Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, November 28, 2010

Work accident!

An Islamic Jihad member was seriously injured in an explosion in densely-populated Rafah on Saturday.

His arms and legs were amputated in emergency surgery and he is in intensive care.

Too bad he couldn't become a full martyr, with all its benefits. Now he's just a loser.

Iran freaks over Star of David at airport (updated)

From YNet:

Images published Saturday by Iranian media outlets show a Star of David on the roof of the main national airline's building at the Tehran airport.

The satellite image was taken from the Google Earth service. According to the Iranian report, the Iran Air building was "built by Israeli engineers," who operated in the countries before the 1979 Islamic Revolution during the days of Shaa Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

"It's interesting that even 32 years after the victory of the revolution, this Zionist star symbol has yet to be removed from this building," a local news website wrote.

The calls to remove the Star of David, which the Iranian authorities view as a symbol associated with Israel, were accompanied by local media reports on the close relations with Israel in the past, which were completely severed after the revolution.

Here's a Farsi article about it.

I was able to find the image in Google Maps:

Check it yourself here.

UPDATE: Marc El in the comments points out an Iranian feature visible from satellites as well, at a university, that does not make the Iranians upset at all:

UN flotilla investigator attends Israel hatefest

From the Bangkok Post:

Two women, one a Jewish-American and the other a Christian-Malaysian, last week provided some deep insights into the Israeli occupation of Palestine and appealed to global activists and media to help the world hear an alternative perspective on the long-standing conflict.

Anna Baltzer, a political activist and a grandchild of Holocaust refugees, and Kuala Lumpur-based human rights activist Mary Shanthi Dairiam, were on the programme to commemorate the UN International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People organised at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand by the Bangkok arm of the Palestine Solidarity Council on Thursday.

...Ms Dairiam's presentation was directly relevant to Thailand. She was one of a three-member panel appointed by Thai Ambassador Singhasak Phuangketkeow after he assumed chairmanship of the UN Human Rights Council in June to investigate the May 21 attack by Israeli commandos on the Mavi Marmara, the Turkish aid ship seeking to break the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip.

Ms Dairiam provided insights into the Human Rights Council investigation panel's findings. She said that as she was watching Ms Baltzer's documentary, it occurred to her that the Israelis always seem to have reasons for everything that they do. ''We have to fully understand the rationale that Israeli gives and attack that rationale, not just the incidents,'' she said.

Although she called herself a pacifist who had never held a gun in her life, she said the accounts of violence she had heard from victims of the Israeli attack on the Mavi Marmara had changed her forever. ''I have learned so much about the violence in this investigation. It is mind-boggling. I am not the same person now. I am not proud of the knowledge I have.''

Ms Dairiam said the panel had concluded that it had been the Israeli intention all along to cause as much physical injury as possible. She said the Israelis were apparently embarrassed by the many maritime efforts to break the blockade and the adverse publicity it was generating. ''They were going to stop it once and for all. They were intending to kill,'' she said.

Which explains of course why every other ship in the flotilla - the ones without any IHH activists - were taken peacefully without incident.

This violence was totally unnecessary, she said. The captain of the ship told the investigators that if the Israelis had simply intended to stop the ship from sailing onwards, all they had to do was blast the propeller, which would have rendered the vessel inoperable.

And leave the ship stranded in the sea? The Mavi Marmara, as I recall, was too big to be able to safely tow to port in a reasonable amount of time. (And commenter Eliezer, who has served in the Israel Navy for decades, flatly says that it is impossible to blast the propeller without sinking the ship.)

The rest of the article is filled with lies that have already been debunked, by the BBC and by a Turkish reporter no less. But it shows very well that not only was the UN investigation of the incident was a sham, but it was intended to be a sham from the start.

(h/t Israelinurse)

Overnight open thread

I've been spending time trying to make my December 7 "one-man show" as educational and entertaining as possible, so blogging may be somewhat lighter than usual as I keep adding and tweaking slides.

