Sergio Tessa can be reached at Hadar-Israel@verizon.net

A two-column New York Times article was headed, "Ex-Security Chief Says Israeli Government Is 'Misleading' Public About Iran."

DOUBTING NETANYAHU: Recently retired chief of internal Israeli security Yuval Diskin finds his government not candid about whether a raid on Iran can succeed. He has no faith in its leadership. Instead, he claims that the government, whose leaders he has observed personally, lets "messianic" feelings determine its decisions. He did not define those "messianic" feelings, how they applied to Iran, nor what evidence he saw. [PM Netanyahu and DM Barak are known as secularists.]

Days earlier, IDF chief Benny Gantz said that sanctions are proving more effective and Iranian leaders more rational. [When that statement led to some notoriety, he explained that his views are closer to the government's views than reported.

CRITICS TOO VAGUE: Much of the article features partisans discussing motives and experts stating intangible opinions. Maybe Mr. Diskin was disappointed at not having been promoted. Maybe Meir Dagan, a former head of Mossad who criticized the government similarly, was disappointed at having been dislodged.

Some officials worried that the criticisms may harm Israel's foreign policy [by giving Iran to believe it can continue nuclear weapons development with impunity]. A blogger suggested that doubts about governmental policy were increasing, because the public can see the government's success in gaining support from President Obama and other foreign leaders.

ACCUSE WITHOUT EVIDENCE: Mr. Diskin also impugned PM Netanyahu's policy toward negotiations with the Palestinian Authority (P.A.). Whereas the government asserts that it has no peace partner to negotiate with, Mr. Diskin accuses the government of not wanting to negotiate and even of not wanting to resolve the conflict. Again, he cited no evidence (Jodi Rudoren, NY Times, 4/29/12, A17).

So vague is the complaint about policy on negotiation that it is difficult to analyze. The Arab side refuses or quits negotiation. Israel keeps offering to negotiate. It is difficult to see a basis for Mr. Diskin's misunderstanding.

Perhaps he means that if Israel agreed to P.A. pre-conditions, then the P.A. would negotiate. But that meaning would be circular reasoning. Demanding and reacting to pre-conditions is a form of bargaining. If Israel acceded, it would preclude negotiating over major issues. Therefore, the complaint is specious.

CRITICS' VIEWS DANGEROUS: If Israel conceded, it would be deadly for the national security that Mr. Diskin once was charged with maintaining. The pre-conditions would render Israel non-viable against the Muslims. Those terms would deprive Israel of secure borders, flood Israel with enough Muslims to take over, and deprive Israel of a primary water source.

What would be the value to Israel of conceding? Since the P.A. is demanding what would enable it to conquer Israel, its demand is just another indication that it still wants to conquer Israel. It should need little intelligence expertise to conclude from that indication that negotiations over land cannot make peace with the Muslim movement for religious predominance but it surely would make war.

PM Netanyahu doesn't want to resolve the conflict? Absurd! Doesn't Mr. Diskin mean that PM Netanyahu doesn't want to get an agreement with the P.A. on Muslim terms? Doesn't he mean that after the Arab side has violated the agreements in ways that make for war, PM Netanyahu doesn't see the point in pretending an agreement has solved the problem, only to have the P.A. violate the new agreement, because its primary mission is jihad?

Those who put great stock in negotiation are obliged to explain how negotiation could solve a conflict between an irresistible force and an immovable object. Their approach to negotiation is to try to move the Israeli object so that it succumbs to the jihadist irresistible force.

UNSUBSTANTIATED—NOT NEWSWORTHY: Where is the newsworthiness in all this vague and unsubstantiated accusation? This seems part of the New York Times propaganda campaign against Israeli self-defense.

OBAMA'S ALLEGED SUPPORT FOR ISRAEL: What about President Obama's alleged support for Israel? Obama professes support while doing many things to undermine Israel, including on Iran. Remember his Administration's leaks of military secrets about Israel's plans for a raid? Those who accept Obama's profession of support fail to distinguish between campaign statements and tactical retreats on the one hand, and ideology and long-range policy on the other.

They also count as evidence minor, temporary, and probably deliberately deceptive instances, such as security cooperation with Israel, even as the U.S. continues building up jihadist forces in Egypt, the P.A., and Lebanon. They herald Obama's assassination of al-Qaida leaders, but heed not his policies that support or lead to the rise of Islamist movements, his failure to admit there is an international jihad, his ignoring its victims though he professes to be humanitarian, and his not developing a program for opposing Islamist ideology.

OBAMA NOT CREDIBLE: They also fail to take into account Barak Obama's lack of credibility. He has lost credibility for the following reasons, some of which apply to his whole Party leadership. He: (1) Persists in imposing failed policies; (2) Constantly falsifies his record on positions he took; (3) Takes credit for successful policies that he did not enact and even opposed, such as the surge; (4) Agrees to the surge but undermines it by premature withdrawal; (5) Bases estimates of not needing more taxes by plainly under-estimating costs and over-estimating tax revenues, starting with cost increases and supposing that later regimes will reduce costs; (6) Underhanded partisanship, slandering people, and lying about the Supreme Court possibly declaring Obamacare unconstitutional as unprecedented, when as a constitutional lawyer he well knows that constitutional review of laws is a major duty of the Court; (7) Maligning whole industries we need; (8) Demanding that corporations be barred from making political contributions, but exempting unions; (9) Acting contrary to law and to the Constitution; (10) Interfering in a major Supreme Court case; (11) Accusing the Catholic Church and Republicans of a war on women, when they feel that requiring employers or insurers to offer women free contraceptives violates their religious freedom; (12) Calling his mandate to buy medical insurance a tax, when such a view would support the mandate in one part of the Court hearing, and not a tax, when that opposite view would support the same mandate in another part of the Court hearing; (13) Shaming people on an enemies list, that I described in a prior article; and (14) His deceit about Jerusalem not being the capital of Israel, explained next.

Obama Anti-Israel on Jerusalem

BACKGROUND: Israel designated Jerusalem its capital in 1949, when it had secured the New City. It acquired the Old City in 1967.

Jerusalem has been the capital of the Jewish people during centuries of sovereignty over it and during centuries of foreign occupation of it. The Old City was an unallocated portion of the Palestine Mandate, from 1948 to 1967, when in defending itself from an Arab Muslim attempt to exterminate Israeli Jews, Israel gained control of the Old City and some room for the city's natural expansion (jointly called eastern Jerusalem).

The U.S. State Dept. had opposed Jewish sovereignty over any part of the Jewish homeland. It later tried to reverse that sovereignty. It kept rescuing the Arabs from Israeli military victory over Arab aggression. It does not recognize Israeli annexation of the Old City nor of the Golan Heights. International law, however, recognizes a country's right to annex areas to protect national security. That law applies to both the Old City and the Golan. In addition, Israel had the right to annex eastern Jerusalem as an unallocated portion of the Palestine Mandate, of which Israel is the intended heir.

NEWS ANALYSIS: Even before a recent press briefing, the State Dept. reissued the press release for it, in order to delete "Israel" from the phrase, "Jerusalem, Israel." The change was made to avoid controversy over which country the State Dept. considers Jerusalem to be in. The controversy arose in connection with lawsuits by American citizens born in Jerusalem, who want the birth certificate to state their country of birth as Israel. The State Dept. refuses to designate a country. [It also refuses to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem.]

A reporter kept asking a State Dept. briefer what the State Department considers Israel's capital. The briefer refused to say, except that it considers the capital something to be determined by negotiation with the Palestinian Authority.

[The State Dept. is not logical. It is one thing for a final status negotiation later to make a status change desired by the State Dept.. It is another thing for a country to designate its capital in the meantime. In all other countries whose capitals are disputed, the U.S. recognizes the capital that the government designates and controls. Why treat Israel worse by denying its designated capital?]

[The State Dept. is implying that it not only thinks the status of the Old City must be negotiated, but that the status of the New City must be negotiated, too, although the New City was within the original State of Israel. Perhaps the State Dept. is relying upon the UN Partition Plan recommending that Jerusalem be an international city. However, that recommendation was not binding, as the State Dept. knows. The UN Plan had no legal force. In addition, the Arabs rejected it in favor of war. The Arab plan was all or nothing, but now they talk about territorial rights that their defeated attempt at genocide forfeited.]

[If Jerusalem were open to negotiation, then so would be the whole country. In other words, the State Dept. really does not recognize any Jewish sovereignty. How like the Muslims!]

ADMINISTRATION FALSIFIES RECORDS!: The Obama administration was caught altering the Internet records of historical documents from previous Administrations, so as to make the previous Administrations seem to have the same policy as the current one. Then the Obama administration claims not to have changed policy, Copies of the records kept elsewhere shows that there is indeed a change. The Obama administration is not honest about it.

The Administration claimed that no Administration ever referred to "Jerusalem, Israel." Omri Ceren, the source of this article, found several references to "Jerusalem, Israel," on George W. bush websites. Others found dozens of such references, including in Presidential diaries, dating back to the Nixon administration.

In countering the Obama administration's contention, people cited the captions on photographs on the White House website. In reaction, the Administration deleted "Israel" from the captions.

President Obama is trying to erase the whole "special relationship" the U.S. has had with Israel. Going further, he is falsely pretending it never existed. He said early on that he would put "daylight" between the two countries' relationship. He did. How?

He pressured Israel into making "unprecedented diplomatic and security concessions" to the P.A.. [And then the New York Times cites those coerced concessions as indicators of Israeli approval of them.] He worked to undermine PM Netanyahu domestically and abroad. Contrary to previous understandings with Israel, he demanded a full construction freeze only for Jews, in the Territories and in eastern Jerusalem. Again, contrary to binding assurances from the Clinton and Bush administrations, Obama insisted that Israel begin negotiations from the 1949 armistice lines.

The speech was meant to offer the P.A. so much, that it would resume negotiation. It doesn't make sense for the Administration to insist, as it does, that there is nothing new in the radical incentive to the P.A.. If it were not new, why offer it as an incentive?

OBAMA VIOLATED OFFICIAL UNDERSTANDING: Obama's proposal is the Arab position. It would eliminate Israel's bargaining chips. It also violated understandings with the Clinton and Bush administrations about defensible borders. Israel had paid for those U.S. assurances by withdrawing from most of Hebron and from the Gaza Strip. Obama was not proposing that in exchange for the new policy on where negotiations begin from, the Arabs return territory Israel ceded on the basis of U.S. assurances under the former policy. No, he was letting the Arabs keep the Israel concessions while he withdrew the U.S. assurances on which those concessions were made. Instead, the Administration denied that President Bush had made the assurance to Israel. [Many of us remember the memo of understanding that PM Sharon cited.] The Obama administration also claimed, concurred with by media supporters, that U.S. policy was unchanged. What does this say about the reliability of those media supporters?

OBAMA HELPED PRECLUDE NEGOTIATIONS: His effort prompted the P.A. to raise its demands so much as to preclude negotiations [not that negotiations are of any use to peace]. Obama treated Israel with more hostility than did any predecessor, but he claimed to be the most pro-Israel. [Another blow to his credibility.]

The Obama Administration created a crisis in relations with Israel by demanding that Israel approve housing construction in parts of Jerusalem only for Arabs. This violated Israeli sovereignty and demonstrated again Obama's hostility. It reflected a pattern of making demands upon Israel and not from the P.A.. [Likewise, the Administration makes frequent harsh criticism of Israel over every minor thing, none of which is wrongful, and no criticism of the P.A. over its many violations of peace agreements.]

Although the Bush administration had worked in detail with Israeli counterparts on designating where Jewish communities in the Territories may allow for natural population increase but not otherwise expand, the Obama administration denies there was such a policy. He refuses to allow for natural increase. Married children need a new house? They have to move away from their parents.

No wonder American supporters of Israel regard Obama with suspicion! (Commentary, May 2012, p. 40).

To be fair, prior Administrations also had anti-Israel policies and did not honor guarantees to it. But Obama has the harshest policies and is the most deceitful.

Obama's insults to U.S. allies and his betrayal of Israel renders his U.S. guarantees worthless. That can encourage a country planning aggression. Therefore, Obama is dangerous for world peace and national security.

Rabin Assassination Cover-up — More

Hagai Amir served 16½ years in solitary confinement for having supplied brother Yigal with the weapons and ammunition for assassinating PM Rabin. He is about to be released.

Some people think that, once out of prison, he might reveal elements of the cover-up that made his family a scapegoat. Not likely. The prosecution had called him as a witness in the trial of his brother. The prosecution had gotten to review his testimony in advance. They learned that he was going to testify that a government agent provocateur named Raviv knew about the plan to murder Rabin. Before he could testify, another brother of his "died" in the IDF. Hagai did not give the testimony after all. Apparently he felt intimidated.

My source is Barry Chamish, the investigative reporter who broke the story of the real plot and cover-up. At a lecture of his, he was approached by a man for a private talk. The man pointed to a page in Mr. Chamish's book containing the report on the weapons charge, including the serial number of a pistol Hagai supposedly gave his brother, Yigal. The man showed Chamish the serial number of his own pistol. It was the same as Hagai Amir's. The man explained that the secret police raided his house, seized his pistol, and returned it after the trial.

On the night of the assassination, police raided Yigal Amir's house, but found no weapons. Two days later, the secret service raided his bother Hagai's house and purportedly found a large arms cache.

Reporters noticed that photographs showed that the arms cache included IDF weapons. How did he acquire them, they asked.

To answer the questions, the secret police claimed the source was a sergeant in charge of a small IDF armory.

Police came to the Sergeant's house when he was out. They asked his mother where he keeps his weapons. She did not know what they were talking about. Police replied, the weapons he stole from the army. Mother said he took his weapon (singular) back to the base. What about the others. She said he never brought anything else home. They searched and found nothing.

The Secret police went to the house. She agreed to tell the police that she had packed his weapons in a valise and threw it into the sea.

The regular police said that such a suitcase would weigh about 180 pounds. She couldn't even lift it, much less throw it.

So the secret police returned. They demanded she find a strong young may who could have thrown the suitcase into the sea. [A Hercules, perhaps?] So now she claimed she had asked her nephew to do it. He must have loved helping her destroy key evidence in the biggest murder in the country's history, so he could spend 15 years in jail.

But at the police station, the pair confessed. She said she carried the suitcase downstairs, and the nephew drove with it to the sea. The nephew claimed not to know what was in the suitcase, but threw it 150 feet into the sea.

Again the police were skeptical. She could not have carried the suitcase to the car. [When I did some weightlifting, I bench pressed 125 pounds. The aunt was 61 years old. 90 feet is about as far as I could throw a rubber ball of a few ounces. 150 feet is more than a city block. The suitcase was about 180 pounds. Throw it a long distance?]

To answer the regular police's skepticism, the nephew claimed it was stormy that night, and he threw it only a few meters, and let the waves carry it out. The regular police did not believe that a suitcase full of steel floated.

Since the story had been changed to asserting that the nephew took a certain trail to the sea, how come in the aunt's original story, she identified the trail? She couldn't answer. Police dismissed the pair.

So the secret police returned to the woman. Now she had the answer. She now said she had asked to see the spot, and the nephew showed it to her.

Police frogmen could not find the object, which could not have floated far.

The nephew was arrested, anyway. As for the sergeant, his mother and he refused to implicate him. As a result, the Shamgar Commission omitted their role and that of the protocols of the Amir brother's trial in its investigation. But the sergeant was indicted anyway for stealing the weapons and selling them to Hagai Amir. On the basis of the comedy the secret police calls evidence?

One ridiculous explanation after another. One conspiracy after another. All in the service of an obvious frame-up (www.barrychamish.com, 4/25/12 via email).

Obviously the police concocted the dubious explanations. How do you suppose they got people to confess to nonsensical explanations? This story is funny but tragic for the ruined lives, frightening for what it implies about secret police behavior, and sinister for being a cover-up.

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.

We, Israeli professors for justice and peace, do hereby appeal to researchers, academics, scholars and teachers, in Israel and throughout the world, to take a firm and clear stand against the continuing occupation and denial of rights.

We are, of course, referring to the continuing British occupation of territories in which Britain clearly has no right to be. We demand that all British universities, and all academics at those universities, be boycotted until these same institutions and individuals come out clearly and openly in favor of immediate unconditional removal of all British occupation from these territories. We demand a moratorium on all funding of academic research in Britain and divestment from Britain in all its forms. Unlike Israel's "occupation" of the West Bank and Gaza Strip (the latter of which is not occupied any longer in any way), which has lasted a mere 45 years, Britain's occupations of territories has lasted centuries.

Take, for example, the clearly illegal British occupation of Gibraltar. There, Britain maintains an illegal settlement in open defiance of all internationally accepted standards of legitimacy and concepts of national rights. Moreover, Britain has placed there an illegal security fence that prevents non-British nationals from entering Gibraltar. This "apartheid fence" is a human rights atrocity and must be torn down at once. And until it is, the entire world should divest from Britain and boycott British universities. Then there are those clearly illegal British settlements constructed on occupied Argentinian territory in the Falkland Islands. What clearer example is there of the continuing colonial aggression of white European imperialism against the Third World?

But Britain's illegal settlements have also been constructed elsewhere. Britain continues to maintain settlements on the Channel Islands that obviously belong to France. While it is true that Britain earlier ended its occupations of Hong Kong and India, that is no excuse for its settlements elsewhere. After all, Israel ended its occupation of Sinai, but that has not stopped the British University and College Union, representing more than 120,000 college-level educators, from voting on May 30 to pass a resolution calling for a boycott of Israeli academics and universities, as well as a moratorium on European Union funding of Israeli research.

And what about Britain's occupation forces in Afghanistan and Iraq? True, Afghanistan and Iraq were terrorist enclaves, but since when does that serve to legitimize the dispatch of occupation forces? British professors clearly do not think that Israel has any right to use force against terrorists attacking its population, so why should British forces do so? Of course, the very worst cases of illegal English occupation are in Wales, Scotland and Ireland. These are occupations imposed upon those oppressed populations by force of arms. And in Ireland, the occupation produced genocidal levels of mortality. These occupations have lasted for centuries.

The moral indifference by British academics to these continued barbarous occupations and to the denial of self-determination for Scots, Welsh and the Northern Irish is clearly as unforgivable as the failure of some academics in apartheid South Africa to speak out against abuses there.

Moreover, England itself is a racist apartheid society. Not only the Welsh, but Muslims, Blacks, and Asians suffer from discrimination and disadvantage inside Britain, as do people with normal senses of humor or human tastes in food. The wages of these minorities are lower than those of white Englishmen and they face discrimination in housing. British universities have failed to redress these inequalities. If divestment from South Africa was justified, it is all the more so in this case. In fact, 27 British professors have endorsed our calls for imposing an international boycott of their own universities. These courageous, heroic souls must be supported.

We have sat in silence for much too long. The time has come. Please join us in calling for an open-ended boycott of British academics and universities until all these cases of occupation are ended.

Israeli Professors for Justice and Peace Steven Plaut, Chairperson

For more information, go to Pacbi.com

http://isracampus.org.il/third%20level%20pages/BGU%20-%20Dershowitz%20says%20 Neve%20Gordon%20Fifth-Rate%20Pseudo-Academic.htm

Harvard Prof. Alan Dershowitz denounces BGU's Neve Gordon (Dept of Political Science) as a Fifth-Rate Pseudo-Academic and Traitor, Compares him with Holocaust Denier Special Isracampus Report 29/4/2012

On April 27, 2012 the Right-leaning daily Makor Rishon ran an extensive in-depth interview with the legendary professor of law Alan Dershowitz. The interview covers two full newspaper pages in the "law supplement" of the weekend edition of the paper. In the interview, Dershowitz is asked about and speaks freely about a wide number of subjects, from Israel's own Supreme Court, to the Obama Presidency, to the Goldstone Commission, to the so-called "BDS or Boycott-Divest—Sanctions movement, which he considers to be anti-Semitic. He denounces J Street as an anti-Israel propaganda group.

But Dershowitz fires his most devastating ammunition in the interview against three anti-Semitic Israelis. They are Neve Gordon from Ben Gurion "University," Ilan Pappe, once at the University of Haifa but today a full-time Israel Basher in Britain at the University of Exeter, and the demented Holocaust Denier, ex-Israeli sax player Gilad Atzmon.

In the interview, Dershowitz is asked about a comment of his cited last year in Globes in which he said that some of the worst enemies of Israel are themselves Israelis. Dershowitz responds by saying that not only are these anti-Israel Israelis among Israel's worst enemies, but also they are among Israel's most dangerous enemies. He then says that he has in mind (in this order) Neve Gordon, Ilan Pappe and Gilad Atzmon. In spite of the fact that the last two have emigrated from Israel, Dershowitz says that these three and people like them are "People who wrap themselves in the Israeli flag only for the purpose of burning it. The only time these people claim to be Israelis at all is when they wish to wave this as a certificate to legitimize their own malicious and unreasonable attacks against Israel." While insisting that criticism in and of itself is something positive, Dershowitz says that these people are not "critics" but rather are seeking the demonization and delegitimization of all of Israel in the most hypocritical manner.

Dershowitz is then asked about the ulterior motive of these people. He replies: "Most anti-Israel Israelis are fifth rate academics incapable of finding themselves professionally or academically in Israel. Hence they try to find themselves positions in Europe, even though they generally are also too inferior to get work there. But they believe if they market themselves as anti-Israel Israelis, the novelty will boost their standing and they just might find jobs. I realize this may sound like I have a personal grudge against them, but in fact this is the simple truth."

It is notable that Dershowitz lumps Neve Gordon (and Pappe) together with Gilad Azmon, an open Holocaust Denier as well as someone who has called for burning down synagogues (see http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/02/26/1068563/-Faux-Progressive-Holocaust-Denier-Gilad-Atzmon-Tours-U-S-
and
http://articles.nydailynews.com/2012-01-13/news/30626127_1_semitic-jews-students). Neve Gordon of course cannot play the saxophone.

To complain, contact:

Ben Gurion University:
Rivka Carmi, President
P.O. Box 653, Beer-Sheva, 84105, Israel,
rcarmi@bgumail.bgu.ac.il
and president@bgu.ac.il
Tel: 972-8-6461211/9
Fax: 972-8-6472991

Zvi HaCohen, Rector
P.O. Box 653, Beer-Sheva, 84105, Israel
rector@bgu.ac.il
and cohen@bgumail.bgu.ac.il
Tel: 972-8-6596801
Fax: 972-8-6596802

Other officers are listed here: http://cmsprod.bgu.ac.il/Eng/Units/management/

University "Friends of" Offices outside Israel are listed here: http://web.bgu.ac.il/Eng/Units/associates/WorldwideAssociatesOffices

Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist, a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com.

A tragic addenda to the History of the Jewish People, is the role of Gertrude Stein, Hitler and the Vichy Government of France.

A NAZI COLLABORATOR AT THE MET: New exhibition omits reference to Gertrude Stein's cozy relationship to fascism during World War II

Crowds are packing one of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's most impressive exhibits in recent memory: "The Steins Collect," a staggering display of the avant-garde art assembled in early 20th century Paris by Americans Leo and Michael Stein and their formidable sister, the writer and poet Gertrude.

The period's greatest are on the walls: Matisse, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Renoir and Picasso, as well as famed portraits of the Stein siblings, art savvy children of a prosperous family of Jewish merchants from Baltimore who settled in Paris in the 1900s. It was there that Gertrude Stein wrote her most famous works; it was from there that she taught the world that, famously, "Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose."

Brother Leo left Paris for Rome in 1913. Brother Michael and his wife, Sarah, went back to the U.S. in 1935, as clouds were gathering over Europe.

But Gertrude remained in France until her death in 1946, continuing to build her part of the art collection and, with it, one of the most glittering intellectual salons Paris has ever known.

The Met exhibit, which runs until June 3, details the history of the collection. But there's one problem: It makes no clear mention of the reason this American-Jewish writer/collector, who remained in France during World War II, evaded Vichy violence, Nazi plunder and anti-Semitic laws: Gertrude Stein was what the French call une collabo — that is, a collaborator.

While that may not take away from the art, visitors should be made aware that one of its owners stood with feet planted on the wrong side of history. To do otherwise is to engage in whitewashing.

Like several other American modernists, Stein was a vocally harsh critic of FDR and the New Deal. But she also flirted with fascism, becoming a great fan of Spain's fascist Francisco Franco and of France's Marshal Philippe Petain, the World War I hero who became the Vichy puppet leader of Occupied France and, ultimately, an ally of Adolf Hitler.

Stein even became a Vichy propagandist, translating Petain's speeches into English, then submitting them for publication in New York, to which the publisher Bennett Cerf reportedly responded, "Over my dead body!"

Stein chose to collaborate to support her political beliefs — but also to safeguard herself, her life partner, Alice B. Toklas, and their property in wartime France.

Although Stein's own works were barred from distribution under Vichy/Nazi censorship, she and Toklas were otherwise protected. They were never put on any police lists of Jews in France and ignored American diplomatic warnings to flee to Switzerland.

Instead, they remained safe in their Rhone Alps country home. Stein's art collection, unlike most other Jewish-owned ones in France, remained untouched. Her main protector was Bernard Faÿ, the anti-Semitic wartime head of the French National Library.

Nor are there any signs that Stein ever spoke out against Vichy's anti-Semitic laws — certainly not during and not even after the war. Nor did she take steps to help any of the figures in her prewar circle who ended up deported to death camps.

Worst of all, she lobbied for the nomination of Hitler for the 1938 Nobel Peace Prize. By that time, the Nuremberg Laws that so harassed Jews were some three years old; there is no way she didn't know what kind of man she was offering up for world acclaim.

The Met has yet to explain adequately why it has ignored this part of the Stein story. It seems that since fascism is part of her past, it should be made known, if for no other reason than to give visitors context.

Flake or fascist? Genius or selfish narcissist? Or, simply, as Stein herself might say: "Collaborator is a collaborator is a collaborator is a collaborator."

Janet Lehr is editor/publisher of the daily e-mail "Israel Lives." She can be contacted at janetlehr@veredart.com

In the interests of accuracy, an addition to the information I provided last week on the excellent video "Israel Inside": Tal Ben-Shahar did not generate the original idea for this film -- although he did run with it once he was approached. The producer of the film, Rafael Shore, conceptualized it and came to Tal with the idea.

~~~~~~~~~~

As to that "start," I am referring to a delay that was requested by the government on the demolition of Givat Ha'Ulpana:

On instructions from the government, the attorney general went to the High Court on Friday and requested that the Court release the government from its pledge to demolish housing in Ulpana this very week.

~~~~~~~~~~

Before I proceed further, I want to point out what we are seeing here: Just days ago, I was reading, from multiple sources, that it would be impossible, or near-impossible, to stop the demolition, because the Court had ordered it on the pledge of the government. That was nonsense, as many of us understood. And what we see now is how politicized this process is -- how much it is a question of political will.

~~~~~~~~~~

What the attorney general told the court was that the State wants to re-examine its policy that automatically mandates the removal of all "unauthorized" buildings on "private Palestinian land." Each case should be decided separately, but as things stand now a decision regarding Ulpana impacts other sites. "Other sites" that are most immediately pertinent are Givat Assaf, which the government pledged to dismantle by July 1 and Amona, which is slated to be dismantled by the end of the year. Migron, about which I've written extensively, would likely also be affected.

~~~~~~~~~~

Each time I see reference to "private Palestinian land," I have this great impulse to ask, "Seez who?" This is another issue that is really politicized. We're not talking about land that has documented ownership by a Palestinian Arab, but rather situations in which ownership is unclear, or, worse, in which Jewish ownership has been challenged -- situations in which sometimes land is almost arbitrarily designated as "Palestinian." (There is a convoluted history here that I will, perhaps, revisit.) In the instance of Ulpana, the Beit El community claims ownership and this claim has never been adequately examined in the courts.

~~~~~~~~~~

The government requested a delay of 90 days; the Court has granted 60 days.

A matter to be followed closely...

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Givat Asaf is a community of about 30 families that was established in 2001, in memory of Asaf Hershkovitz, who had been killed by terrorists. Associated with the Beit El Local Council, in Samaria, it is about 3 kilometers from Beit El.

(A note of correction here: Beit El functions politically within its own Local Council and is not part of the Binyamin Regional Council.)

~~~~~~~~~~

Amona is part of the Binyamin Regional Council of Samaria. On a hilltop that overlooks Ofra, it was founded in 1997 by young people from that community. It was the site, six years ago, of violent (obscene and shameful) police/IDF actions against residents of the area, as action was taken to dismantle homes.

There were some 30 families in this community, and it has never been abandoned.

~~~~~~~~~~

I follow through here with additional reports on attacks by Arabs.

Last Thursday was a day of particular Arab unrest/violence precisely because it was Yom Ha'Atzmaut. Outside of the walls of the Old City in Jerusalem, there were two incidents. In one -- in the valley of Hinnom -- members of a family were attacked and required hospitalization; in another -- outside the Lion's Gate -- an 11 year old boy received injuries to his head.

Last night, in Hevron, in the Beit Hadassah neighborhood, Arabs attacked a group of Jewish children in a playground with rocks big enough to kill. The children escaped, but residents noted "a sharp escalation in the size of the blocks thrown." The rocks were thrown from the roofs of two vacant buildings into which Arab squatters have moved. Those throwing the rocks ran away before the IDF arrived.

~~~~~~~~~~

During the day yesterday, a Palestinian Arab was arrested at the Hawara checkpoint near Shechem (Nablus); he was carrying two bombs. The night before, in Nablus, another Arab was arrested by the IDF; he was carrying several improvised weapons, including Molotov cocktails.

~~~~~~~~~~

Bad news. But why am I not surprised?

From The Investigative Project on Terrorism:

"In a major concession, Obama administration officials say they could support allowing Iran to continue a crucial element of its disputed nuclear program if the government in Tehran took other major steps to curb its ability to develop a nuclear bomb. The officials told the Los Angeles Times they might agree to let Tehran continue enriching uranium up to concentrations of 5% if the Iranian government agreed to unrestricted inspections, and strict oversight and safeguards that the United Nations long has demanded. Iran has begun enriching small amounts of uranium to 20% purity in February 2010 for what it contends are peaceful purposes, although most of its stockpile is purified at lower levels. Uranium can be used as bomb fuel at about 90% enrichment. The question of whether to approve even low-level enrichment is highly controversial within the U.S. government and among its allies because of the risk that Iranian scientists still might be able to gain the knowledge and experience to someday build a bomb..."

http://www.investigativeproject.org/ext/9302

This definitely does not meet PM Netanyahu's red line stipulations.

~~~~~~~~~~

At the very same time, security specialists have reported to Congress that "Iran is recruiting a hacker army to target the U.S. power grid, water systems and other vital infrastructure for a cyberattack in a future confrontation with the United States." This was reported by the Washington Times, which acquired the testimony to be provided to Congress.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/apr/25/us-seen-as-iran-cyberarmy-target/

~~~~~~~~~~

Khaled Abu Toameh reported yesterday that Fatah officials, who are feeling increased confidence as the result of positive election results lately on Palestinian campuses and in professional unions, have been encouraging Abbas to replace Prime Minister Salam Fayyad (an independent) with someone from Fatah.

This is not an action that Abbas would take lightly, however, because Fayyad is so heavily favored by the international community. Reports I have read today indicate that Abbas and Fayyad have met and "smoothed over" recent tensions.

~~~~~~~~~~

Fayyad (the "moderate"), for his part has -- according to Ma'an -- voiced a pledge in Ramallah to fight for the use of the PA curriculum in the 50 Arab schools run by the municipality of Jerusalem.

This is actually a hot issue that had many people tearing their hair out for a long time. For years, the municipality and the government turned a blind eye while Palestinian Arab students studying inside of Jerusalem were allowed to utilize PA-produced textbooks, which promote jihad and give Israel no legitimacy.

In 2011, in a move that was long overdue, the municipality set a stipulation that all schools in the city that receive government funding would be permitted to use only textbooks prepared by the Jerusalem Educational Administration, a joint body of the municipality and the Israeli Ministry of Education.

~~~~~~~~~~

Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il And visit her website at www.arlenefromisrael.info

We should, for example, provide money for a strike fund; provide secure communications equipment and training on how to use it, and airlift WIMAX wifi transmitters that can provide internet service to all regions currently under a regime-ordered communications-blackout. Why? Because it is in our national security interest to do so.

Thirty-two years ago this week, on April 24, eight U.S. servicemen died in the southeastern desert of Iran when their mission to rescue 52 Americans held captive by the revolutionary regime in Tehran was aborted by President Jimmy Carter.

Operation Eagle Claw was one of the first missions conducted by the recently-formed Delta Force. Depending on whose account you read, it was either an unlucky masterpiece of complex planning or a desperate attempt to save a doomed presidency that never should have been given the green light in the first place.

The mission's failure convinced U.S. military leaders to rethink how they would conduct special operations in the future: formulating plans that were simpler, carrying them out under unified command, and managing the risk.

While our military has learned the lessons of the failed hostage rescue mission, however, our political leaders have not.

When the first reports came in of the deadly aircraft collision during a sandstorm in the Iranian desert, Jimmy Carter lost his nerve. Rather than follow the advice of his military advisors and continue the mission with a smaller force, he pulled the plug and exposed it to the world. His fear of defeat trumped his will to win. The result? Our enemies smelled weakness and sought to deepen our humiliation by parading about the sand-clotted bodies of our dead servicemen like trophies in a Roman Triumph.

Jimmy Carter's multiple failures in Iran have given us thirty-two years of state-sponsored terrorism in the Middle East. By allowing the forces of chaos and extremism to unseat the Shah of Iran, a staunch U.S. ally, Carter not only destroyed the future for two generations of Iranians; he ushered in an era where a sovereign government operating under the guise of terrorist proxies was allowed to murder, maim, and bomb with impunity.

The victims of Iran's terrorist rampage included people such as Robert Ames, the CIA Near East chief of operations, who was killed when Iranian-backed terrorists blew up our embassy in Beirut on April 17, 1983.

As one of the first journalists on the scene after the bomb ripped off the front of our seaside embassy, I will never forget a dust-and-debris-covered press officer named Ryan Crocker emerging from the rubble to tell us that he had seen the U.S. ambassador, saved by the weight of his office desk, climbing down a broken fire escape at the rear of the embassy.

The victims also included people such as Donald G. Havlish, Jr., an insurance executive from Yardley, Pennsylvania who missed taking his daughter to her first day of preschool on the morning of September 11, 2001 so he could attend a business meeting in New York. He worked on the 101st floor of the South Tower of the World Trade Center, and was killed by the al Qaeda terrorists who crashed a hijacked airplane into his building that morning.

Although I did not know him, I came to know his widow, Fiona, and helped her and other families of 9/11 victims trace the origins of the 9/11 plot back to Iran. These brave families won a measure of justice in a federal court on December 15, 2011, when District court judge George B. Daniels, after hearing our testimony, determined that the Islamic Republic of Iran shared "material responsibility" for the 9/11 attacks with the al Qaeda terrorists.

Mihaela, their daughter, who had turned 13 by then, and she impressed me to tears as she stood near me in the cold winter winds where once the South Tower had stood. With TV cameras trained on her, she made a brushing of her father's name in the commemorative marble plaques around the foundation. "I am Mihaela Havlish, the daughter of Donald G. Havlish, Jr, who died on September 11, 2001," she said. Simple, clear, brave.

We have an opportunity today to ensure that Robert Ames, Donald Havlish and so many others — including hundreds of our servicemen in Iraq — will be the last American victims the evil regime in Iran can claim. We have the opportunity today to craft effective policies that will end the rein of terror in Iran.

And yet, President Obama has embarked on a different course — a course that I believe will lead directly to a major war with Iran that we do not need and that we can actually prevent.

His course is called appeasement. It begins with the notion that you can rationally discuss matters of import — such as nuclear weapons development and terrorism — with a regime that seeks just one thing: to negotiate the size of your coffin.

The Islamic Republic leaders have shown repeatedly that their only goal in these negotiations is to buy time to complete their nuclear weapons development. During their latest round of talks with the Obama administration on April 14, they succeeded yet again.

If you read the opening of this Bloomberg News wire story; you'll see what I mean:

"The first international talks with Iran on its nuclear program in 15 months produced a promise to reconvene in May amid calls for urgent diplomacy to avert military strikes."

See anything there about getting the Islamic Republic to stop uranium enrichment? Neither do I. Forget about any calls on the regime to lift its stranglehold on the Iranian people.

During the 2008 presidential campaign, then-Senator Barack Obama, backed by top Congressional Democrats such as Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen, were calling for "negotiations without preconditions" with the Iranian regime.

To their mind, it was U.S. "intransigence" that was causing the bad behavior of the Iranian regime. If only we would relent, they would behave.

Almost immediately after taking office, Obama sent emmissaries to open a chanel to Teheran. Six months later, the Iranian regime got its first payback: When three million Iranians took to the streets after a fraudulent presidential election and publicly begged for U.S. help (with signs in English for the benefit of international TV cameras), President Obama remained silent.

When he finally spoke, it was to declare haughtily that the United States had a bad history of intervening in Iran's domestic affairs, and so we would abstain from playing any active role in aiding the Iranian people in their quest for freedom.

This, too, was appeasement.

Remember what Winston Churchill said after Neville Chamberlain returned from negotiating with Adolf Hitler in Munich, "You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor, and you will have war."

And that is precisely where we are headed now because of the appeasement policies of Obama, J Street, and the Obama Democrats.

I believe we have a real alternative, but one that has never been tried before: we must urgently launch a massive program to help the pro-freedom movement in Iran.

We need a comprehensive strategy that uses all the tools of power diplomacy to help them achieve their freedom frm tyrrany. Why? Because it is in our national security interest to do so.

We should, for example, provide money for a strike fund to support the families of Iranian workers who leave their jobs to protest the regime.

We should provide secure communications equipment and training on how to use it.

My own favorite is to airlift in WIMAX point of site Internet wifi transmitters at a cost of $500,000 each, a relatively small investment in terms of defense, that can provide free, secure Internet service to all regions of Iran that are currently under a regime-ordered communications black-out.

We should provide the pro-freedom movement with the best political consultants money can buy, who know how to wage high visibility grass roots campaigns. During the Cold War, such operations were carried out covertly by the CIA. These days, ironically, they mostly are done by George Soros and the Democrat party.

We owe it to our men and women in uniform to try this approach before they get called on once again to pick up the pieces from the mistakes of our politicians.

When the war from the dishonorable decisions hits, who can predict the ultimate consequences in terms of regional stability, oil prices, and, worse, the number of Americans who will lose their lives?

Contact Laura at LEL817@yahoo.com

BDS GOAL The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanction (BDS) movement strives to turn the public against Israel. The goal is to damage Israel and to make the Jewish people uniquely seem not entitled to sovereignty, a step toward rescinding Israeli statehood. The movement's activists hate Israel.

Where military means are not practical, jihad resorts to BDS. Economic boycott is part of warfare. This is war on all Israelis, not just ones accused of anything in particular. BDS is not consistent with peace-making.

Contradicting this movement is the pacts for mutual trade that several Arab governments have made with Israel. In the U.S., it is illegal for companies to enforce the Arab boycott of Israel.

ORIGIN OF BDS The BDS movement grew out of the 2001 Durban UN conference supposedly against racism but just doing Israel-bashing. The movement hurls at Israel the slogans used against the former South Africa. S. Africa became a pariah, eventually overturned. The BDS people hope to do the same with Israel by calling it inappropriate names, such as apartheid, colonialist, occupier, repressive, and international law breaker.

MAKEUP AND ACTIVITIES The movement comprises a few, full-time, well-financed anti-Zionists encouraged by Palestinian Authority (P.A.) leaders. The activists raise funds, and arrange seminars, conferences, and demonstrations in Europe and North America. BDS events present misleading allegations against Israel.

The movement targets college students, shoppers, performers, their audiences, and companies. They threaten stores, suppliers, academic institutions, and performers unless they disavow Israel. They often harass people and would deny freedom of choice and of where to shop. The targets' unfamiliarity with Mideast history lures them into bias.

As an example, the University of Paris-VI asked the EU not to renew its 1995 Association Agreement with Israel. Student and faculty groups at several American universities launched campaigns to divest from Israel. The Church of Sweden urged a boycott of goods produced by Israeli communities in the Territories. Several performers have canceled appearances in Israel.

Israel's supposed "peace partner," the P.A., demanded an economic, cultural, and academic boycott of Israel. In this campaign, the P.A. has been able to enlist left-wing organizations and individuals. The list of endorsing NGOs include some that cannot be found and others tied to terrorist organizations, such as the Council of National and Islamic Forces in Palestine, a terrorist coordinating group, illegal organizations, and one-person organizations. The public supposes that each organization listed in support of BDS is legitimate or has many members. By using social media, the BDS movement makes itself appear to be a mass movement.

Worse for Israel, some of the performers released statements they got from BDS propaganda and that slander Israel. The 150 Irish artists who pledged to boycott Israel had not been invited to Israel.

On the other hand, many BDS resolutions were rejected. Some reasons for rejection were the illegality of boycotts and stifling of freedom.

A United Church of Canada regional chapter voted to boycott goods produced by Jewish communities in what it calls "occupied territories," but its General Council would not.

BDS activists have been harassing store owners and people on the streets. Such a public nuisance may invite legal action against them. In Montreal every Saturday, a BDS group harasses two shoe stores selling Israeli-made shoes. In France such harassment is illegal, and in the U.S. it is restricted. The theory there is that the BDS campaign harms freedom of commerce and incites hatred and intolerance.

The BDS movement cultivates Western campuses, hoping to influence future leaders. The movement's primary effort is "Israel Apartheid Week." The movement falsely likens Israel to the former South Africa. It could more appropriately liken Arab societies to South Africa.

What a perversion of the role of academia, promoting fantasy and falsity instead of knowledge and critical thinking!

SOCIAL INJUSTICE OF BDS The campaign takes on an antisemitic edge. Activists pretend an interest in social justice. But they favor the Arabs, who crush social justice.

The self-proclaimed reformers never evaluate the legitimacy of Arab dictatorships that repress women, minorities, the media, and society in general, and that promote hatred and jihad. Jihad seeks to destroy the same Western societies from which the BDS people hail. That seems to be too difficult for the BDS people to understand.

APARTHEID So what is "apartheid?" "Apartheid is an Afrikaans word that originally denoted the system of racial segregation and curtailment of rights of the non-white population of South Africa between 1948 and 1994. It is difficult to imagine a country more diverse and less segregated than Israel, where 15 religions have official status and where Muslims, Arabs, Christians, and others are represented in all professions, serve in the military and the Knesset (Israeli parliament), the Supreme Court and play leading roles in sports and the arts. Israel has welcomed and embraced Vietnamese "Boat People" and Cambodian refugees from genocide. Gay, lesbian and transgender people from all over the Middle East have found refuge in Israel. Israel's Christian community is the only Christian community in any nation in the Middle East that has grown in number since 1948."

As Justice Goldstone affirmed, Arab patients lie alongside Jewish patients in Israel, enjoying identical medical care.

In "'The Campaign to Delegitimize Israel with the False Charge of Apartheid,' Prof. Robbie Sabel writes: "Incitement to racism in Israel is a criminal offence, as is discrimination on the basis of race or religion."

[I disagree with Prof. Sabel. He is relies on the formal law. Reality is different. Muslims and leftist Jews incite to bias against Israel and other Israelis, including calling for terrorism. These offenders are not prosecuted. On the other hand, Jews whom the leftist prosecutors and judges and newspapers dislike, and who discuss the problems of national security vis-à-vis domestic and foreign Arabs, are persecuted. Anti-hate laws are too abused to be worthwhile. Let free speech reign!]

[Again, Jews' property rights contested by Arabs are precarious, but Arabs seize public land and build illegal houses in the many thousands. Jews are beaten and arrested for legal protests, whereas Arabs are not beaten and rarely are arrested for violent protests. Jews are not allowed to pray on the Temple Mount, but Muslims are allowed illegally to destroy ancient Jewish artifacts on the Mount. The problem in Israel is unequal enforcement of the law.]

[Arabs get special preferences or scholarships for colleges and civil service jobs. These preferences discriminate against Jews. Most Jews are subject to the draft or to alternative national service. The Arabs are not, though ultra-Orthodox are not, either.]

What you can say about Israel is that it does not pick on Arabs. That fact contradicts the BDS claim.

JEWISH STATEHOOD IMPROPER? Another spurious accusation against Israel is that there is something wrong with its being a Jewish state. About 50 states whose majority is Muslim have established Islam as the official language; some Western states have done the same for Christianity. BDS singles out Israel. BDS objection to Israel is hypocritical. You figure out the real motive.

SCORECARD FOR BDS BDS has hardly impaired Israel's economy or its relations with other governments. It has had some success in cultural boycott. By working with small trade unions, academic and church bodies, and food supply stores, BDS defamation of Israel has marred Israel's standing with the general public (Jerusalem Issue Briefs, Vol. 12, No. 2, 3/19/12, Alan Baker and Adam Shay http://www.jcpa.org/JCPA/ via www.imra.org.il).

BDS need not necessarily incite hatred if it were factual and civil. But BDS campaigns usually are neither. The campaign resorts to an implied economic coercion. This attempted coercion is an undemocratic substitute for persuasion.

A similarly undemocratic tactic is reliance on the Supreme Court's unwarranted judicial activism and ideological bias against Jews who own property that Arabs claim. Peace Now organizes many fraudulent claims, but expresses moral indignation against Jewish owners. Masquerading as virtue, evil condemns the virtuous.

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.

When God made His Covenant with Abraham, He copyrighted social justice.

The Jewish nation rights to the land of Israel are not inscribed in the Balfour Declaration or the Mandate for Palestine document, it precedes them. The Mandate for Palestine is the Bible only.

On Tuesday, April 24, 2012, the 49th International Bible Quiz for Jewish youth, one of Israel's Independence Day's noble traditions, which the Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu attends, was held at the Jerusalem Theater. The first event, which David Ben-Gurion attended, took place in 1958. (Video: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/155164.)

Thanks to global cyber services I was able to sit at my computer and for over two hours I was glued to the screen — and mesmerized — while watching the young contestants, who arrived to Israel from twenty two countries, competing for first prize.

These knowledgeable young men and women, whether they arrived at first or last prize are all winners. Because they are marching into adult life equipped with wisdom only those who take time in life to learn the Bible have.

I went through my elementary education in Israel and one of the subjects was Bible study, which every kid in Israel had to take. I personally liked the Biblical stories, but learning the Bible was not a favorite subject by most students. However I did not appreciate the wisdom of the Bible until years later.

Watching the 49th International Bible Quiz reminded me that the Bible is the book of books and there is no other like it. The wisdom of the Bible is infinite.

While the European countries, such as France, would like to have a claim to their enlightenment revolution and being the first to come up with social justice, they are not. The Jewish forefather Abraham and his Covenant with his newly found God, which he passed on to the Jewish Nation, gave birth and hold the copyright to the humankind's early enlightenment. With receiving and accepting the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai, Moses and the Jewish nation have etched social and political justice on the entire world and have started paving the way to what later became psychology. Therefore, Jews and their Nation State Israel see themselves as 'Light unto the Nations'.

To encapsulate these claims we have to refer to the Bible. Watching the Bible Quiz enabled me to do just that.

On grace and mercy:

In the Book of Zachary, Chapter 7, it is said: 8 And the word of God unto Zechariah, saying: 9. Thus said the God hosts, saying; judgment of truth judge with grace and mercy one another. 10 and widow and orphan sojourner and poor so not exploit; and the evil man his brother do not think in your heart.

On brotherhood:

In the Book of Malachi, Chapter 2:10, it is said, Is it not one father to all of us, is it not one God created us, why betray man his brother to desecrate the covenant of our fathers

On justice:

In the Book of Amos, Chapter 5:15, it is said, Hate the evil and love the good and present judgment in the gate maybe God of hosts will pardon the remnant of Joseph.

On those who know justice:

In the Book of Isaiah, Chapter 51:7, it is said, Listen unto me those who know justice, with my Torah in their heart do not fear the disgrace of men and so nor fear their cursing.

On charity and benevolence:

King Solomon, in Proverbs Chapter 21:21, said, The one who chases charity and kindness will find life of charity and honor.

On compassion:

In the Book of Malachi, Chapter 3:17, it is said, And they were to me, said God of hosts, the day in which I make treasured, and I felt compassion for them — like a man has compassion for his son who is working with him.

On helping the weak:

In the Book of Deuteronomy, Chapter 24:19, it is said, When you reap your harvest in your field, and have forgot a sheaf in the field, you shall not go again to fetch it; it shall be for the sojourner, for the fatherless, and for the widow; for that God may bless you in all the work of your hands.

On grace and truth:

In the Book Samuel 2 Chapter, 15:20, the prophet Shmuel told Avshalom, Whereas you came but yesterday, should I this day make you go up and down with us, and I go where I may go again and bring back withyou're your brother with mercy and truth

On the good and the honest:

In the Book of Psalm, Chapter125:4, King David said, Do good God to those who are good and honest in their hearts.

On filling the soul:

In the Book of Jeremiah, Chapter 31:25, the Prophet Jeremiah said, For I have satiated the weary soul, and every sorrowful soul have I replenished, and,

In the Book of Ecclesiastes, Chapter 6:7, King Solomon said, All the labor of man is for his mouth, and yet the appetite is not filled.

On salvation:

In the Book of Deuteronomy, Chapter 33:29 Moses said, Happy are you, Yisra'el: Who is like you, a people saved by God, the shield of your help and that the sword is your excellence, your enemies shall submit themselves to you and you shall tread on their high places, and,

In Book Samuel 2, Chapter 22:28, King David said, The afflicted people you will save; and your eyes are on the haughty, that you will bring them down.

On spirit of God:

In the Book of Isaiah, Chapter 11: 2, it is said, The Spirit of God shall rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of God, and,

In the Book of Ezekiel, Chapter 3:12, it is said, Then the Spirit lifted me up, and I heard behind me the voice of a great noise, Blessed be the glory of God from His place.

In the entire Bible there is hardly any repetition of commanding a Deed - Mitzvah. Only few special Deeds the Bible repeats. One is the concern for the sojourner, the orphan and the widow, a Deed that appears in the Torah over forty times. Only once the Bible presents the demand for a double Deed, "Justice, justice shall you pursue." That means, that for a Jew it is not only to do justice, it is also to go after justice, which is the very foundation of the Jewish people. And though throughout history the world did not behave with justice with the Jewish people, Jews did not forget this Deed and any of the other Deed the Torah commands on a Jew. And perhaps it is the very reason of the strength of the Jewish people and their uniqueness that helped them to survive as a Peoples, and remain Jews observing Judaism against all odds. Other nations disappeared from the world under much less pressure and affliction.

The Nation of Israel is alive.

Contact Nurit Greenger by email at nurit.nuritg@gmail.com. Visit her blog:
http://ngthinker.typepad.com

His father praised Hitler, but Kasim Hafeez writes about love for Israel, Jewish people

I am a Zionist, a proud Muslim Zionist, and I love Israel, but this was not always the case. In fact, for many years I was quite the extreme opposite. I experienced the high levels of anti-Semitism and anti-Israel activity taking place on British university campuses, because I was the anti-Semitic, anti-Israel activist.

Growing up in the Muslim community in the UK I was exposed to materials and opinions at best condemning Israel, painting Jews as usurpers and murderers, and at worse calling for the wholesale destruction of the "Zionist Entity" and all Jews. In short, there was no accommodating a Jewish State in the Middle East. To grow up around this constant barrage of hatred directed at Israel has a massive effect on an individual's own opinions. More disturbingly, many of these people weren't radical or extreme, but when it was about Israel the most vicious of rhetoric poured out, coupled with the casual anti-Semitism that seemed too prevalent, when the phrase "stop being a Jew" used as an insult.

My father, however, was much more brazen in his hatred, boasting of how Adolf Hitler was a hero, his only failing being that he didn't kill enough Jews.

By the time I had reached 18 I was completely indoctrinated to the fold of radical Islamism. My hate for Israel and for the Jews was fuelled by images of death and destruction, set to the backdrop of Arabic melodies about Jihad and speeches of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah or Osama Bin Laden.

These views were reinforced when I attended Nakba Day rallies, where speakers predicted Israel's demise as Hezbollah flags were waved proudly in the centre of London.

The Case for Israel

Was there a case for Israel? In my mind, of course not, there was no shadow of doubt. Even the most moderate clerics I came across refused to condemn terrorism against Israel as unjustified; the Jews must obviously deserve it, I believed.

So what changed? How could I go from all this hatred to the great love for and affinity with Israel and the Jewish people? I found myself in the Israel and Palestine section of a local bookstore and picked up a copy of Alan Dershowitz's The Case for Israel. Given my worldview, the Jews and Americans controlled the media, so after brief look at the back, I scoffed thinking "vile Zionist propaganda."

I did, however, decide to buy it, content that I would shortly be deconstructing this propaganda piece, showing that Israel had no case and claiming my findings as a personal victory for the Palestinian cause.

Hafeez in Israel in a visit that changed his life

As I read Dershowitz's arguments and deconstruction of many lies I saw as unquestionable truths, I searched despairingly for counter arguments, but found more hollow rhetoric that I'd believed for many years. I felt a real crisis of conscience, and thus began a period of unbiased research. Up until that point I had not been exposed to anything remotely positive about Israel.

Now, I didn't know what to believe. I'd blindly followed others for so long, yet here I was questioning whether I had been wrong. I reached a point where I felt I had no other choice but to see Israel for myself; only that way I'd really know the truth. At the risk of sounding cliché, it was a life-changing visit.

No apartheid state

I did not encounter an apartheid racist state, but rather, quite the opposite. I was confronted by synagogues, mosques and churches, by Jews and Arabs living together, by minorities playing huge parts in all areas of Israeli life, from the military to the judiciary. It was shocking and eye-opening. This wasn't the evil Zionist Israel that I had been told about.

After much soul searching, I knew what I had once believed was wrong. I had been confronted with the truth and had to accept it. But I had a bigger question to confront, what now? I'd for years campaigned against Israel, but now I knew the truth.

The choice was obvious: I had to stand with Israel, with this tiny nation, free, democratic, making huge strides in medicine, research and development, yet the victim of the same lies and hatred that nearly consumed me.

Doing this is not easy and that's something that has become very obvious. I have faced hostility from my own community and even some within the Jewish community in the UK, but that's the reality of standing up for Israel in Europe today. It is not easy, and that's what makes it so necessary.

This isn't about religion and politics; it's about the truth.

When it comes to Israel, the truth is not being heard, the ranks of those filed with blind hatred continue to swell, yet many have not been exposed to the reality, away from the empty rhetoric and politically charged slogans they are so fond of.

We can change this situation but we need to be strong and united. Israel is not just a Jewish issue - it's about freedom, human rights and democracy, all the values that Western nations cherish. It's also about trying to be a light among nations.

Israel's international humanitarian aid work speaks for itself, but if we don't get the message out there, no one will. We don't have to be head-bowed apologists leading with :Israel's not perfect..." - we should never be afraid to say: I am a Zionist and I'm proud. I stand with Israel. Now I ask, will you do that?

Contact Robert Hand by email at borntolose3@att.net

The Jewish community's largest "defense" organization, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), has adopted a policy, consistent with the progressive agenda, not to speak up much about the global tsunami of Muslim anti-Semitism, but instead to campaign against "Islamophobia." This while FBI statistics show that hate crimes against Jews in America are five times the number of hate crimes against Muslims. The rationale for this policy, as the ADL's chief, Abe Foxman, told the Boston Jewish Advocate, is that "[y]ou can't fight the fight against anti-Semitism without fighting against bigotry. ... You cannot ask people to stand with you unless you are ready to stand with them."

But in cities across America, Foxman's policy has led the ADL to stand with people and organizations whose mission it is to defame and harm Jews. To defend its policy of "outreach," the Anti-Defamation League vigorously defames as "bigots" citizens who question radical Islamists' true aims. This pattern of allying with Muslim anti-Semites to fight "Islamophobia" and then defaming legitimately concerned citizens can be clearly seen in three cases:

1. Detroit Imam Mustapha Elturk spoke at an interfaith event on the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks at Congregation Shaarey Tzedek, a synagogue with a proud and longstanding pro-Israel reputation. According to locals, the ADL branch in Detroit blessed the invitation -- ignoring reports (available on ADL's own website) that Elturk's group -- the Islamic Organization of North America -- has a history of anti-Semitism.

The ADL has an annual $55M budget; presumably some of it is used to seek out enemies of the Jewish people. But any unfunded but curious citizen could have found on Elturk's own website (it was on his homepage) the following sermon:

If the Zionists don't repent and stop their aggression... they will be rest assured punished by God as he twice punished them here in this world... Who are the Zionists? ... Allah said, "Every time they enter into a covenant, they breach it. {...} People who break their covenant are worse than animals in God's sight."

During this sermon, the imam solicited his congregation for donations to Hamas-affiliated charities in the Gaza Strip, and he praised dead Gaza fighters as martyrs. In other sermons posted on his open site, Elturk defames American democracy, American society, and moderate Muslims -- and he describes in exquisite detail the ways in which Westernized Muslim women will suffer in Hell for their libertine ways.

When some members of the Detroit Jewish community spoke out online against the synagogue's embrace of Imam Elturk, 38 Detroit rabbis -- following Foxman's logic, it would seem -- co-signed a letter (a Jewish fatwa?) condemning the anonymous dissenters for being "uncivil." The president of the local Jewish Community Relations Council came out in favor of silencing the "online demagogues" and, channeling Stalin or Mao, promised to "set appropriate standards for conversation." Daniel Levy, executive board member of Detroit's ADL, defended Elturk's invitation to speak at the synagogue because -- again following Abe Foxman's reasoning -- the Detroit Jews and Mr. Elturk need to be "working together in mutual respect [as] the only way to move forward and not back." He then accused those who disagree with Elturk's invitation of "doing the work of our enemies." Apparently irony is not Mr. Levy's strong suit.

2. In Florida, the ADL is doing the work of CAIR (Committee for American Islamic Relations) -- a group identified by a federal judge as an American front for Hamas. Florida's ADL recently helped CAIR defeat that state's "American Laws for American Courts" law. The ALAC law was meant to prevent judges from taking into account foreign or religious laws, as was the case two years ago in New Jersey when a judge denied a Moroccan woman a restraining order against her estranged husband, who wouldn't stop raping her. The Jersey judge ruled that because they were still married, Islamic law allowed the husband full rights to her body and that the poor woman must submit to rape at his leisure.

After the ADL helped defeat the law, a gleeful Ahmed Bedier, CAIR-Florida director, was caught on tape bragging that "when we go lobbying [against] the bill today, we will be using the talking points of the Anti-Defamation League." (Bedier is close supporter of convicted Islamic Jihad terrorist Sami Al Arian.) Hassan Shibly, CAIR-Tampa's executive director, said that "[o]ur victory tonight is a great example of how the interfaith and civil rights community united can make a positive difference for all Americans." Mr. Shibly is a man who has claimed that Hezb'allah is a legitimate resistance movement. On Facebook -- where he was once "friends" with Syrian dictator Bashar Assad -- Shibly would post messages such as:

How Jews and Christians lost the teachings of their Prophets and how Muslims can avoid falling into the same mistakes.

Niqab [full face veil for women] is Required in Islam!!

The Grandchildren of Holocaust Survivors from World War II are doing to the Palestinians exactly what was done to them by Nazis

Its time Americans WAKE UP to the ATROCITY that is Israel!!

3. In Michigan's Farmington Public Schools district, not far from Dearborn and Detroit, the Islamic Cultural Association of Michigan (ICA) got what seemed to many as an inside deal to purchase an abandoned school in order to build a mosque. (They beat out the bid of a Jewish religious school.) The deal was negotiated when the district's school board was led by former ADL Detroit Director Howard Wallach. The ICA mosque-builders are affiliated with the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT) -- which is, according to federal authorities, a Muslim Brotherhood front. They have invited the Jewish anti-Semite Norman Finklestein to lecture to their members.

Last June, at an explosive school board meeting, concerned locals questioned the manner of the sale. They were opposed by speakers, including Dawud Walid, executive director of Detroit's branch of CAIR, who hurled accusations of Islamophobia at anyone who disagreed with the deal. Joining CAIR's Walid in support of the mosque were Betsy Kellman, the Michigan director of the ADL, and Detroit Jewish Community Relations Council executive director Robert Cohen.

Jewish leaders, defending the deal, accused Farmington residents of having "strong anti-Muslim feelings" and "making generalizations about Muslims." They said nothing about the proposed mosque's radical links or its likely animus toward their own Jewish constituents. The next day, CAIR issued a statement thanking both for their support and unfoundedly attacking the pro-Israel group StandWithUs for instigating the opposition.

In a phone interview, Kellman told us she did not know that ICA is linked to NAIT or that NAIT is a Muslim Brotherhood front. (The ADL has an annual budget of over $50M. The facts about NAIT are easily available from public, open sources.) Currently, Kellman chairs an interfaith group that includes -- and thereby legitimates -- CAIR. In 2010, Kellman spoke at a Detroit conference that also featured Tariq Ramadan, a Muslim Brotherhood leader who has called Israel the "enemy of Allah" and prayed for it to be struck down.

Such are the people and organizations that Foxman's policies have this country's largest Jewish defense organization allying with, as it aggressively attempts to silence, intimidate, and smear those who would criticize its actions, or its allies.

Recently, the National Conference on Jewish Affairs (NCJA) called for ADL head Abe Foxman to resign. We concur. The words used by Detroit ADL official Daniel Levy to describe the ADL's critics apply most appropriately to Foxman: he is -- with precious sums of Jewish money meant to protect Jews from their foes -- doing the work of Jews' enemies. This should be stopped.

For more on the ADL's failures: www.charlesjacobs.org

Contact Roberta Dzubow by email at Roberta@adgforum.com

According to Al Ahram, Egypt's leading newspaper, a shadowy organization calling itself the "Jihad Group to Cleanse the Country" is threatening On TV, one of the nation's leading liberal media stations, which regularly exposes the Islamist agenda. It sent a letter to the president of the station threatening to target its studios and facilities, as well as kidnap some of its top reporters and journalists, holding them for a $20 million ransom or otherwise "liquidating" them. The message further threatened other media and organizations dealing with On TV with "painful and severe punishments."

The reason for all this? According to the letter, the media policy of the channel "seeks to destroy the nation and create chaos to implement the American and Zionist agenda"—or, more accurately, the media policy of the station is exercising free speech, and thus exposing the nefarious agenda of groups like this "Jihad to Cleanse the Country."

This article was cross-posted on Jihad Watch http://www.jihadwatch.org/2012/04/egypt-jihad-to-cleanse-the-country-of-free-speech.html Contact Raymond Ibrahim at list@pundicity.com

Newspapers have been reporting Israeli leaders evaluation of Iran's nuclear intentions. The leaders' differences in expression are seized upon as differences in policy. Sometimes alleged differences are misquotations or misinterpretations.

Israeli leaders speculate on whether Iranian leaders are rational about whether to make and use nuclear weapons. Former UN Ambassador Dore Gold may have put it the most sensibly: "the Iranians have irrational goals, which they may try and advance in a rational way." (Jodi Rudoren, NY Times, 4/27/12, A8).

The Israeli leaders' discussions are stated without context. But there is context. Anticipating war, the leaders may be trying to prepare the world and the electorate emotionally to accept Israel's need to strike before it is too late. Heads of Israeli defense agencies often foresee a political career following their military one. They position themselves for politics, usually by taking leftist stands. A good example is Defense Minister Barak, who spitefully refuses to sign off on Jewish communities authorized to be built in Judea-Samaria, and indignantly expels Jews from some of them. That plays well not only with the international media with as head of the leftist Labor Party.

What is the nuclear situation. Israel may not be able to survive a conventional attack on it, but it certainly could not survive a nuclear attack. The chilling fact is that Iran's leaders have specifically stated a belief that Israel would be annihilated and Iran would be only wounded. They further said that if Iran actually were destroyed, but Islam won out, the sacrifice would be worth it!

Time is running out for Israel to deter or prevent a nuclear attack. The U.S., whose policy toward jihad may not be adversarial, and which does not seem adversarial except for show, has more time and less existential risk. The U.S. does not face annihilation right away, though my city, New York, does. So the Obama Administration does not reflect the pressure of time; Israel does.

Israeli leaders may also be trying to impress Iranian leaders not to produce nuclear weapons. Reporters act unaware of what is going on, they deal just with the words they hear or that they think they hear.

The notion of "rational" and "irrational" is approached incorrectly. It is approached from the viewpoint of Western culture. How practical is it to evaluate Iranian leaders' intentions on the basis of how we would act? Not practical, we mislead ourselves.

We think of "rational" as survival first, economic welfare second, and religion third. Iranian leaders hew to a fanatical sect that puts their religion and its triumph over the rest of the world first, survival second, and economic welfare third.

People immersed in Muslim culture think differently. We patronize Muslims and make strategic errors when we suppose they share our values. Islam has different values. Islam approves of deceit in jihad. Jihadists approve of every useful means, including terrorism. Terrorism is greatly encouraged by Westerners who, being so anti-Israel, see peacemakers among jihadists, lend credibility to fabricated Muslim grievances, pretend Israel is an aggressor and oppressor, and in general defend the benighted 7th century mentality of Arab culture as if such a defense against the idealistic Israelis is humanitarian.

Muslims perceive peace treaties, especially with non-Muslims, as being mere truces to be overturned by new leaders. Mubarak had said at the 10-year mark, that the treaty with Israel is defunct. But the cry is arising in Egypt to extend Egyptian violations from the cultural and trade spheres to the military sphere.

Arabs have a sense of honor that often keeps them from negotiating face-to-face with their victims. They use negotiations to advance war aims. Americans do not behave like that. Unfortunately, Americans often do not realize what enemy behavior means.

Sometimes the Palestinian Authority refuses foreign donations for a sewage plant if it means cooperating on the project with Israel. Considering that the Arabs are the aggressors and Israel their victim, The Arabs are turning the conflict topsy-turvy. In constantly trying to negotiate with the Arabs and making concessions including releases of terrorists as good-will gestures, Israel i not being al. That is, Israeli leaders have not thought out the matter in an informed, logical, and rational manner.

Western notions about prosperity preventing terrorism are misguided and fail. Americans who hold such notions fail to notice how Arab dictators restricted economic development because they were more interested in keeping power. To hell with the people's welfare, they thought.

Iran's Supreme Leader combines government power with religious power. He believes that death in jihad leads to a fabulously better life. His Twelvers' sect within the Shiiite school of Islam believes that a global conflagration would evoke their messiah and guarantee complete victory over other religions. That notion may be behind Iranian threats to incinerate Israel.

When Iran was struggling in war against Saddam's Iraq, Iran sent many thousands of Iranian children to their deaths, to walk over mine fields and make the mines explode. Then the troops could proceed over those fields to reach the enemy. That war wasn't a jihad, but note the callous disregard for life! Jihadists casually murder innocent people. Their bombs often kill bystanders holding the same beliefs as themselves. They don't care, they call those bystanders martyrs. Hamas uses its own people as human shields. When Hamas complains about civilian casualties, its complaint in insincere propaganda. Again, not understanding Islamic culture, and accepting any way to blame Israel, the world laments Arab casualties. What about systematic murder of Christians in Sudan by Arabs?

Ambassador Gold's description of rationality makes the most sense. Think of the other leaders of equally fanatical totalitarian movements, Hitler and Stalin. Hitler and Stalin had values and goals that were insane, but they often used methods that were clever. But Hitler told General von Paulus not to withdraw his 500,000 troops from Stalingrad, with the result that that whole army was destroyed. Both leaders were genocidal mass-murderers based on ridiculous notions of race and class inheritance. Iran is genocidal, too.

From that cultural background, we can see that we must take Iran's threats seriously. Our great weakness has been American Presidents' years of futile negotiations and weak sanctions, the State Department sabotage of President Bush's policy to help Iranian dissidents overthrow the clerical regime, President Obama's opposition to strong sanctions and then taking credit for sanctions imposed over his objections, Obama's failure to encourage the Tehran Spring, his withdrawal of American power, his planned reductions in American might and leadership, his ignoring of international jihad when he should be alerting the whole world to it, and his anti-Zionist policy that gives Iran confidence the U.S. would not back up Israel.

Speaking of irrationality, Obama reflects an ideology that rejects wars that may advance the U.S. strategically against its enemies, but not wars that are said to be humanitarian but of no strategic value for the U.S.

How Extreme Is Israeli Left?

Haaretz is a far leftist newspaper in Israel whose fine reputation has not been shaken by years of extremist anti-Zionist falsity [though its circulation in Israel has shrunk].

Haaretz greeted Israeli Independence Day with treasonous articles that propose giving Arabs across the Green Line independence, which would enable them to proceed as planned to Israeli independence. The paper's front page column was by Gideon Levy, its most extremist writer.

Its main feature article was by Avraham Burg, a former Israeli and politician who bashes Israel from abroad to the point of calling for the elimination of Israel.

Shortly before that, the newspaper published Akiva Eldar's exhortation to Palestinian Arabs to take to the streets against Israel, though not violently. The editor of another, more moderate newspaper, Maariv, protested against such treason. Mr. Eldar publishes articles in Counterpunch, a magazine run by the Cockburns, notoriously pro-Communist and antisemitic.

Eldar finds everything Israel does in relation to the Palestinian Authority corrupt and oppressive (without stating particulars), and considers the Arabs purely victims.

"You can see the English version of Eldar's screed here:"
http://www.haaretz.com/opinions/time-for-abbas-to-take-to-the-streets-1.425932.

Eldar's article states that Peace Now has identified "settlers" who stole land from Arab farmers. No, their cases indicate an occasional boundary mistake, frequently fraudulent claims of Arab ownership, and Arab attempts to steal land from the state and from Jewish owners. Peace Now twice has been found guilty of libeling settlers. The tens of thousands of Arabs' illegal houses in the Territories and in Israel attest to who is stealing land from whom.

Has he visited the Territories? Most of the land is vacant state land. Not farmed. The article gives the false impression of Arab farmers being hustled off cultivated acres. Rather, Jewish and foreign radicals shepherd Arabs to attack working farms owned by Jews, personally assaulting farmers or stealing or destroying their crops.

The article interweaves in its tirade against Jews being evil the controversy over the Israeli colonel who struck a protestor. Mr. Eldar complains that Israel does not know how to handle non-violent protestors (Prof. Stephen Plaut, 4/27/12).

Does he mean the struck member of International Solidarity Movement, which takes its direction from Arab terrorists in its attempts to impede the Israeli Army? He means the "non-violent" people who broke the colonel's fingers until the rifle butt was his only defense. No facts from the Jewish side were given.

I agree, however, that Israel does not know how to handle protests. When Jews protest, usually non-violently and legally, police beat, arrest, beat, and frame them. When Arabs and their supporters protest, police do not do much. A patriotic government with normal courage would arrest and deport all the ISM members, come to the area to cause strife.

One can suggest that an Arab uprising be non-violent. Considering the immersion in bigotry against Jews to which that wonderful Palestinian Authority subjects its people, and considering the high proportion of terrorists among them, and considering the inherent violence and racism of Arab culture, an uprising against Israel is not likely to stay non-violent. This is especially true about the Palestinian Arabs who call rock throwing and firebombing "non-violent."

Why don't Western journalists expose the pretense that violent Palestinian Arab protest are non-violent? The problem is that journalists' advocacy of leftist or anti-Zionist views overcomes any residual beliefs in justice, humanitarianism, and peace. When will Western "mainstream" journalists object to Muslim Arab promotion of bigotry and violence? Their only objection seems to be to false or unsupported claims of Jewish violence.

Obama Appoints Bigot to Atrocities Prevention Board

President Obama has appointed Samantha Power to the new Atrocities Prevention Board. Ms. Power had worked on Obama's 2008 election campaign. For calling Hillary Clinton "a monster," she was fired.

At the U.C.-Berkeley Institute of International Studies, she was asked in April 2002 what the U.S. should do if Israel or the Palestinian Authority (P.A.) were "moving towards genocide." Her reply ignored what she might do if the P.A. were preparing genocide. [Actually, the P.A. broadcasts sermons citing Islamic authority mandating the murder of all Jews.]

She replied, "What we need is a willingness to actually put something on the line in sort of helping the situation. And putting something on the line might mean alienating a domestic constituency of tremendous political and financial import ... It may more crucially mean sacrificing — or investing, I think, more than sacrificing — literally billions of dollars not in servicing Israelis', you know, military but actually in investing in the new state of Palestine, in investing billions of dollars it would probably take also to support, I think, what will have to be a mammoth protection force, not of the old, you know, Srebrenica kind or the Rwanda kind, but a meaningful military presence."

Her reply was the antisemitic canard that the U.S. interest is not to support Israel, and that nevertheless the government bows to Jewish voters. She also attributed to President Obama's critics a motive to do what was "good for the Jews." Actually, the American people support Israel.

She accused Israel of "major human rights abuses." She suggested transferring U.S. subsidy of Israel to the P.A. [which commits major abuses].

When the New York Times admitted that Israel had not massacred Arabs in Jenin, in 2002, Ms. Power criticized the paper, in February 2008. [Claims of a massacre there were Arab propaganda, soon disproved, as are all such claims. Anti-Zionists are too eager for mud against Israel to check the facts and acknowledge their falsity.]

What judgment can she have, thinking that Israel might commit genocide? Should such a vicious believer in lies, and who doesn't know which side commits atrocities, head a bureau supposed to help end atrocities?

Radicals who favor the P.A. seek to make Israel seem illegitimate by accusing it of war crimes. Ms. Power is their likely accomplice (Zionist Organization of America, 4/27/12, press release).

Is that how Obama has "Israel's back?" What judgment can our President have, appointing that person, one whom he had to fire before for an intemperate outburst? Just what we need, another government bureau! Meanwhile, Obama ignores the Islamic genocide in Sudan and other persecution.

Unscrupulous, President Obama tends to repress our liberty, prosperity, and national security. President Obama is a combination of Aaron Burr, Huey Long, and Richard Nixon. Burr was a traitor; Long was a demagogue; and Nixon tended toward fascism.

Nixon had a political enemies list. He ordered government agencies to "investigate" them. Kimberly A. Strassel reports that Obama, too, has an enemies list. So far he used the list to defame contributors to his political opponents.

An Obama website named eight private contributors to Romney's campaign, labeling them as "less-than-reputable," "on the wrong side of the law," and as profiting at "the expense of so many Americans."

Who are they? Three had outsourced jobs, one worked for a company that forecloses on mortgages, one manages a hedge fund, one is a lobbyist, one is CEO of an energy company that made money from oil, and another opposes the gay rights movement.

None of those private individuals, or the accusations against them, is criminal. Shaming them publicly is the real shame. Will they be persecuted by the IRS, SEC, or the Justice Dept.? Obama has targeted their oil, insurance, and finance industries in his campaign, regulations, and proposed laws and taxes.

[Hedge funds did not cause the financial collapse, the government largely did. American depends on oil. Every group seems to lobby including environmentalists and unions. If more mortgages were foreclosed the housing market might hit bottom and recover. Government insistence on ethanol is causing world food shortages. Government is losing a fortune on subsidizing renewable fuels.]

In an earlier attack on free speech, Obama had publicly embarrassed Supreme Court judges he invited to some event, for allowing corporations the same free speech rights that unions have to donate to political campaigns. [Union donations go almost entirely to his party, whereas corporate donations are fairly mixed. Liberals unfairly and incorrectly denounce corporate donations as unduly influencing elections, but if really concerned about money buying elections, they would denounce union funding, too.]

[Obama's current attack on GOP contributors resembles what his union allies did. They found out which companies donated to their political opponents, and then ridiculed and boycotted them. While my friends worry about the religious right, here is the Left infringing upon freedom of speech.]

Obama also has falsely accused the Chamber of Commerce of spending foreign donations on U.S. elections.

The Administration has drafted an executive order demanding that bids for federal contracts list their political donations. Would bids be rejected for donating to the wrong Party? Or in the name of disclosure, would donors be identified and shamed?

Our President does not act like one. He, the supposed non-partisan unifier, is our most divisive and authoritarian one, the epitome of what our founding fathers had rebelled against (Wall St. J., 4/27/12, op-ed; I took some literary license).

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.

On 02/05/12 06:54, Shraga Simmons wrote:

Shalom,

I thought you may want to share this with your readers: http://davidandgoliathbook.wordpress.com/2012/02/03/new-york-times-misrepresents-the-third-jihad

In the silence of remembrance the present is always the past and the sky hangs like a thin veil fluttering against the future.

"Who can count the dust of Jacob or number the seed of Israel" Numbers 23:10

The sun sets above the hills. The siren cries out and on the busy highways that wend among the hills, the traffic stops, the people stop, and a moment of silence comes to a noisy country. Flags fly at half mast, the torch of remembrance is lit, memorial candles are held in shaking arms and the country's own version of the Flanders Field poppy, the Red Everlasting daisy, dubbed Blood of the Maccabees, adorns lapels. And so begins the Yom Hazikaron, Heroes Remembrance Day, the day of remembrance for fallen soldiers and victims of terror-- Israel's Memorial Day.

What is a memorial day in a country that has always known war. Where remembrance means adding the toll of one year's dead and wounded to the scales of history. A country where war never ends, where the sirens may pause but never stop, where each generation grows up knowing that they will have to fight or flee. To stand watch or run away. It is not so much the past that is remembered on this day, but the present and the future. The stillness, a breath in the warm air, before setting out to climb the slopes of tomorrow.

Who can count the dust of Jacob. And yet each memorial day we count the dust. The dust that is a fraction of those who have fallen defending the land for thousands of years. Flesh wears out, blood falls to the earth where the red daisies grow, and bone turns to dust. The dust blows across the graves of soldiers and prophets, the tombs of priests hidden behind brush, the caverns where forefathers rest in sacred silence, laid to rest by their sons, who were laid to rest by their own sons, generations burying the past, standing guard over it, being driven away and returning each time.

On Memorial Day, the hands of memory are dipped in the dust raising it to the blue sky. A prayer, a whisper, a dream of peace. And the wind blows the candles out. War follows. And once again blood flows into the dust. A young lieutenant shading his eyes against the sun. An old man resting with his family on the beach. Children climbing into bed in a village beneath the hills. And more bodies are laid to rest in the dust. Until dust they become.

In this land, the Maker of Stars and Dust vowed to Abraham that his children would be as many as the dust of the earth and the stars of heaven. In their darkest days, they would be as the dust. But there is mercy in the numberless count of the dust. Mercy in not being able to make a full count of the fallen. In remaining ignorant of that full measure of woe. Modern technologies permit us terrible estimates. Databanks store the names of millions, village by village and city by city. Terrible digital cemeteries of ghosts. But there is no counting the dust. And when we walk the length and breadth of the land, as the Maker told Abraham to do, it the dust that supports our feet. We stand upon the shoulders of giants. We walk in the dust of our ancestors.

Some new countries are built to escape from the past, but there is no escaping it in these ancient hills. IDF soldiers patrol over ground once contested by empires, tread over spearheads and the wheels of chariots buried deep in the earth. The Assyrians and the Babylonians came through here in all their glory. Greek and Roman soldiers and mercenaries pitted themselves against the handful of Judeans who came out of the Babylonian exile. The Ottoman and the Arab raged here, and Crusader battering rams and British Enfield rifles still echo in the peaceful hills.

Here in the silence of remembrance the present is always the past and the sky hangs like a thin veil fluttering against the future. The believers cast their prayers out of their mouths against the veil. The soldiers cast their lives and their hearts. And still the future flutters on above like the sky, near enough to touch but out of reach. Beneath it, the sky blue flag, the stripe of the believer's shawls, the mark of the House of David.

Can these bones live, the Lord asks Ezekiel. And generations after each slaughter, they come again, the descendants of the dead to reclaim the hills of their ancestors. Rising like the red flowers out of the soil. Like the bones out of the earth. They come up as slaves out of Egypt, as the handful come out of the captivity of empires, of Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Rome, the Caliphate, Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, the kingdoms of Araby, their tongues as numberless as the earth. Here they come again to set up kingdoms and nations. And there in shadows on the dust, a handful of men fight off a legion, swords, spears and rifles in hand they face down impossible odds. They fight and die, but they go on.

The calendar itself is a memorial. After Israel's Memorial Day and Independence Day, Lag BaOmer, the commemoration of the original Yom Yerushalayim, the liberation of Jerusalem from the Romans, still covertly remembered in bonfires and bows shot into the air. Remembering a victory turned into a defeat and encoded in a story about a plague caused by a lack of brotherhood. That lack was very real and the plague took the form of swords and spears. All in a season that begins with Passover, the exodus that set over a million people off on a forty year old journey to return to the homeland of their forefathers.

The battles today are new, but they are also very old. The weapons are new, but the struggle is the same. Who will remain and who will be swept away. Some 3,000 years ago, Judge Jephthah and the King of Ammon were exchanging messages not too different from those being passed around as diplomatic communiques today. The King of Ammon demanding land for peace and the Judge laying out the Israeli case for the land in a message that the enemy would hardly trouble to read before going to war.

Take a stray path in these hills and you may find a grinning terrorist with a knife, or the young David pitting his slingshot against a lion or bear. This way the Maccabees rush ahead at the armies of a slave empire, and this way a helicopter passes low overhead on the way to Gaza .. Like Dali's melting clocks, time is a fluid thing here. And what you remember, you shall find.

The soldier is not so sacred as he once was. The journalist and the judge have taken his place. The actors sneer from their theaters. The politicians gobble their free food and babble of peace. Flowers in gun barrels and doves everywhere. But the soldier still stands where he must. The borders have shrunk. The old victories have been exchanged for diplomatic defeats. From the old strongholds come missiles and rockets. And children hide in bomb shelters waiting for the worst to pass. This is the doing of the journalist and the judge, the politician and the actor, the lions of literature who send autographed copies of their books to imprisoned terrorists and the grandchildren of great men who hire themselves on in service to the enemy.

The man who serves is still sacred, but the temple of duty is desecrated more and more each year. Leftist academics dismiss the heroes of the past as myths or murderers. Their wives dress in black and harass soldiers at checkpoints, their children wrap their faces in Keffiyas and throw stones at them. Draft dodging, once a black mark of shame, has become a mark of pride among the left. Some boast about how easy it is, others enlist only to then refuse to serve. They call themselves Refusniks, accepting the Soviet view of Israel as an illegitimate warmongering state, but laying claim to the name of the Zionists who fought to escape the Soviet Union.

Some are only afraid, but some are filled with hate. They have linked into a twisted mirror and drunk of the poisoned wine. They have found their Inner Cain and go now to slay their brothers with words.

How shall I curse whom G-d has not cursed, asks Balaam. But the King of Moab is determined to have his curses anyway. And today it is to the UN that they come for curses. The Arab lands boil with blood, but resolution after resolution follows damning Israel. China squats on the mountains of Tibet like a toad, Russian government thugs throw dissidents out of windows, and Saudi firefighters push girls back into a burning building. And still the resolutions come like curses against this people that has come out of Egypt.

In a land built on memory, it is possible not to remember, but it is impossible to entirely forget. Memory becomes a desperate burden that some are only too happy to cast off. Life beats hardest against the fall of night. Its pulse pounding against mortality. To know death is to rush and embrace life.

A war of memories comes. A war for the dust. Is this a day of remembrance or a day of shame. Were those men who fought and died for Judea and Samaria, for the Golan and Jerusalem, for every square inch of land when the armies of Arab dictators came to push them into the sea, heroes or villains. Were Nasser, Hussein, Saddam, Arafat, Gaddafi, Assad and the House of Saud the real heroes all along. The tiny minority of 360 million pitted against the overwhelming majority of 6 million.

Yet though men may forget, the dust remembers. And the men return to it. For some four thousand years they have done it. And they shall do it yet again. For He who has made men of the dust and made worlds of the dust of stars does not forget. As the stars turn in whirling galaxies and the dust flies across the land, so the people return to the land. And though they forget, they remember again. For the dust is the memory of ages and the children shall always return to the dust of their ancestors.

In the cities, towns and villages-- the dead are remembered. Those who died with weapons in their hands and those who just died. Men, women and children. Drops of blood cast to the dust, reborn as flowers on lapels. Reborn as memory.

All go to one place, said King Solomon, all that lives is of the dust, and all returns to the dust. There is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his works. And so memorial day precedes the day of independence. That we rejoice in that which those who sleep in the dust have died to protect. The skyscrapers and the orchards, the sheep ranches and the highways, the schools and the synagogues. For they who drained the swamps and built the roads, who held guard over the air and built the cities, may not have lived to see their works. But we rejoice in their works for them. And a new generation rises to watch over their dust and tend the works that they have built. Until the day when He that counts the dust of Jacob shall count them all, and the land shall stir, and in the words of Daniel, they that sleep in dust shall arise, and then rejoice with us.

Contact Roger Bodle by email at rjbodle@xtra.co.nz

Writing in the Middle East Quarterly's spring 2012 issue, Emanuele Ottolenghi took Professor Gary Sick's October Surprise thesis to task. In his article, Ottolenghi disputes Sick's long-standing allegation that incoming Reagan administration figures persuaded the Iranians to hold U.S. hostages until after the 1980 election to ensure Carter's defeat. He unearths new and previously unreported faults in Sick's research and further discredits the October Surprise.

In his famous 1992 book October Surprise, Sick relied heavily on the supposed actions of a figure named Mehdi Kashani. Ottolenghi reveals how Kashani is actually an imaginary character created by Ari Ben-Menashe, a proven fabricator, thus knocking the legs out from under Sick's accusations against the Reagan campaign. According to Ottolenghi, Ben-Menashe's Kashani is actually "the casual blending of the biographies of two real-life people, neither of whom could have played the role attributed to Mehdi Kashani by Sick in his book.

"Sick ... chose to believe Ben-Menashe's story about Kashani because it suited his theory and, once he could document an arms transaction signed by an Iranian man named Mehdi Kashani on behalf of Iran's regime, Sick thought he had corroborated Ben-Menashe's testimony."

Ottolenghi's piece underscores the sorry state of Middle Eastern studies in America where it takes more than two decades for someone to challenge a pivotal aspect of a far-fetched conspiracy that has been paraded around as scholarship. Sick has responded on his blog and his Gulf 2000 list where he devotes more time to ad hominem attacks than to seriously refuting Ottolenghi's findings. Ottolenghi has now written a rejoinder (posted online as an update to his article) where he rebukes Sick's retort and addresses his new allegations.

Judy Goodrobb is with Middle East Forum.
E-mail her at MEQ@MEForum.org; and visit the organization's website at www.MEForum.org

Feeling good about Israel is great. But I would like to suggest that it's just a first step. Once you understand what we're about, and what there is in Israel to be celebrated, you can then help others to understand --- especially is this the case if you are outside of Israel. In light of all the attempts today to delegitimize Israel, this is not a small thing.

Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar is an Israel who left for the States years ago, and ended up teaching at Harvard.

When he returned to Israel recently -- he's now teaching at the Inter-Disciplinary Center in Herzliya -- he was astounded at the changes in his native land. This ultimately prompted him to created a film, "Inside Israel: How a Small Nation Makes a Big Difference."

"[It] shows Israel to be a dynamic, inventive and humanitarian society. Tal helps us discover that the deep-seated Jewish values such as freedom, education, family and responsibility (tikun olam), mixed in with a good dash of chutzpah, contribute to Israel's accomplishments in both the economic and humanitarian spheres. We learn that these core values define Israel and have fueled this tiny, resource-challenged country's drive to become an invaluable asset to the world."

(It is breathtakingly ironic, of course, that enemies of Israel, for perverse political reasons, would destroy a state that does so much good for the world, including for those enemies. But I digress from the focus of this film...)

