upon a time, and it seems like it was truly a very long time ago, Israel knew how to stand on principle. Attacks on our citizens were met with swift and forceful retaliation. Talk of surrender alluded to our foes, rather than to official Israeli government policy, and we didn't hesitate to defy the world when necessary in order to defend ourselves. The spirit of Entebbe, Osirak and yes, the Six Day War, sparked our imagination, filling us with pride at the valor and heroism of the modern-day Jewish warrior. Our lives had meaning, our society had a purpose, and the nation's overriding goal was to build the land, rather than withdraw from it. But all that appears to have changed. Our leadership's infatuation with retreat has become an obsession. Yesterday's trial balloons have become today's diplomatic agenda, and what was once considered unthinkable, such as the division of Jerusalem, is now suddenly looming over the horizon. How did we reach this point? How could we sink so low so swiftly? Well, you might be saying to yourself, we don't have a choice. We're a small country, with limited resources. What else can we do? Do you really think we can stand up to the rest of the world? Heck yes. If you think this is naïve, just take a look at Greece, which recently stared down the entire Western alliance over an issue of semantics.
EARLIER THIS month, at a NATO summit in Bucharest, Greece singlehandedly caused a major diplomatic imbroglio, scuttling the expansion of NATO and defying the will of nearly all of its friends and allies, for the simple reason that it objected to the name of its neighbor, Macedonia. Macedonia, which used to be part of Yugoslavia, had been hoping to receive a formal invitation to join the trans-Atlantic coalition, as a means of further deepening its integration into the West. "But Athens blocked the invitation," the Associated Press reported on Monday, "to protest Macedonia's name, saying it implies a claim to a northern region of Greece also called Macedonia." As the Greek Foreign Ministry Web site explains, "The choice of the name Macedonia directly raises the issue of usurpation of the cultural heritage of a neighboring country. The name constitutes the basis for staking an exclusive rights claim over the entire geographical area of Macedonia." In other words, Greece is willing to risk the wrath of the United States, Britain and the rest of the NATO coalition, merely because they believe that Macedonia's choice of name masks expansionist ambitions that threaten to undermine their sovereignty and territorial integrity. The boldness of Athens's position becomes even more apparent when one considers that over 100 countries formally recognize Macedonia as Macedonia. Nonetheless, Greece stubbornly continues to insist that it be referred to as the "Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia," or FYROM. There are those who will look at the Greek position with raised eyebrows, wondering what all the fuss is about. After all, who cares about names? But I applaud their resolute determination to stand firm and defend what they consider to be their national interests, even at the risk of international opprobrium. Indeed, Greek Foreign Minister Dora Bakovannis didn't hesitate to announce publicly in March that "as regards the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia... the policy followed by our neighboring country in its relations with Greece, on the one side with intransigence and on the other with a logic of nationalist and irredentist actions tightly connected with the naming issue, does not allow us to maintain a positive stance." "As long as there is no such solution," she added, "Greece will remain an insuperable obstacle to the European and Euro-Atlantic ambition of FYROM." Imagine that. A country that is prepared to stand up for itself and proudly declare its willingness to be "an insuperable obstacle" over a matter of principle! If only Israel and its leadership would learn from Greece's example. Instead, we are being led by the nose inexorably towards catastrophe, unwilling to buck international pressure even when it threatens to undermine our very existence. There is, of course, an expression that something "looks like Greek to me" when we can not begin to fathom what it says. But this is one case where Israel would do well to start deciphering the words. And fast. Michael Freund served as an adviser to former Prime Minister Binyamin
Netanyahu.
This article is entitled "It's Greek to me" and it appeared today in The Jerusalem Post
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IGNORANCE ISN'T BLISS
Posted by Naomi Ragen, April 22, 2008. |
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Friends, The repeated claim that Shia Iran doesn't help Sunni terrorists is wrong. Dead wrong. When McCain stated this, he was called every name in the book: "Abysmally ignorant," said someone on the Atlantic.com website. Someone else accused him of brain failure. But the abysmally ignorant are those that can't figure out that terrorists all over the globe are helping each other. Irish terrorists, for example, are in love with PLO terrorists, with whom they share neither religion, nationality or culture. McCain got it right. The Obama cheerleaders might want to reconsider whom they are calling ignorant, and wise up. Tom Gross explains below in an article entitled "McCain was
right: Iran's help for Sunni terrorism" in National Review Online
Naomi |
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The 4 million Democrats eligible to cast ballots today in the crucial, delegate-rich Pennsylvania primary might like to consider the following. The repeated claim by Barack Obama and his supporters in the media that Shia Iran doesn't help Sunni terror groups is wrong –– very wrong –– and yet again reveals their ignorance of foreign affairs, an ignorance that may prove extremely dangerous were he to become president. While Shia and Sunni extremists do of course have deep theological differences they cooperate in at least a dozen countries on a political and terroristic level to work against the interests of the United States. The following are a few examples of Shia Iran helping Sunni militants. Amir Taheri, who was formerly the executive editor of Kayhan, Iran's largest daily newspaper and remains one of the leading experts on Iran in the world, helped compile this information. * In AFGHANISTAN, Iran has financed and armed the Sunni Hizb Islami (Islamic Party) since the 1990s. *** If it was only one, or two, or even three, of Obama's close advisors who have adopted anti-American positions, one might possibly excuse Obama. But Obama has chosen to surround himself with many such persons. Again, if Obama had appointed even one reliable, experienced Democrat, such as Richard Holbrooke, to his foreign policy team, one might feel more comfortable that he won't make disastrous foreign policy mistakes if elected. But he hasn't. As an intelligent man, Obama is no doubt capable of mastering
foreign policy but it will take some time; and while he's doing
so, in an extremely dangerous world, it may well prove a very
costly education for the rest of us.
(For a longer version of this piece, goto
Naomi Ragen is an American-born novelist and journalist who lives in Jerusalem. She can be contacted at www.naomiragen.com, where you can subscribe to her newsletter. Or write nragen@netvision.net.il |
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TERROR SURVIVOR, SHLOMI AZULAY, SPEAKS OUT
Posted by Fern Sidman, April 22, 2008. |
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Can any of us ever imagine what our lives would be like had we personally survived a terrorist attack? In this age of ubiquitous terrorism, most of us only read about the horrific plight of victims of such attacks. We may certainly sympathize, yet we can never truly understand the emotional and physical trauma that envelopes the lives of those who are fortunate enough to survive. So is the case of a young Israeli man, whose miraculous story moved him to become a strident advocate for the rights of survivors of terrorism. Born in Jerusalem to Sephardic parents of Moroccon descent, Shlomi Azulay is a 34 year sabra, who is wise beyond his years. Says Shlomi, "I was born and raised in Jerusalem, and even though I grew up in a traditional home, I was very much a modern secular Israeli. I had very long hair, wore an earring and was totally immersed in the 'rebellious youth' mode. I served in the army and when I was 23 in the year 1997, I decided to come to the United States for a short visit, perhaps 2-3 weeks and I ended up staying for six years." While life in New York was exciting for Shlomi, he missed his family and friends in Israel and hadn't seen his mother for six years. For Shlomi the time had come to plan a trip back home and in the year 2002, Shlomi returned to Israel. While in Israel, a friend invited Shlomi to join him and others for an evening out at a new coffee shop in Jerusalem. It was a Motzei Shabbat, and even though Shlomi wasn't too thrilled about accepting the invitation, he nonetheless did so. "My friend was really excited about going to the Café Moment that happened to be located right across the street from then Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's house. I accompanied him because I didn't want to disappoint him" says Shlomi. What occurred on that fateful night would change Shlomi's life forever. "When we arrived the club was jammed packed, literally wall to wall people, and the waitress told us that if we wished to be served we should try and come back later when perhaps the crowds would diminish. My friend knew several people at the club and stopped to talk with them. We were headed towards the exit when my friend spotted a young woman that he knew. He stopped to talk with her, however when I realized that this was not going to be a brief conversation, I excused myself and told my friend that I would meet him outside when he was finished talking." With pain etched on his face Shlomi continues, "I headed towards the exit and was standing at the threshold of the door when suddenly, out of nowhere, I heard a huge blast. My ears were ringing from the loudness of it. It was a bomb and it went off only three feet from where I was standing. I turned around and saw complete bedlam, total carnage, the likes of which no one could ever imagine. Body parts flying everywhere. I saw my friend's head blow right off his body. The young woman he was talking to also died. There was not even a scratch on her body. Her insides were blown up and it looked like she was sleeping. Had I stayed inside the club, I too, would have been killed." In the end, eleven people were killed and over 100 were seriously injured. Shlomi was treated for shrapnel wounds to his face, three broken joints in his lower back and an injured knee. "Even though I was never really religious, in the aftermath of the bombing, I was livid with G-d. I was angry that G-d could let this happen. I really did not turn to religion at all for solace or comfort" said Shlomi. "My life was a real mess. I couldn't function. I couldn't go to work. I couldn't deal with the nightmarish reality of what occurred. The government of Israel remained apathetic and totally indifferent to my plight and frankly, downright callous. They not only neglected to provide services to a survivor of terrorism, but they made me feel that I had to prove that I needed help. They made me feel as though somehow I was the criminal. I started to wonder to myself, who is our bigger enemy, the government of Israel or the Palestinian terrorists groups who engage in these suicide attacks", Shlomi recalls. "Here I was, mired in my anger, rage and resentment, when things began to change. I wasn't at all cognizant of it at the time, but the events that followed were orchestrated through the compassion and mercy of the One Above, by Hashem Yisborach" says Shlomi. Shlomi's mother felt her son's pain quite acutely, and one day through a chance meeting at her local JCC she met a representative from Hineni, the internationally renowned Torah outreach organization under the leadership of Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis. Shlomi's mother met Benjamin Phillips, the director of Hineni in Jerusalem who told her of Hineni's established programs for survivors of terrorist attacks, including the sponsorship of trips to Europe, the United States and elsewhere. She urged Shlomi to contact Hineni, to speak with them about participating in their programs. "Suffice it to say, I had absolutely no interest whatsoever in contacting Hineni or getting involved in such a program. Admittedly, I was quite cynical. After living in the United States for six years, I just couldn't believe that an organization would give away free trips to Europe or anywhere in the world. Soon after, Benjamin called me and asked me to join the Hineni group on their forthcoming trip to England. I told him in no uncertain terms that I was not interested and literally hung up on him. Thank G-d, Benjamin persisted. He called me again and again and again and finally I relented and I agreed to come down to Hineni for an interview. I just couldn't believe that I didn't have to pay for anything, that everything was absolutely free. He told me that I would meet many other survivors of terrorism and that we would just relax, have fun and enjoy ourselves for a week. I was still very skeptical and extremely hesitant about making any commitments and Benjamin told me that the group is leaving for England and he's not going without me. After endlessly tossing this around in my mind, I finally said, 'Why not? What do I have to lose?' So, off I was to England with Hineni", Shlomi recalls. According to Shlomi this was the best decision that he ever made. During his week in England he met many wonderful and kind people who understood and related to his plight. Shlomi and the other members of the Hineni group shared their experiences of surviving a terrorist attack, explored their emotions and graciously supported one another. Shlomi felt as though he made a new family with people who genuinely cared about him. He also says that he will never forget the abundant kindness that was shown to him by the people with whom he stayed. "We all stayed with different families, who had been told our personal histories before we arrived. They were so understanding and exceptionally generous in every way" says Shlomi. He adds, "What really touched me in such a special way was our first Shabbos in England. At that time, I didn't understand anything about Hineni or Rebbetzin Jungreis, yet the entire community came to see us on that Shabbos and talked with us and provided us with every accommodation imaginable. It was right then and there that my romance with Hineni began." After returning to Israel, Shlomi became totally immersed in Hineni activities. At the Hineni Center in Jerusalem, he began to give lectures about terrorism to audiences from virtually every country in the world. He even traveled to Holland where he addressed 1500 people; mostly members of a Christians for Israel organization. Shlomi became a media spokesman for Hineni in Israel and slowly but surely found himself as a chief advocate for Israeli survivors of Palestinian terrorism. "I had the opportunity to meet and talk with Rebbetzin Jungreis on one of her trips to Hineni in Israel. We had a chance to go to the Kotel together and we talked on a deeper, more meaningful level. She really displayed such genuine empathy and inspired me to do great things for the Jewish people," says Shlomi. About two years after joining Hineni, Shlomi began to learn Torah on a