Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, May 15, 2006

Happy Naqba!

I just wanted to wish all of my readers a Happy Naqba!

As Hossam Ezzedine, the terror apologist for AFP, describes it:

Palestinians marked the worst day in their history, determined to lift damaging economic sanctions and warning that Israeli unilateralism could kill off a two-state solution.

Indeed, it was the worst day of their history. (Notwithstanding that they weren't called "Palestinians" for at least 15 years afterwards...)

Because what exactly happened in May of 1948? Instead of accepting a Palestinian Arab state that the UN offered, they decided to try to wipe out the Jews.

Of course it was a disaster! They chose wrong and lost!

In 1948 there could have been a Palestinian Arab state with its own flag, currency, and international legitimacy. If they would have chosen peace with Israel they would have jobs, a good economy, oceanfront property, and an incredibly tiny Jewish state next door.

So, in commemoration of the incredibly bigoted and stupid move that their forefathers chose, they celebrate the annual event of the disaster of their own making. They wave flags and shout empty slogans and threaten the West and make friends with Iran and Syria and support terrorists.

And here's the funniest part - they could have a state today! They could declare a Palestinian Arab state in Gaza and easily get more than half the UN to recognize them as a legitimate state - any hour of any day they choose. They could invite the gigantic Palestinian "diaspora" to help them build their country in the areas that Israel no longer enters. They could be preparing the institutions needed to run their state. It is all there for the asking.

After all, the very day that Britain left Palestine was the day the Israel declared itself independent. It isn't that hard.

But evidently it is preferable to complain about a naqba rather than do anything about it.

Because they do have a currency today - and that currency is whining.

They have learned that they get more attention by whining to the world about their self-imposed catastrophe than by doing something about it. They whine about occupation, they whine about having no money, they whine about Israelis defending themselves, they whine about a Jewish mom in Samaria building a new bathroom on her house. They love when their kids get killed, because a funeral is worth many, many whines.

Complaining is its own reward. It gets results - nations throw money at the whiners, at least at whiners about Israel.

So we will be seeing many, many more decades of Naqba celebrations. You can whine more easily about catastrophes that you pretend happened to you than about the hard work you refuse to do. And it is hard to teach an entire generation how to work when they have been raised to whine.

Humanitarian crisis, part 9 - Isn't it strange?

Our friends the Palestinian Arabs are showing yet again how much they value their economy:

Several greenhouses belonging to the former settlement of Morag in the Gaza Strip were destroyed over the weekend during an attempt by dozens of gunmen to take control of the area.
The Palestinian Company for Economic Development, which is in charge of thousands of greenhouses that used to belong to Morag and other settlements in Gush Katif, said the attack, which took place on Friday, was the latest in a series that began almost immediately after the settlements were evacuated.
The company revealed that hundreds of greenhouses and other agricultural installations have been sabotaged over the past few months, expressing its outrage over the recurring phenomenon. The company issued an urgent appeal to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and Interior Minister Said Siam to intervene to halt the attacks on the lands belonging to the former settlements.
"These greenhouses and other installations and projects provide a source of income for over 4,500 families," company officials said. "We are very disturbed by the recurring attacks and thefts. Such actions jeopardize the largest agricultural project carried by the Palestinian Authority after the Israeli withdrawal."

Isn't it strange that 90,000 policemen can't guard a few hundred greenhouses?
Isn't it strange that the Gaza Arabs who are the subject of so many sympathetic newspaper sob stories about how rough they have it can tolerate the destruction of their economy?
Isn't it strange that the world nations (including Israel) are tripping over themselves to help people who have a history of wasting every penny they ever received?
Isn't it strange that a people who pretend to want a state so much cannot expend any effort on actual state-building?
Isn't it strange that the bulk of the money that these emotional infants receive come from the West that they hate with a passion, and not from their own Arab brethren?

Another American victim of Arab terror dies

Daniel Wultz, HY"D, the 16 year old victim of last month's Tel Aviv bombing from Miami, died today.

