Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, January 02, 2009

Bloggers' block

After a week of seeming non-stop blogging, I cannot find any stories today that aren't being covered well by other pro-Israel blogs. Or maybe I'm just tired.

There are plenty of great things to read out there, at Daled Amos, Meryl Yourish, Soccer Dad, Israel Matzav (possibly the best place to find videos), and now even the IDF Spokesperson Blog. These are besides the liveblogging I've mentioned before from Israellycool and The Muqata and the coverage from Mere Rhetoric.

My "If the IDF made Hamas-style videos..." video is still doing well on YouTube, with over 3000 views. It also is adding interest to my older Hello Martyr, Hello Fatah video. You can see most of my videos, the serious and the funny, on the Elder of Ziyon YouTube channel.

Whether I find a second wind or not, thanks for visiting and have a pleasant and peaceful Shabbat!

A letter from Jerusalem - a spiritual response

EoZ friend Yerushalimey, who should really be enjoying his first week with his new bride rather than emailing me, forwards an email from a friend named Steve in Jerusalem for a proper Jewish response to the impending ground battle.

Good Shabbos, Good Shabbos,

Hi to everyone -- in the name of, towards the zchus [merit] of my son Yitzhak Avrohom Chaim ben Shabtai Moshe and Rena Bracha, (he should live and be well) who is now stationed and ready with his fellow soldiers to defend our land -- to ensure (as much as we can ensure) that we here in Israel are safe, b'ezrat Hashem..in his name i would like to offer this thought.

(the following dvar torah is also in response to the questions from outside - other people - and from inside -- How am I / How are we doing -- with Yitzhak "on the front" so to speak...so, I'm answering that question, as well...)

In times of disaster, hard times, times of stress - times of WAR - It seems natural to ask, What can I do? (or on a community level - what can we do?) What extra can I do to help fix the situation?...and this happens, i think, on both the physical and spiritual planes...and specifically regarding the spiritual plane, the answers that most often come up (in my humble opinion/ experience) are that we often decide to learn more, to undertake an extra stringency of practice, to say extra tehillim [Psalms], or to have group tehillim readings, to pray with more fervor -- and other similar actions. And all of these are holy actions and I am sure they make their mark in Heaven, and bring down extra heavenly goodness, in the proper proportion. I am not going to disagree with any of that.

However, I think i found another answer - another way to answer the question: "what more can I do?" -- another way, which is actually, perhaps, "The Way", all along -- nothing extra, nothing beyond what we are already doing.

It was in davening [prayer] today that a phrase in Tachanun jumped out at me, and I realize that this was an answer -- that saying Shema is the answer -- and that saying Shema is the one thing that as long as we continue saying Shema, we will be zocheh (we will warrant) G-d's protection.

Let me explain:

In Tachanun it says:
"שומר ישראל, שמור שארית ישראל, ואל יאבד ישראל - האומרים שמע ישראל".
O Guardian of Israel, protect the remnant of Israel, let not Israel be destroyed -- those who proclaim - Hear O Israel . (those who say the Shema.)

That's it! We say the Shema, we become one of Israel who says the Shema, one who warrants G-d's protection.

So that's it. Not to suddenly say Shema in order to warrant protection. Just to say shema, as prescribed -- 3 times a day, and to understand that in saying Shema we are taking on the Yoke of Heaven -- we are proclaiming that G-d is our G-d and that G-d is one -Master of the Universe --

and that's what we need to do: Daven it -- take it seriously -- connect with the Creator of the Universe -- and know that this connection and proclaiming G-d is One is what merits our protection.

"שומר ישראל, שמור שארית ישראל, ואל יאבד ישראל - האומרים שמע ישראל".
"Shomer Yisrael, shmor shearis yisrael, v'al yovad yisroel, haomrim. shema yisroel."

May all of Israel be blessed with peace - safety - with the understanding that G-d runs the world and that G-d is One, and that our safety is in His hands.

May Yitzhak be safe.

Good Shabbos, Good Shabbos
steve

Israeli leaflets urging Gazans to cooperate

From Ma'an:

Israeli airplanes dropped leaflets calling for Gazans to inform the Israeli military of the whereabouts of projectile launchers in return for aid and assistance.

