Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

11/12 Links Pt2: Obama’s False Choice on Israel; Kevin Vickers to be honoured by Israeli Knesset

From Ian:

Until the political culture of the Palestinians undergoes a sea change that will make peace possible, talk about what Israel must do is a waste of time. The overwhelming majority of Israelis who, unlike Obama and many American Jews, have paid attention to the Palestinians’ consistent rejection of peace understand this and are prepared to wait until then. Considering that the status quo has lasted for decades after we first heard arguments about it being unsustainable, it is not unreasonable to think that it can go on for a very long time indeed without Israel being obligated to endanger its security in order to avoid its continuation.
That’s a position that all friends of Israel, whether liberal or conservative, Democrat or Republican, should be willing to accept even if it goes against our instinctive American belief that all differences can be split in a spirit of compromise that even moderate Palestinians still dreaming of Israel’s destruction don’t share. The only real choices facing Jews and other friends of Israel is whether they are prepared to give the President a pass for his destructive attitude toward the alliance because of his party affiliation or if they are so detached from a sense of Jewish peoplehood that they will tolerate the mainstreaming of anti-Israel attitudes that are growing dangerously close to anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. Any argument to the contrary is merely a partisan attempt by Obama apologists to change the subject.

Dan Joseph of MRC exposes a failed protest against Sabra Hummus

My friend, Dan Joseph, a journalist with Media Research Center recently went to a protest in Georgetown, Washington DC. Dan was kind enough to give me some time out of his busy schedule to tell me what the premise of the protest was and how he was able to get these anti Israel activists to admit their disdain for Israel’s existence. This recent protest was directed at Sabra products which creates hummus and various other types of dips that many people all over the world enjoy. The forecast of these protests is becoming increasingly smaller since Protective Edge. As Dan pointed out to me, people are much more aware of the fact that Hamas perpetrated these attacks directly on Israel, and social media awareness has woken many people up that Israel is not at fault for the deaths of Palestinians in Gaza. We applaud Dan for his unapologetic support for the Jewish people and the state of Israel.
“The protest started, and it was raining on and off, it grew in numbers and was there for an hour. I hid camera to side, walked up as objective observer, they tried to stop me from interviewing them. Their line of reasoning behind the protest was that Sabra hummus sends care packages to IDF, Golani Brigade who they accuse of doing all sorts of terrible things, we couldn’t find anything troubling with the Golani Brigade’s involvement in the war in Gaza. Once they figured out who we were it got more hostile and they got defensive about their protest, tried to make it light, get them to say crazy things and that throws them off, “Israel is guilty of genocide and any company does business with them is guilty of genocide.” Dan Joseph
And this:
“One man came out and said “Israel does not have the right to exist.” They’re (the protestors) are very good at hiding and keeping on their talking points, it’s very hard to get them to admit their antisemitism. They will say they have Jewish friends, but that they hate and are against zionism. Once you get them to say the truth of their agenda the truth wins out. “ Dan Joseph

Anti-Israel Protestors Target Hummus

Kevin Vickers to be honoured by Israeli Knesset

Israeli parliamentarians will honour Canada's sergeant-at-arms, Kevin Vickers, on Wednesday for the actions he took during the shootings on Parliament Hill.
On Oct. 22, Vickers, 58, shot Michael Zehaf-Bibeau after the gunman stormed Parliament Hill.
Vickers is being invited to Israel's parliament, the Knesset, to meet his Israeli counterpart and talk about security. While there, he will be recognized by the speaker of the Knesset and will be asked to rise in his seat in the gallery to be acknowledged by Israeli legislators.
Vickers is in Israel to attend a major conference on security in Tel Aviv, a trip planned long before the shootings in Ottawa. He is part of a delegation sponsored by the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs that includes other Canadian police and security officials.

"If Israel takes over Jerusalem, then Palestinian nationalism will die"

Rami G. Khouri is about as moderate a Palestinian commentator as you can find. He is Christian, recognizes that the Temple Mount is holy to Jews and is willing to blame Arabs for their mistakes.