regular basis. "The person who served as my inspiration to learn Torah was my friend Amichai, a yeshiva bochur who I met at Hineni. He, too was also injured in a terrorist attack. He began to call me once a week. It was a long process until I decided to wear a yarmulke, to pray everyday at shul, to put on tzitzes, but eventually I did and I am indebted to Hashem for bringing Amichai and Hineni into my life, says Shlomi. Shlomi recounts his experiences at Hineni by saying that 99.9 percent of all the social services he received was through the efforts of Hineni. Everything from psychological counseling to complete medical care was provided free of charge to him and other survivors. "If I needed to see any doctors, any specialists, everything went through Hineni", says Shlomi. He says that the togetherness and love he felt at Hineni was beyond remarkable. "For us, the survivors of terrorism, the cohesive group atmosphere really aided us throughout our journey to healing and well being. We did everything as a group. We went out to a restaurant together, we went to a movie together, we learned Torah together." Shlomi says that Hineni does not receive any monetary assistance from the Israeli government and is privately funded. He has also publicly challenged the government of Israel regarding funds sent to Israel by the worldwide Jewish community to help terrorist survivors and victims of the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah forces in Lebanon. As Shlomi has ruefully observed, "During the war, American Jews sent almost 40 million dollars to help Israelis directly effected by the war and other survivors. This money went through the UJA and Keren Hayesod and after engaging in extensive research, I found out that 39 million had vanished. The monies were never appropriated to Jews in Israel that are in such desperate need of services. As a matter of fact, I have proof that monies contributed not only did not end up assisting survivors of terrorism, but rather it was used to impede their progress. Soldiers were never given the bullet proof vests that were supposed to be provided. I have yet to receive an answer to my challenge from any government agency or representative and I think the American Jewish community must hold the government of Israel accountable", says Shlomi. Shlomi continues to forge ahead with his advocacy work on behalf of survivors of terrorism and is currently organizing a trip to the United States for Israeli survivors of terrorism and soldiers. Says Shlomi, "I am grateful to Hashem that I can participate in this great mitzvah and I hope that everyone reading this will want to participate as well. Anyone wishing to contact Shlomi Azulay to arrange for him to speak or to contribute funds for the upcoming trip for survivors of terrorism can reach him at: 646-220-0826 or by e-mail at hinenimiami@yahoo.com Contact Fern Sidman at ariellah@aol.com |
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SHIN BET: GAZANS PAY DOCTORS TO DECLARE THEM ILL
Posted by Avodah, April 22, 2008. |
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This was written by Dan Izenberg and it appeared yesterday
in the Jerusalem Post
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Palestinians from Gaza bribed local doctors to declare that they were seriously ill and required treatment in Israel, the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) charged on Monday.
"Recently there has been an increase in the exploitation of Israel's humanitarian policy by way of fraudulent medical permits in return for bribes to doctors in the Gaza Strip," a Shin Bet spokesman told The Jerusalem Post. "This, plus the requests of terrorist activists to enter Israel for medical treatment, increases the danger to state security." The statement came in response to the latest allegations by Physicians for Human Rights, which charged that since the beginning of April, the Shin Bet has been preventing 12 new cancer patients from receiving life-saving treatment in Israel. In addition to these 12, the Shin Bet had for several weeks been preventing dozens more, including cancer and heart patients, from passing through Israel on their way to treatment in Jordan and Egypt. PHR charged that the Shin Bet response to requests for entry permits to Israel is complicated and takes a long time, and thereby ignores the urgency of the situation. The slow processing by the Shin Bet follows an already protracted process in the Palestinian committee that approves the requests and in the IDF Liaison Office, before the matter comes to the Shin Bet. PHR also charged that the shuttling of patients who are barred from entering Israel directly to Egypt and Jordan did not work properly. They said the shuttle operated on an average of once every five weeks, that buses could not accommodate all the patients, so some were forced to wait, that many of the shuttles were canceled and that patients did not know when the next shuttle would be running. "The Shin Bet and the army portray the shuttle service as a genuine solution for the distress of many patients, including cancer patients, and as a worthy alternative to their demands to enter Israel for treatment," wrote PHR. "In this way, a flawed and unsuccessful procedure becomes a fig leaf for the continuation of the Shin Bet's harmful policy towards the sick population of Gaza and as a tool for the state to portray its alleged 'humanitarian' policy towards them." In its response to these charges, the Shin Bet added that the question of allowing sick Palestinians from the Gaza Strip into Israel cut across many authorities and was not the sole responsibility of the agency. The spokesman said that in all 12 cases, the agency had given its replies to the requests long ago, and therefore could not be held responsible for any delays that followed.
Contact Avodah at avodah15@aol.com
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SUPPORT FOR TERRORISM AGAINST ISRAELIS RISES
Posted by David Meir-Levi, April 22, 2008. |
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This was written by
Khaled Abu Toameh and it appeared yesterdat in The Jerusalem Post
Toaheh's article tells us why we should continue to petition Bush and Rice to stop their pointless and counter-productive pressure on Israel, and start supporting Israel in its need for a comprehensive military action against the Gaza Strip...an action which will render Hamas harmless and strongly deter Hezbollah for initiating any future military actions. |
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The number of Palestinians who support attacks against Israelis continues to rise and more than half of them favor suicide bombings, according to a poll published this weekend. The survey also showed that Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh is still more popular than Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. The percentage of Palestinians who support "resistance operations" against Israeli targets rose from 43.1 percent in September 2006 to 49.5% at present. Support for this option was highest in the Gaza Strip, at 58.1%, with 24.5% in the West Bank agreeing. Palestinians who support bombing attacks against Israeli civilians rose from 44.8% in June 2006 to 48% in September 2006 and to 50.7% now. Again, more Gazans support these operations (65.1%), compared with 42.3% of Palestinians in the West Bank. The Palestinian public is divided on the rocket attacks on Israel: 39.3% said the firing of these rockets was "useful" to Palestinian national interests, while 35.7% said they were harmful. The poll results showed a general feeling of frustration with regards to the future of the Palestinian cause and the peace process in light of the ongoing Israeli military operations and the split between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Both Fatah and Hamas continue to lose support among the Palestinians, and the level of trust in political leaders also dropped. Support for Abbas fell from 18.3% in November to 11.7% this month. The poll also showed that fewer Palestinians are satisfied with Abbas's performance. Support for Haniyeh also went down, from 16.3% in November to 13.3% this month. The same applies to Fatah's imprisoned leader, Marwan Barghouti, whose popularity moved down from 14.3% to 12.8% during the same period. With regards to confidence in the political parties, support for Fatah decreased from 40% in November to 32.5% this month, while Hamas's popularity went down from 19.7% to 17.8%. The poll, conducted by the Jerusalem Media & Communications Center, covered 1,190 Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza Strip and has a margin of error of 3 percentage points. It was held from April 8-13. [Editor's Note: Results appear mixed –– both Fatah and Hamas have lost support but Palestinian Arabs support terrorism even more than before. Does this mean the "splinter" terrorist groups will gain more support from the Palestinian public?] David Meir-Levi is an American-born Israeli, currently living in Palo Alto. His expertise is in Near Eastern studies and the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. He is Director of Peace and Education at Israel Peace Initiative (www.ipi-usa.org). Contact him at david_meirlevi@hotmail.com |
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FORGET OIL, THE NEW GLOBAL CRISIS IS FOOD
Posted by Avodah, April 22, 2008. |
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This was written by Alia McMullen, and it appeared January
7, 2008 in the Financial Post
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BMO strategist Donald Coxe warns credit crunch and soaring oil prices will pale in comparison to looming catastrophe new crisis is emerging, a global food catastrophe that will reach further and be more crippling than anything the world has ever seen. The credit crunch and the reverberations of soaring oil prices around the world will pale in comparison to what is about to transpire, Donald Coxe, global portfolio strategist at BMO Financial Group said at the Empire Club's 14th annual investment outlook in Toronto on Thursday. "It's not a matter of if, but when," he warned investors. "It's going to hit this year hard." Mr. Coxe said the sharp rise in raw food prices in the past year will intensify in the next few years amid increased demand for meat and dairy products from the growing middle classes of countries such as China and India as well as heavy demand from the biofuels industry. "The greatest challenge to the world is not US$100 oil; it's getting enough food so that the new middle class can eat the way our middle class does, and that means we've got to expand food output dramatically," he said. The impact of tighter food supply is already evident in raw food prices, which have risen 22% in the past year. Mr. Coxe said in an interview that this surge would begin to show in the prices of consumer foods in the next six months. Consumers already paid 6.5% more for food in the past year. Wheat prices alone have risen 92% in the past year, and yesterday closed at US$9.45 a bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade. At the centre of the imminent food catastrophe is corn –– the main staple of the ethanol industry. The price of corn has risen about 44% over the past 15 months, closing at US$4.66 a bushel on the CBOT yesterday –– its best finish since June 1996. This not only impacts the price of food products made using grains, but also the price of meat, with feed prices for livestock also increasing. "You're going to have real problems in countries that are food short, because we're already getting embargoes on food exports from countries, who were trying desperately to sell their stuff before, but now they're embargoing exports," he said, citing Russia and India as examples. "Those who have food are going to have a big edge." With 54% of the world's corn supply grown in America's mid-west, the U.S. is one of those countries with an edge. But Mr. Coxe warned U.S. corn exports were in danger of seizing up in about three years if the country continues to subsidize ethanol production. Biofuels are expected to eat up about a third of America's grain harvest in 2007. The amount of U.S. grain currently stored for following seasons was the lowest on record, relative to consumption, he said. "You should be there for it fully-hedged by having access to those stocks that benefit from rising food prices." He said there are about two dozen stocks in the world that are going to redefine the world's food supplies, and "those stocks will have a precious value as we move forward." Mr. Coxe said crop yields around the world need to increase to something close to what is achieved in the state of Illinois, which produces over 200 corn bushes an acre compared with an average 30 bushes an acre in the rest of the world. "That will be done with more fertilizer, with genetically modified seeds, and with advanced machinery and technology," he said. Contact Avodah at avodah15@aol.com |
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QUEST OF CNN
Posted by Steven Plaut, April 22, 2008. |
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One of the best reasons to switch to FOX News is CNN's Richard Quest. A know-it-all "business" journalist, who could not pass a pop quiz in any economics course I have ever taught. An unctuous mimic of Uriah Heep, an insult to the intelligence of CNN viewers, someone who reminds me of "Martin" in Bart Simpson's class. Now you will never know this from watching CNN or reading its web site, cause it ain't there, but Richard Quest was arrested Friday for running around Central Park very high on drugs, naked, and reportedly with a length of rope wrapped around his neck and also attached by the other end to that part of his anatomy that the Moyel would have attended to on the 8th day. See this: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080419/tv_nm/quest_dc_1 Let me say that I have been in Central Park many a time, including for 60s anti-Vietnam War protests back when I was a young whipper snapper, and never once was I naked, although I spent most of the antiwar protests hoping that some coeds near me would take off their tops. [I am too old now to remember exactly why.] No, that is not me in the movie singing the Aquarius song. Now I find this story quite inspiring. Not the part about the drugs, but the part about the rope. In fact, I think we could probably produce peace in the Middle East if we adopt the idea. See, just attack ropes with one end around the neck and the other end around the other end, to all Israeli politicians implicated in the "peace process," and set them loose to run around the Ramat Gan park at 3:00 in the AM, but making sure that THIS time CNN and not just Reuters is there to get the photo shoots. And everything else will follow! 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. His website address is http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com. Or write him at splaut@econ.haifa.ac.il |
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SEE UNIFIL RUN –– HIZBULLAH CHASES AWAY UNIFIL MONITORS
Posted by Bryna Berch, April 22, 2008. |
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Another triumph for Condi comes unravelled! When General Olmert and
his cabinet of "generals" lost the Lebanese War in August 2006, Olmert
and the Bush administration reassured us that things were swell ––
UNIFIL was stepping in to fill the separation between Hezbollah and
the Israelis. So all would be calm. The realists knew better –– they
suspected that UNIFIL would be a pushover whenever Hezbollah wanted to
do something it had committed itself not to do. And so it is.
