June 2005 ~ Elder Of Ziyon

Thursday, June 30, 2005

Israel arrests Palestinian terrorist/"policeman"

Just another shining example of the types of people that Mahmoud Abbas is paying for his "police" force that does no policing.

A Palestinian policeman involved in the October 2000 Ramallah lynching has been arrested. Numerous investigations have shown that Wassim Radi, the Palestinian policeman in question, was directly involved in the murder of Sergeant First Class Yossi Avrahami. Wasam Radi was arrested May 22nd, 2005 in a joint IDF and ISA operation.

Radi is suspected of being directly involved in the Ramallah lynching on October 12, 2000, during which two IDF reserved soldiers were brutally murdered. Radi, a 30-year old Palestinian policeman, is originally from the Gaza Strip and is currently a resident of the village of Beituniya, southwest of Ramallah.

The IDF will continue to hunt all those who were involved in the murders until they are brought to justice.

According to the news, only settlers are "extremist" and only Palestinians are "moderate"

Number of hits in Google News search for the phrase "extremist settlers": 106
Number of hits in Google News search for the phrase "extremist Palestinians": 1
Number of hits in Google News search for the phrase "moderate settlers": 0
Number of hits in Google News search for the phrase "moderate Palestinians": 125

In other words, people who advocate genocide of Jews, who danced on 9/11, who cheered Saddam's SCUD missiles, who burn the American flag regularly, who idolize people who blow up pizza shops, who name public squares after terrorists, who prefer Hamas to any non-Muslim - they don't have an extremist among them!

So what crimes are the extremists in this conflict doing? Read the articles: they are doing such heinous crimes as stopping traffic on Israel's highways, protesting and getting hit by moderate Palestinian stones, building houses, and, um, that's about it.

A reasonable question to all "news" sources would be why wouldn't they use scare quotes when talking about "extremist" Jewish settlers when they will use them while talking about Muslim terrorists?

Arabs helped Titus conquer Jerusalem in 70 AD

Interesting tidbit (thanks to Emet m'Tziyon). Publius Cornelius Tacitus mentions this in his Histories:
[5.1] EARLY in this year Titus Caesar, who had been selected by his father to complete the subjugation of Judaea, and who had gained distinction as a soldier while both were still subjects, began to rise in power and reputation, as armies and provinces emulated each other in their attachment to him. The young man himself, anxious to be thought superior to his station, was ever displaying his gracefulness and his energy in war. By his courtesy and affability he called forth a willing obedience, and he often mixed with the common soldiers, while working or marching, without impairing his dignity as general. He found in Judaea three legions, the 5th, the 10th, and the 15th, all old troops of Vespasian's. To these he added the 12th from Syria, and some men belonging to the 18th and 3rd, whom he had withdrawn from Alexandria. This force was accompanied by twenty cohorts of allied troops and eight squadrons of cavalry, by the two kings Agrippa and Sohemus, by the auxiliary forces of king Antiochus, by a strong contingent of Arabs, who hated the Jews with the usual hatred of neighbours, and, lastly, by many persons brought from the capital and from Italy by private hopes of securing the yet unengaged affections of the Prince. With this force Titus entered the enemy's territory, preserving strict order on his march, reconnoitring every spot, and always ready to give battle. At last he encamped near Jerusalem.

So while students of the Bible may not be surprised, Tacitus shows that Arab hatred of Jews pre-dates Islam by many centuries.

I imagine that they were only upset by the "occupation" of Canaanite land a millenium earlier, and that they were just trying to help the Romans uphold international law.

----------------
By the way, Tacitus clearly hated Jews and Judaism, but some of his complaints (the few that are accurate) are actually quite complimentary to Western eyes:

This worship, however introduced, is upheld by its antiquity; all their other customs, which are at once perverse and disgusting, owe their strength to their very badness. The most degraded out of other races, scorning their national beliefs, brought to them their contributions and presents. This augmented the wealth of the Jews, as also did the fact, that among themselves they are inflexibly honest and ever ready to shew compassion, though they regard the rest of mankind with all the hatred of enemies. They sit apart at meals, they sleep apart, and though, as a nation, they are singularly prone to lust, they abstain from intercourse with foreign women; among themselves nothing is unlawful. Circumcision was adopted by them as a mark of difference from other men. Those who come over to their religion adopt the practice, and have this lesson first instilled into them, to despise all gods, to disown their country, and set at nought parents, children, and brethren. Still they provide for the increase of their numbers. It is a crime among them to kill any newly-born infant. They hold that the souls of all who perish in battle or by the hands of the executioner are immortal. Hence a passion for propagating their race and a contempt for death. They are wont to bury rather than to burn their dead, following in this the Egyptian custom; they bestow the same care on the dead, and they hold the same belief about the lower world. Quite different is their faith about things divine. The Egyptians worship many animals and images of monstrous form; the Jews have purely mental conceptions of Deity, as one in essence. They call those profane who make representations of God in human shape out of perishable materials. They believe that Being to be supreme and eternal, neither capable of representation, nor of decay. They therefore do not allow any images to stand in their cities, much less in their temples. This flattery is not paid to their kings, nor this honour to our Emperors.

Islam is more a political ideology than a religion

One of the reasons that the West treats Islam with kid gloves is because of our understandable desire for world-wide freedom of religion. But when religion becomes more than a personal or community-based belief system and turns into a worldwide political philosophy (and a very bigoted and ugly one, at that) then the free world has no obligation to treat it like a religion, rather it should be treated the way that fascism is treated - with no tolerance.

The latest evidence that Islam is not acting like a religion comes from this latest demand:

Islamic states want permanent seat on UN Security Council
Foreign ministers of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) opened a meeting with a call for a Muslim permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

OIC secretary general Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu urged a greater role for Muslim countries in world affairs and demanded a 'permanent representation for the Islamic world on the UN Security Council'.

'The Islamic world, which represents one fifth of total mankind, cannot remain excluded from the activities of the Security Council which assumes a fundamental role in keeping security and peace in the world,' he said Tuesday.

Notice that they aren't saying that any single Islamic state should be represented.

Notice how they wouldn't support India (which is also seeking membership in the Security Council), even though it has more Muslims than any other nation - because it is not an "Islamic state."

Notice how they put aside all their many political differences in order to push their agenda of increasing Islamic influence on the world.

The West needs to wake up and treat Islam on a geopolitical level the way that it treats all other oppressive and bigoted ideologies. The fig leaf of "religion" should not protect today's Islam.

June 28, 1935-36: The Power of Lies

A sobering article in the June 28, 1935 edition of the Palestine Post:

Everyone knew what was happening in Nazi Germany. Everyone saw the vile Jew-hatred coming from Europe. (In the same edition of the Palestine Post was an article about how cities in Germany were stripping Jews of their citizenship, even before Hitler's national law disenfranchising Jews took effect.) While they may not have imagined genocide, it was very clear that for the foreseeable future Jews would be heavily persecuted in Europe.

Britain could have saved millions of the Jews by just allowing them to go to Palestine (and Cyprus and Trans-Jordan.) So why didn't they?

The reason is simple. They didn't want to upset the Arabs.

And the Palestinian Arab leaders had no qualms about playing up their "fears" that Jews would destroy the Al-Aqsa mosque, that they would "endanger the Arabs existence" - any convenient lie would do.

As can be seen in the Post on June 28, 1936:

Do these complaints sound familiar? They are the same complaints we have heard for the past 70 years. And they are just as absurd as they were then.

And the British weren't stupid. They knew that the Arabs were liars (also the same issue):

But lies are insidious. When someone hears a lie, even if they know it is false, it still affects them. A little bit of us tends to think, "What if it is true?" Or, more commonly, "Both sides are very passionate and I don't know all the facts - probably the truth is somewhere in between."

Couple that with the fact that the Western mind has a very hard time accepting that someone would lie to our faces. Hitler did it in the 30s, and the "relief" that could be felt in the West whenever he claimed that he was finished his expansionism was palpable. And they were always lies.

The Arabs learned very well from Hitler's playbook. A lie, repeated often enough, tends to be believed. And in this case the Arab lies about their "fears" of their future (rather than the Jew-hatred that was truly the source of their being against Jewish immigration) made the British pause and think that perhaps this year isn't the best time to allow Jews to save their lives - maybe next year, maybe after negotiations, maybe when the Arabs stop rioting and things calm down - maybe then we will do the right thing. But until then, it is easier to close our eyes and believe some of the lies coming out of the mouths of vile bigots.

Westerners are fans of fair play, of the adage that "there are two sides to every story." It is very hard to accept that one side is right and that the other side is lying.

Arab lies and British (and world) apathy helped combine to the destruction of European Jewry. And the Arabs have never stopped their campaign of getting rid of any Jews in positions of power in the Middle East, partially through their incessant repitition of anti-Semitic lies to their own people and to the apathetic West.

Each lie affects us all until they are called out and exposed for what they are. It is a moral responsibility to expose each Arab lie about Israel and Jews and show the liars to be the bigoted scum they are.

