Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, July 23, 2006

Today's wire service bias

Yesterday, there was an anti-Israel demonstration in London, attended by thousands of people.

Today, there was a pro-Israel demonstration in London, attended by thousands of people.

So one would think that the media coverage of both demonstrations would be roughly similar?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Compare for yourself:
Yahoo photos with keywords "israel london"
Google news with keywords "israel london demonstration"

There is some coverage of the demonstration for Israel - in British news sources and in Israel. Very few other sources could be found.

But the coverage of the pro-terror, pro-Hizbollah rallies in London are plentiful - almost invariably called "peace" rallies. For example, a few paragraphs into this Australian news story "Global protests held for peace" comes this telling detail:

"Stop the killing, stop to the bombs. Israel out of Lebanon," shouted the peaceful protesters, many draped in Lebanese or Palestinian flags, while others yelled: "Hizbollah is here to stay. Zionism go away."

Calling that a "peace" rally is something only news editors can do with a straight face.

Elder Tzedakah challenge expanded - 6 more charities for matching contributions

First of all, thank to my readers. As you can see in the sidebar, we have already raised over $360 for Israel and I have matched each amount donated.

Thanks to Backspin, I have a list of a few more worthy organizations that need our help. Here are the ones that had easy-to-access web forms and can take credit cards:

One Family Fund - directly helps victims of terror and their families.
JNF Operation Security Blanket - send kids from the North to summer camps in central Israel for a few days at a time
WIZO Emergency Fund - provides shelters and food for displaced families
Meir Panim - feeds many poor Israelis; providing emergency food and medical equipment to victims
Israel Free Loan Association - helps families get back on their feet with dignity
Kids 4 Kids - program for kids worldwide to help Israeli child victims of terror

These are in addition to the five charities I listed before that you can see on the sidebar. Go to their websites, give generously, and email me at elderchallenge-at-gmail.com and I will match it until we hit our limit (currently $1000.)

Israelis leaving their homes in the north to avoid rockets being referred to as "refugees."
Any call for international aid to repair damage to Israeli cities from thousands of Hezbollah rockets.
"We support the goal of removing Hezbollah from Lebanon."

One Israeli's View (Bob Rosenschein)

Buried in the Washington Post's blog is this great posting: (H/T Rishon Rishon)

The great Yogi Berra once said, "In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is."

I am not a columnist - just an ordinary American citizen living in Israel - but I have gained some insight into both cultures, some might say mentalities. Here is what many Israelis are feeling nowadays.

The first point concerns some unwritten American values I grew up with:

* Problems are solvable.
* Good will is returned in kind.
* In general, favor the underdog over the top dog (unless you're the top dog).
* If two sides are fighting, they must both have some justification.
* Be reasonable; split the difference.

But what if you are living in a neighborhood where they are not quite as reasonable as you? Where your attempts to reason and split the difference backfire? Or worse, where concession is laughed at as weakness.

The second point concerns Israel in particular. We are 6.6 million people, toughened but pragmatic. At 8,020 square miles, we have an area 25% smaller than Maryland. The difference is that, unlike America's vast power, with oceans and peaceful neighbors on all sides, the Jewish state is surrounded on several sides with people who actually want to kill us. Not subdue us - destroy our country.

It would be convenient to think that this must be because of something we did. But Hamas and Hezbollah say it out loud and crystal clear. The "occupation" is the whole works. Their final solution is the total destruction of Israel. Iran, a member state of the UN, holds conferences called "A World Without Israel."

This is the backdrop against which most civilized countries would have us turn the other cheek. As social writer Eric Hoffer once said, "We really do expect the Jews to be the only good Christians in the world."

To put things in perspective, imagine, if you can, that Arlington lobbed 1,000 shells at Georgetown. Or sent suicide bombers. How exactly would you react? Imagine that Mexico was calling for the destruction of the United States, backing it up with cross-border raids and missiles.

The third point is that Israel already withdrew from every last inch of southern Lebanon and Gaza, as the international community demanded. But the provocations and terror - violence aimed intentionally against civilian targets - continued. This is why we entered this conflict. Enough is enough.

This is a horrible situation to be in, fighting Hezbollah behind its human shields. But before bombing southern Lebanon and the Hezbollah neighborhoods of Beirut, Israel dropped leaflets encouraging evacuation. Confronted with terrible choices, we are trying to fight while minimizing civilian casualties.