Even so, he justifies the recent spike in Arab terror:

The absence of PA forces under the control of President Mahmoud Abbas also means that those forces cannot quell Palestinian demonstrations against Israel, as happens in all other parts of the West Bank, where PA forces more often than not act to defend Israel as much as to keep peace among Palestinians, unfortunately. Arab Jerusalemites are essentially ungoverned and unrepresented politically, because they do not fall under Palestinian authority and they are underserved by an Israeli state that also keeps building new settlements on lands surrounding the holy city. Because of this condition of living in a political vacuum, Palestinians in Jerusalem have only themselves to rely on to defend their lands and rights, and in cases of extreme threats and violence used against them, they resort to violence such as we are witnessing these days.

Then he says something interesting:

The intense symbolism of Jerusalem for Palestinians includes two dimensions: the holy sites of the Noble Sanctuary, especially the Dome of the Rock and Al Aqsa Mosque, but also the city as the capital of Palestine, even though a Palestinian state does not exist yet. If Jerusalem is allowed to fall to Zionist colonialism and become fully Judaized, the entire Palestinian national cause would have been dealt a fatal blow. Jerusalem has always been a central battle in the Arab war with Zionism — but for many Palestinians it is now also the last battle.

The PLO covenants of 1964 and 1968 did not mention Jerusalem once. The Palestinian National Charter of 1968 likewise does not mention Jerusalem a single time. (Fatah's charter does mention Jerusalem once.)

If Jerusalem has always been so central to Palestinian Arab nationalism, then why was it ignored for so long?

The interest that Arabs altogether, and Palestinians in particular, have shown in Jerusalem has been proportional to the interest that Jews have to assert their national and religious rights in their ancient capital. Between 1948 and 1967, Jerusalem was an unimportant Jordanian city, and there were no mass pilgrimages there. Only when Jews started to say that Jerusalem was theirs, and always has been, have the Arabs decided that it is supremely important for them too.

And this spills over even into the writings of a "moderate."

The fact is that if Palestinian nationalism cannot survive without Jerusalem, then it is an artificial construct to begin with. The nearly exclusive use of the Dome of the Rock as the constant backdrop for Palestinian press conferences is a relatively recent phenomenon.

They don't want Jerusalem - they want to ensure that Jews do not have Jerusalem. Because they know that Israel without Jerusalem is just a secular state, and they can deal with a secular state, because such states come and go. They cannot deal with a proud Jewish state that asserts rights that go back to before Islam existed.

Khouri has subconsciously revealed the shallowness of the Palestinian national cause. If it was about rights, or refugees, or land, or even "justice," then they could have a state. But it isn't about any of those. It is about the symbolism of controlling Jerusalem. And the only reason that this is so important is because of the Arab honor/shame society that cannot stomach the weak, dhimmi Jews asserting rights on land that everyone knows they have been tied to for thousands of years. The minute they give up on Jerusalem, they give up on the goal of expelling Jews from political power in the Middle East.

EU: "We're Not Antisemitic - We Haven't Had A Holocaust In Like 70 Years" (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

We're Not Antisemitic - We Haven't Had A Holocaust In Like 70 Years

By The European Union

The recent spate of antisemitic violence in France is deplorable, as were the various attacks on Jews in Belgium and elsewhere over the last several months. But it would be irresponsible and malicious to say that Europe as a whole remains antisemitic - we haven't had a Holocaust here in almost seventy years.

The Holocaust was easily humanity's - and Europe's - darkest hour. Entire ethnic groups ganged up on a defenseless minority and tried to wipe them out. But to claim that the continent and culture that gave ruse to such a horror and the continent and culture of today have similar characteristics is to engage in petty demagoguery. It's been nearly seven decades since we last engaged in the systematic vilification, persecution, torture, internment, starvation, and slaughter of Jews. That's a whopping 2,207,520,000 seconds between us and the worst crime in the history of mankind.

