Tuesday, February 17, 2015
Toddler injured in 2013 attack in critical condition
A 4-year-old girl seriously injured in a 2013 rock-throwing terror attack is fighting for her life, doctors said Tuesday.UPDATE: Toddler injured in 2013 attack dies of pneumonia
Adele Bitton was readmitted to the Schneider’s Children’s Hospital in Petah Tikva earlier this week for pneumonia and on Tuesday, doctors said her condition was critical.
Bitton suffered a traumatic brain injury in March 2013 when Palestinians threw rocks at a car she was in near the West Bank settlement of Ariel, and has been largely unresponsive since then.
Medical staff at the hospital said Bitton’s condition deteriorated after developing respiratory complications from the lung infection. She was transferred to the hospital’s Intensive Care Unit where doctors are working to save her life.
Speaking to Channel 2 News, Bitton’s parents urged the public to pray for their daughter’s recovery, and said they were hoping for the same miracle that saved her life two years ago.
A 4-year-old girl seriously injured in a 2013 rock-throwing terror attack died on Tuesday afternoon from complications from pneumonia, a Petah Tikva hospital said.As anti-Semitism makes a comeback, Obama remains ignorant
“With great sadness we announce the passing of Adele Bitton, who passed away this evening despite doctors’ efforts to save her. We send our condolences to the family,” the Schneider’s Children’s Hospital said in a statement.
Medical staff at the hospital said Bitton’s condition deteriorated after developing respiratory complications from a lung infection. She was transferred to the hospital’s Intensive Care Unit Tuesday where doctors attempted to save her.
The hostility of the intellectual elites to Israel encourages these terrorists as they plot further evil. The men of evil understand that only the Americans stand in their way of realizing the dream of the worldwide caliphate, and when the leader of the Americans isn’t even sure who the enemy is they rightly figure they have little to worry about.We'll be the Judge, episode 2
The 8,000 Jews in Denmark deal with anti-Semitism every day, and the Danish government, full of the usual Scandinavian piety about its wonderfulness, grants millions of kroner to activists who disguise their hatred of Jews, and lecture the Israelis about how they deal with the real-world threats to Israeli survival.
The good news is that France, which has had a habit of sleepwalking through history, seems to have pinched itself awake. Since the Charlie Hebdo and kosher supermarket attacks even the densest Frenchman can see that the Islamic radicals have him in their gunsights along with everyone else who doesn’t bow to Allah in the way of the 9th century. Prime Minister Manuel Valls has ordered the isolation of Muslim jihadis in prisons, increased spending on intelligence agencies and according security forces greater authority to monitor terrorist suspects on the Internet.
Mr. Obama wants more authority, too, but nobody in Congress can figure out why. He already has more authority than he’s willing to use. He could take to heart the admonition of Theodore Roosevelt: “I have a perfect horror of words that are not backed up by deeds.” So do we all.
The second episode of the Israeli satire program "We'll be the Judge," from the creators of Latma's Tribal Update, Israel Channel 1, February 12, 2015. (h/t Ronin0948)
‘I wish I didn’t have a bat mitzvah and Dan was alive’
The mother of the girl who was celebrating her bat mitzvah at a Copenhagen synagogue Saturday when a gunman opened fire outside, killing one Jewish security guard, recalled the attack with horror and grief on Monday, and expressed sorrow at the death of the beloved community member, Dan Uzan.30,000 Attend Rally to Commemorate Copenhagen Victims
“Only an hour beforehand I went out to bring [Uzan] cakes and sandwiches,” Mette Bentow told Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth. “All of the sudden the celebration looks vain. [My daughter] Hannah told me ‘Mom, I wish I had not had a bat mitzvah and that Dan would have stayed alive.'”
Bentow said guests and children were forced to hide in a basement for two hours following the shooting.
Some 30,000 people gathered in Copenhagen Monday to commemorate the victims of twin shootings that shocked the nation, with the Danish premier telling the crowd that an attack on the country's Jews was an attack on all of Denmark.Copenhagen shootings: Friends pay tribute at shrine for the gunman
"Tonight I want to tell all Danish Jews: you are not alone. An attack on the Jews of Denmark is an attack on Denmark, on all of us," said Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt, according to AFP.
She was speaking near a cultural center where a gunman opened fire Saturday on a meeting discussing free speech and Islam, killing a 55-year-old film director.