It is mystifying how any American can continue to support the terrorist Arab side of this conflict when in fact Americans are just as much targets as Israelis. What strange psychological illness makes people so willing to identify with their would-be murderers?

Forget the fact that by any rational argument, Israel is in the right in essentially every important aspect of the war. But just normal human self-preservation should allow every single American and Westerner to be able to clearly see that one side is on our side and the other is against us. One is an expert in building, the other an expert in destroying. One wants to help Americans and the other celebrates their deaths. One wants to build a better world and the other wants to conquer it.

An American boy died today at the hands of an evil and depraved culture. Where is the spontaneous anger? Where is the outrage?

It is way past time to wake up, because the longer it takes, the more Daniel Wultzes will be murdered.

Greetings to The Great Jamahiriya

One good benchmark of how politically isolated a nation is comes from its state-run media. It is fun to read Iran's websites, for example, for their daily articles about how some former EU diplomat agrees with a narrow part of their policies, or how a minor parliament member in Pakistan or Lebanon praises their leader. When you read that you know they are grasping at straws, despite their bravado.

Here's a great example of a country hitting rock bottom, and it is instructive as to who, exactly, is singing its praises.

The Palestinian President Mohmmoud Abbas praised the Leader of the Revolution and the Libyan people expressing his profound thanks and appreciation for the support and assistance made and still being by Great Jamahiriya to the Palestinian people in these difficult and harsh conditions wishing further progress and prosperity to the Libyan people.
This came in a cable sent by the Palestinian President to the participants in the 1st session of the Permanent Bureau of the Arab Bar Union which began Saturday morning in Sert He referred in his cable to the situation experienced by the Palestinian people due to the escalating aggression by the Zionist army terrorist organization against the Palestinian people.

With all due respect to the Great Jamahiriya and the Arab Bar Union, this has got to be one of the funniest press releases I've seen this year.

But it is nice to know that Abbas is keeping himself busy as he continues his long slide into irrelevance.

Humanitarian Crisis, part 7

Apparently, the PA has access to a lot more money then they are letting on.

But if by lying they can get free money from the EU, US and Israel, why argue with what works?

Israel Matzav blog is superb

Carl in Jerusalem, who runs the Israel Matzav blog, follows things much more closely than I do, and he has none of the reluctance to criticize the Olmert government that I do.

(I always feel that it is a bit unfair for someone like myself in the Diaspora to criticize the Israeli government publicly, for a number of reasons: there may be nuances I am not aware of, I aim at Jewish unity in this blog, and I try as hard as I can to give benefit of the doubt to those whose lives are directly at risk based on their own decisions. This doesn't mean that I haven't been very disappointed and upset at various actions taken by the leaders of Israel, but this is not the venue to tackle those topics. Israeli bloggers don't have the same constraints that I impose on myself.)

Here are three in a row that are must reads:

Weapons, money, men

Once again, Hamas makes its priorities clear.

"We ask all the people in surrounding Arab countries, the Muslim world and everyone who wants to support us to send weapons, money and men," Hamas political leader Khaled Meshaal said in a speech at a pro-Palestinian event in Qatar.
"You should not shy away from of this. This is resistance, not terrorism," said Meshaal whose group -- sworn to the destruction of Israel -- leads the Palestinian government.

Somehow he didn't seem to ask for food, or medical supplies, or fuel, or any of the other things that are causing the bogus "humanitarian crisis" that the West is so upset about.

And, of course Reuters has to add this lie at the end of the article:

Hamas, which has largely abided by a ceasefire for more than a year, has been under increasing Western and Israeli financial pressure to recognize the Jewish state, abandon armed struggle and accept interim Israeli-Palestinian peace deals.

Money for nothing

Well, the US and the EU caved.

The United States bowed to pressure from its allies Tuesday and agreed to support a new program to temporarily funnel additional aid directly to the Palestinian people.

