Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, August 06, 2007

Fayyad: 50,000 policemen but no security

The Palestinian Authority's security organizations are unable to assume security control of cities in the West Bank, Prime Minister Salam Fayad told senior Israeli officials during recent meetings. Fayad told Israeli officials that the PA's security forces are unable "to impose law and order in the West Bank at this time."

During meetings with senior Israeli officials, the interim Palestinian prime minister and his interior minister, Abd al-Razek al-Yihiya, made it clear that the PA's security cannot at this time assume control of West Bank cities. Among those to whom this message was conveyed recently was Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin.

Originally, Fayad and al-Yihiya made the transfer of some West Bank cities to PA security control one of their prime requests of Israel. Israel did not immediately reject the request, but asked that the PA security forces be prepared to take action against any militants who may try to carry out a terror attack against Israel from areas in which Israel would surrender security control.

However, Palestinian security commanders admitted before the PA leadership that their forces are not currently capable of preventing terrorist attacks against Israel, or, as Israel defines it, of "combatting terrorism."

Fayad told Israel that the PA's security forces are unable to "impose law and order in the West Bank at this time."

We've made fun of the pathetic Palestinian Arab police forces mercilessly in the past, but in the context of this story it is important to revisit the issue.

The PA is effectively a giant public works project, with the difference being that in real public works projects something gets accomplished. But in the PA, the people who are being paid by international funds are not building anything - they are just slapped with the name "policemen" and then they go back to whatever they were doing before, usually nothing but often moonlighting as terrorists. And more terrorists are joining all the time.

At least Fayyad is being honest, but where is the logical Western reaction? Why isn't the EU and the US going to Abbas and saying - OK, we've given you billions, why can't you have a police force that can do basic tasks, as was required by Oslo for 14 years?

A similar question can be asked as to why exactly the Palestinian Arabs, the group of people who support terrorism more than any other group on the planet, deserve a state to begin with? Unfortunately, when Israel's PM runs interference and supports the idea of a terror state "as quickly as possible" why should the West be more pro-Israel than Israel seems to be?

From the New York Post:

Activists with ties to the principal of the city's controversial new Arabic-themed school are hawking T- shirts that glorify Palestinian terror, The Post has learned.
The inflammatory tees boldly declare "Intifada NYC" - apparently a call for a Gaza-style uprising in the Big Apple.
The organization selling the shirts, Arab Women Active in Art and Media, shares office space on Brooklyn's Third Avenue with the Saba Association of American Yemenis.
Dhabah "Debbie" Almontaser, principal of the Khalil Gibran International Academy - which is scheduled to open in Brooklyn next month - is a board member and spokeswoman for Saba.
Members of AWAAM refused to comment.
But Almontaser downplayed the significance of the T-shirts.
"The word [intifada] basically means 'shaking off.' That is the root word if you look it up in Arabic," she said.
"I understand it is developing a negative connotation due to the uprising in the Palestinian-Israeli areas. I don't believe the intention is to have any of that kind of [violence] in New York City.
"I think it's pretty much an opportunity for girls to express that they are part of New York City society . . . and shaking off oppression."
AWAAM's co-founders, Rama Kased and Mona Eldahry, are also active in the more militant pro-Palestinian group, al-Awda, whose main U.S. office is in California.
That organization, according to the Anti-Defamation League, is an active supporter of the terrorist groups Hezbollah and Hamas.

The principal is engaging in unbelievable sophistry when she says that the word "intifada" in the T-shirt has a peaceful meaning, given the al-Awda's history.

Her connection with terror may be tenuous but her refusing to denounce a transparent call for violence by her co-religionists make her a very, very poor choice for a public school principal - especially a public school that caters only to Arabs.
(h/t: Eye on the World and Hot Air)

Penmanship exercise in England praises Allah

From the Sun (UK):

ANGRY parents have blasted a teacher for telling ten-year-olds to copy a Muslim prayer saying “There is no God but Allah”.
Helen Green is said to have picked the Muslim call to prayer as HAND-WRITING practice.

It includes the lines “Allah is the greatest” and “I bear witness that there is no God but Allah”.