Early Sunday morning, an attack on Copenhagen's main synagogue, reported to have been carried out by the same gunman, resulted in the death of a 37-year-old Jewish man.
The turnout at the gathering Monday evening, happening in chilly darkness, was large by Danish standards.
On the street corner where Copenhagen’s Islamist gunman died in a shoot-out with police, his friends laid floral tributes in his memory on Monday.Copenhagen Terrorist Pledged Allegiance to Islamic State
Emulating the actions of the hundreds of people who left flowers outside a café and a synagogue two men were shot dead at the weekend, those who regard Omar el-Hussein as a “good guy”, not a terrorist, created a third shrine.
The heap of flowers outside the drab four-storey block of flats where he lived in the mainly immigrant district of Mjølnerparken was smaller than the other two, but no less poignant in the eyes of those who grew up with el-Hussein.
“We’ve put flowers here because we must remember him,” said a young Arab man, who gave his name as Mohamed. “He was a good guy. We don’t believe he did anything wrong. It wasn’t like the police say.” A placard placed with the flowers read: “May Allah be merciful, rest in peace” in both Arabic and Danish.
The terrorist who killed two people in two consecutive attacks in Copenhagen Saturday and in the pre-dawn hours Sunday pledged allegiance to the Islamic State (ISIS), IBN-CNN reported.Danish officials knew gunman ‘at risk of radicalization’
Omar Abdel el-Hussein had posted on his Facebook page, “I pledge allegiance to Abu Bakr [ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi] in full obedience in the good and bad things. And I won’t dispute with him unless it is an outrageous disbelief.”
El-Hussein was armed with two guns when police killed him in a shoot-out after he fled the scene where he gunned down a Jewish volunteer guard at a synagogue and wounded two nearby policemen.
The Prison and Probation Service reported the 22-year-old as being at “risk of radicalization” in September, while he was serving time for a stabbing, according to a statement from the intelligence service.Denmark will grieve, then forget
Also on Tuesday, Copenhagen police cordoned off an area around the site of the deadly weekend attacks after discovering a “suspicious” letter but later said no explosives had been found.
“Investigation finished. No explosives. Cordon has been lifted,” police wrote on Twitter.
Police are on high alert after the weekend attacks on a cultural center and a synagogue that left two people dead.
We also should not expect a significant change from the political leadership. The police and security forces will receive additional resources, the prime minister will continue to shower the wounded victims with sympathy and words of encouragement while condemning terror and saying Denmark is on the side of the "good guys," and the changes, lessons and conclusions reached will last until the next terror attack. Denmark will not take the drastic steps required, such as limiting Islamic activity in the country, and we should not expect to see inciting extremists deported or stripped of their citizenship.Danish Jewish radio silenced ‘for security reasons’
In recent days, of course other voices heard as well, such as that of the deputy chairman of the right-wing Danish People's Party, Soren Espersen, a member of parliament who is considered a great friend to Israel. He blamed the government for allowing the situation to deteriorate to this point with its liberal immigration policy. In an editorial published on Monday, the Jyllands-Posten newspaper also calls for a new way of thinking, and requests, among other things, to put a stop to the harsh criticism of Israel, as it is on Europe's side in the war against radical Islam. At this stage, however, these are still lone voices, and it seems that the significance of this new reality has yet to sink into the Danish consciousness.
Danish Security and Intelligence Services advised the Jewish community to cancel its Radio Shalom broadcasts Monday.Obama, Danish PM Vow to Fight Anti-Semitism
On the recommendation of the Politiets Efterretningstjeneste (PET), for the first time since going on air, host Abraham Kopenhagen did not broadcast his mix of Jewish music and culture Monday evening, reported the Copenhagen Post.
Kopenhagen told Danish-language DR Nyheder, “PET says it’s too dangerous. We do not feel that it is too dangerous, but we respect the information we are given.”
Kopenhagen reportedly turned down a PET security detail and said the station would resume operations when given an all-clear from the intelligence agency.
“We must do as instructed, but we will not have police standing outside the door. We would rather close down until it is quiet again. I do not know how long that will take,” he said.
United States President Barack Obama on Monday expressed solidarity with Denmark after two shootings that shocked the country, and vowed to confront anti-Semitism and assaults on freedom of expression together with Copenhagen, reported AFP.'There is No Future for Jews in Western Europe'
Faced with the spectacle of European Jews being again targeted by extremists, just over a month after similar attacks in Paris, governments were scrambling to reassure their Jewish communities.
