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Friday, October 04, 2013

10/04 Links Pt 2: Hamas 'Charity' Operating in the UK, NGO Uses Blood Libel to Raise Funds

From Ian:

UK Charity Commission Permits Hamas Charity
We should welcome, then, the promise by Shawcross that pro-terror organizations will no longer be free to employ the moral monopoly afforded by charitable status to shroud their extremist activities.
Unfortunately, however, charities accused of extremism do not appear to be concerned by any of the proposed changes. Interpal, for example, a leading British charity supported by a number of British politicians and cabinet members, is, in the United States, designated a terrorist organization. A comprehensive profile of Interpal, written by this author and published by the Gatestone Institute in January 2013, examined the charity's links to terrorist groups as well as its trustees and staff's expressed support for extremist ideas.
Children’s Rights Group Using a Blood Libel Against Israel to Raise Money
Clearly, there is some uncertainty over the circumstances surrounding the shot that tragically crippled Atta Sabah. Some reports indicate the shot was fired after Israeli soldiers saw a firebomb, others omit or discount this story.
But the story Karakashian told of a young boy being lured into place and then shot in cold blood just doesn’t stand up in light of what the UN and the PCHR report about what happened on May 21, 2013.
This raises a serious question: Is Defense for Children Palestine using a blood libel as a publicity tool?
Israel: European stance on circumcision ‘intolerable’
Israel denounced the Council of Europe for its recent anti-circumcision resolution Friday, calling on it to rescind its statements and warning that the resolution “fosters hate” and racism in Europe.
“Circumcision of male children is an ancient religious tradition of two important religions, Judaism and Islam, and it is also common among some Christian circles,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said in a statement Friday.
Israel to Run for Security Council Seat in 2019
Israel plans to run for a rotating seat on the UN Security Council for the first time ever for 2019-2020, its envoy said on Thursday.
"We're going all out to win," Ambassador Ron Prosor told the Reuters news agency, adding, "It's about time."
'We are not Arabs. We are Christians who speak Arabic'
It was no coincidence that Khalloul chose the Aramaic word for allies to describe his people. In his view, Israeli Christians are not mercenaries, as they might be perceived, but in fact allies. "We want to defend the holy land alongside the Jews," he insisted. He mentioned the Christians' support for the establishment of a national homeland for the Jews in the 1947 UNSCOP Committee. In a letter to the committee at the time, the Maronites rejected any reference to the land of Israel as Arab land.
Khalloul said further that global Christianity supported them, but refrained from making the support public because of the fact that Christians in the Middle East are hostages in the hands of Islamic forces.
American Analyst ‘Grateful’ for Dismissal of Libel Case Brought by Son of Mahmoud Abbas
American political analyst Jonathan Schanzer said he was “grateful” a judge had dismissed a libel case brought against him by Yasser Abbas, the son of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
Schanzer, a political analyst and vice president of the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies, was sued for libel after he wrote an online opinion post for Foreign Policy magazine in June 2012 that called into question the legitimacy of PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s two sons’ wealth.
Indonesia’s last synagogue, an intended heritage site, destroyed
Indonesia’s last synagogue has been destroyed, a Dutch news site reported.
Unidentified persons demolished the Beith Shalom synagogue in Surabaya on the island of Java to its foundations sometime earlier this year, according to a report on Indoweb.nl.
The synagogue has seen a number of anti-Israel protests staged in front of it and was sealed by Islamic hardliners sealed in 2009, according to the Jakarta Globe.
Head of Greece’s Golden Dawn party jailed
The head of Greece’s extremist right-wing Golden Dawn party was jailed early Thursday, pending trial on charges of running a criminal organization in an investigation into his party triggered by the killing of a left-wing rapper.
Nikos Michaloliakos, who is a sitting member of Parliament, was ordered remanded in custody in the early hours of Thursday morning, after overnight testimony that lasted for more than six hours.
Nazi Hunters Call on Dutch to Dissolve Gov't Advisory Body
The Simon Wiesenthal Center has written a letter to the Dutch Prime Minister asking him to disband a statutory government body that has called on the Netherlands to develop closer ties to the terrorist organization Hamas at the expense of Israel.
