Abbas continues to push his lies at both houses of British Parliament

The number of foreigners who have spoken at both Houses of British Parliament is pretty small - only 15 since 2000.

Now, Mahmoud Abbas - the Holocaust denying, terrorist-supporting, Jewish Temple denying financier of the Munich Olympics massacre, who has publicly charged Jews with training pigs to attack Arabs - has joined this formerly illustrious and exclusive club.

Abbas is not a great orator. He has zero charisma. But he does have something that the Europeans lap up: the ability to speak in sound bites that have, by their very repetition, become accepted as facts - even when the real facts are known.

Here is his speech. Plenty of lies, although not quite as many as Abbas has spouted in the past.  But note how many times he says "1967 borders" using his Goebbels technique - which has worked wonders.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

I am honored once again to be in this chamber, with the distinguished members of the House of Lords and the House of Commons.

Last month we resumed negotiations on all core issues. This could not have happened without the active and constructive efforts made by President Obama and Secretary Kerry, and also the efforts of Europe, Russia and the United Nations. I hope that the U.S. and the Quartet will be a full partner in these negotiations. We will address all permanent status issues: Jerusalem, Borders, Settlements, Refugees, Security, and Prisoners.

A time period of 6-9 months has been designated to achieve a comprehensive agreement including end of claims and end of conflict. If the Israelis honor their commitment to release the 104 Palestinian prisoners from pre-1993 I commit not to accede to any of the U.N. agencies or conventions, during the 6-9 month period.

We also agreed to continue fulfilling our security obligations during this time, and we will shoulder all commitments emanating from agreements signed, The Road Map and the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002.

If Israel withdraws from the territories occupied in 1967, 57 Arab and Muslim nations will normalize relations with Israel. [Even Egypt and Jordan haven't "normalized relations."] In a region experiencing a period of deep unrest, this would be a most significant and beneficial development and we hope that the Israeli government will consider it seriously.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

We hope that the Israeli government will honor its commitments including a halt on settlement activities, which have accelerated drastically in the past six weeks. It should be noted that (4019) new housing units have been announced in Israeli settlements since the negotiations resumed in Washington D.C. July 30, 2013.

I would like to take this opportunity to express my deepest appreciation for the recent E.U. Guidelines on Israeli settlements. This step, which reinforces the 1967 border and the two-state solution, provides a constructive atmosphere for negotiations. I hope that these Guidelines will enter into effect in January 1st, 2014, as announced. Moreover, we hope that you, as Britain, and as a member of the EU, will continue to take steps aimed at realizing the two-state solution, which are a natural translation of your clear policy on Israel’s settlement enterprise, and which will help us to finally achieve peace for the benefit of both Palestinians and Israelis.

Ladies and Gentlemen

Last year 138 nations voted for Palestine as a non member state in the U.N. I hope the day will soon come when Great Britain will recognize the State of Palestine with East- Jerusalem as its capital on the 1967 borders.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

On incitement I propose to revive the trilateral committee on anti-incitement. (U.S. Palestinian, Israeli). [What he means is "I propose to push the issue off because if anyone looks closely at how I and my people speak in Arabic, I'm screwed.]

As for the reconciliation:

We will do it when Hamas accepts to go to elections (Presidential and legislative).

Reconciliation will not be a burden on negotiations. Hamas have agreed that if a peace agreement is reached, and put to referendum, then they will accept that agreement. [I think Hamas will disagree, and a brief glance at any Hamas media outlet shows this to be a risible lie.]

Meanwhile we will continue our institutions building for the State of Palestine. I thank Britain for its generous contributions in this endeavor. I assure you that the State of Palestine takes its responsibilities as an international actor very seriously, and will continue working in the fields of democracy, human rights, women rights, accountability, transparency and the role of law.

On the changes in the Arab World:

Democracy and peace are essential. We are taking a neutral position (Syria, Lebanon, Egypt and Elsewhere).

Ladies and Gentlemen:

You may have many questions that you want to ask. I will distribute a booklet that I prepared after meetings held in U.S., Europe, Latin America, and Palestine with countless Israeli and Jewish leaders.

We need your active support to ensure the successful conclusion of the peace negotiations so that the State of Palestine can live side by side with the State of Israel in Peace and Security on the 1967 borders.

By any objective measure, Abbas is more like Bashar Assad than any Western leader.

Just today, it was revealed that the PLO's claim that the US wrote a guarantee signed by John Kerry, assuring that negotiations would start at the "1967 borders," was fiction. Once again, there are no consequences to Arabs lying - it is expected so therefore not punished.

The willful blindness of the West, combined with extreme wishful thinking that Abbas is a peace partner, ensures that the lies, corruption, incitement and human rights abuses of the PLO continue to be swept under the rug.

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The Ophel medallion - and 7th century Zionism

Early Monday a spectacular archaeological find was announced:

During excavations at the foot of the Temple Mount, which were conducted this summer, Hebrew University of Jerusalem archaeologist Dr. Eilat Mazar discovered two bundles of treasure containing 36 gold coins, gold and silver jewelry, and a gold medallion with the menorah (Temple candelabrum) symbol etched into it.

Also etched into the 10-centimeter (4-inch) medallion are a shofar (ram’s horn) and a Torah scroll.

...Hanging from a gold chain, the menorah medallion is most likely an ornament for a Torah scroll. If this is the case, it is the earliest Torah scroll ornament found in archaeological excavations to date.