This is from yesterday's Jerusalem Post and written by the
Jerusalem Post Staff.
The original article ––
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Hizbullah gunmen chased away UNIFIL inspectors in south Lebanon who identified a truck carrying arms belonging to the guerrilla group, a report published twice a year by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon revealed Tuesday. The incident was the first time UNIFIL troops confirmed the presence of Hizbullah gunmen south of the Litani River, in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, Channel 1 reported. The resolution, which enforced the ceasefire between Israel and Hizbullah after the Second Lebanon War, calls on the terror group to disarm and also forbids its members from operating south of the river in the southeastern part of Lebanon. Israel has claimed on more than one occasion that Hizbullah was not abiding by their end of the deal. The incident, on the night between March 30 and March 31, is cited in the report in reference to a different resolution –– UNSC Resolution 1559, which calls on all Lebanese militias to disarm. Sources in Jerusalem said the incident was a source of great embarrassment for UNIFIL. The troops trailed the truck and stopped it, but when the troops approached the truck, armed Hizbullah members jumped out and threatened to hurt them if they would not leave the area. The source said UNIFIL's men turned back and left the scene. This serious disregard of UN resolutions is reason for much disconcert, the report claimed. The incident was not previously published and similar incidents were not recorded. |
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SILLY, SILLIER, & SILLIEST; EXTREMISTS EXPLOIT CONCESSIONS TO "MODERATES"
Posted by Richard H. Shulman, April 22, 2008. |
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REFORM PROPOSED IN ISRAEL The Knesset is moving to eliminate debtors' prison (Arutz-7, 3/25). The US eliminated it before I was born. What took Israel so long? ANOTHER REFORM NEEDED Judicial custom in Israel is that if the police refuse (or fail) to undertake the appropriate forensic investigation, they may not prosecute. The two brothers who were convicted of firing guns at trespassing Arabs denied having fired. Police refused to test the guns. The Judge believed the Arab accusers, despite the absence of forensic evidence of a crime. The brothers are trying to get international pressure for their release (Caroline Glick in IMRA, 3/29). HERE'S WHAT'S SILLY Israel is attempting to negotiate a "two-state solution" with Abbas, who doesn't believe the Jewish people have a right to one of those states (Op. Cit.). AND SILLIER The US pressed Israel intos an informal ceasefire with Hamas, which then fired more than a hundred shells and fired bullets at Israeli farmers. That is in addition to Hamas arming and tightening its control over Gaza (Ibid.). The US claims it opposes Hamas. That's no way to do so. SILLIEST As Arabs stone more Israeli cars, and Arab criminals try to infiltrate Judea-Samaria more, Israel reduced settlement funds for counter-terrorism (IMRA,3/29). Is that stupidity, cheapness, or bigotry against settlers? LETTING ABBAS POLICE HIS CITIES Reluctantly, Defense Min. Barak bowed to US demands and let several hundred P.A. police into Nablus to patrol the city. The result is that the police coordinate with terrorists. So far, the police tolerate terrorists' placement of roadside bombs (IMRA, 3/29). What did he expect, real anti-terrorism? Hasn't happened in the other patrolled cities. Note the constant US pressure on Israel to let terrorists get through! Don't believe the rumor that Pres. Bush is favorable to Israel. REFORM PROPOSED IN ISRAEL The Knesset is moving to eliminate debtors' prison (Arutz-7, 3/25). The US eliminated it before I was born. What took Israel so long? ANOTHER REFORM NEEDED Judicial custom in Israel is that if the police refuse (or fail) to undertake the appropriate forensic investigation, they may not prosecute. The two brothers who were convicted of firing guns at trespassing Arabs denied having fired. Police refused to test the guns. The Judge believed the Arab accusers, despite the absence of forensic evidence of a crime. The brothers are trying to get international pressure for their release (Caroline Glick in IMRA, 3/29). BARUCH GOLDSTEIN FRAMED Barry Chamish and other readers of his have come up with such discrepancies in the official government version as to show that Dr. Goldstein was framed and trapped if not directly murdered by the government. The motive would have been to discredit prominent Kahanists such as Goldstein, nd to make it seem as if it would be better to oust the Jews from Hebron. One expects discrepancies in fast-moving, shocking events. The official story about Goldstein has too many discrepancies, some major. Witnesses saw a second shooter. Investigator Shamgar refused to listen to them nor to heed the finding of another, different type bullet from his. Too many people were shot for Goldstein to have done it all. How did the second shooter get away and why did he lock Goldstein in? Having fired only 105 rounds, how did Goldstein achieve 154 casualties, something even Green Berets couldn't do with a mob? In a mob, some people blocking access to others. Goldstein's intent was defense, not offense, since most of his shots were first at the ceiling as warnings, then at legs. (The government claims he became bitter against the Arabs and set out to massacre. Why does it make such a ridiculous claim?) Some older men were shot dead from his firing at the legs, because they didn't rise fast enough. Other older men were trampled by the crowd. Muslims murdered Goldstein, but those who boasted of having killed him were not prosecuted –– it would show Arab wrongdoing, dissipating some of the anger against Goldstein). There also are peculiar discrepancies in the story of the massacre of the 8 yeshiva students. Why no guard at the school and no official discussion about it? (Removal or change of guards is an old Mafia and Israeli secret service trick, applied to PM Rabin and the Israeli Ambassador to France.) How did the assailant get in unobserved, with 600 rounds of ammunition? Any help in carrying all that? Why did police who heard the shooting post a guard outside, instead of running inside to catch the assailant? (Chamish, 3/30.) Any cases alleged of Jews attacking Arabs and of Arab assassination of right-wing Jews should be scrutinized and audited by independent forensic experts. PUTTING TWO HEADLINES TOGETHER An IMRA headline of 4/17 is "Attempted Infiltration Through Kerem Shalom." Headline of 4/18 is "Easing of Restrictions Announced In Coordination." Three P.A. gunmen tried sneaking into Israel through that crossing used to supply humanitarian needs. The restrictions were on travel and on police stations. Terrorists keep trying to get at Israelis. Restrictions should be tightened until Israel gets at the terrorists. That would be prudent and logical, not easing. ISRAELI ARABS At this year's Land Day protests, Israeli Arabs chanted an appeal for terrorist attacks against Israel (IMRA, 3/30). When Israeli Jews suggest pro-active national defense, they are liable to arrest. Land Day commemorates the Arabs' loss of land in Israel. They abandoned property when they lost their civil war of aggression and genocide against the Jews. How they wax indignant over the consequences of their wrongdoing! "DISTINCTION BETWEEN EXTREMISTS & MODERATES?" Former PM Netanyahu criticized some governmental concessions to the P.A. in Judea-Samaria as rendering Israel less secure. A Cabinet Member faulted him for failing to distinguish between extremists and moderates (IMRA, 3/30). What distinction did the Cabinet Member make, aside from asserting that there is a difference? He didn't say what makes Abbas a moderate, though other people and I have pointed out many things that make him a terrorist. The Cabinet Member talks about distinctions, which really are false, but the point is not to whom Israel nominally makes concessions but that concessions, such as opening checkpoints, are taken advantage of by terrorists. I think that the West makes such distinctions in order to get Israel to make fatal concessions and because the West in incapable of seeing that all Arab factions are extremist. HAMAS USE OF LULL Hamas may be digging tunnels under the security fence. An Israeli official claims that Egypt finally is blocking the Sinai border to Gaza (IMRA, 3/30). BIG MEETING ON SECURITY CONCESSIONS The P.A. made many demands. Israel yielded. It did not demand anything concrete of the P.A., such as numbers of prisoners and destruction of weapons. If fact, some of the P.A. demands are for deployment of terrorists. The P.A. calls them police, but it recruits police from among terrorists (IMRA, 3/30). REPORTING OF ANTI-ISLAMIC MOVIE The Dutch film, "Fitna," is about Islam's bigotry and goal of world conquest. Many in the West have condemned it as inflammatory. Most US reporting includes far more of the condemnation than of the evidence and ignores the validity of the evidence (Arutz-7, 3/30). We are afraid of the truth. Richard Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. His comments and analyses appear often on Think-Israel. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at richardshulman5@aol.com |
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YOM HA'ATZMAUT –– CELEBRATION OF HOPE!