The papers were found by the thousands all over Gaza Friday morning, and bear the signature of the Israeli military forces.

The leaflet reads:

Dear people of the Gaza Strip,
Bear the responsibility for your fate!

The Projectile launchers and the terrorist elements pose a threat on you and your families.

If you wish to provide help and assistance to your people in the sector, call the number below to provide us with the needed information.

The future of the massacre is in your hands
Don’t hesitate!

We will be glad to receive any information you have and it is not necessary to give us your personal information.

We will keep it as a secret.
Call us at the following number:
02-5839749
Or e-mail us at:
Helpgaza2008@gmail.com

To provide us with any information on the terrorist factions.

Note: To protect your safety we ask you to be secretive when you call us.

Head of the Israeli Defense Forces.

The line that Ma'an translates as "The future of the massacre is in your hands" seems wrong; the autotranslation from Firas Press is "With a tragedy has become a present to you" which sounds to me that the real translation is more like "You have the opportunity to be part of the solution to this tragedy."

As we have seen, the intelligence from Gaza has been very effective - reports indicate that Israel only destroyed weapons smuggling tunnels and not the ones that were used for consumer goods, and the videos of the air strikes on mosques showed secondary explosions that proved that they were stockpiling weapons, for example. There are plenty of Gazans who do not want to live under Hamas rule.

Egyptian aid compared to Israel's

Yesterday, Egypt allowed 9 trucks of humanitarian aid to enter Gaza. This aid is coming from all over the Arab world (with the exception of Jordan), flying in to the airport at El Arish.

Also yesterday, Israel allowed - while under attack - 60 trucks, with 1360 tons of aid. These came from Jordan and many Western countries, as well as from NGOs.

Sounds like the Arabs don't care as much about Gazans as the West does!

Now is a good time to backup your blog

Since YNet got hacked this morning, it appears to be a prudent time for pro-Israel bloggers to backup their blogs, which is what I've been doing this morning instead of posting.

I was only able to research how to backup Blogger blogs, so here is how:

If you have Windows, simply download the Blogger Backup Utility for free. It quickly downloads your Atom feed posts to your hard drive and it can do incremental backups as well as restores.

Another much uglier way is to simply go to your blog's URL in this way:

http://yourblogname.blogspot.com/search?max-results=6000

where yourblogname is, um, your blog name and the number at the end is the number of posts you want to see. This will create a huge, single page with all of your posts that you can save. Unfortunately, restore from such an archive would be really time consuming and ugly, but it is better than losing everything.

The late Sheikh Rayyan: political or military?

Was Sheikh Rayyan a "political" leader or a "military" leader?

For some reason the West likes to distinguish between the supposedly hard-line "military" terrorists and the supposedly more peaceful, pragmatic "political" terrorists.

Here's how the media has been reporting his role.

Reuters:

...a 49-year-old cleric regarded as one of Hamas's most hardline political leaders.

RTT News:

Nizar Rayyan, considered a political leader by Hamas, had close ties to the military wing of Hamas.

The National (UAE):

He often served as a spiritual adviser to both the Hamas political and military wings and would often co-ordinate the group’s political and military operations, according to people close to Hamas.

Bloomberg:

Rayyan was a go-between for Hamas’s political and military wings.

Arab News:

The 49-year-old Rayan ranked among Hamas’ top five decision-makers. A professor of Islamic law, he was known for his close ties to the group’s military wing and was respected in Gaza for donning combat fatigues and personally participating in clashes against Israeli forces.

The now-exploded spiritual leader is proof positive that there is no real distinction in Hamas between the "political" and "military" wings.

Hopefully, the media will start understanding this.

While the Hamas alqassam.ps website is down, its message board site called www.almoltaqa.ps (hosted somewhere in France, apparently) is still up and running.

I was just glancing through the site, seeing pictures of today's martyr Sheikh Rayyan , here showing his peaceful, political nature.

What struck my eye was a posting in the English section of the site. It contains an interview with Hamas' English-language spokesman, Abu Obaida, from a year ago. Here's one Q&A:

What is the justification behind the martyrdom operations against the " Israeli" civilians?

