Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, July 16, 2012

Journalist imprisoned, tortured by Hamas. Yawn.

Palestine Press reports about Mohamed Nimer Guenith , a freelance journalist in Gaza, who was abducted, imprisoned and tortured by Hamas.

According to Guenith, ge was arrested on June 10 after his home was raided and his computer confiscated. He was asked about articles he had written that were critical of Hamas (specifically about the fuel shortage,) as well as for details on who his journalist friends were. He was beaten, punched and slapped, and forced to sleep on the ground.

The next day, were subjected to investigate again and asked him about those critical of Hamas, and raises the issue of lack of fuel in the Gaza Strip, next to the same questions about his friends in the journalists 'union and his friends journalists in Egypt, and journalists who work for the Fatah movement, and during his interrogation was colleague, the journalist was beaten with' punched and slapped, forced to the wall strongly ', was detained for 12 days in a cell about a meter and a half, including a toilet, sleeps on the ground in some nights.

The interrogators asked him if he was biased against Hamas because they killed his brother. They beat his feet and shaved his head, and accused him of being a Fatah journalist who is undermining the unity between Hamas and Fatah, a charge he denied.

After 15 days he was released. He then made a statement that it is clear that there is a systematic policy practiced by Hamas in the Gaza Strip with the aim of gagging the media by subjecting journalists to arrest, torture and detention in harsh conditions.

As far as I can tell, the UN Human Rights Council didn't bring up the issue of Hamas repression of freedoms when they visited Gaza this weekend. Perhaps it is outside of the UNHRC's mission statement to accuse anyone besides Israel of abuses.

Iranian press says Israel will attack - America

One of the Western conspiracy theorists who has found a comforting home in Iranian media is Gordon Duff, who usually hangs out at that anti-semitic nutcase site Veterans Today.

Last week he posted a classic on Iran's PressTV:

The most likely scenario, should the Likudists in Israel find their stranglehold on that country, one held through propagandization, pouring millions into the American electoral system, much of it proceeds from drug sales, human trafficking and other areas of organized crime, some of it even America’s own foreign aid to Israel, used for “pump priming,” Israel is likely to try to precipitate a war on Iran by staging an attack on the US, its forces in the Persian Gulf region or on a European NATO target, most likely the London Olympic games.

There has been highly credible information that an attack on the Olympics is planned.

Additionally, Dolphin submarines supplied to Israel by Germany have now been proven to have been specially modified to launch Cruise type and surface to air missiles.

This would allow Israel to attack American ships in the Persian Gulf, stage a nuclear attack on the London Olympics or shoot down commercial aircraft while blaming Iran.

Their powerful lobby in the US would back them up, their control of the press through much of the world would immediately blame Iran and any potential investigation would be rigged beforehand.

A critical component of the success of such an operation is that “highly informed sources” that might speak openly, would be threatened with any number of fates from immediate firing to the “accidental death” of their children.

In fact, we actually have statements from “highly informed sources” that this has happened before, more than once, in the US, United Kingdom and elsewhere in Europe.

See how we Zionists think everything through?

Lebanese graduate from Technion accused of "collaboration"

At the very same time that graduates from American University of Lebanon were heckling an American honoree for supporting Israel's existence, a Lebanese Arab woman was honored - as the valedictorian at Israel's Technion!

From the Times of Israel, June 6:

The daughter of the man who founded a mini-army in southern Lebanon graduated on Wednesday from a prestigious Israeli university with a master’s degree in aeronautics, having developed a rocket engine that enables speedier and longer-range missile fire.

Arza Haddad, 31, is the daughter of the late Saad Haddad, an officer who split away from the Lebanon Army in 1976 with his unit to create what became the South Lebanon Army, the Maariv daily reported. Haddad allied himself with Israel to fight guerrilla and terror groups and protect the Christian community in South Lebanon, including in the First Lebanon War, whose 30th anniversary falls this week.

After Haddad’s death in 1984, Arza completed high school and then fled to Israel. On Wednesday, she graduated with a master’s degree in Aeronautics from the Technion in Haifa, having worked in research on Ramjet missile engines. The rocket she worked on, she said, “can travel 1,000 kilometers, relatively rapidly.”

The valedictorian at the graduation ceremony, she told Maariv she had not yet decided whether to mention her father in her speech, as “some people remember him well and some don’t.”