Posted by Steven Shamrak, April 21, 2008. |
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Out of the ashes Eretz-Israel began emerging 60 years ago. Jews around the world saw new hope with the commencement of the realisation of a 2000 year-old dream. Since then Israel, a newly emerged agricultural country, has become one of the leading technological centres of the world. The country, which had no real military force at the time of its creation, is being defended by one of the world's most advanced army. Unfortunately, at the same time Jewish national spirit has being systematically squashed by inept political leaders who are selling out the Jewish national dream to the enemies. Fear, apathy and lack of self-respect have again replaced the boldness, enthusiasm and belief in the new bright future of the Jewish people. The spirit of the Zionist pioneers is being deliberately discredited and squashed by a corrupt bureaucracy run by a self-hating political elite both within Israel and in the Diaspora! Sixty years is a good occasion to celebrate the country's achievements. In accordance with the Gematria, Jewish numerology, number 60 symbolises the word "vessel" or unity. I only hope that this is a sign that from now on Jewish unity is going to emerge and the Jewish two-millennium dream will be achieved! Food for Thought. by Steven Shamrak Zionism was always about re-creating a Jewish homeland in Palestine, not to be against anyone else. The systematic transfer of Muslim Sudanese, Algerians, Kurds, Circassians, Cherkesians, Turkmenians, Bosnians, Iranian, Egyptians and Arabs from Syria, the Arabian Peninsula and Iraq to Palestine by the Ottoman Empire and Great Britain since the creation of the modern Zionist movement in 1880s was a deliberate attempt of sabotage against the Jewish National aspiration. Just imagine if the Arabs had won the war in 1948, would any Jew live in Jerusalem, Haifa of Tel-Aviv by now? Those Jew-hating critics of Israel must take a close look in the mirror. Jews invented Humanism and, in spite of personal suffering, we live it! Traitors are Plotting Merger. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said that he does not rule out the possibility of a merger between his Kadima party and the Labor party. (A Kadima-Labor merger is considered in a desperate bid to stay in power!) Return Land to Jewish Owners. The Valero family is asking for the return of several dunams of land near the Damascus Gate (Shaar Shechem in Hebrew) of the wall around the Old City of Jerusalem as property of the inheritors of Aharon Valero. Valero purchased the property prior to the War of Independence, they say. The property was confiscated by the Jerusalem municipality decades ago and now includes a promenade, parking lots, and an Arab market. Quote of the Week: "It was not the decision by the United Nations that established the State of Israel; Israel arose in the merit of the Aliyah and the settlement enterprise, and in the merit of the struggle by the Lechi and Etzel, the Haganaha, and even HaShomer and Nili. But above all, the State of Israel was established in the merit of those who continued –– the warriors of the Israel Defense Forces, who repulsed the Arab attack after the declaration of the State." –– Binyamin Netanyahu, leader of Likud party. –– It is not an accident that he forgot to acknowledge the contribution of Irgun and the Stern fighters. Words are cheap! Has he learned his lesson of the Oslo war? Is he ready to repulse the Arab occupiers from the Jewish land after winning the next election? Enemy Create Artificial Fuel Crises. Terrorists in Gaza fired on Israeli trucks as they delivered fuel to Gaza last Thursday afternoon. The attack took place at the Nahal Oz fuel terminal, where terrorists murdered two civilian workers a week. Hypocrisy of the 'Loaded' Headlines: "The children of Gaza deserve a childhood..." –– Jewish children of Sderot, who are being shelled daily by rockets from Gaza, do not? Jews left Gaza, but the rocket attacks have intensified. Our enemies are using their own children as a human shield and consider their suffering as a part of Jihad and expected 'collateral damage'! Back into the Right State of Mind (Emergence of New Leadership) 60 years of independence of Israel and there is not much to celebrate. Yes Israel controls more land, but national morale and hopes Jews had attached to the creation of the Jewish state are being systematically squashed by an inept, corrupt, self-hating leadership in Israel and the Diaspora. The following is an extract of an interview Moshe Feiglin (the head of the Jewish Leadership faction within the Likud party) gave to Frontpage Magazine. It brought some glimmer of hope. We need to revisit the past inspiration of Zionism in order to achieve our goals in the future: Feiglin: ... the Prime Minister of Israel, Ehud Olmert, came to a hospital in Ashkelon. He came to visit the Jews of Sderot and Ashkelon that had been wounded by the Qassam, Katyusha, and Grad rockets being fired from Gaza. Do you know what he told them? He said "get used to it"; just like that, "get used to it, I don't have a solution". Do you understand the meaning of that? Just 63 years after the gates of Auschwitz were opened, Jews are supposed to get used the fact that every once in a while we will get killed just because we are Jews. ... we don't have a solution. And this isn't about Olmert personally; the entire state of Israel doesn't have a solution. Our whole state of mind, our mentality, and our leadership are void of faith. That's why we have no solution. The problem is much more than Olmert not giving the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) an order. ...The problem is our mentality. Since Rabin's handshake, the entire state of Israel marched into a state of mind of pragmatism and non-spirituality. The only way we can solve this problem is not by getting more weapons from the United States. We don't need more F-15s and F-16s. That is not our problem. What we need is to march back into the right state of mind. And for that we need leadership. True, authentic leadership based on Jewish values. ...I say the entire Jewish Nation because whatever happens in Israel immediately reflects back on all Jews worldwide. When these Jews in Gush Katif were pulled from their homes, what happened to the level of anti-Semitism worldwide? It went up of course. Israel did what the world expected of us and anti-Semitism went up. When we defied the world and did what we had to do in 1967, the level of anti-Semitism dropped. Suddenly every Jew on the streets of Toronto and New York was proud to be a Jew. How did we achieve this true peace there? Rule number one: the Syrian Arabs that were there were evacuated. None stayed. So the first rule is, encourage the Arabs to leave. The second thing that was done was the land was taken over. After the war in 1967, we took the land over. The third rule is to annex the land. In the Golan Heights we annexed the land and put it under full Israeli sovereignty. The fourth rule is to flourish the land with as many Jewish villages as possible. And the fifth and most important rule is to never sign a peace treaty. We have not signed any peace deals with respect to the Golan Heights and look what we have –– true peace. A real, true peace exists there, something that doesn't exist anywhere else in the country. Our border with Egypt is very dangerous even though we have a peace deal signed with them. To this day, Egypt fights against us via that border. And we can't do anything because our hands are tied because of the peace deal we signed. Any solution that leaves the Arabs in their place will not work, period. Fortunately, one good thing did come out of Rabin's handshake –– 15 years under the PLO/Hamas regime have made the Arabs want to leave. Various polls have showed this, the majority wants to leave. ...every year Israel spends 10% of our entire national income on the concept of Oslo. That is $150 billion every decade spent building fences, destroying Jewish villages, and putting guards in front of every coffee shop and store. Before Oslo, Israel didn't need to have an armed guard in uniform in front of every store. That is 60,000 people on full payroll just guarding us from the effects of Oslo. That money is enough to give every Arab family in Yesha (the West Bank and Gaza) $250,000. America did not want Israel to go and fight the Six-Day War. America did not want Israel to go and bomb the nuclear reactor in Iraq. And there are many more examples like that. I respect the United States a lot, but I expect that kind of respect back and I believe I will get it. People who respect themselves, get the kind of respect they deserve from others. I will not let anyone tell me what is in my best interests. I am going to worry about Israel first, but I do believe that, at the end of the day, my policies are in the interests of the United States as well. First of all, we have to stop this game of being attacked by sub-contractors. Egypt is fighting us through Gaza. It attacks us daily. There is no doubt about it, there is a war going on between Egypt and Israel today. It is just being fought through a sub-contractor. Syria and Iran are fighting us through Hezbollah in Lebanon. And we are playing their game, instead of making them pay a price for what they are doing. We have to break this cycle and make them pay a serious price. We gave up the Sinai for peace and now they are using it against us. ...a strong Israel can achieve peaceful borders. Notice I didn't say "peace". "Peace" is something totally different. But we can achieve peaceful borders; a situation where people are not getting killed. A weak Israel can only achieve peace agreements. But those agreements come with a lot of bloodshed. Therefore, we should radiate strength. We have shown in the past that we can do that. Contact Steven Shamrak at stevenshamrak@gmail.com and visit his website at www.shamrak.com. |
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THE ISRAELI 'SETTLER' SERVING IN ITALY'S PARLIAMENT
Posted by Shoshanna Walker, April 21, 2008. |
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This was written by Meron Rapoport and is appeared April 18,
2008 in Ha'aretz
www.haaretz.com/hasen/objects/pages/PrintArticleEn.jhtml?itemNo=976069 |
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Almost 50,000 people live in Jerusalem's Gilo neighborhood, one of the largest in Israel. Up until now, it had no representative in parliament. As of this week, it does. Fiamma Nirenstein, a neighborhood resident for 10 years, was just elected to the Italian parliament. If we stick to the definitions of the UN, which views Gilo, on the capital's southern edge, as a settlement, one could say that Nirenstein is the first settler to be a member of a non-Israeli parliament. This week, in a series of phone calls to Rome, between the first reports of a close victory for the right-wing coalition, to which Nirenstein belongs, and the final reports of Silvio Berlusconi's sweeping victory, Nirenstein explained several times that she has not requested Israeli citizenship but that this bureaucratic fact does not affect her identity. "I feel as though I made aliyah," says Nirenstein in a conversation that fluctuates between Hebrew and Italian. In the elections, Nirenstein did not hide her Israeliness. Her campaign was centered on the view that Israel is Western democracy's vanguard in the struggle against world terror. "I ran for a place in parliament as a representative of the Liguria district. I held rallies in Genoa and other cities in the region," she recounts. "But I didn't talk with the people about local problems. I told them that the most important thing for their Italian identity is to stand by Israel's side." Nirenstein called her most recent book "Israele Siamo Noi" ("Israel Is Us"). By "us," she was referring, of course, to Italians. Even though Italy hasn't experienced much in the way of terror attacks and the number of Muslim immigrants there is small compared with other countries in Europe, the talk about the importance of the fight against Islamic terror, or simply of how to deal with Islam in general, is very much present in contemporary Italian discourse. Oriana Fallaci devoted the last years of her life to writing books in which she forthrightly pegged Islam as the source of all the world's evil. Berlusconi himself, the unquestioned leader of the Italian right for more than a decade, explained at one of his appearances a few days ago: "We must be conscious of the superiority of our culture, which gave prosperity to people in countries that adopted it and ensures respect for human rights and religion. This respect certainly does not exist in the Islamic countries." Perhaps this is the reason why Berlusconi and Gianfranco Fini, Berlusconi's partner and the former head of the neo-fascist party, proposed that Nirenstein join their joint list, Il Partito della Liberta ("The Party of Liberty"). Nirenstein's father arrived in Italy during World War II, as a soldier in the Jewish Brigade. In Florence, he met her mother, who fought as a partisan against the fascist government and later against the Nazi regime. "I was born as a communist," she says. In her youth she was part of the 1968 generation, founded the first feminist journal in Italy and worked at leftist newspapers. After the 1967 Six-Day War, a rift began to develop between her and her "communist comrades," who saw Israel as an occupying country. "I was confused for a long time," she says. "In 1982, I signed a petition against the First Lebanon War. Today I wouldn't sign it. What did Israel gain from the withdrawal from Lebanon?" To the right of Netanyahu Her first visit to Israel was as a reporter, and it was only after this initial visit that she returned in 1992 for the long term. For two years, she ran the Istituto Italiano di Cultura in Tel Aviv, and after the Rabin assassination, she decided she had to stay in Israel. "I had the feeling that this was the most interesting place in the world, and I also felt that the reporting on Israel was biased." She did not obtain Israeli citizenship because she thought an Israeli passport would hinder her in her work, but aside from that, she also thinks that "every Jew in the world is an Israeli even if he's not aware of it. Anyone who doesn't know it is making a big mistake." In terms of the reality of Israel's current political system, Nirenstein is located to the right of Kadima and Labor, and maybe even of Likud Chair Benjamin Netanyahu. She says she believes in the idea of two states for two peoples, but thinks the principle of "territories for peace" has been a failure. There's no point in