Diana Muir Appelbaum has a different theory:

 The gold medallion with its image of the seven-branched menorah that once stood in the Temple, a Torah scroll, and a shofar is a remarkable piece of jewelery.  At 10:30 on this video, which includes excellent photos of the objects, archaeologist Peretz Reuben compares the newly discovered medallion with a similar medallion in the collection of the Jewish Museum of London.  The London medallion features  (12:16) very similar images of a menorah, shofar and Torah scroll.   Unlike the Ophel menorah, however, the London menorah is inscribed (12:39) in Greek: This is the donation of Jacob the head of the synagogue (or community) the setter of pearls.  A wealthy  and generous jeweler (remember the vastly higher rarity, and therefore, value, of pearls before the 19th century development of cultured pearls)  and community leader who apparently donated the London medallion to a synagogue for use as a Torah ornament.

Reuben and Eilat Mazar, the archaeologist who headed the dig,  propose that the Ophel medallion was intended for a Torah ornament, and that, because the image of a Torah in this period was rare in the land of Israel but common in the diaspora, that it may have been fashioned elsewhere and brought to Jerusalem by pilgrims.   Perhaps.  But the Ophel medallion does not have a donor inscription.  Instead, it is large and associated with a heavy gold chain and, in short, it looks remarkably like a chain of office.

Large gold medallions suspended from heavy gold necklaces are known in this period.   Here is a Byzantine pectoral now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  

Popes and Byzantine bishops wore  pectoral medallions [Engolpion  (ἐγκόλπιον)]  and pectoral crosses at least from the time of Pope Hilarius (461-468).

Jews in the Levant, who had suffered under Byzantine rule, are known to have supported the Sassians against Emperor Heraclius in the hope that a Sassanian Persian conquest would be less oppressive than Byzantine rule. If  they had expectations of attaining some kind of official status as a community under Persian rule as a reward for this political  support, or if for a brief time early in the Sassanian period some sort of autonomous status was granted,  there may have been a moment when someone prepared -  or actually wore – a heavy, gold chain of office with a large gold medallion symbolic of his role as the leader of the Jewish community of Jerusalem or of the Land of Israel.

Simcha Jacobovici also thinks along these lines:

The Jews were not always victims. The Persian monarch Khasrau II put a Jew, Nehemiah ben Hushiel, at the head of his army. The latter recruited 20,000 Jewish troops. They were then joined by the wealthy leader Benjamin of Tiberias and a military force of Tiberian Jews. The combined Jewish-Persian forces successfully captured Jerusalem in 614 CE, the exact date that Mazar points to. In other words, the Jews were not fleeing the Persians, they were leading them. This same Nehemiah was appointed the ruler of Jerusalem. He was a messianic figure who began the work of rebuilding the Temple of Jerusalem. He even appointed a council to sort out genealogies in order to establish a new High Priesthood.

The Christian population of the city, however, fearful that the reestablishment of a Jewish Temple would challenge the supremacy of the Church, rioted. A mob captured Nehemiah and his “council of the righteous”, murdered them and, after dragging their bodies through the streets of Jerusalem, dumped them over the city walls. Later, Nehemiah’s followers staged a bloody retaliation.

In other words, the treasure probably dates to this tragic moment in Jewish history when plans for the rebuilding of the Temple were suddenly aborted. Mazar speculates that the treasure was meant for the building of a synagogue. Unlikely. The treasure was found a mere 50 meters from the Temple Mount’s southern walls. This kind of treasure and this kind of symbolism are more likely connected to Nehemiah’s plans to rebuild the Holy Temple. You don’t build synagogues on the Temple Mount – you rebuild the Temple.

The video can be seen here.

The similarities between the London medallion and the Ophel medallion are unmistakable, except for the dedication. But the London medallion is not definitively a Torah breastplate either.

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Meanwhile, Muslim leaders are claiming that this medallion, as well as all other archaeological evidence that points to a Jewish presence in Jerusalem that pre-dates Islam, is a forgery.

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Israeli police commissioner says Jews can pray on Temple Mount

Kipa reports that Israeli police commissioner Yohanan Danino has stated that Jews have the right to visit the Temple Mount and to pray there, at prescribed times and places.

The Muslims are freaking out. While this story received practically no coverage in Israeli media, it is a major story in many Arabic news sites from Egypt to Saudi Arabia.

The Al Aqsa Foundation stated that Muslims will not share even a particle of dust on the Temple Mount with the Jews.

Meanwhile, here is a photo in Al Yaum captioned "Settlers storm and desecrate the sanctity of Al-Aqsa:"

And here is a video of Muslims presumably showing calm and respect for the same site on September 4:

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Interactive world map of where IDF soldiers come from

From the IDF:


View Global Stories: IDF Soldiers from Across the World in a larger map

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9/09 Links Part 2: Google Moves Israeli Town to Jordan, “Jews of Egypt” Wins Best Doco.

From Ian:

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'40 Years on, It's Time to Mark Victory in the Yom Kippur War'

In an interview with Arutz Sheva, Gur says the time has come for Israelis to realize that even though the war caught Israel's leaders unprepared, the efforts of the military are a cause for great pride.
The Yom Kippur War began on the holiest day of the Jewish Calendar in 1973 when an Arab force led by Egypt and Syria made a joint surprise attack on Israeli positions in the Sinai desert to the south, and the Golan Heights on Israel's northern border.