And it is the height of stupidity to believe the promises of liars.

Muslim male bombers get virgins. What do the women get?

From OpinionJournal's Best of the Web:

Girls Gone Wild
Fundamentalist Muslim mythology has it that terrorist 'martyrs' are greeted in heaven by 72 virgins. With Palestinian Arabs increasingly making use of female suicide bombers, we've often wondered what they get in heaven. Now we have the answer, thanks to a report in London's Sunday Telegraph from an Israeli prison:

One of the inmates, Ayat Allah Kamil, 20, from Kabatya, told me why she had wanted to become a martyr: 'Because of my religion. I'm very religious. For the holy war [jihad] there's no difference between men and women shaid [martyrs].'

According to the Koran, male martyrs are welcomed to Paradise by 72 beautiful virgins. Ayat, as with many of the women she is incarcerated with, believes that a woman martyr 'will be the chief of the 72 virgins, the fairest of the fair.'

That is to say, the highest aspiration for a fundamentalist Palestinian girl is murder, suicide and prostitution. Has there ever been a more depraved culture?

"We deserve a state"
JERUSALEM - The upcoming disengagement will allow the Palestinians to show the world they deserve an independent state, Palestinian Authority National Security Advisor Jibril Rajoub said at a conference in Jerusalem Monday.

“Gaza will be a model for the Palestinian state,” Rajoub said in the session, organized by The Media Line news agency at Jerusalem’s American Colony hotel.

Other greatest hits from Rajoub include: "The Israelis may have killed the Israelis in Taba."
and
"The blood of Arafat will chase the Jews forever, the same as Christ's blood"

By Dr. Alex Grobman

What irony! While there are so many reasons for American and Israeli Jews to feel threatened by Arab politicians and religious leaders, they act as if they are not. Arabs, who for the most part could count on Jews to be their friends, continue to act as if Jews are their mortal enemies.

Arabs have been hostile to Jews in Israel for over 100 years. Najib Azouri, a Christian Arab, wrote in 1905 that the Arab nations and Israel were destined to fight until one of them wins. The most recent indication that Palestinians refuse to recognize Israel as a Jewish state was in Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ mentioning the right of return during the 15 May 2005 Naqba (catastrophe) ceremony. Harvard psychiatrist Kenneth Levin gives psychological reasons for this. One is that reality is too painful to accept; another is believing peace will come if Jews make concessions, which also makes Jews feel they are in control of the situation. Another example of self-delusion is that Palestinians and Jews have the same goals, which led them to be taken in over and over again by Yasser Arafat.

Political correctness also plays a role since Jews might be accused of racism if they were to challenge Arabs. Clearly, many Jews who are the wronged people in this conflict believe they are in the wrong.

I have often wondered how people translate information into knowledge. During the Shoah, there was no historical precedent for the systematic, bureaucratically administered, mass murder of the Jews of Europe. Even when information became available, it took time to assimilate the dimensions of what was happening. Marie Syrkin, a Labor Zionist leader and editor of the Jewish Frontier, explained how American Jews, including Jewish journalists who since 1933 had been actively involved in the fight against Nazi persecution, were not psychologically prepared to accept the truth:

“Today when genocide, gas-chamber and massextermination are the small coin of language, it is hard to reconstruct the more innocent state of mind when American Jews, like the Jews in Europe’s ghettos, could not immediately grasp that the ascending series of Nazi persecutions had reached this apex.” Further, she asked: “If such was the psychological unreadiness of sophisticated publicists whose ‘concerns’ had been to expose each new phase of the Nazi terror, what could be expected from a less informed general public?”

Given our recent experiences with the Nazis, however, why has it been difficult for so many Israeli and American Jews to recognize that the attacks against Israel by Arab religious and political leaders constitute a threat to our very existence as a people and as a nation? How many Israelis have to be killed or maimed by homicide bombings. How often do Jews have to be portrayed in the Arab media and in sermons as Satan, sons of apes and pigs, and as a cancer? How often do Israelis have to have their connection to Jewish holy sites refuted and the Holocaust denied, before we acknowledge the true extent of Arab enmity and their real objectives in dealing with the Jewish Question?

Arab hostility to Jews in the Land of Israel is, after all, not a new phenomenon. In March 1899, Zadok Kahn, Arab Mayor of Jerusalem, responded to Zionist overtures with a suggestion that “the Jews would do better to go somewhere else.” In 1905, Najib Azouri, a Christian Arab who worked as the assistant to the governor of the sanjaq (district) of Jerusalem, was the first Arab publicist to predict that Arab and Jewish national movements would end up in serious conflict with each other. In the introduction to his book, Le Reveil de la Nation Arabe dans l’Asie Turque (The Awakening of the Arab Nation in Turkish Asia), Azouri warned that these two movements, the emerging Arab nation and the “latent effort of the Jews to reconstitute ‘the ancient kingdom of Israel’ are destined to fight each other until one of them wins. The fate of the world will depend on the final result of this struggle between two peoples representing two contrary principles.”

One would be hard pressed to find any indication that these sentiments have changed. If anything, Arabs now are even more vocal about their contempt for Israel and their determination to destroy the country. In a 1974 interview with Oriana Fallaci, an Italian author, writer and journalist, Yasser Arafat was asked how long the conflict would continue. He indicated that the Palestinians did not think in these terms: “We are just beginning to get ready for a long, long war, a war that will run for generations. Ours is not the first generation to fight. In the 1920s our fathers were already struggling against Zionist invaders. We will never stop until we can go back home and Israel is destroyed.” When Fallaci questioned Arafat about whether he was seeking peace, he replied: “We don’t want peace, we want victory. Peace for us means Israel’s destruction and nothing else. What you call peace is peace for Israel. For us it is shame and injustice. We shall fight on to victory. Even for decades, for generations if necessary.”

In a November 1992 speech to an Arab youth group in Amman, Jordan, Faisal Husseini, the leading spokesman for the Palestine Liberation Organization in the disputed territories, declared, “We have not conceded and will not surrender any of the existing commitments that have existed for more than 70 years. We have within our Palestinian and united Arab society the ability to deal with a divided Israeli society. We must force Israeli society to cooperate with our Arab society, and eventually dissolve the ‘Zionist entity.’” During the Oslo period, he asserted that their objective was to establish a Palestinian state “from the river to the sea.”

At a 15 May 2005 ceremony in Ramallah commemorating the Naqba (Arabic for catastrophe), Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas said, “Peace, stability and security in the Middle East” is subject to “achieving a just and agreed solution to the refugees issue.” Zalman Shoval, who twice served as Israeli Ambassador to the U.S., concluded, “the Palestinians, by claiming the ‘right of return’ are still refusing to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.”

Kenneth Levin, a clinical psychiatrist at Harvard Medical School, offers a plausible answer as to why, in the face of continuous killing of Jews, open declarations to destroy Israel and blatant violations of agreements made with the Jewish state, many Jews still disregard this evidence and cling to the notion that Arabs want peace. Israelis, Levin says, are in “state of chronic siege,” which causes them to seek ways to extricate themselves from this predicament. This has produced “the Oslo approach,” which is based on “wishful thinking divorced from reality.”

Maintaining this position regardless of countervailing evidence and tolerating no debate is textbook “delusional,” according to Levin.

This self-delusion, he says, manifests itself in a number of other ways as well. One is to believe they can actually maintain some kind of control of the situation. By accepting the condemnation of their enemies and appeasing the terrorists, Israelis think they will themselves bring an end to hostilities. If only the Jews would make enough concessions to the Arabs, and stop obsessing about defensible borders and other strategic issues, peace would soon be at hand and such concerns would become irrelevant.

Why do some Israelis respond in this way? Levin suggests that since Jews were historically subjected to so much abuse, elements within the community are so eager to escape this painful experience that they interpret the ostensibly improved conditions under Oslo as proof that the past is behind them.

There is also an element of arrogance to “this self-delusion.” Jews assume a responsibility for something over which they have no control in order to ward off despair. Levin suggests that this is similar to an abused child who feels responsible for his plight and views himself as “bad.” The child maintains “the fantasy that if he becomes good enough,” his father will cease hitting him, his mother will give him attention and whatever other form of abuse he suffered will stop. In the same way, some Israelis are delusional when they assume they can control Arab behavior.

Another myth is to describe Arab intentions as “moderate,” even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

A third assumption is the “fellowship fallacy” - that the Palestinians share Jewish values, goals and positions. Some Israelis have met informally or in public forums with high-level individuals from the territories who are connected to the PLO. The Israelis hear more nuanced statements about the conflict in these discussions than are usually heard from the PLO leadership. These words are then interpreted as reflecting what the PLO would agree to in negotiations with Israel. Such was the case after informal discussions with Faisal Husseini. In October 1989, Husseini proclaimed, “The Palestinian Peace Camp has won, and now leads the PLO and the Palestinian people.”