It was wishful thinking to hope that joining the government would make Hamas and Hezbollah more responsible. Sometimes putting the bully in charge of the playground works, and sometimes it doesn't.

The operative emotion in Israel right now is sadness, sadness for what is being done to us, sadness for what we must do to defend ourselves. The missiles shot at Haifa landed a few miles from the research labs of Intel, IBM, Microsoft and Google. Israelis would much rather continue working on desalination, stroke treatment, and alternative fuels (see www.israel21c.org). We would rather that our adversaries developed their own economies pragmatically.

We hate this conflict, but we will not commit suicide. As Golda Meir said, "We will have peace when our enemies love their children more than they hate ours."

My father was a survivor of Auschwitz and Buchenwald, was the most optimistic person I ever knew, but he once taught me, "Above all else, when someone threatens to kill you or your loved ones - just believe him!"

The lesson for America is simple. Do not hide from international responsibility. Do not assume the oceans offer protection. Iran is behind Hezbollah, Hamas, Syria, and, of course, the insurgents in Iraq. If Iran gets nuclear bombs, do you want to bet they won't sponsor a radical Islamic group to eradicate American cities?

You want to know what Israelis are thinking? Theory and practice are intertwined. We are on the front line, but we will show patience and strength. That's why 89% of Israelis, Left, Right and Center, support the army right now. A mere 61 years and 10 weeks after V-E day, we know that evil and blind hatred exist. And that they can be beaten.

-- Bob Rosenschein is CEO of Answers.com (NASD:ANSW); he can be reached at rrosenschein at gmail.com; this piece reflects his own views

HH LXXIX is out!

Life-of-Rubin hosts this weeks' Haveil Havalim 79, best of the JBlogosphere. Lots of links including many to postings about the current "matzav."

He links to my fundraising campaign for Israel where I will match your donations this week to 5 Israeli charities, up to $1000. The running total of donations is on my sidebar.

It's a great round-up, so check it out!

Mosques used to store weapons. But don't touch the Korans!

From Arutz Sheva:

The Meron A-Ras area of southern Lebanon has been taken by IDF ground troops. The Hizbullah bunkers in, around and below the village have all been raided and the IDF has now stationed troops in the village. Security forces in the area report scores of Katyusha shells, missile storage areas and missile-launchers, which were concealed in the village's mosque.

From YNet:

“We searched through the village carefully, we went house to house, and we found three sites where Hizbullah operatives had been hiding out. We could tell by the flak jackets, helmets, and even the cups of coffee still sitting on the table – but the Hizbullah men apparently fled when we entered. We also found a lot of ammunitions, including weapons, Lau rocket launchers in the yard of a mosque, binoculars, and various rockets,” said battalion commander Lt. Col. Wajadee.

Wajadee said the terrorists used sites in the village to survey and collect information on Israeli communities across the border. An 80-year-old Lebanese man, who remained nearly alone in the town, told soldiers that residents did not cooperate with Hizbullah, but Hizbullah forced themselves on the village and used the residents in operations against Israel.

Just waiting for the massive worldwide Muslim protests in Pakistan and Indonesia that people actually use mosques for storing deadly weapons.

Just waiting for the freedom-loving protesters in Canada and Europe to show outrage over Hezbollah taking an entire town hostage.

I'm sure the protests are being organized right now. Any minute we will be seeing lots of photos and news coverage. Right?

Elder Tzedakah Challenge extended!

I only received one reply to my Tzedakah Challenge, so my ego from the thousands of page hits I got in the past ten days has been properly deflated.

Nevertheless, I am serious about wanting to match $1000 in contributions given to the Israeli charities listed by any readers. Other bloggers, feel free to repost the modified posting below:
-----------------------------------------

Between now and July 28, for any money that you donate to one of the Israeli charities listed below, I will match it, up until we get to a total of $1000.

After you donate, copy your receipt and email it to elderchallenge-at-gmail.com (you should XXX out the credit card number.) Or we can use the honor system if you are paranoid; just let me know. Afterwards, I will match your contributions to the charity or charities you chose. I will try to keep updated blog entries throughout the week showing a running total.

At this time, the total is only $50, so let's please get moving!

Here are the organizations you can donate to, all via the web:

BurgerIDF.org and PizzaIDF.org delivers great food and morale to the brave soldiers defending their land.

Zaka is the world famous organization that offers first response service to terror attacks.

American Friends of Magen David Adom.