~~~~~~~~~~

I encourage you to visit the website for the film: http://www.israelinsidethemovie.com/. There, you can see the trailer. Then if you are inclined -- and I encourage this! -- you can order the video or make arrangements for a showing in your community. It should be shown on campuses, especially, but also in synagogues and churches, community centers, etc.

Borrowing from an old commercial: "When you care enough..."

~~~~~~~~~~

The modern State of Israel is 64 years young today. Our population has grown to 7.8 million: 75.3% Jewish, 20.6% Arab, and 4.1% who identify otherwise. There were 161,000 babies born in Israel during this past year.

A full 28% of our population is under 14, compared to an average of 17% in Western nations. That is because our birthrate is higher than in the Western countries. And it leads to a child-oriented society, with kids everywhere, even brought to fancy weddings; in malls, and in museums, even on the street, during vacations times, there are activities for children. I think it's great and what a positive, hopeful attitude this reflects.

The birth rate for Jews is increasing, I will add (for those concerned about demographics) and for Arabs is decreasing.

~~~~~~~~~~

Yom Ha'Atzmaut is a good day to read a piece, "Taking back our national sovereignty," written by Gerald Steinberg, who is president of NGO-Monitor and professor of political science at Bar Ilan University.

"...the last thing that most of us want is to have foreign governments, with their own interests and perspectives, trying to manipulate Israel's most important decisions, regardless of their good intentions. This was the thrust of David Ben Gurion's addresses to UN committees in the 1940s, and Menachem Begin's impatient meetings with Jimmy Carter in the 1970s.

"As Israelis celebrate their 64th anniversary, the relationship between independence and Zionism is still insufficiently understood or accepted around the world...

"For the first years after the creation of modern Israel, Europeans generally seemed to accept the centrality of Jewish sovereignty, reflecting the tragic legacy of oppression ending with the Holocaust. But gradually, as the consequences of Arab rejectionism, wars and terror spilled over into Europe, this understanding was replaced by paternalism and manipulation. In the years and decades following the 1967 war, European leaders began to seek instant solutions to the conflict.

Their peace plans promote the false narrative that automatically defines Palestinians as weak victims and refugees, while blaming Israeli policies, particularly settlements, for the ongoing violence.

While using international frameworks in the effort to impose policies based on this false premise, Europe (including non-EU members Norway and Switzerland) has used funding mechanisms to manipulate Israeli politics and society on a massive scale. Both tactics negate the core principle of national sovereignty..."
http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/taking-back-our-national-sovereignty-again/

~~~~~~~~~~

In light of this, I make mention here that three communities in Judea and Samaria that were unauthorized have now been officially recognized as legal by the Israeli government:

Bruchin, a religious community of 100 families founded in 1999 on state land in the western hills of Samaria.

A general view of the unauthorised Bruchin settlement in the West Bank

Rechalim, a community of some 35 families, founded in 1991 on state land in northern Samaria, after the terrorist murder of Rachel Drouk of Shilo. In the beginning women, with their children, from many places in Judea-Samaria set up tents on this site.

Sansana, a religious community of 48 families in the Hills of Hevron, Judea, on the edge of the Negev, which was established first in 1997 as a Nahal core settlement and then expanded. Its name is taken from the "Song of Songs." (Nahal refers to a program of the IDF that combined military service with establishment of core agricultural communities.)

~~~~~~~~~~

Naturally, we have heard from the international community, including the EU, the UN, the US and the PA, with regard to this. We are, you see, upsetting all chances for peace to advance.

Israel's response is that these communities were all built on uncontested state land and had actually been approved for full legalization a decade ago although the approval was never executed.

~~~~~~~~~~

On April 22, CBS ran a segment of "60 minutes" with Bob Simon that exhibited outrageously anti-Israel bias.

Addressing the issue of disappearing Christian Arab communities in "the Holy Land," Simon managed to finger Israel as the major problem. Ignoring the Muslim treatment of Christians, which has them terrified and often afraid to speak, he is content to lay the blame on Israel. Israel! Which is the only nation in the Middle East that protects its Christian population and provides them with full religious rights. Israel! The only nation in the Middle East where the numbers of Christians living within its borders has grown.

When the program indicated that the Christian population of Jerusalem has dropped precipitously, my jaw dropped. For I know that the Christian population here has grown. And when he painted the security fence -- rather than Muslim violence -- as the primary reason for Christians fleeing from Bethlehem, my blood pressure went up.

And all of this at a time when surrounding Muslims countries, with their increased radicalism, have made life near impossible for Christians.

In a letter he put out on this subject, Israel Allies Foundation (http://www.israelallies.org/site/about/) Executive Director Willem Griffioen writes, "First, and most obviously — it paints the democratic country of Israel in a negative light in a blatant attempt to dislodge Christian support for Israel."

~~~~~~~~~~

The organization Stand-With-US has put out excellent material on this program, and I would like to refer you to that: https://www.standwithus.com/mail/?eid=170.

It examines the lies and anti-Semitic innuendoes, provides important factual information and gives contacts for registering complaints. I urge you to follow through here. This means not only protesting to CBS, but setting the record straight in all possible venues -- speaking to friends who have seen the program, writing letters to the editor, etc.

~~~~~~~~~~

Read the story of the Arab in Jerusalem, identified only as "S," who keeps the fact that he is in the IDF a secret. Heart-warming. Tells us how things should be. But how far we have yet to go: http://www.jpost.com/Features/InThespotlight/Article.aspx?id=267472

~~~~~~~~~~

And in closing on this special day, the very special Naomi Shemer song "Al Kol Eleh," ("over all of these, the bitter and the sweet, grant your protection...please do not uproot the planted, do not forget the hope"), with English subtitles: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gbw2FTYHCTg&feature=channel&list=UL

~~~~~~~~~~~

Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il and visit her website at www.arlenefromisrael.info

According to the Egyptian website Youm 7, Azza al-Jarf, a female Member of Parliament representing the Muslim Brotherhood's "Freedom and Justice Party," is trying to abolish several laws currently enjoyed by Egyptian women—including preventing them from divorcing or even separating from their husbands, because "the man has the authority and stewardship" (see Koran 4:34); mandating that fathers must circumcise their daughters; and trying to get the Egyptian educational system to ban the teaching of the English language—on the grounds that it is an "infidel" tongue—while separating boys and girls in classrooms and forcing girls to wear the hijab.

Azza Jarf: Putting a stop to infidel freedoms in Egypt's new parliament.

Ms. Jarf, of course, is not the first Muslim female in Egypt opposed to her own gender; earlier, another female politician declared that "women are deficient in intelligence and religion," and that, in agreement with Sharia law, they are banned from running for presidency.

At any rate, repressive and discriminatory laws, not to mention laws that mutilate the human body—such represent the Muslim Brotherhood's idea of "Freedom and Justice," the telling name of their political wing.

Contact Raymond Ibrahim at list@pundicity.com

This article was cross-posted from Jihad Watch. It is archived at
http://www.raymondibrahim.com/2012/04/egypt-muslim-brotherhood-mp-seeks-to-abolish

Once again, the incomparable military analyst and astute political advisor, Yoram Ettinger, appears to be the only authority able and willing to see the forest from the trees.

We were privileged to hear the ambassador at our Palm Beach Synagogue, April 21, 2012. He was introduced by proud American, proud Jew and dedicated Zionist, Steven Stern.

The ambassador made the startling announcement that Israel was totally secondary in Iran's master plan — almost kind of a red herring! Huh? The ambassador went on to advise us that the world and especially the American State Department with the current administration has never really understood the geopolitics and military ambitions within the Middle East and how Iran's master plan fits into the current dynamic.

Please look at the map. It is a map of the Middle East showing the vital importance of the Persian Gulf. The Gulf is a large body of water that lies between Saudi Arabia, the powerbroker for Sunni Muslims and Iran the strongest power within the Shiite Moslem world. Much to their disappointment, neither of the two has controlled the Persian Gulf, primarily because neither has ever had any realistic ambition to rival the United States as a naval power. Unfortunately, Iran has obtained a far easier, less cumbersome and less expensive road to this power.

The Persian Gulf happens to be one of the main avenues for commerce, especially for all-powerful oil, in the world. It constitutes the easiest access to the Arabian Sea which immediately borders Pakistan and India and constitutes a much shorter route to the Far East. At this moment, Iran is threatening to close the Straits of Hormuz (see on map) at the bottom of the Persian Gulf which gains entry to the Arabian Sea and thus wreck havoc with the world's oil supply. Iran claims this war provoking action would take place if the United States or Israel or both attempt to take out Iran's nuclear facility.

Ambassador Ettinger asks what of this Iranian threat to close the Straits of Hormuz if it is attacked? So what, points out Ettinger. How does the relative minor skirmish that would ensue to quickly take back the Straits and defeat a conventionally armed Iran, compare to having to deal with one that had obtained even the rudiments of nuclear warfare and has furthermore gained the support of the surrounding nations? There is no comparison. There is nothing, in fact, to talk about except in the minds of the world's talking heads who have thus far failed to see the forest from the trees.

A not incidental problem is that if Iran gains control of the Persian Gulf, it also obtains total domination of the small, virtually powerless Persian Gulf States — Qatar, United Arab Republics. Oman, and Yemen — all very important politically and vital in the production of oil. As the ambassador reminds us, loyalties change at the bat of an eye in the Middle East — not far different from the rest of the world. These countries that have long been supposed allies of the United States, under the threat of merciless punishment from an immediately adjacent neighbor, nuclear armed, would quickly change sides. This change of loyalties is particularly likely given the shocking, senseless, counter productive abandonment of allies by a painfully unreliable Obama administration.

How then does Israel fall within this dynamic? It does not. As much as Ahmadinejad despises Jews, he is far from stupid. He has simply been using the world's all-consuming congenital hatred of Jews and Israel as a ploy to hood wink the world away from his master plan. Look at the map. Does it make sense for Iran to travel over 1000 miles, in exactly the opposite direction, to attack Israel and risk immediate massive Israeli nuclear retaliation? Does he really want to cripple Iran's much more productive and politically more sensible (to their minds) plan of domination of the Arab world and the world's oil supply? Hardly.

Then, one might conclude that the US and the rest of the world's talking heads had better stop talking about nonsensical, consistently failed "negotiations" see the forest not the trees and act immediately, if not sooner. They could quickly enlist the vital help of their only loyal ally in the area — Israel — and take out Iran before a much greater military and political disaster is there at our own doorstep — like it is right now.

Jerome S. Kaufman is Editor of Israel Commentary (www.israel-commentary.org). This article is archived at http://israel-commentary.org/?p=3338

Tomorrow, April 26, 2012 the state of Israel will be celebrating her 64th birthday. The Jewish state is commemorating that she had prevailed, when in 1948, the day after David Ben-Gurion, at that time the Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization, the chairman of the Jewish Agency for Palestine and the leader of the Yishuv, declared her Independence, five Arab states armies converged and attacked her with one goal in mind to annihilate her, there and then, on the day she was conceived.

The Declaration of Israel's Independence took place on 14 May 1948, 5 Iyar 5708, the day before the British Mandate was due to expire. For me it is an emotional day because I was conceived almost at the same time the Jewish state was born and we are childhood friends. We went through all the pain and joy together.

This morning, while sitting at my desk going over the news and searching for news about Israel's Independence Day celebrations, on the Internet, a thought came to my mind, is Israel really an independent state? And the answer that came from my inner being was, NO; Israel is not an independent state.

Yes, Israel was given the international approval as a sovereign state and was accepted as a state among the nations. It is a member of the United Nations Organization and her leaders are invited to the halls of other nations' leaders. But she is not independent.

Though Israel has all the components of an independent state it is not.

Israel is not independent first and foremost because she is the only country in the world that is held to standards that no other nation is held to; the nations of the world deal with Israel based on hypocrisy they expect here to follow rules no other nation would;

Israel is not independent because she is the only country in the world that has her legitimacy is always challenged;

Israel is not independent because all that she or her citizens do they are constantly vilified by [un]Jews and non-Jews;

Israel is not independent because the world treats her as a pariah state, not as equal;

Israel is not independent because the world has not accepted that the land of Israel is her God's given land to the Jewish people;

The ancient Jewish sovereignty was reestablished, third time, after a third of the Jewish nation was exterminated by the anti-Semitic Nazis; yet, anti-Semitism today is alive and as strong as it was in 1938 and has not vanished from the hearts and minds of most. The world is still suffering from this contagious and incurable disease called anti-Semitism, now, attacking, collectively, the six million Jews living in Israel.

Israel is not independent because her leaders still have a ghetto mentality of doing all in their power to go along to get along with even some of the scum on earth nations;

Israel is not independent because when it goes to war the world's powers will not permit her to win it and vanquish her enemies; on the 59th minute they always impose a cease fire on her, leaving the war inconclusive and an open door for another war to come;

Israel is not independent because her leaders play into the hands of her enemies;

Israel is not independent because she has not asserted, to herself, that all the land, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea legally belongs to her;

Israel is not independent because she constantly succumbs to world pressure and dismantles Jewish communities built on land that legally belongs to the state;

Israel is not independent because she still takes her marching orders from the USA and the European Union;

Israel is not independent because when some anarchist is lightly bashed by an IDF commander, for more than a valid reason, instead of this punk being carried out of the country on a stretcher, the IDF commander is dismissed from his command post and Israel apologies and makes excuse to the world;

Israel is not independent because the world has not accepted that Jerusalem is the capital of the Jewish state; Jerusalem is still considered political collateral;

Israel is not independent because her citizens, the people of the Bible, have removed themselves from the Covenant their forefather, Abraham, signed with God;

Israel is not independent because it has given the holiest to the Jews, Temple Mount, to be managed by her archenemy, the Arab-Moslems;

Israel is not independent because she gave control of Hebron, the cradle of Jewish heritage, to her archenemy, the Arab-Moslems;

Israel is not independent because she had let go of her control over her ancient heritage sites;

Israel is not independent because her education system has removed Bible studies and Jewish heritage knowledge and history from the education curriculum and the young generations, her future leaders, have no idea why they are fighting over that precious sliver of land along the blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea;

In an upcoming book by Shmuel HaLevi, he argues that one prime condition to be independent is to WANT to be independent and Israel cannot be independent if she WANTS to be LIKE all other Nations.

The expressed determination to lead the Jewish people into being like all other peoples is promoting an illogical statement of want, because no one nation is like another. Otherwise, the axiom of identification comes to play and all are one and the same.

David Ben-Gurion got it all wrong on the independence of Israel subject and on forgiving, for all practical purposes, Nazi Germany for killing six million Jews and others who harmed the Jewish nation. That was terrible betrayal of principles, which set up conditions that led to Israel's very existence to be terminally compromised.

Out of that terrible act of self destruction, for the sake of hiding from reality, the Ben-Gurion's disciples run amok. Using that expression of LIKE all other nations they have turned the intent into a destruction of all that is uniquely Jewish, because one cannot be "like all other nations" if one is Jewish.

The rest is history and we see it before our own eyes. Destruction, abandonment of Jewish heritage and Judaism, denial of history and violence of Jews against JEWS and stepping on Jewish core rights.

If and when all of the mentioned above are overturned and Israel begins acting as a 64 years old grownup and, in this case, exactly like all other nations act, with the interest of the country and her citizens to be the only priority in mind, then she will be gaining her independence.

I will suggest to start with the following:

1. Add all of Judea and Samaria to the sovereignty of the state under her laws;

2. End all dismantling of Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria and declare extensive building programs in those terrorists;

3. Allow Jews to go and freely pray on Temple Mount.

The truth must be told. Israel is a sovereign state bit an independent state.

I am happy that the Jewish nation owns it sovereignty. The people of the Book must look forward with great hope that in time to come their state will become independent as well.

I am grateful I was born Jewish because, because among all the double standards, the bigotry and hypocrisy the world bestows upon us, we, Jews, own something no one has, it is called Judaism.

Happy Birthday the nation state of the Jewish people, Israel.

Contact Nurit Greenger by email at nurit.nuritg@gmail.com. Visit her blog at
http://ngthinker.typepad.com

Another Zakkai update:

Another 25-hour Tehillim/Psalms rally (hopefully last!!)

Without a doubt, the incredible success of Zakkai's last surgery (on 4/4) was due to the world-class medical team in Boston and the overwhelming outpouring of prayer by friends around the world. The medical team is lined up, including the phenomenal anesthesiologist who took great care of us last time - we found this out today and we're very relieved!

Now we need our friends again for the prayer part. As we did last time, we are organizing a 25-hour Tehillim/Psalms reading during the halachic/Jewish day that Zakkai will be undergoing (hopefully his last) surgery in Boston this coming Monday morning, April 30. There are 20-minute time slots during which one can read Tehillim/Psalms of his/her choice. The timelines start 7:20 pm Sunday, April 29 and end 8:40 pm Monday, April 30. Please see http://tinyurl.com/7k2f6ua for the details. Thank you in advance to all who participate (as well as to those who don't participate but keep Zakkai in their prayers nonetheless).

Tonight we begin the celebration of Yom Ha'Atzmaut -- Israeli Independence Day.

Every year I write with amazement about the sudden transition, from mourning to celebration. It epitomizes Jewish life, with our suffering and our capacity to rejoice all wrapped together.

Tonight we begin with prayer, and then to fireworks, songfests and dancing in city squares.

Israel is, without a doubt, a modern miracle of enormous proportions. Whatever our failings, we have accomplished the impossible in 64 short years.

In the midst of our enemies, rising from the ashes of the Holocaust:

• We have founded a Jewish state that moves according to Jewish time, Jewish practices and Jewish sensibility. It is truly singular: like none other in the world.
• We have managed to sustain a robust, if still-evolving, democracy that boasts great diversity.
• We contribute in manifold ways to the good of humanity with our scientific and medical innovations, and we reach out to other nations to lend assistance.
• We live at the heart of Jewish history with a heritage that reaches back thousands of years -- and a continuing array of archeological discoveries that document this. The Jewish places of greatest sanctity are within our borders.
• We have one of the very best armies in the world (and the most ethical), so that, thank Heaven, we can protect ourselves -- a matter of huge proportions.
• We are fiscally solid and thriving. At the cutting edge of hi-tech (second only to Silicon Valley), we are renowned for our innovative approaches.
• We offer a vast selection of opportunities for Jewish study.
• We have a thriving national high culture, with world-class artists and musicians.

When I say a modern miracle, I mean it literally. What I have just described would not be possible without protection from Above.

Last year I cited a piece from the Koren Siddur (prayerbook) with regard to Yom Ha'Atzmaut. It is so meaningful that I repeat part of it here (with emphasis added):

"Jews were the first to see God in history, to see the unfolding of events as a meaningful narrative, the ongoing story of the covenant between God and His people. The celebration of Yom Ha'Atzmaut as a religious festival is part of this faith. Never before had a people survived so long an exile, its identity intact. Never before had a nation that had not known sovereignty for two millennia recovered it again. Ravaged [as the Jewish people had been] by the Holocaust a mere three years earlier, the declaration of Israel's independence was a remarkable act of faith, an everlasting symbol of the victory of life over death, hope over despair.

"Some thirty-three centuries ago, Moses prophesied: 'Even if you have been dispersed to the most distant land under the heavens, from there the Lord your God will gather you and bring you back.' (Deut. 30:4) and so it happened. If, as we believe, there are events that bear the signature of Heaven, this surely was one. Therefore we give thanks to God for bringing the land back to the people, and the people back to the land -- the land where our people was born in ancient times, and reborn in ours."

~~~~~~~~~~

I am unabashed in my gratitude, to be an Israeli and to be able to participate in this moment in Jewish history.

Because Israel is a very small state, there is a connectedness, a feeling of family, here. I find native Israelis -- who can seem brash and difficult -- to be very good people, capable of embracing life with enormous (sometimes breathtaking) courage, and seizing opportunities to do chesed (works of lovingkindness). There is an great vibrancy to our society. It is no accident that, in spite of all our troubles, Israelis consistently poll as one of the happiest, most optimistic people in the world

Our task is two-fold.

To stay strong and resilient in our conviction that it is our right, our destiny, as Jews to be here.

Where there are weaknesses and failings in the State -- oy v'voy are there! -- to work to make it better. Israel is ours, as nothing else will ever be, and it falls to us to make it all it is meant to be...

I have not yet mentioned the scenic beauty of our land -- a land that Israelis love to tour and hike. And so a video that offers a taste:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2jSi9VxJxg&feature=related

Lastly, from Aish, for your enjoyment, the really neat Yom Ha'Atzmaut musical video, "Wave Your Flag":
http://www.aish.com/h/iid/Israel_Wave_Your_Flag.html

Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il. And visit her website at www.arlenefromisrael.info

Here is yet another starry-eyed op-ed urging Israel to meet Arab demands, after which peace would magically arise. This is almost a regular feature of the New York Times.

Ami Ayalon, Orni Petruschka, and Gilead Sher blame "lack of trust" for failed attempts at negotiations between the Palestinian Authority (P.A.) and Israel.

[What does that mean? Not explained. Stated vaguely, the blame seems meant for both sides. Don't Mr. Ayalon, former commander of the Israeli Navy, and Gilead Sher, former negotiator, know that Israel has offered to negotiate but the P.A. refuses, retracts, raises the ante, or requires that Israel render itself vulnerable? Since the P.A. negotiates in bad faith, they have distrust and do not warrant concessions. Nor is territory the solution. Jihad is the problem; victory over jihad or reform of Islam is the solution. Jihad seeks conquest, not peace. Strengthening the jihadists, as giving more of them sovereignty over strategic territory would do, more likely would bring war than peace. Failing to acknowledge that underlying problem disqualifies the authors from offering diplomatic propositions.]

The trio proposes that Israel set up an Arab state and negotiate later. The new state would be based on "territorial compromise" and "two states for two peoples."

[No territorial compromise is proposed. "Compromise" sounds nice, so it always is used and never meant. Same for "two states for two peoples." If Palestinian Arabs were a separate nationality, then the authors could relax, there already is an Arab state in Palestine — Jordan. Do the authors mean three states for two peoples?}

[But Palestinian Arabs are not a separate nationality, having no separate history, written language, or religion, from most of the region. The Arabs have 22 states. What is the great need for 23 states for two peoples? Actually, there are other peoples besides Arabs in the Arab states.]

[Turning the P.A. into a state would entitle and enable it to import heavy weapons and foreign troops. But the authors claim that such as state, which can import the means for war, "is essential for Israel's future as both a Jewish and a democratic state." That premise, too, is not explained. It probably rests on demographic statistics that Arafat falsified and were exposed a year or two ago. ]

The new state would be based on 1967 borders except for land swaps, regardless of whether P.A. leaders agree. Israel would give up claims of sovereignty beyond the security barrier and in eastern Jerusalem and prepare to move 100,000 Jews into pre-1967 area of Israel.

[Why base anything on the 1967 armistice line, which has no legal or historical significance? Why give up Jewish national claims and three of its four holiest sites, which are in Judea-Samaria?]

[Remember when the security barrier was declared not to be a proposed border? Jewish nationalists, called "right-wingers," predicted that it would be proposed. So much for government declarations!]

[Remember when Israel expelled almost 10,000 Jews from Gaza and northern Samaria, as Medieval antisemites were prone to do? Israel did not keep its promises to resettle them, was stingy about it, cost the uprooted people their livelihoods, and let social problems develop. So now the authors propose expelling or luring 10 times as many! The Jewish refugees would have to crowd into an area whose housing already is so expensive that young couples cannot afford them, where water is scarcer, and where they would make better targets for enemy missiles. Not practical and not humane.]

[Once again, the fantasy of an Arab state is predicated on mass Jewish expulsion and no mention of the million Arabs living in Israel. Why shouldn't the authors consider expelling those Arabs to make room for the incoming Jews? Or is it just a public relations phrase to suggest that the new Arab state would keep Israel both Jewish and democratic? Already Israeli Arabs demand that certain areas be detached from Israel and attached to the Arab state. Can't detach land from such a tiny state and still have it viable, but it would become much more viable by keeping its land and not its Arabs.]

[In suggesting that Israelis in the Territories return to within Israel's "recognized borders," the authors betray ignorance that the Green Line is just an armistice line, not a recognized border.]

[What a fallacy, to set up an Arab state without Arab acceptance, and imagine the result would be peace. Why isn't there peace, now? The P.A. signed a peace agreement? If they don't keep that agreement, why expect peace later?]

[Here is another flaw in the proposal. The PLO and Hamas plan to conquer Israel and use any land they take over as a base for conquering the rest. Give them a state without negotiation, and they can raise the ante. They do operate that way, using concessions as a ladder to climb to more concessions. But Israel would have given up most of its bargaining chips. The proposal puts Israel in an inferior negotiating position. Not that I think one can negotiate with jihadists and expect them to keep their bargain. Islamic doctrine does not hold them to deals with non-Muslims.]

Claiming to have learned from past withdrawals having unleashed terrorism, the authors suggest that the Israeli Army stay in Judea-Samaria until the final agreement is negotiated.

[So P.A. Arabs would get a state they will have shot their way into, and then the Israeli Army would occupy that state. Wonderful prospect for peace?]

[Observant strategists have noted that when Israeli civilians remain in an area, the Army has an anchor. It is too easy to remove the Army when there are no civilians in the area. The authors are kidding themselves.]

[Palestinian Arabs would have another state, Israeli troops would patrol what would have become another country, but the Arabs would not have agreed to it and there still would be a need for negotiating a settlement. Then what would have been accomplished? What's the rush, authors?]

In pursuit of another Arab state, "The P.A. has already taken constructive unilateral steps by seeking UN recognition as a state..."

["Constructive" is it, to violate the peace agreement and to demand everything, including half a million more expulsions of Jews? Now there is a basis for Israel to distrust the P.A.!]

Not to worry, "Israel could negotiate more easily with a state than with a non-state entity like the P.A."

[Why is that? Not explained. Nor is it correct. Sovereignty confers more rights, including war-making ones. It invites foreign intervention. Suppose terrorist attacks emanate from the new state, from which the authors do not propose first have its terrorist organizations eradicated. If Israel shoots back, watch how fast the UN calls for sanctions on Israel, as if it were the aggressor!]

Again, not to worry, "Statehood would undermine the Palestinians' argument [really the whole Muslim world's argument] for implementing a right of return for Palestinian refugees, since the refugees would have a state of their own to return to."

[The fallacy again is viewing a Mideast Muslim struggle from a Western cultural view. That view assumes that the other side has grievances and considers logic against its claims. False assumption. What the Arabs call grievances are contrived for public relations and bargaining. They just want to flood Israel with hostile Muslims, so far from seeking peace are they! Besides, there is no right of return. Period.]

The authors think their proposal would "reduce tensions" and "build hope."

[The proposal would build hope. It would build hope among jihadists that they can shoot their way to statehood, that Israel weakly caves in to them, and that Islam will triumph over the non-Muslims. As for tensions, they were sown by jihad. Tensions would flare as the Arabs, per custom, raise their demands beyond what the plan would have given them.]

The plan would enable Israel "to take our destiny into our own hands and act in our long-term national interest" (New York Times, 4/24/12).

Long-term national interest is not to cede the core of the Jewish homeland, its water supplies, and its strategic invasion barrier to an avowed enemy that insists it would not recognize a Jewish state, in accordance with Islamic doctrine? Surrender to the enemy is not grasping the Jewish people's destiny.

Perhaps the biggest fallacy of the proposal is its narrow vision of the jihad against Israel being a conflict between some Palestinian Arabs and Israel. Arab states repeatedly made war on Israel and endorse P.A. claims against Israel. They, too, are more likely to pounce on Israel, if Israel weakens itself as proposed.

When was the last time the New York Times gave space for the kind of debate about these shallow peace plans such as the one you just read? The newspaper might publish two readers' letters making one point each. That is the newspaper's one-sided use of freedom of the press.

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.

Tonight begins Yom HaZikaron -- Memorial Day. It is a day for remembering all those who have fallen for our nation: Those who have fallen in battle, and those who have fallen at the hands of terrorists. A siren will go off at 8 PM, at which point everyone is expected to stand silently; another will go off at 11 AM tomorrow. Public establishments will be closed for the night -- most especially places of recreation such as restaurants and theaters, but even stores. We become a nation in mourning: the deaths touch us all. A formal ceremony will take place on Mt. Herzl at the national cemetery.

This year we will be mourning 22,993-- soldiers who have lost their lives and civilians who have died in terror attacks.

Paula Stern, has a blog, "A Soldier's Mother," and, with great eloquence born of the deepest of feelings, she has written the following -- http://israelisoldiersmother.blogspot.com/2011/05/standing-for-fallen.html -- about Yom Hazikaron:

"It is a strange and wonderful thing we do each year as we stop and thank those who gave their lives so that we could live here in this land. We will stand tonight and tomorrow, for those who have fallen. It is the least we can do - and the most. But perhaps in this modern world of hustle and bustle, the greatest thanks we give them is in how we as a society remember them, honor them, and mourn for them.

"It is a good thing that our hearts break this day - it is, I remind myself often, so much of what defines our country. May the defenders of Israel be blessed and those who have fallen forever be remembered not just for their sacrifice, but for who they were in the short time they lived. May they be remembered and honored and may their families know no more sorrow." (Emphasis added)

To which I say Amen!

(With thanks to Israel Matzav for calling my attention to the above.)

The price we pay for living in our land. The ultimate price. Our young people understand this. It is too much already, but we know that we are not yet done...

There seems to be an increase of late in the violence directed at us by Arabs. I mentioned yesterday my need to make decisions about what to write about. Because there is so much to discuss, I don't catalogue every incident of violence. But sometimes I wonder if I should.

Last night, over 1,000 people went to pray at Kever Yosef -- Joseph's Tomb -- outside of Shechem (Nablus) in Samaria; they were accompanied by a substantial IDF guard. The Tomb has a painful history, including the murder of Ben-Yosef Livnat by PA security people a year ago. Last night an Arab shot at a member of the IDF.

Also last night -- in the hours before dawn -- an Arab, apparently in Israel without documentation, hailed a cab. When they arrived at their destination in Kfar Saba (near the Arab city of Kalkilyia), the Arab stabbed driver in his upper body several times, leaving him critically wounded. He did not rob him, which tells us we're looking at terrorism.

Less than a week ago, in the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Shimon HaTzadik, an Arab stabbed a yeshiva student.

A common means that Arabs -- especially young Arabs -- use for attacking Jews is stone-throwing. I've written about this with regard to the Mount of Olives cemetery, but it's more pervasive than this. It seems to happen particularly in Judea, in Gush Etzion. Just last Thursday there was such an attack, when a family was driving home to Tekoa, in daylight.

What is regrettable is that such stone throwing is sometimes minimized -- as if it were pebbles being tossed. But we're talking about rocks, chunks of concrete and even bricks that can crash a car windshield, and kill.

In point of fact, Israel is contending right now with a very painful, contentious and messy trial -- taking place at the Ofer Military Court -- that involves death via rock throwing.

Last September, Asher Palmer, of Kiryat Arba, was driving in his car with his baby son, Yonatan, when Arabs hurled a heavy stone through his windshield. It hit him on the head, causing him to lose control of the car. Father and son died in the resultant crash.

It took a while, but ultimately the police determined that this was not simply an accident, but a terror attack. The two Arab men who threw the "stones" were apprehended, and charged, and are now to be tried -- with delays and postponements ensuing.

Asher is an American citizen (the son of Americans) and here, as with the terrorist-generated deaths of other Americans, there is also a US interest in seeing justice done.

Asher's father, Michael, is seen in a video clip here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ebIySofmzho&feature=relmfu.

His final words on this video are that Asher was about "building Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel) and the love of the land...and we have to make sure his message keeps going and work harder and harder for it to be realized."

This is noteworthy for two reasons.

First, because it seems typical of so many Israelis who have suffered losses from terrorists. Rather than rage and lament, they work to achieve positive goals in memory of the one who is gone. I am in awe of this.

And then because it makes an exceedingly important point: Whatever I have described about Arab attacks on Jews here in Israel should not in any terms be used to paint Israel as a dangerous or negative place. We here are aware of the possibility of "something" happening, but we proceed with normal life, joyous for being here. And the great majority of the time, nothing happens. I certainly walk the streets of the Jerusalem I love without compunction.

When you love Israel, there is only determination to fight the fight that must be fought, and to make it all that it should be. This is, perhaps, the over-riding theme of Yom HaZikaron. There is no surrender.

In his message for Yom HaZikaron today, Prime Minister Netanyahu said:

"...our loved ones, who fell in the battles of Israel, did not fall for nothing. Thanks to them, the state was established. Thanks to them, the state of Israel continues to develop and flourish, and thanks to them, the young generation will be able to live their lives in security and peace.

"I can tell you, 'Be comforted, be comforted, my people.' Take comfort in the building of the land, take comfort in the building of Zion, and may you know no more pain." (Emphasis added)

And so, some tentatively good news, which is very relevant:

Yesterday I kept reading in the news that there was nothing the government could do about the demolition of Ulpana, because there was a court order for that demolition and the Civil Administration had promised.

"Come on!" I thought. "What there is genuine determination to accomplish here, can be accomplished," I wrote.

"Can't the government go back to the court and request time to re-evaluate the situation?" I asked of someone with legal expertise. "They can...," was the answer, "if they want to." Ah! I waited, not terribly hopeful.

Now the news is that the Ministerial Committee that was appointed to consider the situation has instructed the prosecutor's office to return to the High Court next week and ask for a delay in the evacuation. During that interim, a special committee will look into the situation, seeking alternate solutions.

This is not a final reprieve for the residents of Ulpana. But it's a step in the right direction. With creative thinking and sincere intent....

