Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, August 07, 2011

Honest Reporting's Mission to Israel [Advertorial]

The following is an advertorial, written by EoZ, for Honest Reporting:

Readers of this blog are familiar with Honest Reporting, the indispensable watchdog group that keeps track of news articles that misrepresent Israel or, worse, make up their own “facts.”

Honest Reporting does more than just keep the media honest, though. It also sponsors a Mission to Israel where you can gain a real understanding of the challenges Israel faces every day.

The mission is a specialized, intense week-long tour of Israel where the participants get to meet with and listen to an impressive array of political experts, military leaders and other well-known Zionist figures. It is far more than a tour – it is an immersive program that is fun and educational, if a bit intense.

This year, the Honest Reporting Mission to Israel takes place from November 15-21. I am told that the itinerary isn't yet set, but from looking at the last trip you can see that they get some very high-powered speakers and topics. For example, last time the trip included:

· Mark Regev, the spokesperson for the Prime Minster, spoke on "Israel's Message."
·Professor Asa Kasher, the author of the IDF Code of Conduct, spoke on "Ethics in the IDF." I blogged about him earlier this year here.
·There was presentation by Itamar Marcus, founder of the invaluable Palestinian Media Watch. He was most recently in the news for presenting to US members of Congress a new report on how the Palestinian Authority pays salaries to terrorists in Israeli prison.
·A meeting at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
· A talk by Dr. Mordechai Kedar, Head of Arab Studies at Bar-Ilan University and expert on Syria. he is the man who made an impassioned defense, in Arabic, of Jerusalem’s Jewishness in one of the most memorable interviews ever aired on Al Jazeera. (Even if you’ve seen it before, stop reading right now and watch it again. It is incredible.)
·A Shabbat discussion with Khaled Abu Toameh of the Jerusalem Post and the Hudson Institute, on “What Arabs Inside Israel are Really Thinking.”

And these are only a few of the people you can meet. Add to that list Ishmael Khalidi, a the first Bedouin to serve as an Israeli diplomat; Aryeh Green, the director of MediaCentral , NGO Monitor's Professor Gerald Steinberg who has exposed an untold number of abuses by anti-Israel NGOs, and the excellent Dore Gold, not to mention the members of Honest Reporting itself. Together this makes a really great lineup of high-powered thought leaders that you can listen to and engage with.

There have been a few occasions that I have gotten a chance to meet with leaders like these, and it is a really fun to discuss ideas with them - much different than email or Facebook messages. It is a great experience to meet any one of these people - to meet them all in the course of a week is an experience that everyone should have.

I wish I could go on the mission to interview every one of them for the blog. Maybe next year…

There is another important reason for going on this mission. The casual disparagement of Israel in the media and even in everyday conversations is increasing. Too often people who support Israel are not armed with the facts to be able to respond effectively when they come across such anti-Israel opinions. Lies have become accepted as conventional wisdom and it takes knowledge as well as passion to be able to counter the false narrative. Honest Reporting, true to its origins, spends a lot of time in this mission in workshops specifically to teach participants how to answer anti-Israel arguments and articles with real facts and real history. People who attend will have more confidence in being able to answer critics immediately and convincingly.

And I haven’t even mentioned the tours! You can get to see Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, spend Shabbat in the Old City, tour the Western Wall Tunnels, visit the IDF Navy Base (where no doubt the flotillas would no doubt be discussed) and more. You can get to see the real Israel, not the funhouse-mirror version that the media often portrays.

One other nice thing about this mission is that it ends a few days before Thanksgiving so Americans can stay in Israel a little longer and enjoy the holiday weekend there. After this whirlwind of a week, you would probably want to unwind and enjoy Israel at your own pace for a few days.

Previous attendees raved about the trip; you can read some of their comments here.

If you want a behind-the-scenes look at Israel that goes way beyond normal tour groups, this is the way to go. Check out the Honest Reporting Mission site to see more details.

PLO reiterates "right of return" has nothing to do with statehood

Zakaria Agha, member of the Executive Committee of the PLO, again stated what the PLO has stated clearly for years and what the West pretends is inconsequential: that even after the establishment of a Palestinian Arab state the PLO will not relinquish its demand that Israel be overrun with millions of so-called "refugees."

He bases this on UNGA resolution 194, which the Arabs love to misinterpret as saying that any Arab whose ancestors came from Palestine has the right to move into Israel, forever.