Isi Leibler: Candidly Speaking: A friendlier Australian government

The community came out strongly for the Liberal party and Tony Abbott, who has been leader of the opposition in the House of Representatives since 2009. Abbott has been a passionate friend of Israel since his first visit to the country as a young man and subsequently as an MP prior to being elected leader of the party. He is a protégé of former prime minister John Howard, recognized as having been one of Israel’s greatest champions among world statesmen. It is anticipated that the new government headed by Abbot will foster robust support for Israel on par with that of Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
It is also ironic that, whereas the former Labor government abandoned Israel in order to procure Arab support for its candidature to the UN Security Council, the Arabs will have effectively guaranteed the appointment of what will in all likelihood be the most pro-Israel government on the council.

Defense minister ridicules notion of democracy in Mideast

Surging as far back in time as the Sykes-Picot Treaty of 1916, which dictated the eventual parceling of the Middle East among the world powers, Ya’alon said that just as the nation state was right for Europe at the time and wrong for the Middle East, so, too, is democracy today — as ushered in at the ballot box — wrong for the region.
Advocating for democracy, he said, in a region where death is frequently valued over life, reeked of “ignorance, naiveté, wishful thinking and, no less important, patronization.”
He also voiced outright surprise that, despite the upheaval in the Arab world, there was still a movement to push for the founding of a Palestinian state.

Israel complains to US over Palestinian leaks

The anonymous Palestinian official said Israel had proposed leaving dozens of settlements and military bases in the West Bank and seeks a Palestinian state in provisional borders.
The Israeli official said Sunday some of the information the Palestinians have leaked is incorrect or distorted. He refused to elaborate. The official spoke on condition of anonymity as both sides said they wouldn’t brief the media.

Guardian columnist Giles Fraser finds ‘caged’ Palestinians in Jerusalem

Towards the end of his column, Fraser acknowledges that “understandably, Israelis hate outsiders like me arriving in their country and talking about the conditions in which Palestinians live” – a sentiment which is only partly true. It would be more accurate to say that what most irritates Israelis is outsiders with little or no understanding of our country who engage in lazy generalizations, half-truths, or outright lies, about every imaginable social and economic disparity between Israelis and Palestinians.
Naturally, for instance, Fraser doesn’t ponder why UNRWA (the UN agency tasked with administering Shuafat), with 29,000 employees and a budget of $1.3 billion, can’t provide adequate services for such a tiny Palestinian community – a query which would of course force Fraser to venture beyond the predictable agitprop he and his Guardian Left amen corner so faithfully disseminate.

Israel’s Tourism Minister Plans Birthright-Style Program for Christians

Israeli Tourism Minister Uzi Landau says that he hopes to create a program modeled after Taglit-Birthright Israel trips for young Evangelical Christians, as part of an effort to increase Christian tourism in the Jewish state.
“The Christians have a problem with their next generation too,” Landau said, Ynet reported. “We are looking to get closer to this public in order to generate tourism and support for Israel when they return to their homeland, become our ambassadors and view Israel not through CNN’s eyes.”

Jordan’s King Abdullah Invokes ‘Duty’ to Protect Mideast Christians

In his speech to the conference, Jordan’s King Abdullah said that protecting the rights of Middle East Christians “is a duty rather than a favor” because “Arab Christians have had a key role in building the Arab society and in the defense of our nation,” theJordan Times reported.
“Christians were in this region before Muslims. They are not strangers, nor colonialists, nor foreigners. They are the natives of these lands and Arabs, just as Muslims are,” Prince Ghazi said in his remarks to the conference, according to the Jordan Times.
The conference also focused on the rapid emigration of Christians from the region. Today, nearly every Christian community in the Middle East, with the exception of Israel’s small Christian community, is shrinking.

Google Places Israeli Towns in Jordan

Some Israeli web surfers recently looked up information about religious Zionist settlement pioneer Rabbi Hanan Porat, as the second anniversary of his death is approaching. Besides a list of entries concerning Porat, the search results also yielded a concentrated summary of information about Porat next to his picture. The summary said that he died on October 4, 2011, at "Kfar Etzion, Jordan."
This is not the first clash between Gush Etzion and Google. Several months ago, residents of the Bloc who were surfing the internet were surprised by Hebrew messages from Google that suggested they use the Palestinian Authority Google site, google.ps, instead of the Israeli google.co.il. (h/t Jewess)

'Cheat' claims mar Thomas Bach's challenge in race to succeed Jacques Rogge as IOC president

Thomas Bach, the firm favourite to succeed Jacques Rogge as head of the IOC on Tuesday, found himself the subject of a withering television documentary in his native Germany last week that has also sparked suggestions he has become the victim of a smear campaign.
A programme called Sport Inside saw the 59-year-old lawyer and former Olympic fencing champion accused of cheating when an athlete by using a wet glove to disrupt electronic scoring apparatus, of appearing in the files of the East German secret police – or Stasi – as part of an influence-peddling scheme, and of fronting an Arab-German chamber of commerce with anti-Israeli leanings.

Israeli start-up Outbrain to seek billion-dollar IPO

After the massive buyouts of two Israeli tech companies for nearly $1 billion apiece, a third Israeli start-up is set to implement an alternative high-value exit strategy. A report Monday said that Israeli start-up Outbrain plans to go public with a valuation of a billion dollars, or a sum very close to it.
According to the report in the business daily Calcalist, Outbrain, which provides a platform for content management and promotion, will seek to raise $250 million, probably on the NASDAQ.

