2009 ~ Elder Of Ziyon

Thursday, December 31, 2009

Martyr inflation

At the end of Operation Cast Lead, Hamas came out with a press release that claimed that only 48 "mujahadeen" had been killed during the fighting, while they estimated that they killed some 80 Zionist fighters.Since then, they have kept adding more and more Gaza "martyrs" who were members of the Al Qassam Brigades to their website. At last count, Hamas has listed out the biographies of no less than 305 Al Qassam terrorists with details of their careers...

From San Francisco's local ABC website:A Watsonville art teacher and her husband are among three dozen people who have reportedly been detained in Egypt on their way to the Gaza strip.Kathleen Crocetti had hoped to deliver a mural to a community center in Gaza, where a pro-Palestinian freedom march is planned for New Year's Eve.Crocetti and her husband, Bill Lucas, have been...

The IDF confirms that weekly demonstrations are always violent

A month ago, I wrote "Protests that happen in Bilin and Na'alin (weekly, not daily) are anything but peaceful, and IDF soldiers often get injured from the violence."A commenter insisted that I was wrong, and said that "The overwhelming majority of demonstrations at both sites you mention have been thoroughly peaceful. Your claim to the contrary is not only not objective, but also not true. "His evidence for this statement was a heavily edited video...

Administrivia open thread

I recently started a new job, and it will not afford me the ability to post as often as I have been. I've been trying to compensate this week by sleeping less, but that is not a very good long-term strategy! I have a couple of other non-blog related projects that I need to be spending some time on. Sorry!In response to reader requests, I changed the comments to now open up in a new window rather than a pop-up, which messed some people up. Let me...

Today's PalArab news 12/31/2009

The PA seized 19,000 shekels worth of nuts that were supposedly grown in Israeli farms in the West Bank. Their goal is to stop all imports of West Bank Jewish products by the end of 2010.Palestinian Arabs are dismayed at Jimmy Carter's pretend apology to American Jews. After all, they note, he had been such a friend to them; they are hoping that it is just a political move to help his grandson run for office and that it doesn't reflect his real feelings.Palestinian...

The 45th anniversary of...what?

Mahmoud Abbas will be giving what is billed as an important speech tonight, marking the 45th anniversary of the "start of the Palestinian revolution."What momentous event happened 45 years ago?Yasir Arafat co-founded Fatah in 1954 along with a number of other people, mostly Palestinian Arabs who were working in Gulf states and who went to college in Cairo. The PLO was founded in May,1964 and Fatah did not join it until 1967. There were other, mostly...

UNRWA/Hamas lovefest

Palestine Today reports that outgoing UNRWA commissioner Karen Abu-Zayd met today with Hamas officials to say farewell.According to the article, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh praised Abu Zayd in front of other Hamas officials, saying that she was daring in her role for the past nine years. He expressed hope that she would continue to speak out on behalf of Palestinian Arabs even after she leaves office.Abu-Zayd, on her part, complimented Hamas on facilitating...

Israeli war crimes against Gazan sperm!

Palestinian Arabs keep trying to claim that Israeli weapons caused all sorts of genetic mutations in Gaza.Dr. Muawiya Hassanein, director of the Emergency Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip, tells Palestine Today that there have been over 75 cases of babies born with heart defects in Gaza since Operation Cast Lead.A quick calculation shows that, in the US, about 0.9% of all babies are born with congenital heart defects (36,000 a year.) In Gaza,...

The "Holocaust survivor" moonbat

It is amusing to see how the Gaza Freedom March moonbats are acting in Egypt:More than 1,000 people from around the world were gathered here on Tuesday for a solidarity march into Gaza despite Egypt’s insistence that the Gaza border crossing that it controls would remain closed to the vast majority of them.The protest, the Gaza Freedom March, was planned for Thursday and intended to mark a year since Israel’s three-week military assault on the territory....

Good news: Water desalinization plant goes online

From YNet:The desalination plant in Hadera, which is considered the largest in the world, has commenced infusing water into the Mekorot system, Water Authority Chairman Uri Shani declared last Wednesday.In recent weeks experts have been holding extensive testing aimed at ensuring the water's quality. The plant has been given the Health Ministry seal of approval confirming that the water being desalinated meet Israel's drinking water standards.In...

Saudi op-ed on runaway girls misses the point

Reading the Saudi press is like looking at the world through a concave mirror. There is something about the lack of compassion and the rush to judge a Saudi woman’s behavior that’s very troubling in Saudi society.Recently a 15-year-old girl was found by the Hai’a in Riyadh with her much older Yemeni lover. The girl was from the Eastern Province and had an affair with the man who was a taxi driver. He moved to Riyadh and asked her to join him. She...