Yad Sarah is bringing medical equipment to the northern communities that are under attack.

Friends of the IDF provides equipment and morale-boosting for the soldiers.

Special note to readers who claim to be anti-Zionist but not anti-Jewish: you should have no problem contributing to Zaka, Yad Sarah and MDA. Let's see you put your money where your mouth is!

תזכו למצוות

(The email address will be disabled after the challenge is over.)

A stomach-turning post

The sickening face of the mass-murderer Nasrallah is popping up all over the world. He has no shortage of people who love him and his genocidal plans.

In Berlin...

Pakistan...

Switzerland...

Ramallah....

Iraq....

Syria...

Tehran...

Bahrain...

Caracas....

Sudan...

Egypt....

San Francisco seemed to avoid showing pictures of Nasrallah, but their sentiments were clear as well...

But sometimes I don't mind seeing his picture. Like this one, found in the ruins of a building in Beirut hit by Israeli warplanes:

International peacekeepers?

As the UN and the EU call for international peacekeepers in Lebanon, a simple fact seem to have been forgotten:

They are already there.

Since 1978, the UN has had UNIFIL (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon) set up. And since 1978, they have not lifted a single finger to stop rocket attacks towards Israel.

Since then, they have not lifted a finger to stop Hizbollah from building a full army under their noses.

Since then, they have not lifted a finger when Hizbollah built military posts right next to UNIFIL posts.

Since then, they have been sipping tea with Hizbollah, they witnessed the fatal kidnapping of Israeli soldiers in 2000 and refused to even help in the investigation, and they have failed miserably to live up to their mandate:

* Confirm the withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon;
* Restore international peace and security;
* Assist the Government of Lebanon in ensuring the return of its effective authority in the area.

In other words, they have been firm supporters of the terrorist Hizbollah organization and firm enemies of Israel (as well as Lebanon.) But Lebanon found them useful as well, because as long as they were in Southern Lebanon the Lebanese army could pretend that Hizbollah was not their problem.

Combine this with the fact that the UN refuses to declare Hizbollah a terrorist organization (perhaps they are a origami club?) and you have a completely immoral organization lecturing Israel about morality.

H/T Atlas Shrugs

As Jed Babbin writes:

The U.N.'s years-long record on the Israel-Lebanon border makes mockery of the term "peacekeeping." On page 155 of my book, "Inside the Asylum," is a picture of a U.N. outpost on that border. The U.N. flag and the Hezbollah flag fly side by side. Observers told me the U.N. and Hezbollah personnel share water and telephones, and that the U.N. presence serves as a shield against Israeli strikes against the terrorists.

This picture is all you need to know about the utterly sickening moral posture at the UN.

Canary in a coal mine

Once again Israel is expected to do what the civilized world tries so hard to avoid - tackle terror head-on.

Once again Israel will be the first to take on a new kind of warfare:

Where every single battle is a potential ambush
Where there is no front line
Where the enemy ignores the rules of war, but the army must adhere to them
Where the enemy maintains the legal fiction of not being an organized national army yet is fully supported and directed by sovereign nations
Where one side is unquestioningly doing the right thing but does not have the support of the world to actually win decisively

The lessons learned from this battle will translate to thousand of lives saved in future battles against Islamic terror, as the hypocrites from Europe act dismayed at Israeli actions yet they will eagerly study their methods.

Once again, Israel must do the right thing even while being criticized by the very people who will benefit most from this war. Secretly there is rejoicing in the European world capitals but publicly they must adhere to their dhimmified Eurabian worldview out of fear of the same terror that Israel must face daily.

Once again, Israeli blood is being shed so that the world will do a better job when the real Islamist world war starts.

Elder of Ziyon 24-hour Tzedakah Matching Challenge

Between now and Shabbos/Shabbat, for any money that you donate to one of the Israeli charities listed below, I will match it, up until we get to a total of $1000.

After you donate, copy your receipt and email it to elderchallenge-at-gmail.com . After Shabbos I will match your contributions to the charity or charities you chose. I will try to keep updated blog entries throughout the day showing a running total.

You can donate up until Shabbat in your time zone.

I also challenge other bloggers to make similar matching challenges to their readers. We're here in the blogosphere and people are reading - let's get the lurkers involved!

Here are the organizations you can donate to, all via the web:

BurgerIDF.org and PizzaIDF.org delivers great food and morale to the brave soldiers defending their land.