Pupil Billy Darbyshire’s stepmum Hayley Clayton said: “The explanation was that the children were learning about Islam in RE.

“But this was like he was taking an oath. A Muslim child would never be asked to write a Bible passage.

“Why didn’t she choose a passage from a normal story book to teach handwriting?”

Hayley, 23, said Mrs Green — deputy head of Newlands Primary School in Wakefield, West Yorks — had acknowledged it was a “sensitive issue” because three of the 7/7 suicide bombers came from Leeds, 15 miles away.

Freedom of the press, PalArab style (VII)

The series continues...

An Al-Hayat reporter in Gaza was threatened by Hamas for reporting stories unfavorable to the terrorist organization. Here's the autotranslated article from Al-Hayat al-Jadidah - the words "new life" are the autotranslation of "Al-Hayat al-Jadidah."

threatening anonymous claimed that Abu Ubaydah Hamas yesterday morning colleague journalist improve Astal immediately stop the publication of any news affecting the Hamas movement, stressing that the movement will not hesitate to Deter if he continued to disseminate lies, according related.

Astal said that the threat came against the backdrop of news bulletin Hamas attacks against the Fatah movement in Khan Yunis, the latest of which was the abduction and torture of leadership in the Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, Yousef Abu Sabha and his companions.

He pointed out that the related threatened to stop the introduction of the newspaper as well as the new life of the Beit Hanoun crossing that did not stop spreading lies, according to him, as well as directly threatened him, saying "We will Baltevgues in Btank that did not stop and consider this latest warning."

I wouldn't be too happy if someone threatened me with being Baltevguesed in my Btank, either.

The symbolism of Hebron

Once again, the Jews of Hebron are being threatened with expulsion - but, this is not 1929 and the ones who want the Jews out of Hebron are Jews.

Others are blogging about the incredible hostility in the media toward's Hebron's Jews, as well as the absurdity of 3,000 IDF soldiers planning to evict 2 Hebron Jewish families.

A couple of years ago, I wrote:

Hebron is the second-holiest city in Judaism. Morally, Jews should have the right to move there if they wish with no limitations. The ones that moved back to Hebron after 1967 were nothing short of heroic. There certainly has been friction between the Jews and Arabs of Hebron. Nevertheless, there is a huge symbolic importance to maintaining - and increasing - the Jewish areas of Hebron.

The Arabs understand the symbolism of Israel giving up on historically Jewish land. That is why they fight, beyond all logic, for the tiniest slivers of land, far beyond its useful value. That is why they never compromise on land. If there were no Jews there, they wouldn't care in the least - they do not fight because it is Arab land but because it is Jewish land.

When Israel gives away the indisputably Jewish parts of Israel, then it loses part of its character. Israel's claim to the land is not based only on logic, it is not based only on the law - it is based on emotions. When the Jewish state suppresses its emotions and its historic ties to the land in the name of an illusory "peace process" it loses far more than land. Emotions and symbols are important, and Israel is at a disadvantage because the world expects the Jews to be logical and Arabs emotional. Logical people can compromise, emotional people cannot. Hebron is not a logical issue.

Some things are worth fighting for, and Hebron is one of them.

PalArab technological innovation: explosive sheep

Never let it be said that the Palestinian Arabs are technologically backward. Innovation just oozes from the territories, if you know where to look.

An IDF force operating in the West Bank on Monday morning uncovered an explosive device weighing 40 kilograms (88 pounds), which was hidden inside the corpse of a sheep.

The soldiers were led to the device by a Palestinian terrorist who was arrested and questioned by the defense establishment.

According to intelligence information, military sources believe that the device, which was found on a road near the settlement of Elon Moreh, was slated to be used in a terror attack in one of the settlements in the area – Elon Moreh, Kedumim, Itamar or Bracha.

Exploding sheep has been a popular meme in the computer gaming community for years, and the earliest pop-culture reference to an exploding sheep seems to date from this Johnny Carson Carnac clip.