This business that the neighborhood "must" be evacuated because it's on "Palestinian" land is maddening. There is no proof of anything of the sort. This is based on a perverse principle that must be re-examined.

~~~~~~~~~~

Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il. And visit her website at www.arlenefromisrael.info

In January 25, 2009 Simon had this to say:

"Palestinians ... when they want to travel from one town to another, they have to submit to humiliating delays at checkpoints and roadblocks. There are more than 600 of them on the West Bank."

In April 22, 2012 he had this to say:

"For all Palestinians, just leaving Bethlehem is a struggle. Getting to Jerusalem, only seven miles away, whether it's to pray, go to a doctor, visit family members, or work, means going through this Israeli checkpoint. That can take hours but before Palestinians can get even this far, they need a permit from the Israelis which can take weeks or months to obtain and is frequently denied."

So Who is Humiliating Whom?

Bob, you say Palestinian Arabs feel humiliated and harassed when Israeli authorities search them and their belongings; when they are prevented from traveling freely because of checkpoints, roadblocks, closures and curfews. You say they feel "corralled."

Bob, in Israel, every Israeli is searched numerous times during the course of a single day. Israelis are asked to open their bags and purses for inspection. In most cases, they are subjected to body searches with a metal detector every time they enter a bank or a post office, pick up a bottle of milk at the supermarket, enter a mall or train station, or visit a hospital or medical clinic. Young Israeli men and women are physically frisked in search of suicide belts before they enter crowded nightclubs.

As a matter of routine, Israelis' car trunks are searched every time they enter a well-trafficked parking lot. Daily, their cars pass through roadblocks that cause massive traffic jams when security forces are in hot pursuit of suicide bombers believed to have entered Israel.

Israelis are searched not only when they go out for a cup of coffee or a slice of pizza, but also when they go to the movies or a concert, where the term "dressed to kill" has an entirely different meaning.

These ordinary daily humiliations now extend to similar searches when Israelis go to weddings or Bar Mitzvahs. No one abroad talks about the humiliation Jews in Israel are subjected to, having to write at the bottom of wedding invitations and other life cycle events, "The site will be secured [by armed guards]" - to ensure relatives and friends will attend and share their joyous occasion.

Bob, these ubiquitous security checks do not exist in Arab cities and towns in Israel (or, for that matter, in Judea and Samaria) because those places are not and never have been targets of Palestinian terrorism. In fact, the average Israeli is "humiliated and harassed" by being searched far more times a day than the average Palestinian. Not one human rights group, nor you, has so much as noted this massive intrusion into the rights of privacy and person imposed on Israelis.

To date, no one protests the fact that, since the 1970s, Jewish schoolchildren in Israel are surrounded by perimeter fences, with armed guards at the schoolyard gates.

Not one Arab village in Israel or the Territories has a perimeter fence around it. Guards are not required at Arab shops, cafes, restaurants, movie theaters, wedding halls or schools - either in Israel or in the Territories. Palestinians also do not need armed guards to accompany every school trip, youth movement hike or campout. They are not targets of terrorism.

Countless Israelis in sensitive areas within the Green Line - not only in the Territories, but also in Jewish towns, villages and bedroom suburbs - are "ghettoized" behind high fences.

Many Israeli motorists avoid major arteries that pass through Arab areas of Israel, while Arab citizens and Palestinians from the Territories continue to enter Jewish cities and go about their business without peril. Israelis are told, in effect, to disguise themselves when traveling abroad - not to speak Hebrew in public and not to wear garments that reveal their Jewish-Israeli origins. Even Israel's national airline - El Al - has been forced to remove its logo from the tails of its aircraft at certain airports, out of concern for the safety of its passengers. On the other hand, Arabs who frequent Jewish cities and towns in Israel wear their traditional Arab headgear without fear of being attacked or harassed.

Bob, all of this begs the question: Who is Humiliating Whom?

Eli E. Hertz publishes essays on the Myths and Facts website. This article is archived at
http://www.mythsandfacts.org/article_view.asp?articleID=232

What about Violence against Jews?

This article was written by Gil Ronen and archived at
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/154797#.UFQJFI1lSKc

Nationalist human rights groups see hypocrisy in the public attacks on Lt. Col. Shalom Eisner, who used his rifle to strike an anarchist Saturday.

"Relying upon the video segments selected by the anarchists is a gift to the rioters and a stab in the back of IDF soldiers who have to face gangs of criminals or neo-Nazis," the Legal Forum for the Land of Israel said.

"The state of Israel's central problem is not the reaction by the Deputy Brigade Commander after he was attacked," it said, "but the fact that the legal authorities allow the rioters to run amok and create mayhem unimpeded."

The Forum added that the same state that placed large police forces at Ben Gurion Airport to block an anti-Israel "flytilla" ignores the anarchists who are already inside Israel, and does not understand that they are violent.

Orit Strook of the Human Rights in Yesha NGO said that "for every video of an officer's violence toward an anarchist, I can bring ten videos of police who were no less violent toward Jews, but the disciplinary and legal measures against them take place at a snail's pace."

Food for Thought by Steven Shamrak

Solders suffer less from PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) when they fight just wars with clear objectives. Most of the current wars - "On Terror", Afghanistan, Iraq, as well as Palestinian terror against Israel - are waged to maintain the status quo, not to end endless terror and defeat the enemy!

PA Snubbed Talk Offer

Israel's latest offer for direct peace talks has been spurned by the PA. A spokesman for PA President Mahmoud Abbas, who also said that Abbas is ready for talks only if Israel halts settlement construction and accepts its 1967 boundaries as the basis for negotiations. Netanyahu suggested starting fresh direct talks between the two sides without any preconditions. It followed an appeal by the Mideast Quartet - a group made up of the US, the UN, the EU and Russia - to resume talks which broke down in late 2010. (There is no point talking to Arab terrorists. Israel needs to pursue its own Jewish national agenda, otherwise the Arabs will achieve theirs!)

Ambiguity or Idiot is Talking Again?

Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak said Tuesday his country has never promised the United States it would hold off from attacking Iran while nuclear talks were taking place. The comments, in which Barak said that a diplomatic push to reach a compromise with Iran was a waste of "precious time," further exposed a rift between Israel and the U.S. over how to deal with Iran and its nuclear program.

In a Spirit of Peace and Co-operation

The governor of Bethlehem, Abdul-Fattah Hamayil, gave orders to enforce the ban and monitor all agricultural imports. The ban is only the latest in a series of bans on Israeli goods in PA-administered enclaves. (Israel needs to impose an embargo of all services to PA. Why not? The USA has done it to Cuba!)

Obama's Secret Dealings with Iran

Israeli official sources now suspect that in their secret contacts, the US has granted Iran far-reaching concessions on its nuclear program - more than Israel would find acceptable. The formal talks in Istanbul and in Baghdad on May 23 are seen as nothing but a device to screen the real business the US and Iran have already contracted on the quiet. Behind the show biz of Istanbul the US and Iran had reached secret agreements in clandestine bilateral contacts channeled through Paris and Vienna.

Seven Firebombs on Jewish Homes

A terrorist hurled seven firebombs at Jewish homes in Maaleh HaZeitim, on Jerusalem's Mount of Olives. He was carrying ten firebombs and managed to throw seven of them at ground floor apartments in the compound.

What is Your Bottom Line for Iran?

Notwithstanding the hugs and personal friendship, Israel's Defence Minister Ehud Barak arrived in Washington Thursday April 19 to tax his host, US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta, with tough questions about the administration's dialogue with Iran. They followed the lines of, "What's going on? Is there a deal? Don't tell me what you have settled with the Iranians, just your minimal demands, your bottom line." The questions reflected Israel's concern at being kept in the dark about US-Iranian back-track negotiations and American concessions.

Soldiers Back Commander

More than 80 IDF soldiers and reservists signed a petition of support for a military commander who was filmed in a physical altercation with a Danish anti-Israel activist. The incident happened on Saturday when a group of foreign and Arab cyclists sought to block a main road near Jericho to protest Israel' s presence in Judea and Samaria. The altercation came at the end of nearly two hours of heated confrontation between protesters and soldiers. The video of the incident uploaded to the internet was clearly edited in such a way as to cast Eisner in the worst possible light. (Israel has enough enemies within. Anti-Semites, who are hiding behind 'support' for so-called Palestinians, must not be allowed into the country and/or jailed when they break Israel's laws!)

Beware of Fake Friendship!

India has, for the first time in its history, penalized a foreign defence vendor, Israel s Military Industries (IMI), for alleged breach of contract and confiscated its $70 million guarantee - alone of the five defence vendors recommended to be blacklisted for alleged involvement in graft. An IMI dossier was filed with the Indian authorities countering the charge. India is strongly suspected in Jerusalem of cooling its defence relations with Israel to line up with Tehran and Moscow and their refusal to join sanctions against Iran. (Israel must be very wary, as Jews through the history have, of so-called friends who are ready to stab them in the back at any time!)

PA Does Not Want Peace - Negotiation Game Must End

PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad pulled out of a planned meeting with Prime Minister Binyamin Netayahu. Fayyad and Netanyahu were scheduled to meet Tuesday evening in what the PA portrayed as "a last-ditch effort to salvage peace talks" before the US election season. The move scuttled what was set to be the highest-level talks between Israeli and PA officials in nearly two years.

Hamas Executions 'Unlawful'

The UN human rights office on Friday charged that three men sentenced to death in Hamas-run Gaza, approved by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, were executed unlawfully. At least 18 men have been executed in Gaza since Hamas seized power in the coastal enclave in a bloody 2007 putsch. However, human rights activists in Gaza say those figures only represent official executions, not the full range of human rights violations perpetrated by Hamas. Hamas has routinely incarcerated, kidnapped, maimed and tortured dissidents and political rivals in Gaza over the past five years. (At the same time a former correspondent with the BBC, known for his criticism of Israel, has compared Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to Norwegian mass murderer. Anti-Semites will never change their hateful way)

Quote of the Week:

"We say load and clear: The struggle for Palestine is not a political struggle. It is a purely ideological struggle. It is a clear religious struggle between Islam and Zionism We cannot possible accept (Al Aqsa) remaining under the control of those whom Allah described as a bunch of apes and pigs, the scholars of whom Allah described as asses carrying books, or as a dog that pants when you beat it and pants when you don't." - Khan Yunis, Gaza, a Hamas preacher, as aired on Al Aqsa TV on February 24 - This is not an opinion of one misguided idiot, but the ideological standing of all of them - Hamas, Fatah and of all the Arab/Muslim world. The fool has just stated it loud and clear, as many before him! Jews need to learn to take control of their own destiny!

Who are the Palestinians?

Extracts from: " Bosnia - Motherland of Palestinians" by Manfred R. Lehmann and "Palestinians 'Peoplehood' Based on a Big Lie" by Eli E. Hertz.

Arab Palestinian nationality (which was officially forged in 1964) is an entity defined by its opposition to Zionism (the Jewish national liberation movement) and not by its national aspirations.

Like a mantra, Arabs repeatedly claim that the Palestinians are a native people of Israel. The concept of a 'Stateless Palestinian people' is not based on fact. It is a fabrication! The following is a chronology of an ethnic make up of so-called Palestinians and their origin.

During Ottoman Empire.

Until the Jews began returning to the Land of Israel in increasing numbers from the late 19th century, the area called Palestine was a God-forsaken backwash that was controlled by the Ottoman Empire.

1880-84 Turkish government settles Muslim Cherkesians refugees in the Golan to ward off Bedouin robbers. Other settlers in the area include Sudanese, Algerians, Kurds...

In 1878, an Ottoman law granted lands in Palestine to the Moslem refugees from Bosnia and Herzegovina in the Carmel region, in the Galilee and in the Plain of Sharon and in Caesarea. The refugees were further attracted by l2-year tax exemptions and exemption from military service.

The same colonization policy was also directed toward Moslem refugees from Russia - particularly from the Crimea and the Caucasus. They were Cherkesians and Turkmenians - leading to their settling in Abu Gosh, near Jerusalem and in the Golan Heights. Refugees from Algeria and Egypt were also settled in Jaffa, Gaza, Jericho and the Golan.

British Mandate: 1917-1947

1923 Having discovered the Golan lacks oil but that the Mosul area in northern Syria is rich in oil, the British cede the Golan to France in exchange for Mosul. At the same time the Trans-Jordan was ceded from Palestinian mandate as well and Egypt was given control of Sinai, British and France gain control of Suetz canal. (82% of Jewish land was sacrificed in the process!)

In 1934 alone, 30,000 Syrian Arabs from the Hauran moved across the northern frontier into Mandate Palestine, attracted by work in and around the newly built British port and the construction of other infrastructure projects. They even dubbed Haifa Um el-Amal ("the city of work").

The Ottoman Turks' census (1882) recorded only 141,000 Muslims in the Palestine. The British census in 1922 reported 650,000 Muslims.

Dear Friends, the aim of this independent editorial is to present the Jewish point of view on the Arab-Israel conflict and motivate people to support ideals and inspirations of true Zionism, the Jewish National independence movement. We are not affiliated with or sponsored by any government or political party.

Steven Shamrak was born in the former Soviet Union (USSR) and participated in the Moscow Zionist "refusenik" movement and currently lives in Melbourne, Australia. He publishes internet editorial letters on the Arab-Israeli conflict. He can be reached by email at StevenShamrak.e@gmail.com

It was a few days before Passover when I first heard the horrific cackling. What the hell is that, I ask the family members, it sounds just like Shulamit Aloni! But it wasn't.

Soon thereafter, my wife comes running into the house. "There is a peacock downstairs in the yard," she proclaims. Hmmm, just in time for Passover, thinketh I?

Down I go to investigate. And there standing in our yard is a giant turkey, like something out of a Thanksgiving poster in a Walmart store. We live not far from the Haifa zoo, and various critters, especially those in possession of wings, tend to escape the place and go seeking friendlier quieter surroundings. The zoo, you see, is rather noisy. Late at night throughout our neighborhood one can hear the elephants in the zoo making loud noises. And, how shall I put this delicately, the noises they are making are NOT from their mouths, and resemble the noises I myself make when I eat too much chulent or read Tikkun magazine.

Zoology is not my wife's strong point, so you will have to forgive her classification error in ornithology. Her Passover peacock was in fact a turkey. She had some good reasons though for the confusion. Years back we actually had a male peacock refugee from the same zoo take refuge in our yard, long peacock feathers with the bluish "eye" looking decorations and all. The kids were young back then and nicknamed the peacock "Notsi" from the Hebrew word for feather, Notz. The yard guest then lost a feather, which we saved, and use to this day in the late night search for any crumbs of leavened bread the night before the Passover seder. The kids discovered that peacocks really like "Bamba," a peanut-butter tasting Israeli puffy snack. Bamba by the way is kosher for Sephardim during Passover, containing kitniyot, and it seems that peacocks are Sephardic because they love gobbling up Bamba even during Passover. We know, we fed it.

The newest "Notsi" was however an obnoxious aggressive male turkey. The various cats on the street found themselves intimidated and chased down the block by the monster whenever they came too close to investigate. No one quite knew what to do with the turkey. Being the only American around, I of course proposed fattening it up and trying to keep it around until the last week of November, when all Americans know just what the proper use for such yard guests should be. The neighbors however cringed at the thought of the noisy gobbling lasting that long.

Meanwhile, the children all along the street were carrying out to the garbage containers plastic bags full of chametz, leavened products. I invited them over to feed our Passover turkey the scraps, instead of dumping or burning them. I am sure it was the highlight of Passover for many of them, and for years they will remember feeding the beast far better than they recall reading about Pharaoh in the Haggada. I am not sure of Levy's rye bread still exists, but I bet it could use the turkey from our yard in its famous ads about how you do not have to be Jewish to love Levy's rye bread.

The Passover turkey did have some problems during Passover itself though. It was not crazy about matzot, not even egg matza or French-toast-style matza.

Anyhow, the parking near the zoo was horrendous during Passover, with some cars parking as far away as the spaces in front of our building just to get to the zoo. But the lazier families stopped the climb up the hill when they got to our yard and let the kids chase and photograph the Passover turkey.

Alas, the turkey did not last very far into the counting of the Omer. One morning it was just gone, and I suspect one of the other critters that lives in the Haifa wadis or gorges came out one night and had its own snack. There are wild boars down there and huge porcupines. There went my plans for Thanksgiving!

But all is not lost. I went for a climb up the Carmel today to get some serious coffee, and a few buildings up the hill from my own I hear a new, but different, cackle. This time it was not Shulamit Aloni either. (She has never quite recovered, by the way, from Hansel and Gretel escaping!)

This time it really was a peacock, the newest refugee from the zoo, although a female this time, meaning she did not have any of those glorious blue feathers. If she hangs around until Shavuos, I will let you know if she eats cheesecake.

Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist, a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com.

As I write, I have no further word on the situation at Givat Ha'Ulpana. Time is short, and I am mindful that all of the words from nationalist members of the government and the Knesset might end up being no more than words, unless the proper strings are pulled. What there is genuine determination to accomplish here, can be accomplished.

What I do have is a video of the plea of Beit El resident Yoel Tzur to Prime Minister Netanyahu. I wrote last night about the fact that this neighborhood had been constructed in memory of Ita Tzur and her son Ephraim, who had been killed by terrorists. Yoel is the bereaved husband and father, who was in the car when it was attacked by three terrorists.

His words are what is "too much." Too much pain, and too much outrage.

~~~~~~~~~~

"I am calling out to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, because this depends only on him,.We have heard what the MKs said, there is no need to add anything. I will just remind you, Mr. Prime Minister: Fifteen years ago you accompanied our community after the disaster that befell us with Ita and Efraim. You personally accompanied our family. And it was fifteen years and a few months ago that we said, just below where we stand, in the cemetery, that a large neighborhood needs to be built here. You promised, and you delivered.

"I am addressing your feelings, your heart and your wisdom, to find the proper ways not to enable the decree that was decreed here, which you yourself said is one that the public cannot bear. Harm caused to the Ulpana neighborhood is harm to our community and to our beloved ones who gave their lives — and even then you told me, and I told you, and we strengthened each other — that wherever there is a terror attack, we will build a settlement." http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/155025

~~~~~~~~~~

See the video, please. And then I urge you to consider writing to Prime Minister Netanyahu. Tell him that you know that in the end what happens to Givat Ha'Ulpana depends upon him. Ask him if his Zionist commitments weigh more than political advantage. Challenge him to be true to his past words and deeds with regard to this neighborhood.

Fax: 02-670-5369 (From the US : 011-972-2-670-5369)

E-mail: Memshala@pmo.gov.il and also pm_eng2@it.pmo.gov.il (underscore after pm) use both addresses

~~~~~~~~~~

As I write my postings, I sometimes do "triage": I "throw out" issues that are important because I cannot write about everything. Today I would like to touch some of those bases that have been passed by in recent postings.

Egypt is perhaps a good base to touch first, as that country has just cut off the natural gas supply to Israel, in spite of understandings in the peace treaty and a subsequent memorandum of understanding in 2005 between the two countries that guarantees an uninterrupted flow of gas to Israel (http://imra.org.il/story.php3?id=56570).

The Israeli government is clearly determined not to make much of it. Netanyahu is saying the basic reason for the cutoff is commercial and not political: "It's actually a business dispute between the Israeli company and the Egyptian company." He reassured the nation that Israel has adequate reserves of gas to be self-sufficient. Foreign Minister Lieberman speculated that this may also be about "the [presidential] election campaign and afterwards things will return to normal."

But, of course, it is also possible to look at this and speculate that the peace treaty between Israel and Egypt hangs by a rather slender thread.

~~~~~~~~~~

You might want to go the site of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs -- http://jcpa.org/ -- where you can see briefings about Egypt, with opinions of various experts.

Itzhak Levanon, who served as Israel's ambassador to Egypt from 2009 to 2011, assesses Egypt's first year after the revolution:

"...Few in Egypt believe that the army is sincere about the transfer of power to the civilians. Many believe that the real objective of the army is to maintain its special status, which the army has had in Egypt since the revolution of 1952. They have their own hospitals and hotels. They are deeply involved in the economy, and they have their own budget. This is an institution that is quasi-independent, and very strong.

"After years of imposed political exile, the Muslim Brotherhood has entered domestic political life in Egypt by the front door. At an early stage after the revolution, we detected at least a tacit understanding between the military and the Muslim Brotherhood, to the detriment of the revolutionaries.

"...There are still security contacts at the upper levels between Israel and Egypt, and this is because there is an interest on both sides, but there are no bilateral relations. The public in Egypt is not aware enough that the peace treaty between Israel and Egypt is an Egyptian interest, no less than an Israeli one.

"My assessment is that the Muslim Brotherhood will compromise with others and will seek a consensus. They understand that if there is failure, the failure will be theirs. This is why they would like to share it with others, and this basically means pluralism. This does not mean that they will not work very hard in order to reach their objective, which is to capture the public, not to change the regime. If they can spread their ideology to enough people, the change will come from them.

"...At this point, I believe that the peace treaty is safe. The military is in power and they support peace between Israel and Egypt. The army supports the treaty because they understand that canceling it is not in the interest of Egypt. Secondly, the peace treaty between Israel and Egypt has three legs; the third leg is the United States. This is why I think the peace treaty is safe, more or less, at this particular time. However, uncertainty about the future [and the entrance into the game of those with radical ideologies] raises real concerns..."

~~~~~~~~~~

Jacques Neriah -- who previously served as a foreign policy advisor to Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Deputy Head for Assessment of Israeli Military Intelligence -- asks whether the Islamists are headed for a collision with the military.

"Much has been written about a tacit agreement between the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) led by Field Marshal Tantawi and the Muslim Brothers. But as events leading up to the presidential elections began to unravel, it has become clear that no such arrangement was ever brokered between the two sides, and if it were, it is today null and void.

"Fourteen months after the revolution it is an accepted fact that the Islamists have hijacked the revolution and have become the leading force in Egypt. They adopted a tactic to create the illusion that they would share power with the non-Islamic forces, but then went on to win 70 percent of the seats in parliament.

"The current situation has been created by the inability of SCAF to rule Egypt since the end of the Mubarak regime. Their zig-zag policy, particularly towards the Islamists, has created a situation in which liberals and secular forces lost at each encounter.

"The Presidential Election Committee has barred three leading candidates: former Minister for Intelligence Omar Suleiman, Salafi candidate Hazem Abu Ismail, and leading Muslim Brotherhood candidate Khairat el Shater. (The Brotherhood was careful to nominate an additional presidential candidate who qualified, Mohammad Morsi.)

"Egypt is entering a period of political instability with dire consequences for its neighbors, first and foremost for Israel. The Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty could become a 'scapegoat' to divert attention from unsolvable domestic economic problems, seeking to blame outside factors for Egypt's deteriorating situation."

~~~~~~~~~~

And from a reliable intelligence source I have information that the Arab Gulf States are carefully watching Egypt and do not intend to accept "an aggressive Islamic regime in Egypt."

~~~~~~~~~~

Samara Greenberg, writing for the Jewish Policy Center, provides information about the recent visit of the Brotherhood to Washington: http://www.jewishpolicycenter.org/blog/2012/04/brotherhood-launches-pr-offensive-in-washington

In due course I hope to have more to say about Brotherhood influence in the US. For now the watchword is Beware!

~~~~~~~~~~

But, speaking of Washington, I would like to segue to the topic of the US Secretary of State. Actually, Clinton was speaking to a group of young Tunisians, when she made the troubling comment that I want to share here:

The following question was posed to her:

"After the electoral campaign start[ed] in the United States...we noticed here in Tunisia that most of the candidates from the both sides run towards the Zionist lobbies to get their support in the States. And afterwards, once they are elected, they come to show their support for countries like Tunisia and Egypt for a common Tunisian or a common Arab citizen. How would you reassure and gain his trust again once given the fact that you are supporting his enemy as well at the same time?"

Her answer:

"Well, first, let me say you will learn as your democracy develops that a lot of things are said in political campaigns that should not bear a lot of attention. There are comments made that certainly don't reflect the United States, don't reflect our foreign policy, don't reflect who we are as a people. I mean, if you go to the United States, you see mosques everywhere, you see Muslim Americans everywhere. That's the fact. So I would not pay attention to the rhetoric..." (Emphasis added) So, let's get this straight: Clinton is saying that when candidates support Zionists, it is merely campaign rhetoric, and the truth of the US embrace of Muslims is demonstrated by the fact that there are mosques and Muslim Americans all over?

I said it above, and I say it again here: Beware!

See the written text and video at Yid with Lid: http://yidwithlid.blogspot.com/2012/04/hillary-clinton-implies-pro-israel.html? utm_source=The+Lid+List&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=32a0d98891-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN

~~~~~~~~~~

According to YNet, citing a report yesterday in Al-Quds Al-Arabi (London), there is considerable tension between PA Prime Minister Fayyad and PA President Abbas because of Fayyad's refusal to deliver a letter written to PM Netanyahu by Abbas.

