June 2009 ~ Elder Of Ziyon

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

"Obama changed his tune due to Zionist pressure"

Iran's Press TV is just so much fun to read:A senior advisor to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says US President Barack Obama's recent remarks about Iran's election show that he is under pressure from the Zionists. In an exclusive interview with Press TV on Tuesday night, Mojtaba Samareh-Hashemi said that Obama originally took a soft stance on the results of Iran's presidential election but then was forced by the Zionists and the US neoconservatives...

I just came across this from the Palestine Post of June 30, 1949, describing how hard the new state of Israel tried to accommodate its Muslim citizens - and even its Muslim enemy POWs.In 1949's Ramadan, Israel went out of its way to give extra rations to Muslims for their break-fast meals, mosques were repaired, special Muslim programs were broadcast on Kol Yisrael, and Muslim...

Rabbi Boteach trying to turn Michael Jackson's kids Jewish?

Apparently, if you believe Al Arabiya in Arabic.Al-Arabiya seems to have taken some relatively obscure news stories: one about Rabbi Shmuley Boteach's friendship with Michael Jackson, and one about MJ's ex-wife Debbie Rowe considering herself Jewish and seeking custody of her two kids.Putting the two together, and you get Arab journalism at its finest.Al-Arabiya is saying that Debbie Rowe seeking custody to raise the kids Jewish at Rabbi Boteach's...

Another Free Gaza lie

The Free Gaza publicity boat that was intercepted by Israeli authorities on the way to Gaza had declared upon its leaving Cyprus that the intended destination was - Egypt:The Cypriot Embassy in Tel Aviv issued a statement following the incident, saying "The Embassy of the Republic of Cyprus in Israel would like to inform that the "Spirit of Humanity" boat, sponsored by the Free Gaza Movement, that attempted in the early hours today to reach Gaza...

"Free Gaza" deja vu

Once again, the "Free Gaza" movement is claiming that Israeli naval vessels are threatening their lives, and once again they are lying.It will be recalled that last December a Free Gaza boat tried to get to Gaza. The Israeli Navy intercepted them and stopped them. They claimed that they were fired upon, that they were surrounded by six boats, that they were rammed by the Israeli boats and lots of other things. Yet the journalists on board and all...

Today's PalArab news roundup 6-30-09

A 'breakthrough" was announced in the Hamas/Fatah negotiations.But even as that was happening, Hamas arrested some 150 Fatah members in Gaza. And the PA arrested seven more Hamas members in the West Bank.Even more bizarrely, the PA announced that they foiled a Hamas plot to assassinate senior PA officials, apparently to torpedo these very Fatah/Hamas negotiations. It is possible that Hamas has some infighting going on, of that the Damascus leadership...

Morocco hosts a beauty contest - for "most beautiful ass"

Remember Saudi Arabia's beauty contest for camels?Well, Morocco has one...for donkeys.Al Arabiya (Arabic only, alas) has details on the competition. It describes a number of competitions - most beautiful ass, fastest ass, and slimmest ass. (Hey, I'm not making this up.)Part of the reason is to promote the donkey as a beautiful animal, and not as a butt of jokes.The festival...

Al Arabiya (Arabic) just discovered the shocking truth that every visitor to Israel knew already: Arab shopkeepers sell items to tourists that include things that tourists might want to buy, including Jewish-themed jewelry!The newspaper is upset:At a time when the Palestinians are struggling to preserve the identity of the city of Jerusalem and the stabilization of the right...

Who says Abbas cannot compromise?

Mahmoud Abbas again today totally rejected everything in Binyomin Netanyahu's peace plan:Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas reiterated on Monday his rejection of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s stipulations for a two-state solution.But no one will call him a "hardliner" or a "rejectionist" or a "hawk" or any of the other pejorative terms that the media loves to give Likud leaders.Perhaps it is because Abbas is very willing to compromise...with...

PA destroys "expired" water bottles

From Ma'an:The health department in Bethlehem destroyed three tons of water bottles and expired food not suitable for human use on Monday.Dr Muhammad Issa Rizek, the head of the health department, added that the quantities were seized at one of the stores in Bethlehem.The PA has had problems with Palestinian Arabs selling food past its expiration date, and those stories pop up regularly in the PalArab press.But destroying water bottles?The best article...

In the magic kingdom of Saudi Arabia, one can never be too careful in avoiding sin. Even acts that might look like they are laudatory may in fact just be fronts for perverted actions, and it is better to stay on the safe side rather than risk doing something awful...like Khilwa.Khilwa, of course, is the illegal seclusion of a man and a woman, and something that our heroes,...

Obama increases aid to Jordan by 41%

From the Jordan Times:US President Barack Obama has signed a supplemental appropriations bill, which includes $150 million in additional economic assistance to Jordan for the 2009 fiscal year, a senior official said on Sunday. Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Suhair Al-Ali said the supplemental assistance is in addition to the $363 million in regular US economic assistance to Jordan for 2009, bringing the total to $513 million.The...

