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On the eve of a visit by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to Europe, two suspects in Belgium were detained and charged with preparing a terrorist attack. A diplomat from the Iranian Embassy in Austria was arrested in Germany.
Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif claimed the arrests were part of a “sinister false flag ploy,” and designed to sabotage Iran’s attempt to court Europe to stick with the Iran Deal.
However, the arrests will overshadow Tehran’s attempts to court European countries as the US pushes sanctions.
The arrest of terror plotters in Europe comes amid increasing pressure on the Iranian regime. Tehran has faced more than a week of protests that cap more than six months of unrest in Iran.
"We strongly condemn the Iranian regime's support for terrorism which clearly continues to threaten out European allies. The recently announced US sanctions on Iran are designed specifically to stop this kind of destabilizing activity," US Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell said in reaction to the arrests.
Iran has set up terrorist and intelligence infrastructure across Europe with aim of assassinating exiled Iranian dissidents and moderate Arab leaders, particularly those whose countries rival Iran in the Persian Gulf, intelligence experts told Israel Hayom Tuesday.PMW: PA TV to pregnant Palestinians: Your fetus will be a “Martyr for Palestine”
According to both Israeli and foreign intelligence experts, the vast Iranian infrastructure was set up to serve the Revolutionary Guard Corps' elite black-ops arm, the Quds Force.
One foreign intelligence official said that a prominent Arab leader had recently canceled a visit to Europe following solid information suggesting that an Iranian terrorist cell was planning to assassinate him.
Belgian authorities announced Monday that they have exposed extensive infrastructure deployed by the Quds Force and Iranian intelligence. Three people were arrested, including an Iranian diplomat, on suspicion of plotting to bomb a meeting of an exiled Iranian opposition group in France.
The IntelliTimes intelligence blog said Tuesday that former Prime Minister Ehud Barak was also in Paris during that time.
Pregnant mothers all over the world are busy imagining the future of their unborn child and wishing him/her the best. The Palestinian Authority is promoting a song lately in which mothers are taught to see their unborn fetus as a future “Martyr for Palestine.” The song has been broadcast on official PA radio, Fatah’s Awdah TV, and now official PA TV.
“Our Martyrs are convoys and our bones are mountains
We don’t surrender to the lowly
We aren't deterred by imprisonment
Palestine is etched on the heart of the fetus
A proud Martyr in his mother’s womb
And the Arab state will remain ours - Arab, Arab Palestine...
We [hold] the rifles to our chests and our eyes are raised to you
Our homes are trenches and our souls are the sacrifice for you
O Jerusalem, you will not remain stolen.”
[Official PA TV, June 19 and 26, 2018]
“Martyrs” (Shahids) are those who die for Allah. “Martyrdom” has been presented by the PA as the most honorable status achievable in Islam.
Palestinian Media Watch reported when this song appeared on PA radio together with five other songs all encouraging "Martyrdom."
The “from fetus to Martyr” image has been used in the past by the PA and Hamas. When a Palestinian terrorist murderer, Yasser Hamdouni, collapsed while exercising in an Israeli prison in 2016, PA District Governor of Ramallah Laila Ghannam comforted his mother, using the image:
Text on image: “You carried him in your womb as a fetus to be separated from him as he is raised over your head as a Martyr (Shahid).
How long the separation, [due to] the jailer, and how you dreamed of embracing him in peace and security, and God’s decree arrived, and he left the grip of the jailer so that you will accompany him as a groom to Paradise (i.e., Martyr's funeral is considered wedding to the 72 Virgins in Paradise in Islam).”
[Facebook page of District Governor of Ramallah and El-Bireh Laila Ghannam, Sept. 27, 2016]
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Melon field, Nahal Oz by Kfir Sivan |
The Palestinian Authority strongly condemned the Knesset on Tuesday for passing into a law a bill proposal to deduct terrorists' salaries from roughly $130 million in monthly tax revenues Israel collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority, defining the move as "a declaration of war on the Palestinian people."