IBM acquires CSL International cloud computing firm

IBM has announced its acquisition of Israel’s CSL International, a leading provider of virtualization management technology for the American company’s zEnterprise system. The deal is seen as a strategic investment that will enhance IBM’s cloud capabilities.
CSL International’s CSL-WAVE software enables companies to monitor and manage their z/VM and Linux on System z environments using an easy-to-use interface. The software provides drag and drop simplicity to instantly create, discover, visualize and connect virtual servers to resources allowing clients to free up more skilled staff to address other business challenges.

Film on Egypt’s Jews wins ‘best documentary’ award

The “Jews of Egypt” follows the lives of the Egyptian Jewish community in the 20th century until they left in large numbers under duress in the 1950s. Ramses describes it as a documentary about the cosmopolitan Egypt in the early 20th century, asking, “how did the Jews of Egypt turn in the eyes of Egyptians from partners in the same country to enemies?”
The film is based on testimonies of researchers, political figures and exiled Egyptian Jews.

Timna copper mines dated to King Solomon era

New archaeological finds, including date and olive pits, have backed up the biblical narrative according to which the Timna copper mines in the south of Israel were active during the reign of King Solomon, around the 10th century BCE.
The findings — based on the radiocarbon dating of material unearthed at a new site in Timna Valley in the Arava Desert, and released last week by a team led by Tel Aviv University’s Dr. Erez Ben-Yosef — overturn a consensus that had held sway among archaeologists for several decades.

Gold treasure trove unearthed at base of Temple Mount

Hebrew University researchers on Monday announced the discovery of a rare trove of Byzantine-era gold and silver artifacts, the most impressive of which is a 10-centimeter solid gold medallion emblazoned with a menorah and other Jewish iconography.
The find, unearthed in the area adjacent to the Southern Wall of the Temple Mount known as the Ophel, was dated to the early 7th century CE, in all likelihood the time of the brief Persian conquest of Jerusalem.

Simon Schama: The Story Of The Jews Episode 2 - Among Believers

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Saudi buys goat for $3 million

From Al Arabiya:

A Saudi businessman has sold a goat for an unprecedented price of $3 million, according to news reports on Monday.

Local newspaper Okaz reported that the sale of the animal for 13 million Saudi riyals ($3.46 million) caused a stir on social media.

Websites have published images of the multimillion-goat and the cheque that sealed the deal.

Experts interested in goat trading said the animal had unique features and is a rare breed, according to the report.

Believe it or not, this is not the most expensive animal ever sold. Not by a long shot. A racehorse named Green Monkey, who had great genes, was sold for $16 million in 2006. It only made $10,000 in its career.

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Again, Westerners care more about Palestinian Arabs than Arabs do

This article from UNHCR bends over backwards not to blame Arab and Muslim countries for their horrendous treatment of Palestinian refugees from Syria, but the facts are all there.

NEW DELHI, India, August 30 (UNHCR) – "The Sunny Side of Life", beam the tourism ads for the Maldives, a tropical island in the Indian Ocean. That tagline has come true for one Palestinian refugee family, who found hope for their future on these islands after 10 months of life on the run.

Last October, Ubaid*, 49, fled Syria with his wife and two little daughters. "I thought the revolution would end and we would get victory. But there was no change, the killings increased and everything became expensive. There was no life for my children, they were living in fear," he said of the civil conflict that has driven nearly 2 million people out of the country – 1 million of them children.

The family fled first to Egypt, then to Libya, before arriving in Dubai, where Ubaid's brother lived. They later tried to fly to Europe to join relatives there. But due to irregular documentation, they were stopped from boarding the flight. Barred from re-entering Dubai and faced with the threat of deportation to Syria, on 10 July they instead chose to go to the Maldives, where the tourist-friendly authorities allow visas on arrival. But yet again their travel documents posed problems, and the Maldivian authorities detained them at the airport in the capital, Male.

The fact the Maldives, the smallest Asian country in population and area, could receive a Palestinian refugee family from Syria was itself unprecedented. This was complicated by the Maldives not being a signatory to the 1951 UN Convention on the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol and lacking experience in dealing with asylum-seekers and refugees.

"Once we heard about this family, we contacted the Maldivian authorities and dispatched a mission to Male to meet the family with the help of UN colleagues based there," recounted Dominik Bartsch, UNHCR's Chief of Mission in India, whose office also covers the Maldives without a permanent presence there.

The government of the Maldives granted UNHCR unimpeded access to the family and after three days of rigorous interviews, UNHCR New Delhi recognized the family as refugees and submitted their case to the Swedish government for possible resettlement in Sweden.

As they awaited a decision, Ubaid and his family were housed close to the airport. The girls were given toys to play with and could watch cartoons on a TV in the lobby. However, they could not leave the building, and greatly missed the fresh air and freedom of movement. It was hard for the parents to keep the girls in the confines of the room as the days went by. Once UNHCR's mission had returned to New Delhi, the UN Resident Coordinator on the Maldives and his Human Rights Advisor continued to provide regular support and comfort to the family.

"I have tried to go to other countries, but it has been impossible," said Ubaid. "Since we are Palestinians, no one accepts us. I can't go back to Egypt or Syria as both are in turmoil. Libya is equally dangerous. I faced harassment every day and once even got close to getting killed."

Sharing his hopes for the future, he added, "I want my daughters to be educated. I want special care for my daughter as she is suffering from Down's syndrome, and all my family live abroad."

Their hopes were answered when Sweden accepted them for resettlement. The family left Male last Monday evening and arrived in Stockholm the following day.