During a telephone call, Obama and Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt "agreed on the need to work together to confront attacks on freedom of expression as well as against anti-Semitic violence," the White House said in a statement quoted by AFP.
The statement added that Obama offered his condolences for the victims and expressed "American solidarity with our Danish allies."
Jewish Agency Chairman Natan Sharansky believes that a long-term plan for new immigrants is necessary, he stated in a special interview with Arutz Sheva on Tuesday morning - because, otherwise, thousands of Jews fleeing from Europe will prefer Canada, the US, and Australia over Israel.'Condemnation is Insufficient' for Anti-Semitic Attacks
Sharansky applauded a long-term plan approved by the Cabinet on Sunday to help absorb thousands of potential immigrants, calling the development "very positive."
"We have an increase in immigration [in general], not only because of recent events," Sharansky stated. "There is such an increase in immigration from Western Europe, especially from France. Recent events encourage people to think about the future outside Europe."
The Simon Wiesenthal Center called for a Europe-wide conference against anti-Semitism Monday, fearing that recent attacks against Jews in both Copenhagen and Paris could be the catalyst of a "pan-European epidemic."Prime Minister Thorning-Schmidt Says Danish Jews ‘Belong in Denmark’ (VIDEO)
The prominent Nazi-hunting and Jewish rights group said that Saturday's shootings in Copenhagen "set a mimetic pattern following last month's atrocities in Paris," outlining the perpetrators' triple formula of "freedom of expression activists, police, and Jewish institutions."
The letter, addressed to European Council President Donald Turk, was written by the group's Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels.
In it, Samuels also stressed the role Jews have played in Europe for centuries and how anti-Semitic attacks affect the greater European community as well.
Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt on Monday encouraged Denmark’s Jewish community to stay in the country, a day after a terror attack at a Copenhagen synagogue left one young man dead.German Chancellor Joins European Calls for Jews to Stay
“I want to make very clear that the Jewish community has been in this country for centuries,” Thorning-Schmidt said at a press conference. “They belong in Denmark. They’re part of the Danish community and we wouldn’t be the same without the Jewish community.”
Her comments came a day after Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu called for Europe’s Jews to immigrate to Israel en masse.
On Sunday, Thorning-Schmidt visited the site of the killing and said that an attack against the country’s Jews is an assault against all of Denmark.
“Attacks against Jews hurt all of us,” she said.
Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany was "glad and also grateful" to have a Jewish community, when asked about Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's renewed appeal following Sunday's attack in Copenhagen.Jewish Cemetery in Germany desecrated, mirroring French vandalism
The German government and other officials will do everything possible to ensure the safety of Jewish institutions and citizens in Germany, Merkel told reporters after Sunday's election in the northern city-state of Hamburg.
"We'd like to go on living well together with the Jews who are in Germany today," the chancellor added.
A German foreign ministry spokeswoman had a similar message, saying "We want to do everything so that Jews stay here in Germany and so that they feel well and safe."
A Jewish cemetery in the northern German city of Oldenburg was desecrated over the weekend, the Oldenburger Online newspaper reported on Monday.France’s Hollande vows to protect Jews after cemetery vandalism
Police are investigating the incident which left swastikas splattered on the cemetery's entrance, a wall as well as on two parked cars.
This is not the first time the burial ground was targeted in such a fashion. Right-wing extremists have vandalized the site a number of times. In a prior case, one man was successfully charged in a court of law, sentenced to two years' probation for shooting paint-balls at a number of Jewish gravestones.
In France, an unrelated attack on a Jewish cemetery also transpired over the weekend; vandals uprooted 300 gravestones in the Alsace region, near Germany.
President Francois Hollande vowed the state would protect French Jews with all its force, as he led a ceremony Tuesday at a Jewish cemetery where hundreds of graves were vandalized.Channel 4 News scolds Danish terror survivor for imputing Islamist motivation to gunman
“I know some are asking if they can live in peace in their country, and ask who will protect them against those who wish them harm,” Hollande said at the ceremony in Sarres-Union in the eastern Alsace region.
“One more time, I want to give the Republic’s response — that it will protect you with all its force.”
He was speaking at a Jewish cemetery where some 300 tombs and graves were defaced and damaged last week.