discussing it, she explains, until the entire Arab world is capable of recognizing Israel. Negotiations with Hamas are absolutely out of the question. But there are polls which indicate that a majority of Israelis are prepared to negotiate with Hamas. Nirenstein: "The public supports a compromise with Hamas, so that it will stop firing on Sderot. But morally speaking, there mustn't be negotiations with Hamas, which thinks that Jews are the sons of monkeys and pigs. You can't negotiate with cannibals, who eat human beings." It's hard to argue with Nirenstein. Not just because of the poor quality of the phone connection to Rome, but also because she thinks that Israel is a beacon that should serve as inspiration for the entire West. "Israel is the vanguard of all the democracies in the world, and the time has come for Europe to recognize that," she says. But in the election campaign you met with Italians who barely know where Israel is. How did you persuade them that Israel is important to their lives? "I said that Italy can learn a lot from Israel. It can learn what a true democracy is, how a democracy can survive in conditions of conflict, without forsaking its fundamental principles. Israel is a culture of life, a culture of people who are always seeking peace. Our problem in Italy is that sometimes we don't know who we are. You can know who you are if you know your enemy and your friend. Israel is Italy's friend." In other words, Islam is the enemy? "I'm not saying that all Muslims are terrorists, or that all Muslims are criminals. But Hamas has announced that it wants to conquer Rome, to make it the outpost from which it will conquer all of Europe." And you think that Hamas really intends to conquer Rome? "Rome is a very symbolic place in the eyes of radical Islam. Italy, with its Catholic culture, is an enemy in the eyes of Islam." Obviously, this all touches on one of the central issues in Italy's recent election campaign: the immigrant issue. Fini, who is slated to be appointed parliament speaker in Berlusconi's new administration, frequently talks about the need to ban illegal immigration. Even the moderate Social-Democractic party, led by the former mayor of Rome, Walter Veltroni, devoted a good amount of attention to the subject. "People feel that immigration is threatening their cities, their culture," Nirenstein explains. "Maybe it's exaggerated, but the residents of Florence, for example, think of their city as a temple for the works of art that were created there. When they see the steps of the Duomo filled with immigrants, they're in shock." I lived in Florence. I remember Italy as a tolerant country. "It's changed a lot. There are entire quarters that you can't enter at night. There's rape, there are assaults, there's drug dealing. There are schools for immigrants where they don't hang the crucifix. The immigrants have contempt for our culture. We gave them work and they scorn our values. There's a deep contradiction between the more radical Islam and Italy's values. The straight-armed salute In Nirenstein's books, you don't find the aggressive anti-Muslim sentiment that screams from every page of Fallaci's books. But while she isn't part of the wave of opposition to immigrants and Muslims that is sweeping Italy, she does belong to the new right that scored an impressive election victory this week. It seems that there is no such thing as a right way to be "right" in all of Europe: Berlusconi, the avowed capitalist and most avid pro-American in Europe, on the one hand, the Lega Nord (Northern League) with its wild incitement on the other, and then Fini and his former neo-facist party. Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy almost seem like communists in comparison to this bunch. Nirenstein does not "completely" accept this definition. To her, Berlusconi is a centrist who also received votes from the left, because he's "for the downtrodden" and wants to lessen their tax burden. Nirenstein sees herself as "a friend of the Northern League," which just wants to turn Italy into a federal state. She feels this is a legitimate ambition, even if some of the League's pronouncements are "unpleasant." Her closeness to the former neo-fascist party caused Nirenstein some discomfort during the election campaign, particularly after one of Berlusconi's candidates for the Senate, Giuseppe Ciarrapico, proudly announced that he was and remains a fascist. According to Nirenstein, his candidacy "does not fit" with her candidacy as an avowed anti-fascist, a Jew and the daughter of a partisan, but she remained on the list nevertheless. "There's no such thing as a perfect list," she says. Did you encounter people like Ciarrapico during the election campaign? "At one of the election rallies I attended, in Genoa, someone gave the straight-armed salute. I went to the Allianza Nationale [the new name of the former neo-fascist party] people and asked who it was. I said that I protested, that I was stunned to see such a thing and that I did not want to see it again." But Fini himself used to do the straight-armed salute at rallies in the 1960s, when everyone knew where fascism had led to. "I don't know if Fini did that salute, maybe he did it in his youth. But I don't know what more he could have done than to kneel at Yad Vashem. Is he supposed to kill himself?" He may not have been able to do more. But how did you, as a Jew, the daughter of a partisan, feel alongside a man who supported fascism as an adult? "He was a fascist like I was a communist, when I was indifferent to what Pol Pot did, when I admired Che Guevara. I see him as someone who has since developed." Post-election Italy, says Nirenstein, is a better place, a more stable place, a place without a radical left and a radical right. She doesn't know yet what she'll do in the new parliament. Nirenstein would like to deal with foreign affairs, but she knows she'll have to pay a price: For now she'll remain in Rome and bid good-bye to her good friends in Israel. She's not giving up the house in Gilo, though. It will wait for the return of the parliament member from Rome. Contact Shoshanna Walker by email at rosewalk@concentric.net |
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AFI BOOKLET FOR ISRAEL'S 60TH ANNIVERSARY
Posted by Simon McIlwaine, April 21, 2008. |
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Dear Friends The AFI 60th anniversary booklet, written by our Membership Director, Fran Waddams, is attached. To download
I hope you will enjoy reading it. Please feel free to download it and share it with your friends, church or synagogue. Chag Pesach sameach! Simon and all at AFI For information on the Celebration in Central London and Manchester,
click here.
Simon McIlwaine is with Anglican Friends of Israel
(www.anglicanfriendsofisrael.com). Contact him at Simon.McIlwaine@ormerods.co.uk
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HAMAS EXPLODES U.S. VEHICLES IN MASSIVE ATTACK
Posted by Aryeh Zelasko, April 21, 2008. |
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This is not the first time that American arms and equipment has been used by terrorist against us. When Begin invaded Lebanon, Sharon pulled out a few Billion Dollars worth of American guns, ammunition, electronics, vehicles and other sorts of equipment. A great deal of all this was officially listed as having been given to the Saudis and other "moderate" Arab regimes. I also remember reading at the time that the explosives used to murder the Marines in Beirut were American. Then there was an entire ship of mostly American arms intercepted a few years ago on its way to the PLO. I am so glad that the American Government is our dear friend. I can only dread to think what things would be like if they didn't really like us. This was written by Aaron Klein, WND's Jerusalem Bureau chief;
it is archived at
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JAFFA, Israel –– Hamas used two seized U.S. military vehicles to carry out a large-scale attack this weekend against a major Israeli border crossing, Hamas leaders told WND. The vehicles were captured when Hamas last June took complete control of the Gaza Strip, overtaking all U.S.-backed security compounds in the territory associated with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party. The U.S. provided Fatah with weapons, vehicles and large sums of financial and military aid. Israeli defense officials called yesterday's border attack the largest, most sophisticated Hamas terrorist operation since Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005. "We utilized two American armored Jeep vehicles in the heroic operation at Kerem Shalom," said Abu Abdullah, who is considered one of the most important operational members of Hamas' so-called military wing. "We obtained the vehicles last June." Muhammad Abdel-Al, the spokesperson and a leader of the Hamas-allied Popular Resistance Committees terrorist organization which participated in this weekend's attack, confirmed two American vehicles were utilized. Abdel-Al added, "We warned you we would obtain all the weapons the Zionists and Americans gave to your puppets in Fatah. It is only a matter of time before we take over the West Bank and obtain the American weapons you are giving Fatah now." In the attack, which took place just hours after the Jewish state ushered in the Passover holiday, two explosive-laden vehicles disguised as Israeli military jeeps exploded at the Kerem Shalom crossing, the main Israeli transport area for goods and humanitarian aid into Gaza. Thirteen Israel Defense Forces soldiers were hurt in the attack, most wounded lightly to moderately. The two vehicles arrived at Kerem Shalom under the cover of dozens of mortar shells just after a third armored vehicle ripped a hole in the border fence. The two disguised vehicles exploded inside the crossing, one reportedly close to a group of soldiers. The drivers of all three vehicles were killed when their cars exploded. At roughly the same time as the Kerem Shalom attack, the Israel Defense Forces fired a missile at a truck approaching Kissufim, another border area previously used to cross into Gaza. The missile caused a massive explosion, indicating the truck was carrying a large amount of explosives defense sources believe was to be used in a second, simultaneous border attack at Kissufim. At nearly the same time along another area of the border, IDF soldiers spotted two Palestinians carrying explosives approaching the border fence just outside Kibbutz Be'eri, a Jewish town bordering Gaza. An IDF force of 11 soldiers entered Gaza in pursuit of the terrorists only to quickly realize they were being ambushed in an apparent Hamas trap. Four Hamas snipers fired at the unit, killing three IDF soldiers. Defense officials here believe Hamas attempted a major, coordinated attack at several points along Israel's Gaza border. Yoav Galant, IDF commander in the Gaza area, called the offensive Hamas' boldest operation since Israel's Gaza retreat. He said the attack, "the likes of which we have not seen since the disengagement," was an attempt "to execute mass-killings and abductions." Galant told reporters Hamas was "harming the interest of the Palestinians themselves, by attack crossings which are the humanitarian lifelines of Gaza." Former deputy defense minister Ephraim Sneh said the attack revealed "the true face of Hamas, which is [itself] creating the blockade on Gaza's people." But back in Gaza City, Sami Abu Zuhri, a Hamas spokesman, said his terror group would carry out more attacks on crossings to break what he claimed was an Israeli blockade of the territory. "These operations are the beginning of the explosions that Hamas has warned of," said Abu Zuhri. "If the parties don't intervene quickly to save Gaza and break the siege, what is coming will be greater." WND previously reported Hamas obtained armored U.S. military jeeps. Immediately after Hamas staged its coup and took over Gaza, WND quoted Hamas officials stating they seized "enormous" stockpiles of foreign weapons, including U.S. arms, that had been stored in Fatah security compounds. The U.S. in recent years reportedly transferred large quantities of weaponry to build up Fatah forces against rival Hamas. Hamas officials told WND in multiple interviews prior to last June they would seize the American weapons. Hamas last summer provided WND with a partial list of what the terror group said were seized weapons, The list included: * "Dozens" of mounted machine guns that can fire at Israeli helicopters Hamas' latest round of terrorist attacks comes as former president Jimmy Carter this weekend continued meeting Hamas leaders and reportedly discussed with them a cease fire to include the possibility of the Palestinians assuming some security control of the Gaza side of Israel's major border crossings. Carter met twice this weekend with Hamas chieftain Khaled Mashaal, and his deputy, Moussa Abu Marzouk, who both reside in Syria. The two men are accused of masterminding attacks that have killed hundreds of civilians. "Several subjects were discussed, including [Israeli-Palestinian] crossing points, [captured Israeli soldier Gilad] Schalit, the siege on the Palestinians and a cease-fire between Hamas and Israel," Abu Marzouk said. The AP quoted a senior Hamas official in Damascus, speaking on condition of anonymity, described the meetings between Carter and Hamas as "warm." Last week, Carter met in Egypt with senior Hamas leaders Mahmoud al-Zahar and Saeed Seyam. Israeli security officials stated it was "almost a one hundred percent certainty" both al-Zahar and Seyam were involved in planning this weekend's border attacks. Al-Zahar and Seyam are identified by both Israeli and Palestinian security officials as the two most senior leaders of Hamas' so-called military wing, which carries out terrorist activities from the Gaza Strip, including rocket strikes, suicide bombings, border raids, kidnappings and shooting attacks. In a WND exclusive interview earlier this week, Ahmed Yousuf, Hamas' top political adviser in the Gaza Strip, called Carter a "noble person" whose planned meeting with Hamas would help the terror organization "engage with the world community." Aryeh Zelasko lives in Beitar Illit, south of Jerusalem. He is Director of Sales and Marketing of Israel Visit (www.israelvisit.co.il) which provides information and an internet buying facility for American visitors to Israel. |
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THE LIBELING OF A PEOPLE SURGES WITH A VENGEANCE
Posted by Marc Samberg, April 21, 2008. |
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This was on my local PBS last night. Check PBS.ORG for your local
stations if in USA.