But that doesn't mean you can't keep using the soon-to-be-gone Echo comments....

People are excited about the Hasby Awards! (corrected)

There have been hundreds of votes so far for the People's Choice Hasby Awards, and the two front-runners are - almost suspiciously - European.

It appears that two sites, drzz.info and Europe-Israel, have been pushing the awards on their sites, and as a result the early (and possibly insurmountable) lead is for the unique protest against the Museum of Modern Art, Paris.

There are a lot of votes also for Pilar Rahola's essay, which didn't make such big waves when it was first published. She would also be a European favorite.

It's great that the awards are getting international attention, even if they are skewing the results a bit. But I will certainly announce the Readers' Choice awards along with the official Hasby Awards during my live appearance in New York on December 7!

(Correction: I had said that the two sites were campaigning for votes, and they were not. I apologize.)

Comment system changes afoot

I just found out that the Echo comment system, which I have never been keen on, has raised their annual fees by a factor of ten - from $12 a year to $120.

Sorry, but I will not be keeping Echo comments. They never did a good job on the conversion from the previous free system; the sidebar widget is not very good, and poor Ruthie is adding the titles of posts to every thread because there is no way to tell otherwise who is commenting on which post.

My Echo subscription expires towards the end of December so I will be looking at changing comment systems to another, or maybe just going back to the default Blogger system. Right now the two that people like the best are Intense Debate and Disqus. I don't know if I can run two comment systems at the same time so comments may be disrupted at times over the next few weeks.

I can save existing comments to an XML format but,to be honest, I do not see any easy way to move the old comments into any new system. Which really sucks. 66 megabytes of comments will probably be history.

I am not happy having to spend time on this.

180,000 PalArabs treated in Israeli hospitals in 2010

From the IDF website:

Humanitarian dilemmas are a recurring issue in the Judea and Samaria region. A terrorist fires at IDF soldiers, is shot and gets wounded. Is an IDF medic to be called to treat him? A building is about to collapse in the heart of Ramallah. Does the IDF enter? Does it jeopardize its soldiers’ lives, or does it call the International Red Cross and risk losing precious time?

To Israel, the answer to these questions is clear. According to Division Medical Officer, Lt. Col. Michael Kassirer, “The treatment of the Palestinian population is first and foremost a moral and professional obligation for every one of us.” Do we treat them? There is no question about it. But what happens in the long run and how? Where do international organizations fit in? How will an independent Palestinian medical body be established and how does coordination between bodies happen in life? These are the real questions.

In order to start answering these questions, a special conference on the topic of humanitarian medicine was held on Monday (Nov. 22), atHadassah Medical Center at Mount Scopus in Jerusalem. Commanders and medics attended in order to speak and learn, from the most senior, IDF Chief Medical Officer and the Commander of Judea and Samaria Division, to the 19-year-old paramedics serving with the battalions in the region.

“Up until September 2000, a Ramallah resident could have taken his car and driven to Ichilov Hospital [in Israel],” began Commander of Judea and Samaria Division, Brig. Gen. Nitzan Alon. “But from September 2000 we’ve been in a state of terror. Hundreds were killed, Jews and Palestinians alike. The battles took place in the heart of the cities, in places where enemies stood side by side with civilians, with difficult conditions and limited ability to evacuate. We could not practice medicine beyond the minimum. In those days, we were on the verge of a humanitarian crisis.”

But today, he says, the situation is different. Thanks to many efforts on both sides, stability has been restored. “The political leadership is able to make decisions not in the context of buses exploding. And now, along with direct military activity – patrolling, arrests, crossings – we are starting a new kind of routine. Medicine is an integral part of it. In today’s reality, we are obligated to do a lot more than the minimum. Our addressing of the situation should be as wide ranging as possible,” said Brig. Gen. Alon.