Op-ed calls supposed Hamas moderation "tactical"

There was a slight splash made by Khaled Mashal a couple of weeks ago when he indicated that he would accept a Palestine in the territories, a move that some Westerners were quick to trumpet as proof that Hamas is "moderating."Certainly, no one on the Palestinian Arab side believes that.From Palestine Today, in a editorial called "The Hamas two-state solution: the strategic tactic!":...It is important to say that the question of the admission of...

Jordan taking away citizenship rights from some Palestinian Jordanians

Over the past two decades, Jordan has been quietly consistently and methodically restricting citizenship rights for its Palestinian Arab residents. These deliberate moves have been essentially invisible to the West.Most people don't realize that, although Jordan extended full citizenship to Palestinian Arabs on both banks of the Jordan river in 1950, they revoked the citizenship of West Bank Palestinian Arabs in 1988 (except for those in UNRWA-run...

Al-Arabiya reports that the Saudi Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice is soon to gain a new weapon in protecting Saudis from the horror of indecent behavior:Saudi Arabia's religious police caused a stir this week after they told a parliament session they planned to install cameras in shopping malls to monitor and catch people committing what they...

"We will Knock on the doors of Paradise with the skulls of Jews"

In the Hamas Al-Qassam Brigades English forum, there is a "martyr" section where the signature of every posting looks like this:Ezzedeen Al-Qassam Brigades We will Knock on the doors of Paradise with the skulls of JewsBut don't you dare call them anti-semites. They get very offended.By the way, the Arabic Al Qassam Brigades site continues to stealthily add more and more names...

Party of God News

Yesterday: Speaking about his party's relations with foreign countries, [Hezbollah deputy leader, Sheikh Naim Qassem] said Hezbollah was open to talks with representatives of all Western governments except the United States. "Several US officials at different levels and more or less close to the administration have asked to speak with us but we have refused," he said. "It is useless to have any dialogue with the...

Terror group celebrates anniversary of murder

From Ma'an:The armed wing of the Popular Resistance Committees said on Friday it would consider capturing further Israeli soldiers for future exchanges.As long as one Palestinian prisoner remains in an Israeli jail, the Salah Ad-Din Brigades said in a statement to Ma'an, capturing Israeli soldiers "will remain among the most important of our priorities for the present and coming stages."The brigades' statement came on the three-year anniversary of...

PalArab news roundup 6-26-09

Amina Abbas, the wife of the PA president, spoke at an Arab women's conference in Tunisia. of course, she didn't talk about "honor killings" or the dangers to women's rights posed by radical Islam or anything like that - she spoke about Israeli "brutal aggression." Interestingly, she said now that "over 1500" were killed in Gaza. The lies keep increasing...A Palestinian Arab media organization blasted both Hamas and the PA for infringing on freedom...

The Jews of Jerusalem, 1871

Sometimes I like looking through Google Books to see what life was like for Jews in Palestine in the 19th century. Here is a description of both prayer at the Kotel as well as how the Muslims treated the Jews at this pre-Zionist time.Narrative of a Modern Pilgrimage Through Palestine on Horseback, and with Tents By Alfred Charles Smith, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (Great Britain),On another occasion we paid a visit to the outer wall...

A new book just came out called "Arafat and the Dream of Palestine: An Insider's Account," by Bassam Abu Sharif.The prologue is available on Amazon and it talks about Arafat's plan crash in the Libyan desert and how Sharif reacted to the news. Sharif speaks reverently about how Arafat heroically handled the crash, taking care of the survivors personally. One detail of the...

Hamas reveals more about Carter's love of terrorists

Palestine Press Agency quotes a Hamas official giving more details of what Jimmy Carter told them during his visit.Hamas parliamentary spokesman Salah al-Bardawil quoted former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, during his visit to the Gaza Strip recently, as saying to Hamas:"Help us to help Obama to overcome the Zionist lobby.... What can you do to help Mitchell, and even help Obama, so that everyone can make the policy change to the terms that the "Quartet"...

Hamas says it doesn't know if Shalit is alive

From Xinhua:The Islamic Hamas movement on Thursday said it cannot confirm or deny if the captive Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit is still alive. "The crazy war on the Gaza Strip wiped out everything so we don't know if Shalit is still alive or if he has died," Osama al-Muzini, a Hamas official authorized to speak on this issue, told Xinhua, referring to a 22-day Israeli offensive against the Hamas-controlled territory in January. Al-Muzini,...

B'Tselem and Hamas' excellent adventure

YNet reports:A B’Tselem ad calling on Hamas to release IDF soldier Gilad Shalit "immediately and unconditionally" has been banned in Gaza, according to the Israeli human rights organization.The group spokeswoman said the ad was published on Thursday by the Palestinian newspaper Al-Quds, which is circulated in the West Bank, but the Gaza-based daily 'Palestine' refused to print it."We wanted to publish the ad in the Gaza Strip as well, but we were...