In the speeches quoted above there was no doubt the Arabs’ ultimate goal was the destruction of Israel. The attitude toward Husseini demonstrated the willingness of many Israelis to overestimate words of encouragement and to underestimate the contradictory and inflammatory rhetoric he said to others. This scenario continued under Yasser Arafat, whose guarantees about his yearning for peace would, incredibly, be accepted with greater credibility than his speeches and statements to the Arab media and public, and the racist curricula taught in Palestinian schools about Jews and the need to destroy Israel.

Those who challenge these myths are attacked as racists and bigots for denying the humanity of the Arabs and their feelings and aspirations. Mordecai Bar-On, a founder of Peace Now, suggested that part of the reason for this intolerance and narrow-mindedness toward the Arabs among some Jews and Israelis can be attributed to a lack of education and upbringing, which breeds less tolerance and an inability to understand the “other” and “the complexity of the issues.” This would account, he said, for the Sephardic community’s mistrust of Arab objectives. This distrust could also be found among elements of the Ashkenazi community that were less educated and had a more traditional background.

Levin has done a great service by diagnosing the irrational behavior of many Israelis and Jews who persist in acting out these fantasies. If we are to move beyond this delusion, to accept the situation as it is instead of what we wish it to be, we need to understand the nature of this pathology, which has caused tremendous damage to Israel and the Jewish people.

Teen victims of West Bank shooting attack laid to rest in Jerusalem
Hamas gathers several thousand Gaza fighters and arsenal of Kassams

Terror tunnel uncovered in Gaza - The 20-meter tunnel, which appeared to be freshly dug, had meant to bypass a checkpoint to allow Palestinian terrorists to infiltrate Israeli territory, Israeli military sources said.

The Saudi newspaper Al-Watan reported over the weekend that PA Civil Affairs Minister Muhammad Dahlan, who is in charge of coordinating the withdrawal with Israel, has invited Hamas leaders to move to Gaza.
"We want to see you among us," Dahlan reportedly told Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal and his top aides.
Nayef Hawatmeh and Khaled Abdel Majid, the leaders of two other Syrian-based groups, are also planning to move to the Gaza Strip, the sources revealed.

Nice to see such dividends from "disengagement" and the "cease fire."

June 26, 1936: Ataroth Buries its Dead

As one reads articles about Arab terror against Jews (and the British) in the 1930s, it is hard not to notice eerie parallels to today's Arab terror.

For months in 1936, the Arabs rioted and terrorized the Jews and British in Palestine, ostensibly in protest of the increased Jewish influence and power in the land. There were shootings, bombings, and destruction of Jewish property and businesses, often parallel to the Nazi persecutions of Jews that were happening at the same time. The British did not treat the Arab criminals with kid gloves.

In the details of the murder mentioned in this article and the one following, notice that then as now, the Arab people closed ranks around the terrorists and criminals. They knew that the British would collectively punish entire villages where the terrorists came from and instead of giving up the criminals, the Arab residents would prepare for the punishment by getting rid of the articles the British would confiscate. The nascent hero-worship of Arab terrorists had already started decades before the current Palestinian idolization of murderers. And, as happens today, ordinary Arabs can be counted to support the worst Arab terrorists rather than appear to be on the Jews' (or West's) side.

Without understanding this history of terror-worship, without learning about how the current Arab culture of death pre-dates Israel's existence, one cannot hope to change anything. Superficial words and assumptions that these Arab murderers and their supporters are "just people like us" who will react positively to acts of goodwill and concessions are deadly miscalculations. At no time in history (that I am aware of) can one say that for Arabs, peace was a goal - when it was desired, it was merely a tactic in a war that spans centuries.

Which means that for any true peace to ever happen, the Arab world needs a complete change of culture - one abhorring violence rather than embracing it, one with a true desire for peace rather than a desire for the concessions that it expects will accompany it. Until then, anything that the West does is just a Band-Aid, and more often than not, counterproductive.

Also, in wake of this weeks attempted terror attack against an Israeli hospital by a Palestinian woman who had received treatment there, here is an article from the same issue about how Arab terrorists would try to use Jewish humanity as a means to kill them:

Cross-posted to Palestine Post-ings.

Report: U.S. Government Funds Terrorism-Promotion

Not too surprising, given that Hamas and Al Aqsa have to get their money from somewhere, and the only places they get money from are the US and EU since Saddam's generous terror support dried up....

An Israeli watchdog group alleges that American aid to Palestinian universities and cities promotes terrorism.

A report to be released Friday by Palestinian Media Watch singles out the U.S. Agency for International Development, contending that it has ignored new congressional restrictions that the group helped craft last year on aid money. Specifically, the report points to American development assistance in the West Bank and Gaza that funds universities with student chapters of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which have funded roadwork for streets renamed to commemorate suicide bombers and television programming that encourages hatred of Jews.

A USAID spokeswoman yesterday said that procedures are in place to make sure that in-kind donations to Palestinian institutions are not diverted to terrorism. But the report has already drawn attention from Capitol Hill, where Palestinian Media Watch's director, Itamar Marcus, is scheduled to testify Friday before the House International Relations Committee on his findings.

3D Test of Anti-Semitism - Natan Sharansky

A nice test to see if someone is giving legitimate criticism of Israel or just hiding their Jew-hatred behind "anti-Zionism".

When I was a dissident in the former Soviet Union, one of my regular activities was monitoring anti-Semitism, and smuggling out evidence and records of such activity to the West. I believed then that the free world, particularly after the Holocaust, would always be a staunch ally in the struggle against anti-Semitism.

Unfortunately, I was wrong. Today, as a minister in the Israeli government in charge of monitoring anti-Semitism, I find myself regularly summoning the ambassadors of West European states to protest anti-Semitic attacks on Jews in their countries and the often meek response of their governments.

Over the past four years, we have witnessed a resurgence of anti- Semitic activity in the democratic world. In Europe, synagogues have been burned, rabbis have been abused in the streets, Jewish children have been physically attacked on the way to school and inside schools, and Jewish cemeteries have been desecrated.

Recognizing the "New Anti-Semitism"

Moreover, the so-called "new anti-Semitism" poses a unique challenge. Whereas classical anti-Semitism is aimed at the Jewish people or the Jewish religion, "new anti-Semitism" is aimed at the Jewish state. Since this anti-Semitism can hide behind the veneer of legitimate criticism of Israel, it is more difficult to expose. Making the task even harder is that this hatred is advanced in the name of values most of us would consider unimpeachable, such as human rights.

Nevertheless, we must be clear and outspoken in exposing the new anti-Semitism. I believe that we can apply a simple test - I call it the "3D" test - to help us distinguish legitimate criticism of Israel from anti-Semitism.

The first "D" is the test of demonization. When the Jewish state is being demonized; when Israel's actions are blown out of all sensible proportion; when comparisons are made between Israelis and Nazis and between Palestinian refugee camps and Auschwitz - this is anti- Semitism, not legitimate criticism of Israel.

The second "D" is the test of double standards. When criticism of Israel is applied selectively; when Israel is singled out by the United Nations for human rights abuses while the behavior of known and major abusers, such as China, Iran, Cuba, and Syria, is ignored; when Israel's Magen David Adom, alone among the world's ambulance services, is denied admission to the International Red Cross - this is anti-Semitism.

The third "D" is the test of delegitimization: when Israel's fundamental right to exist is denied - alone among all peoples in the world - this too is anti-Semitism.

The Rise of Arab and Islamic Anti-Semitism

I am particularly concerned about the constant and growing stream of anti-Semitic propaganda from the Arab and Muslim world - including propaganda that is genocidal in nature against both Jews and the State of Israel. This should be of grave concern, not only to Israel and Jews but to men and women of good conscience everywhere. Such venom defiles the Middle East and the international climate of discourse, and makes it possible for unabashed Jew-hatred to be expressed with impunity.

Earlier this year, my office published a 150-page report on "Anti- Semitism in the Contemporary Middle East." The study surveys anti- Semitic reporting, editorials, and editorial caricatures in the government- controlled press of Egypt, Iran, Jordan, Lebanon, the Palestinian Authority, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and the Gulf states. In the more than one hundred editorial cartoons included in this report, Jews and Israelis are invariably represented as poisonous snakes, murderous Nazis, and bloodthirsty Crusaders.

We found that vicious anti-Semitism which expressly calls for massive terrorism and genocide against Jews, Zionists, and the State of Israel is becoming more and more commonplace across the Arab Middle East. Moreover, the borders between anti-Semitism, anti- Americanism, and anti-Westernism have become almost completely blurred. The overwhelming majority of this propaganda is issued from the government-controlled media and from supposedly respectable publishing houses closely tied to the Arab regimes.

There is a direct link between the laxity with which countries have responded - or not responded - to growing Arab/Islamic anti- Semitism and the sharp increase in physical and verbal attacks on Jews and Israelis globally.

I recognize that there have been positive developments in the fight against anti-Semitism over the past year or so. The Organization of Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) has held several meetings on fighting anti-Semitism, and for the first time ever the UN Commission on Human Rights condemned anti-Semitism in three separate resolutions, which were adopted by consensus.