And it's not as if we've even come close since. We learned some important lessons, such as how to put perpetrators of genocide on trial after they've already slaughtered untold numbers. Not just in far-flung places such as Rwanda and Cambodia, but right here on European soil - we stood firmly on the side of human rights and the sanctity of human life when we put Slobodan Milosevic and his ilk on trial. It was a bold move, sitting in our courtroom in The Hague and shaking our fists at the murderous policies of Milosevic, Karadzic, and Mladic in the former Yugoslavia years earlier.

Not that vigilance is unimportant. We Europeans know well the vigilance necessary to prevent our sense of ethnocentrism from causing others to feel discrimination. That it why we refrain from real action against the rhetoric and violence of Muslim immigrants. Europe knows it must never perpetrate violence against Jews. And far be it from us to impose our sensibilities in that regard on our immigrants, who might have very different ideas about Jews and how to treat them.

There will always be a vocal minority in our midst that refuses to internalize the lessons of the Holocaust. But to define us by them would be unjust. We haven't placed Jews in concentration camps in 3,600 weeks. Keep them from reaching the shores of Palestine, yes, and support the equation of their aspirations for a homeland with racism, sure, but kill them? No - that is no longer our ethos. It hasn't been for, like, seventy years, as far as anybody can prove.

We can leave that part to the Arabs.

11/12 Links Pt1: Why Abbas Will Not Condemn Terror Attacks; Hamas 2nd Richest Terror Org

From Ian:

Khaled Abu Toameh: Why Abbas Will Not Condemn Terror Attacks

Secretary of State Kerry's "peace process" actually put Israelis and Palestinians on a new collision course.
Not a single Palestinian Authority official has denounced the wave of terror attacks on Israel. They, too, are afraid of being condemned by their people for denouncing "heroic operations" such as ramming a car into a three-month old infant.
Kerry and other Western leaders do not want to understand that Abbas is not authorized to make any concessions for peace with Israel. For Abbas, it is more convenient to be criticized by the U.S. and Israel than to be denounced by his own people. Ignoring these facts, Kerry tried to pressure Abbas into making concessions that would have turned the Palestinian Authority president into a "traitor" in the eyes of his people. Abbas knows that the people he has radicalized would turn against him if he dared to speak out against the killing of Jews.

As Israelis Are Murdered in Palestinian Terror Attacks, Psaki Urges ‘All Sides’ to Show ‘Restraint’ (VIDEO)

Matt Lee: All right, I’m just going to assume that, correct me if I’m wrong but when you say all parties must show restraint, you’re talking about the, who are you talking about?
Jen Psaki: Well, we’re talking about the Israelis, the Palestinians, any who are uh, involved in these uh, eh, tension-raising, rhetoric-raising incidents.
Matt Lee: Okay, but I mean, if you’re standing at a bus stop or something and someone runs a car into you or comes up and stabs you, I don’t know how to, I mean, those people aren’t, don’t need to exercise restraint, do they?
Jen Psaki: Well, Matt, I think I’m referring to the fact that we know that there have been, there’s been rising tensions in the region that has led to some of these incidents, I think we are all aware of that (laughs).
Matt Lee: In terms of the restraint and the rhetoric.
Jen Psaki: Um hmm?
Matt Lee: Are you seeing any, I mean, uh, last week you were pretty down on both sides or you were up, you were pleased with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s calls, uh, and uh the stuff that he did with the Jordanians about getting the tensions around the Temple Mount down, but you weren’t particularly happy with President Abbas, is that, is that changed?
Jen Psaki: Well, I think they also said last week, I was speaking to one incident of Prime Minister Netanyahu, obviously there have been a range of issues and events that have led to the rising tensions in the region, that both sides need to do more to [unintelligible].