The letter to PM Mark Rutte condemns a report by the Advisory Council on International Affairs which calls for the Netherlands to distance itself from Israel and develop closer ties with Hamas. The Dutch Parliament is set to debate the report on October 8th.
Hobby Lobby Head Likes Jewish Prayer Books, Jewish Holidays Not So Much
OK. So the ironically named David Green doesn’t like bar mitzvah cards, Hanukkah, women, or the Jews. OR DOES HE? Because the plot thickens, dear readers. Turns out Green is the owner of one of the world’s largest collections of rare biblical texts and artifacts, including, most recently, a siddur reportedly dated to 840 C.E. This latest acquisition was announced on September 26 by Green’s son, Steve Green, amid much excitement. The younger conjectured that the siddur could be the “earliest connection today’s practicing Jews have to the roots of their modern-day rabbinic liturgy.”
National Library to digitize medieval manuscripts
National Library Judaica curator Aviad Stollman said it will be digitizing the Palatina Library’s collection of about 1,600 documents dating to the Middle Ages.
He said the collection includes rare illuminated manuscripts and one of the oldest existing copies of the Mishna, a central Jewish text.
Variety: Israel’s Major Export: TV Know-How
For several years, Israel has been at the forefront of countries exporting TV program content to the United States. Keshet, where Showtime’s “Homeland” has its roots, holds the lion’s share of responsibility.
Keshet holds 42% of the Israeli market share and boasts a prolific global distribution and production arm with U.K., Canadian and Australian outposts.
It’s a stamp that works across many cultures and has translated to successful programming on five continents. Keshet Intl. managing director Alon Shtruzman calls it “edgy mainstream,” comparing Keshet’s success to the local technology boom of the 1990s that was exported to Silicon Valley and earned Israel the nickname of “Start-Up Nation.”
Dexter, Hell on Wheels, Vampire Academy stars in Israel
A star-studded group of Hollywood actors and musicians are taking part in a cultural, historical and religious adventure across the Holy Land. America’s Voices in Israel is once again hosting a week-long tour of the country for the celebrities.
The contingent includes actress Lea Thompson (“Switched at Birth”, “Back to the Future”), C.S. Lee (“Dexter”), Vivian Bang (“Sullivan & Son”), Anson Mount (“Hell on Wheels”), music video director Howard Deutch, Zoey Deutch (who stars in “Vampire Academy: Blood Sisters”) and musician Madelyn Deutch.
Israeli-backed start-up unveils gas-producing plant
Like the alchemists of yore, a US company is seeking to convert a substance the world has a lot of — natural gas — into one it needs more of — gasoline.
Primus Green Energy, owned by the Israel Corporation, on Wednesday opened a plant to demonstrate the commercial viability of its grand plan: to convert millions of cubic feet of natural gas into hundreds of thousands of gallons of gasoline.
Repair work to begin at Auschwitz despite deficit
An international foundation established to preserve the Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial in Poland has fallen short of its fundraising goal, but still plans to begin repair work there.
The site includes the barracks, gas chambers and other structures of the former death camp, where Germany’s Nazis killed some 1.5 million people, mostly Jews, during World War II.
Phone business revolution starts in Israel, says Alcatel-Lucent CEO
One of the world’s largest telecom companies is relying on Israel to restrategize and reformulate key parts of its business – and the technology developed in Israel by Alcatel-Lucent by its CloudBand team has turned out to be good enough to deploy worldwide.
CloudBand is Alcatel-Lucent’s implementation of Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) – the consolidation of carrier network functions across distributed industry standard servers, creating a cloud that telcos can use for standard and even advanced services. It’s where the telecom world is going, as far as Alcatel-Lucent CEO Michel Combes is concerned, and at a press conference in Alcatel-Lucent’s Israel headquarters in Kfar Sava, Combes outlined his vision of how NFV, and particularly CloudBand, will change the telecom world, and why Alcatel-Lucent, with the help of its Israeli CloudBand team.
Forbes: For Real Innovation, It's Not Silicon Valley But Silicon Wadi
Ask most people what they know about the state of Israel, and you’ll get some version of “War, violence, Holy Land, and bus bombs.” But amidst all the turmoil, real people are living real lives. They go to work, eat good food, love their children, and talk to their neighbors.
Oh, and they start businesses.

According to the Startup Genome Project, Tel Aviv, Israel — dubbed Silicon Wadi, which means valley in Hebrew — has the No. 2 startup ecosystem in the world. It has more startups per capita than anywhere else, and it has 61 companies on the NASDAQ. That’s more than Europe, Japan, Korea, and China combined!
Israel in 4K/Ultra HD