But these important initiatives are not sufficient to combat state-sponsored anti-Semitism, especially of the Arab/Islamic variety described above. For real progress to be made, the free world must be willing to not only publicly and forcefully condemn this anti-Semitism, but also to pursue a policy of linkage against states that support anti- Semitism.

The Need for a Linkage Policy

The effectiveness of a policy based on linkage was powerfully demonstrated a generation ago after a group of dissidents inside the Soviet Union, including myself, decided to form the Helsinki Group in the wake of the Helsinki accords - the very agreement that led to the establishment of the OSCE.

With the help of courageous leaders in the West who were willing to link their relations with the Soviets to their treatment of their own people, the Helsinki Group helped ensure that the Soviets could not take one step in the international arena without their human rights policies becoming an issue. As a result, real progress was made.

I believe that combating anti-Semitism ought to become a much more prominent issue in the bilateral relations between America and the Arab and Muslim worlds. Linkage can be used to marginalize the extremists and to encourage and support those who reject this virulent hatred.

Anti-Semitism is not a threat only to Jews. History has shown us that left unchecked, the forces behind anti-Semitism will imperil all the values and freedoms that civilization holds dear. Never again can the free world afford to sit on the sidelines when anti-Semitism dangerously emerges.

We must not let this happen. We must do everything in our power to fight anti-Semitism. Armed with moral clarity, determination, and a common purpose, this is a fight that we can and will win.

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that local governments can force property owners to sell out and make way for private economic development when officials decide it would benefit the public, even if the property is not blighted, and the new project's success is not guaranteed.

The landmark 5-4 ruling provided the strong affirmation state and local governments had sought for their increasing use of eminent domain for urban revitalization, especially in the Northeast, where many city centers have decayed, and the suburban land supply is dwindling.

[...]Justice John Paul Stevens, writing for the majority Thursday, cited past cases in which the court has interpreted 'public use' to include not only such traditional projects as bridges or highways, but also slum clearance and land redistribution. He concluded that a 'public purpose' such as creating new jobs in a depressed city can also satisfy the Fifth Amendment.

So when are we going to see Rachel Corrie's parents and friends standing in front of bulldozers in American slums?

Or will they argue that a strip mall is more of the public interest than Jews stopping arms-smuggling tunnels and terrorist hideouts?

Perhaps, just perhaps, they can resolve the contradiction by arguing that killing Jews is in fact in the public interest, as the ISM evidently believes.

Wiesenthal Center Letter to United Church of Christ on Divestment

This relates to the last article. It is a good letter being written to people who don't give a damn about the human rights of Jews.

The Rev. John H. Thomas
General Minister and President
United Church of Christ
700 Prospect Avenue
Cleveland, OH 44115-1000

Dear Rev. Thomas,

In the name of more than 400,000 member families of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, we express our deep concern and dismay regarding resolutions to be considered at the General Synod that call for the dismantling of Israel’s security barrier, and divestment from companies doing business with Israel.

One of us is writing from Israel, where earlier today a young woman from Gaza, Faha Samir, had permission on a humanitarian medical request to cross into Israel to seek medical treatment. By the grace of G-d, and through a combination of an anti-terror security fence and other protective Israeli measures, she was foiled from what she admitted was her plan – to blow up Soroka Hospital, which offers medical services to Jews and Palestinians alike. Ten kilograms of explosives were wrapped around her body.

Resolution #16 is entitled “Tear Down the Wall.” It boggles the mind that a major denomination could even think of endorsing such a slogan. We cannot fathom what mixture of naivete, lack of a real grasp of the facts on the ground, and wholesale embrace of the Palestinian narrative produced such folly. Temporary walls and strong preventive security measures are saving innocent Israeli lives – Jewish and Arab– every day. Such defenses should be supported and endorsed by those who care about saving lives, and obtaining the peace that will eventually obviate the need for such measures.

As you are well aware, there has been real movement towards that peace for several months. Israelis and Palestinians have talked and negotiated with each other, for the first time in years. Secretary Rice is still in the region, helping the sides hammer out the fine points of agreements. Why would the UCC introduce resolutions against the security barrier and for divestment just now, when the rest of the world is trying so hard to offer encouragement to the fragile talks, and the United States has thrown its full prestige behind making them succeed?

Has the UCC not considered that such resolutions will be dangerously counterproductive? What are its goals? The easing of Israel’s grip on Palestinians? On the cusp of a painful disengagement that has divided Israelis against each other, Prime Minister Sharon is expending his entire political stock to make sure it happens. Does the UCC want to see the release of prisoners? Israel has released over 900, some of whom have already been apprehended in the process of new attacks against Israeli civilians. What effect can these ill-timed resolutions have, if not to embolden the most extreme elements of Palestinian society, and demoralize Israelis who thought they wanted to press on towards peace? Israel should be encouraged and praised for her efforts, not kicked in the teeth.

Why, then, is the UCC seeking to punish Israel?

When another Protestant denomination recently considered similar resolutions, Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, had this to say. “Israelis are already traumatised and feel that the world is against them. This proposal, if it is agreed, would be another knife in the back. Christians who owe so much to the Hebrew Scriptures and to Israel itself should not be among those who attack Israel in such a way.”

The UCC should be concerned with the plight of Palestinians, as should all good people. But the UCC has not heard the pain of Israeli terror victims, or to the larger narrative of the majority of Israelis who are prepared to make concessions for peace, but not at the cost of dismantling their country. While paying lip service to security for the Jewish state, the programs, literature and website of the UCC have shown a decided preference for Palestinian voices and carefully sanitized opinions from the extreme of the Israeli left. We can point to the national tours of Palestinians to local churches. When did the other side ever get a hearing?

These resolutions will work against the cause of peace, and inflict collateral damage upon relations between Jews and the UCC, and the safety and security of Jews around the world. We are in a position to know, as the largest Jewish membership organization on the globe. We have worked in the name of peace with leaders of foreign governments and as a UN recognized NGO. One of us signs this letter between conferring with the Arab League and a meeting with the King of Jordan. We have championed human rights concerns abroad, and pioneered programs of intergroup tolerance at home.

To most people, divestment means South Africa, and its apartheid regime. To link it with an Israeli democracy that guarantees and delivers freedoms of worship and expression to its Arab citizens; where an Arab sits on its Supreme Court; where Jewish and Arab students sit side by side in university classrooms – is a moral outrage, and a declaration of malice to the Jewish people.

Divestment also threatens other Jews throughout the world, or at least outside of the United States. Since the hate-fest at Durban in 2001, we have monitored an explosion of antisemitism and attacks against Jews. They are linearly related to one-sided rhetoric of Israeli brutality and oppression. Around the world, whatever Israel does, Jews are made to pay. Divestment – with its popular link to apartheid – adds an important brick to a growing edifice of the vilification of Jews.

For decades after the Holocaust, American Jews have noticed and appreciated the attempts of church groups – including the UCC – to promote cooperation and good will. Please do not underestimate how damaging the three resolutions will be, how much positive feeling will be dissipated at the upcoming Synod if they pass. Please do not underestimate the depth of feeling American Jews have for the security of Israel and Israelis. While when many openly disagree with particular policies of the Israeli government, American Jews are united in their commitment to the Jewish State’s right to protect the lives and safety of her citizens. They see fairness trampled upon. Inestimable damage will result to the relationship between our communities.

At this critical juncture, the Simon Wiesenthal Center believes that the UCC ought to drop these resolutions in the interests of a fuller peace for all the inhabitants of the Middle East. If in fact UCC is interested in learning of the horrific toll and suffering of Israeli citizens, and the related spike in Islamist-inspired antisemitic violence, our institution stands ready to provide expert testimony for your Synod participants.

We respectfully await your response.

Rabbi Abraham Cooper Rabbi Yitzchok Adlerstein
Assistant Dean Director, Project Next Step

The Christian West has a marked, and growing, prejudice against the state of Israel that the government of that country ignores at its peril. The latest instance will be laid before the Anglican Consultative Council in Nottingham tomorrow, in the form of a recommendation that the 38 provinces of the worldwide Anglican Communion should consider divesting themselves of holdings in companies that support the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The recommendation stems from a report on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict issued last September by the Anglican Peace and Justice Network (APJN).

The report is a piece of sanctimonious claptrap whose authors didn't even bother to talk to Ariel Sharon's government. It takes scant account of the trauma to which the second intifada has subjected Israeli civilians and endorses policies, such as the right of return of Palestinian refugees since 1948, that would spell the death of the Jewish state. It has rightly been condemned by, among others, the International Council of Christians and Jews, Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, and Sir Jonathan Sachs, the Chief Rabbi.

If the APJN recommendation is accepted by the consultative council tomorrow, it will be passed to the individual provinces for a decision on implementation. In most cases, they will do nothing. But the American Episcopal Church, which is a member of the Anglican Communion, is considering disinvestment, while the Presbyterian Church (USA) has already embarked on that course. Even where it is shelved, it will serve as a powerful symbol of hostility to Israel.