In other news...

"Siege" news: Today, Israel is sending in window glass and refrigerators to Gaza.Mortars continue, maybe: The Al Aqsa Brigades (Fatah) claim to have shot a mortar towards Israel yesterday. Israel says it wasn't aware of any such attack.Fly the friendly skies: The PA announced its intentions to build an airport between Jerusalem and the Jordan Valley. It knows that Israel is not keen on the idea, so ...the Authority is betting on U.S. intervention...

Hamas marking anniversary of Cast Lead

Hamas is doing what one would expect it would to commemorate its great "victory" last year.It is rounding up and abducting dozens of Fatah members, just like the good old days.Also, the Al Qassam website keeps on adding names to their list of "martyrs" from the war. PTWatch found a new one today, a "noble fighter" that was listed as a "civilian" by PCHR, bringing our total to 352 "civilians" who were members of terror groups and 662 total legitimate...

PA making money from stolen cars

From Ma'an:Palestinian Authority police in Ramallah said on Monday they confiscated and destroyed 72 stolen cars.The police said the cars were crushed into “iron cubes” which will be sold in an auction. The proceeds will be transferred to the ministry of finance.So, that explains why they don't attempt to return the cars to the people they were stolen from! (And most of them are stolen from Israel...

Gaza war repost: What was the alternative?

Last year on this day, I posted this article:There has been no shortage of criticism of Israel for finally deciding to do something about incessant rocket attacks against its citizens. From the U.N. Secretary-General calling Israel's actions "excessive" to French President Nicolas Sarkozy saying that Israel is using a "disproportionate use of force" to the EU's Javier Solana saying "There is no military solution" to the situation in Gaza, down to...

Compromise radicalizes Arabs against Israel

A Lebanese newspaper is reporting that Israel might withdraw from the northern section of Ghajar in January. The reason given is quoted in YNet:According to the report, the UN and the United States hope that Israel's withdrawal from the northern part of Ghajar will lead to an ease in tensions between Israel and Lebanon.Notwithstanding the legal issues involved, that statement of hope is maddeningly wrong.The very thought that Israeli compromise on...

Still trying to improve comments

I turned off a feature in the comments that would have allowed near-real-time updates from within the comment system. It would have been cool to turn it into a sort-of chat board, but this blog doesn't have enough members in the commenting community to make it worthwhile, and by turning it off the comment threads are now top-down chronologically.You can create a profile, upload an avatar, and have people see all of your comment history, which is...

I scoop Arutz-7 by a month

On November 26th, I showed a series of pictures of Gazans celebrating Eid from the Palestine Today website, and looking quite healthy. This is something I have been doing for a while now.Today, Arutz-7 noticed those same pictures from a month ago.The Israeli press really needs to read my site more ofte...

The question that the White House should answer

The White House announced:The United States opposes new Israeli construction in East Jerusalem. The status of Jerusalem is a permanent status issue that must be resolved by the parties through negotiations and supported by the international community. Neither party should engage in efforts or take actions that could unilaterally pre-empt, or appear to pre-empt, negotiations.Earlier today:Housing and Construction Minister Ariel Atias said Monday that...

Comments on comments

The new comment system is a little maddening. I cannot figure out how to change it from placing new comments on top to on the bottom, as it did before. However, when one is replying to other comments, the replies seem to go top-down, making scrolling through the comment threads difficult.The good news is that the comments are now RSS-compliant, so I can keep track of them that way.Echo is still adding features and listening to complaints, so the...

In a bizarre story in the Arabic media, Lebanese singer Najwa Karam is claiming that she has received death threats from Israel.Apparently, at a concert in Amman, a number of Palestinian Arabs started singing patriotic PalArab songs. This was considered incitement by Israel and prompted the death threats.This is not the first time that Ms. Karam has made this claim. In 1996,...

Palestinian Arab op-ed slams Hamas for Gaza war

Palestine Press Agency has an Arabic op-ed that pulls no punches in blaming Hamas for Gaza suffering. Excerpts:All this happened a year ago and still Hamas is reopening the wounds of the Gaza Strip. It continues to dance on wounds because Hamas appeared to have become addicted to dancing on the blood and body parts of the victims.A year ago and is still Hamas is singing of victory, drawing a surreal picture that violates all logic and facts, Hamas...

One year later: Emotions versus facts in Gaza reporting

I just looked at a CNN interview of Taghreed El-Khodary, a New York Times reporter in Gaza, on December 28th, 2008.She describes the chaos and fear of Gazans in the first days of Cast Lead, as well as her own fear. Superimposed over her interview are images from Arab TV of rubble and fires.El-Khodary begins by talking about how Hamas places its facilities in residential areas, but does not ascribe any blame whatsoever on Hamas for doing so. On the...

