Thursday, January 02, 2014
Khaled Abu Toameh: Will Arabs Have the Courage to Label Muslim Brotherhood a Terrorist Group?
The question being asked today in the Arab world is whether other countries will take similar measures against Muslim Brotherhood groups and branches.The "Palestinian Revolution" Began In 1965
Buoyed by the Egyptian move, Palestinian and Jordanian political analysts and activists have urged their leaders to seize the opportunity and crack down on the Islamists in their countries.
But for now it seems that most Arabs, especially the Jordanians and Palestinians, are reluctant to follow the Egyptians — the reason why this week the Egyptians urged the members of the Arab League to enforce a counter-terrorism treaty that would block funding and support for Muslim Brotherhood.
Badr Abdelatty, spokesman for the Egyptian Foreign ministry, said Arab League members that signed the 1998 treaty should enforce it against the Muslim Brotherhood, which has a presence in most Arab countries.
In 1965 - before the 1967 conflict which resulted in the "occupation" and before "settlements" were constructed.CiF Watch prompts correction to false Indy claim about “caged” Palestinian kids
So says Abbas (thanks IMRA):-
Final Status Agreement Guarantees Our Rights(h/t NormanF)
“We negotiate with Israel to reach a solution that leads to a Palestinian state within the 1967 occupied territory, with Jerusalem as a capital. We negotiate to reach a fair solution to the refugees’ issue based on the UN Resolution 194 as stated in the Arab Peace Initiative”, said Abbas.
...Abbas made reference to the 1965 Revolution by saying it was a success; its ideas of adhering to the national rights and aspirations have been successful from one generation to another.
A couple of hours ago we posted about a horribly misleading report in The Independent (Israel government tortures Palestinian children by keeping them in cages, human rights group says, Jan. 1) which included the following:
The broad, unsubstantiated insinuation, based on very vague wording in a report by the radical NGO PCATI, that Palestinian kids detained by Israeli security personnel are “tortured”.Following our complaint to Indy editors, the word torture in the headline was placed in quotes and, more importantly, the false charge that Palestinian children were caged for months has been amended.
The charge, based on completely uncorroborated allegations, based on a PCATI report, that Palestinian children are sexually abused while in custody.
The completely erroneous charge that Palestinian children were caged “for months” - an allegation which was not even leveled by PCATI, nor by anyone involved in the story.
Template BBC report on prisoner release
The caption to the photograph used to head early versions of the report (which also appears in later ones) states:PMW: YouTube restores PMW video that exposed Fatah incitement to murder
“The prisoners’ releases are deeply resented by families of their mainly Israeli victims”.
In fact, as those who have studied the list of prisoners provided by the Israeli Prison Service will be aware, in this particular round of releases, the number of Palestinian victims is higher than the number of Israeli victims. Like the rest of the Western media, the BBC however is determined to avoid exploring the subject of Palestinians murdered by Palestinians.
Last week, Palestinian Media Watch reported that YouTube had blocked a PMW video in Hebrew that exposed Fatah's incitement to murder, defining it as a violation of YouTube's "policy on depiction of harmful activities."The Jordan Valley is the answer
PMW had exposed a video that was posted on the YouTube account of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades (the military wing of Fatah), which Fatah subsequently publicized on its official Facebook page.
The video incites Palestinians to kidnap, bomb and kill Israelis.
The Jordan Valley is the answer -- it provides the minimum vital strategic depth, it is a defensive strip against outside threats and allows the fight against terrorism to be effective. Full Israeli sovereignty in the Jordan Valley will negate the need for pointless discussions over security arrangements -- give us sovereignty and we will tend to our security needs. Even those who are prepared for less understand that there is no technological system replacement for a defensive buffer and that we cannot trust foreign forces to protects the lives of our soldiers and be the first to retreat during a crisis. The entire Jordan Valley, under complete Israeli control, is Israel's eastern border.Elliot Abrams: Confidence-destroying measures
One can perhaps forgive a murderer's family for greeting him with kisses; one cannot forgive the highest authorities of the PA and PLO for doing so, and Silvan Shalom is right in asking what lesson this teaches all Palestinians. Palestinian leaders refuse to make any moral distinctions, not separating those who committed crimes of violence from those who did not, nor even -- the very least that might be expected -- separating those who killed soldiers from those who killed civilians.Former Navy Head: Who Releases Terrorists With No Peace Deal?
The official Palestinian glorification of those who murdered Israelis is now the backdrop to Kerry's arrival in Israel today to advance "peace."
Marom, who spoke at a seminar of the National Security Studies Center at the University of Haifa, criticized the government for making a connection between the terrorist release and continued construction in Judea and Samaria.Arab MKs: No Way Will we Live Under the PA
"Releasing terrorist murderers with blood on their hands without a peace agreement to keep together a coalition that would allow construction in the settlements, is in my opinion a worthless move,” said Marom.
MK Ahmed Tibi (Ra’am-Ta’al), who used to be an adviser to former PA Chairman Yasser Arafat and a resident of Tayibeh, told Maariv in response to the report, "This is a bizarre offer which treats Arab citizens as a chess piece that one can move around and change.”Leaked PA document predicts ‘third intifada’
He added, “No offer that involves an exchange of population will be accepted, neither by the Arab Israeli community nor by the Palestinian Authority. Once they feared our nationhood, now they fear our citizenship.”
