Israel wakes up to the Rafah problem

From JPost:

Amid concerns that terrorists were allowed to leave Gaza and travel abroad for training in Iran, Israel has filed a complaint with Cairo after Egypt allowed 1,700 Palestinians to pass through the Rafah Crossing to make the haj pilgrimage to Mecca.

On Monday, for the first time since Hamas's violent takeover of Gaza in June, Egypt unilaterally opened the Rafah border terminal and allowed 700 Palestinians, who claimed to be religious pilgrims on their way to Mecca, to pass through. On Tuesday, another 1,000 crossed through the terminal.

"This is a clear breach of agreements we have made with the Egyptians," a senior diplomatic official said Wednesday, in reference to the November 2005 agreement under which the Rafah Crossing was opened. The official said the unilateral opening of the border had been preceded by another breach of agreements in October, when Egypt allowed 85 Hamas operatives to cross back into Gaza after cutting a hole in the border fence.

IDF intelligence estimates released Wednesday indicated that up to a couple of dozen Hamas terrorists were among the so-called pilgrims Egypt allowed out of the Gaza Strip. In recent years, hundreds of Hamas terrorists have traveled abroad to Iran and Lebanon for military training, and officials said it was possible that these terrorists would do the same.

In response to the increasing number of violations, the Foreign Ministry filed a harsh complaint with Cairo, and senior defense officials are scheduled to travel to Egypt in the coming week for talks about the recent events.

Too bad that Israel's Foreign Ministry doesn't read my blog, as I wrote that Hamas intended to illegally send the "pilgrims" through Rafah a week ago. That would have been the time to warn Egypt, not after the fact.

Read More

Work accident!

A Hamas terrorist blew himself up and two others were injured when an explosive they were planting detonated a bit earlier than they had expected.

I don't know whether incompetence gets rewarded with the 72 virgins, but I cannot claim to be an expert on the finer points of Islamic doctrine.

Our 2007 PalArab death count has now reached 587.

UPDATE: More details on an earlier death - the police found a note saying "we are from several families, and have executed Hassouna for violating honor."

How honorable!

UPDATE 2: Hard to figure out the details, but PalPress is reporting on a horrific death of a 14-year old boy, apparently decapitated after being abducted in Rafah. 588.

UPDATE 3: 22 year old shot and killed Friday night. 589.

Read More

Nice shooting

Ma'an (Arabic) quotes Hamas' al-Qassam Brigades as saying that of the 27 people killed by Israel in the past eight days in Gaza, 24 of them were members of al-Qassam.

I don't know whether the other three were civilians or members of other terrorist groups, but it is an astonishing statistic that cannot be matched by any other army in the world when fighting against a group that makes the strategic choice to hide among civilians.

Might be a good time to send the IDF soldiers some pizza - and sufganiot, and send them a message of support at the same time.

Read More

Why Jews eat sufganiot on Chanukah (video)

Finally it gets explained in a clear and concise manner!

Read More

Sharia news: British nurses asked to turn beds to Mecca

From the Daily Mail (UK):

The job of the nurse used to one of caring for the sick and needy.

But not - it would seem - in today's politically-correct Britain.

Now, nurses are being encouraged to spend valuable time turning around the beds of Muslim patients up to five times a day - so they can face Mecca.

In a bid to promote cultural understanding, they are also expected to provide patients with running water so they can wash before prayer.

And then, of course, they are required to turn the beds back around to return the wards to normality. The measures are being pursued by Mid Yorkshire NHS Trust to ensure Muslim patients have a "more comfortable stay in hospital".

Hundreds of staff have attended tax-payer-funded workshops with Muslim GPs and ethnic-minority support groups on how best to help patients.

During these meetings, nurses have been told that if a patient asks for water to bathe in, or for their bed to be turned to face Mecca, then this should be considered.

If the measure is deemed "practically possible" and does not impinge on other patients, then it should be carried out.

And if it is not practical, nurses are encouraged to find them a bed that faces Mecca permanently.

But an experienced nurse at Dewsbury and District Hospital in Yorkshire where the ideas are being tested, has blasted the scheme.

She said: "It would be easier to create Muslim-only wards with every bed facing Mecca than deal with this.

"We have a huge Muslim population in Dewsbury and if we are having to turn dozens of beds to face Mecca five times a day, plus provide running water before and after prayers, it is bound to impact on the essential medical service we are supposed to be providing.

Conservative MP David Davies also criticised the idea, saying: "Hospitals should be concentrating on stopping the spread of infections than kowtowing to the politically-correct brigade."

Isn't it amazing that "promoting cultural understanding" always seems to non-Muslims understanding Muslims, rather than the other way around?

Read More

UNRWA announces donors - how do the rich Arabs stack up?

The UNRWA yesterday announced the amounts of money pledged by different countries for its work in 2008.