This attack may have been inspired by this fake ad for a New Zealand meat pie:

And this is not the first Palestinian Arab innovation in using animals for blowing up Jews. Donkeys have been the animal of choice up until now, as the Jersualem Post helpfully explains:

In 2003, a donkey rigged with explosives blew up as a bus passed on the road from Jerusalem to Gush Etzion, approximately 80 meters from a nearby IDF roadblock and the ascent to Har Gilo and Beit Jala on Sunday morning.
No one was wounded, though a bus passenger was treated for shock.
According to the army, a gas canister filled with explosives and metal rods was strapped to the donkey and a second, full of explosives, was placed next to it. The bombs were detonated simultaneously by two cellphones.
In the Gaza Strip in June 2001, a Palestinian drove a donkey cart laden with explosives toward a group of soldiers. At the last minute he jumped off the cart and detonated the bombs that exploded only partially. The cart had been loaded with four gas canisters, two mines, a bag of oil, and a bag of nails.
In January 2001, terrorists left a donkey cart laden with explosives unattended near the Netzarim junction. Soldiers fired at the cart, detonating the large amount of explosives and killing the donkey.
In June 1995, a Palestinian suicide bomber detonated a donkey-led cart rigged with explosives near an IDF base near Khan Yunis. No soldiers were wounded in the blast, but the Palestinian and the donkey were killed.

One must look at these incidents in context. After all, the jackasses at the Dubai-based Gulf News consider all of the thousands of terror attacks, including the innovative animal-based attacks, as evidence of the Arab world's desperate attempts to make peace with Israel (h/t Judeopundit at Soccer Dad):

Since 1991 the Arab world has been fixated on a peaceful Israel. For years, Arabs have been desperately waiting for Israel to give a nod of approval on accepting to live in peace with them.

You see? Arabs are so desperate for peace that they are willing to blow up their own animals for the cause! Every flying donkey kidney is nothing more than a cry for a more peaceful world.

This week's episode of Saudi Vice

In this week's episode of Saudi Vice....

Ibrahim Mohammed Lawal is a Nigerian student living in Saudi Arabia. He recently converted to Islam and he was enthusiastic about his new religion. He would spend time looking for ways to share his beliefs with others and to do good deeds.

He had a sickly 63-year old neighbor who needed help. Ibrahim tirelessly brought her to hospital after hospital, only to see her being rejected by all of them for treatment. He finally appealed to Sheikh Fawaz, director of Badiya Islamic Center, who took pity on the woman and admitted her.

This horrific behavior could not be condoned, and it was a stain on all believing Muslims and Saudis.

Thank Allah, the heroic Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice swooped in and arrested him, as he visited the apartment of the sick woman and checked up on her status with three other relatives who live there. They placed him and the three other women in jail, thus ensuring that such a horrendous crime would be publicized and never repeated.

It causes one to shudder to contemplate the very idea of a young man, actually secluded alone multiple times with a sick 63-year old woman!

Hamas reportedly kidnapped female professor, forced her to convert to Islam

From the Jerusalem Post:

Fatah officials in Ramallah claimed over the weekend that Professor Sana al-Sayegh, who teaches at Palestine University in Gaza City, was kidnapped by Hamas militiamen who forced her to convert to Islam against her will.

The officials said the president of the university, Dr. Zaher Khail, had assisted Hamas in kidnapping the professor.

They added that senior officials in the office of Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh played a major role in forcing her to convert to Islam.

"She was forced to convert to Islam against her will," the Fatah officials said. "She was kidnapped and held for two weeks during which time she was not allowed to contact her family." Sayegh is the dean of the Science and Technology Faculty at Palestine University. She has represented the university at numerous conferences around the world over the past few years and is considered one of the most prominent experts in her field.

According to the Fatah officials, she went missing in late June. When her family's attempts to find her failed, they sought the help of Haniyeh's office.

Two weeks later the family was summoned to a meeting with some of Haniyeh's aides, who were accompanied by the professor.

At the meeting, which was held at the home of Hamas official Rafik Makki, the family was told that the professor had converted to Islam and married a Muslim man.