She said she herself does not remember her father well as he died of an illness when she was three years old, but that his competitiveness and perseverance were passed on to his family members. She said she had no plans to return to Lebanon. “My whole adult life is here. Israel is my home.”

The story was quickly picked up by Lebanese media.

And then they feverishly claimed that her rocket designs are meant to be used by Israel against Lebanon.

So, naturally, this was inevitable:

Military Prosecutor Judge Saqr Saqr charged Monday the daughter of the disbanded South Lebanon Army of collaborating with the Jewish State.

Arza Saad Haddad, a Lebanese with an Israeli nationality, is the daughter of Saad Haddad, founder of the Lebanese militia which fought alongside Israel during its occupation of south Lebanon 1982 to 2000.

Based on articles 285 and 278 of the Penal Code, Sakr accused Haddad of collaborating with Israel and entering the Jewish state. The case has been transferred to an investigative judge.

Gaza gets visitors from Yemen and the UNHRC

From the Al Qassam Brigades website:

Gaza premier Ismail Haneyya has affirmed that the Israeli occupation was fading and its strategy in Gaza had failed.

Haneyya, speaking to a visiting Yemeni popular delegation on Sunday, said that the Palestinian people are more determined than ever before to restore their land and to return the refugees to their homeland.

He said that Israel would not be able to occupy more land but would rather decline to its fateful end, asserting that there is no future for occupation on the land of Palestine.

The premier hailed the Yemeni delegation, saying that its visit proved that the Palestinian people were not alone in the field of confrontation and against siege.

The chief Yemeni delegation, for his part, affirmed his country would not be preoccupied with its own issues away from Palestine and would continue to support the Palestinian cause.

It is fairly clear from this article that Hamas defines "occupation" as "all of Israel."

But note how the Yemen delegation, coming from a country that is fighting for its life against Al Qaeda and that faces a huge humanitarian crisis as hundreds of thousands of kids are literally starving to death, still says that helping Hamas terror groups is a priority for them.

Because what's more important - helping starving kids in their own country or helping these "starving" Gazans at the beach?

But these weren't the only visitors to Gaza yesterday.

The magnificent organization, the UN, sent representatives from its "Human Rights Council" to Gaza:

A delegation from the United Nations Human Rights Commissioner's office arrived in the Gaza Strip on Saturday evening via Egypt's Rafah crossing, Egyptian media said.

The 11-member delegation will discuss Israel’s violations of human rights in the coastal enclave, according to Egypt's Middle East News Agency.

There is no shortage of people in Gaza eager to testify about Israel to the UN - yesterday, the Al Mezan Center spent hours detailing hundreds of supposed Israeli crimes - but you won't find anyone willing to say a word against the terrorist government that actually occupies Gaza.

The UNHRC didn't send any delegations to Jordan, or Egypt, or Lebanon, and certainly not to Syria.

Because, for both delegations, blaming Israel for all the world's problems is a hell of a lot easier than actually trying to solve them.

"Summer brides" in Egypt; human trafficking in Iran

From Al Arabiya:

Wealthy Arab tourists from Gulf countries are paying money to purchase under-age Egyptian girls as “summer-brides”, claims a new report on human trafficking released by the U.S. State Department.

The marriages are not legally binding and end when the men return to their home countries.

According to the report “Trafficking in Persons”, often times these temporary marriages are facilitated by the girls’ parents who profit from the transaction.
According to Britain’s The Daily Mail, the wealthy tourists pay an amount to poor families through intermediaries, ranging from anywhere between $495 and $4,950.The young victims, some under the age of 18, are then forced to serve as sex slaves as well as servants to their “husbands.”

Egypt has laws in place that aim to combat human trafficking which prevent foreigners from marrying an Egyptian woman if there is more than ten years age difference, but marriage brokers have found a way around that by forging birth certificates to make the girls appear older and the men younger.

These contracts also eliminate any potential problems with hotels and land lords who may demand to see proof of marriage before allowing a couple to stay in a room together, since pre-marital sex is prohibited in Islam.

In many cases, the family agrees to marry their daughter without her consent, but often the girls are willing participants as they see it as the only way to help provide for their families.

In some cases the men take the Egyptian girls back to their home country to work as maids for their first wives. But even the girls who stay in Egypt do not fare much better since they often become ostracized by society and find it difficult to re-marry in the traditional way, particularly if the “summer marriage” resulted in a child.