Country	Amount Pledged
Turkey	$500,000
Germany	$11,000,000
Bahrain	$50,000
Austria	$2,770,000
Luxemburg	$3,000,000
European Community	€66,000,000
Netherlands	$15,900,000
United Arab Emirates	$1,000,000
Switzerland	11,000,000 SwF
Italy	$15,000,000
China	$80,000
Kuwait	$1,500,000
Norway	150,000,000 NKr
Holy See	$20,000
United States	$90,000,000
Denmark	$18,000,000
Oman	$25,000
Spain	€2,600,000
Finland	€3,000,000
Egypt	$10,000
Ireland	$5,500,000
Iceland	$300,000

These numbers are probably not complete yet.

As in the past, the amounts that Arab nations give to UNRWA are a pittance. Egypt, Oman and Bahrain only give token amounts, and the combined Arab contribution announced is smaller than those of Ireland or Austria. It appears that Arab concern towards their Palestinian brethren shows itself in paying for terrorist weapons and the families of "martyrs" and not so much in providing things like food and jobs.

Keep in mind also that the Gulf is now awash with cash because of inflated oil prices, taking in net profits of some $5 billion every week, going on world shopping sprees of real-estate, banks and other blue-chip stocks. Not only could they bankroll all of UNRWA easily; they could build an Arab Palestine-in-exile in the underpopulated Gulf and provide free permanent housing to every PalArab who desires to move there.

But keeping them in miserable camps fits in with their strategy. Happy, contented Palestinian Arabs do not.

Read More

The most boring Chanukah event in history

From the Brooklyn Daily Eagle (which spells Chanukah at least 5 different ways from 1880-1900), December 8, 1890 (click to enlarge):
It's painful just to read it.

Read More

Another "mysterious death" in Gaza

There had been a lull, but Maher Mohamed Hassouna was shot dead in Khan Younis on Sunday by the ever mysterious "unknown persons."

Our 2007 PalArab self-death count is now at 586.

Read More

Minnesotans who want an 8-day weekend

Read More

The NIE Iranian nuke report

The left-leaning media is having a field day touting a National Intelligence Estimate that Iran has no current nuclear weapons program.

The Israeli defense minister disputes the findings.

What no one is emphasizing is that the report also says:

We assess with high confidence that until fall 2003, Iranian military entities were working under government direction to develop nuclear weapons....we also assess with moderate-to-high confidence that Tehran at a minimum is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons.

....We assess with high confidence that Iran has the scientific, technical and industrial capacity eventually to produce nuclear weapons if it decides to do so.

So this report states pretty unequivocally that Iran had a nuclear weapons program until 2003; that it kept it secret and was lying to the world about it; that it is ready to restart the program at any time; and that it certainly has the capability to build nuclear weapons.

The major disagreement with Israeli intelligence is whether Iran had already re-started the program after 2003.

It appears that what this report proves is that the West had really poor intelligence capabilities in Iran. The report proves that Iran is duplicitous; how hard would it be for the Iranians to start a separate secret nuclear weapons program, while they was misdirecting the IAEA and other inspectors with the shenanigans at their known nuclear power plants?

Obviously I don't know any intelligence that the US doesn't, but the NIE did make two possibly very flawed assumptions:

This NIE does not assume that Iran intends to acquire nuclear weapons. Rather, it examines the intelligence to assess Iran’s capability and intent (or lack thereof) to acquire nuclear weapons, taking full account of Iran’s dual-use uranium fuel cycle and those nuclear activities that are at least partly civil in nature.

This Estimate does assume that the strategic goals and basic structure of Iran’s senior leadership and government will remain similar to those that have endured since the death of Ayatollah Khomeini in 1989. We acknowledge the potential for these to change during the time frame of the Estimate, but are unable to confidently predict such changes or their implications.

If these two assumptions are wrong, and I believe that they are, then the chances of a current, secret nuclear program in Iran is significantly higher than the NIE is saying.

The first assumption, that Iran does not intend to acquire nuclear weapons, is very suspect because the NIE itself acknowledges that Iran did indeed have a real, clandestine nuclear weapons program. And the second assumption - that Iran's strategic goals are the same as they were in 1989 - is also shaky, as only in recent years has Iran publicly voiced its goal of being a global Islamist superpower and the major counterweight to the US.

Nowhere does the NIE try to explain why Iran was interested in building nuclear weapons once, and why it would have abandoned its program strategically (it does explain why it would have done so tactically.) Given a known track record of desiring nuclear weapons, the capability to do so and the proclivity to lie about it, this report is hardly something to celebrate. And if the report was written under questionable assumptions then the seemingly optimistic results must also be called into question.

Read More

December 1947: 75 Jews murdered - in Aden (Yemen)

In the wake of the partition vote, Arabs started rioting throughout the Middle East. The worst attacks in the early weeks came from Aden, a British colony that is now a part of Yemen, where 75 Jews were brutally murdered by Arab mobs:

The final death toll was 82 Jews.

It is ironic that the best arguments for a Jewish state at the time came from the Arabs themselves, as their vaunted tolerance for Jews disappeared in an instant and it was clear that only a Jewish state could protect the "dhimmis."

