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Thursday, August 15, 2013

8/15 Links Part 2: Treat Terrorists like Pirates, In Arabic, Jerusalem is Jewish, Jackie Mason on the Conflict

From Ian:

Treat Terrorists like Pirates
International law today paralyzes civilized nations in their war against terrorism. In fact, Israel’s former Supreme Court Chief Justice Aharon Barak once bragged that “we fight against the terrorists with one arm tied behind our back.” But in my view, phony liberals who warn that we shouldn’t “sink to the level of the enemy” are pretentious, racist, and hypocritical.
Few among us understand that the most ancient foundations of international law are supposed to bolster, not weaken the war against terrorism. The historic parallel to today’s terrorist organizations are the pirates, those gangs of outlaws who instilled fear in the hearts of passengers on land and sea, and were defined as early as the time of the Roman Empire as “enemies of humanity.”
In Arabic, Jerusalem is Jewish
Over the weekend, four terrorists preparing a rocket attack against Israel were killed by a drone – probably Israeli – as they were getting ready to launch their lethal weapons. The group that took “credit” for preparing the terrorist attack is an Al-Qaeda affiliate calling itself “Ansar Beit al Maqdes”. Writing in response to my recent post on the origin of the name “Palestine”, my friend Ilan Pomeranc pointed out that this Jihadi group’s name witnesses to the Jewish status of Jerusalem.
“Ansar Beit al Maqdes” literally means the “Army of the Holy Temple”. Media outlets mistranslate the name as “Army for Jerusalem”, but Jerusalem does not appear in the name at all. In Arabic, “Jerusalem” is often called, in shorthand vernacular, “al-Quds”. What this term literally means is “the Holy”. “Quds” is merely an Arabization of the Hebrew “Kadosh” i.e., “Holy”. So if you put the two Arabic names for Jerusalem together what you get is “al-Quds al-Maqdes” which literally means “the place of the Holy Temple”.
UN-touchable
Paralyzed by fear of the UN, the project has either been simply ignored or transferred over the years from one government agency to the other. Even the small initial step of identifying alternative sites suitable to the UNRWA facility’s relocation has not been taken. So that at this very late date, Jerusalem, in dire need of new residential developments, lies in waiting.
Forty-six years have passed since the Six Day War, during which time the entire area surrounding the UNRWA compound, stuck here like a bone in the throat, has been transformed and modernized.
Isn’t it time we had that bone removed and correct this anomaly by completing this important urban area appropriately? A modicum of political courage can make a modern Jewish neighborhood here a reality.
Britain's diplomacy of hypocrisy
For years now Britain has been at the forefront of the global effort to return Israel to its 1967 borders. It is a historically loyal ally of the Arabs, including the Palestinians, who efficiently and doggedly seek to realize their phased plan to eventually end Israel, i.e. pushing the Jews to the "Blue Line," the Mediterranean Sea.
The academic boycott against Israel, similar to the boycott on Israeli goods from Judea and Samaria, are an expression of Britain's diplomacy of hypocrisy. Britain preaches morality to us day and night because of our grip on our national homeland, while it refuses to ease its grip on territories it conquered out of clear imperialistic ambitions. Britain should look in the mirror at its own flaws, and not try to force us, in the name of its hypocrisy, to commit suicide.
Jackie Mason on the Israeli/Palestinian Conflict