"I'm sure the girls will now have plenty of sunshine and fresh air to play in, thanks to the wonderful support from the Maldives, Sweden, and UN colleagues in the Maldives," said a delighted Bartsch.

Sweden and Germany have received the majority of asylum claims from Syria for the entire European Union. UNHCR has urged more countries to help Syria's neighbours shoulder the burden and offer asylum or resettlement.

* Name changed for protection reasons

Notice how hard the UNHCR tries to eliminate the refugee status of just one Palestinian Arab family, while UNRWA does everything it can to perpetuate their refugee status forever.

See also this post from 2008, "The second-most hated people in the Middle East." We've seen this show before - when Palestinian Arabs were fleeing Iraq and Arab countries refused to allow them to enter - and even fought against their becoming citizens of non-Arab states!

(h/t Irene)

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EoZ and other Zionist bloggers profiled in Jerusalem Report

There is a very nice article in the Jerusalem Report by Tibor Krausz about pro-Israel bloggers, including me, IsraellyCool, Arnold Roth and Richard Landes. Here's the PDF (including some of my cartoons.)

Blogging Their Hearts Out by Tibor Krausz

Here are the parts that mention me, but read the whole thing.

Pro-Israel bloggers clearly have their work cut out for them, but that doesn’t faze perhaps the most influential one of them. “We definitely make a difference,” insists the New York-based IT professional who goes by the cyberspace nom de guerre of Elder of Ziyon and enjoys regular attention from mainstream media outlets for his investigative scoops.

Elder, who chose his pseudonym to poke fun at cockamamie conspiracy theories about Jewish power, began frequenting Yahoo message boards a decade ago to challenge the views and logic of Israel’s garrulous detractors. “Arguing one-on-one with people emotionally invested in hating Israel was a big waste of time,” the blogger, who prefers to remain anonymous and describes himself as a “fairly ordinary middle-aged Jewish guy,” tells The Report. “I looked for alternatives where I could write more freely and expansively for a larger audience.”

So in August 2004, he started his own blog. After a first few tentative steps of simply reposting items from the mainstream media, he soon came into his own as a seemingly indefatigable one-man operation, armed only with a computer, chutzpa and stamina. In several new posts daily, except on Shabbat, the blogger — who reaches some 10,000 readers a day and has many fans far and wide, Israel included — links to the latest articles of interest on the Middle East, parses media reports for inaccuracies and overt biases, provides satirical rebuttals to Israel’s fiercest critics, and highlights the Jewish State’s little-publicized achievements. “It takes up a few hours a day; but then again, that’s less time than most people spend watching TV,” he says.

He spends some of that time digging up archival records about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and perusing damning reports by NGOs and the UN on Israeli policy to verify the credibility of their sources and double-check their conclusions. Recently, after delving into a UN document and poring over photographs of damaged buildings in Gaza, he discovered that two Palestinian children whose deaths had been blamed on Israel during its week-long Operation Pillar of Defense offensive against Hamas militants last November, including the much-publicized death of a local BBC correspondent’s young son, had in fact been killed by Hamas rockets. His findings made the headlines.

“Pro-Israel bloggers have served as a sort of ‘information Iron Dome,’” says Dovid Efune, a British Jew who edits the New York-based weekly The Algemeiner Journal, whose website hosts some 500 Jewish bloggers. “During Israel’s Pillar of Defense, they were at the forefront of exposing and intercepting routine bits of misinformation by Hamas before they could land. Hamas and other anti-Israel actors were routinely releasing pictures of bloodied, maimed or dead children with the aim of whipping up anti-Israel sentiments. In many cases, the pictures [some of which were picked up by the mainstream media] were false, taken from different conflicts or scenarios. Larger news organizations [rarely bother combing through] Twitter feeds or translating Arabic Facebook pages.”

But Elder of Ziyon does. Running regular Google News searches on keywords in Arabic, then turning to his trusted aide, the Google Translate tool, the blogger scours the Arab-language news media for reports and op-eds about Israel, mocking, exploring and deconstructing the foibles of anti-Israel firebrands from Iran’s Press TV to Al Jazeera to the Palestinian news agency, Ma’an.

“At this very moment, I did an Arabic news search for ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,’” he explains. “It came up with five articles. One was from a Baathist website saying the US involvement in Syria is just like the Jewish/Freemason methods detailed in the ‘Protocols’ for taking over the world. The second was from a Jordanian columnist who sees the ‘Protocols’ behind Turkey’s current troubles. The third came from Egypt’s Al Wafd [a supposedly liberal daily], which claims to have uncovered a nefarious plot by the singer Madonna to convert the world to Judaism through [her study of] Kabbala. She’s also of course using the ‘Protocols’ as her playbook. There’s always some good material there!”

In March, the blogger revealed that the Arabic version of the website of MIFTAH, an EU-funded “moderate” NGO headed by prominent Palestinian legislator Hanan Ashrawi, ran an article promoting the old libel that Jews used the blood of Christians and Muslims for their matza at Passover. Cue an international hue and cry. MIFTAH lashed out at the “obscure pro-Israeli” blogger over his “smear campaign” before issuing an apology, in English, a few days later.

“Many pro-Israel bloggers are doing cutting-edge work,” stresses Benjamin Weinthal, a veteran American journalist who is The Jerusalem Post’s correspondent in Berlin. “They’re breaking stories either on their blogs or on social media sites like Twitter.” Weinthal first took notice of Elder’s work in September 2009, when the blogger revealed that Marc Garlasco, an American official for Human Rights Watch and a fierce critic of Israel, turned out, under closer inspection, to be an avid collector of Nazi memorabilia.