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, said the PA considered the law a "red line" and threatened that its implementation would lead to "harsh Palestinian decisions."
The Secretary of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, Dr. Saeb Erekat said today that the Palestinian leadership is going to the International Criminal Court to file a complaint against US President Donald Trump's decisions on the city of Jerusalem, stressing that the Palestinian issue is not run by the ideas of real estate men and the managers of casinos.
For all these members of the tribe, the idea that it may be time for the Jews to leave Britain is no more than paranoid hysteria. For other British Jews, though, the current situation is deeply, profoundly upsetting and lowering. The antisemitism is bad enough. But it’s not just the antisemitism that’s so devastating. It’s the reaction to those who call it out for what it is.Melanie Phillips: Prince William's Israel visit, Iran protests
The same people who claim to see antisemitism in European populism or the political base of Donald Trump regularly accuse Jews of claiming antisemitism just to “sanitize the crimes of Israel” or “bring down Jeremy Corbyn.”
This reaction is worse, far worse, than the antisemitism itself. It’s worse even than indifference. For it imputes to the Jews malicious intent in claiming that Jewish people are being maliciously targeted. It says they are lying. It blames the Jews for their own victimization.
This reaction is the inescapable evidence that the Jews are being abandoned. Those of us who have loved Britain for its gentleness, its tolerance, its decency, its stoicism, its reasonableness and the dampness of both its weather and national temperament feel as if we have been orphaned. But maybe we were living all along in a fool’s paradise.
Some people think Europe is over, that the demographics are against it and that it will become a majority-Muslim culture in a few decades. My guess is that Europe won’t go down without a fight. If that happens, the Jews are likely to get it in the neck from all sides. Whichever way it goes, it’s not a pleasant prospect.
So is it time to leave? It’s very personal, and I wouldn’t presume to advise anyone what to do. I can only speak for myself and say that for some years now, I’ve been spending a great deal of my time in Israel. Because even with 150,000 Hezbollah rockets pointing at us from Lebanon, even with Hamas trying every day to murder us and even with Iran working toward its genocide bomb to wipe us out, Israel is where I feel so much safer and the air is so much sweeter, and it’s where Jews are not on their knees and where no one will ever make me feel I am not entitled to live and don’t properly belong.
Israel is where we have astonishingly renewed ourselves as a nation out of the ashes of the Shoah. Israel is where all those who want us gone meet their nemesis in the political realization of the eternal people. Israel is the ultimate, and ultimately the only, definitive and triumphant repudiation of antisemitism and the true vindication of the millions of us who perished in the unspeakable events that we memorialize on Holocaust Memorial Day.
*This article is based on the Simon Wiesenthal memorial lecture which I delivered in London on Holocaust Memorial Day.
Please join me here as I discuss with Avi Abelow of Israel Unwired what actually happened when Prince William visited Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority, as well as the accelerating protests in Iran and what these signify.
I hope that I will be able to visit Jerusalem and pray in the place where my Moroccan ancestors prayed, on their way to the pilgrimage or during the return. They even had a door in their name in this place [Mughrabi Gate on the Temple Mount.] And to pray to God Almighty that everyone enjoy security and a decent life regardless of their different beliefs ..(h/t Ibn Boutros)
I have recalled a memory in my high school days.
I remembered the enthusiastic plays I had written and played the role of a hero, either as a liberator of Palestine from the bond of the Jews, or calling for the opening of the frontier for young people to liberate Jerusalem. My plays often end with the defeat of the Zionists, the victory of the Muslims and the liberation of Palestine. .
One day, the enthusiasm of my teachers' sermons in my small brain was very large in one of the prsentations. The loud applause, the glances of the admiring girls refreshed my enthusiasm, I went off-script a little...In my enthusiasm I threw the microphone in a hysteria, shouting that Holy Jerusalem needs us now.
When the play ended the technician who is responsible for those microphones rebuked me for breaking that device. Then he told me the sad joke that we repeat behind closed doors - There was a man who used to ask all kinds of dirty things from his wife in bed, exploiting her ignorance and her complete trust in clerics (who always say that women have to fulfill every wish of their husbands). So once she had enough and said after an especially rough session: “Do you want to liberate Jerusalem at the expense of my ass?”