Saudi Vice Squad tackles woman in toilet

From Saudi Gazette:Passersby on the Corniche in Dammam were stunned to witness members of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (the Hai’a) drag a young woman out of a public toilet, and hit her and kick her before forcing her into the back of a jeep Sunday morning.The incident, reported by Al-Hayat newspaper Monday and by chance witnessed by one of its correspondents along with nearly a dozen other people, reportedly...

"Honor killing" in Gaza

I had missed this at the time. From PCHR: On Friday afternoon, 27 November 2009, Rifqa Ghazi 'Abdullah Salama, 29, from al-Shati refugee camp west of Gaza City, was killed allegedly "to maintain family honor."According to police sources in al-Shati, at approximately 13:30 on Friday, 27 November 2009, the woman's brother, two uncles and two cousin strangled her using a wet towel while she was sleeping at home near Hmaid intersection in al-Shati refugee...

Hamas accused of closing down another NGO

Palestine Press Agency is reporting that Hamas has shut down the Cooperative Housing Foundation NGO in the Gaza Strip.According to the article, the CHF has been heavily involved in construction, reconstruction, food supplies, and micro-credit for Gazans in need, supporting some 150,000 Gazans with 200 employees.The CHF suffered a break-in in Gaza a couple of weeks ago.Nothing on the CHF website about this yet.Hamas, as usual, seems to be prioritizing...

"Siege" update

From Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs:Humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip has increased by close to 900 percent in 2009 compared to the previous year (Col. Moshe Levi, head of the IDF's Gaza Coordination and Liaison Administration, Nov. 16, 2009).Since the beginning of 2009, the IDF has allowed over 4,000 Palestinians from Gaza, together with 3,600 escorts, to enter Israel (or via Israel to the West Bank) for medical treatment.The IDF has also...

Upgrading comments, expect some problems

Haloscan is forcing me to upgrade to a new comment system called Echo (and to pay for it!) While the features look good, I fully expect that the transition will not be smooth. It is even possible that I will lose my entire archive of comments.Let me know what you thin...

Abbas doesn't want any Israeli Arabs in "Palestine"

In an interview in Asharq al-Awsat, Mahmoud Abbas says something interesting about his negotiations with Ehud Olmert:[Asharq Al-Awsat] Would it have been possible to reach an agreement with Olmert alone?[President Abbas] I believe it would have been possible that I go up a little, and he comes down a little. It was possible to find a solution. He said that he would give me 100 percent.[Asharq Al-Awsat] This is important and fundamental?[President...

Palestine Today calls terror attack a "heroic operation"

The drive-by shooting death of Rabbi Meir Avshalom Hai last Thursday is being hailed in the Palestine Today newspaper as a "heroic operation."The paper reproduced photos of the scene of the terror attack, apparently from Israeli media, to celebrate the murde...

Palestinian Arabs call Jews "their dogs"

(reposted, I didn't realize that there was no sound in the original video.)"ck" at Jewlicious posted a great find. In his words: Every Friday, protesters have been gathering [in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in east Jerusalem] lately to protest the expulsion last August of two families from their apartments after the Israel Supreme Court ruled that the land upon which their homes were built belonged to the Sephardi Jewish community. The evacuated...

Gaza Islamist group criticizes Hamas over rappers

Ma'an reported:Seven Palestinian rap groups battled for the top spot in a Norwegian-funded competition in Gaza City on Monday night.Screaming, fans crammed into a concert hall in the Red Crescent complex for the show, applauding each group on stage. The Norwegian sponsors joined via videoconference.The competition (titled Riasalatna - Our Message) was organized by young Gazan women as the end product of a number of workshops in Gaza and the Norwegian...

Egypt forces Galloway to re-route

From Ma'an:Egypt refused permission on Thursday for a Gaza-bound aid convoy in led by British MP George Galloway to enter the country through the Red Sea port of Nuweiba.There will be "no entry from Nuweiba. Entry can only be through Al-Arish," on the Mediterranean coast, Hossam Zaki told the French news agency AFP.The Viva Palestina convoy of 250 trucks and ambulances laden with European, Turkish and Arab donations of food and medical supplies arrived...

Today is the anniversary of "Operation Oil Stain"

One of the problems with NGOs is that they create a framework around a topic that makes Israel appear like the aggressor. The Gaza war is a perfect example.On December 24th, 2008, Hamas declared war on Israel. As Ma'an reported at the time, The military wing affiliated to Hamas, Al-Qassam Brigades released a statement on Thursday morning briefing the group's military activities over the first twenty four hours of an operation they called "Oil Stain"...