There is no justification for targeting civilians. It is against Islam to deliberately kill unarmed civilians during jihad. In addition, our doctrine is to target the enemies army, security services, and support apparatus. But it is known that Zionist society is a militarized society. Service in the army is mandatory; and reserve duty continues past the age of 40. Our determined stance is that unarmed persons on both sides of the conflict should be left out of the fighting. However, we will not accept giving the enemy a free hand against our civilians.

The unarmed residents of Beersheba, Sderot, Netivot, Ashdod, Kiryat Gat and Ashkelon can now rest easy - Hamas isn't targeting them!

It is interesting that this interview, which is "sticky" on top of the News and Politics forum in the English message board, is completely absent from the Arabic message board.

Hamas al-Qassam website is down

One of my favorite websites on the Internet has seemed to have mysteriously disappeared.

The alqassam.ps website of Hamas was acting a bit shaky earlier this week, redirecting itself from the Palestine domain to the .cc domain - which is in the Cocos Islands but is pretty much available to anyone. But now, alas, I cannot access the lists of martyrs and the hostile propaganda that I so looked forward to perusing now and again.

At the moment, attempts to get to the site are sometimes making it to a 3Com SuperStack Switch. If you should try to access it and see a Username and Password prompt, try "manager" and "manager" (the default.) If you are lucky you wil get to the switch interface, but so far my connectivity has not let me get past a skeleton of a page for that. A good network professional might have a lot of fun with full access to Hamas' Ethernet switch.

Not that I would advocate anything like that. No, hacking Hamas' web site and domain would be really, really wrong.

UPDATE: It is back up, on a new host.

Help Israel

Standing Together helps cheer up IDF soldiers, bringing them food, music, and even charging their cell phones for them.

PizzaIDF likewise delivers pizza, burgers and other foods to IDF soldiers in the field.

Zaka is the amazing first-response organization that treats many injured citizens from terror attacks.

ARMDI - Israel's equivalent to the Red Cross.

Please comment on your favorite relevant Israeli charities that directly help soldiers and terror victims, along with their URL and what they do.

UPDATES:

Operation Take-a-Break for Sderot families to take day trips up north.

Lemaan Achai, helping families all over Israel, has a program for those under attack.

Hamas spiritual leader forced his kids to die with him

JPost:

Sheikh Nizar Rayyan, a senior Hamas leader and cleric was killed along with several others on Thursday when an IAF aircraft dropped a bomb on his Jabalya home, the IDF said.

Channel 10 reported that Rayyan was the "mufti" of Hamas's military wing and had replaced Sheikh Ahmed Yassin as the organization's top clerical authority after Yassin's assassination in 2004.

In addition, the IAF bombed the homes of three senior Gaza terrorists.

One of the homes belonged to Mohammad Baroud, a top Popular Resistance Committees operative. The army said that there were anti-tank missiles, rockets and bombs in the home.

Another of the homes destroyed belonged to Hasim Drili, a northern Gaza Hamas operative. The army said that he had a manufacturing plant in his home for rockets, mortar shells and missiles.

The third home belonged to Tafik Abu Raf, a Hamas terror operative in the central Gaza Strip. The IDF said that he had a weapons laboratory in his house.

Palestine Today says that Sheikh Rayyan knew very well that his house was a target:

Over the past two days, Israeli aircraft bombed a number of the homes of Hamas leadersin the Gaza Strip, but most of the houses were empty

While aware of that, our Sheikh Rayyan refused to come out of his house and remained firm there with a number of his children.

Palestinians have long advocated that the homes threatened by Israeli bombardment should be protected by human shields, and it appears he chose for himself this fate.

Ma'an adds:

Local witnesses told Ma’an that Rayyan had not evacuated his house despite a warning from the Israeli military.

As sickening and twisted as the sheikh was, one can grudgingly admire someone who chooses not to hide from certain death. But when he purposefully sentences his children and (one of) his wives to the same death - or he uses them as human shields to protect himself - he proves himself to be pure, unadulterated evil.

Gaza aid update: The despicable UNRWA

The World Food Programme has informed Israeli authorities that it has a full 2 week supply of food and does not want Israel to send any more food to them in Gaza.