Fayyad was scheduled to meet with Netanyahu last week but at the last minute failed to show. The reason given was that PA prisoners were on a hunger strike. Is this, then the true reason -- that Fayyad balked at being "Abbas's postman"? Fayyad is said to be angry that Abbas had the nerve to expect him to show up in Israel on "prisoner day." More to the point, most likely, is that he was not asked to help draft that letter.

~~~~~~~~~~

What is probably the most moving and incredible -- and inspiring! -- Holocaust story I have ever read was sent to me today by my daughter Sharon. It is a story told by Rabbi Yosef Wallis, of Arachim Israel (an outreach organization), given in testimony to Project Witness -- http://www.projectwitness.org -- about his father, Judah Wallis, who was born and raised in Pavenitz, Poland.

It came as an attachment, and so I have put it on my website, with full accreditation, so that you may access it and read it for yourself. http://arlenefromisrael.squarespace.com/to-wear-my-tefillin/?SSScrollPosition=55

A subsequent piece of the story can be found here: http://www.projectwitness.org/pdf/wallis.pdf

Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner@netvision.net.il. And visit her website at www.arlenefromisrael.info

Buying a Cave in Hebron: The other side of the story

He heard footsteps approaching the tent. He started calling to his wife, to request she prepare a meal for the guests. But then stopped short. His beloved Sarah was gone. Only last week he'd buried her.

He opened the door and was startled to see about a dozen police, in uniform, crowding around the entrance. But then, looking at them closely, he breathed a sigh of relief. They were all adorned with 'stars of david' on their cuffs. Landsmen. His own.

Stepping outside he said, "Yes, my good friends. How can I be of assistance? Perhaps I can honor you with a good meal and some drink? Please come in and recite a blessing."

The highest ranking officer cleared his throat and growled, "Are you Abraham the Hebrew?" Please show me your identification papers."

Abraham, slightly flustered, turned to return inside. Suddenly he felt his arms in the grips of others. Two of the police were holding him tightly, escorting him back into his home. When he attempted to free himself, they squeezed harder.

"You asked for my identification card. Please let me get it for you." One of the police released his hold, but stood close by.

Abraham opened a drawer, pushed aside some papers, found the necessary documents and handed them to the officer.

"It is written here that you are married. Where is your wife? Bring her here at once."

Abraham gulped, and blinking back tears, answered, "Sarah is gone. She died suddenly while I was away with Yitzhak. We buried her last week, here in Hebron."

"How can I help you gentlemen? Why are you here?"

"Abraham the Hebrew, you are under arrest. I have orders to take you to the local police station for immediate questioning. You are suspected of a heinous crime. Please do not cause us any trouble and come with us at once."

The officer nodded his head at one of the other police, who promptly grabbed Abraham's arms, pushed them behind his back and handcuffed them. Pushed along, none to gently from behind, Abraham had no choice but to follow them.

At the station Abraham was pushed into a chair, where he sat, waiting, for quite some time. Suddenly a group of people stomped in. Another, higher ranking officer, moved aside, and pointing at Abraham, asked the man behind him, "Is this him? Is this the one?"

The other man, a well-dressed villager, seemed to jump up and down and exclaimed, 'yes it's him. He's the one. For sure. I could identify him anywhere!" "Abraham the Hebrew," declared the officer, "you are hereby accused of stealing the Machpela cave and the surrounding field, owned by Efron the Hittite, who has just positively identified you as the thief. Do you have anything to say on your behalf?"

Seemingly shocked, Abraham was, at first, speechless. Then he closed his eyes, and could be seen quietly moving his lips. His eyes opened, he stared directly into the eyes of the officer, and responded, "I did not, I repeat, I did not steal, the Machpela cave and field. I purchased them legally from Efrone the Hittite. There were many witnesses."

"So you deny the charges of theft?"

"Yes I do. I paid a tremendous sum for the cave and field, four hundred silver shekels. There are witnesses to that too."

Turning to the villager, the officer asked, "and what do you say, Efrone the Hittite?"

"Yes, well I did meet with this man, but we did not reach any agreement."

"And you did not receive any money from him?

"Yes, of course I received silver shekels from him. He has been using the cave as a place of pagan worship for years. He is a strange man, saying that he prays to only one G-d. A strange man indeed. He rented the cave from me for many years, using it daily. But I would never sell it to him."

"Abraham, do you have a contract?"

"Ah, ah yes, but it cannot be revealed yet, not for another few hundred years. But I can give you a hint."

"Yes, yes, go on."

My family will leave here for hundreds of years. We will sojourn south to Egypt. Returning here, my offspring will receive the word of the living G-d, the Torah, the Bible, and there will be the eyewitness account of the purchase. What proof could be better than that?"

"Efrone?"

"That is clearly not good enough. The word of G-d is not sufficient. First of all, it is forbidden to sell caves to Hebrews. Second, the buyer must seek a license from the local ruler. Otherwise the purchase is invalid. You are law officers. You know this law. Don't you?"

"Ah yes, ah, Abraham, did you receive the necessary permits to make the purchase? Where is your license?"

"I did receive permission from, ah, well, you'll never believe this, but I really did, receive a permit from..."

"Yes, yes?"

"From Adam."

"From who!?!"

"From Adam, and his wife Eve." They okayed the purchase of the cave."

"Perhaps you can explain yourself."

"Well, many years ago I discovered them, also interred in the Machpela cave, and struck up a conversation with them. They liked me, and said I could use the cave too, for Sarah, and myself, when the time came."

Efrone again jumped, exclaiming, "they have criminal records. That Adam and Eve. I've heard they also disobey orders. They are not to be believed. Neither is this man. He has no permit to use my cave! Give it back, give it back!"

"Abraham, we hereby judge you guilty of theft of the Machpela cave and field. You must return it to Efrone."

"But Sarah, she's buried there. So are Adam and Eve. What about them?"

The officer took out a piece of paper, scribbled on it, and gave to another policeman.

"Take this to the cave. This is an expulsion order. Get them all out. If need be, use force. Get the three of them out of the cave before nightfall."

An hour later, hundreds of uniformed police surrounded the cave. Using a megaphone, the officer in charge yelled inside: "Everybody out. Yes, every body! Adam, Eve, Sarah, you must find another final resting place. This does not belong to you. You are occupiers. Out, now!

Moments later, the three of them straggled out. Squinting into the setting sun light, Sarah asked, "where to now?"

Adam looking at Eve and then at Abraham, shrugged his shoulders. "If I'd known it was going to be like this, I'd never have agreed to leave the garden."

"Come on guys, let's go. We're not wanted here any more."

With that, they wondered away, never to be seen again.

Good thing there weren't Israeli security forces and an Israeli government back in the days of Abraham, or the above might very well have occurred.

Bedouin Land Grab; Jewish Supporters

Israeli Bedouin went to court for recognition of their claim to the northern Negev, going back to 1922. A Jewish professor of geography at Ben-Gurion University testified falsely in their behalf.

That professor, Oren Yiftachel, had insufficient academic credentials for a position in urban planning at Technion, but was hired at Ben-Gurion U., where it is sufficient for tenure to be an anti-Zionist activist like Yiftachel. His career there is Israel-bashing. His antipathy to Jewish sovereignty extends to justifying Hamas in firing rockets into Israel. His excuse for Hamas is that Israel had "jailed" the whole population of Gaza. Actually, Israel just refuses to allow terrorists to import advanced weapons.

In recent years, Prof. Yiftachel has been denouncing Israel for rejecting Bedouin's fabricated claims to the Negev. The land they want is valuable in such a small country. The same geographer denounces Israel for letting Jews move to the Negev and Galilee. He calls that "Judaizing" those areas. "Judaizing" is an antisemitic term going back to the Middle Ages.

In the Bedouin lawsuit, Prof. Ruth Kark, a geography professor from Jerusalem, testified for the state. She challenged the testimony of Yiftachel and the Bedouin claims as fraudulent.

Bedouin have been squatting on public land. The State repeatedly demolished their shanties, but the Bedouin persist in rebuilding them.

Judge Sarah Dovrat caught Yiftachel testifying about the contents of documents he had not read. She denounced Yiftachel for misrepresenting historic documents and for fabrication.

The Bedouin's attorney brought in a surveyor who had not surveyed the disputed land, he had looked them up on the Internet.

The judge dismissed the Bedouin lawsuit and reprimanded Prof. Yiftachel (Prof. Steven Plaut, 4/23/12
http://isracampus.org.il/third%20level%20pages/Editorial%20-%20BGU%20- %20Oren%20Yiftachel%20-%20Legacy%20of%20Fraud%20and%20Incompetence.htm).

A geographer who didn't read the documents he is testifying about and a surveyor who didn't survey the land he is testifying about. Nevertheless, the Left takes the side of the Bedouin defrauders.

Egypt-Israel Treaty Out of Gas?

Egypt's government-owned natural gas company stated intent to void the contract to sell natural gas to Israel. Stated reason: four months of non-payment. The head of the company characterized the dispute as commercial, not political.

Egyptians have been suing the government over the contract, alleging that it denied Egypt a fair price.

Israel's Finance Minister Steinitz called the cancellation "a dangerous precedent that overshadows the peace agreements between Israel and Egypt." Israel's Energy Minister Landau said that Israel had been preparing for the time it could switch over to its newly discovered natural gas. He thinks the problem is minor.

"Egyptians of all political stripes overwhelmingly resent Israel because of its continued occupation of the W. Bank and Gaza, which many here believe to be a violation of the accords. The main presidential candidates in Egypt say they will honor the treaty but want to re-examine it (David D. Kirkpatrick, NY Times, 4/23/12, A6).

Now that Islamists are about to take over in Egypt, the cry to cancel contract and treaty is louder. Islamic doctrine permits deception of non-Muslims and terminating agreements when advantageous for Islam. So they find excuses within the contract for voiding it.

Egypt, Jordan, and the P.A. have been violating their agreements with Israel for years. Were it up to the people, there would have been no peace treaties with Israel. Egyptian leaders say they will honor the treaty, but Muslims have a different concept of honor. Thus the Muslim Brotherhood first will field parliamentary candidates for only half the seats, but end up contesting what they can. First the Brotherhood will not run a candidate for the presidency, but then it does. The P.A. will eradicate terrorism, but promotes it. Jordan will have normal relations with Israel, but then does not.

Like Turkey and Venezuela and Argentina, budding dictatorships like the Islamists in Egypt start out with promises and assurances, as they tighten their grip on power. When tight, the promises and assurances fade. Woe unto those who depended upon them!

One can expect Egypt's leaders to make impossible demands about the treaty. They probably would demand the right to militarize the Sinai, in order to position their army nearer to Israel. They will say it is in order to repress terrorists and smugglers. But recent news from Israel quotes a commander as denying that Egypt is not trying to stop terrorists in the Sinai. The well-publicized efforts under Mubarak to shut the smuggling tunnels in Gaza were for show.

Dr. Aaron Lerner of IMRA answered my question about the contract by stating that the price Israel paid Egypt was the highest at the time. Since market prices rise and fall, both countries found it advantageous to settle on a long-term contract. Arabs tend to make agreements and then resent their restraints upon them.

Only recently did Israel discover major gas deposits off its coast. To develop those deposits will take time. If Egypt cuts off the current supply to Israel, Israel will have to pay a lot more to find a substitute fast. I think that Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai, a source of oil and of security, was a blunder. Israel didn't get peace with Egypt, it got time while the U.S. built up an Egyptian army that now, as predicted, Islamists will take over.

Egyptians' anger over Gaza can best be explained as an Islamic one. Islamic doctrine considers it a right and a duty to re-conquer an area liberated from it. That includes Gaza. Otherwise, Egyptians' resentment against Israel over Gaza would be peculiar.

Egypt conquered Gaza in 1948. Nobody called it an occupation. Egyptians did not mind it. Egyptian rule was harsh. Arabs in Gaza were not allowed to work except as terrorists against Israel. Egyptian sponsorship of terrorism led to war in 1956.

Egypt's conquest was by aggression, Israel's, by self-defense — against Egypt. According to international law, Israel's presence was not occupation. Now Israeli forces are not even present, they just try to keep heavy weapons out of Gaza.

When Israelis were present, Gazans enjoyed a higher standard of living. A higher standard of living does not mean as much to Arab Muslims there as the dishonor to them of being ruled by non-Muslims. Westerners overvalue material incentives, Muslims believe.

The peace treaty calls for negotiations over Gaza. Israel offers to negotiate. Most of the time the P.A. refuses to negotiate. Were Egyptians really concerned about Palestinian Arabs in Gaza, they would blame the P.A. for lack of negotiations. The blame would be not only for refusing to negotiate or for walking out, but also for demanding concessions that would render Israel unable to defend itself. One cannot reasonably blame Israel for rejecting such demands.

How many years of jihad must Israel endure before its leaders realize that there is no coming to terms with jihadists and that Israel must crush terrorism in the P.A., let the P.A. economy collapse and Arabs move out, and annex vacant land both for national security and in behalf of the Jewish people's right to its patrimony?

BDS Movement

The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanction (BDS) movement seeks to get the public to act against Israel, both to damage Israel and to get its statehood to seem improper.

The BDS movement grew out of the 2001 Durban UN conference against Racism. Thus the movement adopts terminology against Israel like the slogans used against the former Union of South Africa. S. Africa became a pariah and eventually was overturned. The BDS people hope to do the same with Israel by calling Israel inappropriate names, such as an apartheid and colonial state, an occupier, repressive, violator of international law, whatever is unpopular.

The movement demonstrates or works with [and against the interests of[ college students, the UN, shoppers, performers, companies dealing with Israel, and people who attend cultural events. Most of those people are not familiar with Mideast history. The movement can instill bias in them.

The movement comprises a few, full-time, well-financed, anti-Zionists encouraged by Palestinian Authority (P.A.) leaders. The activists raise funds and arrange seminars, conferences, and demonstrations in Europe and North America. The idea is to isolate Israel. They claim the support of hundreds of NGOs. Many of those NGOs do not exist or exist as fronts for terrorist organizations.

At their events, they present false and misleading information and allegations against Israel. They also threaten stores, suppliers, academic institutions, and performers unless they disavow Israel. In doing this, they often harass people and would deny freedom of choice of where to shop, and to enter stores. This is not a democratic movement.

Where warfare and terrorism are not practical, the BDS movement fills the gap for jihad. Economic boycott is part of warfare, and precedes the BDS movement that has adopted it. This is war on all Israelis, not just ones accused of anything in particular.

For examples, the University of Paris-VI asked the EU not to renew its 1995 Association Agreement with Israel. Student and faculty groups at several American universities launched campaigns to divest from Israel. The Church of Sweden urged a boycott of goods produced by Israeli communities, called by the movement, "colonies," in the Territories.

Several performers have canceled appearances in Israel.

Israel's "peace partner," the P.A., demanded an economic, cultural, and academic boycott of Israel. In this campaign, the P.A. has been able to enlist left-wing organizations and individuals. The list of endorsing NGOs include some that cannot be found and others tied to terrorist organizations such as the terrorist-coordinating Council of National and Islamic Forces in Palestine, illegal organizations, and one-person organizations. The public supposes that each organization listed in support of BDS is legitimate or has many members.

By using social media, the BDS movement makes itself appear to be a mass movement. Worse for Israel, some of the performers released statements they got from BDS propaganda and that slander Israel. Intimidation increases cancellations.

On the other hand, many times resolutions for BDS were rejected. Some of the reasons for rejection were the resolutions' illegality of boycotts and stifling freedom.

A regional chapter of the United Church of Canada voted to boycott goods from Jewish communities in the territories, but the Church's General Council rejected the boycott.

Municipalities are finding the BDS harassment annoying and subject to legal action or engendering calls for legal action.

Another tool of BDS is campus "Israel Apartheid Week." Often the agitation is racist or antisemitic. Ironically, Israel affords minorities more rights than does any other country in the Mideast.

Universities accept myth, fantasy, and lies about history, instead of knowledge and critical thinking. For example, Israel does not segregate, so the accusation of "apartheid" has no basis in fact. "It is difficult to imagine a country more diverse and less segregated than Israel, where 15 religions have official status and where Muslims, Arabs, Christians, and others are represented in all professions, serve in the military and the Knesset (Israeli parliament),

the Supreme Court and play leading roles in sports and the arts. Israel has welcomed and embraced Vietnamese 'Boat People' and Cambodian refugees from genocide. Gay, lesbian and transgender people from all over the Middle East have found refuge in Israel. Israel's Christian community is the only Christian community in any nation in the Middle East that has grown in number since 1948. But these facts have never gotten in the way of the mythic fantasies promoted by the BDSers whose sole goal is the destruction of the only functioning role model of human rights in the Middle East, Israel."

Some BDSers call Israel apartheid for being a Jewish state. But dozens of democracies have crosses in their flags, and many Muslim states' flags have an Islamic symbol [and all Arab states have made Islam the established language]. The U.S. has non-Christian minorities but Christmas is the national holiday. Then why is it wrong for Israel to celebrate Passover nationally?

Ironically, the BDS movement violates P.A. agreement not to boycott Israel. Ironically, the BDS movement is spearheaded by terrorist organizations and acts in the name of human rights. It is a hate movement (Jerusalem Issue Briefs, Vol. 12, No. 2, 3/19/12, Alan Baker and Adam Shay
http://www.jcpa.org/JCPA/Templates/ShowPage.asp?DRIT=1&DBID=1&LNGID=1&TMID= 111&FID=442&PID=0&IID=13179&TTL=Manipulation_and_Deception:_The_Anti-Israel _%22BDS%22_Campaign_%28Boycott,_Divestment,_and_Sanction via www.imra.org.il)

The movement picks on Israel in a pretended concern for human rights. But the movement advocates in behalf of Islamic society that represses human rights.

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.

Oren Yiftachel is one of the worst anti-Israel "academic" extremists in Israel. After being turned down for an academic position in urban planning at the Technion due to his poor academic credentials, he was made a professor of geography at Ben Gurion University, a university where academic credentials are not always a necessary nor a sufficient condition for a person to serve on its faculty.

There Yiftachel has built an entire career upon churning out Bash-Israel propaganda. He specializes in trying to paint Israel as a racist apartheid entity, or — to use his own favorite nonsense word — an intolerant "ethnocracy." He justified the firing of Hamas rockets into Israel, even when some landed near his own campus, on grounds that Israel had "jailed" the entire Palestinian population of Gaza. This "jailing" consisted of refusing to allow the Gazan terrorists to import advanced weapons systems. (See this anti-Semitic smear by him, still carried on the BGU official web site: http://www.geog.bgu.ac.il/members/yiftachel/shorts/the%20jailer%20state.pdf and see also http://www.martinsherman.net/557/comprehending-the-incomprehensible-%E2%80%93-part-i/) Yiftachel churns out anti-Israel hate propaganda for some of the most anti-Semitic groups and magazines on the planet. Along with BGU's Neve Gordon and Lev Grinberg, he is part of the core BGU group of tenured extremists who make no secret of their endorsement of Arab mass murder of Jews.

Yiftachel is also basically the Ilan Pappe of the Negev, meaning someone who never hesitates to lie and defraud when it comes to the holy task of annihilating Israel. And he was recently nailed for this by an Israeli judge.

For the past few years, Yiftachel has spent much of his time attempting to demonize Israel for supposedly mistreating its Bedouin citizens. This "mistreatment" consists of Israel's refusal to accept at face value the fictional and imaginary "legal" claims of the Negev Bedouins to huge portions of the entire Negev. The Bedouins and their lobby have simply fabricated "claims" for this extremely expensive and valuable land in land-poor Israel. Yiftachel, who has no training in law or history or economics, has served as their lobbyist in demanding that these fictional claims be accepted by the state, in essence transferring much of the Negev to Bedouins having no legal claim to the land there whatsoever.

Yiftachel also has a long track record of denouncing Israel for allowing Jews to move to the Negev and the Galilee, or what he calls "Judaizing" these territories. The term "judaization" has been used by anti-Semites as a nonsense term to denounce Jews since the Middle Ages.

In recent weeks, Yiftachel testified in a Beer Sheba Court about those Bedouin claims in a suit against the state of Israel brought by the Bedouin lobby. Yiftachel's fraudulent testimony has now become the matter of public record and of a growing number of media reports. Yiftachel gave false testimony to the court. A second geography professor from Jerusalem, Prof. Ruth Kark, gave non-fictional and factually correct testimony on behalf of the state, challenging the fraudulent claims of Yiftachel and the Bedouin lobby. Kark has published a serious academic book about the Negev Bedouins, along with her PhD student, Seth Frantzman, currently an editor at the Jerusalem Post and someone who often writes for Isracampus. The court ruled against Yiftachel and his lobby. The judge in question, Sarah Dovrat, went out of her way to denounce Yiftachel for fabrication and fraudulent misrepresentation of the contents of a number of historic documents during his testimony, denouncing him explicitly for testifying about the contents of documents he had never even bothered to read!

The denunciation of Yiftachel and his fraud has now appeared in several news venues. Citations from the judge's verdict in which Yiftachel was denounced were posted on an Israeli chat list by the distinguished Israeli professor of Geography from Tel Aviv University, Gideon Biger.

On April 20, 2012, a particularly good expose of Yiftachel's fraud was carried in Hebrew by the Makor Rishon daily newspaper. It filled a full newspaper page and is too long to be translated in full here. But we will paraphrase in English the more important segments of the story:

It cites Judge Dovrat in describing Oren's testimony before her court as a disgrace and embarrassment. It describes the court case in question as one concerning an illegal encampment of Bedouins on Negev land they do not own, where the illegal buildings (really shanties) erected there have been repeatedly demolished by the government of Israel. The lands on which these were erected are state-owned public lands. The judge is cited as saying, "I felt terribly ill at easy in listening to Yiftachel's testimony when it became apparent that he was citing sources he had never even bothered to read."

Yiftachel was called to testify by the Far-Leftist lawyer representing the Bedouins, Michael Sfard, in order to grant academic credibility to their false claims. The judge adds in her verdict: "Yiftachel twisted and squirmed on the witness stand in a manner that caused me to feel completely uneasy, in fact completely embarrassed." She adds that

Yiftachel clearly never bothered to read the documents he was attempting to cite into evidence. Yiftachel was not the only fraud brought by Sfard and his clients to the court. A surveyor who was asked to testify about the lands in question had never surveyed them, merely looking them up on an internet web site. The judge tossed out the entire suit by Sfard and his Bedouin would-be land thieves.

A particularly acrimonious letter was then published by the University of Haifa's geography professor Arnon Soffer, blasting Yiftachel. In that letter, Soffer writes that he has followed Yiftachel's "work" for years and has always found it to be shallow political propaganda and not academic scholarship. He expresses satisfaction that Judge Dovrat essentially confirms officially everything he already knew about Yiftachel. When interviewed for the Makor Rishon piece, Prof. Soffer adds that Yiftachel is basically a traitor to the state of Israel, someone attempting to turn the Negev over to Bedouin squatters. Anyone proposing such an idea, says Soffer, is a rotten villain as well as a traitor.

Soffer is also quoted there as calling Yiftachel a serial liar. For example, Yiftachel likes to pretend that he "ONLY" endorses Bedouin claims to a "mere" 5% of the Negev. It is 5% if one counts all the Arava wastelands going all the way down to Eilat as included in the Negev. But in the fertile Negev land north of Beer Sheba, Yiftachel and his clients are demanding 100% of those lands for the Bedouins, says Soffer. He also accuses Yiftachel of intentionally lying about the number of "unrecognized" — meaning illegal — Bedouin squatter villages in the Negev. Soffer claims that in reality 10% of the land in Israel is being illegally held by the two and a half percent of the population who are Negev Bedouins. Soffer's characterization of Yiftachel was also backed by Prof. Gideon Biger from the geography department at Tel Aviv University, also interviewed for the piece in Makor Rishon. Biger says that Yiftachel's political agenda and biases govern everything he does and writes, and Biger accuses him of producing pseudo-scientific pseudo-research.

The newspaper editorializes that the entire court case in which Yiftachel testified was in fact not at all about legal rights to land but rather about the legitimacy of Israel as a state and its right to enforce its own laws. Things Yiftachel opposes. The Israeli anti-Zionist Left has been denouncing the judge in shrill tones for her decision. The judge has been defended, however, by many of Israel's serious legal academics, including the left-leaning eminent Prof. Ruth Gavison. She insists that if dubious Bedouin claims from the 1920s are to be taken at face value by the courts, then so must all Jewish claims to lands across the Green Line in the "Palestinian" territories. Yiftachel and his buddies of course consider such statements to be fascist racism. The case is expected to be appealed to the Supreme Court.

A second somewhat similar article appears this week on the internet at http://2nd-ops.com/adiby/?p=5658 (in Hebrew). It accuses Yiftachel of forgery and perjury, when he submitted to the court a corrected later affidavit carrying the false date of an earlier affidavit he had submitted.

It should be noted that Yiftachel is not the only anti-Israel "geographer" on the faculty of BGU. Geographer David Newman, currently the Dean of Social Sciences and the Humanities at BGU, shares most of Yiftachel's political biases and passions for anti-Israel propagandizing. Dean Newman can be counted upon to stand by his man and prevent any sanctions against Yiftachel for his misbehavior! BGU president Rivka Carmi can also be counted upon to forget all about

Yiftachel whenever she insist there is only one single anti-Israel lunatic in the entire faculty of BGU.

Neve Gordon and Lev Grinberg are probably better known as the global symbols of the absence of serious academic standards at Ben Gurion University. They are notorious realizations of the long track record of BGU in hiring faculty with near empty "academic" records, promoting them and granting them tenure. There are dozens of others at BGU! But the lesser known Yiftachel is just as much of a full-time pro-terror anti-Israel hate propagandist, hired and promoted in spite of his absence of serious academic credentials - all thanks entirely to his hatred of Israel. Hating Israel is a far weightier factor in getting hired and promoted at Ben Gurion University than is scholarly performance!

2. From Munich unto Munich: The Anti-Israel "Boycott, Divest, Sanctions" Hitlerjugend, also known as the BDS-holes, are taking their campaign for economic aggression against Israel to Munich, where it was born, and where they will be holding their own little Beer Hall Putsch: Munich Conference, The International Movement for One Democratic State in Israel/Palestine June 30- July 1, 2012 By "one democratic state" they mean a Hamastan erected on the ashes of the extermination of Israel and its Jews. Among the speakers at this new Munich who will be calling for annihilation of Israel are two Israeli "academics": the Arab Dr. Ghada Karmi and Dr. Oren Ben-Dor, both living in the UK. The latter, Ben Dor, is a Jewish anti-Semite who writes for the Neo-Nazi "Counterpunch" rag and who has been warring against the Jews for many years: http://www.isracampus.org.il/third%20level%20pages/ Editorial%20-%20Joel%20Amitai%20-%20Oren%20Ben-Dor.htm

3. Neo-Nazism comes to Florida university: http://frontpagemag.com/2012/04/23/blood-libels-from-israel-hating-students-in-florida/ and to Temple University, my alma mater: http://frontpagemag.com/2012/04/20/islamic-apartheid-conference-under-attack/

4. Two really delightful web sites: Pacbi.com, on the BDS-holes, and www.kapodickie.blogspot.com on one of them in particular.

5. Latest cause of the Israeli Left: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4219709,00.html and http://www.jpost.com/NationalNews/Article.aspx?id=267164

6. The Danish Hitler youth who assaulted the Israeli colonel: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/11547 The colonel has now been suspended from duties by Israel's post-survivalist leaders. Meanwhile, it turns out the ISM terrorists who attacked him were carrying knives. The terrorist struck in the face by the colonel's rifle who said he needed two stitches was filmed the day after the attack. No stitches and no bruises, except to his pride. I think we need an official commission of investigation into why not.

7. Am I the only one around he thinks that the French are such disgusting people that they would DESERVE an era of serious socialism, with all the poverty and corruption and retardation it would produce? And the rapid Islamofization of the country? (I secretly cheered when half of Germany was subjected to communist rule! Because the Germans deserved it.)

Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist, a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com.

This article is archived at
http://isracampus.org.il/third%20level%20pages/Editorial%20-%20BGU%20 -%20Oren%20Yiftachel%20-%20Legacy%20of%20Fraud%20and%20Incompetence.htm

First, a Zakkai update. This time I quote verbatim from the parents:

"After two surgeries in 7 weeks, it's very hard for us to believe but we are heading to Boston again for surgery, this time to remove the thoracic component of the tumor. Surgery is scheduled for Monday, April 30th at 7:30 am and is expected to take 5-6 hours. Due to the more complex and higher risk nature of this surgery, which will involve cutting through muscle to spread his ribs as well as fully collapsing his left lung, he will go straight from the OR to the ICU for 1-2 days (with a tube sticking out of him to maintain the pressure in his chest). Our expected stay in the hospital is 4-5 days (hopefully, our trooper will surprise us again just as he has after the first two surgeries!)

"On February 11 (the day before our lives were transformed), we would never have imagined that our son would undergo 3 surgeries in less than 3 months. We truly hope and pray this upcoming surgery will be the last one Zakkai will ever need."

Keep praying, my friends! Rephael Zakkai Avraham ben Yakira Avigael

The red line I am referring to is with regard to the scheduled government (or more precisely the Defense Ministry/Civil Administration) demolition of the Ulpana neighborhood (Givat Ha'Ulpana) of Beit El by the end of this month.

The neighborhood is comprised of 15 buildings, but we are speaking here of a total of five buildings that are scheduled for destruction imminently. Those buildings house 30 families, encompassing more than 150 children.

That red line has been crossed numerous times, as far as I can see -- as with the expulsion of people from Beit Hamachpela. But this particular situation is so blatantly wrong that a number of the members of the government and members of the Knesset, including numerous Likud people, are seriously up in arms and predicting the demise of the coalition. And Defense Minister Ehud Barak is being identified as the problem -- although it must always be asked to what degree Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu gives a tacit nod to Barak's decisions.

This is the running theme: For more than 30 years it has been explicit Israeli policy not to build on land privately owned by Palestinian Arabs. In several instances Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria have been built on land that was not privately owned (by Palestinian Arabs who have come forth) or that had been abandoned for decades. It must be understood that we are speaking of land that has been under the administrative control of Israel only since 1967, so there are no deeds in Israel offices dating way back on this land; the situation is far more complex, and there is a legal status for abandoned land.

Almost always there is tacit government approval for this building -- as various ministries provide assistance. (Here I am not speaking of "outposts" with three caravans.) The Ministry of Building signs off on the construction; roads are paved; mortgages are granted; etc. But what is sometimes lacking is the official sign-off of the Defense Minister -- who, as the situation stands, is an inordinately powerful person.

Then, years after the building has been done and Jews have taken up residence, if there is a challenge either by left-wing NGOs or Palestinian Arabs (who often lack documentation), and that challenge ends up in the courts -- the government does not defend the right of Jews to have built on that land and offer to retroactively supply all necessary documents. Rather, there is a pulling back: A declaration of sorts that, well, if there is such a challenge, then by all means, the community must be dismantled. There has come to be, in fact, a tendency to acknowledge even undocumented land as "Palestinian" once there is a challenge. (And, in point of fact, sometimes when Arabs come forth with their claims they do not have legitimate documentation as to ownership.)

This dovetails well with the orientation of what has been a very left-wing court, but it is not simply a matter of court decisions. It's a question of a government inclination to run to do demolitions. And it represents a shift in government policy over the years. At one point settling the land was encouraged, today, this is much less the case -- which goes to the heart of the Zionist venture.

What I am hearing from representatives of the Beit El community and the Binyamin regional council to which Beit El belongs is at variance with the story put being out by many media sources:

Beit El is built on land that is recognized as State land -- it had been abandoned land that was held by the army for security reasons, with its status becoming State land. Some 15 years ago it was recognized that expansion was going to be necessary and Beit El began buying land from Arabs in preparation for that expansion, which began more than 10 years ago. This applies to the Ulpana neighborhood. The land on which it was situated was bought from Arabs legally in 2000, but registration was never completed because it would have put the Arab sellers at risk (there is a death penalty in the PA for selling land to Jews).

Seven years later, a pro-Palestinian NGO (possibly Yesh Din) brought forth a cousin of the Arab who had sold the land; he registered a claim that it was really his. This claim made its way to the High Court, which in fact does not check documentation but establishes "principles." Contrary to what has been Barak's position on this -- that it's a question of law, so that there is no choice but to demolish the neighborhood -- what I'm being told is that the Court was prepared to take its cue from the government position. In point of fact, the Civil Administration, having little patience for procedures, pushed the issue to this point. (Please follow this below to see the evidence of this.)

Among those who have spoken about what's going on with Ulpana is Minister of Security Affairs and Deputy Prime Minister Moshe (Bogie) Ya'alon (Likud):

The Defense Minister, he said yesterday, "is unfortunately carrying out [a] private political agenda [separate] from the government" and "the demolition of the Ulpana neighborhood and Givat Assaf (about which more at another point) would demand the dissolution of the government — the coalition would collapse...Normative people are suddenly being confronted with questions [on the legal status of their community after being] "told all along that they would not be forced out of their homes."

Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar (Likud) reflected a similar sentiment at a Shabbat function yesterday, when he asked:

"Is there no reasonable solution that does not include the expulsion of Jews? The perception that peace entails the expulsion of Jews from their homes has been tested recently in Gush Katif. We've seen the results of that.

"There is an extraordinary obsession with the destruction of settler homes in the West Bank."

A day earlier, on Friday, Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz (Likud) visited residents of the Ulpana neighborhood, and said:

"If Barak works against the government's position, the Prime Minister must fire him. He took the Ministry of Defense and turned it into a political tool at the expense of the Jewish residents. There are other ways to gather votes.

"I came here to express a clear position that the houses should not be destroyed...There is no doubt that when the government gave its answer to the Supreme Court it did not consider all the consequences of that decision...It is necessary to update the government's position regarding the Ulpana neighborhood."

Katz is working towards establishing a ministerial committee to assume the responsibility the Defense Minister now has.

Environmental Protection Minister Gilad Erdan has also been on board with criticism that Barak's decisions are politically motivated.

(It should be noted that Barak, who broke away from the Labor party and started the Independence Party, is having trouble because that party is not showing the minimum cut-off in polls that would be required in an election for a presence in the Knesset. Catering to the left would possibly enhance his standing in this regard.)

Others in Likud opposed to the demolition of this neighborhood include Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz, Knesset Speaker Ruby Rivlin, Coalition head Ze'ev Elkin. And this is hardly a fully comprehensive list.

Daniel Hershkowitz, Minister of Science and head of HaBayit Hayehudi and Avigdor Lieberman, Foreign Minister and head of Yisrael Beitenu, have also suggested that the Ulpana issue could have real effects on the coalition in which they participate.

MK Danny Danon (Likud) has observed that, "Only left-wing governments would oppose this neighborhood. This is test that Likud must not fail...rejection of the Migron agreement and evacuation of Beit Hamachpela in Hevron were attacks on our communities in Judea and Samaria. The threat to destroy the Ulpana neighborhood is a red line for the nationalist camp - we will not allow this evacuation."

Well, I certainly hope the nationalist camp does not allow that evacuation. The question is how it will be stopped. The most encouraging sign is that the prime minister is nervous enough about his coalition right now so that he has convened a task force to find a solution that avoids the demolition of the neighborhood.

Various responses of Barak are worth noting here. First, he remarked snidely, that, "Ya'alon is probably suffering from severe 'Feiglinism' which is not good for the State, its security, its future or the public. We hope this phenomenon is not contagious." Moshe Feiglin is a right-wing nationalist activist in Likud. Obviously -- ludicrously -- Barak was attempting to paint Ya'alon as a far-right nut case. But in the opinion of this writer, there is no contest between the Feiglin position and the Barak position with regard to what is good for the State and its future.

Then Barak took another tack, which indicates that he is uneasy, or that Netanyahu has communicated unease to him. I ask that you follow this closely, because it puts to lie to so much that had come before:

Attempting to propose a compromise at this morning's Cabinet meeting, Barak suggested that perhaps the Ulpana residents could move from their current location to an alternative location in Beit El:

"We found 22 dunams of land in the town which could, under certain circumstances and after plans are approved, be used to build alternative homes for residents of the neighborhood..."

And then...then he said (emphasis added):

"...the question of ownership of the land is still being adjudicated. If it turns out that the land is owned by Palestinians, we would have no choice other than to abandon it or purchase it." http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/154996

And I say, Stop the presses! The same Barak who piously declared that honoring the court ruling was a matter of rule of law, which is essential to a democracy, now admits that it has not been determined yet if Arabs own the land? And that if it turns out (a most unlikely eventuality) that Arabs do own it, it might possibly be bought?

Then, why the hell the rush to push out the residents of Ulpana within a week's time? The answer is that Barak gave a pledge to the court to do so. The Civil Administration didn't ask for more time to explore the issues, and didn't tell the court that it wanted to re-visit Ulpana's legal status. It caved, as I described above. Says Barak:

"This is not about a ruling but a pledge made by the government last year, that neighborhoods and buildings on private land be evicted." (Emphasis added)
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4219263,00.html

And here the determination that this land is private has not yet been made definitively. But the court ruling followed the pledge.

As to Barak's proposal that the residents be moved, they responded that they are not chess pieces, to be moved about as Barak wishes.

Tonight there was a major demonstration in Beit El, attended by a number of MKs and people from all over the country. Declared MK Tzipi Hotovely (Likud) -- one of several people who spoke -- "We will win!"

Now we must wait to see what transpires.

Please note two additional facts about the neighborhood here, which make it all the more unconscionable that it should be demolished:

The neighborhood was erected in memory of Ita Tzur, mother of 7, who, with her 12-year old son Ephraim, was killed -- in the presence of her small daughters -- by Palestinian terrorists.

One of the young homeowners slated for eviction is Yedidya (Didi) Dikstein, who was 16 when both his parents and his 9-year old brother were killed by terrorists.

More to follow as this story unfolds.

Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info

This month marks a heartrending anniversary, one with ruinous consequences that continue to plague the Jewish state.

It was thirty years ago, in April 1982, that uniformed soldiers pledged to defend Israel and its citizens were given the order to uproot and destroy the Jewish community of Yamit in northern Sinai.

The move came in the wake of the peace treaty with Egypt, when Menachem Begin agreed to a complete withdrawal from all 23,000 square miles of Sinai, which necessitated the forced evacuation of over 7,000 Israelis, including those in Yamit.

Years of toil and sweat, of pioneering spirit and determination, were mercilessly swept away by bulldozers, and by April 25, 1982, Yamit was no more.

Indeed, if you open Google Earth, the popular online mapping program, you can still see the barren site where a thriving community of 2,500 Jews had made Yamit bloom. It looks as if a giant eraser had rubbed away the terrain, leaving behind scars where homes, schools and synagogues had once stood.

This act of destruction was overseen by then-Defense Minister Ariel Sharon, and the agonizing scenes of Jewish soldiers dragging Jews from their homes in Yamit were seared into the nation's consciousness.

The traumatic significance and symbolism of the expulsion from Sinai cannot be overstated. After more than 100 years of Zionism and settlement, Israel was vividly turning its back on some of its key core principles, all for the sake of a dubious peace with a dictatorial neighbor.

Many fail to realize just how important Sinai was. It constituted over 90 percent of the territory Israel had liberated during the 1967 Six-Day War. Israel had more than 170 military installations and dozens of early-warning stations scattered throughout its vast deserts, which were also home to the Alma oil fields.

Sinai provided Israel with strategic depth, the potential for petroleum independence, and new frontiers to explore.

But all that was torn away by the withdrawal.

And while it may have brought us three decades of a cold peace with Egypt, conceding the Sinai will likely prove to have been a colossal mistake.

Consider recent events in the region, which underline the perils inherent in turning territory over to our neighbors.

With the fall of the Mubarak regime, there is no telling who will be running Egypt a year from now, or whether they will feel bound to preserve bilateral relations with Jerusalem. The sweeping victory of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt's parliamentary elections certainly doesn't bode well for the future.

So despite having given up the Sinai for the sake of peace, Israel might end up with neither, which is the worst of all possible scenarios.

Moreover, look at how the territory Israel gave to Egypt has been transformed into a staging area for anti-Israel smuggling and terrorism, as the Grad rockets fired at Eilat from Sinai earlier this month clearly demonstrated.

And most of the weapons Hamas has succeeded in stockpiling in Gaza were smuggled in through the infamous tunnels connecting the strip with Sinai.

Needless to say, an Israeli civilian and military presence in Sinai would have prevented this from occurring.

But with no Israeli forces stationed in the area, there is little that Israel can do about the terrorist threat other than to plead with Cairo to act.

In retrospect, the pullout from Sinai also had still another catastrophic effect on the Jewish state: it set the stage for later expulsions and launched a three-decade long period rife with Israeli retreat. The domino that fell in Sinai would later topple Bethlehem, Hebron and Jenin, and ultimately Gush Katif and Amona.

And now the world wishes to see Judea and Samaria, and Jerusalem too, fall as well. But this is not a child's game. It is about the very existence of the state of Israel and the Jewish people. Our future is at stake, and we must resolutely turn back the clock and forestall any more withdrawals.

The steady march of capitulation that began in Yamit and continued on through the Oslo process has brought this nation to the brink of disaster, resulting in increasing violence and bloodshed.

We must put an end to this headlong rush towards calamity.

Let us use this anniversary of the original sin of the Yamit withdrawal to draw a line in the sand, literally and figuratively, and declare once and for all: never again will Israel uproot Jews from their homes.

We cannot allow the mistakes of the past to dictate future events.

Yamit's legacy is one of desolation and despair. Let's make ours one of destiny and hope.

Michael Freund is the founder and chairman of Shavei Israel (www.shavei.org), which assists Anousim in Spain, Portugal and South America to return to the Jewish people. He served as an adviser to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in his first term in office.

This article is archived at
http://www.jewishpress.com/indepth/columns/fundamentally-freund/yamit-the-original-sin-of-expulsion/2012/04/18/

Prof. John L. Esposito to Defend Saudi Bomb-Maker

Prof. John L. Esposito of Middle East Studies at Georgetown U. is a we ll known academician who declares Islamist ideology not so radical. He also testifies as an expert in trials of accused Islamists. His next case is that of Khalid Ali Aldawasari, a Saudi Arabian student in the U.S. He is indicted for attempting to make a bomb. Penalty could be life imprisonment.

Here is the government's case. Mr. Aldawasari bought chemicals and equipment for bomb-making, had researched whom in the U.S. to attack, and had confessed in detail his purpose of armed jihad in a blog and in a personal journal.

The indictment cites the accused student's taking up chemistry and buying various acids for explosives. He also bought a gas mask, a hazardous materials protective suit, glass chemical apparatus, clocks, a battery tester, wiring, and a stun gum. He emailed data to himself about how to convert cell phones into remote detonators and explanations that these were for military jihad. His journal mentioned the steps in his jihad, such as getting a U.S. birth certificate, renting a car with fake driver's licenses, and where to leave bombs in those cars. He had lists of potential targets, including dams, nuclear power planets, and veterans of Abu Ghraib prison. New York was a main target.

During his period of study and preparation, fellow Saudi students found him "extremely antisocial." He seldom talked with his roommates. He spent his free time in a gym or listening to Arabic TV broadcasts.

Prof. Esposito had testified in 2008. U.S. Vs. Holy Land Foundation, that defendants' Arabic speeches were more innocent than their literal translations. Five leaders of the charity were found guilty of fronting for Hamas.

The case record shows that Prof. Esposito will testify as an expert on Islamic and Arabic culture. As such, he will analyze the defendant's writing submitted as evidence against him. The government depicts that writing as extremist propaganda. Dr. Esposito will testify that Mr. Aldawasari's isolation and the cultural bias he experienced partly explains his conduct. What he wrote, the professor will suggest, is free speech.

Prof. Esposito will explain "jihad", Islamic religious thought and expression, and Islam's effect on the defendant's beliefs. Apparently the testimony would claim a psychological justification for the bomb-making, turning the defendant into the victim of "cultural bias and isolation." However, the evidence shows the accused making rational decisions, however criminal (Stephen Schwartz, American Thinker, 2/17/12,
http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/02/john_louis_esposito_for_the_defense_of_an_alleged_would-be_terrorist.html http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/12074).

If cultural differences for Muslims studying in the U.S. explain and excuse their seeking to bomb us for our nationality and mostly not for something we did individually, then shouldn't we consider barring students from hostile cultures? There are about 10,000 Saudis studying our technology and many thousands of others from hostile cultures. Don't we have more right to defend ourselves from them, than for them to come here, say they don't like it her, and bomb us?

Just freedom of speech, Prof. Esposito may suggest, are the detailed plans for murdering us, plans that the defendant was actively carrying out, as his purchases and planning show. If such plotting is free speech, what is criminal planning?

It seems to me that the defendant starting planning terrorism soon after arriving. It hardly seems likely that his reception here had such an instant effect. Surely his radical Islamic society had more to do with that. Jihad is taught as an Islamic religious duty.

No indication of bias or mistreatment was stated in the article. He was admitted to U.S. colleges and given a scholarship. The cultural isolation mentioned was self-inflicted. He chose not to associate with anybody else, including fellow Saudis.

To suggest a defendant is mentally impaired when he so well knows what he is doing and his motive is an ideology well-known for its fanaticism sounds like a mentally impaired argument. So is turning the aggressor into the victim.

Prof. Esposito contends that jihad has benign meanings. "Jihad" primarily means by war; the more benign meanings are rarely held. When the person's actions reflect the most violent meaning of "jihad," the professor is trying to excuse enemies of our country who could be considered war criminals. The professor does our country a grave disservice.

Only academic and media bias can explain why purveyors of such nonsense have any academic standing. That bias is as dangerous for us as the bomb-making it defends.

Egyptians Argue Over Jerusalem Trip

Egypt's Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa visited Jerusalem unofficially and under the supervision of Jordanian authorities. He prayed at al-Aqsa mosque.

Egypt's Parliament demanded his resignation and apology for his precedent in normalizing relations with Israel. Most Egyptians shun Israel "The international community did not recognize the occupation and annexation of East Jerusalem after the 1967 war."

One of his critics referred to Jerusalemites, meaning the Arab ones, being driven out of Jerusalem. A Salfi MP called the visit backstabbing. The Grand Mufti will be held accountable by God, he said.

Other MPs said that the visit is not normalization, since the Grand Mufti did not meet with any Israeli officials. Another MP noted that Palestinian Arabs consider visits by other Muslims as support.

Egypt's Coptic Church prohibits Copts from visiting Jerusalem.

The censuring parliamentary committee remarked about Israel, "This brutal enemy controls its entrances and exits and its mosques and churches." (Egypt Independent Sun, 4/22/12 http://www.egyptindependent.com/news/parliament-demands-muftis-resignation-over-jerusalem-trip via www.imra.org.il).

That's the kind of argument Arab Muslims have with each other: Visiting Jerusalem out of hostility to Israel versus not visiting Jerusalem out of hostility to Israel.

Who can blame the Copts for not visiting, because they have a legitimate fear of being persecuted even more by Muslims. But Egypt signed a treaty to normalize relations, which includes visiting. Egypt never honored the treaty. The treaty gave Egypt territorial concessions and enough U.S. aid to build a sizeable, modern military. Egypt never made peace. Muslims usually do not make peace, just a truce. Critics predicted that eventually the Islamists would take over, remilitarize the Sinai, in more flagrant violation of the treaty, and make war.

People who credit the treaty with making peace defend it by saying war now wouldn't be so bad, because Israel is stronger than Egypt. Poor logic and not factual! The comparison between the two sides must include all the other countries and militias ranged against Israel. Israel's survival is not guaranteed, high casualties are.

What the biased "international community" recognizes has no moral or legal standing. When Jordan and Egypt seized the Territories in 1948, the world community did not call it an occupation and did not object. So much for world scruples.

Foreigners may disapprove of Israel's annexation of eastern Jerusalem, but such annexation is legal, because: (1) It was for national security against likely further aggression; (2) Israel is the chief heir to the Palestine Mandate; and (3) Much of the land was in the path of natural expansion of the city.

Before annexation, Israel did not "occupy" eastern Jerusalem or other unallocated parts of the Palestine Mandate. One can only occupy part of another country.

Israel had occupied part of Syria, until it annexed it. That occupation was legal. Occupation is legal when a war ends with the victim of aggression stationed in part of the aggressor's country.

The complaint about Israel being brutal turns reality upside down. Masses of Arabs throw rocks and bombs, stab and shoot, riot and vandalize. That is brutality. Israel does not do that.

When Jordan seized the Old City of Jerusalem in 1948, its Arab Legion expelled the several thousand Jews and destroyed all their synagogues. When Israel recaptured the Old City in 1967, it did not expel Arabs. The Arab population increased by hundreds of thousands. Some expulsion!

It is misleading to state that Israel controls mosques and churches. Israel leaves them mostly on their own, intervening only when necessary to keep order. If the Muslims were orderly, and if they were tolerant of other faiths gaining access to their holy sites, Israel wouldn't need to intervene.

Note the religious element in the Arab War on Israel!

How to Whitewash Islamic Persecution

The mainstream media ignores most news of Muslims persecuting Christians. When they barely do report some, they do so by unjustifiably equating Muslim persecution with Christian acts.

One way to equate the two faiths' attitudes is to refer to "sectarian strife." Implication: each side abuses the other. In truth, Muslim majorities persecute "largely passive Christian minorities

Hundreds of thousands of Christians have fled from Egypt recently, but NPR reported, "In Egypt, growing tensions between Muslims and Christians have led to sporadic violence." The report does not identify who started it.. "Many Egyptians blame interreligious strife on hooligans taking advantage of absent or weak security forces." Which hooligans?

NPR, again: "Others believe it's because of a deep-seated mistrust between Muslims and the minority Christian community. NPR does not find out how the "mistrust" originated.

"In Egypt, Christian-Muslim Tension is on the Rise." The photo shows angry Christians. The photo insinuates that Christians are the aggressors. Usually they are reacting to being persecuted. In the photo, a Christian is defiantly holding a cross. Perhaps his militancy is due to the common Muslim destruction of crosses [and churches].

The media similarly confuse Nigerian Islamist genocide against Christians. Almost daily. Boko Haram terrorists, seeking to replace the secular government with Islamic law, murders Christians or destroys churches.

BBC reported an attack on a church that killed three Christians. Then the report described an ensuing riot by Christian youths. The point is lost that Christians are angry about the constant terrorist attacks.

The Washington Post headline about a church bombing that killed 20 Christians was, "Christians clash with police in Egypt after attack on churchgoers kills 21." The New York Times phrased it, "Clashes grow as Egyptians remain angry after attack." The Christian reaction gets higher billing than the original murders.

Agence France Presse reported on another murderous attack on a church by Boko Haram, a group that killed more than a thousand people since 2009, but "whose goals remain largely unclear."

Boko Haram has declared its goals for years. Those goals: impose Islamic law and subjugate if not exterminate Nigeria's Christians. The New York Times had described the group's goals as senseless, but the terrorists have their religious doctrine. When jihadists shout "Allahu Akhbar," do Western reporters think they mean gezundheit?

Media failure to identify Islamic intolerance enables it to blame the violence on politically correct explanations of "political oppression," "poverty," "frustration," etc.. Former Pres. Clinton attributed Boko Haram's slaughter of Christians to "poverty." After last Easter Sunday's church bombing, the U.S. Assistant Sec. of State for African Affairs claimed that "religion is not driving extremist violence" in Nigeria (Raymond Ibrahim, Gatestone Institute, 4/13/12 http://www.meforum.org/3217/media-muslim-persecution-christians).

The media denounces Jewish "settlers" for having religious motives, but never Muslim settlers or raiders.

Usually, Egyptian security forces are not "absent or weak." They back up Muslim kidnappers or assailants of Christians. I have reported such cases.

Not only do the major media downplay most Muslim persecution of Christians. They also let the Palestinian Authority pretend to protect the Christians from Israel. The media does not counter the jihadist propaganda. It could, by explaining that Christians are increasing their numbers in Israel, and fleeing from most Muslim areas.

The major media also refers to "mistrust" of Israel by the Palestinian Authority or perhaps "mutual distrust," without explanation. Readers may mistakenly suppose that the Arabs have justification for distrusting Israel. Instead, the Arab side violates its peace agreements with Israel. The Arab side still, in its violations, promotes terrorism.

A favorite major media ploy is to show photos of Israeli troops reacting to Arab attacks without showing the Arab attacks. Israel is made to seem brutal.

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.

"Surely this nation is wise and understanding people." (Deuteronomy 4);

"Will you thus repay the L-rd, O foolish people and unwise. "(Deuteronomy 32)

How is it that a wise people can be so incredibly foolish? We were given free will to choose either of the two above paths, and incredibly we chose to be a people, foolish and unwise... the government of Israel — and by conditioned reflex, the hapless Jewish Establishment in the United States - is up in arms. Confusion, anger, indignation. Why? The U.S. State Department has issued a study that concludes that the Palestine Liberation Organization is the sole representative of the "Palestinians." And the Rabin government is fuming. The foolish men of Jerusalem who raised their eyes unto Washington and looked for salvation from Kissinger and Ford and the Pentagon; the gentilized Hebrew speakers who placed their faith and trust in the bruised and shattered reed of America. Mass confusion and dismay now reigns. How can the United States which just last week refused to entertain the PLO as a party to talks; which eloquently defended Zionism from the UN; which had Dr. Kissinger say that the security of Israel is the cornerstone of American foreign policy in the Middle East, now come dangerously close to endorsing the PLO as the spokesmen for the "Palestinians?"

O foolish people and unwise. Doubly foolish, unwise ten times over! Foolish to have ever trusted the United States and unwise to have ever believed that eventually Washington would not recognize the existence of the PLO. WORSE! Foolish to have ever claimed that the PLO does NOT represent the views of the "Palestinians" and unwise, mad, insane and lunatic to think that one can admit to the existence of a "Palestine" people and then insist on choosing their leaders for them.

Let it be clear that the United States is tired of Israel and the political headache she represents. Gerald Ford and Henry Kissinger know that all the charades surrounding Egypt and even Syria will be meaningless if the "Palestine" question is not resolved. And they mean to resolve it no matter how shattering that is to Israel. They mean to resolve it within the context of the Rogers Plan and that means the complete withdrawal of Israel from ALL the lands liberated in 1967 and the establishment of a "Palestine" in the areas of the West Bank and Gaza. And this means that "Palestinians" will be invited to peace talks and this means that the United States will seek representatives of the "Palestinians" and as much as the unwise gnash their teeth over it, the State Department is quite correct and the Israelis are wrong and mad self-deluders.

Stop the nonsense from the mouths of Rabin and Peres and Eban and all their foolish Miller, Jacobsen, Blumberg, and Fisher followers. Stop the foolish babbling that the PLO does not represent the thinking of the Arab dwellers of the liberated lands, the "Palestinians." The fact is that if the Israeli government would allow an election to take place and the PLO to run, the terrorists would win an overwhelming majority and among the young and the intellectuals they would have almost unanimous support. The absurd denial of this is almost as absurd as the Israeli statements that it will not recognize the PLO because it is a "Terrorist" group. (How well that will go over with the United States that sat in Paris with the Vietcong, the British who negotiated with the MauMau and the French who settled with the Algerian FLN!)

The clear fact is that the PLO DOES represent the great majority of the Arabs in the liberated lands and the foolish and frantic efforts of Peres, Alon and Rabin to dig up elderly Arab Uncle Toms and Quislings of the effendi-sheik Ja'abri strips are doomed to ridiculous failure. Let us understand one thing:

As long as the government of Israel insists on recognizing a "Palestine People" they will have to recognize, sooner or later, the representative of the "people" — the PLO. It is only the foolish and the unwise who believe that they can, somehow, have their cake and eat it too — recognize "Palestinians" and then tell them who their leaders are and what boundaries of their country will be! O foolish people and unwise...

Those who follow this course will not succeed in convincing the world but will succeed grandly in confusing their own people, Jews in Israel and abroad. It will only take one little word (false) or recognition of Israel under the most absurd terms by the PLO to have Jewish liberals and other confused types screaming for Israeli recognition of the PLO. The cold, harsh, logical fact remains immutable: IF YOU RECOGNIZE A "PALESTINE" PEOPLE YOU MUST RECOGNIZE THOSE THAT THEY INSIST REPRESENT THEM. And if the Israelis keep telling the Jews of the world that there is a "Palestine" people then those Jews will believe it and will insist that self-determination eventually be given them — along with the right to elect the PLO.

The solution? To become wise and understanding. To know that there is no "Palestine" and no "Palestine people" and that neither PLO nor anyone else can represent a thing that does not exist. Arabs in Judea, Samaria, Gaza and the Golan? Certainly, but no "Palestinians" a concept that cannot be unless Zionism died. But if Zionism did indeed live all the years of exile and if Jews never gave up their hope to return, then every non-Jew who ever set foot on Jewish soil was nothing more than a trespasser. He remains what he was before he arrived. A Bedouin, an Arab, a Turk, what have you. But a "Palestinian?" That can only be if there is a "Palestine" and that can never be as long as the hope of the Jew to return to Zion —Zionism — was and remains alive.
Written - November 28, 1975

[This was the beginning of what we are living with today. bg]

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Far from thanking him for his multiculturalism, Muslims say they are "offended" by his "generalizing about their beliefs."

The largest university in London plans to impose a ban on the sale of alcohol on campus to accommodate the "cultural sensitivity" of its Muslim students.

London Metropolitan University's Vice Chancellor, Malcolm Gillies, says it would be unwise to "cling" to a "nostalgic" view where the vast majority wants alcohol to be available. Instead, he says that he believes the university should take account of diverging views, namely those of Muslims, who now comprise 20% of the university's 30,000 students.

"Many of our students do come from backgrounds where they actually look on drinking as a negative. We therefore need to rethink how we cater for that 21st-century balance," Gillies declared in an interview. "What we don't want is the tyranny of a majority view," he added.

Gillies' proposals to re-engineer social life on campus have, not surprisingly, generated a mostly negative response from students, many of whom say a ban on alcohol smacks of politically correct pandering run amok.

Muslims, too, are unhappy with Gillies. Far from thanking him for his multicultural activism, Muslims say they are "offended" by his "generalizing about their beliefs."

To be sure, London Metropolitan University is not the first institution in Britain to bend over backwards to avoid "offending" Muslims. In fact, hardly a day goes by in which Britons are not surrendering some aspect of their culture and traditions — not to mention their rights of free speech and free expression — in order to make Britain safe for Islam.

British schools increasingly are dropping the Jewish Holocaust from history lessons to avoid offending Muslim pupils, according to a report entitled Teaching Emotive and Controversial History, which was commissioned by the Department for Education and Skills. British teachers are also reluctant to discuss the medieval Crusades — in which Christians fought Muslim armies for control of Jerusalem — because lessons often contradict what is taught in local mosques.

British social welfare offices have banned novelty pig calendars and toys lest they offend Muslims. Workers in the benefits department at Dudley Council, West Midlands, for example, were told to remove or cover up all pig-related items, including toys, porcelain figures, calendars and even a tissue box featuring Winnie the Pooh and Piglet.

In West Yorkshire, the Park Road Junior Infant and Nursery School in Batley has banned stories featuring pigs, including "The Three Little Pigs," in case they offend Muslim children.

In Nottingham, the Greenwood Primary School cancelled a Christmas nativity play because it interfered with the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha. In Scarborough, the Yorkshire Coast College removed the words Christmas and Easter from their calendar not to offend Muslims. In Scotland, the Tayside Police Department apologized for featuring a German shepherd puppy as part of a campaign to publicize its new non-emergency telephone number. The postcards are potentially offensive to the city's 3,000-strong Muslim community: Islamic legal tradition says that dogs are impure.

The British Girl Scout Association has designed new uniforms especially for Muslims students, who had "issues" with the existing range of clothing.

In Sheffield, a five-year-old girl had her passport form rejected when an official said the bare shoulders on her photograph could offend Muslims.

Muslim doctors and nurses in Britain are now allowed to opt out of strict hygiene rules introduced by the National Health Service to restrict the spread of hospital superbugs. The change was made after female Muslims objected to being required to expose their arm below the elbow under guidance introduced to reduce the number of patients who were falling ill, and even dying, from bacteria.

Meanwhile, in South Yorkshire, an elderly woman in a nursing home died after she suffered a fall and was left lying on the floor bleeding because the Muslim nurse, Abdul Bhutto, said he had to finish his prayers before he could help the woman.

In Oldham, a breastfeeding mother was evicted from a waiting room in city hall (aka a "multicultural" building) to avoid offending Muslims. British law allows nursing mothers to breastfeed in public.

In Glasgow, a Christian radio show host was fired after a debate between a Muslim and a Christian on whether Jesus is "the way, the truth and the life." In Birmingham, two Christians were told by police "you can't preach here, this is a Muslim area." In Cheshire, two students at the Alsager High School were punished by their teacher for refusing to pray to Allah as part of their religious education class. Also in Cheshire, a 14-year-old Roman Catholic girl who attends Ellesmere Port Catholic High School was branded a truant by teachers for refusing to dress like a Muslim and visit a mosque.

In Liverpool, a Christian couple was forced to sell their hotel after a female Muslim guest accused the pair of insulting her during a debate about Islam. In London, Rory Bremner, a political comedian, said that every time he writes a sketch about Islam, he fears that he is signing his own death warrant. Also in London, Scotland Yard says that Muslims who launch a shoe at another person are not committing a crime because the practice is Islamic symbolism.

In Kent, police have been banned from asking for a person's "Christian" name, in case this request offends Muslims. The Kent Police Department's 62-page 'Faith and Culture Resource' guide tells officers to use "personal and family name" instead of "Christian" name.

In East London, all elected members of Tower Hamlets town council were told not to eat during daylight hours in town hall meetings during the Muslim month of Ramadan. Special arrangements were also made to disrupt council meetings to allow for Muslim prayer. Meanwhile, the council renamed a staff Christmas party as a "festive meal."

In Leicester, a gang of Somali Muslim women who assaulted and nearly killed a non-Muslim passer-by in the city center walked free after a politically correct judge decided that as Muslims, the women were "not used to being drunk."

Elsewhere in Britain, a foster mother was struck off the social services register for allowing a Muslim girl in her care to convert to Christianity. Officials insist the woman, who has looked after more than 80 children in the past ten years, failed in her duty to preserve the girl's religion and should have tried to stop the baptism. They ruled that the girl, 17, should stay away from church for six months.

In London, the Harrow Council provoked a storm of protest after announcing plans to offer Islamic halal-only menus in the borough's 52 state primary schools. Parents are outraged that meat prepared according to Islamic Sharia law is being pushed on non-Muslim children. Meanwhile, most of the in-flight meals on British Airways could soon be halal. The airline also says Muslim staff may wear veils, but Christian employees may not wear crosses.

In West Yorkshire, an electrician working for a housing association in Wakefield was told he would be fired for placing a small palm cross on the dashboard of his van. His employer said the cross could be offensive to Muslims: "Wakefield and District Housing has a stance of neutrality. We now have different faiths, new emerging cultures. We have to be respectful of all views and beliefs."

In London, a Christian employee at Heathrow Airport was fired for exposing a campaign of systematic harassment by fundamentalist Muslims.

In Leicester, furious Muslims demanded that Walkers, a British snack food manufacturer owned by PepsiCo, demanded that the company change its packaging labels after it emerged that certain varieties of its potato chips contain small amounts of trace alcohol to extract certain flavors.

Across Britain, Muslim bus and taxi drivers are telling blind passengers that they cannot bring their "unclean" dogs on board. The problem of prohibiting guide dogs on religious grounds has become so widespread that the matter was recently raised in the House of Lords.

In Reading, one pensioner, a cancer sufferer, was repeatedly confronted by drivers and asked to get off the bus because of his guide dog. He also faced hostility at a hospital and in a supermarket over the animal. In Nottingham, a Muslim taxi driver refused to carry a blind man because he was accompanied by his guide dog. The taxi driver was later fined £300 ($470).

In Stafford, a Muslim taxi driver refused to carry an elderly blind couple from a grocery store because they were accompanied by their seeing-eye dog. In Tunbridge Wells, Kent, a blind man was turned away from an Indian restaurant because the owner said it was against his Muslim beliefs to allow dogs into his establishment.

In London, a bus driver prevented a woman from boarding a bus with her dog because there was a Muslim lady on the bus who "might be upset by the dog." As the woman attempted to complain, the doors closed and the bus drove away. When a second bus arrived, she again tried to embark, but was stopped again, this time because the driver said he was Muslim.

In Britain, police sniffer dogs trained to spot terrorists at train stations may no longer come into contact with Muslim passengers, following complaints that it was offensive to their religion. Sniffer dogs used by police to search mosques and Muslim homes are now being fitted with leather bootees to cover their paws so they do not cause offense.

In British prisons, radical Muslim gangs are imposing Sharia law on non-Muslim inmates, who have been forced to stop playing Western music, take down pictures of women from their cells and stop eating sausage. The gangs are also targeting non-Muslim inmates for forced conversions to Islam.

In Leeds, more than 200 Muslim inmates at a high security prison are set to launch a multi-million pound claim for compensation after they were offered ham sandwiches during the month of Ramadan. They say their human rights were breached when they were offered the meat, which is forbidden by Islam. At the same time, Muslim sex offenders serving time in British prisons are asking to be exempt from a prison treatment program because the idea that "criminals should not have to talk about their offenses" is a "legitimate Islamic position."

Meanwhile, Muslim prisoners in Britain are being given fresh clothes and bedding after sniffer dogs search their cells. The inmates say their bedclothes and prison uniforms must be changed according to Islamic law if they have come anywhere near dog saliva. Government rules mean prison wardens must hand out replacement sets after random drug searches to avoid religious discrimination claims. The dogs have also been banned from touching copies of the Islamic holy book the Koran and other religious items. Prisoners now receive special bags to protect the articles.

At the same time, the British government has spent thousands of pounds of taxpayer money to rebuild prison toilets so that Muslim inmates do not have to use them while facing Mecca. Islam prohibits Muslims from facing or turning their backs on the Kiblah — the direction of prayer — when they visit the lavatory. After pressure from Muslim, who claimed they had to sit sideways on prison WCs, the Home Office agreed to turn the existing toilets 90 degrees.

Muslims attending the 2012 Olympic Games in London will be relieved to learn that toilet facilities at London's Olympic Park are being built so they will not have to face Mecca while sitting on the loo.

Nevertheless, the 2012 London Olympics have been plunged into controversy by the discovery that the Games will clash with Ramadan. In 2012, Ramadan will take place from July 21 to August 20, while the Olympics run from July 27 to August 12. Muslims have asked for the games to be rescheduled.

Contact Laura at LEL817@yahoo.com

WSJ Misleads About PA-Israel Talks

P.A. Prime Min. Fayad was negotiating with PM Netanyahu. Suddenly the Arab leader pulled out. He said he hadn't the stomach for negotiating when a thousand convicted Arab prisoners were starting a hunger strike to protest their conditions in Israeli prisons (A WSJ roundup, 4/18/12, p.12).

That statement of prisoner intent is misleading. It implies something overly harsh for convicted Arab terrorists in Israeli prisons. There isn't. But by taking the Arab word for it, many Western journalists and, increasingly, those of the Wall St. Journal, put in a blow for jihadist propaganda against Israel.

Part of terrorist training is to complain falsely about how they are treated after capture. Actually, Arab prisoners pursue higher education in Israeli prisons. We are not talking about ordinary criminals expected to take their place in Israeli civilian life; higher education for them would benefit the country. We are talking about fanatics making war on Israel because it is run by Jews, and they hate Jews. This is the motive for jihad that the folks who worry about human rights and hate-speech never seem to detect.

We are not talking about torture, either. Torture is what happens in P.A. prisons. Torture is common in totalitarian areas. Among the Arabs, it seems to be a form of recreation. In any case, this week Palestinian Arabs were protesting torture by P.A. police of the Arab who sold his house to Jews in Hebron. Reportedly, the marks still show.

Americans protest when they have grievances. They imagine the Arabs do, too. They imagine incorrectly. The Arabs do not have grievances against Israel. They have defamatory accusations. The Nazis and Communists had their pretended grievances, too, really pretexts for violence. Sometimes convicted Arab terrorists abuse family visits to smuggle in contraband or to smuggle out instructions for terrorist organizations. Then Israel discontinues those privileges for a while. Privileges, I call them, because terrorists are not POWS entitled to them.

By contrast, prisoners of Arab terrorists often are POWs, entitled to certain decent treatment. Not only are they deprived of family visits, they may get no word from or to families. They not only do not get opportunities for higher education, they may be held bound, gagged, and blindfolded.

You say you don't believe in miracles, good ones or bad ones? I think it is a miracle, a bad one, that Western governments, media, and people sympathize with the Arabs and denounce Israel.

Britain Admits Ignoring P.A. Incitement to Violence

British Foreign Office Minister for the Middle East Alistair Burt told the House of Commons that his office has not received any news on P.A. compliance with its agreement to end incitement to violence against Jews. He added, "Our officials in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem have not had any discussions with the P.A. on this issue."

Britain admits not having discussed those serious violations by the P.A. with the P.A.. Clearly, Britain makes its policies on the P.A., peace-making, and Israel without regard to P.A. efforts for terrorism and against peace. Indeed, the British government praises the P.A. for fighting terrorism, although it promotes both. Britain "should be demanding that the P.A. fulfill its signed commitments to arrest terrorists, outlaw terrorist groups, and end the incitement to hated and murder in the P.A.-controlled media, mosques, schools and youth camps. It should be demanding that it cease to hold days of mourning when a Jews-killing terrorist dies."

Result of incitement? "An October 2010 Arab World for Research Development opinion poll found that an overwhelming 85% of Palestinians would oppose a peace settlement with Israel if it entailed Palestinian compromise on key issues such as the legally baseless, so-called 'right of return' of Arab refugees and their millions of descendants; Jerusalem; borders; an Jewish communities in Judea Samaria. 73% agree with the Islamic teaching that Jews must be slain.

Governments claim they want peace. Then why have they no concern for ending P.A. incitement to hatred and murder? Why doesn't the U.S. make further support for the P.A. conditional on its ending the incitement? These governments are "sending the ruinous message that the PA will pay no price for doing such things. In this way, they help to ensure that it continues." (Zionist Organization of America, news release, 4/20/12) from The Commentator [UK], April 18, 2012).

ZOA's complaint is valid. P.A. bad faith and Western hypocrisy over it is clear. Britain and the U.S. do not care about tolerance or peace. Their foreign offices simply are anti-Israel.

By not reporting P.A. bad faith and incitement to violence, the British and U.S. governments help keep their peoples naïve about the chance for peace and bear responsibility for the increasing world pressure on Israel to submit to Arab demands.

But I am not sure that if the P.A. had a price to pay if it didn't comply with its peace agreement, that it would behave better. The P.A. is fanatical. Jihadists do not honor agreements, cease their hatred, and end terrorism.

P.A. Boycotts Israel, Israel Boosts P.A.

The P.A. ordered its people not to deal directly with the Israel-Palestinian District Coordination Office (DCO) any more. Instead, they must deal only with the P.A. Liaison Office when they need something from Israel. Another order bans entry of Israeli produce into Bethlehem. This is said to be a measure of economic protectionism.

The DCO was authorized by the 1994 Cairo Agreement, to coordinate the movement of Arabs in the Territories. Arabs who want to enter Israel for work, to visit, or for medical care must apply through the DCO.

The governor of Bethlehem said the reason for the ban is to counteract Israel's efforts, he said, to undermine the P.A. He accused Israel of using DCO offices to infiltrate P.A. society. He did not define this infiltration nor cite any Israeli efforts to undermine the P.A.

Israeli officials merely suggested that the governor was trying to gain tighter P.A. control in Bethlehem. The DCO will continue to coordinate with the P.A. and local residents and businessmen.

(Khaled Abu Toameh, Yaakov Katz, The Jerusalem Post, 4/17/12 http://www.jpost.com/DiplomacyAndPolitics/Article.aspx?id=266328 in www.imra.org.il, 4/20/12).

The P.A. has a new policy said to be in support of local farmers. It seeks to remove "foreign" produce from competing with P.A. farmers.

Under this policy, the P.A. is blocking the sale of potatoes grown in Israel and sold to P.A. customs. The P.A. claims that Israelis unload cheaper potatoes on the P.A.. As a result, P.A. farmers cannot sell their own potatoes. No facts were adduced in support of the claim. Zakaria Salawdeh, dep. Director of the P.A. Agriculture Ministry said that the ban was not political.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) started to block the sale of Israeli potatoes as part of a new policy to support local farmers and remove foreign produce in the marketplace, agriculture officials said.

The P.A. asserts that its economy depends largely on agriculture. An Israeli official said that potatoes are a minor part of P.A. agriculture. Actually, Israel is trying to help the Arabs boost their produce quality to meet export standards. Israelis buy about $300 million of unprocessed fruit and vegetables from P.A. vendors, repackage them, and sell them under Israeli labels. Israelis are reluctant to buy P.A. brands. [I've reported before that P.A. produce has been found to be over-sprayed with poison. Hence it is not desirable.]

In contrast to the P.A. assertion of the importance of agriculture to its economy, Israelis say that agriculture constitutes only 9% of the P.A. GDP. Israel accepts about 60% of P.A. exports. The P.A. imports about half their produce from Israel, plus plastic for irrigation and hothouses, pesticides, and fertilizers.

For two years, the P.A. has banned produce from Jewish communities. The P.A. also banned working in Jewish communities in the Territories. [and that is political]. Israelis pay double what P.A. employers do. Hence Arabs can't afford the ban and often do not heed it (Arieh O'Sullivan, The Jerusalem Post, 04/15/2012
http://www.jpost.com/Features/InThespotlight/Article.aspx?id=266127 from www.imra.org.il, 4/20/12).

COMMENTS

It is typical of those who accuse Israel of oppressing "the poor Palestinians" not to cite particulars. They really can't. The best they can do is cite some inconveniences from security measures, but those measures are taken in defense against murderous aggression by the Arabs. Therefore those measures are the Arabs' fault.

Many and loud are the false complaints that Israel violates international law, but few and soft are the valid complaints that the P.A. violates international law and, as is the case with agriculture, P.A. peace agreements with Israel. As Prof. Steven Plaut has explained, international complaints against Israel and in favor of the Arabs are like the Nazis' phony complaints against Czechoslovakia and in favor of the Sudetenland German. Crocodile tears were shed in behalf of the Nazis, who used Czechoslovak concessions to conquer Czechoslovakia.

Just as Czechoslovakia had treated its German citizens well, so does Israel treat its P.A. non-citizens well. As we have been reporting, Israel subsidizes the P.A., makes risky efforts to boost the P.A. economy, and trains P.A. residents to be more productive. In return, what does Israel get, some appreciation? No, it gets complaints and efforts to bash the Israeli economy. It also gets foreign complaints that Israel oppresses the P.A..

Israel is foolish to try to win P.A. goodwill. The P.A. is too filled with prejudice. Israel hurts its own future by not fulfilling Jewish rights in the Territories.

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.

With the Goldstone Report delegitimized by its own author, and the failure of PA President Mahmoud Abbas to gain the UN's consent to admit "Palestine" as a state, PA leadership is making good on Abbas' threat to internationalize the Arab-Israel conflict once the PA joined the world's family of nations at the UN:

Palestine's admission to the United Nations would pave the way for the internationalization of the conflict as a legal matter, not only a political one. It would also pave the way for us to pursue claims against Israel at the United Nations, human rights treaty bodies and the International Court of Justice.

NGO-Monitor gets it right. This ploy to create a faux legal reality and spurious international recognition for the fiction of a Palestinian state is in reality just another hostile assault against Israel, an assault aided and abetted by a host of international NGOs whose original humanitarian missions and noble aims have been transmogrified into a disgraceful collusion with thedeeply evil Arab and Muslim forces that seek Israel's destruction and the genocide of its Jews:

"Throughout this process, the ICC — created to punish the worst perpetrators of war crimes and mass murder — was exploited by several EU- and European-government funded non-governmental organizations (NGOs), which intensively lobbied the OTP [Office of the (ICC) Prosecutor] as part of their campaign to attack the legitimacy of the State of Israel," says Anne Herzberg, legal advisor for NGO Monitor. "The NGOs Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Al Haq, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, Federation Internationale des Ligues des Droits de l'Homme (FIDH), and Adalah campaigned at the ICC in support of the Palestinian Authority's political goals. This clearly was contradictory to the spirit and substance of peace negotiations."

It is important to recognize that these Arab political and legal machinations regarding the PA are pure farce. The PA leaders and their terrorist allies have made it clear numerous times that they do not want a state alongside of Israel. They want a state instead of Israel. They want a "one-state solution," "Palestine from the river to the sea:" no room for a Jewish state in that vision of the future.

Had they ever really wanted a state alongside of Israel they could have had it 31 times since 1937. But Arab leadership, and myriad rank-and-file followers, chose every time to reject offers for Palestinian statehood, and for peace and co-existence with Israel, in favor of war, terrorism, and an endless, relentless campaign of delegitimization and demonization of Israel and of Jews.

Therefore, as much as we can rejoice in this recent lawfare victory, we need to keep it in perspective and be mindful of the dynamic of the past 75 years. Thanks to Arab oil wealth, a tragically compromised UN, anti-Semitism revived in the EU, much of mainstream media, and a host of enablers and allies among international and local NGOs, Abbas will have other opportunities to wage lawfare against Israel.

In fact, the ICC prosecutor has already instructed Abbas (perhaps inadvertently) as to how to go about doing exactly that. Luis Moreno-Ocampo was careful to describe to the PA the two circumstances under which another PA request could be honored by his court. If the UN Security Council would make a referral regarding the court's jurisdiction over the PA, or if the Assembly of States Parties (the states that have recognized the ICC's jurisdiction) were to resolve the legal issue regarding article 12 of the Rome Statute, which limits the ICC's jurisdiction, then the ICC could consider the PA's allegations. With these opportunities in mind, the PA legal counsel and allied NGOs can go back to the drawing boards and prepare for the next hostile lawfare assault against Israel.

Will our next president instruct the American ambassador to the United Nations to veto any UN Security Council resolution for such a referral? Will he or she urge the Assembly of States Parties to validate article 12 of the Rome Statute as it now stands?

Contact Barbara Sommer at lsommer_1_98@yahoo.com

Jerusalem - an Introduction

This article was written by Mitchell Bard and archived at
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/Jerusalem.html

Ever since King David made Jerusalem the capital of Israel 3,000 years ago, the city has played a central role in Jewish existence. The Western Wall in the Old City - the last remaining wall of the ancient Jewish Temple, the holiest site in Judaism - is the object of Jewish veneration and the focus of Jewish prayer. Three times a day for thousands of years Jews have prayed "To Jerusalem, thy city, shall we return with joy," and have repeated the Psalmist's oath: "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning."

By contrast, Jerusalem was never the capital of any Arab entity. In fact, it was a backwater for most of Arab history. Jerusalem never served as a provincial capital under Muslim rule nor was it ever a Muslim cultural centre. For Jews, the entire city is sacred, but Muslims revere a site - the Dome of the Rock - not the city. "To a Muslim," observed British writer Christopher Sykes, "there is a profound difference between Jerusalem and Mecca or Medina. The latter are holy places containing holy sites." Besides the Dome of the Rock, he noted, Jerusalem has no major Islamic significance.

Meanwhile, Jews have been living in Jerusalem continuously for nearly two millennia. They have constituted the largest single group of inhabitants there since the 1840's (See map of Jerusalem in 1912). Today, the total population of Jerusalem is approximately 850,000. The Jewish population in areas formerly controlled by Jordan exceeds 160,000, outnumbering Palestinians in "Arab" Jerusalem.

When the United Nations took up the Palestine question in 1947, it recommended that all of Jerusalem be internationalised. The Vatican and many predominantly Catholic delegations pushed for this status, but a key reason for the UN decision was the Soviet Bloc's desire to embarrass Transjordan's King Abdullah and his British patrons.

The Jewish Agency, after much soul-searching, agreed to accept internationalisation in the hope that in the short-run it would protect the city from bloodshed and the new state from conflict. Since the partition resolution called for a referendum on the city's status after 10 years, and Jews comprised a substantial majority, the expectation was that the city would later be incorporated into Israel. The Arab states were as bitterly opposed to the internationalisation of Jerusalem as they were to the rest of the partition plan. Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, subsequently, declared that Israel would no longer accept the internationalization of Jerusalem. (cont. below)

Food for Thought by Steven Shamrak

Most politicians in democratic countries are functioning as a prostitute! They bow to the demands of the pay-masters, who finance their political carriers and take care of them after retirement from politics. At the same time, in order to be elected and re-elected, politicians are acutely attuned to the attitude of main-street voters. Most of us have no resources to become political pay-masters, but we can influence the views and political awareness of Israeli voters and members of Jewish communities.
Anti-Semitic Bastardy of the White House http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/154641

The White House said that despite the plea by President Shimon Peres to free Jonathan Pollard, who is being treated for an illness, the US has no intention of releasing him. (Yes, anti-Semitism! Even Soviet spies were not held in US prison as long as the Jewish guy. He gave Israel information about Israel's enemies, which was withheld by the US, Israel's 'friendly' ally.)

Will Iran Get the Message? http://www.debka.com/article/21907/

At least 200 American and Arab Gulf fighter-bombers participated in the biggest air force exercise ever conducted in the Gulf region, taking off from the *USS Enterprise *and *USS Abraham Lincoln*. 100 were contributed by the Saudi, UAE, Kuwaiti and Bahraini air forces. They are simulating war with Iran and an operation for reopening the strategic Straits of Hormuz if it is closed by Tehran.

FBI: Foreign Spies Infecting US Campuses http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/154658

"We have intelligence and cases indicating that US universities are indeed a target of foreign intelligence services," Frank Figliuzzi, FBI assistant director for counterintelligence - spying on the United States, in addition to Muslim academics' activities against Israel and often promoting terror. Foreign intelligence agencies find universities an "ideal place to find recruits, propose and nurture ideas, learn and even steal research data, or place trainees," according to a 2011 FBI report.

Regime Change is an Option http://www.wnd.com/2012/04/shah-of-irans-exiled-son-seeks-israels-help/?cat_orig=world

The exiled son of the toppled shah of Iran called on Israel not to bomb his home country, but rather to help the opposition to the ruling system, in an interview aired on Israeli television. Prince Reza Pahlavi said that bombing Iran would play into the hands of the regime. Instead, he appealed for help, saying the Jewish state should put its "technological, financial and other resources at our disposal."

PA Minister: 'Palestinians' Must Unite to Destroy Israel

PA Minister of Social Affairs Majida Al-Masri called for 'Palestinian' unity in order "to turn to the struggle for the liberation of Palestine - all of Palestine.'" It has been extensively proven http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=466that when the 'Palestinians' refer to liberating "all of Palestine," they mean all of Israel, not merely areas outside of the Green Line. (No ambiguity here! Enemies of the Jewish state have a clear objective, which has not changed. It is time for Israel to set Jewish national goals and free all Eretz-Israel from enemy occupation!)

They Hate Each Other More

Sunni Bahrain is wielding knives and sticks attacked Shia villagers. A gasoline pipe bomb injured seven policemen, men from Sunni neighbourhoods. (Focus on Israel is the only thing that keeps Muslim countries from destroying each other)

Iran has no Plan to Abandon its Nuclear Program http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/04/2012410152428706957.html

President of Iran Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Iran has enough oil saved up to manage "easily" for two to three years without any oil sales. Ahmadinejad said his country would be able to withstand a complete embargo. Ahmadinejad's remarks came days before the resumption of talks with world powers on Tehran's nuclear program. The European Union is set to impose a total embargo on Iranian crude oil from July following similar measures imposed by the United States to try to force Iran to abandon uranium enrichment. (Embargo is ineffective delay tactic, set in order to prevent Israel's strike of Iran's nuclear targets!)

Quote of the Week:

"State Department Spokeswoman Victoria Nuland refused to say what the capital of Israel is. It was ironic because anyone who visits the consulate knows that the US's position on Jerusalem is in perfect alignment with that of Israel's worst enemies... "the US Consulate General in Jerusalem is the only US consulate in the world that is not subordinate to the embassy in the country where it is located." - Caroline Glick
http://www.carolineglick.com/e/2012/03/the-state-departments-jerusale.php

Jerusalem In Our Times - an Introduction
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/Jerusalem.html

by Mitchell Bard

In May 1948, Jordan invaded and occupied east Jerusalem, dividing the city for the first time in its history, and driving thousands of Jews - whose families had lived in the city for centuries - into exile. For the next 19 years, the city was split, with Israel establishing its capital in western Jerusalem and Jordan occupying the eastern section, which included the Old City and most religious shrines...

After the Arab states' rejection of UN Resolution 181 and, on December 11, 1948, UN Resolution 194, establishing the UN Conciliation Commission for Palestine (effectively losing any legal right to claim Jewish land as their own), Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion declared that Israel would no longer accept the internationalisation of Jerusalem. The UN passed one more resolution on the subject in 1949 and tried, but failed to adopt resolutions in 1950 and 1952, and then did not address Jerusalem again until it was captured by Israel in the 1967 War.

In 1950, Jordan annexed all the territory it occupied west of the Jordan River, including East Jerusalem. The other Arab countries denied formal recognition of the Jordanian move, and the Arab League considered expelling Jordan from membership...

From 1948-67, the city was divided between Israel and Jordan. Israel made western Jerusalem its capital; Jordan occupied the eastern section. Because Jordan - like all the Arab states at the time - maintained a state of war with Israel, the city became, in essence, two armed camps, replete with concrete walls and bunkers, barbed-wire fences, minefields and other military fortifications.

In violation of the 1949 Armistice Agreement, Jordan denied Israelis access to the Temple Wall and to the cemetery on the Mount of Olives, where Jews have been burying their dead for 2,500 years. Jordan actually went further and desecrated Jewish holy places. King Hussein permitted the construction of a road to the Intercontinental Hotel across the Mount of Olives cemetery. Hundreds of Jewish graves were destroyed by a highway that could have easily been built elsewhere. The gravestones, honouring the memory of rabbis and sages, were used by the engineer corps of the Jordanian Arab Legion as pavement and latrines in army camps (inscriptions on the stones were still visible when Israel liberated the city). The ancient Jewish Quarter of the Old City was ravaged, 58 Jerusalem synagogues were destroyed or ruined, others were turned into stables and chicken coops. Slum dwellings were built abutting the Western Wall. (There was no international outcry then!)

Jews were not the only ones who found their freedom impeded. Under Jordanian rule, Israeli Christians were subjected to various restrictions, with only limited numbers allowed to visit the Old City and Bethlehem at Christmas and Easter. Jordan also passed laws imposing strict government control on Christian schools, including restrictions on the opening of new schools; state controls over school finances and appointment of teachers and requirements that the Koran be taught. Christian religious and charitable institutions were also barred from purchasing real estate in Jerusalem. Because of these repressive policies, many Christians emigrated from Jerusalem, leading their numbers to dwindle from 25,000 in 1949 to less than 13,000 in June 1967. (The Christian world was silent - but they are vocal about 'poor' Palestinians now!)

In 1967, Jordan ignored Israeli pleas to stay out of the Six-Day War and attacked the western part of the city. The Jordanians were routed by Israeli forces and driven out of East Jerusalem, allowing the city's unity to be restored.

Steven Shamrak was born in the former Soviet Union (USSR) and participated in the Moscow Zionist "refusenik" movement and currently lives in Melbourne, Australia. He publishes internet editorial letters on the Arab-Israeli conflict. He can be reached by email at StevenShamrak.e@gmail.com

The International Solidarity Movement (ISM), made more famous by its activist's confrontation with an IDF soldier, is known as a left-wing pacifist group, but its sole mission in backing "Palestine" is to defame Israel. Whether it qualifies as being "pacifist" depends on whether the definition includes backing the Hamas terrorist organization and Arab "resistance."

The activist from Denmark was one of approximately two dozen bicyclists stopped by the IDF at a checkpoint in the Jordan Valley on Saturday. During a two-hour confrontation, an IDF officer said he suffered wounds, including broken bones, at the hands of the activists who beat him with sticks. The ISM edited a film that showed the officer rifle-butting the activist, leading to as media outcry and a suspension of the officer pending a further investigation.

Mainstream media describe the ISM as a pacifist group supporting the "Palestinian cause," but the group includes anarchists who openly support terrorists.

"The International Solidarity Movement (ISM) is an organization focused on assisting the Palestinian cause in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict using nonviolent protest," according to Wikipedia.

Non-violence may have been a principle of its Israeli and Arab and American founders, but if so, traces of it barely exist.

Its own website says it is a "Palestinian-led movement committed to resisting the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land using nonviolent, direct-action methods and principles".

However, its mission statement also recognizes "armed struggle" as the "right" of Palestinian Authority Arabs.

"As enshrined in international law and UN resolutions, we recognize the Palestinian right to resist Israeli violence and occupation via legitimate armed struggle. However, we believe that nonviolence can be a powerful weapon in fighting oppression and we are committed to the principles of nonviolent resistance," according to the ISM.

The group insists is does not condone or support terror, but one of its articles stated, "Non-violent resistance is no less noble than carrying out a suicide operation."

Asked by a CNN interviewer if that could be understood as promoting suicide bombings, two ISM leaders tried to explain, "The article that we wrote was actually in response to another article written by a Palestinian, who said the Palestinians could not be nonviolent..."

"There already is violence. We're not advocating it. It's already there. It's on the ground. We're working with people and with Palestinians who want to promote nonviolence, and that was the context of the whole article."

The Israeli Foreign Ministry has said that two terrorists involved in a suicide bombing at a restaurant had "links with foreign left wing activists and members of the International Solidarity Movement."

Part of the ISM non-violence is to use themselves as "human shields" as in the case of Rachel Corrie, who was overrun and killed while trying to block an IDF bulldozer.

Other non-violent tactics that actually promote violence include removing Israeli military checkpoints and roadblocks, violating curfew orders, using incitement through slogans painted on the security fence along Judea and Samaria, entering closed military zones and trying to break the maritime embargo aimed at preventing the support of Hamas terrorists in Gaza.

Several ISM activists have suffered wounds by participating in violent protests against the IDF, although Wikipedia quotes ISM volunteer Joe Carr as stating that Israeli soldiers try not to harm them.

Lesser known incidents include an Italian ISM activist kidnapped and killed by Gaza terrorists.

ISM activists' tactic of avoiding terrorism often disguises what the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center in Israel says is their having "abetted the grave wave of terrorism that deluged Israel in the last decade] ... and disrupted the IDF's counterterrorism activities."

In the United States, the ISM supports "The U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation" that includes groups promoting revolution and Marxism.

"The ISM has built a network across our nation's colleges," according to investigative journalist Lee Kaplan. He added, "Campus 'clubs' such as the Students for Justice in Palestine and the Muslim Students Union, both ISM affiliates, are found at every major campus where they support the goals of terror groups like Hamas.

ISM activists also supported the terror-linked IHH flotilla from Turkey to Gaza two years ago before IDF commandos, backed by international law, tried to convince the crew to change course. IHH terrorists on the Mavi Mamara ship brutally attacked commandos as they rappelled onto the deck from a hovering helicopter. Nine terrorist were killed in the clash after the IHH members kidnapped and seriously wounded three of the soldiers.

Kaplan has written, "In addition to supporting Hamas, ISM activists assist the cause of Iran, not only in its campaign against a U.S. ally, Israel, but also to aid Iran's geopolitical goals against the United States.

Contact Barbara Sommer at lsommer_1_98@yahoo.com

(JTA) -- Imagine if the NAACP responded with skepticism to the passage of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and urged African Americans to exercise their civil rights cautiously under this law. Title VI was landmark legislation when it was passed in 1964 to remedy racial and ethnic discrimination in programs receiving federal funding.

In fact, the NAACP fought for Title VI's passage and has vigorously sought to enforce it to uphold the right of African Americans to be free from discrimination.

Jewish students are facing their own serious problems of harassment and discrimination at schools receiving federal funding. After a six-year campaign by the Zionist Organization of America, the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights, or OCR, finally clarified in October 2010 that Jewish students finally would be afforded the same protection from harassment and discrimination under Title VI that other minorities have enjoyed for close to 50 years.

Yet instead of embracing the new legal protection, some in the Jewish community have been strangely critical of it.

The Jewish Council for Public Affairs describes itself as "the representative voice of the organized American Jewish community" in the Jewish community relations field. Its national member agencies include the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee and more than 100 Jewish community relations councils throughout the country.

A year after the Office for Civil Rights' policy clarification, the JCPA proposed a resolution regarding Title VI. Instead of praising the new policy and committing to a nationwide campaign to educate Jewish students and university officials about students' right to be protected from anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination under Title VI, the JCPA resolution tried to impose unreasonably harsh standards on when Jewish students should use the law to rectify a hostile anti-Semitic school environment -- stricter even than the standards that the Office for Civil Rights applies.

Critics of the new Title VI policy have paid little attention to the fact that the policy has already shown its value. University of California President Mark Yudof recently issued a public statement in which he condemned anti-Semitic harassment on the UC campuses. This month, Rutgers University President Richard McCormick issued a statement publicly condemning a student paper, The Medium, for falsely claiming that an article mocking the Holocaust had been written by a vocal Jewish, pro-Israel student. McCormick said that "no individual student should be subject to such a vicious, provocative, and hurtful piece, regardless of whether First Amendment protections apply to such expression."

Significantly, McCormick had failed to condemn previous anti-Semitic incidents on campus. It is likely that OCR's Title VI policy, which recommends that university leaders label certain incidents as anti-Semitic, played a role in the decisions of both McCormick and Yudof to speak out. Surely also at play was the fact that there are Title VI investigations pending against their schools.

The David Project recently issued a report about rethinking Israel advocacy on campus. Curiously, the report cautions that "legitimate efforts to combat campus anti-Semitism could be complicated by overly aggressive complaints" under Title VI. But what are "legitimate efforts"? And what does the David Project mean by "overly aggressive"?

Only weeks after the Office for Civil Rights issued its new Title VI policy, the ZOA was able to use it effectively without even filing a complaint with the OCR. We contacted officials at a Maine high school where there was longstanding anti-Semitic harassment and informed them of their Title VI obligations. The school acted on nearly all our recommendations and rectified the situation.

Would the David Project consider our actions legitimate or overly aggressive? What if school officials had refused to fix the problems? Would a Title VI complaint then have been legitimate?

It is difficult to understand why members of the Jewish community are skeptical of a critical new legal tool under Title VI or why they are sending a cautious message about using it. We should be fully supportive of Jewish students and holding schools accountable when they don't respond to campus anti-Semitism.

It's time for us to stop being "shah-still" frightened Jews of the previous generation and start strongly speaking out on behalf of our Jewish brethren when necessary.

Contact Barbara Sommer at lsommer_1_98@yahoo.com

Raid Iran? Beware Poor Arguments

Should Israel or the U.S. raid Iran and how? A host of facts and judgments about this can bewilder one.

In the end, decisions require judgment. Some of the arguments seem to be to be poor judgment. Fareed Zakaria's, for example.

President Obama tries to tamp down war sentiment, while PM Netanyahu tries to ramp it up, writes Mr. Zakaria. Pres. Obama's motive may be partly electoral, part of his usual appeasement of Radical Islam, and part of his desire to end U.S. initiatives. One would not know of those motives from Mr. Zakaria's essay.

About threatening military strikes, Mr. Zakaria finds that Pres. Obama has amped up what he earlier had tamped down. Why ramp it up, now? Escaping Mr. Zakaria's notice is an Obama administration campaign to undermine any Israeli intention to raid Iran, party by insisting the U.S. would raid it if necessary. Pres. Obama has reversed himself so frequently on so many topics and has misrepresented his plans and other people's so much, that he warrants no credibility. Neither does anyone who believes Obama sincere.

As for Republicans, they would "instantly denounce any negotiated solution..." They might and they might not. How does Mr. Zakaria know? Don't know, don't insist.

Then Mr. Zakaria claims there are no serious discussions of negotiated outcomes. There have been discussions, negotiations, or UN inspections for years. For 20 years, Iran has been backing and filling, saying yes then no, agreeing and violating, denying it is building nuclear weapons but threatening to incinerate Israel. Meanwhile, Iran persists in barbaric terrorism, a war crime.

Like North Korea, Iran negotiates in bad faith in order to gain the time to develop nuclear weapons or gain other concessions. Mr. Zakaria would have us to continue to be suckers. Now that Iran is only months away from having such weapons, perhaps weeks, negotiations cannot conclude anything required in time. Nor could Iran be believed. To expect useful results from negotiations is naïve if not suspect.

Yes, Iran is not likely to back down just because Israel demands that it surrender its program for nuclear weaponry.

According to Mr. Zakaria, it is a fact that Iran has no nuclear weapons now. How can he be sure of that? He also finds it unclear whether Iran intends to get them. "The U.S. intelligence community has twice concluded that there is no evidence that Iran has made a decision to build nuclear weapons." "On the other hand, the International Atomic Agency recently suggested that Iran could be working on some military aspects of a program."

Iran could be? Enough evidence has been found to indicate well that Iran has been working on nuclear triggers, nuclear-capable warheads, and enrichment beyond ordinary civilian use of nuclear fuel.

There may be some weasel wording in the claim that Iran has not decided to build nuclear weapons. If it decided to get all the parts ready to be assembled in a couple of weeks, that is tantamount to having the weapons.

Suppose it gets the weapons. Mr. Zakaria think that does not mean, contrary to Pres. Obama's warning, that other countries would follow suit. South Korea and Japan have not followed North Korea's example. Nor did Arab states such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, after Israel developed the capability of having nuclear weapons. Egypt has no conflict with Iran.

All that the U.S. has to do to prevent a Mideast nuclear arms race is to give the other countries a nuclear guarantee. Does anybody but Mr. Zakaria still think that a U.S. guarantee means anything, any more?

The analogies presented are not comparable. S. Korea and Japan are civilized, the Arab countries are much more violent. Egypt has no conflict with Iran, but Saudi Arabia does. Indeed, all of Iran's neighbors fear Iranian hegemony.

Another example is that of India and Pakistan. They warred before gaining nuclear weapons, not any more. Actually, Pakistan is warring against Afghanistan, gateway from India, and against India by supporting terrorist organizations. Who knows how long their restraint will last?

Deriding the notion of deterrence, Mr. Zakaria asks that if Israel doubts that nuclear deterrence works, why does it retain a nuclear capability? Specious logic! Israel might deter an existential threat when its enemies lack a nuclear comeback. Once Iran got nuclear weapons, Israel would lose its deterrent. An Iranian leader speculated that Iran could absorb Israel's nuclear strikes, but Israel could not absorb one from Iran. Why didn't Mr. Zakaria take up that point?

Doubting that nuclear weapons would fall into terrorist hands, Mr. Zakaria asks why would Iran, having suffered sanctions and costs, turn nuclear weapons over to terrorists. Here is why it might. If terrorists struck with nuclear weapons, Iran could deny having given them the weapons. Iran does use terrorist proxies to make war and to commit war crimes.

To expect Iran to use nuclear weapons assumes "that the Iranians are mad, messianic people bent on committing mass suicide." No, it assumes that the leaders are messianic, not mad. Leaders have explained their religious beliefs as including the appearance of the Hidden Mahdi if conflict is great enough, and that they don't need to survive if they eliminate Israel and Islam survives. They believe in an afterlife better than this one (Time Magazine, 3/19/12m p.16).

One should consider the many pros and cons to a nuclear raid on Iran. I think that Mr. Zakaria's pros and cons are not among them.

Sermon Urges Jordan to Defeat Israel

In a mosque sermon rebroadcast on Jordan TV, 3/23/12, Ghaleb Rabab'a said, "the Jordanian Army is invincible, Jerusalem will be regained, the arrogance of the Jews will be defeated." The rest of the message emphasized Islamic religion.

(MEMRI, 4/12/12, Special Dispatch No.4653
http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/6273.htm via IMRA, www.imra.org.il, 4/12/12.)

By "arrogance of the Jews," I think the Muslim refers to Israeli resistance to the Muslims. Considering themselves to have divine entitlement to rule, they think Jews arrogant for not submitting. The Jordanian cleric's behavior fits my definition of arrogance.

The Real Islam

Sheikh Abdul Aziz bin Abdullah is the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia. He also is President of the Supreme Council of Ulema and Chairman of the Standing Committee for Scientific Research and Issuing of Fatwas. He is Saudi Arabia's most authoritative Islalmic official.

The Grand Mufti answered a question with a fatwa: It is "necessary to destroy all the churches of the region." That region is the whole Arabian Peninsula, including Kuwait, where his questioner is form.

The fatwa is based on the tradition of the prophet declaring that there must not be two religions in the Peninsula.

When ordinary people, such as a fringe pastor who wants to burn a Koran, "offends" Islam, the West [and Muslims] gets hysterical. Imagine if the Pope were to declare that all mosques in Italy must be destroyed. "Sensitive" politicians would demand his apology and resignation and would call him a bigot. But when Saudi Arabia's highest religious authority demands that churches be destroyed, the West ignores his incitement to violence. That is hypocrisy [I guess the media is too busy calling Islam a religion of love and peace.]

Now, the Grand Mufti based his conclusion on a tradition. When non-Muslims, even scholarly experts, cite Islamic traditions of intolerance and violence, they are accused of being "Islamophobes" and of slander. That is another hypocrisy.

Actually, there is no mystery in understanding what Islam holds. Islam has several sources of rulings, yet the West is mystified about it. Western politicians are addled instead of alert.

Every month, Muslims destroy churches. Shouldn't there be an outcry? (Raymond Ibrahim, Jihad Watch, 3/14/12 http://www.meforum.org/3191/saudi-church-destruction)

Does Israel Boost P.A. Economy or Oppress the Arabs?

PM Netanyahu again urged the P.A. to negotiate peace.

The P.A. economy has grown. Israel has supported economic growth in the Judea-Samaria part of the P.A.. It has removed additional check points, upgraded commercial crossings, approved projects in Area C [under complete Israeli control), issued more permits for P.A. Arabs to work in Israel, and promoted an agreement to build four electricity substations.

Israel works with the P.A. and foreign entities to upgrade the P.A. infrastructure, facilitate trade, and improve P.A. governance and economic capacity.

Israel increased its purchases from the P.A by 18.3%, and so forth.

Although security cooperation improved, terrorists continue their threat. More than a threat, there were 563 terrorist incidents from Judea-Samaria. Ten people were killed in 2011. From Gaza, there were many additional attacks.

Hard to make peace when Gaza is a terrorist base. Nevertheless, Israel tries to help Gaza recover economically, too. Israel has approved 176 foreign projects in Gaza. Israel is letting more people leave Gaza for commercial and humanitarian purposes. Gaza exported more produce, furniture, and textiles, and imported more construction materials.

Now the P.A. faces a financial crisis. Foreign aid does not suffice. The P.A. is unable to pay many suppliers. Its banking system cannot sustain its economy. The private sector has not developed enough, and the public sector employs the most people (Full report (pdf)

http://www.mfa.gov.il/NR/rdonlyres/3EA95081-06AF-4FF7-977F-338D72FD8868/0/AHLCMarch2012.pdf via www.imra.org.il 3/18/12).

By letting the P.A. build in Area C, Israel hampers its own people's growth in favor of an Arab population that wants to conquer Israel. How wise is Israel?

Arab Muslims consider religious commands and honor more important than economic growth. So the P.A. can take Israel's money and still incite its own people to attack Jews. Is Israel wise to offer the money?

In any case, Israel is offering all this help to the P.A.. In view of that fact, how do people increasingly come to say that it is Israel, not the terrorist P.A. that should be destroyed?

They complain that Israel is "oppressing" the Palestinian Arabs. They do not explain how, they just like a general accusation not backed up by facts. Fact is,Israel does not rule those Arabs, the autonomous P.A. does.

Oh, critics might contend that Israel takes "Palestinian land." What does that mean? There is no country "Palestine." So what land are they talking about? Most of the land in the P.A. is public land. Israelis legally have taken about 5% of it. Arabs have seized much of it illegally, as they do in the State of Israel. There are some disputes over land, in which Arabs usually come up with forged or invalid documents, and Jews prove ownership. The courts and police, however, usually side with the Arabs. The judges' motive is ideological — most are anti-Zionist far Leftists. The police motive is to avoid Arab riots, against which, if they defend themselves vigorously, they get punished.

Considering the many attacks on Jewish farmers, the frequent theft or destruction of crops and Jewish holy sites, and the need to drive around the most dangerous points, and up to a million Israelis now having to hide in air raid shelters when warned, a fairer statement would be that the Arabs are oppressing the Jews -- with the help of Far Leftist Jews and foreign anarchists.

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.

In mid-March some 70 or 80 NYC locals traveled to Yonkers to attend an event aimed at raising awareness and monies for the tragic wreck of Har HaZeitim in Jerusalem. The faraway though terrific Rabbi Rigoberto Emmanuel Vinas' place in the double highway-edged Lincoln Park Jewish Center, on Central Park Avenue, in Yonkers 10704, kindly hosted this peaceful, if mournfully sad, congregation of adult Jews outraged that the Israeli government annually permits hundreds of grave desecrations against this most holy cemetery, where past Israeli Prime ministers are buried, and the greats of our people are interred.

It has not a single policeman or even a cemetery gate. Think of a single cemetery in the United States that does not have sturdy gates to keep people out after hours—you won't find one. Not to mention cameras in key loci, to prevent malevolent passersby, often arabs, from at will climbing and abusing our holy greats buried there. I have been to Jerusalem's up-to-the-second police HQ, and it is like a Hollyweird set for thousands of camera eyes in the sky--there is nowhere in the Old City that is not captured and traced on thousands of these cunning police surveilling eyes everywhere.

Yet on the holiest burial site in the world, not a camera. Not a single camera to catch the paid miscreants (Shekels 1,000 to overturn tombstones and burial stones, paid by the Waqf) who depredate at will, every day.

All kovod (respect) to Rabbi Vinas for so valiantly hosting our event.

I could barely sit still for grief. And the money we gave, whatever money could have been collected from some 70 to 80 people from Manhattan and the nearby boroughs, could not amount to very much--but it is a shaming tell against the Israeli government secularists, who clearly do not give a moldy fig about safeguarding our now-deceased greats. Disrespect that is echoed at practically every Jewish holy site.

Speakers included Rabbi Vinas, a moving word-picture of the grievous state of the Mount of Olives under the present oblivious Knesset, Rabbi Jay Schoulson (Sons of Israel, Long Island City), Menachem Lubinsky (Co-Chair, International committee for the Preservation of Har HaZeitim), a strong 10-minute video presentation (of vandalism on the Mount) by the ICPHH Mission to Har HaZeitim/Jerusalem Great Synagogue Forum), the heartfelt words of the indefatigable Helen Freedman (Executive director of Americans for a Safe Israel), Abe Lubinsky (Chair of the International Committee for the Preservation of Har HaZeitim), words by Congressman Eliot Engel, and closing remarks again by Rabbi Shoulson.

Stone-throwing and worse is a given if one tries to go to a gravesite, visit Kever (the grave of) Rochel, or even spend a peaceful weekend attending the M'ora Ha'Machpaella in Hebron. The world stood by silent as the Grave of Joseph was desecrated and razed by Palestinian thugs, who paid no heed to past promises to keep it inviolate, indeed erecting a contaminating mosque atop the ruins. When the ancient statues of Bamiyan, carved in 507 ACE and 554 ACE, these monumental 6th century[1] statues of upright Buddhas carved into a cliffside 140 miles or so off northwest Kabul in the Bamyan (thus the nomenclature of Bamiyan statues) of central Afghanistan. Once sitting at an altitude of 1½ miles, 2,500 meters up (8202 feet), these religious symbols, represented a classical blended style of fabled Gandhara Art, and they were priceless.

In today's terms, they were worth millions—and several billionaires and slightly lesser financial wizards offered to dismantle, pack and ship them to their countries. No dice. They were blown up by fanatics oblivious to their priceless value from antiquity, the world lamented and bitterly resisted, some groups offering millions to redeem and transplant the millennial statuary from their ancient site to elsewhere, safe from the depredations of islamists impatient with competing religious symbology.

Nothing was done. The ageless classicism of these millennial sculptures was unceremoniously blown to smithereens without apology or recrimination from the primitives executing their rival Deities. The same way nothing is done to raze illegal mosques on Israeli-owned land near the Redemption Gate, and nothing is done to unseal the various approaches to the Golden Gates where the Messiah will reputedly come, virtually nothing, too, is done to defend these holy places.

How disconcerting we had to go all the way to Yonkers. That no one else wanted to host us.

All around, one sees determined and encroaching self-delusional dhimmitude. Tragic is not the half of it.

Marion Dreyfus is a writer and travelor; she has taught English in China on the university level.

A terrorist hurled seven firebombs at Jewish homes Sunday night in Maaleh HaZeitim, on Jerusalem's Mount of Olives.

The terrorist's face was covered. He came carrying ten firebombs and managed to throw seven of them at ground floor apartments in the compound, causing a fire to break out in one of them. The compound's security guards identified the terrorist and fired in the air, causing him to flee.

MK Aryeh Eldad (National Union) said Monday that police arrived on the scene and proceeded to question the security men over their decision to fire in the air. "The Commander of the Jerusalem District deserves to be sacked for a lot less than that," said Eldad.

Eldad wrote to the Minister of Public Security and asked him to reissue the instructions on opening fire, and to clarify that a firebomb is a deadly weapon and that whoever uses it should be fired at, with intention to hit him.

"The worst outcome of all would be if the terrorist who meant to burn Jews in their sleep will continue his actions while the security men who dared to protect the residents' lives are sacked from their jobs," he added.

1> Was Gandhi really the picture-book pacifist, or a dhimmi* Hindu Muslim 'slave'?

Text taken from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q49p-mdnX_0 received from Janet Levy who wrote: I work with a number of Hindu activists (they found me after I wrote a few articles on the jihad against Hindus) around the U.S. and the Indian sub-continent. (They have faced decades of jihad with millions murdered). One East Coast-based Hindu activist, Ravi (a Bengali) sent this:

M K Gandhi, the prophet of nonviolence, was indeed the father of politics of Muslim appeasement in India, as will be reveled in following examples. It is well known that whenever the Muslims attack a Hindu settlement, they, in addition to killing, looting and setting their houses on fire, rape the Hindu women.

Gandhi's appeasement of these horror acts of Muslims was simply mindless. In the 6 July 1926 edition of Navajivan, Gandhi wrote that "He would kiss the feet of the (Muslim) violator of the modesty of a sister" (Mahatma Gandhi, D Keer, Popular Prakashan, p. 473).

Gandhi: A Dhimmi Hindu Muslim 'Slave'

Gandhi was the textbook definition of a Dhimmi/Pacifist whose cowardice was on display during the dark days (1920s-1940s) where the Indian subcontinent witnessed large scale Islamic pogroms of Hindus.

As Muslims began raping the Hindu and Sikh women in large numbers in the course of the partition, Gandhi advised that - "If a Muslim expressed his desire to rape a Hindu or a Sikh lady, she should never refuse, but cooperate with him. She should lie down like a dead with her tongue in between her teeth. Thus the rapist Muslim would be satisfied soon and leave her". (D Lapierre and L Collins, Freedom at Midnight, p. 479).

It is not surprising that Gandhi met his end at the hands of a young Hindu Nationalist-turned-Newspaper Editor named Nathuram Godse in 1948.

Godse and his alleged accomplice (Narayan Apte, an entrepreneur-turned-Hindu activist), who were both hanged by the Government of India in 1949 after a farcical trial, are considered heroes and martyrs by large sections of Hindu society to this day.

Gandhi In His Own Words

Gandhi's Jewish Solution

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q49p-mdnX_0
"The Salvation of the Jews lies in their committing collective suicide."

In Letters to the Führer:

"Friends have been urging me to write to you. We have no doubt about your bravery or your devotion to your Fatherland. Nor do we believe that you are the monster described by your opponents."

"That I address you as friend is no Formality."

In a letter to George Orwell:

Hitler didn't just come about out of the blue. The conduct of the Jews in Germany during and after WWI helped create the conditions for Hitler's rise."

"The salvation of the Jews lies in their committing collective suicide. "

Asked to clarify this last remark, Gandhi replied:

"Suffering voluntarily undergone will bring the Jews an inner strength and joy. If the Jewish mind could be prepared for voluntary suffering, even the massacre I have imagined could be turned into a day of Thanksgiving. It is a joyful sleep to be followed by a wakening that would be all the more refreshing for the long sleep."

And What Of Gandhi's Grandson Arun?

"This holocaust" is something the Jews have been unable to shed. It is a very good example of how a community can overplay an alleged historic experience to the point that it begins to repulse friends."

"The Jews don't befriend anyone. They dominate them. They have created a culture of violence that will eventually destroy humanity."

"I think it's shameful that a peace institute would be headed by a bigot, Europhobic, Jewish suprematist, anti-gentile Abe Foxman," commented Arun.

Because of his remarks Arun Gandhi was fired from his position as president of the M.K.Gandhi Institute for Non-Violence at the University of Rochester in America, the Institute he himself had co-founded with his wife Sunanda, in 1991. University President Joel Seligman personally enacted the dismissal. (Seligman took office in 2005, Gandhi was dismissed January 25, 2008)

DHIMINI definition: Dhimini Laws in Moslem lands define the subservient relationship of non-Moslems to the Moslem majority. [For anyone choosing to research dhimini in google - pages of sites, one after the other, are completely 'scrubbed' of any alarming content but think about Wilders, think about the Intifada, think about bombed Synagogues and torched cars in France, think about the active Sharia court system in England; all occurring since Caroline Glick wrote Europe's Arab Gambit, Jan. 1, 2004.

2>In the tradition of dhimmitude

Bat Yeor, a Geneva based historian expresses a new interpretation of the history of Europe during the years since the end of WWII. Like Toynbee and the great historical theorists who preceded her, the clarity of Bat Yeor's ideas and the perfection of her expression 'put the pieces in place'. Judeo-Christian Europe has become Eurabian. The world divides between believers of the Judeo-Christian ethic in America + Israel and ? (including Hindus) vs Europe and the Muslim world.

The Muslims are at work in the US to establish their primacy, to the point of rewriting texts to show that the founding fathers fled Europe in response to the Muslims!?!!! (I reported this in a previous email as a humorous squib, but after reading Caroline Glick's article, I see that it is part of a far larger, threatening program promoting the tradition of dhimmitude — the subservience of non-Muslims to Islamic culture and expansionism.)

3>Europe's Arab Gambit

By Caroline Glick
Jan. 1, 2004 in the Jerusalem Post

Europeans and Arabs. Is the continent surrendering its Judeo-Christian roots for a 'Eurabian' alternative?

The poll conducted recently by the EU which found that Europeans consider Israel to be the single greatest threat to world peace shocked many and caused the EU's political leadership to cringe with embarrassment. And yet, according to Geneva-based historian Bat Yeor, the results are the culmination of a European policy now three decades old.

Yeor was born in Egypt and as a Jew was forced to renounce her Egyptian citizenship in 1955 when she fled with her family to Britain. In 1960 she settled in Geneva and has, over the past 30-odd years been a trailblazer in the study of how Muslims have, throughout Islamic history, mistreated their non-Muslim minorities and indeed, how Muslims today attempt to take over non-Muslim societies.

Bat Yeor was in Israel last month giving a series of lectures on her newest book, Eurabia. In it she presents her thesis that today Europe is both consciously and unconsciously surrendering its Judeo-Christian roots and embracing new cultural and political identities in which Arab and Islamic traditions, including the tradition of dhimmitude (the subservience of non-Muslims to Islamic culture and expansionism), are its central unifying themes. In line with her analysis, Yeor defines the new anti-Semitism in Europe as "an expression of the mutation of Europe into a new culture and society linked with profound cultural and religious transformations." During her visit, she discussed with the Jerusalem Post what she sees as the results of Europe's abandonment of Israel.

"After the [1962] French withdrawal from Algeria, [French President Charles] De Gaulle, who up to that point favored Israel, completely changed France's policy toward the Arab and Muslim world. There was a convergence between France's embrace of the Arabs and its attempt to weaken the Atlantic alliance with America. The Arabs were to give France strategic independence from the US. France's attempt, first through the European Economic Community and now through the European Union to create a unified European foreign policy, in competition with the US and led by France, sees European alliance with the Arab world as one of the primary sources of this strategic independence."

While, in Yeor's view, "De Gaulle's strategy was in the abstract," the European embrace of the Islamic and Arab at the expense of Israel and the US became a concrete policy in the wake of the 1973 Yom Kippur War and the subsequent OPEC oil embargo of the West.

In November 1973, French president George Pompidou and German chancellor Willy Brandt met in Paris and proclaimed a joint resolution aligning EC policy with the Arab demands against Israel. This, according to Yeor was the first official European declaration of a unified foreign policy.

"After this proclamation, the Arab League opened a formal dialogue with the EC. It was not a simple exchange between elites from the two sides. It established three bodies that would regulate European-Arab relations regarding the US, Israel and Arab immigration to Europe."

THE AIM of these joint policies was to force an Israeli withdrawal to the 1949 armistice lines, to enable free immigration of Arabs to European countries and to apply consistent pressure on the US to end its support for Israel, she says.

The main organ of this new framework was the European-Arab Dialogue, or EAD. The EAD encompassed political, parliamentary and cultural dialogues and also oversaw the European agreement to allow unimpeded immigration of millions of Arabs to Europe. According to Yeor, "the volume of this population flow was unprecedented in the history of European colonialization. And also unprecedented was the European decision to allow and encourage the new immigrants to maintain their ties to their countries of origin and thus prevent their integration into European society."

In a continuous flow of joint resolutions, Arab and European officials called for the diffusion of Arabic and Islamic culture in Europe through European universities. A pinnacle of these efforts, Yeor argues came during French President Jacques Chirac's 1996 visit to Cairo. "During that visit Chirac proclaimed that Europe and Muslims should write history together."

As to Arab cultural autonomy in Europe, the resolution of the 1975 conference of the Parliamentary Association for Euro-Arab Cooperation anchored this effort by calling for the European governments to facilitate "the creation of generous means to enable immigrant workers and their families to participate in Arab cultural and religious life." The results of these policies on Europe have, according to Yeor, been nothing short of disastrous.

"What the Europeans did not realize at the time was that their embrace of the Arab and Muslim world did not simply involve their abandonment of Israel. What they were actually destroying was themselves. "Europe is a continent built on the roots of Judeo-Christian traditions and history and values. By allowing unlimited Arab immigration and the Islamization of their universities, they were destroying their own culture.

The new culture that has taken form in Europe is one of subservience to Islam. The new religion, in the post-Christian Europe is 'Palestinianism' whose core belief is the need to destroy Israel and replace it with a Palestinian state. Palestinianism replaces a Jewish Jesus with a Muslim Jesus."

FOR ISRAEL, the European decision to merge its foreign policy with the Arab world has led to diplomatic isolation and demonization, according to Ye'or. It was in the wake of the Yom Kippur War and the increased European cooperation with the Arab League that European countries began voting against Israel in the UN and seeking to isolate it in international bodies. The 1975 UN General Assembly Resolution that equated Zionism with racism was a capstone of these efforts.

"Since the intifada broke out in 2000, the rejection of Israel and the embrace of Palestinians has taken on cult-like attributes," Yeor notes. "Every manifestation of public and political life must take up the Palestinian cause. In a very real way, the embrace of the Palestinians provides a mask for the expression of traditional European anti-Semitism."

Europe's embrace of the Arab political agenda for Israel lies, according to Yeor, at the root of European unwillingness to cooperate with the US on the war on terror. "Until September 11, Chirac and Villepin always said that the root cause of terrorism is the Israel-Arab conflict. This is of course the Arab-Islamic view. Like the Nazi vision of the centrality of Jews as the root of all evil, it is a vision long developed and adopted by Europeans.

"When George Bush said, after September 11 that 'you're either with us or with the terrorists,' he didn't understand what was going on in Europe. The truth is that for 30 years the Europeans were with the terrorists. They can't fight the Arabs; they have allowed the Arabs to dictate their policy since 1974. It is a huge problem. Part of the reason is also that they are terrified of terrorism. Their decision was to be subservient, not to fight and that has been their policy for 30 years. By attacking Israel, they believe they are saving themselves, but really, they are destroying themselves.

"Increasingly," Yeor notes, "the European-Arabian alliance has led to the increase in European anti-Americanism. For the Arabs, President Bush's quotations from the Bible and allusion to the Judeo-Christian roots of America is anathema."

Janet Lehr is editor/publisher of the daily e-mail "Israel Lives." She can be contacted at janetlehr@veredart.com

Text of a Letter from the Israeli Government

The Israeli government has issued an official "welcome" letter to the pro-'Palestinian' "flytilla" activists who plan on arriving in the country on Saturday and Sunday. See the attached picture of the letter, partially, it reads as follows:

"Dear Activists,

"We appreciate your choosing to make Israel the object of your humanitarian concerns.

"We know there were many other worthy choices.

"You could have chosen to protest the Syrian regime's daily savagery against its own people, which has claimed thousands of lives.

"You could have chosen to protest the Iranian regime's brutal crackdown on dissent and its support of terrorism throughout the world.

"You could have chosen to protest Hamas rule in Gaza, where terror organizations commit a double war crime by firing rockets at civilians and hiding behind civilians.

"But instead, you chose to protest against Israel, the Middle East's sole democracy, where women are equal, the press criticizes the government, human rights organizations can operate freely, religious freedom is protected for all - and minorities do not live in fear."

"Therefore, we suggest you solve the real problems of the region first, and then come back and share your experiences with us.

Have a nice flight."

Yuval Zaliouf writes the Truth Provider columns. To subscribe, send an email to ynz@netvision.net.il. Visit his website at www.truthprovider.com.

J Street Specialty: Anti-Israel Falsehoods

In March, J Street claimed that an Israeli strike against terrorists in Gaza killed "over a dozen" civilians. Actually, all 16 killed were terrorists. Then, when chided for its misstatement, J Street asserted that it merely had the incorrect number of civilians killed. But no civilians were killed.

It's bad enough for an organization that calls itself pro-Israel to erroneously accuse Israel of having killed a considerable number of civilians for a single strike. It's bad of the organization to issue a false correction that still claims some civilians were killed. When does a repeated error become a lie?

J Street claims to "unequivocally support Israel's right to protect its citizens from attack." Not really. That is because J. Street also urges "all involved to exercise maximal restraint." That exhortation implies that Israeli counter-attacks against terrorists are as wrongful as terrorists aiming rockets at Israeli civilians.

"The J Street statement has also outraged MK Otniel Schneller from the left-wing Kadima Party who said in the Knesset that, "At a time when a million Israeli citizens have been living in bomb shelters for four days and four nights, have not gone to school or work and anxiously await the next siren, the terrorists firing on them are getting encouragement and support, not just from Iran and Hezbollah, but also from the left-wing Jewish American organization J Street ... The anti-Israel and anti-ethical statement of J Street should serve as a warning for Israeli politicians and left-wing activists, including members of my party, against supporting and identifying with J Street, as they have done in the past" (Jeremy Sharon, 'MK slams J Street for statement on Gaza, Jerusalem Post, March 14, 2012)."

Here are earlier examples of J Street bias and falsehood against Israel, quoted by Zionist Organization of America:

J Street urged the Obama Administration to support a UN Security Council condemnation of Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria as 'illegal':

JStreet refused to condemn the UN Goldstone Report;

JStreet opposed Operation Cast Lead in Gaza in 2009-10, despite the operation enjoying overwhelming Israeli public support, including even from the far-left Meretz party.

JStreet falsely claimed that 'at most 3 percent' of its donors were Arab, rather than something like 10%;

JStreet posted a Youtube video purporting to show prominent Israelis speaking in support of J Street when in fact, of the eleven interviewed, only three mentioned J Street at all, one of whom — Colette Avital — is a J Street employee; and

JStreet cited polls inaccurately to bolster its claim that Israelis and American Jews want greater Israeli concessions and agree with President Obama's pressure on Israel to stop Jews building in eastern Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria.

(ZOA press release, in mid-March www.zoa.org.) Anti-Zionist media and NGOS have low standards about vetting anti-Zionist news. They are in too much of a hurry to defame Israel.

It is not wrong to kill civilians incidental to a military action, as international law recognizes. J Street should be pointing that out, instead of pointing fingers at it.

Were J Street really concerned about innocent civilians, it would demand that Hamas destroy its rockets and adhere to the P.A. agreement not to attack Israel. At least it would stop aiming at civilians, which under international law is a war crime but under jihad rules is honorable. Or doesn't J Street care about war crimes against Israel?

The answer is not restraint. The answer is first for Israel to take back the Territories and eventually for Islam to end jihad.

Incidentally, earlier reports indicated that much of J Street's initial funding came from Iranians. J Street refused to divulge the identities of a certain class of its donors.

Let ZOA head Morton Klein debate J Street head Jeremy Ben-Ami about what ways is J Street pro-Zionist!

P.A. Has Nazi Laws; Deserves Statehood?

The Palestinian Authority has sentenced Muhammad Abu Shahala to death for selling real estate to Jews in Hebron. Mr. Shahala was tortured, confessed, was rushed through a trial, and was sentenced to death under P.A. law. If P.A. head Abbas concurs, execution follows.

Two prominent Jews of Hebron, David Wilder and Noam Arnon sent national and international leaders a letter, asking them to demand the convict's release on the basis of his not having committed any crime.

The Hebron spokesmen contend that a legal system banning property sales and meting capital punishment for it is a "barbaric and perverse type of justice, reminiscent of practices implemented during the dark ages." They demand that the "international community," which considers Abbas and his P.A. a viable peace partner, to reject the sentence as "legal murder." Can you imagine the U.S. forbidding property sales to Jews? One can imagine Nazi Germany doing so. In fact, its infamous Nuremberg laws of 1938 turned Jews' property over to gentiles and eliminated the whole Jewish population from Germany's economic life.

"Is the Palestinian Authority a reincarnation of the Third Reich?" (hebron@hebron.org.il, via www.imra.org.il 4/15/12.)

The property is the big house that the Israeli Civil Administration of the Territories admitted Jews had purchased legally and from which the Defense Minister expelled those same Jewish owners (www.hebron.com). Thus both sides of the deal have been punished arbitrarily. Israel tacitly colludes with the P.A. in bar Jews from property in areas that the Left wants to cede to the Arabs. Oh, you thought that PM Netanyahu is right wing and would not permit that?

Suppose Abbas stays the execution. He still could leave the seller in prison for life. More likely, people would come and lynch him. In some Muslim areas, such as in the P.A. and in Egypt, Muslim men gather into jihadist lynch mobs, condoned by their governments.

The letter could justifiably have demanded and end to the Palestinian Authority, which sets up Nazi-like laws. People forget that the Arabs generally admired the Nazis and that the Palestinian Arab leader during the Holocaust was a leading Nazi who participated in the genocide.

The Palestinian Arab cause really is jihad. Jihad is much like the Nazi and Communist expansionism — totalitarian, bigoted, terrorist, and imperialist. The Nazis murdered millions of Jews; Muslim Arab preachers continually quote a passage in the Koran calling for extermination of the Jewish people for racial reasons (i.e., considering them to inherit evil traits). Of course, the real evil is bigoted genocide.

Such a Palestinian Arab cause and such methods make the P.A. not a peace partner but a jihadist enemy of peace and civilization.

People in many countries sympathize with the P.A.. They think they are humanitarian, but oh how inhumane their policy is!

Jihadists Try to Repress Anti-Jihad Movie -- More

Here is more definitive information about The Third Jihad, the movie that NYPD stopped using for training, as we had reported about before.

Zudhi Jasser, a U.S. veteran and Muslim who rejects jihad against non-Musllms, narrated The Third Jihad. He is a patriot.

The film examines jihad by violence and by stealth. In January, the New York Times published a series of articles depicting the film as filled with bigotry against Muslims.

First, the series accused the film of suspecting all American Muslims. The reporter must have missed the film's opening, which stated, "This is not a film about Islam. It is about the threat of radical Islam. Only a small percentage of the world's 1.3 billion Muslims are radical."

Then the reporter misquotes Mr. Jasser's statement in the film, "this is the true agenda of Islam in America." What Mr. Jasser actually said: Jihad "is the true agenda of much of the Muslim leadership here in America." Again the newspaper falsely depicted the film as an attack on all Muslims here, rather than on radical leaders.

The point is that the leaders of the prominent Muslim organizations here only pretend to be moderate. One such organization is the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), quoted in the newspaper as offended by the film.

Here is what the New York Times must have lacked the space to print: CAIR was an unindicted co-conspirator in the U.S. v. Holy Land Foundation et al case involving financing of terrorism. The FBI broke its ties with CAIR. The U.S. deprived CAIR of tax deductible status for failing to report revenues for three years. The Times did have space to question the film's financing.

The Times might have avoided some of its errors and bias if it had interviewed Mr. Jasser, to get his side of the story. It might have interviewed the NY City Council's Muslim member, Robert Jackson, who told other reporters that the film concentrates on dangerous radicals, not on all Muslims. Neither did the newspaper accept op-eds from former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge and former CIA Director Jim Woolsey, both of whom defended the film.

A photograph in the film was of the White House flying an Islamic flag. The reporters called the photograph "doctored," as if the filmmakers had doctored it. Actually, the photograph illustrated what one can find on jihadist websites.

The newspaper accounts contained errors. Did the film? Not that the Times noticed.

Although CAIR calls itself a civil rights organization, Jasser said it seeks to restrict the right of free speech by opponents of jihad. One of CAiR's methods is to defame Muslim reformers as if they are anti-Muslim extremists.

CAIR's political Islam is not compatible with American democracy. Political Islam is a shield for militant Islam. It acts as a shield by trying to squelch critics of militant and political Islam. CAIR has had some successes. It got the City to stop using the film for training police. It got our appeasement-minded Mayor to denounce the film. In some supposedly democratic foreign countries, criticizing Islam has become a criminal offense (Clifford D. May, National Review Online, 2/9/12 from Jewish Political Chronicle, Spring 2012, p.48).

The truth of criticism does not save critics from being convicted under those European and Canadian laws.

Imagine if, during the Cold War, it were illegal to criticize Communism, the dominant totalitarian, imperialist movement of the time? Kept unaware of the menace, America might have been conquered.

The answer is to get over the extremes of multi-culturalism and political correctness and back to the Americanism of free speech. We must retain our civil liberties while finding ways to keep enemies from taking unfair advantage of our open society to start to close it.

In our current fight to save American values and civilization as a whole, we need to shine a searchlight on subversive organizations, such as CAIR, and on their enablers, such as the New York Times.

Does Support for Israel Depend on Negotiations?

Almost everybody knows that Americans' support for Israel depends on its willingness to negotiate a final settlement with the Palestinian Authority (P.A.). Well then, almost everybody would be wrong. So found a Gallup poll study of the past 25 years of comparisons between support for Israel and negotiations with the P.A..

The study found repeatedly that when Israel refused to negotiate, Americans held a higher opinion of Israel than when Israel negotiated.

One example was 64% approval in1991, when PM Shamir refused to grant concessions or negotiations and encouraged the most new Jewish communities in the Territories. But to be fair, it also was when the Palestinian Arabs took an anti-American stance on the Gulf War.

When Rabin signed the Oslo Accords, American approval of Israel fell to about 40%. Then, in his last three years, when much of the world blamed Israel for the freeze in peace negotiations, Americans' approval of Israel climbed back to about 60%.

The other examples follow the pattern [but their language is unclear to me, so I won't cite them].

Why was American approval of Israel lower during periods of negotiation? Probably it was lower because in those periods, Israel acted as if it had deprived the Arabs of territory. American heard both sides of the conflict taking up the Arab case.

Thus Israel hurts its own standing when it appeases the Arabs. Americans react more strongly to matters of justice than to peace. If Israel wants to keep Americans' favor, it should stress the justice of its case. It should stress its historical and legal claims to the Territories, international pledges that Israel have secure borders (Evenly Gordon, CommentaryMagazine.com, 3/5/12 from Jewish Political Chronicle, Spring 2012, p.50).

I think that Israel also should explain that it is the victim of jihad, the same jihad and terrorism striking the U.S. and all over. Jihadists do not make peace, they are too fanatical. They also freely lie to make their case. They pretend to have grievances against Israel, whereas they are the ones who attempted genocide against the Jews.

Israel also should challenge those who claim that Israel oppresses Palestinian Arabs to show evidence, not just accuse. If the response is to claim that Israel takes' Arabs' land, Israel can show the falsity of that claim. Except for the right to import weapons, Palestinian Arabs rule themselves, oppressively so. Tell Israel's critics to complain about the Arabs' leaders. They and their followers make war on Israelis, which is a form of oppression.

Israeli leaders have been reluctant to show how evil is the Palestinian Arabs' cause.

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.

I'm back to normal (whatever that means) after Pesach, but don't see that anything of enormous import seems to have happened over the holiday week.

I ended with good news before the chag, and will pick up with a continuation of that same good news -- this concerning Zakkai, who had surgery to remove a tumor from his spine right before Pesach. The update on this is that an MRI was done, and, indeed, the surgeons got everything off his spine. Baruch Hashem! In about two weeks he will have similar surgery in his thoracic cavity, and, as long as the tumor is not adhering too persistently to his aorta, it is expected to go well. Keep praying.