It was written by Alessandra Stanley and published January
8, 2007 in the New York Times.
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Diatribes against the Jews are shockingly crude in Arab television programs and newspapers. They are also shockingly commonplace, "the elevator music for the Arab world," as David Ignatius, an international affairs columnist for The Washington Post, puts it in "Anti-Semitism in the 21st Century: The Resurgence," a PBS documentary that is broadcast tonight. And that background noise has become more strident and pervasive over the last few years, spread by satellite television and the Internet throughout the Middle East and North Africa, with echoes reverberating deep into immigrant groups in Europe. "Anti-Semitism in the 21st Century" tries to explain the origins of that hate as well as its surge. Whatever its roots, anti-Semitism in the Muslim world is linked inexorably to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and keeps getting worse. And no topic is more sensitive or incendiary. So not surprisingly, the script is cautious and elliptical, more comfortable exploring the past than the present. The film begins with a vitriol sampler, clips of various Islamic clerics culled by the Middle East Media Research Institute, a Washington monitoring group founded by Yigal Carmon, a former counterintelligence adviser to the Israeli government. In 2004 on Al-Manar TV in Lebanon, for example, Sheikh Taha al-Sabonji said, "Those responsible for all civil strife and other problems throughout history were the Jews." (Muslim extremists are not the only ones to express such sentiments, of course. Mel Gibson expressed a similar idea when he was arrested for drunk driving.) A history lesson follows. Various experts explain that Jews did not have equal rights in the Muslim-ruled world, but were relatively tolerated until the 19th century, when the crumbling of the Ottoman empire and the rise of the Zionist movement dramatically changed the landscape. Jewish refugees escaping persecution in Europe arrived in Palestine en masse. "The Arab reaction was a refusal of Jewish presence," says Zeev Sternhell, an Israeli historian. "It was not anti-Semitism." But European missionaries and colonists supplied those biases, bringing to the region a Christian rationale for anti-Semitism, steeped in images of Jews as devils and killers of Jesus. During World War II Arabs found common cause with European fascists. Hitler won the allegiance of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem by promising to remove the Jews from Palestine. Fabrications like the early-20th-century Protocols of the Elders of Zion and medieval blood libels, legends that Jews baked matzo with the blood of murdered Christian children, faded in Europe after World War II. They lingered on in the East, finding new traction when Arab armies were defeated in 1948 and Israel emerged as a state and Palestinians were displaced. Israeli's victory in the 1967 war left the Arab world humiliated and angry, so anti-Semitic theories of an all-powerful worldwide Jewish conspiracy were "soothing," says Bernard Lewis, professor emeritus of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton. The film does not mention that Mr. Lewis is one of the leading scholars that Vice President Dick Cheney consulted to formulate the administration's rationale for toppling Saddam Hussein. The documentary makes very little mention of the American occupation of Iraq — which is odd, given how often the Arab media paint the war as a sinister conspiracy cooked up by Israel and its supporters in Washington. The film reports that anti-Semitic acts of violence have almost doubled since the 1990s. But there are lots of other indicators besides violence. Lately lurid television dramas include cockeyed depictions of Jews and Jewish history. One notable example from 2003 is a lavish, Syrian-made series called "Al Shatat," a term for diaspora, which begins with Baron Edmond de Rothschild, an earlier financier of Jewish settlement in Palestine, on his deathbed, telling his family and friends that "God has given the Jews the mission of ruling the world." "Al-Shatat" also includes a modern-day blood libel: bearded Jews slitting the throat of a Christian child. Scholars say that Israel's enemies exploit anti-Semitism to rally support for their cause, but Rashid Khalidi, the Edward Said professor of Arab studies at Columbia University, argues that Israel also finds anti-Semitism useful. "I think that the brouhaha about it is a systematic attempt to draw attention away from the roots of the conflict," Mr. Khalidi argues. "There has been an oppressive occupation going on for 40 years, a people has been dispossessed." The narrator, Judy Woodruff, steps in as if to cool frayed tempers. "And while some say that hatred of Israel is caused by Israel's occupation of the Golan Heights and West Bank, and the conflict in Lebanon," she says, "others note that overt calls by Arab leaders for the destruction of the entire Jewish state were commonplace even before the occupation which began in 1967." "Anti-Semitism in the 21st Century" explores the ancient hatreds that have risen up in new forms. But the film's circumspection reveals just how complex the problem is to address, let alone redress. http://www.twocatstv.com/pressroom/press_antisem_starledg.htm
Our 2007 PBS film Anti-Semitism in the 21st Century: The
Resurgence,
has won the Cine Golden Eagle Award. For more info go to
Contact Marc Samberg at MarcSamberg@yahoo.com |
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'PALESTINIANS' USED ISRAELI-SUPPLIED APC'S IN KEREM SHALOM ATTACK
Posted by Avodah, April 21, 2008. |
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This comes from Carl in Jerusalem on his website:
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As some of you may recall, just about a month ago, Prime Minister Ehud K. Olmert approved the delivery of twenty-five Russian armored personnel carriers ("APC's" in English or nagmashim in Hebrew) to the 'good terrorists' of 'moderate' 'Palestinian' President Mahmoud Abbas Abu Mazen. The approval was contrary to the recommendations of both the IDF and the General Security Services. Some of you may have wondered at the time how something that is a 'personnel carrier' could be used directly for terrorism. Have a look at the picture at the top of this post –– it's an IDF issue APC. And if that's not enough for you to imagine how terrorists could use an APC, consider this account of Saturday's Hamas attack on the Kerem Shalom crossing and recall that Hamas got APC's and other pieces of military equipment when it overthrew Fatah in Gaza. Thirteen soldiers were wounded at 6 a.m. on Saturday when an armored personnel carrier –– supplied to the Palestinian Authority in the 1990s –– rammed through the fence between Israel and southern Gaza near the Kerem Shalom crossing, used to transfer humanitarian aid to the Strip. After the APC opened the gate, two vehicles –– disguised as IDF jeeps and packed with 300 kilograms of explosives each –– drove through. One blew up next to an IDF watchtower, causing extensive damage but no injuries to the soldiers inside. The second vehicle exploded next to a number of IDF jeeps belonging to the Southern Command's Beduin Desert Battalion. Despite the thick fog, the deputy battalion commander spotted the second jeep as it made its way into the crossing. Thinking at first that the jeep was Israeli, the officer tried to contact the driver on the standard military radio frequency. When he did not receive an answer, he understood that it was a car bomb. "The deputy battalion commander shouted, 'Car bomb, car bomb,' and all the soldiers ran into their armored jeeps," an officer who witnessed the infiltration said Sunday. Most of the soldiers made it into the vehicles. The 13 who didn't sustained light-to-moderate wounds. And that wasn't the only attempt to use an APC for a terror attack on Saturday: Moments later, another APC approached the Kissufim crossing, north of Kerem Shalom. A tank from Brigade 401 opened fire and destroyed the vehicle, which was believed to have been packed with explosives. But if any of you think that's enough to get Prime Minister Ehud K. Olmert to alter his plans to give the 'good terrorists' from Fatah more APC's, please think again. Also on Sunday, defense officials said Israel did not plan to alter an earlier decision to permit the PA in the West Bank to receive 25 APCs from Russia, despite the use of an armored vehicle in the Kerem Shalom attack. The decision to transfer the APCs was made by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert several months ago following a request by Russia to supply the vehicles to Fatah forces in the West Bank to bolster PA President Mahmoud Abbas. The more things change, the more they stay the same. This government is still 'led' by idiots. Contact Avodah at avodah15@aol.com |
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IRANIANS PROTEST DUTCH "ZIONISTS"
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, April 21, 2008. |
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This comes from yesterday's Gateway Pundit website
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 A large group of people congregated in front of the Dutch embassy in Tehran on Thursday to voice their strong protest against an anti-Islam documentary produced by the far-right Dutch politician, Greet Wilders.   Gabrielle Goldwater lives in Switzerland. Contact her at III44@aol.com |
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INDIVIDUAL ISRAELIS FIGHT ARAB POACHERS; WHAT GOVERNMENTS REALLY THINK ABOUT ISRAEL
Posted by Richard Shulman, April 21, 2008. |
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ARAB CLAIMS & REALITY During this year's Israeli Arab protest against establishment of a Jewish state, an Arab claimed that Israel demolishes homes and ethnically cleanses cities of mixed populations on an unprecedented scale. Fact is, whole cities of Bedouin are illegal, but the government does not act against them (Arutz-7, 4/17). In Israel, an Arab clan illegally built a village of 20 houses that they call storage containers, on land owned by the Jewish National Fund. They cut a hole on the fence of the nearby kibbutz, and graze their horses on the Jews' crops. "Fearing Arab riots or political condemnation by the Israeli Left, Arab leaders, the Islamic Movement and their allies abroad, the police and the state prosecutors have simply stopped enforcing the laws against the Galilee and Negev Arabs. Surrounded by increasingly hostile and lawless Arab and Beduin villages, local Jews' livestock and crops are continuously plundered." Jews either abandon their fields or pay protection money to Arab gangs, because the police close thousands of complaints a year, alleging "lack of public interest." The Jewish state does not protect Jewish property. A farmer's son and combat veteran has organized a movement that guards the farms, fends off the Arabs, and teaches and inspires Israelis about their Zionist rights and purposes (Caroline Glick in IMRA, 3/24). The Arabs ethnically cleanse cities of mixed populations. In one town, Druse burnt down the Jews' houses. Muslim Arabs like to play the victim. Most people sympathize with the Palestinian Arabs, having no idea of the Arabs' extensive robbery of Jews in Israel and in the Territories. SEC. RICE'S LATEST CONCESSION FROM ISRAEL She got Israel's Defense Minister to approve a new P.A. town on the outskirts of Jerusalem, on the road connecting it to several Jewish towns in Judea-Samaria. The IDF foresees security problems (Arutz-7, 4/17). Arabs will attack Jews on that road, will try to cut off the Jewish towns, and will besiege Jerusalem. It's happened before. Rice interferes with Israeli security. She should be given a lifetime membership in the PLO terrorist organization. An Americans should stop asserting that Pres. Bush is pro-Israel. NEW ISRAELI ANTI-TERRORIST WEAPON Israel has developed a camera-guided machine gun that will enable Israeli troops indoors to fire at terrorists outdoors near the security fence (IMRA, 3/24). U.S. ARMS FOR ABBAS FAILS The US finds that Abbas does not undertake counter-terrorism with the arms and training the US gives him. He makes some arrests and has a few of the suspects tried, when pressed. Then he lets them go. His main use of power is to try to keep Hamas from wresting it away. Why keep giving Abbas arms? Obviously those arms either will be used by him against Israel or will be taken by Hamas and used against Israel (IMRA, 3/26). Could that be the purpose in arming him? Or does Sec. Rice still think, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, that Abbas is anti-terrorist and a viable leader? SHOULD ISRAEL LET P.A. POLICE PATROL JENIN? Eventually, the P.A. must be responsible for maintaining order in its cities. Some Israelis, however, consider the P.A. police a threat to them. Having noted that terrorists exhibit military training, they are reluctant to let P.A. police assigned to Jenin receive such training in Jordan, under US auspices (Arutz-7, 3/26). The answers are not to recognize the P.A. and gradually to get the Arabs out and annex undeveloped areas of the Territories. Let the western Palestinian Arabs go to Arab states, including the Palestinian one, Jordan! Pity the countries that receive them! OBAMA'S ADVISOR Former US Air Force Chief of Staff Peek is a senior military