“I’ve written several articles based on [revelations by] pro-Israel blogs,” Weinthal says. One of those articles revolved around findings that Vittorio Arrigoni, an Italian activist for the pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement who was murdered by Islamists in Gaza in 2011, called Jews “rats” and posted anti-Semitic cartoons on his Facebook page.” He adds: “Bloggers have carved out new territory for themselves by zooming in on stories that remain in the cracks or on the edges of mainstream news coverage. They bring these stories front and center into the mainstream.”

Elder himself downplays his influence. “I’ve been fortunate that some of my posts do bubble up to [the mainstream media] but too much of the stuff we bloggers do stays stuck in our little world,” he remarks.
...

“My standard reaction [to being labeled a paid propagandist] is: ‘When do I get my check?’” Elder of Ziyon quips. “The idea that we’re ‘well-coordinated’ is itself hilarious. Some [anti-Israel blogger] can, with a single tweet, mobilize thousands of people to create a trending topic on Twitter or to vote in some online poll,” he says. “Our side can’t even figure out how to put together a single site that looks as professional as +972 Magazine [an online publication by the Israeli left].”

He himself uses a plain and free Blogspot template for his site.

“We each have our own ideas on how to relate to Islam, on whether to embrace the two-state solution, on what issues are important,” Elder goes on. “I’m in touch with other bloggers, of course, but there’s no Hasbara Central. We have lots of generals and very few troops.”

...As with journalists, so with bloggers, credibility is an important issue. Operating without any editorial control in the Internet’s raucous free-for-all, freelance bloggers can blow hot and cold as they please. “Any way you slice it, a regular person will instinctively trust Reuters as being less biased than someone called ‘Elder of Ziyon,’” the eponymous blogger says. “I try to substitute transparency for my anonymity, so I back up my arguments with references to original sources.”

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9/09 Links Part 1: 7 Pillars of ME Idiocy, Abbas Not Stopping Terror Attacks, PA Still Honoring Terrorists

From Ian:

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Barry Rubin: Obama Administration: The New Seven Pillars of "Wisdom" on the Middle East, Part One

These are the new (hopefully temporary): The White House’s Seven Pillars of Idiocy in the Middle East:
One: Other than aid and official government rhetoric, the United States is now neutral on the Israel-Palestinian conflict and, to put it more accurately, tilting toward the Palestinian side.
This does not mean disaster for Israel—and no Israeli official will say so in public--but it is a strategic reality.
Of course the talks will not go anywhere because the Palestinians know that they have a strong hand and they will overplay it. But, the administration’s willingness to punish Israel to win public relations points and shore up the doomed U.S. alignment with Islamists had to be reckoned with.

Amos Gilad: Strong Arab Sunni bloc doesn't see Israel as enemy

A powerful Middle Eastern axis of Sunni states has taken form in the region, which “does not view Israel as a sworn enemy” and has successfully kept extremist jihadi terrorism at bay, Maj.-Gen. (res.) Amos Gilad said on Sunday.
Speaking before the Institute for Counter-Terrorism’s international summit in Herzliya, Gilad, who is director of the Political-Military Affairs Bureau at the Defense Ministry, said that Israel “won’t ever be accepted as a formal member” of the Sunni axis, but that the states that make it up all view the US as the sole superpower and that their regional policies are indirectly beneficial for Israel.

Abbas Scorecard on Stopping Terror: 5,700 Attempts to Kill in 2013

The resumption of “peace talks’ between the Palestinian Authority and Israel in July came one month after 660 rock and firebomb attacks in June in Judea and Samaria, according to figures compiled by the “Hatzalah’ Judea and Samaria Emergency teams.
In the first six months of 2013, Hatzalah recorded 5,635 attempts to injure and murder Jews, including 611 Molotov cocktail attacks, eight shootings, three stabbings and 5,144 rock-throwing attacks that are intended to force drivers into fatal accidents, such as the one that killed American Israel Asher Palmer and his two-year-old son two years ago.
The statistics do not include terrorists’ blockage of roads and arson. At least 180 people were wounded from January through June, including 10 in June, and many of them still suffer from trauma and refuse to travel anywhere except in buses that have extra-thick plastic windows to protect it from rock attacks.

PMW: Terrorist featured in Palestinian education and culture as role model

Terrorist Dalal Mughrabi, who led the most lethal terror attack against Israel, is still being presented as a role model by Fatah, and being endorsed as such by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
In 1978, Dalal Mughrabi led a group of terrorists who hijacked a bus and killed 37 civilians, 12 of them children.
Recently, Abbas awarded $6,000 to a dance group named after terrorist Dalal Mughrabi:

Jordanian children taught that terrorist Mughrabi is role model

Jordanian actress Najla Sahwil on PA TV:
"When I was growing up, I dreamt of playing the part of that great personality, Dalal Mughrabi. We grew up in school on the personality of this Palestinian female fighter. In first grade, I was throwing stones. In school we were nursed on the politics of Palestine, when we were little kids."

Khaled Abu Toameh: Hamas aims to open naval military academy in Gaza

Hamas is planning to open a naval academy soon in the Gaza Strip, Hamas Interior Minister Fathi Hammad announced on Sunday.
He said that the new institution, which would be part of the police academy, would be an “extension of all marine sciences which benefit the society in civilian and other affairs.”