Temporary is never temporary when it comes to welfare.
Any money going to Palestinian Arabs who voted for terrorists gives the terrorists more money to buy bombs and missiles.

A surprise statement by Mideast peacemakers, issued after a day of closed-door diplomatic meetings, did not say precisely how much or what kind of aid they would provide. But the agreement seemed to underscore a concern that months of withholding most aid from the Palestinians, part of an effort to pressure the new Hamas-led government toward a more accommodating stance with Israel, was harming the Palestinian people.

The newspapers played their part - writing up stories about how Palestinian Arabs can't buy gas and aren't getting paid and are holding signs saying "hungry." When in fact, the Palestinian Arabs are in better shape than a good percentage of the world's people economically.

The United States and European Union have cut off direct aid to the Palestinian government while pledging to help meet the crushing humanitarian needs of the Palestinian people through charities and other means.

An entire nation on welfare, living it up and terrorizing the world on the world's dime. No real industry, no forward thinking, no creativity except for ways to build new rockets and tunnels. Sure, let's give them aid.

Speaking Wednesday in Ramallah on the West Bank, Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh slammed the United States and its Western allies for demands on his government, but did not reject the temporary program.

The world should be more understanding that when they decide to give Arabs millions of dollars, they will get insulted in response. Saying "thank you" would violate his cultural norms, and we need to be sensitive to those.

"The Quartet brings from time to time conditions to force the government to concede the rights and recognize the legality of the occupation," Ismail Haniyeh said.

"I believe the government will remain faithful to the Palestinian rights and will keep seeking the equation that protects the Palestinian people. The financial crisis has never been a factor dividing the Palestinians. It will be a factor that unites them," he told reporters.

Of course, just a few days ago Palestinian Arabs started protesting Hamas because of their not getting any money. The Quartet cannot abide Arab protests against other Arabs, only against Denmark and other countries that offend Arabs.

Overseas donations, mostly from Europe, have long sustained the cash-strapped and bloated Palestinian government.

Isn't it interesting that everyone knows the government is "bloated" but no one dares suggest that the terror supporters slash, say, 75,000 jobs from their payroll? Nope, the donors do not have any say in such matters.

The new fund is supposed to administer only money for basic human needs. But both European and U.S. diplomats said that at some point it might be used to pay salaries for urgently needed doctors or teachers or for other services that the Hamas government otherwise would be expected to provide.

Ah yes, teachers who teach that Palestine is a country that extends from the Jordan to the Mediterranean, and it will be Jew-free, inshallah.

Frustrations rose to the surface over the weekend, when hundreds of Palestinians staged strikes and demonstrations in the West Bank and Gaza to demand payment, the first public signs of discontent with Hamas' handling of the situation.

So at the exact time that it looks like the sanctions might have a positive effect in weakening the terror group Hamas, what does the West do?

European governments in particular have been alarmed at the worsening plight for unemployed Palestinians and concerned that charities and U.N. agencies could not meet the demand for services or handle the amount of money that might be needed, diplomats said.

They pressed the United States to agree to the new humanitarian fund, even though that kind of assistance may be an indirect benefit to Hamas. The United States agreed on condition the fund be temporary and limited to programs that meet basic needs, a senior State Department official said

"It would be against our values to let people starve," said Marc Otte, the EU's special envoy for the Mideast.

Let's see - the Palestinian Arabs have farms, crops, livestock, poultry, fruit trees, and even some greenhouses that are still intact after Israel abandoned them. Who, exactly, is in danger of starvation?

And if a few would go hungry, why are Palestinian Arab terror supporters more deserving of food than the millions of truly starving people worldwide?

The entire exercise of withholding money was a sham, with the Eurabians so eager to strengthen those who celebrate when Westerners die. This is humanitarian aid; this is where limited money should go, according to the dhimmis that are in reality trying so hard to make sure that their supply of oil never gets disrupted. And if hundreds of Jews get blown up in the meanwhile, no biggie.

Insane Muslim protestors of the day - The Next Generation

The cartoon protests have entered the second generation!