Mr Sharon is a "power and stockade Zionist" who believes in accomplishing "facts on the ground". His government is not doing nearly enough to advance the moral case for Israel to those Christians who believe that the present-day population has nothing to do with the Jewish aboriginals and therefore has no right to Palestinian land. The further the Holocaust recedes into history, the less Mr Sharon can count on natural sympathy for the Zionist cause. The fact that two Churches in the United States, a country whose support Israel tends to take for granted, are at the forefront of the moves to disinvest is a salutary warning: moral force is just as important as acquiring the latest military gismos from Washington.

This fact cannot be overstated: Israel's "hasbara" has been criminally incompetent. The moral case for Israel is crystal clear and it is botched daily by the people who supposedly "own the media."

There are a number of reasons for this that are not Israel's fault - endemic anti-semitism; the West's guilt over colonialism; the Left's knee-jerk support for the seemingly weaker party in any conflict regardless of the facts, Islam's manipulation of the West's inability to distinguish between the religion of Islam and the fascist political ideology that it also represents, and the media's desire to frame a conflict as "balanced" where a Sharon who gives land for nothing is considered a "hawk" and an Abbas who denies the Holocaust and whose government has yet to show Israel on any map of the Middle East is a "moderate."

Even so, the job of Israel to show its side to the West has failed miserably. Israel already lost the semantic war ("illegal occupation", "settlements", "Palestinian") and it has so far not managed to make much of a dent in presenting its moral case. There are of course some shining exceptions, examples of individual organizations like MEMRI and Honest Reporting who manage to point ou the truth among the deceptions. But from an Israeli government level the incompetence has been stunning, not the least because of self-loathing Israelis who are more than happy to go in front of foreign cameras and tell reporters what they already want to hear.

The number of Israeli government representatives who forcefully and accurately can make Israel's case have been few. Netanyahu was very good when he was Israel's ambassador to the US, and Moshe Arens used to be excellent, as was Sharansky when he was in the government. But it is not enough, and it hurts Israel immensely.

And when it gets to the point that churches, institutions that supposedly are meant to be the leaders in morality, openly support the terrorists and oppose those who want peace and freedom for all, it is clear that Israel has failed at getting her message out.

The PA is finished

The PA is being run by a bunch of wimps who get no respect from anyone. Their days are numbered unless they can figure out a way to actually put some force behind their "peaceful" words.

Oh, and when they say they are against violence, it means against themselves, not against Israelis.

BALATA REFUGEE CAMP, West Bank - Gunmen in a refugee camp opened fire Wednesday, disrupting a lecture from the Palestinian prime minister about the need to end violence. The brazen shooting highlighted the difficulty of his task.

'This country needs order, needs quiet,' Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia shouted, repeating a theme he has pressed for weeks. But even as he spoke, gunfire rang out, startling Qureia and putting his bodyguards on high alert.

Associated Press Television News footage showed militants angrily waving their weapons as Qureia's security guards �� their rifles trained on the gunmen �� stood at the windows of the building where the prime minister was speaking in the Balata camp next to the city of Nablus.

'Don't listen to them. Don't be scared, don't let these gunmen run the show,' Qureia implored his audience.

After Qureia's speech, gunmen opened fire again and set off an explosive device about 300 yards from his convoy. No one was injured. Qureia was whisked away.

Beyond ordinary morality

Check out this remarkable article about how Israeli hospitals and doctors treat Arab terrorists, often going above and beyond.
The moral dilemma of treating someone who wants to kill you is beyond my wisdom, but it once again shows the stark contrast between the truly superhuman way that Israeli Jews keep their morality under fire and the subhuman acts that Palestinians routinely practice and support.

June 21, 1938: Why We Need Israel

It is very scary reading the Palestine Post in the 1930s as it watches the rise of Nazism and yet has no idea of the magnitude of the crimes yet to be committed.

Here is a fairly typical article. showing the increasing criminal acts against Jews in Berlin and Vienna in 1938:

On the same front page is this smaller, far more hopeful item, showing Jews who managed to get out of the ovens of Germany to build a new life in Israel. They built a new town on Jewish-owned land with their own hands and escaped the fate of their doomed families in Germany. They even built their own security fence to keep the inevitable Arab terror attacks from reaching them.

This is the story of Israel and anyone who considers this "immoral" hasn't the faintest idea what the word means.

Cross-posted to Palestine Post-ings.

Is it stupidity or denial?

MEMRI has another winner:

In a June 15, 2005 editorial titled 'All the Evidence Proves that Al-Zarqawi is an American Agent,' a leading Egyptian government daily Al-Akhbar's states that Al-Zarqawi is working for the U.S. and is massacring Iraqis in an effort to extend the occupation in Iraq. [1] The following are excerpts from the article:

'All the evidence proves that Abu Mus'ab Al-Zarqawi is working for America, because his victims are Iraqis and not [members of] the coalition forces under the command of the American occupation forces in Iraq. Abu Mus'ab Al-Zarqawi's official title is 'leader of Al-Qa'ida's faction in Iraq.' Osama bin Laden is the commander of the Al-Qa'ida organization, and this proves that [Al-Zarqawi's commander,] bin Laden, has [also] been an American agent ever since he operated against the USSR forces in Afghanistan in favor of the Americans!'

So the question is, are Arabs that publish and presumably believe such idiocy struly imbecilic, or is this just an extreme manifestation of the absurd Arab pride that cannot admit that any Arabs can ever do anything wrong?

How Palestinian Arabs are treated under Arab nations' laws

I guess I missed when Amnesty International condemned these laws.

Jordan

Palestinians in Jordan are NOT given full Jordanian citizenship, and DO NOT have the same rights and duties as any other Jordanians. Palestinians in Jordan carry special identification stating that they are not Jordanian. They are disproportionately represented in business, but underrepresented in the army. Information from the Jordanian censuses which distinguishes between Palestinians and pre-Nakba Jordanians is not publicly available; however, the Palestinian population is estimated to be 50-60%.

Saudi-Arabia

An estimated number of 500,000 Palestinians are living in the kingdom of Saudi-Arabia as of December 2004. They are not allowed to hold or even apply for Saudi citizenship, as the new law passed by Saudi Arabia's Council of Ministers in October 2004 ( which entitles expatriates of all nationalities who have resided in the kingdom for ten years to apply for citizenship, with priority being given to holders of degrees in various scientific fields ) has one glaring exception: Palestinians will not be allowed to benefit from the new law because of Arab League instructions barring the Arab states from granting them citizenship in order 'to avoid dissolution of their identity and protect their right to return to their homeland'.

Lebanon

Palestinians in Lebanon are barred from 73 job categories including professions such as medicine, law and engineering. They are not allowed to own property. Unlike other foreigners in Lebanon, they are denied access to the Lebanese healthcare system. The Lebanese government refuses to grant them work permits or permission to own land. The number of restrictions have been mounting since 1990.

Israeli hospital helps Palestinian woman's injuries; she then tries to blow it up

Palestinian depravity keeps getting worse, just when you thought it wasn't possible.

Israel says a 21-year-old Palestinian woman arrested carrying explosives at a Gaza checkpoint planned to blow herself up in an Israeli hospital.

Wafa al-Bis was stopped on her way on her way to Beersheba hospital where she was to receive treatment for burns.

Ms Bis said on Israeli TV she wanted to be a suicide bomber but then later told foreign journalists the explosives were planted on her without her knowledge.

The incident comes amid a rise in violence despite a four-month truce. (Someone please explain what a truce means according to the BBC.)

The Israeli military said Ms Bis was stopped by suspicious soldiers at the Erez crossing point between Gaza and Israel.

The army said she had tried to blow herself up there but the explosives did not detonate.

Israeli officials said Ms Bis, who comes from the Jabaliya refugee camp in Gaza, was burnt in a cooking accident five months ago, and had received treatment on humanitarian grounds in the Beersheba hospital.

They said she was making another trip for follow-up treatment on Monday, but planned to blow herself up instead.

In an interview shown on Israeli television, Ms Bis said her 'dream was to be a martyr'.

She said she was recruited by the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades - an off-shoot of Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction.

Ms Bis also said she had been angry over allegations that Israeli guards had ripped out pages of the Koran at a prison in northern Israel, claims Israel denies.

'What angered me and the Palestinian people is the abuse of the Koran,' she said. 'Should we sit in silence with our hands tied?'

Later, she pleaded for mercy because she 'didn't kill anyone'.

Presumably if she has managed to blow herself up with a bunch of Jews she would not be pleading for mercy.

Incidentally, where does the Al Aqsa Martyr's Brigades get their money from? Could it possibly be from the PA - from the millions coming from Europe and the US? As far as I can tell, no one from the PA has ever declared the Al Aqsa terror group illegal - which sounds to me like they are still on the payroll. Probably "policemen."