...Dr. Tawfik Nasr, Director of the Augusta Victoria Hospital in Jerusalem and coordinator of all hospitals in east Jerusalem, described the example of patients coming from Gaza to be treated in Jerusalem, sometimes over a period of three to four months. They are housed in a special hotel on the Mount of Olives.

...And, unbelievable though it may sound, because of desire and will, it is working. Last year, 180,000 Palestinian citizens entered Israel to receive treatment.

Maybe the IDF should receive the Muammar Gaddafi Prize for Human Rights!

Oh, too late for this year, but maybe next year.

Latner disqualified from Cambridge Union election

From Varsity, yesterday:

Initially, you had indicated that you were not planning to apologise to Lauren Booth. What made you change your mind?

I said I was sorry for "speaking in haste and choosing my words poorly". It's true. I am sorry about that. The minute I said it, I thought of a dozen funnier, less vulgar comments I could have made instead. Hindsight's 20/20.

What is your reaction to the Appeals Panel's decision to impose a penalty of a 40 per cent reduction of your first preference votes? Do you see it as a fair penalty?

My reactions were, in chronological order: surprise, befuddlement, amusement, hysterical laughter, and contacting every single reporter and blogger who has been in touch with me over the last month. Was it fair? No. I may be biased, but I'm around 99% sure that this penalty reflects who I am, not what I did. As I said, I don't really think the Rules were intended to prohibit what I did, and if they were, there was discretion to impose a) no penalty, b) a far less severe penalty that wouldn't have the effect of rigging the election.

Why have you agreed to this interview, given that it could lead to further penalties imposed on you as a candidate?

I think it's important that people know what's going on – same reason I spoke with the Tab. As to the possibility of further penalties – it would kind of be like sentencing someone serving a life sentence to another 100 years in jail. I wasn't ever going to win this election. Anything else they throw at me now will just make them look kind of silly. Plus, I don't think I'm breaking any of the rules – I'm not soliciting votes, or talking about my campaign. I'm talking about what I see as a fairly ridiculous disciplinary hearing, and the resulting punishment. While there is a certain cadre of people currently running the Union may not like that, I don't think they can do much. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.

And today:

Gabriel Latner has been disqualified from the election for the Union presidency, after Returning Officers found that he had given an interview to Varsity, in contravention of election rules.

Latner had previously been penalised 40 per cent of his first preference votesfor commenting for an article by The Tab.

In a statement, the Union Returning Officers said: "Due to the fact that this is second time that Mr. Latner had been found guilty of such an offence and that, in this case, the article was much more focused on the Candidate’s own quotes, the Returning Officers have resolved to disqualify Mr. Latner from the current election."

Fact-checking Bibi and the NYT

The New York Times reports on Binyamin Netanyahu's reaction to the PA paper saying there is no Jewish connection to the Kotel.

The "paper of record" makes a couple of mistakes, but, unfortunately, so does Netanyahu.

The Western Wall is a remnant of the retaining wall of a plateau revered by Jews as the Temple Mount, the site where their ancient temples once stood. The plateau is also the third holiest site in Islam.

Actually, it is the third holiest place in Sunni Islam only. Shiites have many other shrines that they say are more important.

In Muslim tradition, the wall is the place where the Prophet Muhammad tethered his winged steed, Buraq, during his miraculous overnight journey from Mecca to Jerusalem in the seventh century.

If you look at 19th century sources, it appears that the spot that Muslims believed Muhammed tethered his flying horse was quite a bit to the north of the Kotel. From The survey of western Palestine: Jerusalem By Sir Charles Warren:

The "Bab al Nazir" is well to the north of the Kotel, as this map from the Aqsa.org.uk shows:

I believe that there are other Muslim traditions as to exactly where Muhammed was said to have tied his horse, but none of them included the Kotel until the Mufti of Jerusalem made that story up as part of his plan to drive the Jews out of Jerusalem.