17 Yemeni Jews secretly airlifted to Israel
The operation — a coordinated effort among the Jewish Agency and the Israeli ministries for the interior, foreign affairs and immigration absorption — was prompted by growing concern for the safety of the Jews in Yemen, according to the Jewish Agency. Anti-Semitic violence has been a growing problem since the 2011 ouster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
The airlift brings to 45 the number of Yemeni Jews who have been brought to Israel this year and 151 since 2009.
Fewer than 90 Jews remain in Yemen, with about half of them living in a guarded structure in the capital, Sa’ana, Haaretz reported.
'Hidden' Polish Jews Embrace Their Heritage in Israel
In order to save their children from the clutches of the Nazis and their Polish accomplices, many Jews in Poland handed over their young children to sympathetic Polish families during the Holocaust era. Many of those children survived physically, but not as Jews.
As they grew up, many of these children raised their own children as Poles, and nominally if not actively Catholic. Nevertheless, many of them remained aware of their Jewish heritage, and in recent years their descendants – now themselves adults, many of them in their 20s and 30s – have come to find out about their Jewish heritage, and are interested in hearing more.
Merkel to become first German leader to visit Dachau
Merkel will lay a wreath at the site’s memorial, make a short speech, and will tour the camp, AFP reported, citing Merkel’s spokesperson.
Merkel will be joined on her visit by Holocaust survivor Max Mannheimer, director of the site, and by Bavaria’s education minister.
In 1992, German Chancellor Helmut Kohl turned down a request to visit the concentration camp, angering Jewish and Israeli groups. Seven years earlier, US President Ronald Reagan also refused to visit, saying that he and Kohl both agreed that it was unnecessary.
Online Hate Prevention Institute Denounces Holocaust-Denying Facebook Account, Calls on Social Media Companies to be ‘Socially Responsible’
“The Untold History” Facebook account was created on March 20, 2013. It mainly features pictures and collages of Holocaust imagery with captions suggesting that the photos were staged, or have been misrepresented by Jewish interests.
Practitioners of Holocaust inversion, a theme which is prevalent on the page, attempt to falsely portray “Israel, Israelis, and Jews as Nazis,” according to Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.
Israel builds world’s first fire forecasting system
Research Director Besora Regev and geographic systems information manager Shai Amram demonstrated Matash to interested delegates from countries including Spain, Bulgaria, Italy, Croatia, South Korea and Kenya at a homeland security conference in Tel Aviv last fall. The system operates in English, so it could be used anywhere.
Strategizing how to fight forest fires is largely luck and guesswork because so many unpredictable or unknown factors affect how it spreads, from wind conditions to the moisture level of the vegetation.
2 Israeli researchers among Top 10 rising stars in Artificial Intelligence
Dr. Aviv Zohar and Dr. Ariel Procaccia — both PhD graduates of computer science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem – have been named among ‘AI’s 10 to Watch‘ by IEEE Intelligent Systems magazine. Published every two years, the list recognizes 10 researchers who are rising stars in the field of artificial intelligence (AI).
Another billion-ish buyout: IBM buys Israeli security firm
Just months after a jumbo buyout of an Israeli start-up by a tech giant, IBM is acquiring Israel-based Trusteer, a maker of security software to protect data from phishing and other malware attacks, in a deal rumored to be worth between $800 million and a cool billion.
Now in the IBM orbit, Trusteer, with R&D in Israel and an office in Boston, will become the nucleus of a new IBM cyber-security research center that the multinational plans to establish here.
Trusteer was established in 2006 and has about 300 employees, and is one of the largest security firms working in the online banking space. Among its customers are institutions like Bank of America, Société Générale, INGDirect, HSBC, NatWest, The Royal Bank of Scotland, and more.
Israel Daily Picture: Another Photographic Treasure Found in a Far-Flung Antique Collection -- From a Jewish "Kiwi" Soldier's Album
Since crossing the arid Sinai Desert and its confrontation with a hostile Turkish enemy and, more often than not, a treacherous contact with Arab Bedu tribesmen - The Auckland Mounted Rifles agreed it was a joy to meet a people who had just been freed from Turkish tyranny. It was a land worked into agriculture and planted with fruit trees and vineyards. Not only were the men taken with the settlement conditions, the horses too were impressed and ate heartily of green feed, and enjoyed the soil firm under foot.
A few weeks later the Regiment remembered the village, the official history "Two Campaigns" reported: "On January 12, the brigade moved north to Rishon LeZion, the Jewish village near to Ayun Kara, and there tents were provided, and training and football again became the normal life."
Star of David Crop Circle Appears in British Wheat Field (VIDEO)
Here’s one for all the conspiracy theorists out there: a crop circle in what appears to be the shape of the Star of David was spotted this week in Hackpen Hill, near Broad Hinton, Wiltshire, United Kingdom.
Discovered on August 11th, photos were posted to the website crop circle connector, and speculation as to what the sign could mean was rampant on social media sites. On one Facebook page focusing on crop circles, one commented pointed to “The Sun, Star and 6 Spirals.”