“You get the impression that an army has passed through here,” said the chief rabbi of Strasbourg, Rene Gutman, as he visited the cemetery.
Five boys aged 15 to 17 have been taken into custody over the incident.
Prosecutors say there is no indication they were specifically targeting the Jewish community, with one boy reportedly claiming they were unaware the cemetery was for Jews.
This of course brings us to the following interview of Ms. Kolek on Channel 4 News, which aired on Feb. 15th. Pay attention to the exchange which begins at roughly the 1:50 minute mark and ends with the Channel 4 News anchor’s interruption at the 2:15 mark.Channel4 News interview with Agnieszka Kolek
To summarize:
Ms. Kolek explained that she and others won’t have their free speech stifled by Islamist extremists who wish to impose sharia law.
The anchor interrupts her and says that “we don’t know details about the gunman yet”.
“I could hear him shouting ‘Allah Hu Akbar’. I could hear his voice,” Ms. Kolek responded.
A serious discussion on the threat to European Jews – and democratic values within the continent – posed by Muslim extremism would of course require that the media cease in their never-ending fealty to such intellect-numbing political correctness.
Copenhagen attacks: BBC whitewashes again over Islamism
It never goes away. Last month, the BBC was busy burying or completely whitewashing any mention that the killers who perpetrated the Charlie Hebdo and related Jewish supermarket attacks were Muslim or had any relationship with Islamist ideology.New York Times on Copenhagen shootings: ‘Terror Attacks by a Native Son Rock Denmark’
Now, the same politically correct agenda -- totally incompatible with basic journalistic standards -- is being applied to the Copenhagen attacks. In fact, they're being even more shifty than usual.
Today's BBC website top story on Copenhagen, where a flim director and a Jewish man were shot dead, manages the extraordinary feat of producing a lengthy piece that does not use the word Islamism or Islam once, but does raise the thought that the attacks in Denmark may have been a copy-cat operation based on January's attacks in France.
But what on earth would the killer, named by Danish police as 22 year old Omar El-Hussein, possibly be copying? Read that report (link in previous paragraph) and on the basis of that report you'll be none the wiser. Perhaps he's just a lunatic who goes around copying people, even if he doesn't know what he's copying.
After killing a Danish film director in a Saturday afternoon attack on a Copenhagen cafe and then a Jewish night guard at a synagogue, the 22-year-old gunman responsible for Denmark’s worst burst of terrorism in decades unleashed a final fusillade outside a four-story apartment building before dawn on Sunday…Guardian’s Hugh Muir Taken Apart in Comments Section For Arguing Freedom of Speech is Provocation
…The Danish news media identified him as Omar Abdel Hamid El-Hussein, but the Copenhagen police did not confirm his name. They identified him only as a 22-year-old, born and raised in Denmark, whom they knew for gang-related activity and for several criminal offenses linked to weapons violations and violence…
Writing for the Guardian in a piece entitled Our response to the Copenhagen attacks will define us, Muir opined: “Free speech as legal and moral pre-requisites in a free society must be defended. But there are also other obligations to be laid upon those who wish to live in peaceful, reasonably harmonious societies. Even after Paris, even after Denmark, we must guard against the understandable temptation to be provocative in the publication of these cartoons if the sole objective is to establish that we can do so. With rights to free speech come responsibilities.Former French Foreign Minister Not Taking Back PM Jewish Wife Slur [video]
“That seems to me the moral approach, but there is a practical issue here too. There is no negotiating with men with guns. If progress is to come, it will be via dialogue with the millions of faithful Muslims who would never think to murder but also abhor publication of these cartoons. We cannot have that conversation in a time and spirit of provocation. And to have it would not be an act of weakness. The strong approach is not necessarily to do what is possible, but to do what is right.”
But the timidity of his argument was laid bare by angry readers, who took to the comments section to chastise Muir for his Vichyite stance.
‘Wasserfall’ lamented “Yet another Guardian comment piece with the obligatory “but” – so where do we draw the line about being provocative to certain people Hugh? Cartoons, women’s dress, gay rights, the food we eat, what we are ‘allowed’ to read? At what point is ‘not being provocative’ turned into ‘appeasement’ and eventually ‘surrender’?
“I note The Guardian is selling “Je Suis Charlie” solidarity badges, have you got one on Hugh? Or are you afraid that wearing one would be considered provocation as well?”