Many of the young women end up in a cycle of temporary marriages with Gulf tourists, and others are targeted by Egyptian men who marry them in order to force them into prostitution.

Many abandon the child out of shame, either to orphanages or leaving them to join the hundreds of thousands of street children that already exist in Egypt.

But Egypt isn't nearly as bad off as Iran is in this State Department report.

Iran is a source, transit, and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to sex trafficking and forced labor. Iranian and Afghan boys and girls residing in Iran are forced into prostitution within the country. Iranian women, boys, and girls, are subjected to sex trafficking in Iran, as well as in Pakistan, the Persian Gulf, and Europe. Azerbaijani women and children are also subjected to sex trafficking in Iran.

Afghan migrants and refugees are subjected to forced labor in Iran. Men and women from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Iraq migrate voluntarily to Iran, or through Iran, to other Gulf states, particularly the UAE, and Europe, seeking employment. Some are subsequently subjected to conditions of forced labor, including debt bondage, through the use of such practices as restriction of movement, nonpayment of wages, and physical or sexual abuse. NGO reports indicate criminal organizations, sometimes politically connected, play a significant role in human trafficking to and from Iran, particularly across the borders with Afghanistan and Pakistan in connection with the
smuggling of migrants, drugs, and arms. Unconfirmed reports indicate that religious leaders and immigration officials are involved in human trafficking.

The Government of Iran does not comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking, and is not making significant efforts to do so. The government did not share information on its anti-trafficking efforts with the international community during the reporting period; this impedes the collection of information on the country’s human trafficking problem and the government’s efforts to curb it. Publicly available information from NGOs, the press, international organizations, and other governments nonetheless indicate that the Iranian government is not taking sufficient steps to address its extensive trafficking challenges. For these reasons, Iran is placed on Tier 3 for a seventh consecutive year.

Iran shuts down coffee shops for being "immoral"

From Reuters:

Iranian police shut down dozens of restaurants and coffee shops over the weekend, Iranian media reported, in a renewed crackdown on what the state sees as immoral and un-Islamic behavior.

Regular officers and members of the "morality police" raided 87 cafes and restaurants in a single district of the capital Tehran on Saturday and arrested women for flouting the Islamic dress code, according to the Iranian Students' News Agency.

"These places were shut for not following Islamic values, providing hookah to women, and lacking proper licenses," said Tehran police official Alireza Mehrabi, according to ISNA. Women are not allowed to smoke hookah, water pipes, in public.

Mehrabi said the raid came as part of a plan to provide "neighborhood-oriented" security, and would continue in other parts of Tehran.

Coffee shop culture has flourished in Iran in recent years, offering wireless Internet, snacks, hot drinks, and a place to hang out for Iranian youth in a country where there are no bars or Western chain restaurants or cafes.

Ah, human rights.

Sunday links

From Ian:

Latma summer shorts: The peacenik boss's amazing admission

New York Post Editorial: Israel on the outs — again

“Once again, Israel was excluded from one of Team Obama’s pet projects — the Global Counter-Terrorism Forum, a group of 29 nations that met this week in Spain.
Israel was not only not invited — Turkey objected — it also was completely ignored.”

Israel considering sanctions against UN agency for illegal activity in Judea and Samaria

“Israel is considering sanctions against the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs due to illegal activities in Judea and Samaria. Specifically, the office stands accused of performing illegal construction activity in the region.”

B’nai Brith slams UNESCO affiliation with Gaza University

“To so strongly associate an organization meant to promote peaceful goals with a terrorist organization is yet another contributor to the world body’s tarnished reputation in the international community,” B’nai B’rith International President Allan J. Jacobs said.
“Establishing this special UNESCO scientific chair in effect legitimates an anti-Semitic
institution so closely associated with a terrorist organization. This decision flies in the face of rational thought, and once again gravely politicizes an agency that should be dealing with education, science and culture,” added B’nai B’rith International Executive Vice President Daniel S. Mariaschin.

China, Cuba Block U.N Human Rights Council from Condemning Syria

The BBC’s talent for misrepresenting Mizrahim

“To read this article you would never guess why hordes of Mizrahim would willingly choose to put themselves through the mill of cultural oppression that is Israel. But the truth is that such obstacles as they encountered were a walk in the park compared to the persecutions and pogroms they had endured in their countries of birth. There, discrimination was enshrined in law. But you will never learn such inconvenient truths from the BBC or from the lips of Rachel Shabi, whose goals are to whitewash Arab anti-Semitism in order to attack Israel’s “Ashkenazi” elite as European colonialists. They maintain that the Mizrahim simply “arrived” in Israel from countries like Morocco, Tunisia, Iraq, Yemen and Iran in the years following its establishment — like aliens from the planet Zog.”