Assad says his friends will hit US and allies if struck

Syrian President Bashar Assad warned America and its allies to expect multiple forms of retaliation, possibly including a chemical attack, if the US goes ahead with a military strike on Syria, in remarks published Monday by CBS News.
Assad, speaking to Charlie Rose in a Damascus interview, said Syria was “not the only player in the region” and, if an attack occurs, the US and allies in return “should expect everything. Not necessarily from the government.”

Syrian Warplanes Test British Air Defenses in Cyprus

RAF Typhoon fighters won a mid-air showdown with two Syrian warplanes heading towards Britain’s main base in Cyprus, the Sunday People reports.
The dramatic confrontation came after President Bashar Al-Assad’s air chiefs sent two Russian-made Sukhoi Su-24s to probe British air defenses, the report said.
The Syrian bombers refused to respond to repeated attempts by the control tower at the UK’s Akrotiri air base to contact them.

Turkey Moving Jets and Troops to Syrian Border

Over the past week, Turkey also moved convoys of military vehicles carrying equipment and personnel between its bases near the southeastern border.
Local media speculated, according to RT, that the Turkish move might be related to an accident last Tuesday, in which a package of live ammunition exploded while being smuggled into Turkey. Six people were killed in the incident at the border.
It has been suggested by the media that the additional troops will be the first to respond to a possible strike by Syria.

Arad: Attack On Syria May Not Bring About Positive Result

Speaking Sunday at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism's (ICT) World Summit on Counter-Terrorism, taking place at the Herzliya Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Arad said that President Barack H. Obama had bitten off more than he could chew, and that the best thing he could do now was extricate himself from the corner he had backed himself into with as much dignity as possible.
“Syria is not a signatory to international conventions against the use of chemical weapons,” said Arad, so the legal basis for intervention by the West was somewhat shoddy. “You cannot say that Assad violated an international convention Syria is not signed onto.” Assad, therefore, sees no reason not to use such weapons against anyone he feels threatens his rule.

Syria Amassed Chemical Stockpile with Western Help

Syria’s leaders amassed one of the world’s largest stockpiles of chemical weapons with help from the Soviet Union and Iran, as well as Western European suppliers and even a handful of American companies, American diplomatic cables and declassified intelligence records reveal, according to the New York Times.

Syria Strike: Nine Arab Countries on Board

According to Al Jazeera, Kerry said a number of Arab countries were willing to sign a statement issued by 12 countries of the G20 summit earlier this week, which called for a response to the chemical weapons attack. Announcements regarding this decision would be made in the next 24 hours, he added.

Arab Christians come out strongly against US strike in Syria

At a conference of more than 50 regional Christian leaders and a handful of global Christians and Muslim scholars in Amman this week, the dangers of Western intervention to the region's Christian minorities emerged as one of the strongest themes. With political Islam on the rise after the Arab uprisings of 2011, the region's ancient Christian communities are already feeling under threat and have the recent example of the devastation of Iraq's Christian community following the US-led invasion of 2003 to make them worry about the consequences of action.

Author of WSJ Op-Ed Supporting Syrian Rebels Has Ties With Islamist Group

Elizabeth O’Bagy, identified by the Wall Street Journal as senior analyst at the Institute for the Study of War, wrote in her op-ed that the Syrian civil war “is not being waged entirely, or even predominantly, by dangerous Islamists and al Qaeda die-hards.”
But Daniel Greenfield wrote Sept. 4 for FrontPage Magazine that the Wall Street Journal op-ed did not disclose that O’Bagy is also the political director of the Syrian Emergency Task Force—making her an advocate, not just an analyst, on the issue she wrote about. The task force’s board of directors includes officials of the Muslim Brotherhood-linked Muslim American Society, the Hamas-linked Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center mosque, and the Council of Islamic Organizations of Chicago, which advocates for a boycott of Israel. Mouaz Moustafa—the task force’s executive director and a Palestinian Arab—on Twitter has called for the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, and on YouTube marked an anti-Israel video from a channel called “JewsExposed” as one of his favorite videos, according to Greenfield.

Overrated: Hassan Rouhani

Rouhani is unlikely to invoke heavenly creatures from the UN podium, as Ahmedinejad did; he will probably refrain from engaging in Holocaust denial; and he will seek to engage the West in substantive negotiations to end the nuclear impasse.
He is definitely more moderate than Ahmadinejad, then — much as Nikita Khrushchev was more moderate than Joseph Stalin. But he is no Mikhail Gorbachev.
In a sense, there has been a softening in rhetoric, but no evidence yet that in substance Rouhani will be any different from his predecessors. And why should he be?

Sinai Terror Group Claims Failed Attempt on Minister's Life

The attempted assassination occurred as a car bomb ripped through the interior minister’s convoy as he was leaving home for work on Thursday.
One person was killed but Ibrahim, who was travelling in an armored car, survived the attempt unhurt.
The terrorist group apologized in the statement “for not killing the tyrant,” pledging more attacks against Ibrahim and the commander of Egypt’s military, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.
Ansar Beit al-Maqdis is an extremist Salafist group that has in the past claimed responsibility for an attempted rocket attack on the Israeli resort city of Eilat.

Egypt: 'Israeli Spy Stork' Killed and Eaten

Nature Conservation Egypt told the newspaper that the White Stork, which they named Menes, was released into a conservation area in southern Egypt but flew to an island in the Nile where it was caught and eaten.
The group said on a Facebook post, "Storks have been part of the Nubian diet for thousands of years, so the actual act of eating storks is not in itself a unique practice. However, the short-lived success story of getting Menes released was not enough to keep him safe till he exited Egypt.