A little background:

A Pakistani student, carrying a knife, was caught by German police trying to enter a building housing a newspaper that published the dreaded Mohammed cartoons.

The student, Amir Cheema, committed suicide in jail using his bedclothes. He left behind a suicide note written in Urdu and a will.

Pakistanis are outraged, calling the would-be murderer a martyr and a hero and claiming he was murdered by German police.

Now they are staging violent protests, burning German flags, in honor of their terrorist hero:

The world just doesn't seem right unless hordes of insane Muslims are protesting in support of terror.

Iranian human rights doesn't extend to women

Der Spiegel reports on the latest misogynist moves by Ahmedenijad:

Tehran's deputy attorney general, Mahmoud Salarkia, has begun a new drive against "immoral behavior in public" directed largely at the capital city's young female population. The relaxed appearance of many women in Tehran has long bothered archconservative politicians and the country's religious leaders. Headscarves have become shorter and more colorful and among the brave, bare feet in flip-flops are considered all the rage in summer.

But now Iran's feared moral police, founded by Islamic revolution leader Ayatollah Khomeini, are to be strengthened with 50 more patrol groups. They will be equipped with police cars from Germany that should allow the mullahs to monitor "un-Islamic behavior" spreading through the land more closely. Women that show too much hair peeking from their headscarf or wear figure-defining clothing face a fine of around Â€300 -- roughly a month's salary for a teacher -- or ten days in jail. Taxi drivers that pick up such fashion sinners also face punishment. The expanded patrols are also supposed to crack down on pop music in public and dog owners will be banned from walking their pets -- considered unclean in Islam -- in city parks.

The government's hard line is also feared by Iran's intellectuals, especially after Ramin Jahanbegloo, a prominent Iranian philosopher and writer who also has a Canadian passport, was arrested on charges of "spying and endangering domestic security" last week. The move was condemned by a leading liberal cleric, Mohsen Kadivar, as "completely arbitrary." But Jahanbegloo's detention is likely retribution for his publicly critical comments about Ahmadinejad's notorious anti-Israel rhetoric.

Ahmadinejad, who has been seen kicking around a ball with Iran's national soccer team, has also apparently decided not let his fondness for the sport cloud his conservative agenda. The president had in April surprisingly chosen to allow women fans to watch men's soccer games. But on Tuesday, the Iranian ISNA news agency reported that following intense criticism from clerics over lifting the decades-long ban, Ahmadinejad had reversed his decision.

Speaking of Ramin Jahanbegloo:

A mouthpiece of mullahs daily newspaper accuses detained Iranian intellectual Ramin Jahanbegloo, a prominent thinker and writer on democracy and non-violence, of having links to US and Israeli intelligence services.

"Ramin Jahanbegloo has been linked to the CIA and the Mossad for a while but he has been under surveillance," Jomhuri Eslami newspaper charged, without giving a source.

Yes, this is the country that lectures the US on human rights and morality. This is the country that intends to become a nuclear superpower. This is the country that has explicitly called not only for a world without Israel, but a world without America.

Ahmadinejad's letter - prelude to attack? (Jihad Watch)

A very important point made by Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch:

An initial thought on Ahmadinejad's letter to Bush. When he says this, he is calling Bush to accept Islam -- since in traditional Muslim belief it is only Islam that guarantees "monotheism, worship of God, justice, respect for the dignity of man, belief in the Last Day."

Do you not think that if all of us come to believe in and abide by these principles, that is, monotheism, worship of God, justice, respect for the dignity of man, belief in the Last Day, we can overcome the present problems of the world – that are the result of disobedience to the Almighty and the teachings of prophets – and improve our performance? Do you not think that belief in these principles promotes and guarantees peace, friendship and justice? Do you not think that the aforementioned written or unwritten principles are universally respected? Will you not accept this invitation? That is, a genuine return to the teachings of prophets, to monotheism and justice, to preserve human dignity and obedience to the Almighty and His prophets? Mr President, History tells us that repressive and cruel governments do not survive.