New evidence may lead to arrest of world’s ‘most wanted’ Nazi
Ladislaus Csizsik-Csatary, spotted by British reporters, implicated in testimony by survivor in Sydney

Hamas says Egypt's Mursi will end Gaza blockade
Leader of terror group Ismail Haniyeh says he is confident Egypt's new president will shield Palestinians from Israeli attack.

Iran vows to back any nation that fights America, Israel

HSBC ignored financial transactions to Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas

Israel is more like Australia than you probably realise. In both countries cricket matches will only be halted by bushfires, if the field starts to burn.
Australia: Out in a blaze of glory: a bushfire fails to stop cricketers at Abernethy in 2003.
Israel: Smoke blows toward the pitch at Lod, shortly before play was suspended on Friday. 2012
From: Flames interrupt already hot Israeli cricket
White smoke from blaze forces a temporary halt to game between Lod and Ra’anana.

Onco-washing

From COGAT:

In the [IDF] Civil Administration they were hard at work in the last few weeks, preparing a special summer camp for cancer-stricken children from Judea & Samaria and from Gaza. 24 Palestinian children along with their parents departed, from Monday, July 2nd until Thursday, July 5th, for four days of fun in the Jordan Park, financed by the Civil Administration. These included horse riding, activities on inflated contraptions, music workshop and various other attractions.

The Jordan Park contains a combination of tourist, recreation and archeological facilities. The park, which extends over an area of about 1000 dunam, belongs to the Jewish National Fund and is administered by the Economic Association for Golan Settlements. The Health Coordinator in Judea & Samaria, Mrs. Dalia Basa, coordinated the children’s visit with the park management after having verified that the facilities in the park and the basic medical services exist and are adapted to the children’s special needs.

“We were happy to see how the children forgot, even if for a short time, the disease and connected to the summer camp experience during their summer vacation, just like all children throughout the world and in Israel.” summarized the Health Coordinator in Judea & Samaria, Mrs. Dalia Basa.

The civil Administration reported that different groups of Palestinian children and teenagers go out daily on excursions and visits of Israeli sites and that every year the wish increases to participate in summer camps, workshops, vacation days, etc., which combine visits in Israel and mainly organized excursions to the water sources in the North and in the Tel-Aviv area.

Obviously the IDF helps out cancer-stricken Palestinian Arab kids only to whitewash their crimes against, um, Palestinian Arab kids.

Only one problem: they do a really poor job publicizing it. Not a single story in any major Israeli newspaper about this. The only other places I saw it was the IDF website copying this article and a Christian organization.

So I guess that I am the main purveyor of Israel's evil onco-washing.

This joins Israel's evil pinkwashing, snow-washing, eye-washing, quake-washing, tech-washing, hunger-washing, med-washing, heart-washing, infection-washing, breast-washing, tumor-washing, germwashing, robot-washing....

All done, as any trendy Lefty knows, to cover up Israeli crimes.

Because that is the only way for tolerant über-Lefties and anti-Zionists to understand Israelis doing anything that is not a war crime.

(h/t Yerushalimey for robot-washing)

A Cyprus thought experiment

From Israel HaYom:

Cypriot police are continuing to question a 24-year-old foreigner arrested last week for allegedly plotting an attack on Israeli tourists visiting the Mediterranean island, Cypriot media reported on Saturday.

The man, said to be a Swedish passport holder of Lebanese extraction, was arrested on July 7 and was detained following remand hearings held in camera, Sigma TV reported. He has not yet been charged with any offence.

Sigma TV's website reported the man had been tracking the movement of Israeli tourists on the island, while Cypriot newspaper Phileleftheros said he was attempting to pinpoint areas frequented by Israeli tourists and the buses they used.

A Cypriot government spokesperson confirmed the arrest of the Lebanese man, and according to media reports, the arrest took place after a "foreign intelligence agency" submitted information on the suspect to the authorities.

Police reportedly arrested the Lebanese man in his hotel room, where they also found photos and documents containing information on Israeli targets, including flight departure and arrival times for Israeli airlines. Sigma TV said the suspect arrived in Cyprus with the intention of carrying out a terror attack against an Israeli plane or tourist bus, and according to other reports, he spent time in the southern coastal city of Limassol where he photographed "Israeli targets."