~~~~~~~~~~

King Abdullah of Jordan is waxing very nervous because of increased talk that Jordan is the Palestinian state. Since a majority of the Jordanians (including his queen) are of Palestinian Arab origins, and since what we call Jordan today was lopped off from what had been promised to the Jewish people as a homeland via the Mandate for Palestine and rendered Judenrein, indeed Jordan is the Palestinian state. Any notion of establishing yet another Palestinian state is a political redundancy that ignores history and Jewish rights.

Yet, clearly, it's not history and Jewish rights that concern Abdullah, but rather retaining control of his Hashemite throne. And so it has been announced that the Jordanian citizenship of PA and PLO officials will be renounced; whether this will apply to Mahmoud Abbas is not clear. This move is being announced in tandem with a new law that will limit Palestinian Arab representation in the Jordanian legislature. According to Khaled Abu Toameh, writing in the JPost a couple of days ago, in addition to these moves, Jordan's interior minister will be refusing to take in 1,100 Palestinian Arabs stranded at the Syrian-Jordanian border as a result of the turmoil in Syria.

~~~~~~~~~~

You might want to see the clip below, from MEMRI, showing a Jordanian cleric doing saber-rattling against Israel during a Friday sermon last month broadcast on Jordanian TV. This is the tone that plays right now. http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/6273.htm

~~~~~~~~~~

The Quartet met this past week, and disappointed the PA by not fingering Israeli settlements as the cause of the impasse in "peace negotiations." Of course "the settlements" were mentioned, but so was Palestinian Arab incitement and violence. All in all a "ho hum" document that will be followed by a "ho hum" meeting between Netanyahu and Fayyad, perhaps this week.

~~~~~~~~~~

Today is "flytilla" day -- the day that pro-Palestinian activists designated for having some hundreds if not a thousand Palestinian Arab supporters enter Israel via Ben Gurion Airport, and disperse to Palestinian areas to "lend support." Been there, done that. And just as the first "flytilla" day fizzled, so does it seem this one will. Dozens of activists -- many of whom have been identified by Israel as troublemakers -- are being stopped at European airports as they attempt to board planes to Israel, with such airlines as Air France, Lufthansa and British Airways cooperating; others are being stopped in the airport here.

Some of the "peaceful" activists in the airports in Brussels and Paris are reported to have wrestled with police when prevented from boarding planes. Those wishing to participate have been blocked in Canada, Portugal and elsewhere, as well.

~~~~~~~~~~

Those coming into Ben Gurion are being presented with an official letter from the Israeli government, which has been translated into several languages. It reads:

"Dear activist, we appreciate your choosing to make Israel the object of your humanitarian concerns. We know there were many other worthy choices. You could have chosen to protest the Syrian regime's daily savagery against its own people, which has claimed thousands of lives.

"You could have chosen to protest the Iranian regime's brutal crackdown on dissent and support of terrorism throughout the world. You could have chosen to protest Hamas rule in Gaza, where terror organizations commit a double war crime by firing rockets at civilians and hiding behind civilians.

"But instead you chose to protest against Israel, the Middle East's sole democracy, where women are equal, the press criticizes the government, human rights organizations can operate freely, religious freedom is protected for all and minorities do not live in fear.

"Therefore we suggest you first solve the real problems of the region, and then come back and share with us your experience. Have a nice flight."

~~~~~~~~~~

By far the most troubling issue, in the midst of all this small stuff, is what is happening with Iran. The six international powers (the Security Council permanent members plus Germany) met with Iran in Istanbul yesterday. Even before that meeting, Iran had rejected two key demands -- suspension of high-level uranium enrichment and closing of the Fordow underground enrichment facility near Qom.

This tells us all we need to know about Iranian intentions. And yet, now, after yesterday's meeting, Western diplomats are declaring themselves encouraged because there will be another meeting on May 23. "The dialogue" is progressing, you see.

I want to ask, "what dialogue?" And I would laugh at them all, clowns that they are -- if the willful blindness of the international community were not so terrifying. This is not going to go where it needs to go. But pretense that something is happening apparently makes the Western leaders comfortable -- for it provides them with an excuse to do nothing.

Said Catherine Ashton, EU foreign policy chief, "We want now to move to a sustained process of serious dialogue, where we can take urgent practical steps to build confidence."

This is painful. Confidence in whom, pray tell?

~~~~~~~~~~

What is so very infuriating is the difficult spot in which all this places Israel -- with intent, of course. We are "waiting to see how matters work out." We know full well that nothing constructive is going to happen, but were we to attack now we would be accused of subverting a diplomatic resolution that was in progress.

The question is one of how long we wait before we declare that enough is enough. Israel has set the bar higher than the Western powers. What others may declare acceptable, we will not. As I understand it, Netanyahu said last week that the talks should lead to removal of all enriched uranium from Iran, a halt to further enrichment, and closure of the facility at Qom. Barak set a bar that was slightly lower, saying that while all 20% enriched uranium had to be relinquished, a certain percentage of 3.5% enriched uranium could be retained for peaceful purposes.

~~~~~~~~~~

Just to show how confusing the situation is: I have just read two commentaries, one of which said that Israel would be happy to take a breather from this issue and a second that suggested that we might move the date for hitting Iran closer once it was clear that nothing was going to happen and that additional waiting would be futile.

~~~~~~~~~~

See Israel Hayom's article on this subject, "On nuclear talks, one step sideways, two steps back" (All emphasis added):

"A strange meeting took place in Istanbul on Saturday. Both sides to the renewed nuclear talks between Iran and the major world powers tried to present a new concept: succeeding in negotiations without making any progress. Under these circumstances, it came as no real shock to anyone that the big achievement coming out of the talks was the general agreement that there is even an issue to discuss, and there is also a date and a venue for the next round: May 23, in Baghdad.

"...While the six powers communicated their stance, Iran gained precisely what it was after: time. It is no wonder that Iran's leaders were all smiles following the meeting. 'We didn't expect to be received in this way,' said one member of the delegation from Tehran. 'We didn't think that the world powers would display such a positive attitude.'"

He added that the Western delegations were enthused by the fatwa (Islamic decree) issued by Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei against nuclear weapons, calling it an example for other nations. The head of the Iranian delegation, Saeed Jalili, also presented the meeting as a big achievement, telling reporters that the West understood that 'for the Iranian people the language of threats and pressure doesn't work.'
http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=3951

~~~~~~~~~~

Ilan Berman calls negotiations with Iran "the gift that keeps on giving: a surefire way to delay (and possibly even derail) a forceful Western response.

"For the United States and its allies, meanwhile...negotiations will provide a temporary reprieve, deferring some hard choices about whether force will ultimately be needed to stop Iran's nuclear progress.

"If history is any indication, however, they won't eliminate them."

http://www.ilanberman.com/11534/dim-prospects-for-diplomacy-with-iran

~~~~~~~~~~

For a smile, I close with the link to the Israel 21C story, on the top ten must-see buildings in Israel:
http://www.israel21c.org/culture/the-top-10-must-see-buildings-of-israel

Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info

Changing Sinai

We cited Egyptian complaints that tourism is thriving in the Sinai, and that Israel is acting to depress it. How well is tourism doing in the Sinai?

For years, masses of people have been leaving El-Arish and Rafah. The area has few tourist attractions. The government does not invest in tourism, there. Tourist project construction has halted, and most existing resorts are empty. The main road into central Sinai is closed to tourists and abandoned. A former driver of tourists says that travelers have been abducted or robbed by Bedouin.

The Egyptian Army has sent troops and armored personnel carriers into the Sinai. They do not go to the areas of the worst smuggling. The troops are mere recruits. Their APCs seem assigned mostly to guard them form Bedouin attack. They hug the main road, do not patrol, and withdraw at night (Anshel Pfeffer, 4/12/12, Haaretz,
http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/egypt-s-army-fills-sinai-but-business-runs-as-usual-1.423872 from www.imra.org.il

The Bedouin there have become a force to reckon with. How Egypt is turning back the centuries! Fourteen centuries ago in the Arabian Peninsula, Muhammad placed his fledgling religion on a firmer financial footing by capturing a wealthy caravan. Joseph Stalin's early Bolshevik activity was robbing banks.

A dilemma for Israel: Egypt says it can repress smuggling if Israel permits Egypt to send in more heavily armed forces than the peace treaty allows. Israel is afraid that those armored forces then would stay and could be used to jumpstart an invasion of Israel.

But Egypt has enough troops to stop goods from being smuggled into Gaza from Rafah. Smuggler's trucks come along a road without hiding points, and easily could be stopped. Nevertheless, that smuggling continues. Therefore, the question is whether Egypt wanted to stop the smuggling. Is it a lack of will, or malign intent toward Israel, or corruption?

Corruption is so stark in Egypt that government agents sell off cement obtained to repair major roads. Those roads now are in great disrepair.

What Could Stabilize the Arab World?

As the Arab world destabilizes¸ Radical Islamists gain strength, will not resolve economic problems, and the people are likely to turn more to violence. How can the Arabs re-stabilize and democratize?

According to Daniel Doron, founding director of the Israel Center for Social and Economic Progress, the answer is a free market economy without the Army or government controlling, stifling, and milking it. He makes a case for capitalism promoting individual choice and a middle class that will turn away from dictatorships.

I recommend the full article (Middle East Quarterly, Spring 2012, pp. 15-22 (view PDF) http://www.meforum.org/3187/middle-east-free-markets).

I have come to realize that socialists who seek "social justice" end up dividing society, restricting thought, and creating injustice. Capitalism under just a few restraints releases decision making to millions of people, thereby encouraging more self-reliance and democracy.

Russia Preparing Iran Against Israeli Nuclear Raid

Russia has been providing Syria with advanced radar so as to give early warning to Iran of an Israeli raid. Russia claims that its radar can detect stealth bombers, which Israel is supposed to be acquiring soon (www.imra.org.il, 3/7/12).

Does President Obama really not understand that the Russian government is a rogue enemy of the U.S. that will not cooperate with the U.S.? He keeps offering and giving concessions to Russia, getting nothing in return except he hopes Russia would cooperate. The strategy fails. Is he unable to learn or does he secretly want the U.S. to fail?

The U.S. has been investing a fortune in stealth aircraft, depending on military secrets to keep the technology exclusively ours. But the secret already seems to have gotten out, especially after a U.S. stealth aircraft crash-landed in hostile territory without our destroying it. How much will the U.S. depend on a technology that our enemies can counteract?

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.

Back on New Years Day of this year, the Tea Party Tribune published, "Jonathan Pollard: Revisited Again and again," the third of three articles I had written about Jonathan Pollard and the wrongful sentence he received for the crime he plead out to. Some of my dear readers wrote to me, "he's a traitor," "he should rot in hell," and so on. Interestingly, I was accused of being a leftist for stating Pollard had engaged in criminal behavior; me being accused of being a leftist, that's a new one, others on the right called for my head because I advocated for his release. In all my years of writing I can't remember another situation having to defend my position to both sides of the political spectrum. What castigators on both sides fail to recognize, this is not about left or right, it's not about Pollard being Jewish; although the veracity of this statement could come into question, it's not even about Pollard. It's about a modern day injustice which has kept a man incarcerated for an inordinate amount of time despite protestations from those most closely related to this action.

For those interested in the facts of this case and not just gut feelings, you may wish to read the article. "Jonathan Pollard: Revisited Again and again"
http://www.teapartytribune.com/2012/01/05/jonathan-pollard-revisited-again-and-again/

However, mitigating circumstances aside; and there are many, the question begs, why after 26 long years; many of which served in solitary confinement hasn't Pollard been granted clemency? Many, many people have done far worse and in times of war but have been either pardoned or granted clemency, why not Pollard? Let's review some of them.

Without a doubt the most harmful espionage ever committed against the United States in the 20th century was that of the Rosenbergs, Julius and his wife Ethel. Both devout American communists, they were executed in 1953 for passing critical secrets to the Soviets allowing them to construct their first atom bomb. The Rosenbergs, amidst a great deal of controversy in the ensuing decades, were the first civilians to be executed in U.S. history for espionage. Despite the uproar over guilt or innocence, decoded Soviet cables in recent years corroborated courtroom testimony that Julius indeed passed information and recruited others to do so against the United States. These same documents indicate that Ethel knew of her husband's activities but her only guilt was being married to Julius. Germane to our discussion are the other actors Julius recruited for his spy ring.

Ethel's brother, David Greenglass had supplied documents to Julius from Los Alamos. For his role he served 10 years of a 15 year sentence and was released; Klaus Fuchs, another conspiritor was arrested in 1950 and admitted to passing Atomic secrets to a courier named Harry Gold, also a stealth Soviet spy. Gold in turn confessed to transferring this information to Ethel's brother, David.

In 1951 Gold was sentenced to 30 years in prison but was later paroled in 1965 after serving 19 years. Klaus Fuchs, considered by many to be a much more damaging Soviet agent than Julius Rosenberg only served 9 years of a 14 sentence and returned to East Germany upon his release. Ethel's brother David, a major figure in this subversion served only 10 years for his role.
See Rosenberg's Trial: at
http://www.enotes.com/topic/Julius_and_Ethel_Rosenberg

Other members of this nefarious cabal, Jack Soble (no relation to me, thank you) received a 7 year sentence and his wife Myra 5 years, reduced to 4 and eventually received a presidential pardon from President George H.W. Bush in 1991 for her conviction; (conspiracy to receive and obtain national defense information and transmit same to a foreign government.) Keep in mind, these lenient sentences were meted out for transference of vital atomic secrets to a hostile foreign government, the Soviet Union. They had a direct effect upon the security and vital interests of the United States. As you will read later, according to the Assistant Attorney General at the time, this was not the case with Pollard. In lieu of the deeds of the aforementioned and those to follow, it's ludicrous and a gross miscarriage of justice that Pollard has not been granted clemency after all these years.
See Myra and Jack Soble at http:/ /www.enotes.com/topic/Myra_Soble

Gerald Ford at the conclusion of his term in office pardoned Iva Toguri D'Aquino, the only U.S. citizen convicted of treason up to that point. Never heard of her? If you still have any living relatives that served in the South Pacific during World War II, they'll surely remember her as "Tokyo Rose." She was the child of Japanese immigrants that went back to Japan to undermine the morale of U.S. troops by broadcasting daily propaganda messages on radio broadcasts.

Likewise Ford, a Conservative Republican offered conditional amnesty to no less than 50,000 draft dodgers from the Vietnam War era. As did his successor, Jimmy Carter who actually granted them an unconditional amnesty in the form of a pardon.

Ford also posthumously restored full citizenship to someone that actively sought the downfall of the United States, Robert E. Lee, the Commanding General of the Confederacy.

Carter carried his magnanimity even further by posthumously pardoning what some might consider the most treasonous person in American history, Jefferson Davis the President of the Confederacy. However, upon leaving office in 1979, Carter's most controversial clemency was bestowed upon incarcerated members of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party.

Seeking independence for Puerto Rico; in what today would be considered an act of terrorism, FALN members, Lolita Lebron, Rafael Cancel Miranda, and Irving Flores Rodriguez were convicted for opening fire in the House of Representative chamber and seriously wounding 5 Congressmen. After serving 25 years in prison Carter granted them clemency in 1979. Juxtapose this act with what Pollard did as he enters his 27th year of incarceration. It just doesn't add up. See: On This Day: Puerto Rican Nationalists Launch Assault on U.S. Congress at
http://www.findingdulcinea.com/news/on-this-day/March/Puerto-Rican-Nationalists-Launch-Assault-on-U-S--Congress.html

Bill Clinton who came within a hair of needing clemency for himself made a farce of the system. He further exemplified the injustice of Pollard's continued incarceration by granting clemency to 14 FALN terrorists on August 13, 1999. The following are some of the despicable acts these sweethearts committed.

Over a six year period of time they took responsibility for 100 bombings which took the lives of six people while injuring 130 others. For many of us living in New York in 1975 the memory still lingers over the bombing of Fraunces Tavern. Likewise, they also took responsibility for the bombing Police Headquarters in 1983 in which three police officers were maimed for life attempting to diffuse the bombs.

Amongst other violent terrorists covered by this unjustified clemency was Dylcia Pagan the wife of FALN leader Hector Morales who was convicted of conspiracy to blow up no less than 48 buildings in Chicago. Along with her, 11 others members were convicted of conspiracy to bomb federal buildings and for planning to kidnap government and private citizens. The Clinton White House ludicrously justified the release of these terrorists, the forerunners of Al-Qaeda by stating, "they never killed anyone," well neither did Pollard and unlike them, neither did anyone else he was associated with. See Clinton Pardons Terror at http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/puertorico/sep4.htm

For a real bit of irony, lets fall back in time to the Reagan Administration and a rogue operation known as the Iran-Contra Affair. Although a supporter of the Contra cause, no evidence ever linked Reagan to any authorization of wrong doing; at least none which ever came out. However, the scandal occurred right on under his very nose.

In a move to subterfuge a law specifically enacted by Congress to prevent it, elements within Administration schemed to sell weapons to Iran through Israel and use the money received to fund anti-Communist and anti-Sandinista rebels, known as Contras, in Nicaragua.

The impetus for this sordid affair was to secure the release of 6 American hostages being held by Islamic terrorists with links to Iran, known as the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution. Before long the entire arrangement was outed and a myriad of investigations ensued. Reagan himself went before the nation in a televised address and accepted personal responsibility for the scandal and for those of his Administration.

As a result of these investigations 14 members of the Administration were indicted, 11 were convicted for their roles in the scandal, and 3 were preparing for trial just prior to being pardoned by Reagan's former Vice President, outgoing President George Herbert Bush.

So where's the irony? Of the 3 preparing for trial, the most prominent was former Secretary of Defense Casper Weinberger. That's right, the same Casper Weinberger that excoriated Jonathan Pollard in a 46 page supplemental, pre-sentencing "Victims Impact Statement." A memorandum which exaggerated the harm caused by his crime, but so damning it convinced the presiding Judge, Aubrey Robinson, to throw out the plea deal the government and Pollard had agreed upon. A deal Pollard signed onto to avoid a life sentence, a punishment he received nonetheless. Justice? Maybe in Iran or Syria, but not what we expect here in the United States.

Phillip B. Heymann, former U.S. Assistant Attorney General concurs. In a letter written this past January, Heymann requested President Obama commute Pollard's sentence. He stated, the sentence was "entirely out of line with others engaging in similar behavior." He went on to say that after reviewing Pollard's complete record, he found no evidence that he helped America's enemies. See Pollard Didn't Harm U.S: Says Former U.S. Deputy Assistant Attorney General at http://www.jpost.com/DiplomacyAndPolitics/Article.aspx?id=205369

He's far from alone, countless notables in and out of government both in the United States and around the world have petitioned President Obama for Pollard's release.

Notable Quotes in Support of Jonathan Pollard's Release: See here.

Is there any hope for Pollard? If there is it will have to be during this election year but Obama, ever the politician better do it quickly. According to a published report in the April 6th edition of the Jerusalem Post, Pollard now 57 is in ill health. He was rushed to the hospital this week and may need emergency kidney surgery. According to some sources his condition may be life threatening.

He is also reported to suffer from a long list of other ailments which include: Diabetes, nausea, dizziness, sinusitis, gall bladder problems, and Meniere's disease.

The article further states that recently released Israeli soldier Gilead Schalit and his family signed a petition that Shimon Peres, slated to receive a life time peace award from President Obama not accept the honorarium. The petition states, "Due to the superior values the medal represents, we feel we cannot reconcile you receiving it when the United States is still holding Pollard in prison." It goes on to say, "We ask you to take advantage of your unprecedented diplomatic standing in order to work for Jonathan's immediate release before you are given the medal. Otherwise receiving the medal would make a mockery of Israel."

In my last article I wrote, "Oh cynical me, more so now than ever, if he can only hold out until November, I do believe Pollard will finally be freed this year. Following an indisputably anti-Israel bias the past three and a half years and losing Jewish voters and supporters of Israel in droves; ever the Chicago politician, President Obama is almost certain to make a magnanimous gesture to his formerly faithful voting block and finally release this broken man from his incarceration." Since Pollard may not make it to November, let's hope the President, whatever his motives may be, finally heeds the admonitions of so many and grants Pollard clemency.

Reach Justice for Jonathan Pollard by sending an email to justice4jp@gmail.com and visit their website at http://www.JonathanPollard.org

What's the greatest problem facing Judaism today? No, it's not Iran. As I write this we're a week away from the anniversary of the prison break from Egypt. Hand in hand, escorted by the Lord G-d of Host, we escaped. If you believe in Torah, the Iranian will suffer the same fate as Pharaoh.

No. Our greatest adversary is a secular culture that lures us as clover lures bees. It's our children — our future — the Jewish culture of tomorrow that's our stake in the game. They are the prize. And strangely enough a welcome kiss on the lips is more dangerous to our future than the clubs of the Cossack.

You can accomplish every mitzvah — you can build a miniature temple in the backyard — go to shul minion three times a day — and not carry a penny in your Shabbos pocket — but not inspire your kids. ... And Judaism dies with you.

Out there — in that flawed world that our G-d encourages us to repair lies the Amalekite picking off the stragglers. Only today his weapon is not a sword, but TV tube, the movies, the Ipad. The culture with a big booming smile is as seductive as your first girlfriend.

No one said it better than a Christian poet named Mathew Arnold who never went to Hebrew Day School, but had the vision of Jeremiah. A hundred years ago he said, "The sea of faith was once, too, at the full ... but now I only hear its melancholy, long withdrawing roar".

He heard the roar of the waterfall long before Christianity's frail raft approached the watery cliff. The same is true of us today All statistical meters are at the red line: intermarriage, synagogue attendance, conflicts within Judaism, an over-abundance of rabbis. The metrics signal danger. Luckily, the salvation is not institutional. Committees, meetings, structural changes institutional changes aren't called for. Even money is powerless.

The magical potion, the balm of Gilead, is not patching up a disorderly world. Fortunately It's entirely within your grasp. Your family, your kids. Show them the beauty of Judaism that rabbis, and teachers strenuously but often vainly promulgate — point out the pride that should illuminate this cultural, racial, religious club we call Judaism. Explain our contribution not just to monotheism, but to morality. Point out that Torah, a beacon of civilization, is our exclusive gift from He who hit the switch that lighted the sun. Call attention to Jewish names in the pantheon of peace and science. Gloat over Jewish accomplishments. Read the Parsha every week and remind your kids that our prophets spoke tenderly and knowingly of nature thousands of years before Wordsworth. And since we live in a Christian world, talk about our contribution to this creed, imbued with Judaism, that softened a harsh world. Talk about our differences, too.

In short, make them proud to be Jewish. An easy parental task. You may have to strengthen yourself first. But remember — they are our future. Their care, their "instruction" to use a politically incorrect phrase, is our memorial to those who came before us. As the Torah says over and over — tell your children of our deliverance from Egypt and inferentially the same mitzvah applies to all of Torah.

Tikuun Olam — our mission, say the sages — is a challenging assignment, but a gargantuan one. Our family is our world. The least we can do is to tend that patch of garden.

Contact Ted Roberts at telld@hiwaay.net.
His website is at http://www.wonderwordworks.com; he blogs at http://www.scribblerontheroof.typepad.com. You can buy his collected works at http://www.lulu.com/content/127641.

Obama Favors Islam

The "Morning Joe" TV program interviewed Rev. Franklin Graham, head of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Assn. on Christian persecution. He was asked whether he thought Pres. Obama is Christian. Rev. Graham said he would take Barak Obama's word for it, but suggested that Pres. Obama's policies disagree with Christian principles.

Having been raised as a Muslim by a Muslim father and having attended a Muslim religious school, Obama is a Muslim according to Islamic law. Many Muslims consider him a Muslim

When a father converts to Islam, his children supposedly become Muslims automatically. The Islamic penalty for not denying one's father's Islamic faith is death. In Egypt, when children resist joining their father's new faith, thousands of Muslims seek the children out, threatening to burn down the churches if they hear rumors that the children are hiding in them.

Obama denies being a Muslim. However, Islamic doctrine permits denying being Muslim in order to advance the faith. Muhammad encouraged a secret Muslim to betray his tribe to Islamic armies.

Hence Rev. Graham said that Obama has given Islam a "free pass" and that Obama expresses more concern about Muslims than about Christians being murdered in Muslim countries.

Yes, the U.S. has mostly ignored Muslim persecution of Christians, ordered NASA to make Muslims feel good, and omitted mention of Islam from U.S. security documents. Rev. Graham is going by what Obama does, not by what he professes as his religion (Raymond Ibrahim Stonegate Institute, 2/27/12 http://www.meforum.org/3179/obama-islam).

The question what is Obama's religion cannot be answered by anybody else, and Obama's answer cannot be believed. One can judge only by actions. However, an alternative theory could explain Obama — he is a radical who distrusts U.S. military power, weakens the economy by expanding government at the expense of the economy, and he appeases Islam.

The problem with that alternative is Obama's continued subsidy of certain terrorists, his policies that help Islamists take power abroad, his foot-dragging on Iran, etc.. He was concerned about Libya, not Christian persecution in Sudan, Nigeria, and Egypt.

U.S. Building Up the Palestinian Authority

The U.S. has been donating an average of half a billion dollars a year to the Palestinian Authority (P.A.). The U.S. has spent $3.4 billion developing the P.A..

The State Dept. defends such largesse as an investment in democracy and stability in the P.A., therefore being beneficial to Israel and the U.S.