The man grabbed my ear and shouted: "So you want to liberate Jerusalem by breaking my microphone?"
I remember those passionate poems that I used to recite outside the synagogues, because we are all in contact with the Jews and the Zionists, and I do not differentiate between them like others. I remember my laughter from saying "Khaybar Khaybar, Jews .. The Army of Muhammad will return." I am now going to visit this brutal entity which I have repeatedly cursed in poems I memorized and even wrote myself. What has changed?
How much has the Israeli Foreign Ministry given me to change my position and come to this country? Did the Mossad pump billions of dollars into my bank account?
It is the right of the Palestinians to defend their land and the estate of their country. But we, who are far from the center of the conflict, have the right to visit them together. We raise our voices and pray to find a solution. We have no benefit other than words that do not guarantee or enrich. My solidarity does not benefit them in anything, nor does my visit to Israel hurt them in anything.
The decline in suicide bombings was followed, starting in 2004, by a spectacular rise in missile and rocket launchings. Hamas continually improved its missiles’ payload and distance – so much so that by 2006, the number of Israelis directly affected by the missiles increased from 25,000 inhabitants in the immediate areas bordering Gaza to the hundreds of thousands who live in major cities such Beersheba, Ashdod, Ashkelon, and beyond.Daniel Pipes: Israel Victory gains strength
For all the feelings of terror the launching of over 14,000 missiles between 2004 and 2014 engendered (the phenomenon largely came to an end after the third bout between Hamas and Israel in the summer of 2014), missile terrorism was not nearly as costly to Israel as suicide bombing had been.
Military expenditures as a percentage of GDP and as a percentage of total government expenditures continued to decline, whereas at the height of the “al-Aqsa intifada,” they remained level.
Missile terrorism was far less costly in human terms as well. Even if we take into account all the casualties of the three rounds of fighting between Israel and Hamas, mortalities add up to approximately 120 – that is to say, less than one-third the number of Israelis who were killed during the wave of suicide bombing. Note also that the wave of missile terrorism took place over ten years compared to the suicide bombing wave, which lasted four.
Whereas the effectiveness of suicide terrorism was vastly reduced as a result of the military punishment meted out by the IDF and the Israel Security Agency, missile terrorism became less effective over time due to technological developments that denied Hamas much of the potency of this means of attack.
What do Israelis think of the idea of Israel winning and the Palestinians losing?Only 3% of Jewish Israelis View Settlements as a Roadblock to Peace
It's a radical idea, very different from the 50-year-old-and-counting win-win assumption of "land for peace" that has transfixed governments and monopolized their attention. That old idea holds that putting Palestinians and Israelis in a room together will prompt them to settle their differences. On the cusp of the Oslo Accords' 25th anniversary, we know precisely how well that worked out: Israelis gave real land, Palestinians rewarded them with false promises of peace.
Indeed, according to a poll commissioned by the Middle East Forum and carried out by Rafi Smith of Smith Consulting, only 33% of Jewish Israelis (and about half that number among those who voted for the current government) still believe in land-for-peace and about the same small number still believe in Oslo. So, the old ways not only failed but are deeply unpopular. What takes their place?
One alternative is the Middle East Forum's Israel Victory initiative, and it polls well. Respondents were asked, "Do you agree or disagree with the proposition that it will only be possible to reach a peace agreement with the Palestinians when they recognize they have lost their war against Israel?" Fifty-eight percent agreed. This has the makings of a revolution.
A new survey conducted for the Middle East Forum and the Israel Victory Project indicate that 65% of the Jewish public in Israel believes that Israel needs to achieve a clear victory through military confrontations with the “Palestinians” in order to end the conflict, as reported by Channel 20. The survey will be presented to the Knesset on Tuesday.
77% of the respondents agreed that in the next round with Hamas or Hezbollah, the military leadership should decide to “let the IDF win.” It has been a common complaint in Israel that the IDF has been holding back in their battles with the enemy.