In a Hadith, Muhammad tells his followers to call people to Islam before waging war against them:

Fight in the name of Allah and in the way of Allah. Fight against those who disbelieve in Allah. Make a holy war…When you meet your enemies who are polytheists, invite them to three courses of action. If they respond to any one of these, you also accept it and withhold yourself from doing them any harm. Invite them to (accept) Islam; if they respond to you, accept it from them and desist from fighting against them….If they refuse to accept Islam, demand from them the Jizya [the tax on non-Muslims specified in Qur’an 9:29]. If they agree to pay, accept it from them and hold off your hands. If they refuse to pay the tax, seek Allah’s help and fight them. (Sahih Muslim 4294)

In light of that, this letter could be -- but is not necessarily -- a prelude to an attack.

Hat tip: Pastorius.

Diplomacy of Fear - the Muslim way

Many liberals like to decry conservatives for what they call the "politics of fear." This means that neocons like to use fear as a battering ram of sorts to spook people into voting for them, specifically fear of terror.

There may or may not be merit in this argument, but I have hardly anyone talk about the flip-side of this concept, one that liberals wholeheartedly embrace, usually without realizing it.

I call it the diplomacy of fear.

For decades, the Arab world specifically and the Muslim world in general has used threats as its main leverage to get the West to bend to its will. The threats aren't usually direct; most often they take the form of "if you don't do what we want, the Arab street will erupt" or "the terrorists will have an excuse." In other words, if Arab thugocracies do not get what they desire from the West, then they will be powerless to stop the irrational forces within their borders from damaging Western interests.

I touched upon an early example of this in this recent posting about Arab sympathies with the Nazis, and the British reaction:

“If war were to break out, no trouble that the Jews could occasion us, in Palestine or elsewhere, could weigh for a moment against the importance of winning Muslim opinion to our side,” Britain’s Minister for Coordination of Defence, Lord Chatfield, told the British cabinet in 1939, shortly before Britain reversed its decision to partition its mandate, promising instead all of the land to the Palestinian Arabs.

Think about this for a minute - the British are saying that since Jews are not troublemakers and the Arabs are, it is in the British self-interest to appease the Arabs (at the expense of thousands of Jewish lives).

And this theme is so widespread, so much a part of the fabric of the way the world thinks today, that it is unthinkable that there could be an alternative.

European Mideast policy is almost wholly driven by fear of upsetting Arabs and Muslims. Those who claim to be seeking "peace" make the assumption that asking Arabs for concessions is useless and could ignite some sort of negative response - so is makes more sense to pressure Israel into making even more concessions.

How many times have we seen a variant of this recent pronouncement from Mahmoud Abbas:

Mr Abbas said the freeze was causing hardship to ordinary people and would lead to further instability.

"Instability?" We all know what he means by that - he means violence and terror, which is apparently a natural reaction in the rules of Arab physics. If the West doesn't give Palestinian Arabs more and more money, well, hey, he sure can't control his people from the spontaneous inevitable violence (remarkably similar to the violence they seem to have perfected when they had a billion dollars a year coming into their coffers.)

Mahmoud Abbas threatens the Western world and no one bothers to call him on it.

Similarly, a Canadian imam threatened Canada with similar unspecified terror last year. Iran threatens the West daily with implied terror and eventual nuclear bombs. It is the main leverage the Saudis have when lobbying Europe and America - they are more "moderate" and if the royals don't get their request taken care of, they might fall and those "militants" will take over.

This climate of fear is so endemic that fundamentally irrational and immoral acts by the Muslim world are accepted by the West with little question - to challenge it could put you in the same category as a Salman Rushdie or a Danish cartoonist, and who needs that hassle?