Notwithstanding the fact that General Assembly resolutions have no legal force, the constant reference to that resolution by the Palestinian Arabs is the height of hypocrisy.

If they believe to strongly that UNGA 194 must be adhered to by Israel, then they must also believe:

Jerusalem will never be the capital of "Palestine" because UNGA 194 says it is part of a separate territory that must be under UN control - including much more of "Palestine." than of Israel. Many Arab towns, and even all of Bethlehem, would not be part of "Palestine."
Mount Scopus would be part of Israel proper.
Descendants of Jews who were expelled from Gush Etzion. the Old City and other areas would be allowed to live in their ancestral homes. UNGA 194 just refers to "refugees," not "Arab refugees."
Free access to Jewish holy places in Judea and Samaria would have to be enforced.

For some reason, the PLO doesn't like to refer to those parts of UNGA 194. And, of course, they steadfastly refuse to remember that the resolution only refers to refugees who are willing to "live at peace with their neighbours."

Keep in mind that no Palestinian Arab leader is anxious for millions of Arabs now living in Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and elsewhere to "return" to "Palestine." Unlike the Zionist in the 1940s and 1950s who happily took in hundreds of thousand of Jews from the Diaspora, Palestinian Arab leaders are in no rush to help out their brethren who have been rotting away in camps for decades. To them, the descendants of "refugees" exist for only one purpose - to destroy Israel by "returning." Besides that, they couldn't care less about them.

Their hypocrisy - and their goal in erasing Israel - cannot be more transparent. And the world cannot be more blind as to their goals, even when they say it explicitly.

New Israeli cyberwar unit?

From Fox News:

Israel has set up a military cyber command to wage a computer war against Iran as senior officers become increasingly concerned that a conventional attack on Tehran’s nuclear sites could end in failure, London's The Sunday Times reported.

The new cyber command will report directly to Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu who has placed the program at the heart of Israel’s defense capability.

“Israel must turn into a global cyber superpower,” he told a meeting of cyber warfare experts recently.

The center, which has been set up under the auspices of military intelligence unit 8200 has already conducted a series of “soft” espionage missions, including hacking into Iran’s version of Facebook and other social networking sites.

The Stuxnet malware virus, which dramatically affected Iran’s nuclear program in 2009 by sabotaging the delicate centrifuges needed to enrich uranium, is widely believed to have been developed by Israeli and American technicians.

In April, Iranian government offices came under attack from a hitherto unknown malware virus to which Tehran officials gave the name Stars. They claimed the damage had been contained but admitted it was the second mysterious virus found since the Stuxnet attack.

“Israel has two principal targets in Iran’s cyberspace,” said a defense source with close knowledge of the cyber war preparations. “The first is its military nuclear program and its military establishment. The second is Iran’s civil infrastructure. Attacking both, we hope, will cripple the entire country’s cyberspace.”

The detail about hacking into Iranian social media sites, rather than supporting the story, undermines it.

It's like saying that the US has detailed plans to infiltrate into the upper reaches of the Kremlin - and has already installed spies in a Russian women's book club.

Or to put it more subtly, see this xkcd comic from last week:

I'm sure that Israel is working on real cyberwar, but I'm not sure the Sunday Times has any proof of it.

(h/t Yoel)

Hamas again delays salaries; denies financial crisis

Hamas, which delayed paying the June paychecks to its workers until late July, said that it will delay the July checks as well until before Eid al Fitr which is at the end of August.

However, assistant minster of finance Ismail Hafouz insisted that this does not reflect on any financial problems Hamas is having. Rather, he says, there is a shortage of "liquidity" (paper cash) that is preventing the disbursement of salaries.

It is an interesting coincidence that Hamas started having problems paying its employees at the exact same time that the PA did. Did the cash-strapped PA reduce the amount of its budget paid to Gaza in June, leading to this situation? Hamas only stays afloat because of the money the PA continues to pump into territory that its officials still cannot safely visit.

French journalists' union acts against Gilad Shalit

Paraphrased from JSSNews:

Radio France Internationale (RFI) is a well known radio station for all French speakers worldwide. It is one of the only radio station that broadcasts the voice of France across the globe.

Every day the station lists reminds its listeners not to forget about all the French hostages held around the world, and reads their names.