The survey found that 59% of Israelis see US President Donald Trump as the most pro-Israeli president ever, compared to only 25% of respondents who expressed concern that in the future Trump will still “charge a price” for his support of Israel.
Only 21% expressed concern about the possibility that President Trump would recognize the state of Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital, while 62% do not believe it will happen.
Most importantly, only 3% of Israelis believe that settling in Judea and Samaria is an obstacle to peace.
[The Lebanese government] may call Hezbollah freedom fighters, they may applaud them in Beirut, they can act helpless and blame the Syrians and the Iranians, but the responsibility is on their shoulders.
Moshe Arens, Hezbollah 2 Israel 0 in Ha'aretz
Some freedom fighters.
We are making these drugs for Satan America and the Jews. If we cannot kill them with guns, so we will kill them with drugs.And we know that Hezbollah is a proxy of Iran.
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Hezbollah leader Nasrallah. Credit: Rainwiki |
a group of experienced international narcotics trafficking, terrorism, organized crime, and money laundering prosecutors. HFNT prosecutors and investigators are tasked with investigating individuals and networks providing support to Hezbollah, and pursuing prosecutions in any appropriate cases. The HFNT will begin by assessing the evidence in existing investigations, including cases stemming from Project Cassandra, a law enforcement initiative targeting Hezbollah’s drug trafficking and related operations.
The triborder area of Paraguay, Argentina, and Brazil continues to be a haven for Islamic extremists. The two major terrorist organizations in the triborder area are Hezbollah and the Islamic Resistance Movement known as HAMAS. [emphasis added]Years later, a 2010 report to Congress about drug trafficking in Latin America and the Caribbean confirmed Hamas involvement:
International terrorist groups, including Hamas and Hezbollah, have also reportedly raised funding for their terrorist activities through linkages formed with DTOs [drug trafficking organizations] in South America, particularly those operating in the tri-border area (TBA) of Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina. [emphasis added]That same year, Judicial Watch came out with a report that a few years earlier the DEA, revealed that Islamic terrorists had teamed up with Mexican drug gangs to infiltrate the US and to finance Middle East terror networks. A top official in the Texas branch of Homeland Security warned that among those crossing the Mexican border into Texas were terrorists with ties to both Hezbollah -- and Hamas.
Although the evidence in Latin America overwhelmingly points to Hezbollah, rather than Hamas, one should not rule out the possibility that Sunni Jihadis too, sooner or later, may find crime as a convenient source of funds. After all, this has happened already in the Middle East and the Maghreb, where illicit trafficking – drugs, fuel, cigarettes, illegal immigrants – is increasingly being conducted as a joint venture between Islamic terror groups and local mafias.
Why there is no recent information on Hamas’ possible involvement in trafficking is anyone’s guess. It could just be that agencies previously involved allocated their limited resources to address other concerns, or that changes in personnel and loss of expertise on the subject created a blind spot for those investigating. Or even that Hamas has enough funding from other sources – Iran primarily – that it does not need to fundraise by getting entangled with transnational criminal networks.
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Emanuele Ottolenghi. Snapshot of YouTube video |
It is inconceivable to me that with all the drug trafficking in the Sinai Peninsula, and Hamas tight relations with Hizbollah, Iran, and Turkey - all major drug traffickers who encourage the trade to finance their activities, Hamas has stopped trafficking in drugs. And as far as I know, Palestinians are almost always in the forefront of most Islamist terror groups, including narco-terrorists, including Hizballah in Latin America.
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Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld. Snapshot of YouTube |
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Annual Hezbollah al Quds rally in London. Screenshot from YouTube |
Saudi Arabia is currently investing a great deal of behind-the-scenes effort into taking away from Jordan its guardianship of the holy sites of Jerusalem, a senior official in the Palestinian Authority (PA) told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity. The pressure seems linked to the Saudis' friendly relations with the United States, and with President Donald Trump's desire to win Arab support for his Middle East peace plan, which Jordan has not backed.