Daily Press Briefing: November 10, 2014 (starts 29:16)

Israel's faulty calculus

In response to Palestinian unilateralism, Israel must also assert full sovereignty over any areas in Judea and Samaria deemed necessary to maintain its security. Palestinians living in any annexed lands should likewise be given a path to citizenship and the option to relocate.
If a further entrenchment of the IDF is temporarily necessary, then forces should be deployed in requisite numbers.
Finally, Israel must consider cutting ties entirely with the PA, allowing it to collapse like the house of cards it is. The country can, and will, deal with whatever comes afterwards as long as its borders are secure and a military presence exists in close proximity to any cities under continued Palestinian control.
The alternative to asserting Jewish rights is worse – and in plain view: an endless cycle of violence waged by sworn enemies under the guise of a phony peace process. There is no white dove fluttering its wings at the end of the peace tunnel, which is nothing less than another underground conduit for more terrorism from the likes of Fatah and Hamas.
Pandering to murderers is not why Jews fought and died for the establishment of Israel. The goal was never the creation of a banana republic devoid of direction or intestinal fortitude; one which, unless it gets its act together – and soon – might no longer be worth fighting for at all.

PA official calls for jihad, then warns of religious war

You know how Mahmoud Abbas liked to warn that Israeli actions in Jerusalem would lead to a religious war?

Only one side is calling for a religious war, and it isn't Israel:

In a November 6, 2014 interview on Palestinian Authority TV, Mahmoud Habbash, former PA minister of religious endowment, said that waging Jihad for the sake of the Al-Aqsa Mosque was a duty incumbent upon every Muslim worldwide, and warned that the flames of a religious war "could reach the U.S., Washington itself, Europe, Asia, Africa, everywhere." In a sermon delivered in Ramallah on November 7, 2014, in the presence of PA President Mahmoud Abbas, Habbash said that the battle being waged in Jerusalem is "the final phase, after which our banners will fly... over the minarets of Jerusalem, over its churches, its domes, its hills, its mountains, its alleys, and its homes." The sermon was broadcast by the PA's Awda TV channel.

Following are excerpts:

Awda TV, November 6, 2014

Mahmoud Habbash: Today, protecting the Al-Aqsa Mosque and waging Jihad – both with one's own body and through aid – for the sake of Al-Aqsa constitute an individual duty, incumbent upon every Muslim man and woman from all corners of the Earth.
[...]
We are witnessing an insane war, being waged against the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the holiest place for Muslims in Palestine.
[...]
If this escalation continues – as President [Abbas] himself warned – it might ignite a religious war. Some people might just ignore it when they hear the term "religious war." They do not fathom what religious war means and how dangerous it might be. Simply put, a religious war would mean that every Israeli would become a target for any Muslim, from America to Japan, from the north to the south. From everywhere. Every Muslim would feel that his religious and faith are under threat, and that one of his holiest sites is being targeted by those Israelis, and would conclude that the Israelis are enemies, and therefore, constitute targets, for the sole reason that they are Israelis.

Once all the Arabs and Muslims from all over the world join the fray in the direct, physical, and operational sense, the [Israelis] will face a war against 1.5 billion Muslims.
[...]
This religious war will not be limited to Palestine. Its flames could reach the U.S., Washington itself, Europe, Asia, Africa, everywhere. Is that really what they want? It's not what we want. When we warn of a religious war, it is not an attempt to threaten anyone or arouse fear. It is a genuine warning to the world and to the U.N. Security Council.
[...]
Palestinian Authority TV, November 7, 2014

The Prophet Muhammad has given us orders and we obey them. We are grateful to Allah for choosing us, selecting us, to live in Jerusalem and its environs. We confront [the enemy], challenge it, entrench ourselves, and defend the places holy to our religion and our nation. We are protecting the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the third most holy place in Islam, the place to which the Prophet Muhammad made his nocturnal journey, and the cradle of Jesus.

We are protecting the land of the prophets from the enemies of the prophets. We are protecting the land of the divine revelations from the enemies of the messengers. The battle that is being waged today in Jerusalem, my brothers – by Allah, I believe that this is the final phase, after which our banners will fly, by the will of Allah, over the minarets of Jerusalem, over its churches, its domes, its hills, its mountains, its alleys, and its homes.

Sounds a lot like the mob, doesn't it? "We don't want to burn down your store, but you give us no choice!"

The Palestinian Authority just threatened every "Israeli" (wink, wink) worldwide, by saying that if Israel enforces civil rights for Jews, then Jews worldwide will pay.

And not one Western leader will denounce this.