Terrorist commander in West Bank says he's going to be a policeman in Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas's security forces

Syrian historian: Palestinian moms' wombs are weapons factories (MEMRI)

The following are excerpts from an interview with Syrian historian and author Dr. Georgette 'Attiyya. Syrian TV aired this interview on June 15, 2005.

Dr. Attiyya: The Palestinian woman's womb is a factory for the conflict; it produces fighting children. After this fighting child is produced, he is taught: 'This is your land, this is your country, you will fight for it, stand on it, and die for it.' Therefore, a very important connection exists between motherhood, land, and blood."

My streak may be over...

but SoccerDad threw me a pity mention in the latest (excellent as usual) Haveil Havalim, mentioning my Palestine Post-ings website as well.

Hey, a pity mention is almost as good as a regular one :)

Mediacrity: Reuters Buries the Lead--and the Truth

Example #2659 of Reuters' explicit pro-terror bias in this article in Mediacrity.

The Palestinian Arab Refugees in April, 1948 (Palestine Post articles)

In April 1948, in one of the battles that preceded Israel's War of Independence, the Haganah decisively defeated the Arab fighters for control of Haifa. The Palestine Post has a few articles that describe the Arab refugees from Haifa during this time period that shed a little light upon the basic question of who created the Arab refugee problem?

This is only about Arabs in Haifa (and Jaffa) in a very small timeframe, but it shows the mindsets of the Jews and of the Arabs at the time and that it would be reasonable to expect that these mindsets remained somewhat consistent throughout the duration of the war.

The first article describes the Arab dilemma of whether they should leave a Jewish-controlled Haifa. Notice that these decisions are being made after the major fighting is over, while the truce is being negotiated. These Arabs, at least, were clearly not leaving because of war.

Notice also how the Haganah is bending over backwards to try to respect the rights of the Arab citizens of Haifa, pledging to protect their property and clearly expecting them to return. This is not the behavior of people who are trying to ethnically cleanse an area.

Meanwhile, Arabs were streaming out from Jaffa. A telling detail emerges in this account of the flight to Egypt: that Arabs were the ones encouraging other Arabs to leave, and other Arabs were upset by this. But no where do they say that Jews are expelling Arabs.

The general sense of panic among the Palestinian Arabs at the time can be seen from the tiny article at the end about the run on banks.

The next week, in a recap of the events that happened in Haifa, we see that it was clearly the Arab leadership who encouraged their people to leave. Interestingly, shortly thereafter most of Haifa's Arabs have returned to their intact homes, safe and sound. This is not the first time that the Arab leadership's treatment of the Palestinian Arabs were at cross-purposes with what the people wanted.

Again note how explicitly the Haganah is trying to keep the Arabs in their homes.

This is only a snapshot in time from a single source, and this is all before the outside Arab armies invaded (although this was considered a fait accompli), but it does show a couple of inescapable facts:

* The Haganah was acting in a way totally inconsistent with the desire to create a Jews-only state.
* The Jews were bending over backwards to respect Arab property and lives.
* The Palestinian Arab people were feeling that their leadership was not acting in their best interests. This feeling was amplified in an article the following week, right before Israel declared her independence:

The analogy to today is clear. Today the Palestinian people remain pawns in the hands of their supposed "leaders" - while the people just want to live and be able to raise their families, their leaders are obsessed with the destruction of Israel and are willing to sacrifice as many of their people as necessary to reach that goal. While the Arabs show no respect for the religion or property of others, the Jews retain respect for the human rights of their declared enemies. While the Arabs create nations that are Judenrein, the vast majority of Israelis have no desire to kick out the Arabs from Israel.

Crossposted to Palestine Post-ings.

UPDATE: SoccerDad adds this article with more details about that time period.

Is Sharon abandoning Gaza to make Washington happy?

I continuously look for reasons for the disengagement that makes sense. In a Jerusalem Post op-ed, one reason is given (although this is not the point of the article:

One explanation for Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's about-face on the settlements, his willingness to uproot what he himself planted, is that in his mind as a statesman – rather than in his view as a general – a close strategic relationship with the US will do more to protect Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Netanya 50 years down the line than a hilltop settlement.

When Sharon is asked what he is getting for disengagement from Gaza, he – or his aides – reply that they are not getting anything from the Palestinian Authority, but are getting something very substantial from Washington: commitments that the US will back Israel's position on the Palestinian refugee issue and on retaining the large settlement blocs. This is far more important than a billion-dollar arms deal with Beijing.

Sharon has built up an unprecedented relationship with US President George W. Bush, but at the same time he has also stacked Israel's eggs in one basket to an unprecedented degree.

If this is the reason for the pullout, it makes no sense. While Sharon and Bush do have a close relationship, what good does that do Israel when either of them are out of office? To think that this will help things 50 years down the road, or even ten years from now, is foolish as well as foolhardy.

Fatah still recruiting kids to blow themselves up

It is always interesting to hear the deafening silence from the world about daily Palestinian child abuse. And this isn't Hamas; it is Fatah Tanzim, whose salaries are paid by our favorite terrorist in a suit, Mahmoud Abbas.

The Shin Bet and IDF have arrested in recent weeks four Palestinian minors, aged 15 and 16, who were recruited by the Fatah Tanzim to blow up in Israel, details released for publication on Wednesday afternoon revealed.

Arrests conducted by security forces in the Balata and Askar refugee camps in Nablus thwarted the attacks that had been in advanced planning stages.

One of the minors admitted to being recruited by Muhammad Nakib, 21, who was arrested in January this year for involvement in terrorist activities.

The minor told officials that he expressed intentions to follow in the footsteps of his friend, Omar al-For, who blew up in the Carmel Market in Tel Aviv in November 2004 – an attack that claimed the lives of three Israelis.

Two other minors from the Askar camp said they were recruited in April by Tanzim activists in the Balata camp to blow up at an IDF checkpoint near Nablus. The fourth minor said he had been recruited by operatives in Balata to blow up in Israel.

Four suspected recruiters that belonged to the infrastructure were also arrested. According to officials, they had received instructions and funds from Hizbulalh in Lebanon.

New blog just for Palestine Post articles

I decided that the articles that I write based on historical Palestine Post clippings would be more effective on their own blog, so I created one called Palestine Post-ings.

All of those articles will continue to be posted here as well, and I am not turning on comments on the other site, but it looked to me that having them all gathered in one place is more effective than searching through the other assorted stuff here.

Arab blood libel against Jews alive, well and updated

Remember how the Jews used to be accused of poisoning the wells during the Bubonic Plague?

Palestinians seem to be students of history.

RAMALLAH, June 13 (Xinhuanet) -- Palestinian chief of Environment Authority Yousef Abu Safeya accused Israel Monday of glutting the Palestinian markets with carcinogenic canned juice.

'Such kind of drinks are specifically produced for the Palestinian consumers in the Gaza Strip.' Abu Safeya told a weekly session of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC).

He pointed out that the Palestinian security services had recently seized a number of shipments, including canned juice containing a carcinogenic substance.

He added that the Egyptian authorities impounded two Israeli trucks carrying child toys polluted with carcinogenic and radioactive substances at the Rafah commercial crossing on the borders with Israel in March.

UPDATE: The specific carcinogenic substance that Israel is inflicting on unsuspecting Palestinians has been identified:

It is saccharine.

For some reason, no one is saying that the PA is inciting terror when it makes classic anti-semitic claims like this with a straight face.

Haveil Havalim 24 - My streak has ended

But it is a very good issue even without yours truly being linked.

I will not be blogging during the yom tov. Chag kosher v'sameach!

Early 1948: Arabs recruit Nazis to kill Jews

Arab countries in 1948 realized that they had natural allies in fighting Jews: Germans who were in British POW camps in the Middle East during World War II.

The Germans had the advantage of real-world combat experience to be able to effectively train Arabs to throw the Jews into the sea.

Soon, it became apparent that there were other Nazi sympathizers who could be called upon to help in this jihad:

And soon, a more organized campaign was started by Egypt and Syria to recruit Muslims who had fought with the Nazis in Europe to act as mercenaries against the Jews in preparation for the upcoming, inevitable war.

Apparently, the International Refugee Organization operating in Europe was at least partially complicit in this plan to allow former Nazi sympathizers to be recruited to try to finish the job that Hitler didn't.

There has been much documented about the collusion of Arabs and Nazis, but the Nazi contributions to the Arab cause in 1948 and the active Arab recruitment of Nazi and Fascist elements appears to be a lesser-known chapter in this wicked partnership.

Jihad in Dublin

An all-too familiar scene - rabid Jew-hatred in a European city where the police stand by doing nothing.

THE blazing afternoon sun is beating down and youngsters with kaffirs wrapped round their heads mimic Palestinian terrorists, drawing on the full power of their small voices to scream anti-Israel slogans.

"Victory to the intifada," shouts one, perched on his father's shoulders as a megaphone is thrust into his face. Another clutching a "death to Israel" placard, is encouraged to join in with the chanting hundreds.

Slowly it forms into a sea of Palestinian flags and banners; the baying crowd's animosity towards the Jewish State is unequivocal.

