Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Freeman proves the points against him

Chas Freeman couldn't resist proving his critics correct in his withdrawal statement from consideration as NIE head:

The libels on me and their easily traceable email trails show conclusively that there is a powerful lobby determined to prevent any view other than its own from being aired, still less to factor in American understanding of trends and events in the Middle East. The tactics of the Israel Lobby plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency and include character assassination, selective misquotation, the willful distortion of the record, the fabrication of falsehoods, and an utter disregard for the truth. The aim of this Lobby is control of the policy process through the exercise of a veto over the appointment of people who dispute the wisdom of its views, the substitution of political correctness for analysis, and the exclusion of any and all options for decision by Americans and our government other than those that it favors.
There is a special irony in having been accused of improper regard for the opinions of foreign governments and societies by a group so clearly intent on enforcing adherence to the policies of a foreign government – in this case, the government of Israel. I believe that the inability of the American public to discuss, or the government to consider, any option for US policies in the Middle East opposed by the ruling faction in Israeli politics has allowed that faction to adopt and sustain policies that ultimately threaten the existence of the state of Israel. It is not permitted for anyone in the United States to say so. This is not just a tragedy for Israelis and their neighbors in the Middle East; it is doing widening damage to the national security of the United States.

The outrageous agitation that followed the leak of my pending appointment will be seen by many to raise serious questions about whether the Obama administration will be able to make its own decisions about the Middle East and related issues. I regret that my willingness to serve the new administration has ended by casting doubt on its ability to consider, let alone decide what policies might best serve the interests of the United States rather than those of a Lobby intent on enforcing the will and interests of a foreign government.

In the court of public opinion, unlike a court of law, one is guilty until proven innocent. The speeches from which quotations have been lifted from their context are available for anyone interested in the truth to read. The injustice of the accusations made against me has been obvious to those with open minds. Those who have sought to impugn my character are uninterested in any rebuttal that I or anyone else might make.
Still, for the record: I have never sought to be paid or accepted payment from any foreign government, including Saudi Arabia or China, for any service, nor have I ever spoken on behalf of a foreign government, its interests, or its policies. I have never lobbied any branch of our government for any cause, foreign or domestic. I am my own man, no one else's, and with my return to private life, I will once again – to my pleasure – serve no master other than myself. I will continue to speak out as I choose on issues of concern to me and other Americans.

Here is his statement - in context - blaming the nefarious "Israel Lobby" of a carefully controlled and centrally managed campaign on behalf of a foreign power for "libeling" him. It is yet another manifestation of the anti-semitic canard that the Jews control America. He has the audacity to say, publicly and in the pages of countless newspapers and magazines, that his anti-Israel statements are not permitted to be said in this country.

He says that he never accepted money from Saudi Arabia or China directly for lobbying on their behalf. That is probably true. Their influence on him may have been less direct (he clearly has business dealings with them) and it is possible that his reprehensible views predated his accepting business ties with them. But his hypocrisy is crystallized in this statement where he claims that he is only being a patriotic American by advocating pro-Saudi and pro-Chinese policies - yet when people advocate and lobby for Israel, they must all be working for a foreign government and cannot possibly be patriotic Americans.

This is the classic accusation of dual-loyalty, and if he wants to make it publicly then he has no right to be so insulted when others make the exact same accusations of him.

Beyond that, the campaign against him was no more virulent than that against any high-profile political nominee from any party. As ABC's Jake Tapper writes:

What's perplexing about this that so much of what critics objected to were Freeman's statements, in full context. His record was picked apart like that of any other controversial nominee -- sometimes fairly, sometimes not so -- but only in Freeman's case does the nominee make an allegation that a foreign power was lurking nefariously somehow behind it all.

But Freeman would no doubt dismiss this criticism - because, to him, Tapper is one of those dual-loyalty Zionists who are clearly paid by Israel to attack Freeman.

Purim Open thread

It is the first day of the Purim Open, and the crowd is hushed as Rabbi Weissschwartz is putting for a birdie...which is remarkable, considering that this is a tennis match.

Feel free to post any narishkeit in the comments.

UPDATE: Cool....I was quoted in James Taranto's "Best of the Web Today" column in the WSJ Online.

MEMRI brings us another insane Egyptian cleric, who says that the girl on the Starbucks logo is none other than Queen Esther!