The problem is that Gilad Shalit never was mentioned in this list, even though he is a French-Israeli who is held hostage by a terrorist group.

To counter this omission, two Zionist activists - Jonathan Curiel and Yoann Taïeb - have been pushing that Shalit is not forgotten in France.

Initially, the media response was that Shalit was not French. This is easy to refute. Then they argued that Shalit is a prisoner of war. Even President Sarkozy noted that prisoners of war have certain privileges under international law; Shalit has none.

Gradually, the two activists have managed to include Gilad Shalit as a French hostage "like the others" in various French radio broadcasts, including at RFI.

But JSSNews obtained the minutes of a French National Union of Journalists (SNJ) meeting that took place on July 26th, only days after the RFI decision, demanding an explanation from the station's management for their decision.

The union wrote to RFI:

Gilad Shalit is a French-Israeli soldier kidnapped 5 years ago by a Palestinian faction. He is a prisoner of war, and yet the RFI now lists him among the "French hostages" (civilian) which is noted every day at 8am in the broadcast. A pro-Israel information site jssnews.com welcomes and boasts of having sent "notice" to Alain de Pouzi. What's going on? Was the management of RFI pressured? Why this change of attitude about Gilad Shalit?

RFI responded:

Yes, RFI was contacted by a "listener who is interested in the issue." We turned to the Quai d'Orsay [French Ministry of Foreign Affairs], which aligns itself to the position of French President: "Gilad Shalit is not a prisoner of war because he does not enjoy the provisions of international conventions." He is therefore considered as a hostage.

The SNJ responded back:

If all the prisoners of war who do not benefit from provisions of international conventions were regarded as hostages, that would make the world .... (Remember Guantanamo?). The listener in question is actually an activist of jssnews.com, a site that speaks with virulently anti-Palestinian agenda.

Thus the powerful SNJ is deciding contrary to the provisions of the Geneva Conventions, and in defiance of the fact that the UN, the European Union, the International Red Cross, Amnesty International, the Elysée, the Quai d'Orsay or the group "Hostages of the World" say's that Shalit is not a prisoner of war...

To add power to their point of view, they speak about "civilian" hostages... Shalit was a soldier so, he cannot be counted! But the fact is that one man, Denis Alex, a member of French Secret Service, that has been held hostage in Somalia for 2 years... And he's been counted every day!

Gilad Shalit was doing his obligatory military service, he was not in hostile terrain or on an spy mission. Denis Alex was operating in hostile terrain and was on a spy mission. However, he is recognized as a civilian French hostage without any protest by the SNJ. Gilad Shalit is unfairly and arbitrarily excluded from his status as a hostage by the union. Without paranoia: is it because he is Israeli or Jewish ?

The SNJ has poisoned its credibility of of being objective in journalism with this letter.

Arabs and leftists calling Tel Aviv protests "Sons of Dogs Revolution"

A hashtag that popped up on Twitter by anti-Israel tweeters shows their pure anti-semitism.

The tag is #ThawretWeladElKalb, which means "Sons of Dogs Revolution."

The reference of Jews as dogs is of course a popular motif in Arab history.

This hashtag is very active at the moment, with new tweets every few seconds. A very small minority are protesting the use of the hashtag, but it has been embraced by many tweeters - including leftist cartoonist Carlos Latuff. Some are even making fun of the dissenters (one saying "Stop it - I like dogs!) or freely embracing the racism ("i love this racist hashtag #thawretweladelkalb :) )

If a racist hashtag was used by Zionists against Arabs, you can be certain that the leftists who pretend to be against all forms of racism would be the first to loudly protest against it. But with some exceptions, this one is being widely embraced and the people who use it are not in the least bit embarrassed to publicly espouse their anti-semitism.

(h/t Jonah)

Turkey intercepted arms shipment from Iran to Syria

From Today's Zaman:

Turkish diplomatic sources approached by Today's Zaman have confirmed that an arms shipment from Iran to Syria was intercepted by Turkey.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, the sources said the incident took place two-and--half months ago in the southeastern province of Kilis. The Turkish National Intelligence Organization (MİT) was already aware of the transportation in a convoy of trucks.

Turkish officials said the original transport papers designated the shipment as “spare parts for guns” when Iranians declared them to custom officials upon entry. An examination of the contents revealed that it matched the declaration. Yet Turkish officials suspected the shipment may have violated the UN arms embargo imposed by the Security Council and decided to seize the contents.