Mr. Netanyahu, in a statement issued by his office, said the Western Wall “has been the Jewish people’s most sacred place for almost 2,000 years, since the destruction of the Second Temple.”

He is wrong; the most sacred place remains the Temple Mount. The holiness of the Kotel and the other remaining portions of the wall around the Temple Mount derive from the super-holiness of the Mount itself. To say that the Kotel is the most important spot today is like saying that moonlight is more important than sunlight. By saying this, Netanyahu is effectively abandoning Jewish tradition and claims to our holiest site, and the fact that the prime minister of the Jewish state can make such a statement is a very sad commentary on how far we have fallen - and a very big warning as to how committed he is to other Jewish holy sites.

The excitement for the 2010 Hasby Awards, for the best hasbara events of the year, is reaching a fever pitch!The entire free world is awaiting the live presentation of the winners on December 7th in New York City.

While the selection process for the official Hasbies is a closely guarded secret by the audit firm of EoZ and Associates, the People's Choice Hasbara Awards are all up to you.

In no particular order, here are the nominees. (I am not including those who nominated things I did; that will be a separate poll.)

1. The IDF releasing video of soldiers being attacked on the Mavi Marmara within hours of the event, causing most viewers to see that the "peace protesters" were hardly peaceful:

2. The Im Tirtzu organization on publicizing the recipients of New Israel Fund monies going towards anti-Israel testimony in the Goldstone Report

3. Gabriel Latner's speech at the Cambridge Union Society debates arguing "Why Israel is a Rogue State."

4.Latma's We Con the World:

5. HRW founder Robert L. Bernstein's speech on Human Rights in the Middle East.

6. David Horowitz asking a question from a Muslim student at UCSD and getting a chilling answer:

7. RabbiLIVE revealing Helen Thomas' anti-semitism and ending her career:

8. 16-year old Elad Daniel Pereg facing off, alone, against an angry anti-Israel mob in Los Angeles with an IDF shirt and Israeli flag:

9. Israeli tourists sing Hebrew songs to the consternation of protesters outside the Ahava store in London on Rosh Hashanah:

10. The IDF's instant field hospital in Haiti after the earthquake:

11. The Emergency Committee for Israel's TV campaigns against anti-Israel candidates, specifically Pennsylvania's Joe Sestak, who lost:

12. The IDF's soldiers rocking the casbah in Hebron:

13. Rupert Murdoch's pro-Israel speech at the ADL dinner.

14. Pilar Rahola's article, "The Anti-Israel Hysteria"

15. Canadian PM Stephen Harper's speech at an anti-semitism conference:

16. Paris Zionists' unique protest against the anti-Israel Gaza photo exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in Paris:

Vote now!

They don't make martyrs like they used to

The Hamas media is mourning the loss of their latest member to be killed.

The Palestine Times headlines the article "In Jabalia - the Martyrdom of an al-Qassam Mujahid."

The English Al Qassam website spoke of the fallen fighter in glowing terms:

The Ezzeden Al Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, mourned on Thursday evening November 25th one of its heroes, the mujahed Bilal Maher Zaqout ,22, from Jabalia refugee camp.

...Ezzeden Al Qassam Brigades said in its military communiqué that the mujahed was martyred after a long bright path of jihad, hard work, struggle and sacrifice.

In addition, the Brigades reaffirmed the commitment and determination to continue the resistance against the belligerent occupation forces.

Finally, the Brigades prayed to Allah to accept the martyrdom of the mujahed and to grant his family patience and solace

And what heroic thing was he doing when he became a martyr? Here's how they described it in paragraph 2:

The Brigades announced in a military communiqué released on Thursday evening that the mujahed Bilal Maher Zaqout was martyred due to a live bullet fired by mistake while he was cleaning his own gun in Jabalia refugee camp north of the Gaza Strip.

Yes, this Hamas hero shot himself in the chest while cleaning his gun.

(h/t Samson)