‘Trivet1′ agreed, noting “The author is unable to express a single principled position without then qualifying it with some mealy-mouthed equivocation. Is it any wonder that these enemies of the West regards us as weak, unprincipled and vacillating?”
‘Harif_’ succinctly asked “What’s provocative about Jews in Synagogues Hugh?”
Former French foreign minister Roland Dumas, 92, would not budge from the comment he made over the weekend, when he criticized Prime Minister Manuel Valls, saying he “has personal alliances that mean he has prejudices.”New Israel Defense Force Chief of Staff Inaugurated
“Everyone knows he is married to someone really good but who has an influence on him,” Dumas told BFM-TV, referring to Valls’ Jewish wife, violinist Anne Gravoin.
When the interviewer asked Dumas directly: “Is he under Jewish influence?” the late Socialist President François Mitterrand’s foreign minister responded, “Probably, I would think so.”
On Monday, in a FRANCE 24 interview, after Dumas had been rebuked by France’s ruling Socialists, he replied: “I will not apologize!”
For its part, the Socialist Party declared that Dumas’ statements were “unworthy of a Socialist decorated by the Republic.”
Inaugurating Gen. Gadi Eisenkot as the new chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday warned him that “you will not have a single day of grace” due to turbulence in region.Jerusalem Arab Indicted for Plotting with Hamas
“The Middle East is disintegrating,” said Netanyahu. “States are collapsing. An empire with nuclear aspirations is charging into this vacuum,” a reference to Iran. “It vows openly to destroy the State of Israel. Joining it are the forces of extremist Islam who are breaking through every crack in the Middle East and bringing their murderous acts to the entire world.”
Eisenkot succeeds Gen. Benny Gantz, who led the IDF in its 50-day war with Hamas in Gaza last summer and supervised various cross-border operations during his four-year term. Netanyahu told Eisenkot that the next four years are likely to be even tougher.
The Jerusalem District Attorney has submitted an indictment against Mohammed Abu-Taya, a 20-year-old resident of the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Shiloach (Silwan in Arabic) located adjacent to the Old City, for apparent membership in the Hamas terrorist group.Khaled Abu Toameh: Fatah official survives assassination attempt in Gaza
The indictment charged Abu-Taya with making contact with a foreign agent, and laid out evidence showing a high likelihood that he had joined Hamas.
Abu-Taya holds residency in the state of Israel but not citizenship. According to the charges, while studying in Al-Yarmuk University in Jordan in 2013, Abu-Taya made the acquaintance of a Hamas terrorist, and they were in close contact through meetings and Facebook.
Last May the Hamas terrorist proposed that Abu-Taya join the Islamist terrorist organization, offering him to either become a "martyr" and conduct a suicide mission, or alternatively to carry out a different kind of attack.
A senior Fatah official in the Gaza Strip on Monday survived an assassination attempt while two of his aides were injured.An empty boycott
Three unidentified gunmen opened fire at a car belonging to Ma’moun Sweidan, who is in charge of Fatah’s international relations, in the center of Gaza City.
Sweidan was not in the car at the time of the attack. Two of his aides, who were sitting in the car, which was parked outside his office, were injured and taken to hospital.
The two were identified as Salameh Al-Aweidat and Yasser Elayan.
The attack was the second of its kind against a senior Fatah official in less than 24 hours.
On Sunday night, arsonists set fire to a car belonging to another senior Fatah official, Abdel Muni’m Al-Tahrawi, who lives in the Nusseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip.
No presidential order was issued on this decision, as is normally customary with such actions, but Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' bureau in Ramallah did issue a statement declaring that the committee "has President Mahmoud Abbas' full support."PMW: PA renews religious incitement that led to recent terror
There was good reason for the absence of a presidential order -- violation of a presidential order is a very serious offense in the Palestinian Authority, which comes with very heavy penalties. If the decision had been made by presidential order it would have made thousands of Palestinian vendors, not to mention hundreds of thousands of Palestinian consumers, vulnerable to criminal prosecution.
Both the vendors and the consumers in the Palestinian Authority assume that the boycott will not be very strictly enforced, if at all. They know that at best, a black market will develop whereby the boycotted products will be sold "under the table" at all the stores only without tax, and at worst, the Palestinian consumers will have to venture out just beyond the Green Line to the Israeli operated stores to purchase said items.