As there was no explicit violation of Turkish law and the declaration matched the contents, the driver and trucks were either released or about to be released, the same official said. The contents however were stored in a safe depot.

A news report that appeared on Israeli website ynetnews.com on Thursday quoted the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, saying an arms shipment was intercepted by Turkey. The German daily reported that unnamed diplomatic sources said the weapons were meant for Hezbollah.

On another incident in April, it emerged that Turkey had seized a cache of weapons Iran was attempting to export in violation of a UN arms embargo. Turkish authorities later informed a UN Security Council committee of the interception.

(h/t Yoel)

PA intimidating female journalist; arrests her brothers

From JPost:

An award-winning Palestinian female journalist has been forced to go into hiding out of fear of being arrested by the Palestinian Authority security forces for covering a sit-in strike.

Over the weekend, the PA’s Preventive Security Force in the West Bank arrested her two brothers in an attempt to put pressure on her to turn herself in.

The journalist, Majdoleen Hassouneh, has twice refused to report for interrogation at the headquarters of the Preventive Security Force in Nablus.

Hassouneh’s friends and colleagues have launched a Facebook campaign in solidarity with her and in protest against the PA government’s measures against Palestinian journalists and freedom of the media.

Hassouneh, a graduate of An-Najah University in Nablus, is the recipient of the best investigative reporter award from the Thomas Foundation for an investigation into the medical field in the Palestinian territories.

Last week, she received a phone call from a Preventive Security Force officer who demanded that she report immediately at the headquarters of the apparatus in Nablus.

When she failed to show up, the Preventive Security Force sent her a written summons asking her to report for questioning on Saturday morning.

The letter warned that she would be arrested if she failed to show up.

Hassouneh, who lives in Beit Umrin, near Nablus, announced that she would not go to the security headquarters and described the invitation as an attempt to restrict her freedom of expression.

She said that the Preventive Security Force was trying to force her to sign a document that would limit her freedom of expression as a working journalist.

A number of Palestinian journalists said they have already been asked by PA security forces in the West Bank to sign similar documents where they pledge to cover certain events.

On Saturday night, PA security officers raided Hassouneh’s family home in an attempt to arrest her, but she was not there.

The officers detained her two brothers and told the family that she must report for questioning immediately.

Naturally, the leftists who obsess over every aspect of Israel's supposed anti-democratic nature are absolutely silent over this. Their avowed liberalism stops where Arab autonomy starts.

(h/t Yoel)

It's easy to convert to the As-A-Jew religion

You just have to tell sympathetic, gullible leftist media that you are Jewish!

From CAMERA:

A little over a month ago, as anti-Israel activists gathered in Greece expecting to embark on their journey to the Gaza Strip, Ha'aretz published a column by would-be flotilla participant,Gabriel Matthew Schivone ("A Moment before boarding the next flotilla," June 24, 2011).

Schivone is identified as "a Chicano-Jewish American from Tucson, and coordinator of Jewish Voice for Peace at the University of Arizona." Schivone begins his column: "You might wonder what would motivate a Jewish American college student to participate in what may be the most celebrated -- and controversial sea voyage of the 21st century. . . ."

Schivone emphasizes his Jewish identity no less than eight times, and repeatedly emphasizes the influence of his identity on his anti-Israel activity. For instance, he writes, "I am one of a growing number of American Jews who are determined to shake off an assumed -- and largely imposed -- association with Israel"; "For our part, we Jews launched an initial chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace at the UA campus. . . ."; "Through JVP, I discovered there were a great many others like me, who were experiencing profound internal conflicts regarding Israel"; ". . . we as Jews had an alternative to either unquestioning support of Israel (the status quo) or staying silent and thus supporting it by default. I myself was silent and timid for much too long.

"We are committed to acting out of Jewish ethical traditions. . . ."

But there is just one problem -- Schivone is not Jewish.

Read the whole thing.

The FringeGroups blog describes this as a phenomenon:

What are we to make of the Schivone Jews ? Gabriel here is the purest form: no Jewish background whatever, but this lack compensated by a strong desire to work against Israel. The old joke was about the fervent anti-Communist being some-sort-of Communist, so, why not, by that logic the anti-Jew surely has claim to being, at the very least, a some-sort-of Jew. This pure form of being a Schivone Jew may be rare, it is the Schivone Jew in the strong sense.