advisor to Barak Obama. Gen. McPeek blames US Jews for the war in Iraq and for keeping the US from making peace between Israel and the Arabs. He accuses US Jews and Christian pro-Zionists of dual loyalty. If Obama wins, McPeek is likely to become Sec. of Defense (Arutz-7, 3/26). UNFREE SPEECH IN ISRAEL An Israeli was sentenced for "incitement to racism." When PM Sharon planned to expel thousands of Jews from Gaza and northern Samaria, Ben-Yaakov conducted an informal referendum asking which is preferable, that expulsion of Jews or the expulsion of hostile Jews from Israel. How democratic was the prosecution? (Arutz-7, 3/26). The government of Israel represses much dissent. Acting against Jewish interests, it is the government that is discriminatory. HOW ISRAEL TREATS DISSIDENTS Some teenaged girls protested the government's failure to demolish the house of the terrorist who had murdered eight yeshiva students. Arrested, they were placed in a prison with foul-smelling blankets and a chain-smoker but no ventilation. They were denied medical treatment, though one was injured, at at first, food and water. (Israeli police don't just arrest Jewish dissidents, they often beat them up.) This was verified by the Israeli Bar Association. Later, the police admitted they had had no reason for arresting the girls (IMRA, 3/25). In other words, the police were just repressing critics of the government. We keep hearing what a democracy Israel is, but it is a semi-police state. WHAT THE GOVERNMENTS SAY & WHAT THE MEDIA SAYS Foreign leaders tell former PM Netanyahu of their surprise that Israel does not use its overwhelming power vis-á-vis Hamas to bring it down and end its bombardment of Israel and its threats of greater damage in future (IMRA, 4/18). The media, however, asserts, and reports that the US government agrees with it, that Israel is too hard on Gaza. Those positions seem contradictory. I would explain them like this. The governments side with the Arabs, the US privately and some publicly, but think that Israel would be within its rights to use greater power against Hamas and are surprised that Israel listens to their demand that Israel refrain from doing so. UNO APPOINTMENT TO JUDGE ISRAEL ALREADY HAS The UNO has appointed an American Jewish (nominally?) law professor as special investigator of Israel's actions in the Territories. Prof. Falk has accused Israel of treating the Palestinian Arabs as the Nazis treated the Jews, of terrorism, and of having genocidal tendencies. He was part of a UNO mission which judged suicide bombing a valid method. His impartiality has come under question (IMRA, 3/27). The value of the UNO should come under question. After all, this outrageous appointment is routine for the UNO. So is stealing from the vast sums the UNO raises publicly and privately. Falk's demonstrated lack of solidarity with fellow Jews contradicts antisemitic conspiracy theories about the Jewish people conspiring in behalf of Israel. He is among the many Jews conspiring against Israel. How sad that such a sick mind comes from my Jewish people! Richard Shulman is a veteran defender of Israel on several web-based forums. His comments and analyses appear often on Think-Israel. He provides cool information and right-on-target overviews. He distributes his essays by email. To subscribe, write him at richardshulman5@aol.com |
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PLEASE HELP SAVE ISRAEL
Posted by Mark Tollman, April 21, 2008. |
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Shalom and Howdy If the Jewish people don't retain all OUR biblical archeology and heritage and Bible-land, then ... we will become a vanquished people; dead physically and spiritually, severed from our Bible-soul. Let's save Israel. What to do? read www.middleeastsolutions.com and tell the world ASAP. ask the Knesset; to review the analysis of www.middleeastsolutions.com Please ask the bloggers to add this link, to their pro-Bible-Israel websites. Please write to the Israeli media, the Israeli newspapers,
organizations, groups, etc, talk about this on Israeli Radio.
Let's save Israel
www.middleeastsolutions.com seems to express a solution, very diplomatically. A population transfer, reminding Islam to kindly compute their square miles of these 52 Muslim countries –– Islam has 52 Muslim countries! The website does indeed provide the only true peace, that ensures a future for the Jewish people, connected to our Biblical Covenants and allows for our growth with safety. (otherwise we turn into a parking lot in a few decades) And gives Palestinians their county in Arabia. ( with wealthy Saudis to nurture them.) The British only gave us 20% of what was promised us. No one has suffered more that the Jewish People. Our connection to the land is biblical and ancient and 4000 years. The Romans, Christians and Muslims, have so brutally exterminated us. We are an endangered-species without our ancient-Homeland. ! ! !!!!!!! We are a special people; with a special situation. www.middleeastsolutions.com should be translated into Hebrew, so all Israel can read about the hopeful options of retaining our Bible-land www.pmw.org.il & www.prophetofdoom.net should also be translated into Hebrew; so we know what evil Islam is, and we must educate the naïve Knesset NOW. Perhaps a great website is simply needed; with these Koran quotes highlighted (www.prophetofdoom.net ) in multiple languages, telling what Islam is, in their own words. Listen to You Tube videos of Robert Spencer, Wafa Sultan, Nonie Darwish, Craig Winn, Ibn Warraq, Bridgette Gabriel, Bat Ye'Or (author of Eurabia), Walid Shoebat, Serge Trifkovic, Michelle Malkin, Melanie Phillips, Eurabia videos, Idiots Guide to Islam videos ___________________ HADITH Sahih Bukhari [4:52:176] Narrated 'Abdullah bin 'Umar: Allah's Apostle said, "You (i.e. Muslims) will fight with the Jews till some of them will hide behind stones. The stones will (betray them) saying, 'O 'Abdullah (i.e. slave of Allah)! There is a Jew hiding behind me; so kill him.' " (www.prophetofdoom.net under the tab Islamic quotes ) Qur'an:8:12 "I shall terrorize the infidels. (non-Muslims) So wound their bodies and incapacitate them because they oppose Allah and His Apostle." Islam = terrorism The Jewish community of Hebron, is completely abandoned by the (dhimmi) Knesset. Can U please bring attention to their plight and help them {www.hebron.org.il } Lastly, i am always told that everyone knows about how the Koran turns Abraham & Jesus into Muslims, embellishing megalomania-Mohammed' s self-claimed Paraclete status. If everyone knows this, when will someone actually say it. Mohammed claims Abraham is a Muslim –– and Mohammed has no connection to Ishmael. (www.faithfreedom.org & www.answering-islam.org & www.memri.org & www.wikiislam.com) If Islam wants peace, then declare peace, but Israel keeps the Bible-land. If Islam wants peace, then Islam must apologize to Jews and Christians for morphing Jewish-Abraham and Rabbi Jesus into bogus Koran-Muslims. only this is peace. Also; Israel can't survive with the Muslim 5th Column. The Jews only have tiny Israel. Islam has 52 countries. The Israeli-Muslims, must leave. Only this is peace. It was always my assumption, if Christians were aware how the Koran morphs their Jesus into a bogus-Muslim, they would react with horror and revulsion, and in turn, would increase their support for Jewish-Israel. ( Koran 3.67 ) Perhaps the time has come to inform the Congress & EU, it seems that they don't know that Islam morphs their Gospel-Jews and our Bible-Jews into Koran-Muslims. So how do they get informed? perhaps this is something to explore for a website and information campaign. (www.pmw.org.il & www.prophetofdoom.net) And how does one change the paradigms of getting the population-transfer ideas of www.middleeastsolutions.com into the proposals and solutions, ASAP and NOW before its too late. Let's work on this NOW. PLEASE SAVE BELOVED-ISRAEL, OUR JEWISH BIBLE-NATION. This is our land, Promised to Isaac, Jacob, Moses and David When will we have our David Jerusalem temple, our Caves of the Dead Sea Scrolls, our Shiloh, our Shechem, ( where Joseph's tomb was destroyed), our Ariel near Joshua's Tomb, our Hebron, our Galilee Golan, our Bethlehem, of David's birthplace, our Bible-land of the 12 Tribes of Jacob, our Jerusalem of Mount Moriah. Tell the gentiles: if they want to celebrate Mohammed's Muslim-Jesus; then do that in their churches in Rome, but –– Save our little Jewish Bible-Nation ! ! !!!!!!!!!!! Tell the Knesset; if they don't want to ensure the Preservation of all our Bible-land of our Zion-David-hope, then tell them to Go live in Saudi Arabia NOW. What would David do? he would fight for Jewish Bible Israel of Zion. David would NEVER give away our Bible-land. NEVER. We need our land and more land for Growth & Development, water supply, farming, our Archeology, Bible-identity, security, sanity, Bible, tourism, David's kingdom, Preservation of the Jewish People, Aliyah. project what will happen to us, in a tiny country, 50 years from now –– we will be a crowded parking lot. {Islam has 52 Muslim countries} www.middleeastsolutions.com is the answer. Just do it. all of us. NOW. Contact Mark Tollman at marktollman@earthlink.net |
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THE OSLO DAYENU
Posted by Steven Plaut, April 20, 2008. |
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Oslo put the "die" back in "Dayenu!" When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Arafat would pursue peace.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Hamas would be more of a threat to the PLO than to Israel.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Arafat would fight the Hamas and Islamic Jihad "with no Supreme Court or 'Betselem'" (in Rabin's immortal words).
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that terrorism would decrease.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that hostility to Jews in the Arab and the Western media would decrease.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that trade between Israel and Arab countries would flourish.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the Palestinian Authority would be disarmed.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the PLO would cooperate strategically with the Israel Defense Forces.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that there would be an economic peace dividend.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Israeli Arabs would demonstrate increasing moderation due to the "peace process".
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the Hamas and Jihad would be persecuted and suppressed by the PLO.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that PLO arms would never again be used against Jews.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the PLO leadership would speak in terms of peace with the Jews.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the PLO would denounce and renounce anti-Semitism.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the PLO would encourage normalization and daily peaceful commerce between Arabs and Jews.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the Palestinian Authority would be forced to spend all its energies on resolving domestic social and economic problems.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the Palestinian Authority would have so many internal troubles that it would not have the time or ability to pursue confrontation with Israel.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the US would back Israel if the PLO reneged on its obligations or displayed duplicity.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the US would cease to pressure Israel to endanger its security and fundamental interests.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the Europeans would rush forward to support Israel.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the Japanese and Saudis would pour money into regional investments, including into Israel.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the Egyptians would end all animosity towards Israel, Zionism and Jews.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the non-Arab Moslem countries would gush friendship for Israel.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Arab military expenditure would drop significantly.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Arab verbal threats against Israel would end.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Nazi-like propaganda in Arab countries would end.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the Israeli Left would lead the retreat from the Oslo experiment it if proved to be not working.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the Palestinian Authority would never behave as a tin cup Third-World kleptocracy if granted power.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Jews remaining in Moslem countries would see their treatment dramatically improved.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that liberals and leftists around the world would congratulate Israel for taking risks for peace and rush forward with goodwill and support.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that the majority of Palestinians would denounce all violence and terror.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Israeli Arabs would exhibit moderation and increasing loyalty to the state of Israel.