Hebron Jewish Community spokesman David Wilder challenges the assumption about how the money is spent. P.A. spokesman Daoud Kuttab refers to results as: (a) New schools, which, Mr. Wilder points out, indoctrinate in unwarranted hostility to Israel; and (b) More judges, who sentence to death Arabs who sell land to Jews. As for development, how do the Arabs utilize such funds? "From the objectives of the Hebron Rehabilitation Committee: counter and limit Israeli settlements inside the Old city [of Hebron] by surrounding settlements with inhabited buildings to prevent their horizontal expansion; and to avert the urban interconnection of these settlements by increasing Arab demographic density between them.

Is such spending being in the general interest? The money is not accounted for. Hundreds of millions donated by the U.S. were missing during Arafat's tenure.

Rep. Illeana Ros-Lehtinen feels that such donations reinforce the Palestinian Arabs' bad behavior by rewarding them despite it (hebron@hebron.org.il, 1/31/12. The article was well documented).

Quartet. Leftist Double Standard Against Jews

In March, Arabs, mostly from the Palestinian Authority (P.A.) threw 70 firebombs and attacked Jews 43 times in Judea-Samaria, and threw 29 firebombs and attacked Jews 29 times in Jerusalem, including 2 stabbings.

By contrast, there were a few instances of vandalism of mosques and other Arab property, nobody was hurt, and nobody was caught.

On April 11, the Quartet stated: (1) "Noting the significant progress on security achieved by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, the Quartet calls on the Palestinian Authority to continue to make every effort to improve law and order, to fight violent extremism, and to end incitement. The Quartet emphasized the need to continue assisting the Palestinian Authority in building its law enforcement capacity."

(2)"The Quartet also expressed its concern over ongoing settler violence and incitement in the West Bank and calls on Israel to take effective measures, including bringing the perpetrators of such acts to justice."

The Quartet praises the P.A., whose media and mosques incite Muslims to violence, and condemns Jews in the Territories without knowing whether they are the culprits.

The Quartet expresses "concern" about "settler violence and incitement" and demands that Israel take effective measures, including bringing the perpetrators of such acts to justice."

Apparently the Quartet has no concern about Muslim Arab violence, including stabbings and firebombing. It does not call for "effective measures" to "bring the perpetrators to justice."

From Israel, the Quartet wants effective results, but not from the P.A., which the Quartet claims is already making "every effort."

Although the Quartet wants settlers jailed, it does not oppose the P.A. position that Israel should free all terrorists (www.imra.org.il,4/12/12).

In Haifa, seven Arabs jumped two Israeli reservists for being Jewish, beat them with clubs, and carved "you dog" Israeli police tried to call the attack "hooliganism," but eventually classified it as terrorism.

In four February days out of five, Muslims threw stones at Israeli police and Christian and Jewish visitors to the Temple Mount. The first time, about 100 Muslims were involved. This must be an attempt to intimidate non-Muslims from using the Mount.

Neither the Quartet nor the usually vocal Israeli Left expressed indignation over the attacks. They have a double standard favoring Arabs over Jews (Prof Steven Plaut, 3/1/12).

P.A. leaders have stated frankly that they believe that Jews should not be allowed to pray on the Temple Mount or in the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron. Israeli withdrawal would end freedom of religion.

Palestinian Arabs in Religious War

Palestinian Authority (P.A.) Minister of Religion Al-Habbash often describes the Arab-Israel conflict as a religious one, to defend a land that Muslims consider Islamic.

The official P.A. 12th grade textbook teaches that Muslims are in an eternal religious war with Israel.

In January, the P.A. Mufti declared that killing Jews is an Islamic duty.

P.A. head Abbas said that taking Jerusalem away from Israel is an Islamic duty.

But now P.A. TV has broadcast a song that accuses Israel of torturing Palestinian Arabs and usurping their land in the name of God (Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik, Palestinian Media Watch, ttp://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=6525, sent via IMRA www.imra.org.il).

The Arab side constantly makes false accusations against Israel. That is for propaganda. Many of the accusations are for crimes that the Arab side really commits. The accusations about torturing and usurping land really apply to the Arab side.

One hears people complaining that Israel wants to retain the Territories for religious reasons. Why don't they complain that the Arabs want to seize both the Territories and Israel for religious reasons? Double standard! Note that the Muslim Arabs don't want to allow any Jewish state, so why expect an Arab state to lie peacefully alongside the Jewish one?

Actually, the modern Zionist movement largely was a secular one.

Historical Islamic Conquests

The contemporary Western tendency is to whitewash Islam and its historical conquests [and depict Islam as a religion of peace]. Vast Islamic sources document matters otherwise. Non-Islamic sources confirm the Islamic sources.

Muhammad united the Arabian tribes. On his death, many tribes broke away from Islam. Muhammad's succor, Abu Bakr, made jihad against them and killed tens of thousands of Arabs, until their tribes re-submitted to Islam.

The next caliph started imperial expansion: Syria, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Persian Empire, North Africa, Spain, Central Asia, and India were conquered. People resisted, but lost.

"The colorful accounts contained in the Muslim tradition are typified by constant warfare...: Muslims go to a new region and offer the inhabitants three choices: 1) submit (i.e., convert) to Islam; 2) live as second-class citizens, or "dhimmis," paying special taxes and accepting several social debilitations; 3) fight to the death."

"Centuries later, and partially due to trade, Islam came to be accepted by a few periphery peoples, mostly polytheists and animists, who followed no major religion (e.g., in Indonesia, Somalia), and who currently form the outer fringes of the Islamic world."

"Ironically, these exceptions are now portrayed as the rule in America's classrooms, as many textbooks suggest or at least imply that most people who converted to Islam did so under no duress, but rather through peaceful contacts with merchants and traders; that they eagerly opted to convert to Islam for the religion's intrinsic appeal, without noting the many debilitations conquered non-Muslims avoided—extra taxes, second-rate social status, enforced humiliation, etc.—by converting to Islam. In fact, in the first century, and due to these debilitations, many conquered peoples sought to convert to Islam only to be rebuffed by the caliphate, which preferred to keep them as subdued—and heavily taxed—subjects, not as Muslim equals."

"The dissimulation of how Islam was spread in the early centuries contained in Western textbook's mirrors the way the word jihad, once inextricable to the conquests, has also been recast. Whereas the word jihad has throughout the centuries simply meant armed warfare on behalf of Islam, in recent years, American students have been taught the Sufi interpretation of jihad—Sufis make up perhaps one percent of the Islamic world and are often seen as heretics with aberrant interpretations—which portrays jihad as a "spiritual-struggle" against one's vices."

"Contrast this definition of jihad with that of an early edition of the venerable Encyclopaedia of Islam. Its opening sentence simply states, "The spread of Islam by arms is a religious duty upon Muslims in general.... Jihad must continue to be done until the whole world is under the rule of Islam.... Islam must completely be made over before the doctrine of jihad [warfare to spread Islam] can be eliminated." Muslim legal manuals written in Arabic are even more explicit."

In any case, Islamic history is clear. Political correctness is trying to muddle its picture (Raymond Ibrahim, Jihad Watch, 3/1/12 http://www.meforum.org/3182/history-muslim-conquests).

I read Muslim generals' accounts of their conquest of cities in India, centuries ago. They boasted of wiping out populations that surrendered and of plundering them. The numbers murdered were in the thousands each time.

This is a history that we ignore at our own peril. Historians and journalists who mislead us cannot be trusted to help alert us to the need for defense. How can we believe what they say about the Arab War on Israel?

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.

In his speech before the Newspapers Association of America/American Society of News Editors Wednesday, likely GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney accused the president of changing positions to get re-elected. For instance, Romney charged that, "As president," Obama "delayed the development of our oil and coal and natural gas. Now, as candidate Obama, he says he favors an energy policy that adopts an all-of-the-above approach."

That's not exactly right. Yes, Obama still says he's in favor of an all-of-the-above energy policy, but that hasn't slowed him down in his pursuit of his very-few-of-the-above policy.

Back in 2008, then-Sen. Obama explained that under his energy plan, electricity prices would "necessarily skyrocket." The explosion in costs wouldn't be a bug of his plan either, but a feature.

The idea under so-called cap-and-trade is that if you tax fossil fuels, you will, over time, reduce the use of fossil fuels. It's really basic economics. One wishes the president saw the logic of this proposition when it came to taxing business and investment as well. But, that's a topic for a different column.

The president's defenders have long complained that it's unfair to dredge up this old sound bite, particularly in a climate of gas-price outrage, because Republicans — and a lot of Democrats — successfully prevented cap-and-trade from ever becoming law. Absent cap-and-trade, they claim, he is pursuing an all-of-the-above strategy. Coal! Oil! Natural gas! Solar! Wind! And, of course, algae, algae, algae! We're doing it all, Obama says.

Just the other day, Vice President Joe Biden insisted that "our energy policy's the best it's ever been." Why? Because, he said, we're doing "everything," i.e., all of the above, to make energy affordable.

Except that's simply not true. It's not remotely true. A new rule from the Obama administration's EPA will, according to an Associated Press analysis, force 32 mostly coal-fired power plants to shut down and threatens to close 36 others.

Moreover, the new "blackout" rule will effectively prevent the creation of any new coal-fired plants in America unless they adopt new technologies that will make it unprofitable to burn coal at all. So there's that.

Now, I don't have much affection for coal. I think mountaintop-removal mining should be phased out. But, you can't really say you're pursuing an all-of-the-above energy policy, or deny that you want energy prices to go up, and declare war on coal at the same time.

The inanity of all this is that the real impulse behind the war on coal is the belief that we need to stamp it out to reduce global warming. But, even if you believe the full suite of global-warning-crisis complaints, the policy is nuts because the net result will be to lower the price of coal and increase the amount we sell to places like China. Is it better if we burn the coal here, with cleaner emissions and more jobs for Americans, or there, with dirtier emissions?

But, forget coal. What about oil? The president killed the Keystone XL pipeline.

After the BP oil spill, his administration overruled its own panel of experts to implement a moratorium on offshore drilling (while suggesting it was the experts' idea).

Obama wants to revoke "subsidies" for oil companies, which are in fact the same tax write-offs that any business gets. He takes credit for the increase in oil drilling on U.S. soil but leaves out that drilling on federal and American Indian lands has gone down under his administration.

He also forgets to mention that he opposes drilling off the mid-Atlantic coast, the Florida coast, the full Gulf of Mexico, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge or in the Rockies.

When those resources aren't exploited, oil rigs don't sit and rust, they go to other countries (often ones with fewer environmental safeguards) to find oil elsewhere — oil we will then buy.

Romney is right to suggest that Obama is saying things he doesn't believe to get re-elected. But, at least on energy, he's not taking a new position. When you're the incumbent president, you can say that your position is whatever you want. But, the truth of the matter isn't determined by what you say, but by what you do. And judged against what he is doing, Obama's all-of-the-above strategy isn't a policy change, it's just a lie.

Jerome S Kaufman is National Secretary of the Zionist Organization of America and hosts the Israel Commentary website (http://www.israel-commentary.org).

The world we build tomorrow is born in the stories we tell our children today.

What creates freedom? A revolution in the streets? Mass protest? Civil war? A change of government? The ousting of the old guard and its replacement by the new? History, more often than not, shows that hopes raised by such events are often dashed, sooner rather than later. "Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive," wrote Wordsworth about the French revolution, but the mood did not last long. It rarely does. Sometimes all that happens is that the tyranny of the minority is replaced by the tyranny of the majority; sometimes not even that. The faces change. The suffering remains.

The books of Exodus and Deuteronomy take a different route altogether. It's astonishing how, reflecting on the Israelites' journey from slavery to freedom, Moses keeps returning to one subject above all others: how we teach our children. "When your children ask you this, you should answer them that." "Teach your child on that day." "Say to your child ..." Four times Moses speaks about the duty of parents to educate their children, handing on to them their people's story until it becomes their own.

That's what we do each year on Passover as we gather in our extended families to re-enact the night long ago when our ancestors readied themselves to leave Egypt and begin the long walk to freedom. It's a remarkable ceremony, the oldest continuously observed religious ritual in the world, going back thousands of years. We still eat the matzah, the dry unleavened "bread of affliction," and taste the maror, the "bitter herbs" of slavery. And children are still at the heart of this celebration. For we can only tell the story in response to questions asked by a child. That's why, for many of us, our earliest Jewish memory is of asking the "four questions," beginning with "Why is this night different?" We remain faithful to Moses' mandate: first teach the children.

Much has been written since Moses' day about freedom. Even today it is the key word of politics, especially in those parts of the world under repressive regimes. Still the talk is of politics and power, armies and militias, tactics and strategy, regime change and international intervention. Still we are surprised when the new guard turns out to be as bad as the old guard. The faith religious believers have in God is small compared to the faith people put in politicians, knowing how many times they have been disappointed in the past but still insisting that this time it will be different.

Moses taught us something else entirely. The world we build tomorrow is born in the stories we tell our children today. Politics moves the pieces. Education changes the game. If you want a free society, teach your children what oppression tastes like. Tell them how many miracles it takes to get from here to there. Above all, encourage them to ask questions. Teach them to think for themselves. Get them to continue the heritage not through blind obedience — the world's worst preparation for liberty — but through active, challenging conversation across the generations. That's how we learned, as children, about the long walk to freedom. It's how we came to take our ancestors' story as our own.

Amid all the talk about the challenges facing the world in the twenty first century — climate change, the global economy, political turmoil, the impact of the new technology — far too little is said or thought about education, and even when it is, it focuses on the wrong things, such as technical skills. Education is the single most important determinant of the future of the human race, and what and how we teach our children is the most important decision we can make.

We have to teach our children that freedom only comes when you respect the freedom of others, that it involves responsibilities as well as rights and that it means making sacrifices for the common good. God, the supreme power, intervened in history long ago to help the supremely powerless, a nation of slaves, and ever since, His work must be ours. Nor can we teach these things without giving children the space to ask, question and challenge, thereby learning the dignity of dissent, itself one of the elements of freedom.

Liberty is born not on the battlefield but in homes, schools and houses of study. That is the message of the world's oldest ritual, Passover, and its force remains undiminished today.

Why does the international community hate Israel so much?

Not long ago, the Economist ran an unsigned editorial called the "Auschwitz Complex." The unnamed author blamed serial Middle East tensions on both Israel's unwarranted sense of victimhood, accrued from the Holocaust, and its unwillingness to "to give up its empire." As far as Israel's paranoid obsessions with the specter of a nuclear Iran, the author dismissed any real threat by announcing that "Iran makes an appealing enemy for Israelis," and that "Israelis have psychologically displaced the source of their anxiety onto a more distant target: Iran."

It is hard to fathom how a democracy of seven million people by any stretch of the imagination is an "empire." Israel, after all, fought three existential wars over its 1947 borders, when the issue at hand was not manifest destiny, but the efforts of its many enemies to exterminate or deport its population. I would not otherwise know how to characterize the Arab promise of more than a half-century of "pushing the Jews into Mediterranean."

While it is true that Israeli forces stayed put on neighboring lands after the 1967 war, subsequent governments eventually withdrew from the Sinai, southern Lebanon, and Gaza — areas from which attacks were and are still staged against it. The Economist's choice of "appealing" is an odd modifying adjective of the noun "enemy," particularly for Iran, which has both promised to wipe out Israel and is desperately attempting to find the nuclear means to reify that boast.

The Economist article is fairly representative of European anger at Israel, a country that is despised by most of the nations that make up the UN roster. Or as Nicky Larkin, an Irish documentary filmmaker and once vehement anti-Israel activist, recently confessed, "An Irish artist is supposed to sign boycotts, wear a PLO scarf, and remonstrate loudly about The Occupation. But it's not just artists who are supposed to hate Israel. Being anti-Israel is supposed to be part of our Irish identity, the same way we are supposed to resent the English."

What then are the sources for widespread hatred of Israel? Such venom cannot be explained just by political differences with its Arab and Islamic neighbors. After all, take any major issue of contention — occupied land, refugees, a divided Jerusalem, cross border incursions — and then ask why the world focuses disproportionately on Israel when similar such disputes are commonplace throughout the globe.

Over half a million Jews have been ethnically cleansed from Arab capitals since 1947.

Does the world much care about the principle of occupation? Not really. Consider land that has been "occupied" in the fashion of the West Bank since World War II. Russia won't give up the southern Kurile Islands it took from Japan. Tibet ceased to exist as a sovereign country — well before the 1967 Middle East War — when it was absorbed by Communist China. Turkish forces since their 1974 invasion have occupied large swaths of Cyprus. East Prussia ceased to exist in 1945, after 13 million German refugees were displaced from ancestral homelands that dated back 500 years.

The 112-mile green line that runs through downtown Nicosia to divide Cyprus makes Jerusalem look united in comparison. Over 500,000 Jews have been ethnically-cleansed from Arab capitals since 1947, in waves of pogroms that come every few decades. Why are they not considered refugees the way the Palestinians are?

The point is not that the world community should not focus on Israel's disputes with its neighbors, but that it singles Israel out for its purported transgressions in a fashion that it does not for nearly identical disagreements elsewhere. Over 75 percent of recent United Nations resolutions target Israel, which has been cited for human rights violations far more than the Sudan, Congo, or Rwanda, where millions have perished in little-noticed genocides. Why is the international community so anti-Israel?

A new sort of fashionable and socially acceptable anti-Semitism looms large. For much of the past two millennia in the West, hatred of the Jews was a crude prejudice, rich with state-sanctioned religious, economic, and social biases. By the same token, dissidents, leftists, and anti-establishmentarians once took up the cause of decrying anti- Semitism, an Enlightenment theme until well after World War II.

No more — with the establishment of Israel, anti-Semitism metamorphosized in two unforeseen ways. First, it became a near obsession of the modern Left, which associated the creation of the Jewish state with a sort of Western hegemonic impulse. That Israel was democratic and protected human rights in a way unlike its autocratic neighbors mattered nothing. To the international Left, Israel was a religious, imperialistic, and surrogate West in the Middle East.

The new anti-Semites are not crass and vulgar. They are sophisticated intellectuals.

After the 1967 war, when a once vulnerable Israel emerged victorious and apparently unstoppable, Jews lost any lingering sympathy from the horrors of World War II and Israel became a full-fledged Western over- dog, closely associated with its new patron, the much envied and hated United States. Not only were the new anti-Semites no longer just buffoonish skinheads, neo-Nazis, and Klansmen, but they were polished and sophisticated intellectuals. Deploring anti-Semitic illiterates in white sheets was rather easy; but countering Hamas cartoons of Jews as apes and pigs in West Bank newspapers was difficult when they were disseminated in the name of free speech at U.C. Berkeley.

There was a second facet of the new anti-Semitism. The establishment of the state of Israel itself also served as a respectable cloak for anti-Semitism. One now spoke not of disliking Jews, but only of despising the Jewish state and seeing Palestinians as if they were victims analogous to minority groups within the West. From Oxford dons to award-wining novelists, it became socially acceptable to decry the creation of Israel in a way it was not to say that the Jews were again causing trouble. Alleging that "Jews" had too much influence was still retrograde, but worrying about the power of the "Jewish lobby" was suddenly politically-correct.

Oil, of course, played an even larger role. By the 1960s, the West was heavily dependent on Persian Gulf and North African oil and gas, and by the 1990s, was in a rivalry with emerging economies in India and China to ensure steady Middle East supplies. After the deleterious oil cutoff of 1973, the Arab world proved not just that it was willing to use oil as an anti-Israel weapon, but also that it could do so quite effectively.

On the flip side, since the 1960s, trillions of petrodollars have flowed into the Islamic Middle East, not just ensuring that Israel's enemies now were armed, ascendant, and flanked by powerful Western friends, but through contributions, donations, and endowments also deeply embedded within Western thought and society itself. Universities suddenly sought endowed Middle East professorships and legions of full tuition-paying Middle East undergraduates. Had Israel the oil reserves of Saudi Arabia, then "occupied" Palestine might have resonated at the UN about as much as Ossetia, Kashmir, or the Western Sahara does today.

"Being anti-Israel is supposed to be part of our Irish identity," says a filmmaker

Size matters as well. Israel is tiny; its enemies, legion. For many in the world, demography is everything: would an opinion-maker or journalist rather side with seven million Israelis or 400 million of their enemies in the largely Islamic Middle East? And if Israel had clearly done well in the 1947, 1956, and 1967 wars, after the next round of fighting in 1973, 1982, and 2006, critics smelled weakness and found it more comfortable to prefer the soon-to-be winning side. As a result, diplomats, military officers, journalists, writers, and actors found it easier to count heads and choose the path of least resistance—given Israel's recent inability to defeat quickly and decisively its Arab adversaries.

The terrorism of the last thirty years loomed large as well. If in the 1970s, Western governments feared that their Olympic games, their jet airliners, their embassies, and their sports teams might by attacked by secular left-wing Palestinian terrorists, by the late 1990s they were even more afraid that radical Islamist suicide bombers and terrorists would strike not just abroad, but inside Europe and North America itself. After 9/11, to draw a cartoon in Denmark mocking a Jewish rabbi would earn either praise or indifference; but to caricature Mohammed or the Koran ensured threats of assassination in the heart of postmodern, humanitarian Europe.

Intellectuals are not moral supermen, and supposedly courageous muckraking writers and journalists prefer, we have seen, to live without fear than to accurately describe the situation on the ground in the Middle East. For many intellectuals, the choice of lauding or disliking Israel was not just based on careerist self-interest, but also on a careful calculus that Western nations, for all their talk of free speech, were as terrified of terrorists as were the latters' targets. Criticize or caricature radical Islam, and a terrorist was more likely to get you than your fearful Western government was to protect you. Ask Salman Rushdie or Kurt Westergaard.

Finally, Israel in the West has become analogous to something like the uncool image of Sarah Palin — a target of mindless and uniformed invective that nevertheless serves as a sort of cachet or membership card into the right circles. Filmmakers do not usually shoot sympathetic documentaries about Israel — not if they want grants from foundations and social acceptance from their peers and overseers. Visiting journalists and authors might hotel in Israel, but their professional work on the West Bank will be praised and supported to the degree that it is pro-Palestinian and shunned should it be either balanced or pro-Israeli.

Will the image of Israel ever be reversed? Only if the above criteria are altered — a damning indictment that popular antipathy has little to do with the reality of Israel's predicament.

EDITOR'S ADDENDUM:

Some comments that added useful information.

Prevention Vs. Defense Vs. Retaliation

Israel has switched from a no-Arab state solution to a two-state solution. Results: (1) Palestinian Authority let in 60,000 terrorists, educates to hate, manufactures missiles; and (2) Israel spends billions on counter-terrorism, is diverted from planning against major enemy armies, and loses self-confidence.

About a million Israelis now are in range of missiles from Gaza. When sirens blare, the million hides. "Since Oslo 1993, Israel's battle against terrorism has been subordinated to the...state of mind entrenching moral and operational ambiguity rather than clarity. Therefore, it has been addicted to defense, the belief that 'restraint is strength,' the assumption that there is no military solution to terrorism and the subordination of war on terrorism to the pursuit of peace, international pressure and international public opinion." "The war on terrorism cannot be won by defensive - but only by offensive means." "A limited response to terrorism and the pursuit of ceasefires" means a war of attrition. Being more numerous, Arabs have the advantage in attrition. "The answer is not another ceasefire, but "the destruction of the ideological, educational, political, financial, logistical and operational infrastructures of Palestinian fire(power)." "An effective offensive should not strive for engagement and coexistence with — or the suspension of - terrorism, but for uprooting terrorism." "An effective offensive against Palestinian terrorist capabilities should not be surgical and limited in scope and time, but comprehensive, decisive, sustained and disproportionate, aiming to devastate all terrorist infrastructures and capabilities, bringing the enemy to submission." And then the real solution would be a Zionist one, involving Jewish settlement of the land (From Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, "Second Thought -- Israel Hayom," 3/12/12 http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=1534 sent via winston@winstonglobal.org, 3/15/12).

Israel Pays Terrorists

Israel's welfare laws apply to citizens and to Arab non-citizens residing in Jerusalem. The laws do not deny benefits to people convicted of murder and other terrorism, even if still in prison. Some of the terrorists have been injured during commission of their crimes, so they get disability insurance. When they reach retirement age, they get an old-age stipend.

As a result, Israel pays welfare type benefits to people who, as enemies of Israel, have murdered Israelis. A better use of those funds would be to compensate the victims of terrorists.

Nor is this all. Israel collects excise taxes for the Palestinian Authority, which encourages murder of Israelis. About half those collections go to Gaza, whose rulers actively commit terrorism.

Some Members of Knesset have started a process to reduce the benefits for convicted murderers and terrorists by half. "That is correct — the Knesset is only one-half working for Israel's obliteration, by preserving only half of the stupidest idea in human history." "Israel's Ministry of Justice bureaucrats opposed any reduction in the welfare benefits for the mass murderers." (Prof. Steven Plaut, 4/9/12).

To those injustices, add compensation given to enemy people for damages inflicted by the IDF in defending Israel. Add failure to enforce the law against Arabs, Jewish leftists, and foreigners who raid Israelis' crops and try to usurp Jews' land. Then there are the courts that refuse to let Jews move into houses they bought and refuse to make Arabs vacate from houses Jews own. Include police and prosecutors who always take the Arab side in disputes over who attacked whom, though the Arabs are in a state of jihad. As jihadists, Israeli Arabs vote in radical MKs and many belong to the Islamist Movement, that seek to overthrow the Jewish state. Many Israeli Arabs attack Jews; Jerusalem Arabs more often throw stones at them.

Does socialism in Israel mean that Israel should reward terrorists?

It is one thing to offer welfare benefits to Israeli citizens. It is downright foolish to offer those benefits to non-citizens in Jerusalem and to offer citizenship to alien Arab residents of Jerusalem and to allow them to keep residency rights even if they have moved away for years. Perhaps Israeli officials think they are showing how nice they are. I think they are showing how evil they are, by empowering jihadist evil, the attempt to take the Jews' country away from them.

Let us differentiate the brilliance of Israelis in high-tech from the dull-witted Israelis who make policy on the Arabs!

Sinai Security; Arab Attitude Toward Israel

"Major General Mahmoud al-Hefnawy, South Sinai security chief, denied reports in Israeli media that rockets were fired from the Sinai Peninsula into Eilat. He described the security situation in Sinai as 'excellent.'"

"Major General Khaled Fouda, the governor of South Sinai, described the Israeli remarks as "rumors that Israel spreads when tourism increases in Sinai, as occupancy rates have reached 60 percent in South Sinai."

"Sheikh Mohamed al-Ahmar of the Nuweiba tribes said Israel seeks to harm Sinai economically and that it always warns its citizens about going to Sinai ahead of Jewish holidays, especially with the return of tourists from Europe. Sherif al-Ghamrawy, a tourism expert in Taba, accused Israel of spreading those rumors to prevent its tourists from spending their vacations in Sinai. He said that he doesn't receive Israeli tourists in his resort in Taba."

Dr. Aaron Lerner, head of IMRA, aks, "If the security situation in Sinai is so 'excellent' then why is the gas line blown up every time it is repaired?" (www.imra.org.il, 4/10/12, from Al-Masry Al-Youm Thu,3/4/12 http://www.egyptindependent.com/node/753681.)

Israel does warn Israelis against vacationing in Sinai. Even under the Mubarak regime, Muslims attacked Israeli tourists. Now, however, Egypt's Army does not maintain order in the Sinai. Terrorists and smugglers have almost a free hand. European tourists should be shunning the Sinai, too.

But the notion that Israel is trying to harm Egypt has no basis. After all, Israel would like Egypt to restore stability there. Israel wants peace and cooperation with Egypt. Israel is cautious not to set off another war there, as Islamists take power.

The U.S. media does not seem to understand that Muslim Arabs view Israel and Jews with vicious bigotry, pretend that Jews are plotting against them even while they do plot against Israel, and pretend to be victims while they seek to make Jews the victims. Muslim Arabs and Pakistanis also make Christians and other minorities victims. Western reaction should take into account that jihad is evil and its proponents are our enemies who cannot be won over.

The Islamists increasingly say they will end the treaty with Israel. Some pundits advise Israel that if Egypt ends the treaty, then Israel should remove its rewards to Egypt for signing the treaty: the Sinai and its oil wells developed by Israel. Why should Egypt end its obligations and keep the benefits?

Has Israel been stocking up on military supplies so it would not depend upon a hostile President Obama to do so during another war?

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.

Want to see provocative pictures?

These parents and children taking an outing are, according to some, the most dangerous people on the planet

Some of the desecrators were even seen singing and dancing. Outrageous, I know.

Sergio Tessa can be reached at Hadar-Israel@verizon.net.

Two separate investigations into the New Black Panthers have been conducted this month, one in response to charges of homegrown terrorism and the other in response to the group's placing a bounty on the head of George Zimmerman, the alleged shooter of Florida teenager Trayvon Martin.

The results of the twofold probe, one of which was released yesterday, reveals New Black Panther ties to the Middle East terrorist group Hezbollah.

Congressman Peter King, R-NY, has been investigating Hezbollah's activities within the United States as part of a Congressional probe into homegrown terrorism. King is Chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security. Part of the results of his investigation can be read here.

On the heels of King's report came another significant development yesterday as a researcher who works with retired General Paul Vallely, a former Fox News analyst, issued a separate report, published here, which exposes significant collaboration between Hezbollah and the New Black Panthers.

The report states,

The springboard of Hezbollah has bearing with regard to the deep ties to people within the Black Panthers Party and the New Black Panther Party and their later affiliation with terror organizations such as Hezbollah. It is important to understand that while there are two distinct names, the doctrine, and the mission and in many cases the same people have been carried over by name and relationships over the years. The Black Panthers, like the New Black Panthers Party, have a Marxist doctrine and have merged much of the common objectives and like minded attitudes to Islam.

David Horowitz of Front Page Magazine and Discover the Networks has provided further in depth information on Hezbollah, the Black Panthers, and the New Black Panthers here, here, and here.

The central issue that can be gleaned from the various probes into the connections between the New Black Panthers and Hezbollah is the failure on the part of Attorney General Eric Holder and the Department of Justice to hold these groups accountable for their actions, the latest of which is the bounty placed on the head of George Zimmerman.

Holder had previously dropped the charges of felony voter intimidation against the New Black Panthers in a case that drew national scrutiny in 2008 when members of the group were videotaped swinging clubs and billy sticks at voters outside a polling place in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

When the history of the New Black Panthers, the Black Panthers, Hezbollah, the Nation of Islam, and high profile members of the Obama Administration are considered within the broad spectrum of long standing connections, advocacy, and legal maneuvering, many observers contend that it is not difficult to understand why Holder would be quick to drop the charges against the New Black Panthers in the voter intimidation case.

It would also explain, say critics, why Holder has failed to launch an investigation into the group's statements and activities in the aftermath of the Trayvon Martin shooting in Florida.

Holder, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and others within this exclusive circle such as Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates all share a common long standing history of close associations with dubious figures in the underground movement involving Black Muslims, the New Black Panthers, the Nation of Islam, the Black Panther Party, Hezbollah, and Hamas.

The names of major figures within this underground movement invariably come to the surface when delving into the background of Eric Holder, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Professor Gates, and others involved in the darker side of left wing politics--Eldridge Cleaver, H. Rap Brown, Malik Shabazz, Abdul Alim Musa, Khalid Abdul Muhammad, Carlos Torres, and Marilyn Buck.

The latter two, Torres and Buck, were recently released from federal prison after Holder quietly implemented a policy of granting freedom to terrorists. Buck had been a member of the Weathermen along with Obama associates Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, and had participated in homegrown terror during the 1960s and 70s. She had also maintained membership in the Black Liberation Army and the Black Panthers.

As this report from Yahoo News shows, the reasons the DOJ provided for the release of Buck from prison drew sharp criticism from those familiar with the case.

A video at the top of the left column summarizes the close ties between homegrown left wing terrorist organizations and overseas terrorists associated with radicalized Islam. Click on the image in order to view the video.

Notice! At my blog at The Liberty Sphere I present an in depth personal conservative manifesto delineating the acute danger America faces at this hour. It is a dire warning to the serious reader who loves freedom and the principles handed down to us by the Framers. Don't miss it.

Contact Barbara Sommer at lsommer_1_98@yahoo.com

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday called on the United States to release Jonathan Pollard from prison, after reports of a deterioration in the American-Israeli spy's health.

"It is time to release Pollard. The Festival of Freedom of all the Jews should turn into Pollard's private one," Netanyahu said in remarks relayed by his office, using a synonym for the Passover holiday Jews are currently celebrating. "I have done much for his release, and will continue to act for it."

On Friday, Israeli media reported that Pollard was rushed to hospital near his North Carolina prison. Israel's Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi Yona Metzger took the opportunity of a Sunday holiday visit paid by President Shimon Peres to convey an appeal to the US leadership for the freedom of the 57-year-old Pollard.

"We call on the US president that in such a situation, he will pardon Pollard and realise that after 27 years it is time to set this Jew free."

A spokesman for the rabbi told AFP that Metzger has recently been holding talks with senior officials in the White House, including Vice President Joe Biden, and that Metzger felt that their stance on Pollard had "softened." "The rabbi's request is that from hospital, Pollard be discharged to freedom," the spokesman said.

Peres told Pollard's wife Esther on Sunday that he was "bothered and concerned by the recent reports" about Pollard's health, and said he would ask President Barack Obama "to positively consider releasing Pollard," in light of his medical condition.

Esther Pollard to Peres: I don't want to be a widow (Aviel Magnezi - YNetNews - April 8, 2012)

While Pollard is hospitalized in North Carolina, his wife urges president to work towards securing his immediate release 'before it is too late' During a meeting with Jonathan Pollard's wife on Sunday, President Shimon Peres said he may file an official request later this evening with his American counterpart Barack Obama to release Pollard now. Pollard was admitted to a hospital in North Carolina after his condition deteriorated over the weekend.

Peres is expected to receive the presidential Medal of Freedom from Obama in June, but a petition signed by more than 10,000 Israeli citizens, including artists and political figures, urged the president to work towards securing Pollard's release beforehand.

Pollard, a United States Navy analyst convicted of passing information to Israel, has served 26 years of a life sentence.

Pollard's wife, Esther, told Peres that she realizes that he cannot bring forward his meeting with Obama, but added that her husband's condition didn't give her the luxury of waiting that long.

"I appeal to you as the wife of Jonathan Pollard who doesn't want to become his widow," she said.

"I'm asking you to ask Obama today to reduce Jonathan's sentence immediately. The Americans, headed by Obama, understand the significance of the holiday of freedom (Passover); they understand the value of freedom and compassion. I ask that you turn to President Obama today and request that he reduce Jonathan's sentence immediately, so that if he recuperates he won't have to go back to jail."

Pollard's condition is apparently not related to the kidney surgery he underwent in August.

During the meeting, which was held at the President's Residence in Jerusalem, activists presented Peres with a letter signed by 80 Knesset members demanding that he work towards securing Pollard's release.

Earlier, Peres discussed the Pollard issue with Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef "There are other American considerations that I am not familiar with," the president told Shas' spiritual leader. (http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-4213838,00.html)

Peres: I will do everything possible to free Jonathan Pollard

Jailed spy's wife asks president to act 'today' for the release of Pollard, currently hospitalized in the US

by Bracha Kurtzer and Yoel Goldman - The Times of Israel - April 8, 2012

President Shimon Peres pledged Sunday to use "all the tools at my disposal" to win the release Jonathan Pollard, the jailed spy who is currently hospitalized in the US.

Peres told Esther Pollard that he is "very concerned about the recent reports about Jonathan's health," according to quotes released by Peres' office. Esther Pollard said "time is running out" for her husband. "I ask you to contact President Obama today on humanitarian grounds and ask him not to send him back to jail," she told Peres.

She said she was making her appeal because she is Pollard's wife and does "not want to become his widow."

Peres was Israel's prime minister when Pollard, a civilian analyst working for the US military, was exposed as an Israeli agent in 1985 - an affair that badly strained relations between the allies.

Pollard, who is held in a North Carolina prison, was taken to hospital Friday. His supporters describe his condition as grave.

Also Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "the time has come to free Jonathan Pollard."

"I have done much to secure his release and will continue with this endeavor," said Netanyahu. "The Jewish festival of liberation should be his private festival of liberation," he said, in a reference to this week's Passover holiday.

Earlier Sunday, the powerful spiritual leader of the Shas party, Ovadia Yosef, urged Peres to press Obama to release Pollard.

Peres, who is set to meet with Obama in June to receive the Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award in the US, was paying a Passover visit to the Shas leader.

Peres promised last month to raise Pollard's case with Obama. He wrote on his Facebook page: "As president of the country it is very important to act decisively to bring about the release of Jonathan Pollard... In all of my meetings with President Obama and American political leaders, I have raised the issue of Pollard's release and I will continue to do so at my upcoming meeting with Obama in June."

An Israeli group that lobbies for Pollard's release said this weekend that the jailed spy is suffering from serious medical problems and that doctors are concerned for his life.

The Committee to Bring Jonathan Pollard Home said Saturday that doctors in a North Carolina hospital where Pollard was taken Friday were still trying to identify his illness.

Pollard, who was rushed to the hospital from prison due to severe pains, has experienced a slow deterioration in his health, the Committee claimed. It urged the Israeli government to push the US to shorten Pollard's sentence. He has been in jail for 27 years.

Returning Pollard to prison would be "a dangerous gamble with his life," the Committee said in a statement.

Bibi Pleads for Jonathan Pollard's Release - Haaretz - April 8, 2012

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called Sunday for the release of Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard, who was hospitalized over the weekend following deterioration in his medical condition.

"The Jewish holiday of freedom should become Pollard's private holiday of freedom, Netanyahu said."I will continue working toward his release."

President Shimon Peres met with Pollard's wife, Esther, in Jerusalem on Sunday and promised her that he will urge President Obama to release him due to his medical condition.

Esther Pollard told Peres that "time is running out" and said she does not want to turn into "Jonathan's widow." She urged Peres to ask Obama to release Pollard on humanitarian grounds.

Pollard, who was convicted in the U.S. of spying for Israel, was transferred over the weekend to a hospital after deterioration in his medical condition. For more, go to Haaretz.com.

Esther's Words to President Peres

April 8, 2012

To His Honor, President Peres,

I am the wife of Jonathan Pollard. I am appealing to you because I do not want to be the widow of Jonathan Pollard, G-d forbid.

I live in daily terror that the phone will ring to inform me of yet another medical crisis for Jonathan. He is only human. His strength has run out. With every medical crisis he survives, it is just a matter of time before the next one occurs.

Jonathan is still in the hospital, struggling to overcome the current medical crisis. The issue right now is to stabilize his condition. It is critical that when that occurs, he should not be sent back to prison.

Sending him back to prison is a death sentence for Jonathan. According to senior American officials it is also a great injustice. Those, who have full knowledge of the classified file of this case - including such notables as Henry Kissinger, George Schultz, and James Woolsey the former head of the CIA, Jonathan's sentence is unjust and he should be released at once. They have written to President Obama to advise him that keeping Jonathan in jail any longer is a travesty of justice..

I am turning to you, honored President, to implore you to do everything in your power today, without delay to ensure that Jonathan is not returned to prison.

I beseech you to make an immediate official request on humanitarian grounds to President Obama that Jonathan NOT be sent back to prison.

The Chief Rabbi of Israel, HaRav Yonah Metzger called me last night to give me strength (I did not know at the time that I would be meeting with your honor today). The chief rabbi told me that today is a special day - it is a shaat ratzon (a time of grace) for freedom. This is the holiday of freedom. The Americans understand the importance of freedom. They understand the symbol.

I therefore appeal to you, honored President, to do what is right and good in the eyes of man and G-d. I am imploring you in the strongest possible terms, to please make an official appeal to President Obama to ensure that Jonathan is not sent back to prison.

It is time for the nightmare to end. 27 years in prison is a long time. It is a long time to be with out proper food, proper rest and proper medical care. It is an eternity to live without family or friends, in a harsh environment.

Please, Honored President, do not delay. Your official appeal to President Obama today, without delay, may mean the difference between life and death for my husband, an Israeli citizen, who served this country faithfully. I beseech you, do and succeed!

With great respect,
Esther Pollard
Mrs. Jonathan Pollard

Jonathan Pollard's wife makes plea to Peres

Wife of imprisoned Israeli agent pleads with president to pressure Obama for her husband's release.
by Greer Fay Cashman - The Jerusalem Post - April 8, 2012

Esther Pollard, the wife of the convicted American Naval Intelligence analyst who has spent 27 years in prison for spying for Israel, on Sunday entreated President Shimon Peres to act immediately to try to secure her husband's freedom before it is too late.

Esther was accompanied by MKs Uri Ariel and Ronit Tirosh who head the Knesset lobby for the release of Jonathan Pollard, along with members of The Committee for the Release of Jonathan Pollard. "I am the wife of Jonathan Pollard. I do not want to be the widow of Jonathan Pollard," she said her voice trembling with emotion and her face crumpling with anxiety.

Attired in a black hat, classic black long skirted suit and an ivory colored blouse, Esther made a dignified entrance to the President's office and tried very hard to maintain her composure, but there were moments when fear for her husband's well-being overtook her efforts at self-control.

Pollard has been hospitalized for several days in the Federal Hospital near the Butner North Carolina prison. He is suffering from intense pain for which the doctors have not yet found an explanation.

Esther told Peres that she lives in daily terror that the phone will ring and inform her of yet another medical crisis. "It's just a matter of time before the next one occurs." The issue right now she said is to stabilize her husband's condition.

Pollard entreated Peres to use all the influence that he has at his disposal to ensure that Pollard is not returned to prison. "Sending him back to prison is a death sentence," she said.

According to American officials, she added it is also a great injustice. She cited Henry Kissinger, George Schultz and former CIA head James Woolsey as saying that the sentence is unjust and that Jonathan Pollard should be released immediately.

Peres, who sat grave-faced as she spoke, told her that he can imagine the agony that she is currently undergoing, and reminded her that it was Casper Weinberger, the late US Secretary for Defense who had insisted on a life sentence for Pollard for what Weinberger had claimed to be security reasons. It was Weinberger who posed the greatest problem, said Peres. "But he retracted," came the chorus from those who had accompanied Esther Pollard to the meeting.

Peres said that at this stage it was important to focus on the humanitarian aspect of the Pollard case, and promised to make it a top priority.

Esther apologized for being slightly repetitious, saying that because she was so concerned about her husband, she found it difficult to concentrate on anything else and she was also sleep deprived as a result of worry.

She implored Peres to do everything in his power to bring Pollard to Israel. No other Israeli has as much influence and respect in Washington as Peres said Pollard, which was the main reason that she was begging him to act immediately. It was time to end the nightmare, she said, adding that 27 years was a long time in which to live in a hostile, anti-Semitic environment to be without proper food, without proper rest, without proper medical care and without family and friends

Pollard was sentenced for passing classified material to Israel which was of vital interest, but which had been held back by the Americans.

Reminding Peres that her husband is an Israeli citizen "who served this country faithfully" Esther again urged Peres to act immediately.

Tirosh reminded Peres that it was during his term as prime minister that Pollard was granted Israeli citizenship in November, 1995. Nothing would be more symbolic during the festival of freedom she said, than for US President Barack Obama to grant Pollard the freedom that he has long been denied.

Ariel presented Peres with a letter to Obama that has been signed by 80 MKs who ask the US president to grant Pollard clemency. The letter was to have been presented in June when Peres is due to fly to the US to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom, but Ariel realized that an appeal to Obama could not wait that long and said that he joined in Esther's plea. Esther said that she had received a telephone call from Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger on Saturday night, who prior to the start of Pessah had called on the public to pray for Jonathan Pollard. Metzger had contacted her in order to give her moral strength and to tell her that the season represented a time of grace, a holiday of freedom, a symbol which the Americans understand.

Coming from America herself, Esther is well aware of this and told Peres of the case of a Cuban who had been released from prison and allowed to go home because his brother was dangerously ill. Under such circumstances, she could not understand why her husband who is severely ill should still be incarcerated.

Peres pledged to explore every possibility and said that he would consult with others, but promised to take action not later than Monday. "We don't want to make any mistakes at this stage," he said.

It was important for him to also convey that he had seen and spoken to Esther because this was yet another dimension of the humanitarian side of the case.

Speaking to reporters after emerging from the meeting with Peres, Esther said that she had no doubt that he was "very sympathetic and very committed to doing whatever he can as quickly as possible." She was also convinced that he understood that time is of the essence and that he must act now. "It's very clear that he's very devoted to bringing Jonathan home," she said.

Asked by The Jerusalem Post if she had been given more reason for hope this time around than on previous occasions, Esther's reply was "Jonathan is alive."

Further questioned as to whether she thought that it would be effective if Peres and the two chief rabbis were to fly to Washington this week to entreat Obama to let Pollard go," her reply was, "There's not enough time."

Prior to meeting with Esther, Peres met with Shas mentor Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and the two chief rabbis, Metzger and Shlomo Amar. Peres had ostensibly visited the rabbis to wish them well on the Pessah holiday, but in each case the conversation got around to Pollard, and in each case the rabbis asked Peres to do his utmost to enable Pollard to go free.

Also speaking on the issue, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Sunday that the time had come to free Pollard. "I have done a lot to secure his release and will continue with this endeavor," the prime minister stated.

End a great injustice

Jonathan Pollard remains in prison largely because of former defense secretary's biases.
by Lawrence J. Korb - The Jerusalem Post - April 4, 2012 (Posted April 8, 2012)

The life term that Jonathan Pollard received for spying on the US for Israel was a direct result of two damage assessments written by my one-time boss, former Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger. When asked by Pollard's father why Weinberger had written such harsh damage assessment affidavits that they apparently caused the judge to overturn the plea bargain government prosecutors made with Pollard, I replied that he was most likely motivated by his visceral dislike for Israel and its impact on US policy.

That was 27 years ago. Last year I wrote US President Barack Obama asking him to commute Pollard's sentence. In my letter I again made the point about Weinberger's personal views motivating his affidavits. I have now been joined in this assessment by Ronald Reagan's National Security Advisor at the time, Robert "Bud" McFarlane, someone who would have been in a much better position than me to understand Weinberger's motivation.

In a letter to President Obama on February 9, McFarlane asked the president to commute Pollard's sentence. McFarlane argued that Weinberger's affidavits were "inspired in large part by his deeply held animus towards the state of Israel" and were manifested in [Weinberger's] "recurrent episodes of strong criticisms and unbalanced reasoning when decisions involving Israel were being made."

He went on to point out that Pollard's resultant imprisonment was "disgraceful and mean-spirited," and "well beyond what any court would sentence for the same action today." McFarlane called Pollard's life sentence a "great injustice," and he encouraged the president to commute Pollard's sentence to time served.

Most of the major decision-makers who were intimately involved in the case have issued public calls for clemency. They include former Secretary of State George Shultz, former Senator David Durenberger (R-MI) (who served as Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence at the time of Pollard's conviction), and former Congressman Lee Hamilton (R-IN) (Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee at the time of Pollard's sentencing). They certainly had the best sense of the damage Pollard caused, and like McFarlane and me, they realize that the punishment did not fit the crime.

Key figures who viewed the classified damage assessment years later also favor Pollard's release. They include former head of Senate Intelligence Dennis DeConcini (D-AZ), Deputy Attorney General Philip Heymann, Attorney General Michael Mukasey, White House counsel Bernard Nussbaum, as well as James Woolsey, former Director of the CIA. Mukasey, who was attorney general for George W. Bush, stated it well when he wrote that no one alleges Pollard intended to harm the United States with his actions - nor was he ever charged with harming the US.

Rumors have recently circulated that there is still opposition to Pollard's release in the defense and intelligence communities. Perhaps the reason it has not been made public is that the voices of those who favor clemency are so overwhelming. As a former Assistant Secretary of Defense and naval intelligence officer, I can say unequivocally that there is no reasonable basis for such opposition - if indeed it exists.

In the last 18 months the only people with significant knowledge of the Pollard case to publicly oppose his release are his government prosecutors - namely, Joseph DiGenova and John Martin. It is astonishing that DiGenova and Martin would oppose Pollard's release, given that it would be consistent with the plea bargain they themselves arranged. They are certainly aware that the average sentence for the offense Pollard committed is 2 to 4 years. Such actions are morally wrong and ultimately damage the integrity of the Justice Department for which they had a duty to uphold.

As Senator DeConcini recently wrote, "Enough is enough." It is clear that every day Pollard remains in prison is a continuation of a great injustice, one which President Obama could rectify with a simple stroke of his pen. If there was any doubt about why Pollard was treated so unfairly, Bud McFarlane's letter should put that to rest.

The writer is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress and a Senior Adviser to the Center for Defense Information. He was formerly Director of National Security Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

Peres to expedite appeal to Obama about Pollard

After meeting with Israeli agent's wife, president promises to issue a formal request for Pollard's release by Monday, in light of his deteriorating health.
by Gil Hoffman, Greer Fay Cashman - The Jerusalem Post - April 8, 2012

President Shimon Peres intends to get in touch with US President Barack Obama on Monday to discuss the fate of Israeli agent Jonathan Pollard, following an emotional meeting Sunday with Pollard's wife, Esther.

Ahead of the meeting, it appeared that Peres would wait to discuss the Pollard case with Obama until June 13, when he goes to Washington to receive a Presidential Medal of Freedom. But by the end of the meeting, he promised to issue a formal request for Pollard's release by Monday, in light of his deteriorating health.

"His response was unequivocal that he would put his international reputation on the line and use every means at his disposal," Esther Pollard said. "He told me he would discuss how to proceed with his advisers because [he said] he must succeed this time."

Accompanied by the heads of the Knesset Caucus for Pollard - MKs Uri Ariel (National Union) and Ronit Tirosh (Kadima) - Esther read Peres a letter to the president she had written in advance of the meeting.

"I am the wife of Jonathan Pollard," she said, with a trembling voice.

"I am appealing to you because I do not want to be the widow of Jonathan Pollard."

Pollard is not allowed to receive visitors except the hospital chaplain. The chaplain had been concerned about Pollard obtaining kosher for Passover food but he is being fed intravenously so it is not relevant.

Esther Pollard told Peres that she lives in daily terror that the phone will ring and inform her of yet another medical crisis.

"With every medical crisis he survives, it is just a matter of time before the next one occurs," she said. "Jonathan is still in the hospital, struggling to overcome the current medical crisis. The issue right now is to stabilize his condition. It is critical that when that occurs, he should not be sent back to prison. Sending him back to prison is a death sentence."

Pollard's long list of ailments include: diabetes, nausea, dizziness, blackouts and ongoing issues with his gall bladder, kidneys, sinuses, eyes and feet. He also suffers from Meniere's disease, which causes him to lose consciousness and fall without warning. But a source close to Pollard said his hospitalization was not connected to any of his past ailments.

Esther also emphasized the injustice of her husband's life sentence, quoting former senior American officials who have called upon Obama to commute his sentence to the 26.5 years he has already served. She cited former secretaries of state Henry Kissinger and George Schultz and former CIA head James Woolsey. Peres told her that he can imagine the agony that she is currently undergoing. He said that at this stage it was important to focus on the humanitarian aspect of the Pollard case.

Esther said no other Israeli has as much influence and respect in Washington as Peres. She said that she had no doubt that he was "very sympathetic and very committed to doing whatever he can as quickly as possible."

Prior to meeting with Esther, Peres met with Shas mentor Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and the two chief rabbis, Yona Metzger and Shlomo Amar. Peres had ostensibly visited the rabbis to wish them well on the Passover holiday, but in each case the conversation turned to Pollard, and in each case the rabbis asked Peres to do his utmost to enable Pollard to go free.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu also released a statement Sunday expressing hope that Pollard would soon be free.

Contact Alexander Dymshits at alex8well@yahoo.com

I'm a 22-year-old Portuguese gay activist and PhD student. I'm not Jewish, Israeli or even religious, but I am a Zionist and strong supporter of Israel, and I want to explain why.

My story begins at the age of nine, when I went to the school library to get the Diary of Anne Frank. I had no prior idea about the Holocaust and I could not comprehend such persecution. I had never met a Jew, but I was raised to see other people as similar to myself.

The book's story haunted me: This girl, slightly older than me, hiding for years, confined, isolated, being persecuted for who she was, constantly fearful of being discovered... How horrible; how could this have happened?

A few months later, I discovered I was gay. I was 10 and in Anne's attic: Confined, isolated, hiding who I was, fearing what would happen if I was discovered... I felt strongly identified with Anne and the Jewish people, and this feeling never abandoned me.

Shortly after, the second Intifada started. I began seeing Israel, a country which I knew almost nothing about, on the news constantly, for the worst reasons. I learned that the Jews had invaded Palestine after the Holocaust to get a country and were occupying and controlling the native Palestinians who lived in the remaining land.

The TV showed us these people blowing themselves up inside buses and cafes and I, like most people around me, thought: "How desperate must someone be to kill themselves like this? How could the Jews go from being oppressed to oppressors? Have they not learned the lessons of History?" I grew up loving the Jewish people but hating Israel.

In 2008, when I was 18 and in college, I found myself criticizing Israel and the Gaza Strip blockade in a YouTube video about the death of Rachel Corrie. I got an answer from an Israeli commenter about my age, who wrote that there was no blockade, as several trucks were crossing into the Strip daily.

This greatly confused me and I asked him to present me with his arguments in defense of Israel. I said I would change my mind if they were convincing. He wrote me a long message, telling me about the massacres of Jews in Palestine before Israel existed, the wars of extermination, and the indoctrination for hate of Jews and Israel in the Middle East, among other things, which he compared to several examples of the humanist character of Israel and its society.

I read it all and, after verifying the information, I was convinced...

Angry and betrayed

My world shook. I became aware that I was making unfair judgments and spreading hate and false propaganda about Israel ... I was sad with myself and I felt angry and betrayed that I had trusted so much in organizations I thought were fighting for peace, equality and against prejudice, like I saw them doing for gay rights.

I realized I was being fed ignorance and hate by people who were, at best, as ignorant and prejudiced as those they were "fighting" against while believing themselves to be enlightened individuals and making me believe it too...

I read more and more about Israel, and I became fascinated with the amazing story of a people who, against all odds, had managed to survive and remain united through centuries of persecution, fight for their homeland, rebuild their country and revive their language - just like a phoenix rising from the ashes, striving for freedom and peace.

I realized Israel is a democratic, tolerant, multi-ethnic, multi-religious, rapidly developing nation. A place I could live in free and more accepted than in my home country, and the only place I could safely set foot at in the Middle East.

I found myself in love with Israel, something I never thought I would do and never really want to be.

In 2010, there was the flotilla incident. Suddenly, all media were reporting about Israel. The news reports were grossly distorted and I knew I had to do something. I found myself arguing about it with professors at the university and I started sharing videos of the IDF through my Facebook account.

I thought I would be risking much socially, but I knew it was a matter of justice, as someone had to tell the truth and not allow Israel to be demonized with no right to defense once again. After the flotilla I kept posting pro-Israel stuff, and had serious and even ugly discussions about this issue with several people.

Each discussion revealed more ignorance and double-standards and made me a stronger Zionist and supporter of Israel and its people. I thought I was the only one defending Israel but I gradually discovered other people doing it.

Once, a friend whispered in my ear: "I am also more on the side of Israel ... but, please, don't tell anyone!" She was scared to voice her opinion, and this reinforced my conviction that I had to be vocal about my defense of Israel; I was speaking for many people who were afraid to do it.

At the end it's a matter of justice. If there's a people that fights for its right to self-determination and to live in peace, I will be on their side. If there's a group that is demonized by prejudice and ignorance, I will fight prejudice and ignorance with them. If there's a culture whose main values include tolerance for different sexual orientations, races and religions - clashing with another one that educates for intolerance and hate - I know which side I'll support.

I am a Zionist and I support the right of the Jewish people to self-rule and to life in peace, like I believe every thinking human being should.

Contact the poster at Neveragainisnow@live.com

Some more indisputable Muslim history. No they don't celebrate April Fool's Day.

Read More About: It was Muslims who had the exodus from Egypt not Jews and Brooklyn Bridge bought by Muslims for gigantic Mosque Site.

"Moses was a Muslim who led Muslims in Exodus from Egypt," says PA university lecturer on PA TV.

Israel's conquest of the Land of Israel is defined as: "The first Palestinian liberation through armed struggle to liberate Palestine." by Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik.

A Palestinian university lecturer taught during a recent Palestinian Authority TV program on religion that Moses, a Muslim, brought "the Muslims of the Children of Israel out of Egypt." He refers to the subsequent Israeli conquest of the Land of Israel as the "first Palestinian liberation... of Palestine." This conquest, he taught, was led not by Joshua, as the Bible tells, but by Saul (Talut) who is also said to have slayed Goliath.

While some of this is retelling of Islamic tradition, some of it is a distortion of even the Quran for political purposes. The Quran refers to the "Children of Israel" in their land in many chapters (e.g., Sura 5), but it never refers to them or anyone else as "Palestinians." Likewise the Quran never refers to Israel's conquest as a "Palestinian" conquest. The lecturer on PA TV, however, deviates from Islamic tradition, and calls the nation of Israel's conquest of the Land of Israel "the first Palestinian liberation through armed struggle to liberate Palestine."

This is another example, among many documented by Palestinian Media Watch, of PA historical revision for political purposes, in this case, rewriting even their own Islamic traditions.

The following is the interview with Dr. Omar Ja'ara, lecturer at Al-Najah University in Nablus and specialist in Israeli affairs, on PA TV religion program: "We must make clear to the world that David in the Hebrew Bible is not connected to David in the Quran, Solomon in the Hebrew Bible is not connected to Solomon in the Quran, and neither is Saul or Joshua son of Nun [of the Bible]. We have a great leader, Saul, [in the Quran] who defeated the nation of giants and killed Goliath. This is a great Muslim victory. The Muslims of the Children of Israel went out of Egypt under the leadership of Moses, and unfortunately, many researchers deny the Exodus of those oppressed people who were liberated by a great leader, like Moses the Muslim, the believing leader, the great Muslim, who was succeeded by Saul, the leader of these Muslims in liberating Palestine. This was the first Palestinian liberation through armed struggle to liberate Palestine from the nation of giants led by Goliath. This is our logic and this is our culture." -- PA TV (Fatah), Feb. 15, 2012

Can you believe it! Have a great Pesoch (Passover) - jsk

Jerome S. Kaufman is National Secretary of the Zionist Organization of America and hosts the Israel Commentary website (http://www.israel-commentary.org). This article is archived at http://israel-commentary.org/?p=3229

Some apologists for Radical Islam claim that Americans are Islamophobic. They depict Muslim and Non-Muslim murderers as equivalent. For example, Prof. Omid Safi of Islamic studies and UNC at Chapel claimed a moral equivalency between Major Nidal Malik Hasan of Ft. Hood, who slew U.S. troops, and U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, who shot some Afghan civilians. Prof. Safi accuses Americans of having a double standard toward mass murder. "He writes: When Americans kill, it is portrayed as an aberration, an act of a tormented and troubled individual. When Muslims kill, it is covered as a signal of a communal, global genocidal tendency." Consider the case of Major Hasan. Maj. Hasan was an Army psychiatrist who often treated mentally precarious war veterans. He abused his patients psychologically. He condemned their national service and tried converting some to Islam. He told one that because she was not a Muslim, she would burn in hell, etc. This went on for years. In his apartment, he left notes calling himself a soldier of Jihad.

Although Hasan's hostile behavior was observed, he was not expelled from the Army until the murders. Far from being bigoted against Radical Islam, the West is afraid to take it on. How did the government react to his murder of 13 fellow soldiers and similar attacks by Muslims? The official military report on that murder does not mention his name, "jihad, or "Muslim." "Islam" appears once in a footnote. Instead, federal officials refer to "overseas contingency operation, "a campaign against extremists who wish to do us hard," and "countering violent extremism" to describe America's wars against radical Islamists and terror-sponsoring nations. Attorney-General Holder would not say that radical Islam was involved in Hasan's crimes or in the attempted bombing of Times Square.

Contrary to Prof. Safi's contention, Hasan is typical of Muslims who murder fellow American soldiers. Hasan was in touch with Islamists and jihadist websites. He murdered to prevent U.S. troops from fighting in Iraq. Islamists called Hasan a hero.

As for Sgt. Bales, nobody praised him. The President condemned him. He faces the death penalty. He was not representative of U.S. military personnel, many of whom gave their lives to protect Muslims from jihadists. U.S. troops incur danger in their efforts to keep Muslim civilian casualties down.

Bales was not part of a hate network. He expressed no religious motivation. The two cases are not similar.

So actually, the U.S. does have a double standard. The U.S. condemns the non-Muslims harshly but is blind toward Islamic motivation of Muslim murderers.

Prof. Safi has no evidence to support his claims. The professor poses as a progressive Muslim fighting for justice. But he has a long history of defending Islamists and intimidating non-Muslims. His classroom assignments call scholars with home he disagrees, "Islamophobes."