In other humanitarian aid news, Israel allowed some 12 Gazans in yesterday for medical treatment. 2 of them were kids who were injured - by a Qassam rocket that fell short.

The UNRWA, as is to be expected, spins facts to make Israel look as bad as possible:

The power plant shut down on Tuesday because Israel has blocked fuel delivery through the main pipeline since Dec. 26, U.N. humanitarian chief John Holmes said Wednesday. This has forced hospitals to use generators, which have limited fuel supplies, and left many of the 650,000 people in central and northern Gaza with power cuts of 16 hours a day or more, he said.
"The situation remains alarming," Holmes said. "Hospitals are obviously still struggling very much to cope with the number of casualties. We have continued to get some medical supplies in and to help them cope, but this remains difficult and fragile."

Israel has, every day for the past few days, scheduled to open the Nahal Oz crossing for transferring fuel. And every day the Palestinian terrorists that the UNRWA refuses to mention have shot mortars at that very crossing - on Sunday, with fatal results. The despicable UNRWA is blaming Israel for "blocking" fuel shipments and cannot say a single word to their hosts in Gaza about stopping mortar attacks.

The daily Nahal Oz attacks are no longr even mentioned in the media, because mortars are so much more plentiful than Qassams and not as newsworthy as Grads. The Popular Resistance Committees have been the main terrorists to fire at Nahal Oz.

The UNRWA continues its one-sided blame game:

Karen Abu Zayd, commissioner of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, which helps Palestinian refugees, told reporters by video link from Gaza that the agency has not distributed any food for two weeks because of the shortage of supplies and the Israeli bombardment.
"I think that means that 20,000 people a day have been without food that they expect — and probably is the bulk of what they get," she said. "So people are doing pretty badly. Everyone we know is sharing whatever they have, not just with their families but with their neighbors."
"We haven't seen widespread hunger. We do see for the very first time ... people going through the rubbish dumps looking for things, people begging, which is quite a new phenomenon as well," she said.

Aby Zayd is using anecdotes to do everything she can to blame Israel, but cannot really explain why there is "no widespread hunger" in Gaza.

And the UNRWA had food before the war - but refused to distribute food to Gazans because they didn't have enough flour. They did have rice, cooking oil and other goods. Now they are blaming Israel for their own pride.

Holmes said the Kerem Shalom crossing from Israel was open, with 55 trucks of food and medical supplies and five ambulances getting into Gaza on Tuesday, and about 60 trucks on Wednesday. That compares to 125 truckloads a day in October 2008 and 475 truckloads a day in May 2007, just before Hamas took control of Gaza, he said.

The real numbers were 93 trucks each day. He may be referring only to trucks meant for UNRWA.

Obviously, his comparison with October (when there were almost no rockets) and May 2007 (when all the crossings were still under control of the PA and Israel could easily coordinate the logistics) ignore the danger to Israelis put themselves in to send over humanitarian aid.

Some medical supplies, ambulances and generators also got into Gaza from Egypt through the Rafah border crossing, he said.

Yet he pointedly does not ask Egypt to increase its trickle of aid - only Israel. Isn't that interesting.

Abu Zayd stressed that her U.N. agency needs 100 trucks of flour a day to meet the needs of refugees.

And yet, after months of much lower numbers of trucks on the average, there is still "no widespread hunger" in Gaza in her own words. Still no one has starved to death. It is a miracle!

But she said Israel has closed down the Karni crossing, the main gateway for cargo into Gaza where it is normally delivered, for security reasons.
She said UNRWA was told by the Israeli humanitarian coordinator that all other crossings aren't open because "there is intelligence about serious preparations for security operations."
"We wonder if it's serious enough to really keep things completely closed and to keep people on their edge of subsistence," she said.

She wonders? While Israel coordinates with multiple aid agencies and countries, arranges to open crossings as much as possible at the same time as it is being attacked every few minutes with rockets, while her hosts brag about the effectiveness of their "resistance" and the number of fancifully named missiles they shoot towards these very crossings - she "wonders" if Israel is really trying hard enough? She "wonders" if perhaps Israeli lives are worthless and whether Israel should sacrifice a dozen or so people so she can get her aid to people who are not dying for lack of aid? Let's parse her colleague's next sentence:

Holmes said "the major needs, apart from medical supplies, remain ... grain and wheat flour and fuel — also cash would be very helpful to enable people to buy supplies."