Much less rare is the Schivone Jew in a weaker sense.

Most of the few active anti-Israel Jews that I have known fall into this category. Usually there was a Jewish parent (whether mother or father, in this context, matters little) but a life totally apart from any other Jewish entanglement. The spouse (or, more often, the "partner") would not be Jewish, and, of course, there would not be synagogue membership, except when that involves, as it sometimes does, anti-Israel activism. In short, the self-identification as "Jewish" comes up for one and only one purpose: a life devoted to fighting against Israel. Which brings us to a definition of the Schivone Jew: someone of little or no Jewish background who, nevertheless, petulantly claims a Jewish identify for the sole purpose of agitating against Israel as an aggrieved Jew.

As it happens, Schivone Jews seem to predominate in the major self-styled "Jewish" groups that oppose Israel. This is certainly true of Jewish Voice for Peace (of which Gabriel Schivone is a member and reports "many non-Jewish Americans" as members) and perhaps also of Michael Lerner's Tikkun (which acknowledges that 40% of its readership is non-Jewish).

Syria happy that they are getting support from - Cuba

From Syria's SANA news agency:

HAVANA, (SANA) – Cuba on Friday rejected the UN Security Council statement on Syria and stressed its confidence that the Syrian people and government will solve their internal problems.

Cuban Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, Marcos Rodriguez, reiterated in a statement Cuba's deep concern over dealing with the situation in Syria by the Security Council under pressure by the West powers, AFP reported.

The statement added that Havana reiterates confidence in the ability of the Syrian government and people to solve their internal problems without any foreign intervention and calls for full respect to the sovereignty and independence of Syria.

Wow...Cuba! I had no idea that Syria had such influential support!

Meanwhile, there are reports of 15 more killed today, random shelling by tanks in Hama - the usual stuff.

Africans are sending an aid shipment to Gaza. Or at least, they were as of May 15th.:

The Africa to Gaza Aid Convoy send off was a huge success. The spirit of the convoy team members, numerous dignitaries, the press and the public, made for a truly great occasion. Leaving right on time for the beginning of their grueling journey, the convoy left town with a police escort to the cheers of a very emotional and appreciative crowd. An amazing experience was had by all.

The last update on their webpage was from July 16th when they were in Kenya.

Their Facebook page gets updated but without many specifics of where they are, what they are taking, or anything else.

But while they are on their journey, perhaps they will meet the aid going the other way - from Gaza to Somalia! From ABNA (Iran):

The Arab Medical Union in Gaza has been campaigning to raise funds to aid famine-stricken Somalians as the country sees the worst drought in sixty years.

‘’The campaign is aimed at showing the physical cohesion between the besieged Gaza and Somalia, and that the Palestinians have the ability to support and stand by the Somalis,’’ said Abdurrahman al-Haddad, the coordinator for the AMU emergency committee.

He added that despite the Gazans’ ordeal, they still ‘’feel the pain’’ of Muslims everywhere, especially in Somalia, where tragedy abounds.

The AMU has already sent a delegation and several aid convoys to Somalia, Haddad said, pointing out that those who saw what was happening there first-hand said the disaster is ‘’greater than can be described’’, as some 11 million Somalians are at risk of dying and four million experience hunger.

He went on to say that the campaign, titled ‘’from Gaza...hand in hand to save the children of Somalia’’, will continue throughout Ramadan.

It's a perpetual motion machine of humanitarian aid! (Just don't pay attention to the electric cable running out the back of the machine, coming from the West.)

(h/t Faith, Folderol)

Iranian Revolutionary Guards site accuses Ahmadinejad of being Jewish

There have been rumors for a couple of years nowthat Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was really Jewish, but now the Iranian Revolutionary Guards site is amplifying that claim.

Al Arabiya reports that, according to the website "Basirat", they have documentation that Ahmadinejad belongs to a secret Jewish organization (translated as "Peripatetic," perhaps freemasons?) that is related to the secret Jewish underground.

The site stressed that they have nothing against Jews, but they don't like that Ahmadinejad was hiding his supposed roots.

Right.

This shows again that for all his bluster, Ahmadinejad doesn't rule the country - the Ayatollahs do.