Based on the suspect's Lebanese origin, it is increasingly believed that the man is a Hezbollah operative who was collecting information for a terror attack that was being planned by the Shiite group, seeking retaliation for the 2008 assassination of one of its senior leaders, Imad Mughniyeh, which they blame on Israel.

The Cyprus Mail notes:

The suspect arrived on the island almost two weeks ago.

Isn't it interesting that he arrived on the island so soon after Cypriot authorities allowed the Lebanese energy minister to expel an Israeli diplomat from a conference?

Is it possible that if the Cypriots had made a stand against the Lebanese bullying, that something like this wouldn't have happened?

Or would it have been more likely?

PalArab suspected of selling land to Jews "falls out of window"

From Now Lebanon:

A retired Palestinian security officer died on Sunday of injuries sustained after falling from a window while in Palestinian custody, security sources told AFP.

The unidentified 63-year-old man was pronounced dead at a Ramallah hospital, where he was transported suffering serious injuries, with one source saying it was unclear if he had fallen or was pushed to his death.

"This citizen is a retired security officer who was being held by the intelligence services in Ramallah on suspicion of corruption involving the sale of land," a security source told AFP on condition of anonymity.

"He fell from a building and died, but we do not know if he fell or was pushed," the source added.

The details were confirmed by a second security source, who said the man was being investigated on suspicion of having "manipulated land records and sold land to Israel."

Ma'an adds:

Osama Akel Hassan Mansour, 49, was detained by security forces on June 19 as part of an investigation against corruption, a security statement said.

Mansour's wife told Ma'an that she believes her husband did not die naturally or commit suicide but was killed.

She had visited him on Friday and said he was in good spirits, joking and making people around him laugh.

That's a neat way to have the death penalty for selling land to Jews while keeping pesky human rights groups off your back.

"US pressuring against Pal UN bid - until after US elections"

The assistant secretary general of "Palestine" to the Arab League was interviewed about the severe PA budget problems and empty Arab promises to help, but he added something interesting.

Dr. Mohammed Sabih told Palestine Press Agency that the US was exerting "enormous pressure" on the Arab League and the PLO to postpone their latest bid to get recognized by the UN - until after the US presidential elections.

After the elections, he said, the US promised to be able to discuss "appropriate solutions" for the PLO.

He might be lying. But then again, he might not be. The PLO doesn't have much incentive to lie about this; if the US was pressuring the PLO to never go to the UN instead of postponing their bid for a few months, why wouldn't he say so?

Given that the initial hostility towards Israel by the Obama administration has been increasingly replaced by very public pro-Israel announcements as the election gets closer, it is easy to be cynical about the about-face.

Don't worry, most Arabs won't read the latest Arabic anti-semitic book

A book was just released in Egypt about how American Jews historically manipulated the US to the Zionist cause.

But you don't really have to read it, since all you need to know is on the cover:

Not to worry, though: Most Arabs don't read books. Ever.

From Al Arabiya:

Earlier this year, a debate on how to foster reading habits among Arab youth was prompted after the Arab Thought Foundation’s Fikr released its fourth annual cultural development report in January, saying that the average Arab child reads “six minutes” a year in comparison to 12,000 minutes its Western counterpart spends.

It also reported that an Arab individual on average reads a quarter of a page a year compared to the 11 books read by an American and seven books by a British person.

“If we adopt the minimum average time that youth is on the Internet, that gives us 365 hours a year, and if we compare that with the average time an individual Arab spends reading, which is six minutes a year, then the difference between the two becomes clear, and the importance of the Internet in youths’ lives becomes apparent,” the report said.

Another survey on reading habits in the Middle East in April 2011 made for a depressing read. Only one in five read on a regular basis and among those under 25 ─ nearly 65 per cent of the 3,667 questioned by Yahoo! Maktoob Research ─ about one in three seldom or never read a book for pleasure.

The survey’s results shows similar reading habits across countries. In an Arab League table of readers by nations, the United Arab Emirates placed fifth behind Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco and Iraq. In the UAE, just 22 per cent of people described themselves as regular readers.

So all those copies of Mein Kampf that are in Arab bookstores aren't actually being read. They are more for show.

Arabs only look at the pictures on the front.