Way down in their statements, after most people stop reading or listening, Holmes just happens to mention that, oh yes, they have plenty of medical supplies! [UPDATE: The English is ambiguous; a commenter mentioned that they probably mean that they need medical supplies. - EoZ] And guess what - there is access to other goods in Gaza - another miracle - but they just need money to buy it! I guess that the families that are sharing what they have, as Abu Zayd said, are not being as generous as the UNRWA says? Or perhaps Hamas is hoarding flour and then selling it at inflated prices - something that the UNRWA is silent about?

As usual, the UNRWA is being deceptive and it is spending more time blaming Israel for everything rather than actually trying to solve the root problems. Which is why it should be dismantled and replaced with something more effective and honest.

Happy New Year!

Thanks again to all my readers!

My visitor count in 2008 was more than double that of the previous year, and December was my highest month ever, averaging over a thousand visitors a day for the first time. I really appreciate that so many of you read my posts and come back, and especially those who contribute to the comments and make the blog into an intimate community as well.

Here is to hoping that 2009 is a great year for all of us!

Long live “Proportionality”!

A mathematician looks at the idea of proportionate response, from the ZioNation blog:

Whenever Israel undertakes a more incisive and forceful action to stop terrorist attacks, we hear the angry cries of condemnation for those who only seek to defend themselves and the cries of pity for those who attack, the poor Palestinian massacred.

Among the main charges and condemnations there is a topic that is always touched upon, the lack of proportionality between the Israeli reaction and the action which caused it. It's a cruel joke.

The mathematical concept of proportionality is expressed by the equality between two ratios:

a/b = c/d

Even in everyday language we do not speak of proportionality until after two ratios are compared. When we say, for example, that the weight of a person is (or is not) proportional to its height, it means that the quotient of dividing weight by height is (or is not) equal to that which is regarded as the standard for the people of his or her age. Without this standard it would be impossible to talk about proportionality.

It is obvious that such a standard does not exist when it pertains to the means to put an end to the deadly and systematic attacks. Humanity has not yet come to establish such a standard, despite its long history of conflict and war, international organizations are powerless to stop terrorist attacks. It is necessary to stop their agents, at all costs. The opposite would be to continue to kill until total annihilation. Nobody can demand such a sacrifice of an entire people in the name of preserving an imaginary indefinable proportionality.

But let's see what the Israeli reaction would have to be, in order for it to be proportional to the terrorist attack, as the world demands.

Consider the relationship between the measurements of the intensity of this reaction, we will call it “y”, and the intensity of the terrorist attack, we represent here by “x”. Without a standard to be used as reference to make the comparison, we will compare the ratio to that between the same “x” and “z” defined as the value of the intensity of the Israeli action which, by definition, would have given rise to the terrorist attack. Proportionality would be expressed by the equality between these two ratios:

But as the assault was arbitrary and does not correspond to any action that could be the cause, we have z = 0, from whence we then conclude that .

Or in common language: If we want to maintain proportionality, the intensity of the reaction to an unprovoked assault has no limitations.

Long live “Proportionality”!

Paulo dos Santos Ferreira

The author is a mathematician. Originally published as a letter to the editor in Brazil and translated to French by the author. Translation from French by Israel Bonan.

To put it in plainer language, Israel's response to provocation should be proportional to Hamas' response to provocation. Since Hamas has shot thousands of rockets without any provocation, that means that the amount of Israel's proportionate response is - infinity.

News roundup (UPDATE 2)

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said that "victory is near."

Israel plans to open up Kerem Shalom tomorrow yet again, sending some 90 trucks filled with food and medicine.

A new website called Aid2Gaza is trying to keep track of all aid sent to Gaza; my earlier estimates of the number of tons a truck holds was way low. The trucks that Israel has been sending hold 30 tons each, which means that Israel has sent about 4500 tons of aid so far this week alone. The 3 tons that Free Gaza was trying to bring sure doesn't sound that impressive, does it?