An internal Palestinian Authority document leaked to Israeli media has predicted a “third intifada” if US-brokered peace talks fail.Cameron, Merkel scheduled to visit Israel in February
The document, whose contents were reported by the Hebrew daily Yedioth Ahronoth and Israel Radio on Thursday morning, said that if the peace process collapsed, a violent uprising was likely to erupt in the West Bank. Jihadi and Salafi groups were also likely to become more active, possibly by setting up a network of terrorist cells with the intention of carrying out attacks against Israel, the report said.
The report also estimated that Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, might secretly renew its military activity in the West Bank if its rift with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah party continued.
According to the report, such a tactic by Hamas would receive the backing of Palestinian prisoners released to Gaza in exchange for the release of captured IDF soldier Gilad Shalit.
Both German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Prime Minister David Cameron will visit Israel in February, but Israeli diplomatic officials stressed the visits are not connected to the diplomatic process with the Palestinians since they were planned months ago.Palestinian Terrorists’ Forgotten Weapon: Murder by Stoning
Most Americans have no trouble recognizing the lethal danger of rock-throwing. Recall the case of three drunken teenagers who threw rocks at cars on the Capital Beltway in Washington, D.C., in 1990. Thirty drivers or passengers were wounded, including a girl who suffered irreversible brain damage. The attackers were convicted of “assault with intent to murder” and each sentenced to 40 years in prison. An editorial in the Washington Post at the time correctly asked, “What’s the difference between assault with a deadly weapon—a shooting—and assault with rocks that hit cars at potentially lethal speeds?”Bad luck: Same family killed by Assad in Syria and by IDF bombing in Gaza
There is no difference, of course, to any reasonable person. But there’s a very big difference to New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman and some of his colleagues. In an April 2012 column, Friedman endorsed what he called “nonviolent resistance by Palestinians”—and then listed boycotts, hunger strikes, and rock-throwing as examples of such “resistance.”
But if you doubt the atrocity tales that Islamic supremacists tell, you're a greasy Islamophobe, a genocide denier, and worse.Rachel’s Tomb Terrorist Shot
IDF troops shot a Palestinian Authority terrorist as he was throwing stones at Rachel’s Tomb.IDF Prepares for Tunnel Warfare
Palestinian Authority terrorists regularly throw firebombs and stones at the Jewish holy site and at the Jews who visit, as well as the occasional explosive device.
The IDF is planning new combat training that will prepare soldiers to fight underground, in tunnels built by terrorists, Maariv/nrg reports.Ariel Sharon’s life in grave danger, doctor says
“The tunnels infrastructure has expanded and continues to expand. New, more technologically advanced tunnels have been found. So we cannot relate to this threat in the same manner we used to,” the paper quoted Lieutenant-Colonel Ziv Namni as saying.
Former prime minister Ariel Sharon is suffering from vital organ failure after his condition deteriorated significantly in recent weeks, Sheba Medical Center director Zeev Rotstein said on Thursday. It was a first statement to the press by hospital personnel since a spokesman put out a laconic statement Wednesday saying the comatose leader’s condition had taken a turn for the worse.Hezbollah Buries Commander Who was Missing for Months in Syria
A Hezbollah commander, who had been missing for months in Syria, was buried in Lebanon on Wednesday after his body was repatriated following his torture and killing by rebels, relatives told the AFP news agency.Jeffrey Goldberg: For Iran, 2013 Was a Very Good Year
Hussein Salah Habib, 30, was captured by opposition fighters during the fight for Qusayr, a strategic town near the Lebanese border that fell to the regime on June 5.
Remember that interim Iranian nuclear agreement forged in Geneva on Nov. 24, the one accompanied by blaring trumpets and soaring doves?MEMRI: Punitive Measures Against Athletes For Flashing Four-Finger "Pro-MB" Sign Spark Controversy In Egypt
Would it surprise you to know that the agreement -- a deal that doesn’t, by the way, neutralize the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear program, just freezes the program, more or less, in place -- has not yet been implemented? Would it surprise you to learn that this deal might not be implemented for another month, or more? Or that in this long period of non-implementation, Iran is free to do with its nuclear program whatever it wishes? And that one of the things it is doing is building and testing new generations of centrifuges? Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Agency, recently said, “We have two types of second-generation centrifuges. We also have future generations which are going through their tests.”
Kung Fu fighter Muhammad Youssef, a gold medalist at the Moscow Kung Fu World Championship in late October 2013, attended the medal awarding ceremony in a T-shirt bearing the four-fingered Rabi'a symbol, and also flashed the sign while receiving the medal. In response, the Egyptian Kung Fu Association suspended him from all competitions at national and international levels for a year, saying that he should have waved the Egyptian flag at the ceremony instead of making partisan political gestures. Furthermore, the Egyptian Sports Ministry stripped him of his medal and announced that he would be investigated for mixing politics and sports and deviating from the national consensus.Egypt refuses to extradite convicted PA official
Colonel Rashid Abu-Shbak, head of the Palestinian Authority’s Preventative Security Agency in Gaza from 2002 to 2006 and head of internal security in the city prior to Hamas’s violent takeover of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, was tried in absentia by an anti-corruption court in Ramallah for the embezzlement of nearly $1 million during his service as security chief.Vodafone Egypt accused of sending coded terror message via online ad
The former security official, who currently divides his time between Cairo and the United Arab Emirates, was convicted on December 29 and charged with a fine of $930,000 in addition to his prison sentence with hard labor.
PROSECUTORS have questioned officials in one of Egypt's largest telecommunications companies over an online advertisement featuring a puppet, which a controversial blogger has accused of delivering a coded message linked to the Muslim Brotherhood group, the company said Wednesday.
The accusations made against Vodafone Egypt's ad starring well-known puppet Abla Fahita come shortly after the government designated the Brotherhood a terrorist organisation.