When they forced Israel to commit Oslo, the Israeli politicians assured us that Palestinian chants of "Death to the Jews" and "Massacre the Jews" would end.
Dayenu. Oslo put the "die" back in "Dayenu!" Any one of these errors in judgment should have been enough to end the career of a politician in a normal country, possibly even enough to indict that politician and imprison him or her. But in Israel? The politicians prepare for negotiations on the Saudi Plan and prepare for new unilateral withdrawals from Judea and Samaria. Dayenu. 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. His website address is http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com. Or write him at splaut@econ.haifa.ac.il |
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TERMINATION OF OUR SPECIAL STATUS AS THE CHOSEN PEOPLE
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, April 19, 2008. |
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[Editor's Note: This has been moving around the internet with no author attribution. Mostly, it's signed "The Jews", as below. On the Freeman Organization website (www.freeman.org), it is signed: Respectfully, |
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Subject: Official Letter
As you are aware, the contract made between you and Abraham is up for renewal, and this memorandum is to advise you that after, yea, those many millennia of consideration, we've decided not to renew. We should point out immediately that there is nothing in writing and, contrary to popular beliefs, we have not really benefited too much from this arrangement. If you go back to the early years of our arrangement, it definitely started off on the wrong footing. Not only were Israel and Judea invaded almost every year, but we went to enormous expense to erect, not one, but two Temples and they were both destroyed. All we have is a pile of old stones called the Western Wall. Of course, you know all this, but we feel it's a good thing to account for all the reasons we wish to terminate the contract. After the Hittites, Assyrians, etc., not only were we beaten up almost daily, but then we were sold off as slaves to Egypt (of all countries), and really lost a few hundred years of development. Now we realize that you went to a great deal of trouble to send Moses to lead us out of Egypt; and those poor Egyptian buggers were smitten with all those plagues. But, reflecting on those years, we are at a loss to understand why it took almost 40 years to make a trip that El Al now does in 45 minutes. Also, while not appearing to be ungrateful, Moses did lead us to the left instead of to the right at Sinai! To the only place in the middle east without any oil. And with water that is controlled by Jordan and Syria. Oy, if only he had stopped to ask directions. OK, so the mineral rights were not a part of the deal, but then the Romans came and we were really up to our necks in dreck. While it's true the Romans did give us water fit to drink, aqueducts, and baths, it was very disconcerting to walk down one of the vias, look up, and see one of your friends or family nailed to a three-by-four looking for all the world like a sign post. Even one of our princes, Judah ben Hur, got caught up with Roman stuff and drove like a crazy man around the Coliseum. It's a funny thing, but many people swore that Ben Hur had an uncanny resemblance to Moses –– go figure. Then, of all things, one of our most up-and-coming carpenters (he did great work, and cheap) declared himself your son (there was nothing said like this about Abe) and before we knew what was what, a whole new religion sprang up. To add insult to injury, we were dispersed all over the world two or three times while this new goy (oops, guy) really caught on. We were truly sorry to hear that the Romans executed him like so many others, but –– and this will make you laugh –– once again we were blamed. Couldn't someone else be chosen, maybe just once? Now here's something we really don't understand. That guy, Jesus Christ, really came into his own. Millions of people revered and worshipped his name and scriptures –– and still killed us by the millions. They claimed we drank the blood of newborn infants, controlled the world banks, operated the world's media, etc. Are we beginning to make our point here? So let's fast forward a few hundred years to the Crusades. Hoo Boy! Again, we were caught in the middle. They, the Lords and Knights, came from all over Europe to smack the Arabs and open up the holy places, but before we knew what hit us, they were killing us along with everyone else. Every time a King or a Pope was down in the opinion polls, they called for a Crusade or Holy War (today they're called a Jihad), and went on a killing rampage in our land. So, you tested us a little here and there, but some bright cleric in Spain came up with the Inquisition. We all thought it was a new game show, but once again we and quite a few others were used as firewood for a whole new street lighting arrangement in major Spanish cities. All right, that ended after about a hundred years or so –– in the great scheme of things not a long time. But every time we settled down in one country or another, they kicked us out. We wandered around a few hundred years or so, but it never changed. Finally we settled in a few countries, but they insisted we all live in ghettos, while the Russians came up with Pogroms. We all thought they made a spelling mistake and misspelled "programs," but we were dead wrong (very dead wrong). Apparently, when there was nothing else to occupy their time, killing Jews was the in thing to do. Now comes the really tough noogies. We were doing quite well, thank you, in a small European country called Germany, when some housepainter wrote a book, said a few things that caught on and became their leader. Oh boy! What a bad day that was for us –– your Chosen People (by now, you must be getting the drift of this e-mail?). We really didn't know where you were in the earth years 1933 to 1945. We know everyone needs a break now and then; even the Lord G-d Almighty needs some time off. But, when we needed you most, you were never around. You are probably aware of this, but if you have forgotten, over six million of your Chosen People, along with millions un-chosen others were murdered in cold blood. They even made lampshades out of our skins! Look, we don't want to dwell on the past, but it gets worse. Here we are, it's 1948, and millions of us are displaced again, when you really pull a fast one. We finally get our own land back! Yes, after all these years, you arrange for us to go back. Then all the Arab countries immediately declare war on us. We have to tell you that sometimes your sense of humour eludes us. So, we win all the wars, and we're now in a new century, but nothing's changed. We keep getting blown up, hijacked and kidnapped. We have no peace whatsoever. Enough is enough. We hope you understand that nothing's forever (except you, of course), and we respectfully would like to pull out of our verbal agreement vis a vis being your Chosen People. Listen, sometimes things work out, sometimes they don't. Let's be friends over the next few eons and see what happens. Meanwhile, how about this idea? We're sure you recall that Abraham had a whole other family from Ishmael (the ones who got the oil). How about making them your chosen people for a few thousand years? Respectfully yours, The Jews Gabrielle Goldwater lives in Switzerland. Contact her at III44@aol.com |
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PRIVATE ACCOMMODATIONS FOR ISLAM
Posted by Gabrielle Goldwater, April 19, 2008. |
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This was written by R. John Matthies and it appeared yesterday in
Front Page Magazine. It is archived at
http://www.meforum.org/article/1885. The original article has live links to additional material. |
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When is it appropriate to critique the policies of private enterprise? Private institutions are clearly permitted to carry out their business in a manner appropriate to their market, so long as they operate within the boundaries of the law. However, these institutions –– commercial, educational, or the media –– also play a major societal role, and hence carry great responsibility. For this reason, the practice of criticizing these institutions is an established tradition, as illustrated by book reviews, theater criticism, Hollywood gossip columns, sports talk, consumer reports, and others. Acknowledging that the critique of private institutions is different from the sort directed at government, we engage private sector entities in consideration of the influence they peddle and (indirect) power they wield. There are now many cases of Islamists in the West demanding accommodations –– and of these demands being met. These range from trivial cases of employee accommodation to cases of gender segregation. While state and local authorities have often bent to the designs of political Islam, it is to private institutions that one turns to examine the most egregious examples of accommodation. Still, it is more difficult to censure private institutions –– given their greater freedom of action –– than it is to censure lawmakers and public institutions, which are directly charged with serving the public good. Private entities have the right to run their own affairs, but the public cannot condone exceptions that result in exclusion or promote a regime of segregation. Merchants are free to choose the services or products they offer to target consumers and hence maximize profit. But to deny service to one group –– or create hardship for select employees –– to accommodate the wishes of another is unacceptable. Those policies that dismiss the rights of others –– whether in a place of work, study, or commerce –– must not be tolerated. For this reason, it is fitting to explore cases of accommodation with an eye both to the exceptional nature of the concession (in light of existing practice) and the degree to which group accommodation results in restricted movement, hampered speech, or great inconvenience to the majority. In the case of Britain's Sainsbury's convenience stores, for example, Muslim employees who prefer to avoid contact with alcoholic beverages for reason of religion are asked to raise their hands so a colleague can replace them at their post or scan the item for them. And those who object to stocking shelves with wine, beer, and spirits have found alternative positions within the company. A similar example is credited to Target, where Muslim employees at a Minneapolis store have been dispensed with handling pork products, for fear of contamination. Sainsbury's and Target have elected to satisfy employee wishes; the pertinent question is whether management has enacted these policies because it feels it's the right thing to do, or simply because no other options exist to fill the positions presently occupied by recalcitrant employees. (A spokeswoman for Sainsbury's admits as much, saying: "At the application stage we ask the relevant questions regarding any issues about handling different products and where we can we will try and accommodate any requirements people have.") If the latter is the case, it is difficult to imagine what these vendors can do or what suggestions we might offer. And so we tolerate exceptions of this kind –– with the caveat that one must guard against those accommodations that infringe upon the rights of others (and do not merely inconvenience). Both state and federal law are clear that employers are obliged to accommodate employees' religious beliefs where these are "reasonable" and do not detract from profitability. But this test fails to account for the inconvenience brought upon employees, which goes to the heart of the fairness issue. At the same time, it is clear that inconvenience extends to paying customers, who are forced to wait while another is found to handle the transaction –– to say nothing of the degrading sort of treatment to which the customer is subjected, who must appear to create a disturbance for wishing to purchase an "elicit" product. All told, these examples speak to the question of the degree to which Islam may be allowed to disengage from society. At the same time, it is also unacceptable for private concerns to enforce Islamic space of their own accord. Consider Harvard University's decision to institute women-only gym hours to accommodate the modesty requirements of campus Muslims, for example. Islamic Knowledge Committee officer Ola Aljawhary says: "These hours are necessary because there is a segment of the Harvard female population that is not found in gyms not because they don't want to work out, but because for them working out in a co-ed gym is uncomfortable, awkward or problematic in some way." But Harvard administrators explicitly noted that the new policy has less to do with gender than religion; and one reports that the Harvard Islamic Society itself was unaware of the change "until it was being formalized and in its final stages." It is one thing for young women to make their own private arrangements to accommodate a requirement for modesty, but it is quite another for a university to make these arrangements. Harvard must be asked to imagine where policies like these might lead (which others might be excluded), and to consider the motives of groups in support of such a program. As one explores cases of accommodation and abuse of influence across the private sphere, one must judge each according to a scale that accounts for both the exceptional nature of the concession and the degree to which the majority is inconvenienced, restricted as to movement, or hampered in expression. Private concerns may be compelled by situation and environment to alter established practice; but for these same concerns to impose a program of segregation or apply select "Islamic" standards constitutes a grave abuse of influence. Gabrielle Goldwater lives in Switzerland. Contact her at III44@aol.com |