UNRWA media advisor pushes anti-Israel fauxtography (UPDATE)

UNRWA media advisor Adnan Abu Hasna has a high-profile job in Gaza.

Here he is with then-EU foreign affairs head Catherine Ashton:

And with UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon:

Here is what the Facebook page of Adnan Abu Hasna looks like, today:

The photo caption says "A despicable Israeli puts his feet on a Palestinian girl. Let this picture reach the entire world in 24 hours. All you have to do is click 'Share'. "

As we've shown, this photo is fake. it was part of a Bahraini street theater.

The photo with the chain mail caption that Hasna shared was uploaded by Ghad.PS newspaper FB page back on April 17. Hasna shared it on November 8.

Most of the Arabic comments point out that the photo was fake, mostly because the IDF does not use Russian rifles.

However, Adnan Abu Hasna didn't bother to read the comments - or he ignored them deliberately. He didn't think twice about forwarding FB "chain mail." He saw an anti-Israel photo, and by Allah, he had to follow the instructions to share it.

And he is a UNRWA media advisor!

Why would UNRWA hire someone as a media advisor who propagates lies so easily?

Oh, right. That's what UNRWA does. Constantly, blatantly, incessantly.

Never mind - dumb question. The real question is how the world tolerates a United Nations agency that disregards the truth so much?

Oh, right. The lies are mostly against Israel. Never mind.

(h/t IronyDome, Ibn Boutros)

UPDATE: It appears I am mistaken. The picture was placed on his timeline by one of his friends. I regret the error. One day I need to learn Facebook. (H/t Bob Knot)

Today's fake Gaza "journalist"

On August 29, UNESCO issued this press release:

The Director-General of UNESCO, Irina Bokova, today denounced the killing of Palestinian journalist Abdullah Murtaja, who died on 25 August.

“I condemn the killing of Abdullah Murtaja,” the Director-General said. “Journalists must be able to carry out their work in safe conditions and their civilian status needs to be respected at all times. Society needs to be kept informed of events, never more so than when living in the shadow of conflict.”

I had previously found a photo of Murtaja with a rifle, but I didn't think he was a terrorist fighter. Until now.

A new video was released showing Murtaja giving his "martyr" statement meant to be shown posthumously.

The "journalist" who worked for Hamas' Al Aqsa TV, was also an Al Qassam Brigades terrorist. Hamas is calling him a "media martyr."

It is a war crime to have fighters pretend to be protected civilians. Will UNESCO release a statement condemning Hamas' using fighters who masquerade as journalists?

See also Israellycool. And Bob Knot found this poster:

(h/t ZioYahud)

Report: Live bullet used on Nakba Day shootings (UPDATE)

From YNet:

A Border Police officer was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of shooting dead a Palestinian teen at a Nakba Day protest outside Ramallah in May.

The suspect was detained by Israel Police and taken for an arraignment hearing, Army Radio reported.

Details of the police investigation into the shooting remained under a gag order, but a lead leaked to the press indicated that the probe found that the officer fired a live round, rather than a rubber bullet, as the IDF had claimed.

A police spokesperson couldn’t comment on the details of the case, but said that the investigation into the shooting was ongoing.

An autopsy performed by Palestinian and Israeli pathologists in June found that Nadeem Siam Nawara, 17, was shot and killed in May’s Nakba Day rally in Beitunia, near Ramallah, by live fire, most likely shot by the IDF.

Nawara, 17, was one of two Palestinian teens killed on May 15. The IDF, which maintained only nonlethal dispersal methods were used by troops against the demonstration, declined to comment on the findings at the time.

I had covered this extensively. I was convinced based on video from CNN, synchronized with the CCTV footage, that Nawara was shot by a rubber bullet. YNet indicates in its headline, but doesn't say explicitly in the article, that this arrest was for the Nawara shooting, and not the later shooting of Mohammed Salameh for which I don't have as much evidence.

Some had mentioned that it was theoretically possible to shoot a live bullet through the attachment meant for rubber bullets, but the gunshot sound would be much different than that of a rubber bullet shooting that we seemed to hear on the CNN video. That scenario seemed to me less likely than the idea that Nawara was shot by a rubber bullet and then killed later. And I really dislike conspiracy theories.