When the professor's stunned mother asked her if this was true, she nodded her head, murmuring: "Yes, God has guided me through the right path." The mother later claimed that her daughter made the statement under threats from Hamas gunmen who were in the room.

The Hamas officials are also reported to have shown the family a document signed by the professor indicating that she had converted to Islam and married a man named Izz al-Arab Awur.

But the family claims that the man told them that he never married the professor.

Several attempts by the family to arrange a meeting with Haniyeh to find out the truth failed. At one point, said a relative, they found the professor's car parked outside Haniyeh's office.

"When we told them that we wanted to see her, we were ordered to leave immediately," he recounted. "We were told that we could take her car and go away. But we told them that we didn't come to get the car, but Professor al-Sayegh." Leaders of the tiny Christian minority in Gaza City who requested a meeting with Haniyeh to solve the problem were also turned down.

Some 3,000 Christians live in the Gaza Strip. Following the Hamas takeover of the Strip, many of them have expressed their desire to leave.

The board of directors of Palestine University confirmed Sunday that Sayegh had converted to Islam, but denied that the university was linked to the case in any way. "We won't allow anyone to exploit our name in political disputes," it said in a statement, referring to the Hamas-Fatah power struggle. "The case of Professor al-Sayegh is a personal one and does not reflect the policy of the university."

Hamas officials strongly denied that they had forced the professor to convert to Islam and accused Fatah of spreading lies designed to undermine Hamas's credibility. The officials said that Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar met with Sayegh, who told him that she had converted out of her own will to marry her colleague, Awur.

Ala Aklouk, a senior Muslim cleric in Gaza City who was entrusted by the Haniyeh government to look into the case, said the professor converted to Islam of her free will. "She was too afraid to inform her family that she had converted to Islam," he said. "So she asked me and other officials to inform her family. She also made it clear that she had no intention to return home unless all her family members converted to Islam." Aklouk claimed that the professor did not convert because she wanted to marry a Muslim man, but because she "really believed in Islam." "If you sit with her, you will feel as if you are sitting with a devout Muslim woman and not a Christian," he said. "She abandoned a good and easy life for the sake of Islam. She challenged everyone and did what she was supposed to do - become a devout Muslim."

Hanan Matar, a female activist working for the Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human Rights, said she met with the professor over the weekend and heard from her that her decision to convert to Islam was not related to her marriage to a Muslim man. She said the professor was wearing the hijab and "behaved like any religious Muslim woman would."

Palestinian police use bulldozers to destroy confiscated cars, stolen from Israel, during a continuing crackdown on illegal vehicles in the West Bank town of Jenin, Sunday, Aug. 5, 2007. (AP Photo/Mohammed Ballas)

Why don't they just return them to Israel?

Members of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' security force guard in a checkpoint at the enterance [sic] of the West Bank city of Jericho, Sunday, Aug. 5, 2007.

Somehow, when Palestinian Arabs set up a checkpoint it is never considered oppressive.

A Palestinian woman and her child attend a rally of Palestinian security forces of the Hamas [sic] in Gaza City Sunday, Aug. 5, 2007.

Now, that looks like a successful rally!

Six years since Sbarro's bombing

Carl in Jerusalem notes that this is the sixth anniversary of the horrendous Sbarro's pizza shop bombing in Jerusalem, when Palestinian Arab terrorists murdered 15 innocent people including 7 children during a busy lunchtime, plus an unborn child and one victim who remains in a coma today. I cannot improve on his lengthy and heartbreaking post about the victims, especially how their families are taking tragedy and turning it into positive actions to help improve the world.

It is worthwhile to read the webpages of organizations started by those victim families: Keren Malki and A Tradition of Kindness.

Noah Pollak blogs at Jewcy about the flattering New York Times picture of one of the terrorist planners of the attack and the moral cretinism that prompts the Times to ignore the details of her role as well as her current pride in what she had done.

And this woman is hardly the only Palestinian Arab to feel pride over that mass murder. An-Najah University famously hosted an "art exhibition" celebrating the bombing.