"In his latest apologia for terrorists, he insults the professionalism of the American military, the decency of the American people, and the truth." (Winfield Myers. American Thinker, 3/25/12 http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/03/no_hasan_and_bales_are_not_equivalent.html http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/12195.) Actually, Arab governments call Arab murderers of innocent tourists individually mentally disturbed and not doing so out of Islamist motives. Examples are the Jordanian soldier shooting Israeli schoolgirls visiting Peace Island at the border and an Egyptian soldier shooting Israeli tourists in the Sinai and hi fellow soldiers barring Israeli ambulances from reaching a wounded tourist, who bled to death.

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.

A beautiful couple in their golden years

paint, or bird splatter, what a golf swing.jpg

Contact Fred Reifenberg Go see more of his graphic art at:
http://denjanewhome.blogspot.com/
http://reifyreadying.blogspot.com/
http://freifenberg-newblog.blogspot.com/
http://abstractsfromfred-fred343.blogspot.com/

1. There is truly encouraging news in Israel this Passover. There is a bill before the Knesset (parliament) now that would turn Israel into a democracy, in place of it being governed by an anti-democratic judicial tyranny. The bill would allow the Knesset to overturn "judicial activist" Supreme Court rulings in which Israeli non-elected judges seek to overturn laws passed by the Knesset which the judges personally dislike.

Let me be clear. The United States and other countries have systems in which the Supreme Court can cancel, revoke, or overturn a law, but that is when the judges rule that the law contradicts the Constitution. The US Supreme Court is about to consider whether Obama's mandatory health insurance purchase is one such unconstitutional law. In these countries, the Courts do NOT overturn laws simply because some judges personally disagree with them or dislike them. Only when there is a clear contradiction of the Constitution.

In Israel there is no formal Constitution. Nevertheless the Court has claimed the right to overturn laws passed democratically by the elected representatives of the people. Had the Court judges restrained themselves and done so only in extreme cases involving clear violations of basic rights and due procedure, perhaps the system could have gone on operating in Israel as is. But the Israeli Supreme Court has long been hijacked by leftist "judicial activists" who display disdain for democracy and have no respect at all for freedom of speech. Their goal has been to impose the leftist political agenda on the country through court rulings. And those who are convinced that the problem has been solved now that Beinisch is out as Chief Justice and Grunis is in need only look at last week's Migron ruling to see reasons for worry.

The Israeli Supreme Court has repeatedly overturned Knesset laws and interfered in the micro-decisions and micro-management of government and the army, all based on the political biases of the judges. The ex-Chief Justice Aharon Barak boasted that the Court was issuing rulings not based on any law but based on "enlightened opinion," by which he clearly meant leftist opinion.

Well, now the elected representatives of the people are fighting back. The Minister of Justice has placed a bill before the Knesset, and I expect it to win if Netanyahu does not have another of his notorious attacks of cowardice and Left-appeasing. It would allow a small super-majority in the Knesset (65 votes in the bill, but could be changed) to overturn a Court ruling that revokes or vetoes a Knesset law.

The Caring Left is of course hysterical. After all, how on earth will the radical leftist 2% of the population impose its agenda and ideology on the other 98% if the unelected judges of the Supreme Court are prevented from acting as dictators!!

In endorsing the bill, Maariv editor Ben Dror Yemini, himself left of center, points out the irony that the Supreme Court cancels Knesset laws without any requirement of a super-majority among judges voting on the verdict, while thundering against this bill that would introduce a Knesset super-majority for purposes of creating in Israel checks and balances.

2. Israel's Interior Minister has declared Gunter Grass, the ex-Nazi and Neo-Nazi writer, persona non grata in Israel. Grass had proclaimed Israel a far greater threat to the world than Iran and made little secret of his desire to see it exterminated much as Jews were exterminated by his SS comrades back when he was in the Waffen SS Panzer division. Haaretz' lead columnist Gideon Levy, who never makes a secret of his own desire for a second Shoah of Jews, writes a column praising and endorsing Grass today
(http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/israelis-can-be-angry-with-gunter-grass-but-they-must-listen-to-him-1.423194).

3. There is no "Two State Solution": http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=265058

4. Newsweek has run a story about America's 50 "most influential rabbis." As expected, not all on the list are rabbis at all, lots are women, and a few are simply leftist propagandists, like the Reform movement's David Saperstein. Many were chosen because they are pro-Muslim lobbyists.

5. I heard an interesting Dvar Torah over the holiday concerning the root of the word Behemah (Behemoth) or cattle in Hebrew. Cattle of course play a special role in the Biblical Temple sacrifices, including the unique Passover sacrifice. A Rabbinic commentator, I think it was the Mahara"l, claimed that the root of Behemah is Bah-Mah. That means, "inside of it, what is there?" Or in simpler terms, a cow is something empty, having no soul, having nothing of human value or divine spark in it. And since the Temple sacrifices were in part to remind humans of how unworthy and undeserving they are, in fact deserving of the deaths that the sacrificial animals were undergoing, there is a moral message in this.

Maybe it is just me, but I could not help noticing at once that the root for Behemah/Bah-Mah is exactly the same as the root in Oh-ba-ma. .

Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist, a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com.

New Israel Fund (NIF) finances many NGOs that seek to destroy Israel. NGO Monitor's president, Gerald Steinberg, keeps identifying such NGOs, and asks NIF to stop financing such NGOs' quests and false accusations against Israel.

For example, the Adalah group was scheduled to attend an "Israel Apartheid Week," where it would falsely accuse Israel of being apartheid. It also was going to tell the UN that Israel's laws foster racial discrimination. [I suppose by "racial" they mean religious or ethnic]. Since 2007, Adalah's constitution expressed the goals of eliminating the Jewish character of Israel and undermining Jewish sovereignty.

As Mr. Steinberg reminds NIF, such goals contradict NIF criteria for granting funds to organizations. Therefore, he asks NIF to take adult responsibility for its donations and stop financing anti-Israel and anti-Zionist organizations (g.steinberg@ngo-monitor.org, 2/8/12 from IMRA, www.imra.org.il).

Anti-Zionist NGOs on NIF subsidy define themselves as merely seeking democratic civil rights. Not that they lack much of that in Israel. They really seek to deprive Jews of civil rights and gain the dominance over other religions that theirs claims them entitled to.

Defining themselves by wording they know appeals to Westerners is part of Islam-approved deceit of non-Muslims in behalf of advancing Islam. The question is why Westerners dig no deeper into the NGOs' records.

We know that some Western organizations that call themselves pro-Israel are anti-Israel, too. J Street has been demonstrated to be like that. Suppose NIF were sincere in its professed care for Israel. What would it do?

A sincerely pro-Israel NIF, just seeking to help Israel improve, would review not only NGO charters but their projects, actions, and press releases. NIF would make sure that not only the projects it subsidizes but also overall NGO efforts are not anti-Israel, not false, anti-Zionist propaganda, and not subversive.

NIF has gotten many reports of subversive activity by those NGOs from NGO Monitor. Nevertheless, it keeps working with subversive NGOs. The pattern persists. Failure to check properly before donating cannot be excused when NGO Monitor shows it how to check. Were NIF sincere, surely it would enlist NGO Monitor to help it check. Otherwise, funds go to the very opposite cause that individual contributors intended.

NIF did not respond to my question how they answer NGO Monitor.

An Israeli Ridicules Accusation of Apartheid

Commenting about some Arab protesters in Israel, an Israeli I know asked, "What do they want?"

She explains, "They ate at the same restaurant that I just ate at. They shop in all the Malls; have the same Hospitalization plan that I have; same building with nurses and doctors in their neighborhood like in mine; go to Jewish hospitals; Arab doctors and nurses are accepted at Jewish hospitals; sit in the Knesset and always against Jews and for Arabs. MK Tibi went to Jaffa and incited the Arabs to shout and demonstrate against the government that he sits in and told them "Jews will take over Jaffa and Ako and throw you out." This was Land Day. MK Zoabi is still in the Knesset after being on the Turkish Ship that had terrorists on board and was out in the streets on Land Day inciting her Arabs in Nazareth. They are still in the Knesset. They can build anywhere they want to and are allowed. Jews can't even have a gutted out bus on a hilltop to live in."

I just submitted an article comprising comments by Muslim leaders calling Jews racially inferior and evil and demanding their expulsion from the Mideast in not from the whole planet. What does that tell you about Arab claims that Israel practices apartheid? It tells you that Arabs do. If they do, their complaints about others are ... What?

Zionism; De-Zionism

The Mount of Olives Cemetery has been a burial site for Jews for three millennia. It is the Jewish people's oldest and largest one. [Many Jews in the Diaspora came to the Land of Israel in their later years, desiring to be buried there. My great-grandfather was among them. So were many notable personages.]

"...this site is subjected to non-stop violence against visitors, grave desecrations, an unlawful mosque expansion, illegal building, all part of a concerted Arab effort to assert control over the burial site..." The desecrations are "rampant and systematic." Arabs are building illegally on land zoned for cemetery use. A nearby mosque is expanding illegally in the direction of the cemetery.

"The International Committee for the Preservation of Har Hazeitim [Hebrew for "Mt. of Olives."] will call an emergency forum to turn back the newest round of violence on the Mt. of Olives Cemetery..."

The news sources calls this desecration the "Arab Version of 'Price Tag' Violence on Mt. of Olives." (http://www.saveharhazeitim.org/ from IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis www.imra.org.il, 2/22/12).

Arab desecration there has been going on for many years. When Trans-Jordan conquered the Old City, the Arab Legion took old gravestones to use as paving for latrines. I've seen reports of Muslims claiming that land Jews were using really are old Muslim cemeteries. To substantiate the false claim, Muslims dug fresh and empty gravesites. I have reported periodic Arab assaults on the old cemetery near Hebron, and insufficient Army protection of it.

Therefore, I would say that the process is part of: (1) Putting a Muslim stamp on Jewish sites and history; and (2) Driving Jews out. The Arab Muslims keep at this because the Jewish state only occasionally and lethargically defends itself from the Palestinian Muslim Arab attempt to new Israel's War For Independence.

The comparison to "price tag," the term for vandalism of mosques and other Arabs' property in Judea-Samaria is a casual one. The differences between the two phenomena are greater than the similarity:

1. First of all, Arabs have been seen and even caught at vandalism of Jews' sacred property, including the destruction of Joseph's Tomb more than once and many attacks on Rachel's Tomb, when the P.A. is not falsely claiming those sites as Islamic. Usurping sites of conquered peoples is an old imperialistic attempt to destroy rival cultures, which Zulus, Incas, and Muslims have done elsewhere. Having defeated modern Muslim attempts to conquer it, all the more shame that Israel lets the struggle go on, the crimes go on, and innocent suffering go on!

By contrast, no "settlers" have been convicted of "price tag" vandalism. Considering the Israeli government's use of dirty tricks, including agents provocateurs, to defame settlers in order to facilitate leftists' elections and the leftist agenda of dispossessing Jews in the Territories, it is not fair to have decided without proof that Jewish nationalists committed the vandalism.

2. Muslim Arabs in the Territories and in Jerusalem have been committing many crimes against Jews and half of them admit in polls to supporting terrorism. Their leaders do onto condemn violent Arabs, they encourage them.

By contrast, if religious or nationalistic Jews are vandalizing mosques, most Israelis condemn it and few would justify it.

3. The Muslim Arab motive is to conquer. The alleged motives for the vandalism of mosques are to show: (1) The Army, which does not protect Jews much from Arab assaults, that it had better protect them, and then the Jewish retaliation would cease; and (2) The Arabs that they have a price to pay for their aggression.

Being hypocritical about the Arab-Israel conflict, the Establishment in Israel, Western Europe, and the U.S. condemn the vandalism of mosques, as do I, but do not condemn the vandalism of Jewish cemeteries. As if a football game, the Establishment team includes the media, which runs interference for the Establishment by conveniently emphasizing the mosque vandalism and practically ignoring the Jewish cemetery vandalism.

This is the same media and Establishment procedure for Gaza, where the media ignored and still ignores thousands of rockets that Arabs fire at Israel, but scream with indignation when Israel strongly retaliates at the cause of the attacks, and Arab civilians get hurt because Hamas uses them as human shields.

Similar hypocrisy is expressed in indignation over some inconveniences to some Arabs caused by a security barrier and checkpoints erected and largely successful against terrorist attacks against which almost no indignation is expressed. In that hypocrisy, Presidents Bush and Obama, both of whom claimed to be friends of Israel, and their Secretaries of State differentiated themselves from true friends of Israel and of peace. Peace starts with thwarting terrorism, which is active war by illegal means.

Illegal Muslim Arab warfare is another source of Establishment hypocrisy, which expresses outrage of what it mistakenly calls illegal Jewish housing. Further hypocrisy is in the lack of outrage of the many times greater and actually illegal Arab housing. There even is outrage over Jews moving into a house they buy. Further outrage flares over a finding that some Jews built on land that later investigation indicates it may be owned by Arabs, and no outrage over large-scale Arab theft of land in Israel and in the Territories.

Further hypocrisy is shown by those who suggest that the Arabs have a separate state "of their own," in the Territories, and that Jews be driven out of much of their houses in the Territories and even in parts of Jerusalem, but do not suggest that Jews have a state of their own but instead must tolerate a million Arabs in Israel, Arabs who often attack Jews with rocks and fists and who increasingly join the Islamic Movement.

At the seder, a fellow celebrant of that holiday of Judaism and Jewish national liberation and Zionist return to the Hebrew homeland, proposed what he calls a "two state solution." He did not know that the Palestinian Arabs already have a state in Palestine, called Jordan.

He accused PM Netanyahu of not negotiating. I got the chance only to mention that he had negotiated, and did not get the chance to mention that Abbas mostly refuses to negotiate.

I asked the fellow why he doesn't propose the removal of Arabs from Israel, since he proposes an exclusive state for Arabs that includes removal of Jews from Judea-Samaria. Four times he evaded that simple question. He kept trying to turn the question around to asking me what I propose. I replied that I had not proposed anything, I was ascertaining whether he is logically consistent in what he proposes. He would not answer.

At that point, he said he simply disagrees with my point of view. I replied that it is not a matter of a point of view. He was making assumptions and decisions contradicted by what I showed are the facts, historical experience, and logic. I found that he was not conversant with the facts and not interested in them, apparently because they contradict his conclusions. Instead of making a case, he asked, "Don't you think" this and "Don't you think" that.

He is not logical and consistent. I find that true of many leftists. Their ideology prevents them from honest reasoning.

So, there we were at a Zionist seder, he striving to deprive the Jewish people of a part of their homeland whose significance religiously, culturally, legally, and for national security he gave no indication of knowing or caring about, and in behalf of a people he did not know and refused to believe are trying to destroy his own people. He is not aware that the world is being subjected to international jihad, the major human conflict of our time.

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.

In October 2010, on the eve of the Islamic revolution that the media fancies as "the Arab Spring," the Supreme Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood called for jihad against the United States.

You might think that this all but unnoticed bombshell would be of some importance to policymakers in Washington. It was not. It is not. This week, the Obama administration quietly released $1.5 billion in foreign aid to the new Egyptian government, now dominated by a Brotherhood-led coalition in parliament — soon to be joined by an Ikhwan (i.e., Brotherhood) luminary as president.

It is not easy to find the announcement. With the legacy media having joined the Obama reelection campaign, we must turn for such news to outlets like the Kuwait News Agency. There, we learn that, having dug our nation into a $16 trillion debt hole, President Obama has nevertheless decided to borrow more money from unfriendly powers like China so he can give it to an outfit that views the United States as an enemy to be destroyed.

This pot of gold for Islamic supremacists is the spoils of a Brotherhood charm offensive. Given the organization's unabashed goals and hostility towards the West, it was U.S. policy, until recently, to avoid formal contacts with the Brotherhood — although agents of the intelligence community and the State Department have long engaged in off-line communications with individual MB members. By contrast, the Obama administration from its first days has embraced the Ikhwan — both the mothership, whose leaders were invited to attend Obama's 2009 speech in Cairo despite its then-status as a banned organization under Egyptian law, and the Brotherhood's American satellites, which have been invited to advise administration policymakers despite their notorious record of championing violent jihadists and repressive sharia.

Obama has overlooked the MB's intimate ties to Hamas, which self-identifies as the Ikhwan's Palestinian branch and is formally designated a terrorist organization under American law. Administration officials have absurdly portrayed the Brothers as "secular" and "moderate," although the organization, from its founding in the 1920s, has never retreated an inch from its professed mission to establish Islam's global hegemony.

The administration further hailed the Brotherhood's triumph in post-Mubarak legislative elections and made a point of abandoning the policy against formal MB contacts — though, in now-familiar Obama fashion, it simultaneously claimed that this "outreach" broke no new ground. And this week, the White House hosted a Brotherhood delegation to "broaden our engagement" with Egypt's new political actors, as an administration spokesman put it. In this, Obama officials were quick to exploit the cover they've gotten from the transnational-progressive wing of the Republican party: The administration spokesman stressed that "Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham and others have met with members of the MB during their visits to Egypt."

The useful-idiot brigade also includes the "House Democracy Partnership," a bipartisan cadre of congressmen that traipsed over to Egypt on its recent tour of the "Arab Spring" countries. On the agenda was a confab with Khairat el-Shater, the Brotherhood's newly announced presidential candidate.

Shater is Washington's new darling. That much is clear from an unintentionally hilarious dispatch from the New York Times' David Kirkpatrick, who portrays the Brotherhood as America's "indispensable ally against Egypt's ultraconservatives." Sure, they may be the world's leading exemplar of what Kirkpatrick gently calls "political Islam," but our policy geniuses reckon the Brothers are much to be preferred over the "Salafis" — reputedly, the more hardcore Islamic supremacists. As the Times elaborates, the Obama administration is alarmed by the rise of a charismatic Salafist, Hazem Salah Abu Ismail, who has shot to second place in the polls. Shater, the theory goes, could overtake Ismail and lead Egypt in the Brotherhood's more "pragmatic direction."

The notices jolted Florida Atlantic University students last weekend: It looked like they were being evicted from their dorms.

The mock notice, taped on more than 200 doors in three dorms on the Boca Raton campus, got their attention. Posted by FAU's Students for Justice in Palestine, the fliers were designed to show residents how Palestinians experience eviction from their homes by the Israeli government.

But the incident has riled some students and community members, who said they feel vulnerable and intimidated by the "provocative tactic."

Moreover, it appears the university helped spark the controversy by approving posting of the fliers, contrary to its own housing code.

SJP members say they had approval from the Housing and Residential Life Department, and were escorted by a department employee as they posted the papers on dorm doors and elevators on Friday night.

But the fliers violated university policy and were removed, Charles Brown, senior vice president for student affairs, said in a statement Wednesday.

"Free speech is good for everyone, but this is a bit intimidating," said FAU student Jackie Klein, 20. "They should be able to promote their views, but in a respectful way."

About 50 students attended a meeting on Wednesday at Hillel, FAU's gathering place for Jewish students, to discuss a response to the fliers. Hillel has no contact with SJP because SJP supports Israeli-divestment campaigns and has sung anti-Israel songs at campus events, Hillel director Scott Brockman said.

SJP is a national organization with 75 chapters that host Palestinian-awareness programs that many perceive as anti-Israel, such as boycott campaigns and annual Israeli Apartheid Weeks. The group opened its FAU chapter in the fall and has about 30 members.

They press Palestinian issues such as the status of prisoners, water rights and civilian home destruction, chapter President Noor Fawzy said.

"We want to raise awareness about the plight of the Palestinians," Fawzy said. "The intent is to expose Israel's illegal policies and give students a feel of what it's like to live under occupation."

Fawzy said four students put up the fliers and remained in the dorms afterward to take questions. She said the group was thrilled with the response from other students.

"We made a great impact on the student body," she said. "Having a table (in the school's breezeway) is one thing, but we have to look for other ways to get people's attention."

She said the group criticizes Israeli policies but not Jewish students or the Jewish religion.

"We have the right to express ourselves," Fawzy said. "There is no reason for the Jewish community to feel afraid."

No complaints were filed with campus police, Deputy Chief Keith Totten said.

The Anti-Defamation League has contacted FAU and is monitoring an investigation by the Student Affairs division, Florida director Andrew Rosenkranz.

Palm Beach County Commissioner Steven Abrams said in a statement Wednesday that using the county seal on the mock eviction notices, even with the disclaimer "not affiliated with county," is illegal and was meant "to scare or confuse students, which I am informed was the case in many instances."

Brockman said SJP violated a university policy by posting directly on dorm room doors, even though it had permission.

He said the university should allow vigorous debate but also should make sure students feel safe.

"This method is unacceptable," Brockman said. "It's not useful in promoting civil dialogue and is meant to provoke and intimidate."

Contact Richard Swier by visiting his website at
http://www.redcounty.com/rich-swier

Poor is Israel's strategic position now. Far more vulnerable in a few months will Israel be. Should improve its position by acting now? Can it get out of being boxed in by thinking outside the box?

Why more vulnerable? President Obama may soon be reelected. Having indicated that once reelected he would act with less restraint, his hostility toward Israel probably would become more active. And dangerous.

By then, Iran would possess nuclear weapons. Pres. Obama not only does not stop Iran, but his Administration has taken steps to compel Israel not to stop Iran. What steps? The Administration has leaked Israeli arrangements to facilitate a raid on Iran. Leaking those military secrets eliminates the element of surprise and enables Iran to thwart a raid.

Backed by a nuclear armed Iran, Iran's terrorist proxies may become bolder and may act withy more impunity. Other countries may press Israel not to fight hard, out of fear of Iran.

Meanwhile, relations with Egypt are likely to get worse. Egypt may back Hamas in a future confrontation, if Hamas still is around for a future confrontation. At any time, Syria may lash out in desperation.

Hamas and Hizbullah have built a sizeable rocket force and real armies. Despite all the hysterics over the last incursion into Gaza, Israel did not dismantle Hamas. Hamas has become a strategic menace to Israel. [I was visiting Israel when] Hamas recently fired 300 missiles into Israel in one day. Therefore, not only may Egypt back up Hamas in a future confrontation, but Hamas may impede Israeli mobilization against sovereign foes of Israel.

Israel could improve its strategic position and better weather Iranian retaliation against a raid on its nuclear facilities, if it destroyed at least Hamas beforehand. Each front removed would enable Israel better to focus its forces against retaliation.

Unfortunately, Israeli leaders rarely think strategically. They are concerned with current situations and the resulting public relations. Hence Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya'alon repeated the usual short-sighted refrain that Israel's goal is to restore the "quiet." As Dr. Aaron Lerner of IMRA keeps warning, that goal lets Hamas "continue to dramatically improve the range, accuracy, payloads and sheer volume of weapons as long as they don't use them too much." In my words, when Hamas decides to go all out, its attack would be much harsher on Israel and it would take far more resources to deal with Hamas later than now.

Israel has other reasons for hesitancy. Poor reasons. One is not to annoy Pres. Obama, nor to distract Pres. Obama's attention from Iran. However, Obama hardly can become more anti-Israel. He seems to think that bombing Iran would cost votes, reelection being his highest priority.

Some people might think a reason to allow a Hamas build-up is that attacking Hamas now would divert military resources from Iran. To the contrary, eliminating Hamas would reduce another front for Israel. Furthermore, attacking Hamas would not use up equipment needed for combating Iran. Ask, if not now, when? When Hamas is stronger? When Iran attacks?

Although the Strategic Affairs Minister and much of the political and military establishment are hesitant and plan short-range, the people of Israel want the government to act boldly and for the long run to eliminate strategic threats to Israel (www.imra.org.il).

People have old-fashioned notions of war. They called the last incursion into Gaza "war." It wasn't a war. It was a battle on a single front.

A more realistic notion of war is that of international jihad. International jihad has no time limit, many fronts, and several means -- diplomatic, propagandistic, economic, and terrorist, and military. All the so-called wars of the Arab-Israel conflict really are part of one war on one front. Bombings in or against the U.S., Europe, India, Pakistan, Mideast, Thailand, Africa, population infiltration of Western countries, and subversion of academia, all are part of international jihad.

Therefore, a new Israeli assault on Hamas should not be viewed as starting a new war. Some people condemned Israeli assaults on Lebanon as wars of "choice." The only choice was when to strike. Under the concept of continuing international jihad, one would recognize that terrorists and states have been attacking Israel for decades. In the campaigns of 1957 in Sinai and against Hizbullah and Gaza, the enemy had been attacking Israel for some time. Apparently, critics of Israel want Israel to keep absorbing casualties. Why listen to them? Ask them why they are not critics of the aggressors?

The Six Day 1967 war is an example of one that many people think Israel started. But the Arabs had committed acts of war first. Arab armies mobilized on Israel's borders with the stated purpose of making war. Egypt blockaded an Israeli port. Egypt got the UN peacekeepers out of the invasion path. But many nice, intellectual, peaceniks said nothing against that. They complained that Israel preempted combat. They wanted to let the Arabs drop the first bombs. That is what they call humanitarian?

After combat began in 1967, Jordan attacked Israel unprovoked.

In the Yom Kippur 1973 war, Israel listened to its 1967 critics, especially to demands by its supposed friend, the U.S. Israel let the enemy attack first. Israel suffered much higher casualties. It almost lost the war. Being tiny, Israel easily could have been overrun. Once overrun, the Arabs probably would have murdered most Israelis. That would be the result of the obsolete notion of waiting to be attacked when the enemy is in a constant state of war.

Some people say, avoid combat and perhaps negotiations would resolve the problem. The mortal antisemitism behind Arab combat could no more be resolved diplomatically than it could have been resolved diplomatically with the Nazi regime. Nazis, Communists, and jihadists used negotiations as a form of warfare, to advance military goals. Expectations about diplomacy with fanatical imperialists are childish wishful thinking. Neurotic humanitarians pat themselves on the head for discouraging self-defense. They should be ashamed of themselves.

Depending on negotiations expects enemy culture to change overnight historical developments that usually take centuries to reform. Israel can't wait for eventual reformation of Islam into a tolerant and non-violent movement.

Remember when people thought that the treaty with Egypt means peace? Egypt used the treaty to build up a military capable of challenging Israel. Now Islamists are coming to power there. The difference from Mubarak is that Islamists are more aggressive and fatalistic. The Sinai, which Israel relinquished to Egypt, is becoming a terrorist haven, as are all the areas Israel withdrew from in Lebanon and the Territories.

What about the U.S.? Our U.S. President actually is campaigning as better on national security, although he is letting the U.S. come under its worst national security menace. He is campaigning as a friend of Israel, although he is actively impeding Israeli national defense against its worst national security menace. This is typical of how Obama treats allies of the U.S. in favor of enemies of the U.S.

Remember when Pres. Obama said he would be satisfied with being a one-term President? Actually, he is desperate to be a two-term President. Why? I think for these reasons. (1) His initiatives all have failed and have slowed down our economy. If he left office, they all are likely to be rescinded. His attempt to turn the U.S. into a welfare and corporate state like European ones will have failed. (2) He wants to continue to hobble the U.S. ability to be a world leader and defend itself by itself.

Does he still believe that the U.S. can be safeguarded by working within international organizations? Those organizations anti-American hostility and their ineptitude should convince any psychologically normal and patriotic American that our country needs to preserve its strength and independent initiative. Of course, we should not resort to war unnecessarily.

Some people worry about casualties from an Israeli offensive now. Fair enough. But they had better worry about the far greater casualties if Israel waits.

Arab War-Crimes Court for Syria?

Civil libertarian Aryeh Neier proposes an Arab League war-crimes court for Syria. He argues that such a court would deter Assad from liquidating opponents and would permit justice after he were overthrown.

Half of Mr. Neier's case is based on what he considers the success of a prior war-crimes court elsewhere (NY Times, 4/5/12, op-ed).

An analogy to Arab society is not valid. Arab society is different. The Arab League itself comprises states and organizations that operate by committing war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Sudan belongs to the League. Sudan has been murdering millions, for motives of jihad and Arab supremacy and oil politics. The Arab League opposes any move against Sudan.

Egypt's first war on Israel was by terrorism, bombing Tel Aviv civilians. Egypt sent Gazan terrorists against Israel, leading to Israel's second war. Egypt still persecutes Christians. The Arab League endorsed Egyptian aggression and did not oppose Egyptian methods.

The Palestinian Arabs, whether headed by the Grand Mufti in the 1920s-1940s, by Arafat, or by Fatah and Hamas now, persecute Christians and commit terrorism against Israel.

What an unpromising forum for justice is the Arab League. What does Mr. Neier think the League would do were Assad overthrown and the Muslim Brotherhood wreaks vengeance against the country's Alawites and persecutes other non-Arab or non-Muslim minorities?

Why doesn't Mr. Neier submit other examples of Arab eligibility for prosecution?

The New York Times seems to suck in half-baked ideas. Its op-eds present mistaken notions of the world. My criticism does not call for censorship. The Times indulges plenty in censorship. Comparisons of its anti-Israel and pro-Israel space have shown that.

Rather, the Times should have more dissent and debate and better judgment. How can it have good judgment? Its anti-Zionist and anti-American ideology drives its opinions, and its journalistic standard is to advocate for its views rather than present the facts so readers have a chance to decide for themselves.

Thomas Friedman Urges Arab "Non-Violence"

Thomas Friedman continues his dedication to paring down Israel with two new approaches. One is to contend that the rise of Islamism gives Palestinian Arabs and Israel an incentive to present a constructive model for the Arabs. The other is to urge Arab "non-violence" to force an Israeli territorial withdrawal.

As he puts it, let there be "a Palestinian state where Arab Muslims and Christians, men and women, can thrive in a secular but religiously respected, free-market, democratic context, next to a Jewish state. This model would end Arab stagnation.

To get there, he urges Arab "non-violence" to shame Israel into ending what he calls its "occupation." He seems to have picked up this idea from Marwan Barghouti, serving five life sentences for terroristic murder. Mr. Friedman repeats Haaretz' praise of that murderer as the "most authentic leader" Fatah has produced, capable of leading his people into a new agreement. [Haaretz is described by Prof. Stephen Plaut as a Palestinian Arab newspaper written in Hebrew, a paper in which one finds calls for terrorism against Israel and non-stop support for Arabs against Israel.]

Not content with letting the two sides negotiate, Mr. Friedman uses the opportunity to insist on the terms of agreement. He demands that Israel withdraw from 95% of the remaining Territories [his percentage does not include Gaza], from annexed portions of Jerusalem, and from Israeli land equal to the retained 5% of the Territories. He calls this giving land "back" to the Palestinian Arabs (NY Times, 4/4/12, op-ed)

Palestinian Arabs never had title to the Territories in the first place. So how does he come up with those percentages and demands based on an armistice line of no legal significance. The expression, "give back," mistakenly makes it seem as if Arab are entitled to sovereignty there.

The silliest notion is that the Palestinian Arabs would want to thwart Radical Islam. What does Mr. Friedman think Fatah and Hamas are? They have been waging jihad for many hears. Has Mr. Friedman not noted half their people's endorsement of violence against Israelis? Maybe he should read their covenants or read their history and study their Friday exhortations to murdering Jews.

The likelihood is that even if the Palestinian Authority approves the journalist's plan, it would be another Arab ruse and violated agreement. Mr. Friedman would bear some responsibility for facilitating war and Israel's destruction.

Notice the proposal, to have an Arab state alongside Israel in which no Jews may live, as an example of religious co-existence. Notice his silence on the million Arabs now living in Israel! The state for Jews would have a huge fifth column. Some deal, the Jews give up territory but keep their Arabs!

Real world considerations such as Israel not having sufficient water or resources to absorb hundreds of thousands of Jews (while keeping the million Arabs whose removal would make absorption of masses of Jews possible) do not figure into these rationalizations for Israeli surrender to jihadistic demands.

Another real world consideration is how an Arab state would become democratic and respectful of other people's religion. That critical consideration is not discussed! No proposals for how to arrive at that nirvana. Nor does Mr. Friedman realize that if the Palestinian Authority could get that tolerant, it wouldn't need an Israeli concessions for peace.

Mr. Friedman's proposal for tolerance and democracy is like other people's proposal that a new Arab state be disarmed, when the current autonomy P.A. is armed and arms and violence are part of Muslim Arab culture. Has it escaped Mr. Friedman's eye that the P.A. already signed agreements to dismantle terrorism, but the P.A. praises and promotes it?

Still another consideration is what makes Friedman believe that Barghouti has become non-violent? Barghouti started an Intifada. Violence is part of jihad.

Far more likely is that Barghouti has found a new means of jihad, in order to get the sovereignty and territory from which the better to commit violence.

By the way, when Palestinian Arabs refer to non-violence, they exempt throwing rocks and firebombs. Mr. Friedman doesn't bother with deadly details like that. History shows that Palestinian Arabs on the whole are an evil people in an evil cause of genocide and religious intolerance, aside from their oppression of females and gay males. When the head of the P.A. honors a murderer of Israeli babies, what claim to morality has he? When the Palestinian Arab people celebrate such murderers as heroes and heroines, why not consider them evil? But Mr. Friedman doesn't note that, when he urges the new tactic as a means of making a moral case against Israel. Neither does he acknowledge that there already is a model of religious co-existence in the Mideast, emanating from Israel. But of course it is a tenuous co-existence, for the Muslim Arabs increasingly lean to jihad.

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.

RIYADH (AFP) - Twenty-five Indonesian maids are on death row in Saudi Arabia and 22 others have been pardoned and sent home, local media reported on Friday, adding that Jakarta will send a delegation for talks on the issue.

'Twenty-two death row Indonesian inmates in the Kingdom have been exonerated and repatriated back to Indonesia, while 25 maids are still facing death sentences in Saudi Arabia for various offences,' the English-language daily Arab News reported.

'Six housemaids are on death row in Riyadh province alone, whereas about 19 female workers have been handed death sentences in the Western region,' it quoted the Indonesian embassy's spokesman, Mr Hendrar Pramutyo, as saying.

Jakarta will send a '14-member presidential task force to the Kingdom on April 7 to talk to Saudi officials and to intensify efforts in cooperation with its embassy to rescue the maids', the daily quoted Mr Pramutyo as saying.

As'ad AbuKhalil is Stanislaus political science professor at California State University. At his lecture on the Berkeley campus, Prof. AbuKhalil expressed a strong desire for violence against Israelis.

In his "Angry Arab News Service, he objected to a criticism of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement by Norman Finkelstein, usually known for defaming Israel (and denying the Holocaust). Mr. Finkelstein called the BDFS movement a cult aiming to destroy Israel.

Prof. AbuKhalil's rebuttal of that criticism is to suggest that the BDS movement openly own up to that goal. He considers the Palestinian Arab cause, which he deems one of justice and freedom, incompatible with the existence of the State of Israel.

Is this the kind of agit-propaganda that taxpayer dollars should be spent so as to indoctrinate youth in genocidal violence? (Cinnamon Stillwelll, 2/20/12 http://www.campus-watch.org/blog/2012/02/the-angry-arab-slams-finkelstein-wants-to).

How do those who organize for murder get access to university facilities and get to teach?

Thus the BDS movement claims to stand on principle but really stands on genocide, BDS being a movement to drain Israel's life force from it.

Time and time again, Muslims Arabs, and especially Palestinian Arabs, make it clear that they do not want peaceful coexistence. They want to destroy Israel. Their claims about Israel oppressing them, and their claims about seeking justice, all are cover for jihad — the struggle of Islam to conquer the world.

Therefore, Israel should make no concessions to the Muslim Arabs. Concessions only would strengthen them militarily and in morale.

Since the U.S. is a victim of the same international jihad, the U.S. should stop demanding concessions by Israel to the Arab side. The U.S. should encourage Israel to advance Jewish rights in the Jewish homeland.

The U.S. needs a comprehensive policy for defeating jihad. It seems to have a President with a comprehensive policy for feeding or ignoring jihad, with a little bit of policy in the other direction, for appearances.

Not So Many Poor People In Israel

Most statistics indicate an Israeli poverty rate of 20%. On the poor Arabs and Ultra-Orthodox! So we are told. Actually, Israel's economy is greater than officially measured. The difference is the "black economy," whereby the people we are supposed to be sorry for do not declare billions. The difference shows up when poverty is measured by consumption rather than by declared income. The actual poverty rate is not more than 12% (IMRA, 3/12/12 www.imra.org.il). Prof. Plaut has pointed out that poorer groups may not try to get as much of an education and may have more children per family. The U.S. measures poverty by indirect measures of consumption. Some of the consumer items used in the computation are seldom bought, nowadays, while items often used are not counted or are not counted in proportion to their cost. Increases in quality of consumer items is not taken into account, either. The government counts all houses and cars as equal, but many Americans are buying bigger ones. Various forms of welfare payments are not counted, although they are considerable. Are the erroneous conclusions innocent errors or staged? Difficult to know. What we do know is that certain interests and ideological schools make much of the false statistics.

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.

Jewish liberation is far from complete

Hamas terror boss Fathi Hamad is a notable figure. Hamad is both the director of Hamas's al-Aksa television station and the terror group's "minister" of the interior and national security. His double portfolio is a clear expression of the much ignored fact that for terrorists, propaganda is inseparable from violence.

Hamad's key posts make him a man worth listening to. His statements necessarily indicate Hamas's general direction.

On March 23, Hamad was interviewed by Egypt's Al Hekma television station. The interview was translated by MEMRI.

Hamad made two central points. First, he claimed that the Palestinian war against Israel is the keystone of the global jihad. Second, he said the Palestinians are not a distinct people, but transplanted Egyptians and Saudis.

In his words, "At al-Aksa and on the land of Palestine, all the conspiracies, throughout history, have been shattered - the conspiracies of the Crusaders, and the conspiracies of the Tatars. At al- Aksa and on the land of Palestine, the Battle of Hattin was waged. The [West] does not want this noble history to repeat itself, because the Jews and their allies would be annihilated - the Zionists, the Americans and the imperialists.

"Thus, the conspiracy is very clear. Al-Aksa and the land of Palestine represent the spearhead for Islam and for the Muslims. Therefore, when we seek the help of our Arab brothers, we are not seeking their help in order to eat, to live, to drink, to dress, or to live a life of luxury. No. When we seek their help, it is in order to continue to wage Jihad."

Hamad next explained, "Brothers, half of the Palestinians are Egyptians and the other half are Saudis. Who are the Palestinians? We have many families called Al-Masri, [Egyptians] whose roots are Egyptian. Egyptian! They may be from Alexandria, from Cairo, from Dumietta, from the North, from Aswan, from Upper Egypt. We are Egyptians."

What Hamad's interview tells us is that today Hamas - the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood - is more interested in unity with Muslim Brotherhood-dominated Egypt than with Fatah. Whereas in the past it joined Fatah in obscuring the direct link between the jihad against the Jews and the jihad against the non-Muslim world, today it seeks to emphasize the connection. To this end, Hamas is willing to abandon the myth of Palestinian nativism and acknowledge that the Palestinians are an artificial people, invented for the purpose of advancing the global jihad in the key battlefield of Israel.

Hamad's statements underscore a widespread sentiment among Israelis about the revolutions now tearing apart the Arab world. That sentiment is that while the results of these revolutions will be catastrophic in the medium and long term, in the short term they bring respite to Israel. With Arab regimes - new and old - struggling to consolidate power, they have little time or energy to devote to their war against Israel.

In this situation, the thinking goes, Israel should be able to devote its attention to attacking Iran's nuclear facilities.

Unfortunately for Israel, while the Arab world is increasingly uninterested in the Palestinian war against Israel, Europe and the American Left are more than happy to pick up the slack.

Consider two recent events. First, two weeks ago the UN Human Rights Council voted to launch a commission whose goal is to criminalize Israel for the existence of Israeli communities beyond the 1949 armistice lines.

The council's decision to form a new kangaroo court to criminalize Israel was not the result of the Arab diplomatic war against Israel. It is the consequence of the European diplomatic war against Israel. It is Europe, not the Arabs that has barred Israel from caucusing with its UN regional group - the Western European and Others Group. By barring Israel from the caucus, the Europeans have denied Israel the ability to make its case to other UN member nations.

For its part, the Obama administration pays lip service to the need to end the Human Rights Council's obsessive war against Israel. But at the same time, it has effectively joined that war by legitimizing the anti-Israel council both by joining it, and by refusing to use its membership as leverage to coerce the council into abandoning its campaign against Israel.

Following the council's vote to form a new Goldstone-style commission to attack Israel, the State Department issued a statement in which it claimed that due in part to US membership in the council, the council had been spurred to "action on a series of important human rights situations around the world."

Then there was last Friday's Global March to Jerusalem, in which a consortium of protesters organized by Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, Iran and the international Left intended to storm Israel's borders and fill the state with hostile foreigners.

As Ribhi Halloum, the coordinator of the march said last year, the goal of the GMJ was "to move the right of return possessed by Palestinian refugees from theory to practice."

In a press conference in Amman days ahead of the operation, Halloum said that organizers expected for two million people to mass at Israel's borders and attempt to breach them.

In the end, the GMJ failed to mount its planned invasion. The sum total of the day's events amounted to several violent local demonstrations by Palestinians in Judea and Samaria joined by foreign and Israeli leftists. Israel's borders were not breached.

The GMJ's failure to achieve its aims owed to the same pan-Arab distraction that Hamad tried to address in his interview with Egyptian television.

But while the Syrians, Egyptians, Jordanians and Lebanese have more urgent business to attend to, the international Left has intensified its own campaign against Israel.

Leading anti-Israel, (and anti-Jewish) leftists including George Galloway, Desmond Tutu, Mairead Maguire, Noam Chomsky, Jeremiah Wright, Cindy Sheehan and Medea Benjamin served as members of the GMJ's various organizing committees. These self-proclaimed human rights activists had no problem with the fact that the Iranian regime took a central role in organizing the operation or that the clear goal of the campaign's Muslim organizers is the destruction of Israel.

To the contrary, this goal is now openly shared by growing numbers of Western leftists. In an op-ed on the Guardian's online opinion forum, Sarah Colborne, a member of the GMJ's organizing committees and its national coordinator for the UK as well as the director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign in the UK wrote, "The struggle for Palestinian rights is at the core of the global movement for social and economic justice."

Judith Butler, one of Colborne's American counterparts, has opined that "understanding Hamas, Hezbollah as social movements that are progressive, that are on the Left, that are part of a global Left, is extremely important."

So just as Hamas's Hamad claims that the jihad on Israel is the key campaign of the global jihad, Hamad's Western partners claim that destroying Israel is the key to the Left's campaign for socialism.

Disturbingly, the international Left is receiving indirect support for its goal of destroying Israel's sovereignty over Jerusalem, (and through it, destroying Israel), from the US government. Just days before the GMJ failed to unravel Israel's physical control over Jerusalem, in a jaw-dropping exchange between State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland and AP reporter Matthew Lee, Nuland refused to say that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel.

The US has always been deeply hostile to Israel's sovereignty over Jerusalem. Beginning in 1950 the State Department directed US diplomats to discourage other governments from establishing their embassies in Jerusalem. But while the US has always undermined its own alliance with Israel by aligning its policy on Jerusalem with Israel's worst enemies, under President Barack Obama, the US's willingness to express this hostility has been unprecedented.

This hostility has been demonstrated most famously by Obama's demand that the government stop respecting Jewish property rights in the city.

It has also been given graphic expression by the administration's decision to move the Consular Section of the US Consulate in Jerusalem from an Arab neighborhood in eastern Jerusalem to the site that Israel allocated for a new US embassy.

The site is located in the Jewish Arnona neighborhood in western Jerusalem.

Israel allocated the land to a future US Embassy after Congress passed the US Embassy Act in 1995 which obligated the US government to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. The site was chosen, among other reasons, because its location in western Jerusalem put it outside the dispute regarding whether or not Israel will retain sovereignty over eastern, southern and northern Jerusalem in a hypothetical peace treaty with the Palestinians. The US government uses the non-resolution of the Palestinian conflict with Israel as its justification for refusing to accept Jewish property rights in those areas of the city.

The US Consulate in Jerusalem is not subordinate to the US Embassy in Tel Aviv. It presents itself as the unofficial US embassy to the non-existent state of Palestine. By utilizing the site in western Jerusalem allocated for a future embassy as an extension office of the consulate, the Obama administration made clear its rejection of Israel's right to sovereignty over all of Jerusalem. And in light of the US law that recognizes Jerusalem as Israel's capital and orders the government to relocate the embassy to Jerusalem, the Obama administration not only indirectly legitimized the cause of those who seek the destruction of Israel.

It did so in contempt of US law.

In truth, there is nothing new about the West's rejection of Israel's right to sovereignty or even to its support and sponsorship for the Arab war for the destruction of Israel. Such animosity predates not only the 1967 Six Day War. It predates the establishment of Israel.

British Col. Richard Meinertzhagen, who served as an intelligence officer in wartime and post-World War I Mandatory Palestine, made this point clearly in his memoir Middle East Diary.

Meinertzhagen wrote that the first Arab terror assaults on Jews under the British military government were instigated by the British military. Just before Easter in 1920, British military authorities contacted future Nazi agent Haj Amin el Husseini and encouraged him to attack the Jews of Jerusalem.

They told him, "He had a great opportunity at Easter to show the world that the Arabs of Palestine would not tolerate Jewish domination in Palestine... and if disturbances of sufficient violence occurred in Jerusalem at Easter, [the British High Commanders] would advocate the abandonment of the Jewish home."

Today, the Jewish people begin their week-long celebration of Passover, the Jewish festival of freedom. This evening we will read in the Haggada that our fight for freedom is an eternal struggle.

When we assess the global nature of the current assault on Jewish freedom and sovereignty in our country, we see the truth of that message.

While our present circumstances give us much to celebrate, the work of Jewish liberation is far from over.

Contact Laura at LEL817@yahoo.com

Reading the paper the other day, I came across a story about Jews ("Jewish settlers") being ordered, by Israeli officials, to leave some of their new homes in Hebron.

Naturally, Hebron's location was given as the "West Bank," and Jews were portrayed as merely militant troublemakers in someone else's land.

Nowhere was it mentioned—and rarely ever is—that Jews have lived and owned land in Hebron for about 4,000 years, clear up to the 20th century, when they were massacred by Arabs in the 1920s and 1930s.

David, son of Jesse (born in another "West Bank" town, Bethlehem), was crowned King of Israel in Hebron and had some of his children there. A thousand years earlier, Abraham had made Hebron known to the world in the first place by purchasing a burial plot there for many of the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Jewish people.

Now, before I deal with the main focus of my concern, let me throw out another thought—one I've dealt with more extensively before http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/ar.....le119.htm

Why Myanmar but not Judea?

Why Sri Lanka, but not Samaria?

Why not Rhodesia, but the "West Bank?"

It's admirable (is it not ?) when a people throws off the legacy of imperial oppression to embrace new freedom. The very renaming of nations themselves has often been a reflection of this wonderful development.

Admirable...unless those folks happen to be Jews. Just reference that above April 3rd article again to see what I mean.

Among the examples of this which have occurred over the last half century are people who lived in Great Britain's former imperial possessions of Ceylon, Rhodesia, and Burma. Those nations are now known as Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe, and Myanmar.

While the so-called "Progressives" of the world—who control much of the mainstream media these days—are adamant that the previous imperialist names of conquered lands be dismissed, why is it that when it comes to dealing with the oft-conquered land of the Jews, the opposite is the case?

In one account after another about Bethlehem, Hebron, East Jerusalem, and other places in historical Judea and Samaria, those towns have been designated by statesmen, journalists, academics, the mainstream media, and others the "West Bank" instead—or, "the occupied" West Bank, to add insult to injury. Judeans/Jews living in those areas are now the alleged settlers and "imperialist occupiers" of the land, and those who beg to differ are more often than not simply dismissed as reactionary Zionist fanatics. That's what the unnamed author of the April 3rd article did.

With few exceptions, however, it's easy to discover that almost all the towns on the "West Bank" were re-named from their original Hebrew sites after the Arabs' own imperial conquests of the 7th century C.E. Check out this source http://www.forward.com/articles/6134/ ("What's In A Town's name?") for starters.

Judea and Samaria—the names the disputed territories now constantly making news were known as for thousands of years—did not become designated the "West Bank" until after World War I and the official break-up of the Ottoman Turkish Empire.

After Great Britain's handing over some 78% of the original 1920 Mandate of Palestine's territory to Arab nationalism in 1922 with the creation of Transjordan, a quarter century later the latter's British-led army then grabbed the non-apportioned part of the Mandate of Palestine west of the Jordan River upon its invasion of a minuscule, reborn Israel in 1948. Holding both banks of the river, it soon changed its name to Jordan. To distinguish the east bank from the newly-conquered territory across the river (acquired as a result of the newest imperial shenanigans in the land), the name "West Bank" was thus born...the imperialist-linked name that the media now insists to call Judea and Samaria by. Imagine telling a black African that he must call his nation Rhodesia instead of Zimbabwe...

I say the following not as a racist, but after giving this some very careful thought...

While it's not good to generalize, Arabs have indeed come to be very good at hijacking...besides and before they made the news doing such with airplanes.

We've seen above how they got the world to view Judeans—Jews—calling the land by its original, non-imperial name as the alleged foreigners and extremists instead.

Along these same lines, they did the same thing with the name "Palestine" as well.

The late Egyptian ghoul, Yasser Arafat, and latter-day Arafatians like to speak of Jesus and his Apostles as "Palestinians"—not Jews. Just recently another Arab "scholar" announced that Moses led Muslims out of Egypt in the Exodus...just in time for this Passover season.

The real deal, of course, is that there never, ever, ever was an Arab kingdom, country, or nation known as "Palestine" during the time of Jesus—nor at any other time either.

The land was known as Iudaea (Judea) and its inhabitants were Judaeans...Jews.

Tacitus, Pliny, Josephus, and Dio Cassius were famous Roman and Roman-sponsored historians who wrote extensively about Judea's attempt to remain free from the Soviet Union of its day, the conquering Roman Empire. They lived and wrote not long after the two major revolts of the Jews in 66-73 C.E. and 133-135 C.E. Note that they make no mention of this land being called "Palestine" nor its people "Palestinians." And they knew the differences between Jews and Arabs as well.

As I've often reiterated, my aim is for the following quote to become a mantra for my readers...that's how important the implications of its contents are in the discussion of this topic when Arabs try to claim aboriginal rights for "Palestinians," and folks like those running such news articles supporting them allow the hijacking to go on unchallenged.

Here is one of many such ancient passages from Vol. II, Book V, The Works of Tacitus. He wrote this regarding the Jews' first major revolt for freedom against imperial Rome in 66-73 C.E...

Titus was appointed by his father to complete the subjugation of Judaea...he commanded three legions in Judaea itself...To these he added the twelfth from Syria and the third and twenty-second from Alexandria...amongst his allies were a band of Arabs, formidable in themselves and harboring towards the Jews the bitter animosity usually subsisting between neighboring nations.

After that first revolt, Rome issued thousands of Judaea Capta coins which can be seen today in museums all over the world. Notice, please...Judaea Capta...not "Palaestina Capta." Again—no hijacking allowed. Open up the url to my own book and look at the jacket cover to see one of those exact coins http://q4j-middle-east.com

Additionally, to celebrate this victory, the Arch of Titus was erected and stands tall in Rome to this very day.

When, some sixty years later, Emperor Hadrian decided to further desecrate the site of the destroyed Temple of the Jews by erecting a pagan structure there, it was the grandchildren's turn to take on their mighty conquerors.

Please permit me to sidetrack a bit...

Is a victim any less a victim because his victimization has been among the oldest in recorded history?

If not, then why are Judeans/Jews merely portrayed as trouble-making zealots for wanting to finally erase that tragic state of affairs—as witnessed, once again, in the above newspaper article?

Okay, moving on...

The result of the struggle of this tiny land of the Jews—Judea, not "Palestina"—for its independence was, perhaps, as predictable as that which would have occurred had Lithuania taken on the Soviet Union during its heyday of power. Yet, here's Dio Cassius referring to the destruction of Rome's entire 22nd Legion... "580,000 men were slain, nearly the whole of Judaea made desolate. Many Romans, moreover, perished in this war (the Bar Kochba Revolt). Therefore Hadrian, in writing to the senate, did not employ the opening phrase commonly affected by the emperors, 'I and the legions are in health.'"

The Emperor was so enraged at the Jews' struggle for freedom that, in the words of the esteemed modern historian, Bernard Lewis...

Hadrian made a determined attempt to stamp out the embers not only of the revolt but also of Jewish nationhood and statehood...obliterating its Jewish identity.

Wishing to end, once and for all, the Jews' hopes, Hadrian renamed the land itself from Judaea to "Syria Palaestina"—Palestine—after the Jews' historic enemies, the Philistines, a non-Semitic sea people from the area around Crete. Not only were the Philistines not Arabs, they were not even Semites.

Thus, the Arab attempt at hijacking the Philistines' identity won't work any better than their attempt to steal that of the ancient Jews. Yet, the mainstream media, once again, accepts their fractured fairy tales hook, line, and sinker and routinely gives them a free pass.

Much later, Palestine became largely "Arab" the same way that most of the twenty-one states that call themselves "Arab" today did...by the murderous conquest, colonial occupation, and forced Arabization of other native, non-Arab peoples and their lands. Muhammad's and his successors' imperial Caliphal armies burst out of the Arabian Peninsula in the 7th century C.E. and spread in all directions.

From the 10th century onwards, the Arabs lost control of the land themselves. And when the Arabs' own empires ruled, it was from Damascus or Baghdad. Again, there was no independent Arab entity of Palestine then either.

While there are other nauseating examples of this Arab proclivity towards hijacking, the last one I want to expose was also revealed in that April 3rd article about Hebron.

Read carefully the first sentence of the last paragraph of that article...

Hebron is the traditional burial site of Abraham, the shared patriarch of both Jews and Muslims.

Now, while it's true that Arabs and other Arabized folks (some now also known as Muslims) claim Abraham as their own, they also claim that the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem was never a Jewish site. They call it Buraq's Mount instead—after Muhammad's supposedly winged horse with the head of a woman who just happened to take him on a flight to Heaven from the holiest site in all of Judaism and Jewish history.

Keep in mind that the Jews had already been around for almost three millennia before Muhammad ever walked Planet Earth.

While this is indeed a stretch, if militant Hindus conquer the Vatican, does that make the latter as holy to them as it is to Roman Catholics? In that light, consider Muslim claims over Jerusalem, Hebron, and so forth.

Now, unlike what Muslims indeed do to others all the time, I am not aiming to belittle anyone's faith—including Muslims'.

But I am going to be true to history and state that, despite Muhammad's alleged conversations with the Angel Gabriel, we do know that—beyond the realm of pure faith— he fled Mecca and landed in the Jewish date palm oasis town of Medina. Jews had settled there after the Roman wars and knew the Arabian Peninsula very well via the spice trade and such. The Hebrew Bible's Book of Job likely takes place there, and Yemen even had a series of Jewish kings just before the rise of Islam.

While there were also Arab pagans who lived in Medina, ancient Arab historians such as Jalaluddin came right out and spoke of the enormous influence the Jews had on Muhammad—so much so that he changed the qibla—the direction of prayer—towards Jerusalem instead.

As with Arabs claiming themselves the original aborigines of the Holy Land, they then also hijacked the stories of the Hebrew Bible—which they only learned of primarily via their contacts with the Jews (and also a bit from Christians).

Hocus pocus...

Abraham was now transformed into a Muslim, not a Hebrew, and the story about the sacrifice of Isaac was transferred to Ishmael instead as well.

Again, via the Hebrew Bible's account of Abraham's relationship with Hagar the Egyptian and the birth of her son, Ishmael, Arabs attempt another hijacking.

But, the Hebrew Bible calls Arabs Arabs and Egyptians Egyptians...and the latter were also, like the Philistines, not even Semites let alone Arabs.

Something to think about...no?

Such continuous Arab hijacking is blatantly obvious, and many more examples could be cited.

That Muslims—especially Arab Muslims—repeatedly choose to do such things speaks volumes. I don't think that I really need to explain how pathetic this is to those with functioning neurons. Arab (and Arabized) envy and jealousy of the Jews is sickening to the point where it accounts for much of the hatred towards "their" reviled kilab yahud..."Jew dogs."

Despite all of this, however, to have other people—like the author of that April 3rd article—spouting such nonsense is the real cause for concern.

Such folks are merely willing stooges and accomplices to a hijacking.

Chag sameach and Happy Easter to my Jewish and Christian friends.

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 This article is archived at http://www.geraldahonigman.com/blog/2012/04/05/hijackers-accomplices/

Daniel Moshe Levy and Joseph Rothstein are two Israeli archeologists who have devoted their careers to comparing archeological evidence with Biblical accounts. They are serious guys. Not everyone likes what they do.

They have a new book in which they claim that if one corrects for the dating that traditionally was thought to identify the Pharaohs of the Biblical account of the Exodus, then there is actually an amazing amount of archeological evidence that is consistent with and supports much of the Biblical account.

They claim that most historians assume that the Biblical accounts are referring to the Pharaoh Ramses and his son, part of the 16th dynasty, where a large statue of Ramses appears in the Egyptian town of Memphis. The two Israeli archeologists believe the Biblical events are actually associated with different Pharaohs, those who lived a thousand years earlier. They base this claim in part on reports by Herodotus about legends he had heard from Egyptian pagan priests. These included the Pharaoh who dreamed of a pregnant woman whose offspring would grab the reign away from him, after which he ordered all male children drowned in the Nile. There are also some archeological reports consistent with the plagues. A Russian-Jewish scientist named Immanuel Velikovsky (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanuel_Velikovsky) found an ancient Egyptian papyrus report on the Nile turning to blood and the land around it turning barren, accompanying by mass deaths. There was also an Egyptian report, known as the Prophecy of Nacho, describing mass drowning A different report tells of a genius in Egypt during the seven years of famine, considered the wisest man in the country and later worshipped as a demigod. This was during the second and third dynasties. The archeologists claim that the Biblical word for what the Hebrew slaves were building, Cities of Miskanut, is based on the ancient root SKN, which referred to grave monuments, and so could refer to the pyramids, constructed as massive tombs

Finally a tomb was discovered for a later Pharaoh, with an inscription now in the Cairo Museum, reading, "I destroyed the children of Israel and none of their seed remains." It was found on a tomb of a Pharaoh who had drowned to death. There are not too many places in Egypt where someone can drown.

Happy Passover!

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.

Dr. Meir Rosenne, former Israeli ambassador to the United States and France, said on Wednesday that the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria are legal and that this is true under international law.

Rosenne spoke to Arutz Sheva a day after the prosecutor for the International Criminal Court in The Hague rejected a complaint filed by the Palestinian Authority against Israel for alleged war crimes during "Operation Cast Lead" in Gaza in 2009.

The prosecutor explained that only states can file a complaint with the International Criminal Court, noting that the PA is only an observer at the United Nations and not a member state.

Dr. Rosenne noted that "the PA is not a country. It has a Palestinian Authority and Hamas which controls Gaza but they have no country. All UN documents dealing with Resolution 242 do not mention the word Palestinian."

He added that although some people may not be aware of this, under international law the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria have full legal status.

"American jurists such as former ICJ President Stephen Schwebel have said that Israel has more rights to Judea and Samaria," said Rosenne. "Any legal expert who looks at the UN documents will see that there is no such concept as the West Bank or the occupied territories, but rather Judea and Samaria. That is the terminology that appears in the most official documents."

Dr. Rosenne added that according to the Geneva Convention, all the Jewish communities are legal, saying, "Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention says that an occupying power cannot forcibly move citizens to occupied territory. This was true during World War II when the Germans forcefully moved German citizens to occupied Polish territories. In our case, Israel never occupied Judea and Samaria. Judea and Samaria is an area that has never belonged to another country. Jordanian occupation was never recognized, just as the Egyptian occupation of Gaza was not recognized. The fate of these areas should be determined by negotiations among the parties. The settlers never forcibly entered anywhere, nor were they moved there, so they are perfectly legal."

He also noted that, according to the Geneva Convention, terrorists imprisoned in Israel should not be considered prisoners of war.

"The Geneva Convention states that a prisoner of war is a man who openly carried weapons and wore uniforms and respected the laws of war," said Rosenne. "The terrorists do not carry arms openly, they do not have uniforms and they do not respect the laws of war when they kill children. They are not party to the conflict because no Arab state has adopted them. Nevertheless, Israel allows every terrorist to meet with an attorney."

Contact Barbara Sommer at lsommer_1_98@yahoo.com

"Good News and Not"

We start with the good. Little Zakkai's surgery on his spine was yesterday and the word is fantastic: The surgeons were able to work with an incision no longer than what had been opened in his first surgery, and found the tumor to be rubbery, so it sort of peeled off. Little additional damage was done to his vertebrae, there was minimal muscle involvement, and not a lot of bleeding. One spinal nerve was sacrificed. They believe they got all of the tumor that was in his back! In two weeks he returns for similar surgery in his thoracic cavity (where the tumor may be growing against heart, lungs, etc.). But for now he's recovering -- yes, already! kids can do that -- marvelously and will be released soon.