I'm looking forward to seeing the details when they are released.

UPDATE: NRG says that the bullet that was recovered (possibly from Nawara's backpack, or from his body) matched the Border Police gun. (h/t Yenta P)

Arab Dancing With the Stars (video)

Don't blame me....I found it on an Arabic Facebook page.

11/11 Links Pt2: Dershowitz: How Amnesty International suppresses free speech

From Ian:

Alan Dershowitz: How Amnesty International suppresses free speech

Last month the Columbia chapter of Amnesty International invited me to deliver a talk on human rights in the Middle East. I accepted the invitation, anxious to present a balanced view on human rights, focusing on the Israeli-Arab-Palestinian issue. As a supporter of the two state solution and an opponent of many of Israel’s settlement decisions, I regard myself as a moderate on these issues. That was apparently too much for the national office of Amnesty International to tolerate. They demanded that the Columbia chapter of Amnesty International disinvite me. They did not want their members to hear my perspective on human rights.
The excuse they provided were two old and out of context quotes suggesting that I favored torture and collective punishment. The truth is that I am adamantly opposed to both. I have written nuanced academic articles on the subject of torture warrants as a way of minimizing the evils of torture, and I have written vehemently against the use of collective punishment of innocent people—whether it be by means of the boycott movement against all Israelis or the use of collective punishment against Palestinians. I do favor holding those who facilitate terrorism responsible for their own actions.
The real reasons Amnesty International tried to censor my speech to its members is that I am a Zionist who supports Israel’s right to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish people. As such, I have been somewhat critical of Amnesty International’s one-sided approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For example, I wrote an article criticizing Amnesty International’s report on honor killings in the West Bank. An honor killing occurs when a woman has been raped and her family then kills her because of the shame her victimization has brought. Despite massive evidence to the contrary, Amnesty International mendaciously claimed that honor killings had increased in the West Bank since the Israeli occupation and that the fault for this increase in Arab men killing Arab women, lies with Israel. The reality is that there are far fewer honor killings in the West Bank than there are in adjoining Jordan, which is not under Israeli occupation, and that the number of honor killings in the West Bank has been reduced dramatically during the Israeli occupation. But facts mean little to Amnesty International when Israel is involved.

Dershowitz: Obama Must Fire Official Who Insulted Netanyahu

Renowned Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz made it clear that the case must not be closed regarding the Obama Administration officials who personally attacked Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with various epithets. The insults were widely reported in the international press after having been first reported in the New Yorker.
Speaking with Newsmax TV this past Thursday, Prof. Dershowitz said that President Obama "must get to the bottom of this, find out who the two people are who made those statements, expose them, and fire them."
Dershowitz, who endorsed Obama in both of the last two Presidential elections, hinted that Congress should get involved in the matter. "Congress can have hearings to determine who those two senior White House officials are who used those terrible words about PM Netanyahu," he said.

Kristallnacht fundraiser for Gaza riles Danish Jews

A leader of Denmark’s Jewish community criticized local politicians who raised money for Gaza at a Holocaust memorial event.
Donations raised at Sunday’s event in Copenhagen’s Norrebro district - commemorating the victims of Austria and Germany’s 1938 Kristallnacht pogroms against Jews - would go toward buying ambulances in Gaza, organizers from the Red-Green Alliance party said.
“When the profits from the Norrebro event go to Gaza, whose government is at war with Israel, I think that there is inappropriate confusion,” Dan Rosenberg Asmussen, president of the Jewish community in Copenhagen, told the Kristelig Dagblad newspaper.

The accusations and counter-accusations between Hamas and Fatah continue, with Mahmoud Abbas directly charging that Hamas set off several bombs last Friday against Fatah leaders - and the stage meant for a Arafat anniversary rally.

Today, the Fatah Facebook page says that students in the Jabalya camp in Gaza tried to organize a march to commemorate Arafat's death anniversary, and that Hamas came in and beat them up.

True? Who knows? It is pretty clear that the "unity" government is no more unified than it was before.