Zaka is the world famous organization that offers first response service to terror attacks.

American Friends of Magen David Adom.

Yad Sarah is bringing medical equipment to the northern communities that are under attack.

Friends of the IDF provides equipment and morale-boosting for the soldiers.

תזכו למצוות

(The email address will be disabled after the challenge is over.)
UPDATES: Here and Here - the challenge has been extended and expanded.

Results of Palestinian Public Opinion Poll 3-5 November 2004
An-Najah National University
Center for Opinion Polls and Survey Studies

If Israel withdraws from the Strip do you support or reject launching attacks against Israel from inside the Strip?
I strongly support 22.5 [Gaza Strip 30.2]
I support 33.8 [Gaza Strip 20.8]
I reject 26.5 [Gaza Strip 24.6]
I strongly reject 10.4 [Gaza Strip 17.6]
No opinion; I do not know 6.8 [Gaza Strip 6.8]

So 56.3% of Palestinian Arabs supported attacking Israel from Gaza at the time even after an Israeli withdrawal.

It's not like they didn't give adequate warning of their plans....

"Well, that wasn't there yesterday."

From Pixane.net:

Listened to an interesting audio blog post from Stuart Hughes, a journalist for the Beeb who is in Beirut now, covering the war. He woke up to find a larger-than-normal SUV in his hotel parking lot:
A new arrival in the parking lot next, to my hotel, in the form of a Lebanese Army rocket launcher, I came out to work this morning to find a camouflaged rocket launcher sitting in the car park, pointing at the sky, and I thought “Well, that wasn’t there yesterday”. I think that tells you everything you need to know about the situation here.

Whether or not the launcher is Lebanese army or Hezbollah (no pictures to tell the difference, and it might be a loaner to Hezbollah or perhaps simply stolen) — the fact that it’s parked next to a hotel housing journalists speaks volumes about the kinds of tactics used to ensure civilian casualties.

What, precisely, is Israel supposed to do? Sit back and let the rockets be launched? Attack the missile battery, and risk hitting a hotel full of journalists? I’m sure this launcher is positioned next to journalists for all of the cynical reasons I can imagine.

Also consider: unless Israel uses a large enough explosive charge to ignite the warhead in place and destroy the missiles without igniting their propulsion element, the damage will be even greater as the missile fuel ignites and the rockets launch. Short of sending somebody down there to manually disarm the missiles, it’s actually worse to underuse munitions in destroying these missiles.

My question is, why a hotel full of journalists don't feel this is newsworthy and only one of them mentions it in passing on his personal blog?

(H/T: Israellycool)

Iran boycotting "Zionist" products - like Pepsi and Calvin Klein

More idiocy from the Islamic Republic:

TEHRAN –– Iran on Wednesday launched a major campaign urging consumers to stop buying "Zionist" products, ranging from Coca-Cola and Pepsi soft drinks, to Calvin Klein clothing and Nestle food products.

"Pepsi stands for 'Pay Each Penny to Save Israel", viewers in the Islamic republic have been warned in an oft-repeated three-minute infomercial on state television, prompted by Israel's ongoing assault against the Palestinian territories and Lebanon.

"Zionists are the biggest shareholders in the soft drinks industry, and each year they make billions of dollars for their colonialist aims," consumers with a thirst for fizz have been told. Coca-Cola is also not left unscathed by the new twist to the cola wars.

"This firm openly supports Israel and has even said that it is ready to allocate great deal of money to topple the Islamic republic," state television said.

Both Pepsi and Coca-Cola have factories in Iran, although state television gave no indication over whether their operations would be affected. (This may explain the cola boycott a bit more fully - EoZ)

A popular British high-street retailer, as well as a number of multinational firms, were also singled out for their links to the alleged international Jewish conspiracy to control the world. "Marks and Spencer has very close relations with the Israeli regime and one its primary aims is to help the development of the Israeli economy," the infomercial claimed.

"Nestle is a Swiss food processing firm which in 2000 announced that it will invest millions of dollars in Israel to build a factory there," it added, while neglecting to mention that Nestle also has a factory in Iran.

The world's largest chip maker Intel was also branded as "one of Israel's biggest supporters".

"Its first overseas branch was set up in Haifa in 1974. In 2000 it employed more that 4,000 Israelis. Its top managers have said that they are going to invest 6.5 billion dollars in Israel," would-be Intel customers have been told.