77% of Gaza women subjected to violence

A new study by the Palestine Women's Information and Media Center is saying that some 77.1% of Gaza women are subjected to violence.The abstract is published only in Arabic so far, and the full survey results are not out yet. I do not know the definitions of the terms "verbal violence" and "psychological violence."67% of women are subject to verbal violence71% to psychological violence52% to physical violence15% to sexual violence45% to more than...

Hamas loves Qaddafi

Hamas polical leader Khaled Meshal is in Libya and meeting with crazy president, and inexplicably still Colonel, Maommar Qgaddhaffphi (I think I need to spell it differently every time.Meshal said that he would have preferred if Gaza bordered Libya instead of Egypt, as no one would be building a giant iron wall between Libya and Gaza.I think that this is a wonderful idea. It could easily be accomplished if all Gazans would move to Tunisia, the country...

Israel allows third flower export from Gaza this month

Palestine Today reports that Israel will allow Gaza farmers to export flowers for the third time this month.Don't expect the Free Gaza or Code Pink websites to mention this new...

Traveling open thread

Another nice thing about my trip is that I didn't have to be assaulted with Christmas music for the last two weeks!I'll be traveling all day, so have at it.UPDATE: I am putting a couple of posts in the queue as I fl...

Richard Falk shows his hypocrisy again

From YNet:In Geneva, the UN Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Richard Falk, urged Israel's European and North American allies to press for the immediate end of the blockade "backed up by a credible threat of economic sanctions."Isn't that "collective punishment" against the entire population of Israel, something that Falk considers unacceptable in the extreme?(Links to other examples of Falk's lies, hypocrisy, support for...

Daily Goldstone 12/24

From the University of Pittsburgh Law School website:The Goldstone Commission Report on the January 2009 Israel-Palestinian conflict in Gaza — which comes before the United Nations today, November 4, 2009 — has been accused of failure on various levels. Many commentators argue that the Report fails the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. Some say it reflects a failure to understand the deeper historical realities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict....

Work accident!

Another brave Hamas freedom fighter has missed his chance at getting his virgins because he blew himself up without managing to kill any Jews.He was killed while on a "jihad mission" in the Sabra neighborhood of Gaza City.The fact that Hamas is doing "jihad missions" in crowded residential neighborhoods does not seem to be much of an issu...

A day with the IDF

Today, I attended the IDF Northern Command Familiarization Day, a brand new initiative by the IDF to reach out to bloggers.The two main events were IDF briefings at strategic mountaintops, one overlooking the entire Syrian border and the other one practically surrounded by Lebanon.Although the information given was not "inside information," it was a good first step. It was interesting to see in person border villages that are very possibly Hezbollah...

Abbas for new intifada in Arabic, against it in English

Mahmoud Abbas had an interview in yesterday's Wall Street Journal where he said, among other things:I will not allow a new intifada. As long as I'm in office, I will not allow anybody to start a new intifada. Never never.Yet just last month, in Arabic, the Fatah Central Committee that he leads called for a third intifada, and there were reports that Abbas himself called for a third intifada (without arms but with stones.) The original link to Palestine...

Carter's grandson running for office; benefits from "apology"

As we mentioned yesterday, Jimmy Carter made a non-apology to Jews in the form of "sorry if some of you overly sensitive Jews were upset with my completely correct venomous anti-Israel and borderline anti-semitic actions over the past couple of decades."It turns out that this fake apology, for some reason warmly welcomed by Abraham Foxman, didn't come completely out of nowhere. Carter's grandson is running for office and he is going to need to get...

Moonbats over Gaza

The Daily News Egypt reports:The Gaza Freedom March will move forward with plans to march into Gaza on Dec. 31 despite having its request rejected by Egypt’s foreign ministry Monday. “Our efforts and plans will not be altered at this point,” Ann Wright of the Gaza Freedom March Steering Committee said in a statement.“We have set out to break the siege of Gaza and to march in Gaza on Dec. 31 against the international blockade. We are continuing the...

News briefs

Jimmy Carter "apologized" to American Jews for saying things that may have stigmatized Israel. He even used the words "Al Het" that are used by Jews on Yom Kippur. Of course, he didn't apologize for any of his positions, so this is one of those situations of a non-apology in the form of "sorry if you were offended by my brilliance."British director Ken Loach withdrew a film of his from an Australian film festival because it was partially funded by...

What I've been doing

I've been too busy to blog, too busy to reply to emails (and even to read them all,) too busy to read many of the comments and, most of the time, too busy to sleep.But one of the benefits of this trip to Israel is the opportunity to meet some fellow bloggers. In a sense, this has been my "coming out" party as until a few weeks ago I was almost completely anonymous to the vast majority of bloggers. Since then, off the top of my head I have met and...