Now the PA has renewed this Al-Aqsa Mosque incitement:Senior PA leader: Israel is the enemy
1. The PA Mufti Sheikh Muhammad Hussein said that Israel aspires "to build the alleged Temple on the ruins of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque." [Feb. 12, 2015]
2. Abbas' Advisor on Religious and Islamic Affairs Mahmoud Al-Habbash said that UNESCO must prevent Israel from "destroying the human heritage in Jerusalem." [Feb. 11, 2015]
3. The PA Minister of Religious Affairs Sheikh Yusuf Ida'is warned that since January, Israel has made "over a hundred attacks and incidents of desecration of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Ibrahimi Mosque (i.e., Cave of the Patriarchs)" and that "the Al-Aqsa Mosque is in grave and direct danger and that with every sunrise, this danger grows." [Feb. 5, 2015]
The PA considers any presence of Jews on the Temple Mount an "attack" or "invasion," and denies all Jewish history in Jerusalem. In addition, it denies that the Western Wall - Judaism's holiest site since the destruction of the Temple 2,000 years ago - was a Jewish holy site in the past. The PA falsely teaches that Jews never prayed there prior to the 20th century.
Fatah Central Committee member Nabil Shaath: "The problem in Jerusalem is the Israelis, the Israeli enemy, and what it is doing in Jerusalem. Israel wants to swallow all of East Jerusalem." [Official PA TV, Feb. 4, 2015]
PA TV news: Mother's Day and Dalal Mughrabi’s massacre of 37 are reasons to celebrate
PA TV reporter: "In March, [we celebrate] Women’s Day, the anniversary of fighter Dalal Mughrabi’s Martyrdom-death, Mother’s Day, the Al-Karameh Day and today - the day of loyalty and love for the released female prisoners." [PA TV (Fatah), March 18, 2013]
PA official: Israel views any opinions different from their own as "incitement"
Official PA TV host: "Concerning the Israeli incitement against the official PA TV channel and Voice of Palestine Radio in general... There have been many incitement campaigns and accusations against PA TV and Voice of Palestine Radio, according to which they engage in incitement..."
PA Deputy Minister of Information Mahmoud Khalifa: "The Israelis’ narrative and point of view are different [from ours]. The Israeli sees you as an enemy and from this point, he deals [with you]. He does not deal with us as partners in the construction of a historic peace and a prosperous, safe and stable future for the region. He wants to deal with you as an enemy and he views any action that does not fit his opinion as incitement."
[Official PA TV, Feb. 4, 2015]
Report Says Gaza Hackers Used Pornographic Films to Access Israeli Computers
Palestinian hackers have reportedly joined the ranks of the “national struggle” against Israel, according to a recent report by Trend Micro, a US based cyber security firm.Report: Hamas, Revolutionary Guard Leaders Met in Secret
In the last two years, tech-savvy Palestinians associated with Hamas have stepped up their efforts to steal information from strategically vital companies and organizations, using pornographic films to gain access to sensitive Israeli targets, the report said.
Dubbed “Operation Arid Viper,” the cyber attacks went after Israeli targets through servers operated by Hetzner Online AG, an internet hosting company and data center based in Germany. Though the attacks came from German servers, according to Trend Micro, they were controlled by hackers in the Gaza Strip.
The report said that the attackers had succeeded in infecting computers in the “offices of government, social media networks, an infrastructure provider, a military organization and one academic institution.”
The method was very simple, and according to the report, not very sophisticated. E-mails were sent to employees in the targeted institutions, with various lures to convince the recipients to open the links attached in the e-mails.
The renewed relationship between Iran and Hamas has been simmering below the media's radar for months, Walla! News reports Tuesday.JCPA: Hamas’ Relations with Iran and Saudi Arabia
According to the daily, the Al-Hayat newspaper revealed Tuesday morning that Hamas leader-in-exile Khaled Meshaal met with Iranian Revolutionary Crescent Guards commander Qasem Solemeini, in Turkey - just days after the end of Operation Protective Edge in Gaza over the summer.
There, the two leaders reportedly reached a consensus on several issues, including Iran's military and economic support for Hamas after over a year of hiatus; the possibility of Meshaal visiting Solemeini in Tehran; and other conditions for resuming diplomatic relations.