Read More

Homeboy Chanukah

Read More

Day two: Gaza refuses fuel; complains of "humanitarian crisis"

Ma'an reports:

Fuel companies in the Gaza Strip refused to accept deliveries from Israel for the second day in a row in protest against drastic cuts in supplies on Monday.

On the very same page, Ma'an also reports:

Hospitals in the Gaza Strip have been forced to shut down their emergency power generators, resulting in a looming “humanitarian disaster” due to Israel’s severe reductions in fuel supplies, said Muawiya Hassanein, the director of ambulance and emergency services in the Palestinian Health Ministry.

One gets the impression that if the Gazans could convincingly bomb the hospitals from the air, they would, just to blame Israel. Such is their hatred of Israel that they are willing to let their sick people die - just so they can blame the Zionists.

But when Hamas can blame Fatah, they will, even if the reasons contradict those of the fuel companies:

A petrol organization of the Hamas-run finance ministry on Saturday blamed the acting Palestinian government led by Salam Fayyad on fuel shortages in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip.

The Ramallah-based Fayyad government doesn't pay for Israeli Dor Company which delivers the fuel to Gaza while it pays for Baz Company which provides the West Bank with fuel, the organization said in a statement.

So is it that the fuel companies won't accept Zionist fuel because the amounts are an insult, or is it that the Israeli company is not being paid?

Dor already mentioned the real reason last Thursday:

Dor Alon officials said Thursday they were cutting back because the Palestinians have not paid their bills.

So now the truth becomes clearer - but that will never stop the PalArabs from going out of their way to blame Israel for the fact that even with the hundreds of millions of dollars that they manage to smuggle into Gaza, they can't pay for fuel.

Read More

A video, some pictures and a link

From The Jawa Report - Happy Chanukah!


Also check out The CAIR Bears at The Rude News (h/t Jihad Watch)

Scare bear

Sharia Bear

And many more!

NancyKay Shapiro brings us another Chanukah treat: (h/t Eye on the World)



On a more serious note, see Augean Stables on Humiliation and Apartheid.

Read More

How stupid can the Israeli leadership be?

From YNet:

It is regretful that the Arab nations had formerly rejected the idea of a bi-national state. I can only pray that they now realize that in lieu of fighting we can build a brighter future in two separate, independent states," Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said Monday at a Knesset ceremony marking the 60th anniversary of the UN vote to partition British-mandate Palestine

So now Tzipi is saying that the ideal solution in the past would be a bi-national state - something rejected by most Zionists as well as the Arabs? Is she now more wise than Israel's founders? What is she smoking?

"The state of Palestine will serve as a homeland for the Palestinian people; providing the single comprehensive answer to their national aspirations."

This must be a continuation of her prayer, because there is nothing concrete to support such a position. If a Palestinian Arab state would solve the problems, why exactly must it encompass every square millimeter of the territories? Livni is making it sound like the existence of a state is the important thing, but hasn't she yet realized that the PalArabs are far more hung up on getting 100% of their demands and not a state they can have tomorrow? Hasn't she been listening to their rejection of Israel as a Jewish state and their insistence on the bogus "right" to "return"?

Here was the Peel Commission proposal for two states back in 1937. This plan was accepted (albeit reluctantly) by the Jews and rejected by the Arabs. The Jews accepted it even though it included essentially no sites holy to Jews, even though it was far less than had been promised by the Balfour Declaration, even though it was just a tiny sliver of a state, indefensible and non-contiguous.

So why did the Jews accept such a flawed solution? As Chaim Weizmann put it, the Jews would be foolish not to accept partition even if the Jewish state was the size of a tablecloth. Their goal then was to gain a state in any way possible.

The Palestinian Arabs, on the other hand, have shown no desire to gain a state, despite what Tzipi fervently prays for. They desire to gain an end to the Jewish state. Once that goal is reached, their own independence is far less important, and it seems more likely that they would immediately become absorbed into Jordan and Syria (or, as Hamas wants, into a Islamic caliphate.)

To even imagine that a Palestinian Arab state alone would make Arabs happy and peaceful is the apex of replacing facts with fantasy.

Similarly:

Labor Chairman and Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Monday that creating two states for two people in Israel is inevitable: "We have to admit that there is no way around it… it is the only reality possible."

What exactly makes it "the only reality possible?" Because he, with his amazingly stupid Taba offer, made it so! If the Israeli leadership had stuck to its guns and made it clear that the entire West Bank would always remain under Israeli sovereignty with some other accommodation for PalArabs, whether it is self-rule or a confederation with Jordan or whatever, then that would become the reality - not the "inevitable" creation of a hostile, terror-supporting state that juts into Israeli territory.

It is mind-blowing how the current Israeli leadership has so little faith in the righteousness of its own cause; not only are they in deep personal despair but they have turned this despair into a national policy. How can the leaders of a great state lead when they don't believe in their own cause, in their own people, in their own nation?

Sometimes, there is no solution, and the best you can do is do the best you can do. Creating "solutions" out of exhaustion or despair is not what leaders are supposed to do.

And leading their people into a suicidal "solution" is not leadership.

Read More