Incitement to hatred? Not to the police, who turn a blind eye and happily offer consent to the protesters venting their venomous spleens.

It's an all-too-familiar scene frequently played out across the Middle East. Yet these aren't the dusty streets of Ramallah or refugee camps in Gaza. Welcome to the embodiment of liberal harmonisation: 21st century Europe and one afternoon on the streets of the Irish capital.

What had been promoted as a political protest against Israeli government policy turned out to be a furious demonstration of vitriol against the State - and anyone Jewish who caught the protesters' gaze.

The Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign pledged it would be peaceful, but the evidence on the streets revealed far more disturbing manifestations. The timing was meticulous, coming just hours before Israel challenged Ireland at Lansdowne Road for a World Cup spot.

As the early afternoon downpour subsided, a ragbag of activists gathered at 3pm on the plaza outside Dublin's Central Bank.

The influence of non-Palestinian groups was unmistakable. The presence of Sinn Fein banners, IRA supporters and Socialist Workers' members was barely concealed. A teenager, barely 16, flogged copies of Republican newspaper An Phoblacht. A Palestinian flag was draped round his back.

Floppy-haired teenagers togged out in black Nirvana and Slipknot T-shirts arrived in search of an afternoon's 'entertainment'. They eagerly accepted placards claiming the Israeli army were responsible for the deaths of 3,600 children. Chants about the security barrier were interspersed with cackling as they mischievously adjusted the words.

Either they are unusually well informed for their age or they were just looking to stir up trouble on an otherwise mundane Bank Holiday weekend. Whatever their politics, conflict can never be a laughing matter.

Girls, who have barely finished nursery school, waved banners proclaiming Sharon to be a war criminal that their parents had cajoled into their tiny arms. Like so many generations of Irish children bedevilled by conflict, they risk being the latest young pawns in a complex political battleground.

Then there were the football fans. Celtic and Ireland shirts were encased in Palestinian flags - any tactic to incite the opposition before such a decisive match.

Mostly it was a tame affair - for such a gathering. Leaflets were handed out; flags were being flogged for 10 Euros; and the chatter between marchers was punctuated by chanting.

Until the baying crowd scented their blood: passing Israeli fans.

They had come to support their team, on the brink on an historic second-only qualification for a major international football tournament. None would talk politics, that was a matter for another day - back home. Instead they shrugged their shoulders, amazed that they were facing such animosity.

The only conflict they expected to witness was on the Lansdowne Road pitch. That changed when they came into the sights of the radar of the Palestinian supporters. Their blue stripes and Magen David flags acted like red rags to a bull.

Unprovoked, they found demonstrators squaring up to them, ranting about Israel. The travelling fans were bemused. They assumed they'd left hostilities at home, thousands of miles away. Now they were expected to act as spokesmen for Ariel Sharon, despite no-one enquiring whether they backed the Premier.

"Sieg heil! Sieg heil!" shouted one Irish fan as he proudly Nazi saluted the city's guests - scenes captured by our photographer.

All the Israelis had done was to offer a handshake as a gesture of peace, after spotting the potential flashpoint. It was declined in a forcible manner. The garda (police) response to quell the tensions? To force the Israelis out of the vicinity, as if they bore the brunt of the culpability. The rules of engagement were established.

And worse was to follow. Initially the Socialist Workers, Sinn Fein activists and Muslims reserved their condemnation for the "occupation of the Territories" and the Israeli military.

Until the marching hundreds spotted another group of Israelis. Their Budget Hyundai hire car - adorned with "Israel loves Ireland" posters - was designed to be an illustration of goodwill in this febrile atmosphere.

No chance. Hissing, booing and jeering followed. These Israelis were targeted for backing a simple, non-political message of peace. A Muslim - clad in an "end the occupation" T-shirt, a kaffir around his forehead and a Palestinian flag tied round his neck - gesticulated aggressively towards them.

A one-fingered salute made his feelings transparent: you're not welcome.

Gardai seemed to concur. Confronting the vehicle's owners, their posters promoting harmony between the two nations were confiscated and screwed up. Free speech wasn't applicable for the Israelis on Nassau Street. Their only crime was being football fans.

As one senior constable warned the fans to vacate the vicinity of the protest, without warning their vehicle was removed at speed down the street by a colleague. They were dumfounded.

An officer monitoring the protests told me: "We've been told to remove Israeli flags and banners. I don't want to be here, but I'm only doing my job."

Edging slowly towards the Embassy, a middle-aged Irish woman whipped up the crowd in a frenzy with yells of "Israel is a waste of space" into her megaphone

Passing pub-goers chanted: "Up the PLO. Up the IRA". Groups of marchers were soon echoing this. Arms raised aloft, the spectre of Nazi salutes again reared its ugly head on the route. Gardai turned a blind eye.

As the rally continued down the long road, the venomous chants built up apace. Increasingly it resembled a rally in the Palestinian territories supporting jihadist militants. There they revel in terror; here the guise was a peaceful demonstration.

When they spotted a man sporting a Republic shirt and a kippah, the police stepped in. He was a Chelsea fan from London, and had come for the weekend with friends to watch the match. Bafflingly, the garda tried to remove him from the street. When the Palestine Solidarity marchers spotted him, the response was by now sadly predictable. They turned their venom on him, despite displaying no signs of affiliation with Israel and being one of their own - an Ireland fan. The kippah was enough; this made him fair game.

Again this overt antisemitism and incitement to hatred was unchallenged.

By the time the crowd reached the Israeli embassy their blood was boiling. But as the international television crews pitched up, the speeches delivered by the Palestinian supporters were forced to take on a moderate tone.

Against a backdrop of a re-creation of the security barrier, they claimed their argument was not against Israel.

Try explaining the "waste of space" and "victory to the intifada" yells that reverberated around Dublin. They called for the aerial attacks on Palestinians to stop. Then issued a plea for bombers of their own.

One became suspicious of my presence, having followed them on foot for nearly three hours.

"Your sort aren't welcome," the Muslim protester angrily informed me - assuming that I was Israeli.

At 5.20pm as the crowd dispersed could Dublin now prepare for the main event, a World Cup qualifier?

WITH the clock counting down until kick-off, the strains of Hevenu Shalom Aleichem and Am Yisrael Chai struck up at the rear of the Israeli Embassy. A small group of flag-waving Israel fans began passionately expressing their support.

Some were Irish Christian Friends of Israel, others had made the trip across the Irish Sea and later fans from the Jewish State upped the tempo with festivities and flag waving.

In an instant, the atmosphere was soured when a break-off from the Palestinian rally breached the confines of this peaceful gathering on the narrow pavement.

"A tiny crew of middle-aged motley tree huggers," remarked one observer. But with their giant flags they were determined that their presence was felt.

The Israeli team had been due to pass by the embassy to greet the travelling fans en route to Lansdowne Road, but security concerns prevented this from happening.

Meanwhile the police - so hasty preventing anyone interfering with the earlier Palestinian demo - did nothing to halt this intimidation. Palestinian supporters were allowed to heckle and taunt. One delivered repeated shouts of "Nazis".

Despite Israel fans urging them to halt the standoff, the police response was mute. The scuffles were inevitable.

One skin-headed man openly admitted to being an Irish Republican Army backer, the terrorists responsible for some of the worst violence in Ireland and Britain.

Sealed lips from watching police, despite their quick-fire interventions earlier in the afternoon against the Israelis.

The two sides remained fixed in place, eye-to-eye, flag-to-flag, until they departed for the match. As one protester packed up his placard, another poster was already in place on the reverse, campaigning for the bin tax to be axed. The bedraggled coalition had revealed their true rent-a-mob colours. On to the next demo then.

INSIDE the creaking Lansdowne Road, specks of red, green and white exposed themselves, but stewards appeared powerless to remove the Palestinian flags being hoisted in the stands.

Initially animosity was reserved for Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern. The Taoiseach's anthem was booed, while silence ensued throughout the Hatikva. The 600 Israel fans in the North Bucket braved the teeming rain to belt out the anthem with pride.

But within 11 minutes of the whistle the Israelis were silenced. Lethal strikes from Ian Harte and Robbie Keane appeared to wrap up the tie. Struggling to press forward, Israel didn't appear to have a chance.

On their journey through the heated streets of Dublin, the team had been distracted by a replay of last month's Champions League final. Now they desperately sought to draw inspiration from Liverpool's comeback, a feat they accomplished within six minutes of the break.

Stage one was completed by Avi Yechiel, who marked his international debut with a well-timed equaliser.

Stage two came in the second minute of injury time when Yossi Benayoun, who was being watched by Newcastle United scouts, was brought down in the penalty area. After being forced thrice to retake the spot kick, with jeering ringing in his ears, Avi Nimni displayed coolness to level the tie and edge Israel closer to the World Cup finals in Germany.

At half time fans burst into a chant of "Israel Milchamah" - Israel's army - while the Irish were in shock. In the VIP area, an ashen-faced Taoiseach faced an ecstatic Roman Abramovitch, as the Chelsea owner tucked into kosher sandwiches.