Both Iran and Hamas have agreed not to speak publicly about their stances on the Syrian Civil War, but Hamas reportedly agreed to support Syrian President Bashar Assad, as Iran has quietly throughout the conflict.
Several weeks later, the report states, a high-ranking delegation of Hamas officials visited Tehran, headed by Mohammed Nasser. The visit marks an apparent turning point in relations; however, an official announcement was kept quiet, as repeated requests from Hamas to open offices in a Hezbollah-controlled area of Beirut were rejected.
Since the accession of the new Saudi king, Salman bin Abdelaziz, Arab media have been reporting on an imminent warming of ties between Saudi Arabia and the “moderate” (compared to the Salafi jihadist movements) Islamic movements, including Hamas.CHP deputy: AK Party spent millions to seem friendly with Israel
These reports claim that the new Saudi king’s agenda will concern Syria, Yemen, and Egypt.
According to Hamas sources, King Salman is displeased with his predecessor’s policy over the past two years, which led to the strengthening of Iranian influence in the region, and is likely to change Saudi policy.
These sources believe he will abort the attempts at an Egyptian-Qatari reconciliation and establish a new axis with Qatar, Turkey, and the Muslim Brotherhood – the only axis, he assesses, that can successfully counter the growing influence of Shiite Iran and of the Sunni jihadist organizations.
Improved ties between Saudi Arabia and the Muslim Brotherhood are expected to redound to Hamas’ benefit, since the Saudis have effective leverage over Egypt and can influence Egyptian President Sisi to change his stance toward Hamas.
It is also believed in Hamas that the new Saudi king will work for a national reconciliation in Egypt between Sisi and the Muslim Brotherhood.
AK Party government officials have increasingly employed anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic rhetoric to gain votes from the party's conservative base before the parliamentary elections scheduled to take place on June 7 this year.Sunni Gulf Nations May Act Against Yemen's Shiite Houthis if UN Doesn't Intervene
“We [the CHP] have determined that the AK Party paid $65.4 million to lobby firms in the US to tell the world that they're friends of Israel. We have documents to prove it,” Erdoğdu said in a press conference in İstanbul.
The deputy claimed that the AK Party paid 19 lobby firms in the US, including DiNovo Strategies, FleishmanHillard, Neusner Communications, Livingston Group, Gephardt Group and DPA Piper in order to appear as a friend of Israel. He said that the AK Party government is exploiting the sensitivities of Turkish people to the Palestine-Israel conflict in order to solidify its support among its conservative voter base.
“On the one hand they portray themselves to the Turkish people as being in a constant fight with the Israel while on the other hand they worked hard to make the Jewish lobby in the US believe that the AK Party is a pro-Israeli administration and paid millions of dollars to that end. This is completely hypocritical,” said Erdoğdu.
The unofficial Jewish caucus in Congress has traditionally supported Turkey's position on the Armenian issue in the past, but this support seems to be on the wane in recent years in parallel with AK Party government officials' increasingly anti-Semitic rhetoric.
In a statement released Sunday, the GCC is demanding UN Security Council action against the Houthi government, which took power in late January and has since dissolved the Yemeni Parliament. The Houthi rebels are Shiite Muslims with close ties to the government of Iran. Their official slogan is “God is the Greatest. Death to America. Death to Israel. Damn the Jew and Victory to Islam.”
The GCC nations, meanwhile, are run by Sunni Muslim leaders, and they perceive the overthrow of former Yemeni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi as a threat to their own stability. Their statement on Sunday calls for the Security Council to permit coalition military responses to the “over the Houthis’ illegitimate seizure of power” and allows for the GCC to disregard the Security Council if it does not act: “In the case of failure to reach an agreement … the GCC member states will take measures which enable them to maintain their vital interests in the security and stability of Yemen.”
This is not the first time that the GCC publicly rebukes the Houthi government, expressing no willingness to accept their legitimacy or work with them. Last week, the GCC issued a statement denouncing the Houthi “coup” and warning that the new leadership would take the country down a “dark tunnel.” Meanwhile, Houthi leaders contend that, without their overthrow of the government, Yemen had become a hotbed of Sunni terrorism and that their presence in power would be “in the interest of all Yemenis without exception.” Shiite militia chief Abdel Malek al-Houthi warned, “If Al-Qaeda takes control of the country, it will plot against our brothers in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.”