The IDF bombed a mosque that had been used to store weapons and hide terrorists. Before it did so, it gathered data about the mosque for days, checked with international law experts, and got specific permission from the highest levels. Seems a bit...disporportionate.

Here's the video. Although clouds get in the way, you see the explosion from the IAF bomb followed by a secondary explosion and then a HUGE secondary explosion.

Iran announced it is shutting down a newspaper for publishing an article critical of Hamas. Free speech!

Hamas announced it will try to assassinate Tzipi Livni and Ehud Barak.

Arabs are disappointed that Hezbollah has not done anything to help Gazans - meaning they expected Hezbollah to open up a second front against Israel. Apparently, Nasrallah responded to this criticism by saying that it is not true that Israel could not fight on two fronts; in fact it has fought on three and four fronts in the past and won them all! Instead he instructed his fighters to be on the lookout for "treacherous plots" and he also criticized Egypt for its anti-Hamas stance.

Firas is reporting that Hamas policemen have stopped wearing their uniforms and khakis, and that Hamas members are all trying to lie low, not using cell phones - even Hamas' leadership in Damascus.

UPDATE: Commenter smoke_and_mirrors notices this from the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs:

Despite ongoing rocket fire, Israel continues with the extensive humanitarian effort in coordination with the international organizations, Palestinian Authority and various donors. Ninety three trucks, with approximately 2500 tons of humanitarian aid, medical supplies and medication were conveyed through Kerem Shalom cargo terminal. The World Food Programme has informed Israel that they will not be resuming shipment of food commodities in to Gaza due to the fact that their warehouses are at full capacity and will last for approximately two weeks.

From starvation to overstuffed in only four days?

Al-Aretz sinks even lower

Well, that didn't take long.

Ha'aretz' Gideon Levy has written another of his predictable, sickening articles where Israel's evil is so taken for granted that he makes Al Jazeera sound like Arutz-7:

Our finest young men...set out to bomb the graduation ceremony for young police officers who had found that rare Gaza commodity, a job, massacring them by the dozen. They bombed a police station, hitting a doctor nearby...They bombed a university that we in Israel call the Palestinian Rafael, the equivalent of Israel's weapons developer, and destroyed student dormitories.

The point is that, according to Levy, there are no legitimate military targets in Gaza; every one is fraught with the possibility of hurting someone innocent nearby. Israel must tell its Sderot residents to go to hell, and that will solve the problem. By not doing that, this is all Israel's fault.

According to reports, about half of the people killed were innocent civilians.

Even the UN - hardly unbiased itself - puts the number at half that amount. So what is Levy's source for this bogus number? Here's my guess:

Hamas says some 200 uniformed members of Hamas security forces have been killed.

So Levy, uncritically believing Hamas' own statistics, goes beyond what Hamas is saying in trying to demonize his country. He doesn't even consider that perhaps Israel managed to kill some members of Islamic Jihad, the PRC or the DFLP, and according to Levy any non-uniformed member of Hamas don't count either - presumably because Hamas is so careful about adhering to international law concerning havng soldiers wearing uniforms.

A hint as to where Levy's, and Ha'aretz', mindset is at comes from an article today about that newspaper from Der Spiegel.

The irreverence of the Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz is visible from the first moment a visitor enters the paper's editorial headquarters.<
There in the foyer hangs an open pig's carcass, looking just as it would in a slaughterhouse. This one, however, is reproduced in pieces of candy -- red ones for the muscles, and yellow for the innards. The building's doorman is on hand to help interpret this installation. The sculpture, he says, is like the land of Israel itself: "Beautiful on the outside, rotten on the inside."

Putting aside the fact that the symbolism is exactly the opposite of the stated interpretation (the carcass is ugly on the outside and sweet on the inside), this is the best encapsulation of Ha'aretz' guiding editorial philosophy: Israel is an inherently rotten country, not dissimilar to Ahmadinejad's characterization of it as a "rotting corpse." The elites at Ha'aretz know best, and the 95% of the nation that is to its right are ignorant rubes - too religious or too nationalistic or too Jewish to be taken seriously.

They hate their own country, and they share that hatred with their readers every day.

(h/t EBoZ and Mohammed the Teddy Bear)