And as the tie went into a nailbiting second 45, the visitors faced a barrage of antipathy as their players fought to defend the draw. The acrobatics and apparent histrionics of goalkeeper Dudu Awat infuriated the home crowd and they never forgave him for seemingly feigning injury which led to Andy O'Brien's sending off.

If anything, it was surprising that just one red card was brandished by Greek referee Kyros Vassaras. Israel defender Shimon Gershon feared the closing stages were developing into a street fight. "Tackles and elbows were flying in everywhere," he said.

At 9.31pm, with dusk settling over Dublin, Israel secured the vital point that nudged them closer to the finals in Germany. One Israel fan summed up the mood: "For the first time in Irish history, Israel was attracting the ire and venom of the Irish public with total justification."

However, an Irish fan would not let the tension remain on the field. As Awat was sitting in the lobby at the team's hotel, a bucket of ice was hurled at the Israeli keeper, who was already suffering from a suspected broken nose.

It underlined the rage facing Israelis even before the match. And it signalled the end to a disturbing day the Irish capital would rather forget.

A city that has played witness in centuries past to the tortuous results of bloodshed was again given the oxygen to become a battleground for simmering rivalries - even in the 21st century. Even in Europe, where for one weekend Israelis hoped to find solace in sport and escape the daily traumas back home. Some chance.
(hat tip to Pounce_UK)

Any similarity between Palestinians and adult human beings is purely coincidental

Palestinian Minister Mohammed Dahlan, in charge of coordinating Israel's Gaza withdrawal, said Thursday that Israel has failed to provide vital information about the pullout and accused the Israelis of creating the conditions for a new Palestinian uprising.

In other words, he is saying, "If we don't get what we want we're going to start to throw things! Waaaaaa!"

In other words, he is saying, "My people cannot control their emotions. They are mentally unstable. You have to give them what they want or they might make things uncomfortable for you."

In other words, he is saying, "Palestinians do not have the same free-will that God gave real human beings. They cannot choose right and wrong. They only have instinct. And, unlike dogs and cattle, they cannot be domesticated."

In other words, he is saying, "If you do what we want, nobody gets hurt. For now."

In other words, he is saying, "We have no responsibilities. We only have demands. And no matter what you do, we will always have more demands."

In other words, he is saying, "When you do something bad it is your fault. When we do something bad it is your fault."

This is the mentality of the Palestinian Arabs.

UPDATE: SoccerDad has some observations.

News flash: Palestinian leaders lie!

It is not news when Palestinian leaders, officials, and media lie. What is amazing is that despite decades of consistent lying - easily debunkable lies, bald-faced lies, lies that are so absurd that one would have to be an idiot to believe them - the news media still will report Palestinian statements without even a hint of cynicism.

I think it is a Western pathology - since we are brought up to think that "honesty is the best policy" it is beyond our experience to believe that someone is a complete and utter liar. (Although we are also taught to stretch the truth, to color our observations, and to soften facts a bit for various etiquette and cultural reasons, Westerners are averse to real in-your-face lies.)

This blindness to when someone is lying to your face can have very bad consequences. The Western press is obligated to act with suspicion, to check facts, to be cynical, especially when the person who is stating his stories has been shown to be a liar time and time again. For one to act "even-handed" when comparing the statements of known liars and their more-truthful counterparts is dishonest itself.

Let's look at some history of Palestinian Arab lies:

"Since its establishment, the racist Zionist entity has been implementing various forms of terrorism on a daily basis which are a repetition of the Nazi terror There is no difference between Hitler and Ben-Gurion, and if there was a difference at all, it was one of quantity and not one of substance." - from an article in the official PA newspaper "Al-Hayat Al-Jadida", September 3, 1997.

"Israeli practices in many aspects are equal with, if not more brutal than, those practiced by occupying Nazi soldiers dealing with French-Dutch citizens during the Second World War." PA Information Ministry press release, December 10, 1997.

"Abd Al-Fatah Hamid, the Head of the Control and Inspection Department in the PA Ministry of Supplies, said that a committee will work ... against spoiled goods and food supplies, which are one of Israel's means in its war against Palestinian society." from an article in the Palestinian daily, "Al-Ayyam", October 29, 1997.

"They brought Russian Jewish girls with AIDS to spread the disease among Palestinian youth." Abdel-Razek Al-Majida, Commander of the Palestinian General Security Service in Gaza, quoted by the official PA newspaper "Al-Hayat Al-Jadida", May 15, 1997.

"... there is no tangible evidence of any Jewish traces/remains in the old city of Jerusalem and its immediate vicinity. PA Information Ministry, December 10, 1997.

'Jerusalem is not a Jewish city, despite the Biblical myth implanted in some minds ? There is no tangible evidence of Jewish existence from the so-called 'Temple Mount Era' ? The location of the Temple Mount is in question ? it might be in Jericho or somewhere else' (Walid Awad, Director
of Foreign Publications for the PLO's Ministry of Information, interviewed by the IMRA news agency, Dec. 25, 1996).

Attallah Quiba, the Palestinian ambassador in Sri Lanka, believes that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was killed by unnamed Israelis using advanced technology, the Island newspaper said. Responding to questions at a media conference in Colombo on Friday, Quiba claimed that two Israelis who met Arafat on the day he was taken sick "used a laser device to attack Arafat."

Palestinian television reported, on the basis of an official announcement by the Palestinian leadership, that a priest named Jacques Amathis had been killed and dozens of monks wounded in an IDF action in Bethlehem. The announcement was published prominently in the Italian and French media and prompted a storm of protest. The following day the 'late" priest was interviewed by the MINSA agency and confirmed that he and the monks in the monastery were safe and well.

Saeb Erekat accused Israel of a "massacre" in Jenin and published the number of 520 deaths (ten times the actual number).

'The Nazis probably killed less than one million Jews and the Zionist movement was a partner in the slaughter' - Mahmoud Abbas in his book.

In April, PA head Mahmoud Abbas claimed in a meeting with Israeli reporters that the PA has collected all the weapons held by 'wanted' Palestinians in Jericho and Tulkarem and that they will all soon be joining the PA security forces. In fact, none had been collected.

"We have started to deal with the culture of violence, we stopped the culture of violence and the Palestinian people have started looking at it as something that should be condemned and it should stop." - Mahmoud Abbas

There is a famous, possibly apocryphal quote from Yassir Arafat: ""I am ready to kill for the sake of my cause; wouldn't I lie for it?" Although I cannot find a source to it, it brings up a fundamental truth - why does the Western press trust murderers and proven liars? Why do they give the same weight to statements by Palestinian sources who are known to have lied to the press in the recent past? Why are Palestinian newspapers quoted as authoritative sources?

But there is a far more fundamental question that is much more important than the fact that Palestinians habitually lie to the world: How can anyone expect Israel to make agreements with liars? Time after time, the Palestinian "negotiating" stance has offered nothing of substance, nothing but words - and their words are worth far less than the words of honest people. Yet the world expects Israel to give real concessions in exchange for only words - the words of proven liars.

This is Israel's "peace partner." No one in their right mind would buy a car from someone who acts like this; but Israel is expected to spend much more on the empty promises of terrorist-supporting liars.

The world press gives the Palestinian position legitimacy by its refusal to do basic fact-checking or context when Palestinian officials speak. This is fundamentally immoral and dishonest itself, and it results in more lies and more deaths. To treat Palestinian lies with deference that would not be given to the leaders of any Western nation is not journalism - it is a political agenda that has no place in newsrooms.

(Sources for some quotes: here, here and here. If any of them can be shown to be in error, please let me know.)

UPDATE: See also this article from 2003.

Bizarro World Israel

Here is who is getting arrested:

Seven 15-year-old girls were arrested early Monday morning - for writing slogans and their names in the soot of a Jerusalem tunnel wall.

Here's who is getting freed:

Palestinian former prisoners pay their respects at the grave of the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat at his former headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Thursday June 2, 2005. [AP]

Israel buys huge tool to destroy tunnels

OK, a purely defensive device, won't hurt anyone, designed to stop people from bringing in weapons to kill Jews.

How long before we see Palestinians and terror-supporters complaining about it, under the guise of "human rights" or "religious tolerance" or something similar?

The Israel Defense Forces have found a way to block the tunnels Palestinians dig under the Gaza-Egypt border to smuggle in weapons by using a huge trench-digging machine, according to a military publication.

The 100-ton behemoth would dig deep channels along the border route Israel patrols, exposing the tunnels, the soldiers' weekly 'Bamahane' reports in its current edition.

The new trenching machine, made U.S. company Trencor Inc., might provide at least an interim answer to the smuggling problem by neutralizing tunnels now in operation.

A small picture of the machine in the weekly shows the 'Trencor' logo on the side of the yellow vehicle, sporting a snout designed to dip deep into the ground to dig trenches.

The weekly said only that the machine arrived disassembled from Texas and is now being put together. It will be operational 'in the coming weeks,' it said.