Baruch Hashem. And so happy for the parents, and other family members, who will now go into Pesach with easier hearts. Do not stop praying until this is all over, please!

And the bad? Yesterday I wrote that if Barak acted in Hevron without Netanyahu's consent, we have one sort of a problem, and if it was with the prime minister's consent, we have another. When I wrote, I did not know. But word came out shortly thereafter, and the problem (which I see as the worse of the two alternatives) is that the prime minister did know.

What enrages me so here is that Netanyahu knows better. He understands in a way that someone like Olmert does not. And yet he subverts and betrays his mandate and what is good for Israel. He undermines Jewish rights.

So, no, I do not believe that he will fire Barak. But the guessing is that Barak's political future has dimmed with this act.

The prime minister needs to know how furious people are. If you are inclined, please take the time to tell him:

Fax: 02-670-5369 (From the US : 011-972-2-670-5369)

E-mail: Memshala@pmo.gov.il and also pm_eng2@it.pmo.gov.il (underscore after pm) use both addresses

Most important: Demand that the verification of the purchase of Beit HaMachpela in Hevron be done with all possible speed, and that the legal owners be permitted back in as soon as that verification is done -- with no delays and no excuses. Let him know you will be watching.

If you are an Israeli citizen, you might want to tell him this makes you think twice about voting for Likud. If you are outside of Israel, you might tell him the Likud he heads is not one you would be inclined to financially support.

I continue to hope that there will be sufficient backlash within the government against what has been done to push Netanyahu in the direction of allowing the owners of the house to move back in.

As Danny Dayan, Chair of the Yesha Council says, "If the Cabinet ministers are anything but marionettes, they must make a majority decision to immediately restore the Jewish buyers to their home."

I mentioned some ministers yesterday; among others who are enraged:

Daniel Hershkowitz, head of Habayit Hayehudi party, said this move was comparable to "poking fingers in the eyes of the people."

"This is not a battle between law-abiders and lawbreakers, but rather between those who cherish the settlement project and those who seek to destroy it. The eviction was motivated by personal political considerations and against the positions of most government ministers.

Culture Minister Limor Livnat (Likud) called for "a ministerial committee that will oversee decisions on the Jewish settlement in Judea and Samaria, as was customary in former governments.

"This will put an end to the improbable situation in which the defense minister is the sole authority on such decisions."

But because Pesach begins tomorrow, there is less political action.

I have learned that the meeting at which Barak "sold" the prime minister on the eviction is the same meeting at which Netanyahu spoke to him about legalizing the status of other communities. So it was a quid pro quo kind of arrangement -- an attempt to mollify the right wing. This is just one house people are getting upset about, he reportedly told the (oblivious) Cabinet, but look at all the ways I'm supporting settlement. Netanyahu gave the OK, but I feel Barak was leading him by the nose. A piece in Israelnationalnews says, "As soon as Barak said the eviction was necessary to security, Netanyahu gave his approval." Security? What the hell does this mean. I am convinced that Barak fed him other reasons of a political nature that are not seeing the light of day.

It was Netanyahu, in his last administration, who completed arrangements with the PA to give it jurisdiction over most of the ancient Jewish city of Hevron. He said the deal had already been struck and he was simply enacting it. But while most of Hevron was turned over, not all was. And the house in question is in the part that is totally under Israeli control. And here, there should be a question about Jewish rights to live in any house that is purchased legally? A question because there are Palestinian Arab neighbors who might not like it?

The residents evicted from Beit HaMachpela have set up a tent nearby. They say that, in order to increase pressure on Barak, they will have seder there and remain there until they are permitted back into their home.

I wrote yesterday, as well, about defense official statements regarding not attacking Iran until 2013, and I asked, is this Barak? Now he has made a statement to the effect that, "We are waiting for the results of the negotiations. We will be following the talks to make sure Iran isn't using negotiations to stall for time to advance its nuclear program."

The five permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany (P5 + 1) are scheduled to meet with Iran on April 13; the venue is expected to be Turkey.

Pure political posturing. He knows better but is avoiding the semblance of "acting prematurely." Go ahead, try, he is telling these world powers, and then we'll act. There is no more credence to it than this.

In fact, Barak has set out Israel's goals for the negotiations with Iran:

Transfer out of Iran all uranium enriched to 20%; transfer out of Iran the majority of the uranium enriched to 3.5%, leaving just enough for energy purposes; close the Fordow enrichment facility near Qom. Right...

Barak knows these are not realistic goals but says, "I do however look forward to being surprised if the talks with Iran succeed."

It's on you, guys!

Next week, Netanyahu will be meeting with PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. Please note that it is Fayyad and not Abbas. the meeting will take place in Jerusalem and Fayyad will be accompanied by chief PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat and PLO Secretary-General Yasser Abed Rabbo. Netanyahu will have Yitzhak Molcho at his side.

This meeting will take place after a meeting of the Quartet in Washington, and precisely because of the Quartet. Reportedly there will be an exchange of letters, with the letter from Abbas being carried by Fayyad. Originally Abbas was going to write that he would dismantle the PA if talks didn't proceed, but was pushed by the US to drop that -- although Abbas continues to make verbal "or else" threats.

Around we go... and nothing will come of this.

A Grad Katyusha rocket was fired at Eilat during the night. No one was injured.

Contact Arlene Kushner at akushner18@gmail.com and visit her website: www.ArlenefromIsrael.info

In our last blog we discussed Israel's abject failure in the realm of public diplomacy — dismal to the point of Israeli leaders stumping for President Barack Obama in a recent campaign video.

The information war was of paramount concern to Shmuel, who always considered himself "an information man," and who had hoped to run Israel's first Ministry of Information, a post promised to him, (but not given) by Menachem Begin.

It's difficult to fathom Israel's failure in this area. As Dr. Martin Sherman points out in "Comprehending the Incomprehensible," (The Jerusalem Post, Jan. 13, 2012) Israel typically finds the resources it needs to ward off threats, whether investing in anti-missile defense or bunker buster bombs. But Israel can't seem to do what's needed to counter Arab propaganda. That, as the title of his piece says, is incomprehensible.

Dr. Sherman makes a strong case that at the heart of the problem is Israel's elite, who have "the ability and the motivation to impose on the elected politicians — no matter what their electoral platform — an agenda that reflects their own unequivocally 'PC' (Palestinian-compliant) perspective on the conflict."

Before Israel can deal with its informational shortcomings, he argues, it first needs to deal with this elite. "The remedy does not entail changing the elected political leadership, as two decades of disappointment from ostensibly hawkish candidates has depressingly demonstrated. Instead it involves fundamentally transforming the elite structure of Israel's civil society and the discourse it generates," he writes.

The creation of a counter-elite is no small feat, especially in Israel. Twenty years ago, this writer remembers Yoram Hazony, founder of the Shalem Center, saying in a lecture, 'You think your Left is bad. Compared to Israel's, America's Left are pikers.' Conservatives in the U.S. complain about the slanted mainstream media, anti-American professors at universities, and activist judges, but they pale in comparison to the virtual monopoly Israel's Left enjoys in the state's academic institutions, media and legal establishment.

Part of the reason is that the Left gained early success in the Zionist movement and had ample time to seal the doors to those who thought differently.

As Shmuel writes in "Lone Wolf: A Biography of Vladimir (Ze'ev) Jabotinsky," by 1931, the Labor movement enjoyed "almost complete control of the Zionist economy and its near monopoly in job distribution and in Labor immigration..."

Labor used its power to good effect. At the Seventeenth Zionist Congress, for example, the Labor faction prevented the adoption of the Revisionist platform. As Shmuel writes in "Lone Wolf," things were looking up for Labor's opponents:

The results of the elections to the Seventeenth Zionist Congress were hailed as a great success for the Revisionists: the party jumped from 21 seats in the 1925 Congress ... to 52 delegates (out of 254) ... in 1931. What was no less significant potentially: the central ideas of Revisionism seemed to predominate throughout the Zionist movement.

When it appeared that Jabotinsky's proposal defining Zionism's aim as a Jewish majority "within the historic boundaries of Palestine" would be adopted, Labor resorted to dirty tricks. A telegram appeared, sent ostensibly from the Vaad Leumi, the Jewish National Council in Palestine, urging a cautious formulation of the Zionist aim. The cable was phony, but it had its desired effect. As Shmuel writes:

The gimmick contained in the cable was, of course, the use of the name of the Va'ad Leumi — designed to create a sense of urgency which, of course, every telegram creates, and of authoritativeness — to induce panic among uninformed people.

Labor then successfully tabled Jabotinsky's proposal and would not let the Revisionists speak. In a move that has become part of Zionist lore, Jabotinsky stood on a chair, tore up his delegate's card and shouted, "This is not a Zionist Congress any longer!"

There are lessons from these Revisionist efforts today, namely, how difficult it would be to take over existing institutions already run by the Left. They're on the lookout for such attempts, as they've used the methods themselves.

In the U.S., for instance, radical Jewish groups have been very successful at infiltrating Jewish communal organizations. Dr. Rael Jean Isaac, in her monograph "The New anti-Jewish Agenda," (AFSI, 1987) describes how the left wing group New Jewish Agenda "targeted Jewish community relations councils, seeking both to become part of local federations and to influence the policies taken at the annual general assemblies of these councils."

Never mind left wing. In Israel, it's difficult to take over rightwing groups. Rush Limbaugh, in an interview with Fox News host Greta van Susteren, pointed out that the Republican Party is not really conservative. The same can be said of Israel's nationalist Likud Party — it's not really nationalist.

For instance, it was the Likud Party that shut down radio station Arutz Sheva. Arutz Sheva was a valiant attempt at creating an alternative to Israel's Left-dominated media. The station broadcast from a boat offshore for 14 years and reached one million listeners daily. In 2003, the boat was raided and shut down. Arutz Sheva now operates solely as an Internet site. In the final analysis, it was not the Left that shut down Arutz Sheva, (though it was instrumental) but Likud Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who wanted to silence opposition to his plan to evacuate the Jews of Gush Katif.

This sort of counterproductive behavior goes way back. HaYom was a newspaper of the Gahal Party which presented a rare right wing perspective in Israel. Menachem Begin chose to close the money-losing newspaper down, deciding the party had him to communicate its ideas and so a newspaper wasn't really needed.

Moshe Feiglin, leader of the Manhigut Yehudit, "Jewish Leadership," faction of the Likud, and a religious nationalist, attempted to take over the Likud Party from within. He appeared to enjoy some success. On December 10, 2008 he was voted to the 20th place in the Likud primaries, ensuring him a seat in the next Knesset. The next day, he was unceremoniously demoted to the 36th spot. Likud leader Bibi Netanyahu was responsible for this outrageously undemocratic move.

Over the years, Shmuel chronicled Likud's depressing slide. In "The Chimera of Coordination" (The Jerusalem Post, Dec. 22, 1978) he wrote:

The Likud, which promised the people a new, imaginative and sophisticated foreign policy and information service; which would repair the grievous errors of its predecessors; which was so conscious of the need for speed; and which promised to mobilize the best elements in the U.S. for the difficult task of creating a barrier against the application of the pro-Arab policies rampant in Washington — the Likud did not, on taking power, even make a start on fulfilling its undertakings.

On the contrary the government rushed off in the opposite direction, without recourse either to caution or to commonsense, or to the lessons of experience, in its effort to outdo the [Labor] Alignment.

In "Loves that Labour Lost" (The Jerusalem Post, Oct. 15, 1982), Shmuel wrote:

Since the Likud came to power, the momentum of the hostile campaign [of anti-Israel propaganda] has continued to increase. The Likud, like Labour, has had neither the wit nor the wisdom to assess its magnitude, nor to build up a machine adequate to resist its inroads in the world community.

In November, 2004, on the day the Knesset voted for Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Gaza withdrawal plan, Shmuel said in an interview with the Hebrew daily Makor Rishon,

Today, the Likud has come to the end of its road. ... Somebody should climb the stairs in 'Metzudat Ze'ev' [Likud headquarters] and remove the picture of the Founding Father. To remove it as well from all the offices of the ministers and the office of the prime minister. ... From now on, there is no tie whatsoever between Ze'ev Jabotinsky and what Arik made from the Likud.

What this suggests is that those who would start an Israeli counter-elite face an uphill battle, to say the least. They'll be taking on not just the Left but the so-called Right. Shmuel, however, would approve. As he said in the same Makor Rishon interview:

We need to start everything anew. To prepare the hearts, to renew and be renewed in the doctrine of the head of Betar, to open the youth clubs, to reach the universities, to build a healthy, continuing generation for Jabo. ...

I hope that somebody will still one of these days raise the flag of Jabotinsky. Somebody will definitely rise, I believe.

David Isaac is editor of the Shmuel Katz website: www.shmuelkatz.com. Contact him at david_isaac@shmuelkatz.com. This article is archived at http://shmuelkatz.com/wordpress/?m=201204

An interesting article appeared in the Atlantic Sentinel this past March 13, entitled "Hamas Refused to Participate in Latest Gaza Violence." The author, Daniel R. DePetris, points out that although this was the most intense fighting since Israel was forced to invade Gaza three years ago, he takes solace in the fact that during the latest round of violence, smaller terrorist groups did the heavy lifting, and Hamas largely stayed out of the fray.

I'm sure this was very encouraging to Israeli citizens throughout the south who have fifteen seconds from the time the sirens go off to herd their families into shelters before the rockets land, and even less time if the terrorists decide that short-range mortars are the weapons of choice on a particular day. This is the life Jews living in towns and cities adjacent to Gaza have been forced to live since the Sharon government unilaterally uprooted thousands of people and pulled out of Gaza in 2005.

The author then goes on to applaud the 90% success rate of the "Iron Dome" defensive system jointly developed by Israel and the United States, stating that "only a few projectiles hit populated areas[.] ... One landed in a schoolyard that wasn't occupied at the time." Well, weren't those kids and their families lucky.

This is patently absurd. What a way to live. Even with a 90% success rate, should a country be willing to settle for 10% of an enemy's unprovoked firepower being unleashed upon its citizenry? Or for that matter, should anything less than 100% quiet be acceptable to a sovereign nation? Clearly the Iron Dome, enhanced bunkers, and any other defensive measures are not the answer. They represent a modern-day technological Maginot Line; it's palliation where a cure is what's really needed.

Militarily, this tit-for-tat response to aggression makes no sense. Psychologically, maintenance of the status quo is draining upon the Israeli populace and encouraging to the terrorists. After all, since the initiative remains with the terrorists, they're allowed to pick and choose when it's in their interest to reignite hostilities. Economically, at $100,000 a pop, each anti-missile missile from the Iron Dome could bankrupt Israel in the event of full-scale dependence on this system.

Israel, subsequent to the days of Menachem Begin, has painted herself into a corner. No longer willing to eviscerate her insidious enemies, she has withdrawn into a defensive cocoon, thereby only emboldening them. Vacating positions of power won during four major wars and innumerable smaller ones, she now bows apologetically to the will of an international community, a community in lockstep with her enemies -- enemies supplied by Iran with increasingly sophisticated weapons now capable of reaching major cities deep within her heartland.

Israel today is facing Islamic terrorists made to believe that time and destiny are on their side. No longer fearing the painful retribution once administered to them for incessant aggression, they now depend upon soft jihad -- the canard of peace talks and denial of legitimacy to the land -- and hard jihad -- sustained violence from Gaza and homicide bombings emanating from Judea and Samaria (the West Bank).

What's the answer to this untenable situation? Certainly a continuation of current reactionary defensive policies to both soft and hard jihad isn't it. Some, including this writer, believe that the answer lies in going back to the future.

Can anyone from a security standpoint argue that Israel wasn't in a better position subsequent to exiling Arafat and company to Tunisia following the First Lebanese War? Can anyone who truly loves the Jewish State and the people therein recognize what a mistake it was to bring that tyrant back and sign the Oslo Accords with him? It's time, it's been time, it's time long overdue that Israel formally recognize what the Palestinians and their Islamic supporters have recognized from the get-go: Oslo was a mere ploy to get back in the game. Only Israel, yearning for peace, took it seriously.

Only the naive and/or the disingenuous -- fit Obama into either category -- believe that this conflict has a diplomatic solution. The various Palestinian entities want the peace of the schoolyard bully. They seek submission not compromise. To the ayatollahs, the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Qaeda, the PLO, the Assads, and all the other miscreants within this cabal of hate, compromise and peace are interpreted as weakness and acquiescence. Israel must regain the initiative.

Nations comprise people. The same situations individuals encounter daily mirror those of nations, which are made of their aggregate. Many of us seeking a peaceful life may have encountered the aforementioned schoolyard bully at one time or another: the taunter; the rebel without a cause, except when he or she has made you the cause; the guy or gal who, despite your admonitions, would purposely smack you in the head or knock your books off the desk. Since reasoning failed and only begot further aggression, for many of us, the desire for lasting peace soon outweighed the fear of physical confrontation or administrative sanction by the school authorities. Was there a price to pay for fighting back? Definitely. Was it worth it? Absolutely. In many cases, a former tormentor became a friend after such an incident.

I can think of no better analogy for this dance of violence which Israel is engaged in with the Gazans. In her excellent article published in the Jerusalem Post on March 29, "Another Tack: Batman and the Iron Dome," Sarah Honig correctly recognizes this. She also sees the futility of accepting the Iron Dome and defensive measures as a way to assuage peace with the terrorists.

She aptly notes that during this last spate of violence, the Israeli aim should have been to entirely disable the terrorists from striking again. Since Israel timidly failed to accomplish this, in the view of the terrorists, they won. Whether Israel accepts this view or not is irrelevant. As long as the Islamists are left to think they won, they won.

If Israel is to survive and prosper in peace as a sovereign nation, she must be prepared to foreswear reliance on any other country, including the United States. She must be willing to accept the scorn of the sanctimonious international community and to once again get her hands dirty. She has the power to do so, but the question remains: does she have the will? Most importantly, the Jewish State must readopt the policy made famous by the great Prussian general Karl Von Clausewitz: "The best defense is a good offense."

This article was published April 3, 2012 in the American Thinker and is archived at http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/04/an_untenable_situation.html

Happy Pesach!

For over three millenium Jews have been celebrating their exodus from Egypt. Later we celebrate receiving the Torah and wandering through the desert for 40 years. Arrival to the Promised Land deserves similar attention and should have greater emphasis by our spiritual leaders. Many Jews do not even know what Eretz-Israel represents!

Travesty of US Jerusalem Policy by Timothy M. Phelps

The Supreme Court weighed into one of the thorniest issues in the Middle East conflict - who has sovereignty over Jerusalem - ruling that courts have the power to decide whether Congress can order that passports for US citizens born there list "Israel" as their birthplace.

The justices, ruling 8 to 1 on Monday, passed the decision back to a lower court. So Menachem Binyamin Zivotofsky, now 9, will have to wait to find out what his passport will look like.

The US has long taken the position that sovereignty over Jerusalem, which Israelis and Palestinians both claim as their capital, must be resolved in negotiations, so the government does not recognize Israeli sovereignty there. But in 2002, Congress passed a bill urging that the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv be relocated to Jerusalem and ordering that "Israel" should be listed as the birthplace for those born in the city who request it. (Why on request only? This is another 'politically correct' step back - Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, full stop!)

The George W. Bush and Obama administrations argued that the law was unconstitutional because it impinged on the president's right to conduct foreign policy.

Bush said in a statement while he was signing the bill that he would not enforce the provision because it would "impermissibly interfere with the president's constitutional authority to ...speak for the nation in international affairs and determine the terms on which recognition is given to foreign states."

Zivotofsky was born at Shaare Zedek Medical Center in West Jerusalem shortly after the law was enacted. His parents, Ari and Naomi, argue that is it unfair to allow about 100,000 Americans born in cities that the US recognizes as being under Israeli sovereignty to have their passports list Israel as their birthplace, but not the 50,000 or so Americans born in Jerusalem. The State Department listed his birthplace only as "Jerusalem."

Food for Thought by Steven Shamrak

Some Jews are vigorously objecting to ideas expressed in my letters, even after I send them supporting facts. Being born in a Communist country, without alternative sources of information, I was heavily indoctrinated by government propaganda. It takes time and dedicated effort to change false beliefs and attitudes to which we became attached! But how long are those Jews, who are living in the world with access to freely available information, be prepared to remain slaves to international anti-Semitic propaganda? Isn't it time to create your own opinion, based on facts, not delusion or self-hate? US Blaming Israel for Rising Fuel Prices

The Obama administration is blaming Israel for the recent rise in global crude oil prices. Satloff, executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said that the Israeli leadership saw Washington as attributing the higher gas prices to "Israel's posturing" on Iran. He added that the officials told him the Obama administration was staging a campaign to undermine Israel. "I cannot underscore how deep and visceral the (Israeli) comments of the leaking that came out of Washington were," Satloff said (Fake war, in violation of international laws, against imaginary WMD, waged by America in Iraq, has nothing to do with high oil price? But, Israel is not allowed protect itself against the real nuclear threat from Iran - what hypocrisy!)

Red Crescent and PA Olympic Games Policy

The Shin Bet and IDF have arrested 13 members of a terror cell that fired at IDF soldiers near Ramallah on January 20. Some of the arrested terrorists were employees of the Red Crescent emergency service. Among those arrested is Omar Abu Rawis, 22, who is a Red Crescent employee and also the goalkeeper in the team that is to represent the PA in the upcoming Olympics.

'Friend' Undermines Israel Efforts

The unconfirmed report in Foreign Policy magazine suggested deepening co-operation between Israel and the Caucasian republic, which shares a border with Iran. It said that Israel and Azerbaijan secured a $1.6bn arms deal in February, which included the pledged sale of drones and anti-aircraft missile systems to Baku. "The Israelis have bought an airfield, and the airfield is called Azerbaijan," an unnamed senior US administration official was quoted as saying. Americans may have leaked the news in an effort to sabotage Israel's attempt to stop nuclear armed Iran.

PA Has 'No Problem' Arresting Journalists

In February, an official from the PA Ministry of Telecommunications and Information Technology accused a number of news sites of "broadcasting sedition and lies to break up the structure of Palestinian society". "It is our right to defend ourselves against this malicious and suspicious campaign," the official claimed. There is "no law in Palestine criminalizing this work." "Any journalist is allowed to publish any information he wants to, after proving it with evidence rather than basing it on (rumors on) Facebook and other networking sites," Al Maghni said. (Something Israel needs to learn from our enemies and start defending itself "against this malicious and suspicious campaign"!)

Obama Invites Islamic Terrorism to US

Barack Obama just gave thousands of Syrian Muslims - most of them either sympathizers with Hezbollah or the Muslim Brotherhood - permission to stay in the United States forever. He granted all of them Temporary Protected Status (TPS), so they cannot be deported or even arrested by Immigration.

After it was revealed that a book advising Muslim men how to abuse and control their wives is being sold in a Toronto bookstore, other controversial Muslim books have been discovered for sale in Canada. One Islamic bookstore in East Toronto is selling books that urge Muslims to usurp the Western world and install an Islamic State in its place. (Why not just let Saudi/Wahhabi imams into Western countries and surrender to Islamic barbarism?)

Islamic Assault on Europe is 'Multicultural'

France has expelled an Algerian Islamist extremist and a radical Muslim preacher from Mali, and is in the process of deporting a Saudi Muslim prayer leader. Extremist Muslims from abroad are being targeted as part of a French crackdown after deadly March attacks in the southwest city of Toulouse by a 23-year-old claiming links to al-Qaida. The French Interior Ministry said that it has plans to expel others, including a Tunisian militant and a Turkish imam. (In Britain, the Muslim population is 3% - Muslims in jail is at least 11%. Islam is terrorising the West not just spiritually, but criminally as well!)

Barak Evicts Jews from their Newly Purchased Home

On the orders of Defence Minister Ehud Barak, Israeli police and soldiers cleared a Hebron house of its recent Jewish residents situated near the Tomb of the Patriarchs. The eviction took Jewish residents by surprise, as only hours earlier Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, asked the army to delay the eviction until 25 April to give the settlers time to prove a legal claim to the house. (On many occasions, despite overwhelming evidence of their legal ownership of the properties in Judea and Samaria, the Israeli Defence Minister, driven by the policies of his leftist party, does not allow Jews to live freely on Jewish land. But, he does not care to verify legal documents of Arabs land ownerships!) - Please sign this Petition

The Game is still On - for How Long Must Israel Endure it?

Tehran is seeking a postponement of nuclear negotiations with world powers set for April 13-14 in Istanbul. Washington and Jerusalem see Iran's manoeuvres guided by objective: Having the venue removed from Istanbul buys a couple more months before the diplomatic crunch - hence delaying any military option that Israel or possibly America may choose to exercise if its last-chance of diplomacy fails.

Quote of the Week:

"And it was when Joshua was in Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and saw, and, behold, a man was standing opposite him with his sword drawn in his hand; and Joshua went to him, and said to him, Are you for us, or for our adversaries?" - Joshua, chapter 5.13 - Time of mediocrity and self-servicing has passed! Israeli politicians, rabbis and Jewish leaders around the world must ask themselves the same question - "are you for us?" If not, they must step down!

'Settlements' are Legal, Look at the UN Documents by Elad Benari

Dr. Meir Rosenne, former Israeli ambassador to the United States and France, said on Wednesday that the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria are legal and that this is true under international law...

Dr. Rosenne noted that "the PA is not a country. It has a Palestinian Authority and Hamas which controls Gaza but they have no country. All UN documents dealing with Resolution 242 do not mention the word Palestinian."

He added that although some people may not be aware of this, under international law the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria have full legal status.

"American jurists such as former ICJ President Stephen Schwebel have said that Israel has more rights to Judea and Samaria," said Rosenne. "Any legal expert who looks at the UN documents will see that there is no such concept as the West Bank or the occupied territories, but rather Judea and Samaria. That is the terminology that appears in the most official documents."

Dr. Rosenne added that according to the Geneva Convention, all the Jewish communities are legal, saying, "Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention says that an occupying power cannot forcibly move citizens to occupied territory. This was true during World War II when the Germans forcefully moved German citizens to occupied Polish territories. In our case, Israel never occupied Judea and Samaria. Judea and Samaria is an area that has never belonged to another country. Jordanian occupation was never recognized, just as the Egyptian occupation of Gaza was not recognized... The settlers never forcibly entered anywhere, nor were they moved there, so they are perfectly legal."

He also noted that, according to the Geneva Convention, terrorists imprisoned in Israel should not be considered prisoners of war. "The Geneva Convention states that a prisoner of war is a man who openly carried weapons and wore uniforms and respected the laws of war," said Rosenne. "The terrorists do not carry arms openly, they do not have uniforms and they do not respect the laws of war when they kill children. They are not party to the conflict because no Arab state has adopted them. Nevertheless, Israel allows every terrorist to meet with an attorney." (Did he say those ideas publicly, when he was an Israeli ambassador? The problem is not with the knowledge of these legal facts, but with Israel's leaders who do not use them openly to rebuke international pressure)

Steven Shamrak was born in the former Soviet Union (USSR) and participated in the Moscow Zionist "refusenik" movement and currently lives in Melbourne, Australia. He publishes internet editorial letters on the Arab-Israeli conflict. He can be reached by email at StevenShamrak.e@gmail.com. This article is archived at http://shamrak.com/editorials.php

On April 17, Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority (PA), delivered to Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, a letter listing the PA's demands in anticipation of peace negotiations, demands with which Israel must comply or Abbas will eschew further negotiations and instead "seek the full and complete implementation of international law as it pertains to the powers and responsibilities of Israel as occupying power in all of the occupied Palestinian territory." In other words, Abbas will go back to the UN and the International Criminal Court to seek redress against Israel's putative criminal activities. Much like an obstreperous child on the playground, Abbas tells Netanyahu that either he play the game according to Abbas' rules or Abbas will tell the teacher what a bad boy Israel has been. It would be a comical farce were not so many lives at stake.

Abbas goes on to threaten, albeit obliquely, that because Israel has not played the game according to Abbas' demands, he might just go ahead and dissolve the PA, throwing back upon Israel all of the responsibilities for administration in the West Bank: "For the Palestinian Authority — now stripped of all meaningful authority — cannot continue to honor agreements while Israel refuses to even acknowledge its commitments. The P.A. is no longer as was agreed and this situation cannot continue." So in addition to tattling to the teacher, he will also take his ball and go home.

Hopefully, Netanyahu will not be moved by such puerile posturing.

None of this is new. After being rebuffed at the UN last year, Abbas floated informal threats about dismantling the PA, and even took the idea to the Fatah Central Committee (FCC). The FCC supported the idea but no decision was taken. When questioned while in Japan about Yossi Beilin's open letter in Foreign Policy magazine on April 4, in which Beilin urged Abbas to carry out his threat to dissolve the PA as a way to express his exasperation with Netanyahu's "intransigence," Abbas quickly back-tracked and told journalists that "The PA is an achievement and we must not dissolve it but strengthen it." But if that were true, why would the FCC support the idea? Perhaps because they know that Abbas has no intention of dissolving the PA.

In order to understand what is going on here, we must recognize the perils to Israel that are implied in both of Abbas' threats.

Abbas knows that unlike former U.S. Presidents, Obama has already threatened to withhold a US veto in the UN if a Security Council resolution could create an existential threat to Israel. Abbas' second try at the UN might work, especially if this timethe PA demand is pared down to recognition with the status of a non-member state (a big step above the "observer status" that the PA now has, but below full membership), and especially if Obama wins a second term and no longer needs to worry about losing some of his Jewish vote. Moreover, although the PA's attempt to bring war-crime accusations against Israel at the International Criminal Court ended in failure with the decision that the court had no jurisdiction, as the present writer noted earlier, the chief prosecutor outlined for the PA the directions it could take if it wanted to appeal at a later date. By requesting that the UN petition the court to hear the PA case, or by convincing state members of the court to agree to bring the case to the docket, Abbas could do an end-run around the jurisdiction issue. If the PA's attorneys have the brains that God gave a napkin, they are working on both of these issues now.

So the peril to Israel in Abbas' first threat is that Israel may be pilloried in the ICC with a re-run of the Goldstone report, especially if Obama wins a second term.

The other threat may imply even greater danger. Following Israel's victory over the 2nd Intifada, PA security forces in the West Bank have for the most part cooperated with the IDF in preventing terrorism, even collaborating at times in the hunt for secret Hamas cells. But if those PA forces were to suddenly cease to exist, if all government apparatus for social services and financial controls were to suddenly disappear, the Palestinian organization most primed and ready to take over would be Hamas; and Hamas would jump at the opportunity. It is perhaps not coincidental that Abbas met late last year with Khaled Mesha'al, the political leader of Hamas, to "...discuss...the present situation and the prospects of getting out of it and working out a national strategy for the future."

So what Abbas is really trying to tell Netanyahu is that the terms of his letter are the best deal that Israel can hope to get; and if Netanyahu does not play ball, Abbas will step aside and let Hamas mount the 3rd Intifada from the West Bank and the Gaza Strip at the same time. It would take only a bit of stalling by Abbas to interfere with Israel's assumption of these responsibilities, during which time Hamas steps in.

It is likely that Hamas would jump at the opportunity to rule all of "Palestine" and to launch a multi-front terror war-on-steroids against Israel, precisely because it has been weakened by the loss of its Syrian base due to the Muslim Brotherhood's support of the revolution in Syria, it has lost Iran's financial support to competing terror groups in the West Bank and Gaza Strip (such asHizb ut-Tahrir) as punishment for Hamas' refusal to support Syria's Assad, and its popularity is in severe decline with its rank-and-file in the Gaza Strip and West Bank due to its lack of sufficient qassam rocket attacks on Israel. So expanded political power and greater latitude to attack Israel is just what Hamas needs to get itself back to its position of primus inter pares amongMuslim terrorist groups.

So what are the real options?

The letter itself is obvious bluster and a postured pretense at peace-making. Some have critiqued it noting that it is full of errors, omissions and outright lies; and it is really nothing more than a rehash of PA demands to which the PA knows Israel cannot accede. As Israeli officials have said in the past, if one agrees to all of the other side's demands in advance of negotiations, then what does one negotiate about? PA officials know this just as well as do Israeli leaders. The letter is not an opening to peace negotiations. In fact, it is, in all probability, not even addressed to Netanyahu.

Israeli media sources received leaks from Palestinian leaders about the content of the letter almost a week in advance of the meeting. Yet the Israeli side wanted to keep details of the meeting secret even up to the day of the meeting. For what audienceswere those leaks, obviously in violation of Israel's desire for secrecy, intended?

The same question was asked about Abbas' op-ed in the New York Times before his UN bid for recognition. He stated clearly and unabashedly that the entry of "Palestine" into the family of nations and its acquisition of UN status as a bona fide state would not end the conflict. Rather such status would enable the PA to ratchet up the conflict to a higher level of political warfare by giving the new state of "Palestine" access to the ICC and ICJ (International Court of Justice) wherein Abbas and complicit partners in evil could support the Palestinian attempts to delegitimize Israel, condemn it as the world's worst violator of human rights and perpetrator of war crimes, and then pressure Israel's allies, especially those in the EU, to disassociate from Israel.

Did Abbas think that such threats endeared him to the EU or reduced the likelihood of American pressure against his bid? More likely, his audience for these comments was not those to whom he spoke, but rather those in the Arab world and their collaborators elsewhere who do not want to see the conflict end until Israel is destroyed. For that audience, Abbas' anti-Israel credentials have been eroded by his cooperation with Israel, by his PA security forces' collaboration with Israel, and by the relatively terror-free calm of the West Bank since Israel's defeat of the 2nd Intifada. His statement to the world of Israel-haters was clear: He is still at it, working with lawfare and BDS and delegitimization and accusations of war crimes, rather than with qassams and suicide bombers; but the end game is the same — Palestine from the river to the sea.

And this is probably the case with the letter to Netanyahu. By leaking its contents prematurely, he told his constituency and financial supporters and other partners in evil that he is still in a better position than Hamas to bring about Israel's demise, despite his temporary setbacks at the UN and ICC.

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

Pesach begins on Friday night, April 6 and continues through the following Saturday night. Time for celebration and time to do little day trips (tiyulim) with family will allow me scant opportunity to post during the course of that week. I do hope to post at least once more before the holiday starts, but I wanted to extend my wishes here and now to all:

Pesach marks our redemption from Egypt and the direct intervention of the Almighty in the process that lead to receiving of the Torah and the entering of the Land of Israel. Its messages are inspiring and all-important.

May we be ever be mindful of the power of the Almighty in our lives. May he watch over us at this time and always. And may each of you, with your families, have a joyous, meaningful and kosher Pesach.

In the spirit of Pesach, and mindful of my prayers above, I share this magnificent and moving video, "V'hi She'amdah":
http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fembed% 2F0eVMfNQskWc%3Frel&h=VAQGptRIFAQEB7y02hBeLE4XZsfOXrBjW5qcM7psS6PLqaQ
(With a very special thanks to Malka H.)

Little Zakkai will undergo surgery on his spine and thoracic cavity this Wednesday, April 4. His grandmother asks for the following prayers: "No one has prayed for the doctors...pray that they will be healthy, and brilliant and very capable, and have nimble hands on Wednesday...and may they be blessed with being able to accomplish more than they ever thought they could when they try to remove as much as possible of Zakkai's tumor...May they do no damage..."

Writing these words and looking at your picture with tears in my eyes, I wonder what kind of man would kill an eight year old girl. What does this person gain by his cruel and heinous act? At the moment I saw your picture in the news as a victim of the shooting, I immediately understood why this tragedy took place.

Myriam, you are another victim of jihad — an act of pure hatred perpetrated against you. The one who boldly pointed his gun toward your little body had to fulfill the dictates of his Allah — kill the infidel, kill the hated Jew.

I speak of the morning of Monday, March 19th, in Toulouse, France when three children were shot to death. The shooting occurred in front of a Jewish school. The French media reported the tragedy with political correctness in order to appease Jihadist terrorists, which only assures more horrible attacks in the future. We are all responsible for the loss of innocent lives, all of us who deny reality and hide behind political correctness.

The religious convictions swarming in the mind of a devout man who pulled the trigger on an innocent family walking to school one morning included his own peace of mind in knowing that a paradise of eroticism awaits him in the afterlife. By now all the world knows that such a cowardly act will be rewarded by Allah with a provision of 72 virgins in heaven for compensation for a great achievement.

Looking at your picture I sadly realize that you are neither the first nor the last to be a victim of such barbarity. I feel great sorrow that you, at a very young age with all of life before you, departed from us for any reason, least of all by the hands of a religious man abiding in his dogma. But I am so certain that you are in a much better place, between the arms of the Lord, the God of Israel -- the true and living God. I pray that your soul be at rest and that He receives you in all His Glory. My heart goes out to those who suffer your loss.

Today, around the world there are thousands like Myriam, kidnapped, raped and murdered by the followers of Allah because of religious doctrine and a culture that hates Jews and despises woman and girls. Yet those who make statements pointing out this truth and speaking out for freedom are considered themselves to be bigots and haters. The information war, the war on words now occurring in Western countries, is raging, the one side convincing normal rational people that it is noble to tolerate the intolerant, that progress for humanity means to condone the acts of Jihad by way of cover-ups with misinformation and erroneous reporting.

As a small child in Egypt, I invariably headed to church with fear of never returning because of Islamic Jihad against the Coptic community. Today throughout the West, many communities are vulnerable to the same threat.

Dott. Architetto Ashraf Ramelah is President of Voice of the Copts at www.voiceofthecopts.org. Also visit www.lavocedeicopti.org

1. More book burnings from the Left? A gaggle of tiny far leftist anti-Israel NGOs, funded by you-knows-who, have filed a petition with Israel's Supreme Court to prosecute the authors of the controversial book entitled "The Teaching of the King." The book discusses, among other things, the views of the authors about when Jewish rabbinic law permits the killing of non-Jewish non-combatants in battle situations. The caring Left has long insisted that the book is "racist."

It may well be.

So what? Since when is it prohibited to write and publish racist books in a democracy? The book shelves are filled with racist books. No one has demanded that Prof. Shlomo Sand from Tel Aviv University be prosecuted for writing HIS anti-Semitic book. The "books" of Norman Finkelstein and Walt-Mearsheimer are sold at Israeli book stores. Pro-jihadi racist anti-Jewish books are a dime a dozen. Haaretz and Yediot Ahronot are crawling with anti-Jewish racist columnists. A Jerusalem Post leftist (since fired) openly endorsed indiscriminate terrorist murder of Jews. (Larry Derfner, now writing for the jihadist 972 magazine)

In a democracy it is not against the law to express a racist sentiment or thought or opinion. If it were, 94% of Americans and Europeans would be in prison.

These would-be book-burners have no problem with tenured leftists issuing calls for murder, with Arabs calling for genocide of Jews, but are the first to demand the indictment and imprisonment for racism of any rabbi's wife suggesting that Jewish women should date Jewish men and not Arabs.

2. Special Isracampus Report

Maariv exposes Sexual Misconduct and Predation by Tenured Leftists

Isn't it delicious when leftist academics get nailed for their sexual misbehavior?

Well, Maariv today (April 2, 2012) runs a special expose of the sexual molestation of students by faculty members at Israeli universities. It proclaims Tel Aviv University the country's champion institution for faculty sexual misbehavior. TAU may also hold the single largest menagerie of far-leftist tenured faculty members in the country.

The story, in Hebrew only, is here: http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART2/352/547.html?hp=1&cat=402 The paper also reports how the administrations at Israeli universities try to stonewall and protect the tenured offenders. The cases range from inappropriate grabs to outright rape, and cover all manner of pankying and hankying.

Israel's State Comptroller is currently preparing a detailed report on the cover-ups and failures of the universities to maintain law and order among their tenured sexual predators. Maariv ran its own independent investigation and found that complaints by students of being sexually molested and harassed by faculty are routinely buried and shoved under the rugs. In cases where disciplinary hearings are held, a faculty molester gets judged only by other faculty members, people having no legal credentials. Among the now famous cases of molestation discussed in the paper today are that of Eyal ben Ari, far-leftist anti-Israel sociologist from the Hebrew University, who was fired because of his behavior, and his colleague Gideon Aran, the radically anti-Orthodox sociologist from the same department, Ehud Olmert's brother-in-law, who was ordered to pay compensation to a woman with whom he had "improper relations."

The paper claims the number of offenses and the number of complaints from students have been increasing dramatically. While the paper does not note this, most — if not all — of the offenders are academic leftists.

The Hebrew version can be read here: http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART2/352/547.html?hp=1&cat=402

Steven Plaut is an American-trained economist, a professor of business administration at Haifa University and author of "The Scout." He frequently comments — both seriously and satirically — on Israeli politics and the left wing academic community. Write him at splaut@gmail.com His website address is
http://www.stevenplaut.blogspot.com. This article is archived at http://stevenplaut.blogspot.com

What do Israelis think that the Palestinian Authority (P.A.) Arabs want to do with them? A poll found that 64% of Israelis, including Arabs, think that the P.A. Arab goal is to destroy Israel. Two-thirds of that 64% also believe that the P.A. Arabs want to kill the Jews, too. The poll was taken by Prof. Yaacov Shamir of the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace, Hebrew University and the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research in Ramallah. Support was provided by the Ford Foundation Cairo office and the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung in Ramallah and Jerusalem.

The pollsters' press release stated, "...Israelis reject Palestinians' conditions for returning to negotiations, and Palestinians oppose returning to negotiations unconditionally."

Dr. Aaron Lerner asked Prof. Yaacov how the poll relates to Israelis' willingness to grant the P.A. statehood, when they believe that a new state would try to destroy their own state. Prof. Yaacov differentiated the two questions as being the first, of perception, and the second, of implementation.

Dr. Lerner suggested a poll that asks both sets of people what they intend about the other. Ask Israelis whether they wish to expand their state to the Jordan River and expel the Arabs from the P.A.. Prof. Yaacov said that the question of Israelis did not serve the purpose of his poll. Why doesn't he want to poll both parties' intent? He admitted that he intends his polls to serve policy makers (IMRA, 3/28/12 www.imra.org.il, http://www.pcpsr.org/survey/polls/2012/p43ejoint.html).

The Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research For The Israel Project found that 60% of P.A. Arabs agreeing that: "The real goal should be to start with two states but then move to it all being one Palestinian state." (Questionnaire West Bank and Gaza Strip October 4-15, 2010 854 Respondents, 1020 Unweighted
http://www.theisraelproject.org/atf/cf/%7B84dc5887-741e-4056-8d91- a389164bc94e%7D/NOV2010_PALESTINIANPOLLTOPLINE.PDF]====Prof).

Dr. Lerner's first suggestion was that the poll ask Israelis to reconcile their publicized willingness to grant the P.A. sovereignty. Most Israelis are willing, but under certain conditions that most pollsters do not publicize. The condition is to end jihad. The P.A. will not do that. Most pollsters know it. If those pollsters publicized that condition, they could not claim that Israelis favor P.A. statehood. The pollsters are withholding data that undermines their pro-Arab ideological drive.

Dr. Lerner's second suggestion is to ask the two populations not only what they believe the other side wants, but also what they want. Such a question could discover a more realistic basis for policy. I anticipate such a question would show Israelis more peace-minded and Arabs more bellicose than popularly believed. Is that why the pollster did not consider the mutual question to serve the purpose of his poll and also does not indicate he would ask it in another poll? Notice he comes from pro-Arab Hebrew University, his associates are P.A. Arabs, and one of his sponsors is the pro-Arab Ford Foundation.

The perceptive questions and comments by Dr. Lerner usually are ignored or evaded by pollsters and P.A. and Israeli officials. It can take many questions to pin them down. Usually they walk away from the interview, rather than admit the truth and the logic of the comments.

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.

On March 20, Inquisitr published an interview with Raymond Ibrahim on the plight of Egypt's Copts. The Introduction and Afterword are by Wolff Bachnew, who also conducted the interview, which follows:

Introduction by Wolff Bachner

Most of us in the West have little knowledge of what life is like for Christians in the Muslim world. Take for example, the Coptic Christians, who were once the dominant religious group in Egypt. Previously the mainstay of their nation, Copts are now living as an oppressed minority, denied religious freedom and equal status in Egyptian life. The Copts are routinely denied meaningful employment and may not hold positions in the Egyptian Civil Service. Copts are refused permission to build new churches and even a request to renovate a church that is badly in need of repair can lead to an outbreak of severe Muslim violence against the Copts. Recently, there have even been calls for a return to collecting Jizya from the Copts, a tax that the Qur'an instructs Muslims to charge to all Dhimmis (non-Muslims) whenever Muslims are in power.

To give our readers an accurate picture of the situation in Egypt, we asked Raymond Ibrahim to answer several questions about the Coptic Christians. Raymond is the son of Coptic Christian parents who were born in Egypt and he has first hand knowledge about Coptic life under Islam. Raymond is a highly respected Middle East and Islam specialist, a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum. A widely published author, best known for The Al Qaeda Reader (Doubleday, 2007), he guest lectures at universities, including the National Defense Intelligence College. Raymond also briefs governmental agencies, such as U.S. Strategic Command and the Defense Intelligence Agency. Among other media, he has appeared on Inquisitr.com, MSNBC, Fox News, C-SPAN, PBS, Reuters, Al-Jazeera, CBN, and NPR. Raymond is fluent in Arabic and he has studied the Qur'an and many ancient Islamic historical documents in the original language. You can find Raymond's latest writings at http://www.raymondibrahim.com.

Here is our interview with Raymond Ibrahim:

1. Who are the Coptic Christians and what is their history?

Raymond Ibrahim:

The Copts are the indigenous inhabitants of Egypt, before the Arab/Muslim invasion around 641 A.D.. The word "Copt" simply means "Egyptian"; however, because all Egyptians were Christian in the 7th century — Egypt was a major Christian center, so much so that Alexandria vied with Rome over ecclesiastical leadership — "Copt" also became synonymous with "Christian." In short, the word Copt is similar to the word Jew: both words convey a people and a religion. Tradition teaches that St. Mark, author of the Gospel of the same name, proselytized the pagan Egyptians of the 1st century; by approximately the 3rd century, Christianity was the dominant religion; and by the 7th century when Islam burst into Egypt, Christianity was THE religion.

2. When did persecution of the Copts begin and why?

Raymond Ibrahim:

Muslim persecution of the Copts begins with the Islamic invasion. It is true that, at the time, the Copts were already under nearly a decade of persecution by the Byzantine Empire over doctrinal disputes. However, with Islam's entry, the persecution took on a different shape, and grew steadily worse, until the modern era and the age of colonialism. At first, and because the Copts were the majority people of Egypt, they were merely deemed a subject race, to be heavily taxed and kept in line by their Muslim overlords. Over the years, however, their subject status came to be codified in what is seen as Islam's divine and immutable law, or Sharia.

3. What is Life like for a Copt today in Egypt?

Raymond Ibrahim:

There are approximately 10 million Copts in Egypt, roughly 12% of the population. This is not an insignificant number. In fact, in the entire Middle East, Copts make for the largest Christian minority. Accordingly, the everyday average Copt is not "persecuted"; however, everyday forms of discrimination are common (for instance, only Muslims get hired for the best jobs, and so forth). The problem, though, is that persecution of the sort that occurred centuries ago — for instance, the ongoing attacks on churches — is on the rise, unsurprisingly so, considering the overall Islamization of Egypt in recent decades, culminating with Islamists, who were once in jail for their extremist views, now sitting in Egypt's new parliament.

4. What can the Copts do to protect their lives and preserve their religion? What does the future hold for the Copts? Can they survive in the Middle East and remain faithful Coptic Christians?

Raymond Ibrahim:

This is difficult to answer, as there are several variables and contexts. For starters, emigration is not the solution for most Copts; not only is it impractical for 10 million people to pack up and leave, many Copts do not wish to abandon Egypt, seeing it as their home more than Muslims; some even say they would rather die than abandon their motherland. Their best bet is for a secular and free government to form; the sort of government the youth who initiated the Revolution wanted. Of course, with each passing day it becomes clear that it is the Islamists, the Muslim Brotherhood followed by the Salafis, who will play the greatest role in shaping Egypt's future. Still, there are many secular Egyptian's who oppose the Islamists just as much, if not more than the Copts. Copts need to — and often do — ally with these parties, which stress, not "Muslim" or "Christian" as an identity, but "Egyptian." For the bottom line is, an Islamist government will not only be bad for Christians, but secularized Muslims as well, and these are not an insignificant group. Likewise, though this is out of the hands of Copts and seculars, U.S. diplomacy could help empower the former, though the Obama administration appears more interested in aiding Islamists like the Muslim Brotherhood. So, overall, it is a bad situation, though only the future can tell what will ultimately happen, though one is not optimistic.

Afterword by Wolff Bachner: What Does The Future Hold?

deep in the heart of Texan's

From Fred Reifenberg (30apr12)

Hava Nagila Texas Style

a speech by the "president"

From Fred Reisenberg (29apr12)

Someone please tell him that there are 50, not 57, or more, States in the USA

Psalm, Prayer and Mike Wallace interview

From 12Tribe Films (28apr12)

Lt. Col. Abramson singing the Prayer for the State of Israel

Arab-Israeli conflict: The Mike Wallace Interview with Abba Eban 1958

Shir Lama'alot Powerful Visual of this Psalm

11 Year Old Sings Hallelujah

From Uzi (28apr12)

11 years old Shalev Menashe sings the Hebrew version of Leonard Cohen Hallelujah.

Jew-Hate at Northeastern U

From Lowell Joseph Gallin (28apr12)

Jew-hatred at Northeastern U.

Please see this interview with my friend and colleague, pro-Israel, pro-Jewish Sunni Muslim Sheikh Abdul Hadi Palazzi, from Rome, Italy, Muslim Co-Founder and Co-Chairman of the Islam-Israel Fellowship (established 1997) of the Root and Branch Association (established 1981, of which I am founder and president):

Video

Excoriating Eisner: Egregious or ethical?

From Martin Sherman (27apr12)

The panicky response by Israel's leaders to the Eisner episode will only serve to encourage pernicious protest tourism by pampered radicals.

The Eisner episode

Help this video go viral

From Aaron Seruya (27apr12)

What would happen in the media if Romney released a video announcing a White Americans For Romney Campaign? This is truly racist.

Video

The New Intolerance

From Born to Lose(26apr12)

Melanie Phillips

From David Meir-Levi (26apr12)

Obama said his father served in WW II. Listen to this 18 second video. Barack Hussein Obama Sr. (Obama's father) Born: 4/4/36 Died: 11/24/82 at the age of 46. He was 5 years old when WW II started, and less than 9 1/2 yrs old when it ended. Lolo Soetoro (Obama's step father) Born: January 2,1935 Died: 3/2/87 at the age of 52. He was 6 years old when WW II started, and 10 years old when it ended.

Google both his father and step-father. Neither served in WW2. But in that news clip Obama said: "My father served in WW2 and when he came home....." a casual, off-handed lie....on TV...in front of the American people.

Video

Israel 64th Independence Day Celebrations at Har Herzl, Jerusalem, PM Netanyahu's Message for Israel's 64th

From 12Tribe Films (26apr12)

Israel 64th Independence Day Celebrations at Har Herzl, Jerusalem

PM Netanyahu's Message for Israel's 64th Independence Day

From Billy Mills (26apr12)

Frank Gaffney on the Muslim Brotherhood

Glenn Beck

Unbelievable Footage - Ben Gurion Anouncing the Establishment of the State of Israel,

From 12Tribe Films (25apr12)

Ben Gurion Accouncing the Establishment of the State of Israel

From Roger Bodie (25apr12)

Media gts dirty down Under Part 1

Jerusalem Obama is very bad news.

From Robin Ticker (25apr12)

Economics

More economics

Video About The Status Of Jerusalem; Simon Deng's speech.

From Yuval Zaliouk (24apr12)

This is Remembrance Day for Israel's fallen soldiers and the victims of Arab terrorism. Close to 24,000 Israeli soldiers (including my cousin Mordechai Mordi Friedman) sacrificed their lives in defense of Israel and Jerusalem, the holiest city, the eternal capital of Israel and the spiritual capital of every Jew wherever he or she may live and reside. The above short video will absolutely shock you. Cudos to the brave correspondent who questioned the Secretary of State's representative so bravely and so relentlessly.

Read this.

And this.

Glenn Beck interviewed General Boykin.

Shredding the Constitution

America is financing Terror groups affiliated with Muslim Brotherhood

Simon Deng's speech

From David Gruber (24apr12)

Video 1. Cantor Shlomo Guber sings

Video 2 Cantor Shlomo Guber sings

- If I wanted America to Fail.....

From John Trudel (24apr12)

Lenin Birthday, part 2

If I wanted America to fall

Footage of Israel 1918 and 1932.

From 12Tribe Films (24apr12)

Jerusalem 1918; Feel the pride, And more.

Jerusalem, Israel in 1918

The first Maccabiah in Israel in 1932

Triumph of spirit

Feel the Pride about Israel! Israel Facts 2011

An amazing dancer

From Ted Belman (24apr12)

Maya Plisetskaya, ballerina

Calling Iran Attack Imminent

From Dena Wimpfheimer (23apr12)

Back to the Future

Denial of the threat

Barry Shaw challenges Emma Thompson about Israel.

From Barry Shaw (23apr12)

Barry Shaw rebuts Emma Thompson

Yom Hashoah V'Hagvura - Israel

From Paul Rotenberg (23apr12)

Remembrance Day

We Stand with You, Palestinians are Egyptians and Saudi Arabians! and More

From 12Tribe Films (22apr12)

We stand with you

CNN Debate: Bennett Slams Iranian Claim that it's Peaceful

Children without Shadows, Children without tears

Palestinians are Egyptians and Saudi Arabians!

Remembrance Day: buttons with stories

Jon Voight's Evaluation

Bronze-age barbarians

From k_hallel (22apr12)

barbarians 1

barbarians 2

Lenin's birthday (also known as Earth Day) is coming up: here are two videos to celebrate.

From John Trudel (22apr12)

Lenin's birthday

Cast A Giant Shadow;

From 12Tribe Films (22apr12)

Cast a Giant Shadow

Ofra Haza: Yerushalayim shel Zahav

Shavei Israel Judaism Seminar in Brazil

Learning about Eli in the Shomron

From Pioneers to Entrapenuers

Fantastic speech by Melanie Phillips

From Sergio Hadar Tezza (21apr12)

Melanie Phillips

This video will make your blood boil

From Fred Reifenberg (20apr12)

AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt

IDF and Police can beat settlers and haredim, but not goyim

From Yosef Rabin (20apr12)

IDF beat settlers

Israeli Police Beat Haredim

IDF Officer hits non-Jewish protester

Sar-El Volunteers for Israel

From Roger Bodle (17apr12)

Tour of Duty with the IDF Near Beersheva 2009

f BGU Amnon Raz-Krakotzkin inciting Arabs against Israe

From IAM (16apr12)

BGU Amnon Raz-Krakotzkin inciting Arabs

View from Denmark

From Midenise (16apr12)

View from Denmark

Stunning

From Fred Reifenberg (16apr12)

Roberto Carlos is one of the most famous Brazilian singers of all time. During a career spanning 50 years, he has sold over 120 million albums. In late 2011, when he was 70 years old, he flew to Israel with a full orchestra and choir to give a concert in the Old City of Jerusalem in front of 3000 Brazilian supporters of Israel. The highlight was his version of "Jerusalem of Gold", which he sang in Portuguese and Hebrew.

Roberto Carlos and Jerusalem of Gold

Israel fights Palestinian Protesters With Non Lethal Weapon "Skunk Water"

From Sergio Hadar Tezza (15apr12)

Yiddishe Kopf

A Tribute to the Jewish Mother; Core of the Conflict and More

From 12Tribe Films (15apr12)

Tribute to the Jewish Mother

Ossie Grable at 100

Netanyahu - core of the conflict

Justice for American Victims of Arab Terrorism

Carlebach singing Adir Hu;

From 12Tribe Films (12apr12)

Carlebach singing Adir Hu;

Jerusalem Acrobats at Ultra-Orthodox Wedding, Story of the Four Sons and More

From 12Tribes Films (11apr12)

Acrobats at Ultra-Orthodox Wedding

Young Professionals

Story of the four sons

For your American friends

From David Pisanti (11apr12)

Dr. Corsi and Obama birth certificate

Ayers and Obama

Viviano on democrats

Administration Official Position On Jerusalem

From YogiRUs (10apr12)

Administration Official Position On Jerusalem

The doctors ad about Obamacare

From Dr. History (10apr12)

The doctors ad about Obamacare

Pat Condell and the United Nations

From Yuval Zaliouk (10apr12)

Pat Condell and UN

'You Are Special' Campaign; Cry No More and More

From 12Tribes Films (10apr12)

'You are special' Campaign

Underground Herodian Tunnel

Yaakov Shwekey - Cry no more

Director, Joseph Cedar talks about his film "Footnote".

A Documentary for Monetary Reform

From David Pisanti (9apr12)

The Money Fix

Two-state solution shoves Israel, Palestine into never-ending claustrophobic embrace

From Ted Belman (9apr12)

2-state solution

Powerful Message ii

From Susana K-M (9apr12)

Powerful Message ii

Iran vs Israel: are we really free?

From Mark Pollack (9apr12)

Iran is on the brink of nuclear power

Happy Passover from the IDF

From YogiRUs (8apr12)

Happy Passover from the IDF

The Price We Will Not Pay

From Dr. History (8apr12)

With back-channel (albeit with an open mike in the first case) contacts to Russia, Iran and the Palestinians, with retreat from the Middle East, with de facto capitulation to Iran becoming a nuclear power, with hordes (streaming across the borders of Western democracies (in Europe, North America, Australia, and Israel) Ronald Reagan's words ring more true than ever, as an alarm bell in the night!

The Price we will not pay

Shadow Show of Passover, Jews of India Learning about Judaism and More

From 12Tribes Films (8apr12)

Fabulous Shadow Show of Passover

Park Chaverim

Bnei Menashe Hebrew Seminar in India

It Takes Two For Peace

Inspiring Passover Video

From Glenn Fischer (7apr12)

Passover video

Happy Passover - Chag Kasher V'Sameach

From Paul Rotenberg (6apr12)

Happy Passover

Muslims desecrating Allied WWII graves

From YogiRUs (5apr12)

British military cemetery in Libya desecrated

Rabbi Meir Kahane on Palestinian State

From BL Lemkin (5apr12)

R. Kahane on PA State

Illegal Aliens Laugh at Mention of Americans Killed by Illegal Immigrants

From Billy Mills (5apr12)

Illegals laughing

Google's "Exodus" Passover movie, Letter from Israel and More

From 12Tribes Film(5apr12)

Google Exodus

Global march to Jerusalem

Letter from Israel, 1948

Passover Song, Vehi Sheamda

A Question of Balance

From Albert Wendroff (4apr12)

Question of balance

Passover Rhapsody, A Jewish Rock Opera, Israeli Solar Power, etc.

From 12Tribes Films (4apr12)

Jewish Rock Opera

Israeli Solar Power

Douglas Murry: Israel and Nuclear Iran

Matisyahu special: One Day

Sharia Showdown Looms in Brussels

From Yoram Fisher (4apr12)

Check out Belgistan?

Don't Bungee Jump Naked.

From Fred Reifenberg (4apr12)

Jeanne Robertson

Northeastern Univ Holocaust Offenses; Fashionable Mrs. al-Assad

From Maxime Myer-Smith (3apr12)

Northeastern Univ Holocaust Offenses (also see Mrs. Bashar al-Assad:

"Palestinian" refugees

From Dr. History(3apr12)

Danny Ayalon

Israeli Website Recruits Retired Soldiers to reclaim the land

From Ariah King (3apr12)

Recruiting people to reclaim the Land

Passover Music Video, Midnight Escape, The Israeli Heart

From 12Tribes films(2apr12)

Midnight Escape

The Israeli Heart

IDF Month

food packages for Purim in Judea and Samaria!

A British girl comes home to her home town

From LS (2apr12)

British girl returns

Shaool's new film

From MS Kramer (2apr12)

Shaool's video

Moshe led Muslims out of Egypt to liberate Palestine

From Bat-Zion Susskind-Sacks(2apr12)

Moshe led Muslims out of Egypt to liberate Palestine

The completely non political general and the man who forgot something

From Sergio Hadar Tezza(2apr12)

Non political general

A Passover present for ALL to hear & see!

From Kaylene Rudy (2apr12)

Music based on the Haggadah

Breakin Free; Cleantech in the Making and More

From 12/tribe Films (2apr12)

Click here to watch: Breakin Free

Official US Position on Jerusalem

CleanTech in the Making

Reclaiming The Narrative In South Africa

The story of Obama and Israel

Getting the facts straight on Palestine

The Refugees: Israel Palestinian Conflicct

Movie Trailer You must see.

From Dr. History (1apr12)

007 Mr Flexible

Passover movie, Unbelievable! Jerusalem Snow, The Mystery of Tekhelet, etc

From 12Tribe Films (1apr12)

awesome Passover video

Jerusalem snow

Mystery of Tekhelet

If I forget you Jerusalem