Here are the victims of the bombing, from Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs website:

The names of the victims:
- Giora Balash, 60, of Brazil
- Zvika Golombek, 26, of Carmiel
- Shoshana Yehudit Greenbaum, 31, of the U.S.
- Tehila Maoz, 18, of Jerusalem
- Frieda Mendelsohn, 62, of Jerusalem
- Michal Raziel, 16, of Jerusalem
- Malka Roth, 15, of Jerusalem
- Mordechai Schijveschuurder, 43, of Neria
- Tzira Schijveschuurder, 41, of Neria
- Ra'aya Schijveschuurder, 14, of Neria
- Avraham Yitzhak Schijveschuurder, 4, of Neria
- Hemda Schijveschuurder, 2, of Neria
- Lily Shimashvili, 33, of Jerusalem
- Tamara Shimashvili, 8, of Jerusalem
- Yocheved Shoshan, 10, of Jerusalem

Zvika Golombek	S. Greenbaum	Tehila Maoz	Frieda Mendelsohn
Michal Raziel	Malka Roth	Lily Shimashvili	T. Shimashvili

Mordechai and Tzira Schijveschuurder		Giora Balash	Yocheved Shoshan
Ra'aya, Avraham Yitzhak, and Hemda Schijveschuurder

"New 'Salman Rushdie' in Italy" - Egyptian writes pro-Israel book

From Jordan's Al-Bawaba, via Daily Alert:

The Union of Islamic Communities in Italy has urged all Muslims across the country to express their views following a new book which hails Israel and slams Palestinian resistance groups. According to a Saudi newspaper, the leaders of the Islamic community in Italy are furious about the new book which amazingly was edited by an Egyptian-born Italian writer and journalist!
Magdi Allam, 55, deputy chief editor of Italy’s most influential newspaper Il Corriere della Sera, is again at the center of the storm following his seventh book, dubbed “Viva Israele” (Long Live Israel). The subtitle of the book reads “From the ideology of death to the civilization of life: my story.”

“Long Live Israel” is the tale of his life ever since his youth under the republican regime of late Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser.

According to Allam, Nasser is responsible for having turned Egypt - and the rest of the Arab world - into the cradle of the "ideology of death". Allam claims Nasser brought about an aggressive pan-Arabic dream based on the denial of Israel’s right to exist. The need for the destruction of Israel is the dominant theme that, Allam states, made death and destruction the core values of a once liberal Islamic culture.

Thus, the new book defends the existence of Israel and terms armed Palestinian groups as "dangerous terrorist threats." In addition, Allam wrote that during their operations in the Palestinian territories, Israeli forces have been trying to avoid hitting Palestinian civilians and only aim to defend Israeli citizens….

Furthermore, Allam added that the main cause for the Israeli – Palestinian dispute stems from the Palestinian terror.

Allam says that "Israel - along with Pope Benedict XVI - represents the residual hope for Western civilization, which, more than other civilizations, embodies the sacredness of life and personal freedom."

Allam also slams the Arab calls for the killing of Jews. In the past, Allam also criticized resistance groups in Lebanon and Iraq.

Muslims in Italy have been claiming that Allam is an unreliable person who spreads suspicion and hatred against Islam and Muslim people by reporting undocumented, unverified or even utterly false news, just to flatter to the West.

It should be noted that during his adolescent years, Allam maintained completely different views. Allam was raised as a Muslim and attended the Italian school of Cairo. In Italy since 1972, Allam started his stay there as an enthusiastic activist for the Palestinian cause. At that period, Allam thought of Israel as a racist and aggressive state "invented by the Western world as some kind of compensation for the horrors of the Jewish Holocaust".

Years later, his interest in the history of Zionism and a meeting with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat brought him to realize that "Arafat was responsible for Palestinian terrorism" and that "the predication of the ideology of death eventually hit and harmed the Palestinians themselves."

The latest book has changed Allam's life. The Saudi newspaper reported that following threats to his life, the Italian police decided to intensify his security escort. Under these circumstances, it is not surprising that many Muslims in Italy denounce Allam as a new "Salman Rushdie", the British writer who was forced into hiding in the 1990s after Iran's religious leaders issued a fatwa (religious edict), calling for his death.