This revelation aligns with a June 22 report from Israeli newspaper Haaretz that the Jordanian monarchy is worried about Saudi Arabia's intent to deprive Jordan of its guardianship. Several peace agreements signed with Israel, such as the Jordan-Israel peace treaty of 1994, guaranteed Jordan's guardianship. [No, they didn't - EoZ].
“Saudi Arabia is now setting the stage for its guardianship of these sites," the senior PA official said, "and it is working on strengthening its relations with the Palestinian community in Jerusalem. It's also trying to lead religious figures and public opinion leaders from Jerusalem to visit Saudi Arabia and meet with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to discuss the idea and try to garner Jerusalemite support for it."
In January, the Arabi21 website quoted a Jordanian source as saying Jordanian authorities were discussing behind closed doors the Saudi steps regarding Jerusalem and were worried about their guardianship.
Raed Daana, one of the most important religious authorities in Jerusalem and former director of preaching and guidance at Al-Aqsa Mosque Directorate, told Al-Monitor that Saudi efforts to take over the sites' administration are “serious and real.” He pointed out that such efforts emerged following Trump's visit to Saudi Arabia in May 2017.
On Dec. 19, the London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper revealed that there were behind-the-scenes differences between the Jordanian and Saudi delegations during the Arab Inter-Parliamentary Union, which took place Dec. 17 in Morocco. Saudi Arabia rejected Jordan's assertion of its guardianship of Jerusalem’s holy sites, the paper said.But at the same time, Turkey is making a play for Islamic Jerusalem as well:
Although decision-makers in Saudi Arabia did not publicly announce their desire to manage the holy sites in Jerusalem, several Saudi media circles have called for such a scenario. Abdul Hamid al-Hakim, a Saudi media figure close to the Saudi ruling family, called during the BBC’s "Talking Point" program May 16 for the holy sites in Jerusalem to be under Saudi administration.
Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority have all separately warned Israel over the past year about growing Turkish activity in East Jerusalem, which they say is part of an attempt by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to “claim ownership over the Jerusalem issue.”JCPA has also written about increased Turkish influence in Arab sections of Jerusalem.
Senior officials in Amman and Ramallah told Israel that Turkey was extending its influence in the Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem. Israeli defense officials told Haaretz they are aware of the situation and that the issue is now receiving more attention.
Turkey’s attempts to gain influence in East Jerusalem have been monitored by Israel’s security services for more than a year. Israeli sources pointed to a number of ways in which Turkey is increasing its presence in the city.
These include donations to Islamic organizations in Arab neighborhoods; organized tours arranged by Islamist groups in Turkey, some closely affiliated with Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP), which have brought thousands of Turkish citizens to Jerusalem over the past year; and the prominent presence of Turkish activists in demonstrations around the Temple Mount (known to Muslims as Haram al-Sharif).
In her opening remarks, Aviva Raz Shechter, Israeli ambassador to the UN in Geneva, laid out bluntly how Israel was going to receive the recommendations of fellow members.
"The continuous discrimination against Israel in the HRC and the unparalleled number of one-sided biased and political resolutions adopted regularly by the automatic majority of its members testify not only to the unfair treatment of Israel but also to the deficiencies of the council itself and its agenda," she said.
Shechter said Israel would submit to the review process despite what she called the HRC's bias, and demanded its overhaul.
Shechter, the Israeli ambassador, said it was deplorable that UN representatives would use the UPR session as what she called a platform to politicise the human rights discourse.
"It is a cynical and hypocritical attitude meant to distort the reality," she said, adding however that Israel would continue to cooperate with the HRC and take "seriously" the recommendations made at Tuesday's session.
Buy EoZ's book, PROTOCOLS: EXPOSING MODERN ANTISEMITISM
If you want real peace, don't insist on a divided Jerusalem, @USAmbIsrael
The Apartheid charge, the Abraham Accords and the "right side of history"
With Palestinians, there is no need to exaggerate: they really support murdering random Jews
Great news for Yom HaShoah! There are no antisemites!