Maybe it is pure bigotry that causes Saudi Arabia to not allow Christian bibles or any Jews altogether to be on holy Saudi soil - but you won't see any EU inquiries into that matter. By any objective measure, the Arab world is the center for terror and human rights abuses today. But it is much easier to concentrate on supposed Koran abuse at Guantanamo. Much safer to call Israel with its million Arab citizens "an apartheid state."

Because the US and Israel don't threaten the EU with terror the way the Arabs do.

So, the diplomacy of fear has an excellent record since the first part of the twentieth century, and there is no indication that it will slow down any time soon. After all, it works.

Humanitarian crisis, part 7

Once again, the poor starving Palestinian Arabs are forced to go to great lengths just to acquire the bare necessities of life.

Israel last week seized a large cargo of high-grade explosives which an Egyptian boat tried to transfer to two Palestinian boats from the Gaza Strip, the army told AFP.

According to a military source on Tuesday, an Israeli navy patrol off the Mediterranean coast of Sinai last Wednesday spotted "an Egyptian boat trasferring a cargo to two Palestinian boats".

The suspicious cargo was dropped off by the Palestinian boats once their crews noticed the Israeli ship, the source told AFP.

"Navy divers later retrieved the cargo from the seabed and found it contained 550 kilograms (1,200 pounds) of full-grade TNT (trinitrotoluene) explosives," he said.

Part 6 and links to the others of the series here.

Abu Marzouk: Hamas will never recognize Israel

Since Jimmy Carter is so convinced that Hamas fully intends to recognize Israel and renounce terror if only Israel would abandon all the post 1967 territories, to the point that the world should throw money to Hamas now, perhaps he should read the Muslim Brotherhood website - in English! An interesting interview with Hamas' "deputy chief" Abu Marzouk:

Ikhwanweb: There are statements attributed to Mr. Khaled Mesha’al indicating that Hamas will recognize Israel if it withdraws to the 1967 borders. Your comments.

Abu Marzouk: One of Hamas founding principals [sic] is that it does not recognize Israel. We ran in elections and the people voted for us based on this platform. Therefore, the question to recognize Israel is definitely not on the table unless if it withdraws from ALL Palestinian lands, not only to 1967 borders. How can we be expected to recognize an occupying entity when there are millions of our people refugees and thousands others prisoners! Why must we recognize them when they do not recognize us as a sovereign state with full independence.

Ikhwanweb: what is the future ahead of Hamas amidst the mounting international pressure?

Abu Marzouk: I believe that the formation of Hamas government in itself is a major turning point in the history of Palestinian cause. Hamas government will help transitioning the Issue of Palestine from its international framework to that of the national resistance. Palestinian people will stand resolute and will support their democratic choice. I truly believe that Hamas will succeed by the will of God in addition to the steadfastness of Palestinian people and the support our Muslim and Arab nation.

But no matter how explicitly Hamas states its goals, no matter how clearly they say that their aim is military and terroristic, there will always be useful idiots willing to believe in their make-believe world where all problems can be magically wished away with people in suits talking in conference rooms.

(Hat tip - MEMRI. But the terror apologists like Carter can't claim that MEMRI mistranslated this interview!)

"Wiping Israel off the map is just one step in Iran's attempt to create a new world order," said Brig.-Gen Yosef Kuperwasser, head of the IDF Military Intelligence's research division.
"Iran is interested not only in turning into a superpower, but also in changing the world order," Kuperwasser said at a conference on power projection at the Fisher Institute of Strategic Studies in Herzliya.
"Iran is at the forefront of global terrorism, and aids Hizbullah in Lebanon, al Qaida, and Palestinian terror organizations, and is behind attacks on US armed forces in Iraq," the general asserted.
Just hours before the UNSC votes on sanctions against Iran, Maj-Gen. (res.) Amos Gilad said that he believed Iran was vulnerable to sanctions. "Iran is Not North Korea," Gilad said. "It's a country of intelligent, intellectual people."

While it is nice to see that my own analysis is confirmed by the IDF, I can't help but worry why a solitary person reading the Internet can see things so clearly six months before an organization that presumably has much better tools at its disposal.