UC Santa Barbara clears lying, anti-semitic professor

From YNet/AP:A committee at a California university has cleared a professor who sent an e-mail comparing Israel's policies in Gaza to the Holocaust.Officials at the University of California, Santa Barbara, sent a letter Wednesday to sociology professor William I. Robinson saying the committee had closed the matter.In January, Robinson offended some students and others with an e-mail to his "Sociology of Globalization" class that juxtaposed grisly...

Today's PalArab news, part 2 (6-24-09)

There are rumors that Israel's release of Hamas politician Aziz Dweik is an initial move towards Hamas releasing Gilad Shalit in Egypt in two weeks. We've seen these sorts of rumors before, though.Sources in Jordan's Interior Ministry are saying that there is international pressure for Jordan to naturalize Palestinian Arabs living there, with Jordan refusing to do so - of course, in the name of preserving "Palestinian identity." I wonder if they...

More on Mizrahi Jews

I wrote on Monday about a Cambridge conference on Mizrahi Jews that downplayed the Arab role in their cultural disappearance.This great article at ZioNation, a response to a different article by a "progressive" Sephardic Jew, explains things very well:I would like to respond to "Why Jews left Arab Lands" a Progressive Sephardic view by David Shasha.Allow me to briefly introduce myself. My name is Israel Bonan, I am a Mizrahi Jew. I was born in Cairo,...

PalArab news roundup 6-24-09

Hamas' crackdown on the media continues, as they kidnapped the editor of a Gaza newspaper and confiscated is computer. Which makes their little "visit" to Ma'an even more transparent.A Fatah member was similarly kidnapped from his home by Hamas, and they took his computer and his (and his wife's) cell phones.The only place to find stories like these is the Palestine Press Agency. The rest of the Palestinian Arab media are way too frightened to write...

They might not be "dirty Arabs" but they are liars

Joharah Baker writes in the "Palestine Chronicle" (this article has also been published in literally hundreds of other Arab and left-wing sources):What unwritten law is out there that allows Israelis to sling racist insults at Palestinians with impunity? After all my years in this country and the absurdities that come along with it, this is one absurdity I still find hard to digest.Obviously, my outrage has been most recently rekindled by Israeli...

Afternoon Links

Contentions: What was Jimmy Carter's proposal to Hamas?WSJ: Israel radio show captivates IraniansQantara: Turkey, the Jews and the Holocau...

The worst ex-prime minister in history

From Ha'aretz:Former prime minister Ehud Olmert offered Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas that the Holy Basin area of Jerusalem would be under no sovereignty at all and administered by a joint committee of Saudis, Jordanians, Israelis, Palestinians and Americans, the former prime minister told Newsweek magazine in an interview in the current issue.The proposal to internationalize the Holy Basin was intended to achieve a breakthrough in...

Great Britain, 1929. Barack Obama, 2009.

On September 23, 1928, on the evening of Yom Kippur, the Jews of Jerusalem placed a removable screen at the Western Wall to separate the male and female worshippers.This was not new; they had done this in years and decades past. But this year, the Arabs decided that such a partition was an unacceptable structure, symbolizing Jewish attachment to Jerusalem, and they told the British authorities to take it down or risk mass riots.While the elderly...

Trader Joe's boycott attempt fails miserably

The attempt to "de-shelve" Israeli products from Trader Joe's this past weekend has apparently fizzled, and the store sold lots and lots of Israeli products. Details can be found her...

Jew visits holy place; Arabs call it a "provocation"

From Ma'an:Israel’s Internal Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch visited the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem’s Old City under heavy guard on Tuesday morning in what Palestinian officials condemned as a provocation....The Al-Aqsa Foundation for Heritage said in a statement that the Israeli minister also barged into the Marwani mosque and into the Dome of the Rock, and circled the Al-Aqsa Mosque.The organization said, “This visit shows that...

YNet reports:Some 700,000 households in Syria – about 3.5 million people - have no income. In other words, an average of one family of five in Syria leans on monthly governmental aid in order to survive, according to a comprehensive study conducted by the Social Affairs and Labor Ministry in Syria, whose main findings were published by the local al-Watan newspaper.These reports...

Open thread - summer's here

Even though the East Coast has had one of the coldest Junes on record, it is summer nonetheless. Time for an open thread!Meanwhile, a nice lin...

Proof that Hamas controls the tunnels

The media likes to portray the smuggling tunnels under Rafah as pure capitalism at work, where people desperate for money or goods are forced to engage in this dangerous but heroic activity to bring in candies, schoolbooks and cattle into Gaza.However, a story in Palestine Today puts a lie to that.There have been a large number of motorcycle accidents in Gaza over the past few months, and many people are complaining about it. As a result, Hamas has...

The subtle politics of a Cambridge conference

From the University of Cambridge:A major conference, to be opened by Prince Hassan bin Talal of Jordan this week, will shed new light on the underexplored subject of Arab Jews.The Jews of Arab Culture: 1948-2009 conference, which takes place from 22-24 June, is being co-hosted by Cambridge University's Department of Middle Eastern Studies and the Centre for the Study of Muslim-Jewish Relations of the Woolf Institute of Abrahamic Faiths.Over the course...