"McDonalds, Timberland, Revlon, Garnier, Hugo Boss, Tommy Hilfiger, Calvin Klein and L'Oreal are only some of the firms which belong to the Zionist regime," state television said, before taking a swipe at what it said were less vigilant Arab nations.

"Unfortunately most of the streets of Arab nations are filled with commercials which advertise Israeli products. For each purchase, the money is converted into bullets piercing the chests of the Lebanese and Palestinian kids," it fumed. –– AFP

As a public service, I would like to add a few companies to Iran's list that do business in Israel:

Microsoft - better stop using Windows!
Motorola - all your cell phones are Zionist plants, recording your every move!
Digital Equipment
Sara Lee
IBM
General Motors
Holiday Inn
Hyatt
Cisco - how can Iran be on the Internet, anyway?
Johnson & Johnson
AT&T
Chase Manhattan
Citibank - they charge interest, anyway.
Compaq
Boeing
General Electric
Eastman Kodak

Oh, hell, just look at this page and this page - you will find lots and lots of companies to boycott.

Don't be hypocritical, Iran - better boycott them all!

Morality, collective punishment and collective responsibility

One of the favorite memes of Palestinian Arabs is the notion that Israel engages in "collective punishment." This is viewed as immoral and illegal and de facto wrong.

One can sympathize with this viewpoint. After all, one would naturally think that innocent people should not suffer for the crimes of others. The idea of people being individually responsible for their actions is a strong one (and, I would argue, a Western one.)

There is a flip side though that those who trot out this argument will never address: Do the Palestinian Arab people have any collective responsibility?

Not only must people act responsibly, but nations (and other groups of people) must as well. This is not an unreasonable expectation. It also makes sense that the larger group will be inconvenienced as a result of the criminals' actions.

If a nation decides to act aggressively against another, one cannot expect the victim to keep the same level of economic or diplomatic ties. Even if the first nation is dependent on a specific product or service of the second, and the people of the first nation will suffer from its loss, that doesn't mean that the second nation has any reason to take that into consideration.

In other words, the idea of "collective punishment" being inherently bad is not so cut and dried. The US didn't allow high-tech equipment to be exported to the Soviet Union in the 1970s, depriving them of most computers. Isn't that a form of collective punishment?

Let's look at another angle. One group of people votes to eradicate the other group of people. If the vote was 90%-10%, the second group has every right to defend itself - even if the 10% suffers.

What percentage of a people acting immorally makes collective punishment a moral choice in response? And if the threat to the second group is imminent or present, how should the second group react?

I spent the better part of two years on this blog carefully differentiating between the Palestinian Arab people and their corrupt, terrorist leaders. My theory was that for the better part of their existence, most ordinary Palestinian Arabs didn't care about geopolitics or land or occupation or nationhood - they only cared to be able to provide a safe and secure place to raise their families.

As a result of years of propaganda, though, it is hard to argue that anymore. I recently posted the results of a few polls of Palestinian Arabs and the number that support terror against Jews is not only a majority, but a large majority (depending on how the question was asked.) No matter how hard one tries to spin it, Israel's neighbors want to see it destroyed and the Jews dispersed or killed or subjugated. In other words, no matter what you think, most Palestinian Arabs are in fact immoral.

Does this mean that collective punishment is always justified? Of course not. I cannot see justification for purely punitive actions that serve no defensive purpose. I also admit to feeling uneasy at punitive actions designed to compel a population to act in certain ways. The sentiment may be correct but the probability of success is rather low, IMHO.

So while deliberate collective punishment is problematic, there are fewer moral qualms about doing defensive actions like striking at terrorists in ways that can peripherally hurt the population at large. The complicity of the host population to the terror is a significant factor. Going after hostage takers, for example in Beslan, obviously requires more care than going after a terrorist in a building where the other people are aware of and condone his activities.

It is a tricky ethical problem trying to minimize casualties while trying to aggressively eliminate a threat to your own people. It may an ethical problem that the Palestinian Arabs do not spend one minute worrying about, but Israel should not take morality lessons from those who celebrate murderers.

Even so, it is worthwhile not only to explore the parameters of not only collective punishment but also collective guilt and collective responsibility. Taking responsibility for one's actions is what distinguishes a mature person from an immature one - and taking responsibility for one's people is an even greater level. It is a shame that Palestinian Arabs have shown no ability to even take that first step.

And it is a bigger shame that most of the world community doesn't expect them to.