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Today's Iranian/Shiite/Syrian threat against Israel, Turkey and Gulf states

From Iran's ABNA agency:

Leader of the Lebanese Towhid (Monotheism) Movement Wiam Wahhab warned that hundreds of missiles will rain down on Israel the very moment Syria comes under a foreign military attack.

"The first bullet fired at Syria will be reciprocated by 500 missiles against Tel Aviv," Wahhab, also a former Lebanese minister, said in an interview with Lebanon's Jadidah TV channel on Monday.

"This is no rhetoric, I am speaking the truth and telling you the reality," he added.

Wahhab warned of Syria's retaliatory measures against any possible foreign military aggression, and said Damascus' reaction will not be limited to Israel, but it will also include Turkey and other regional countries and the Persian Gulf littoral states which are collaborating with Washington in the war on Syria.

Note how Iran's threats are explicitly against Muslim countries. This despite Iran's pretense of wanting Muslim unity:

The World Forum for Proximity is an international organization founded by Iran. Its main aim is to create more unity and solidarity among Muslims worldwide, regardless of their schools of thought.

Looks like the World Forum for Proximity and its annual Muslim Unity Conference in Tehran are not succeeding very well even it their host country.

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UN report on Middle East, illustrated

Here is a graphical synopsis of the UN's August 20th report to the Security Council on the situation in the Middle East. I reduced the size of the font for each new paragraph (except the conclusion) to give an idea of how the UN prioritizes Israel/PA, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon.

20 of the 31 paragraphs either were fully or partially about Israel, including the first 16.

You would hardly know that during this reporting period, Syria killed some 1400 people with chemical weapons (paragraph 24.)

Also note that the paragraphs about Israel have detailed statistics on settlement activity, arrests, illegal structures torn down and so forth. No such specifics are given for people being murdered in Syria by the thousands.

(h/t Gidon S. and Mida)

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The Guardian says Jews perform female genital mutilation (UPDATES)

From The Guardian:

Campaigners say that a tangled mix of family pressure, cultural traditions and religious motivations make FGM – illegal for almost 30 years in the UK – hard to eradicate. It has been documented in 28 countries in Africa and in a few countries in Asia and the Middle East. The practice involves removing all or part of the external female genitalia (including the clitoris, labia minora and labia majora – and in some cases the narrowing of the vagina), and is usually carried out before the age of 15. As well as the risk of bleeding to death or infection, a terrifying array of physical and psychological problems can follow.

Today 30,000 girls in the UK are said to be at risk of this form of mutilation, while 66,000 live with the consequences of it. Yet no one has ever been prosecuted for carrying out or abetting the practice (which carries a maximum prison sentence of 14 years).

...Although Muslim, Jewish and Christian communities carry out FGM, mainstream spiritual leaders from all three religions have denied that the practice stems from religion.

Do any Jewish communities carry out FGM?

There are two different sources that I can find, one which is almost certainly false and one which appears to have been true, years ago.

In the book Why Aren't Jewish Women Circumcised? Gender and Covenant In Judaism by Shaye J. D. Cohen, he tracks down a single mention of the practice among Egyptian Jews by Greek geographer Strabo. After looking at the evidence, however, Cohen believes it was simply a mistake on Strabo's part, as he was assuming that Jews from Egypt had taken on Egyptian customs. He quotes Philo as being quite emphatic on the matter that Egyptian Jewish men, not women, were circumcised.

The second source, which seems much more authoritative, comes from the paper "Ritual female genital surgery among Ethiopian Jews" by Grisaru, Lezer and Belmaker of Ben Gurion University of the Negev. In their article they note that most Ethiopian Jewish women claimed to have undergone female circumcision, although only 27% showed any physical signs of any surgery, which is in itself an interesting anthropological issue as far as how much to trust what people say in surveys.

The astonishing part, though, is that as soon as the Ethiopian Jews arrived in Israel, the practice ceased completely. This shows that they did it because of the surrounding Ethiopian culture, but no one claimed - even as a folktale - that this was a Jewish custom. Belmaker wrote a separate paper about this phenomenon:

A group of Ethiopian Jews who had immigrated to Israel was interviewed by an Amharic translator, and examined during routine gynecological examination...All women interviewed reported that FGM was universal in Ethiopia, but none intended to continue this practice with their daughters. All stated that this was a practice that would be left behind in their country of origin. ...

Ethiopian Jews, who practiced a major form of FGM in Ethiopia, give up the custom upon arrival in Israel and no reports exist among pediatricians, gynecologists or the press of FGM among Jews of Ethiopian origin in Israel.

While the only verified cases of FGM among Jews were the anomalous instances from Ethiopia, the practice today has completely disappeared among that community.

Which means that the Guardian is, once again, wrong.

One fact from the second Belmaker paper should have been included in the Guardian article, but wasn't. Bedouin Muslim women who had practiced FGM in Israel have also abandoned the practice, except in a symbolic form, in recent decades. This means that Israel is the only country in the Middle East that has managed to effectively eradicate FGM - far more successfully than even Western countries have been!

A good reporter would have found out that piece of information. A good reporter would have spent time to research and write why Israel has been successful in eradicating FGM when the UK has so many thousands of cases of women being mutilated every year.

That would be a good story, but, again, this is the Guardian.

UPDATE: CiFWatch, predictably, has an excellent response to the Guardian.

UPDATE 2: The article was corrected.

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