Following are excerpts from an address by Egyptian cleric Safwat Higazi, which aired on Al-Nas TV on January 25, 2009.
"Today, I would like to talk about the Starbucks coffee shop. Starbucks is to be found in Mecca, in Al-Madina, opposite the King Abdul Aziz Gate in Mecca, opposite the Al-Majid Gate in Al-Madina, as well as in Cairo. Starbucks is to be found everywhere, with this logo. This is the Starbucks logo.
"Has any of you ever wondered who this woman with a crown on her head is? Why do we boycott Starbucks? I will tell you, so you will know why you should boycott this company, and what this logo stands for.
"The girl in the Starbucks logo is Queen Esther. Do you know who Queen Esther was and what the crown on her head means? This is the crown of the Persian kingdom. This queen is the queen of the Jews. She is mentioned in the Torah, in the Book of Esther. The girl you see is Esther, the queen of the Jews in Persia." [...]
"King [Xerxes] gave an order that the seven most beautiful girls in the kingdom be brought to him. So they held contests and auditions, and selected the seven most beautiful virgins, one of whom was the Jewish Esther, whose uncle, Mordechai - or actually, it was her cousin’s brother - was a villain.
"It was Mordechai who hatched this plot. Esther was one of the seven girls brought before King Xerxes in the palace. When Esther, who was very beautiful, was shown to King Xerxes, she captured his heart, and he chose her to be his queen. He placed a crown on her head, and the crown you see here [Higazi indicates the Starbucks logo] is the crown of the kingdom of Xerxes, and this is Esther, who became Queen of Persia, instead of Queen Vashti."[...]
"Can you believe that in Mecca, Al-Madina, Cairo, Damascus, Kuwait, and all over the Islamic world there hangs the picture of beautiful Queen Esther, with a crown on her head, and we buy her products?
[...]
"We want Starbucks to be shut down throughout the Arab and Islamic world. We want it to be shut down in Mecca and in Al-Madina. I implore King Abdallah bin Abd Al-‘Aziz, the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques: It is inconceivable that in Mecca and Al-Madina, there will be a picture of Queen Esther, the queen of the Jews."

It saddens me that Muslim clerics on TV are so nutty as to make it impossible to spoof them. They always seem to come up with something even crazier than any comedian could credibly make up.

(h/t Sammish and Reuven Koret in the comments)

Purim Torah: The Mossad Connection

Haman's wife Zeresh tells him after he was forced to lead Mordechai around on the royal horse, "If Mordecai, before whom thou hast begun to fall, be of the seed of the Jews, thou shalt not prevail against him, but shalt surely fall before him." (Esther 6:13)

This is strange, because Zeresh already knew that Mordechai was Jewish - Haman himself told her! (5:13)

So what was Zeresh talking about?

Another question: How did Charbonah know that Haman had built a gallows for Mordechai, when he suggested to the King that Haman be hung on it? (7:9) Only Haman, his family and friends knew about the gallows!

And furthermore: How did Esther, out of all the virgins in the kingdom, manage to find favor with the King? The odds were pretty astronomically against that happening!

The answer to all of these questions is, clearly, the Israeli Mossad had infiltrated Persia, and these Zionists were cleverly positioned to convince (or force, if necessary) the King to allow Jews to return to Israel.

Esther was a Mossad agent, of course, but she had help. The king's chamberlain Hegai was one of the most brilliant Mossad scientists ever, and he was in charge of perfuming the women who had to attend to the King. Using secret Zionist pheromone techniques, Hegai ensured that all of the women - while they looked good - smelled terrible.

Esther, who refused to wear perfume (at the suggestion of Hegai - 2:15) therefore had a great advantage after months of the king having to put up with smelly Persian women. Clearly the Mossad was behind this operation.

But it didn't end there. Zeresh was a paid informant for the Mossad, as we could see from her "noticing" that Mordechai was a Jew, something she knew quite well. What she also knew was that Haman* was going to his doom, and she would never see him again - so she couldn't resist one last dig at her husband, whom she only married at the behest of the Mossad to begin with.

And Charbonah was her "handler." The gallows that Haman built was Charbonah's idea, and he suggested it to Zeresh - who in turn told Haman. Charbonah, a highly-placed Mossad agent in service of the King, cunningly planned Haman's ironic means of death down to the last detail.

All of this was part of a huge Zionist plot meant to have Esther become queen, give birth to Darius who would then allow the Zionists to move to Palestine and usurp the natives who had lived there for decades.

It is all so clear!

(Last year's Purim Torah, on rock and roll, here.)

(*2010 update: I clearly was at the point of "ad d'lo yadah" when I wrote this last year, as I originally wrote "Mordechai" instead of "Haman.")

"The Right to Development"

A nice piece by Joseph Shattan in The American Spectator (h/t Sigmund, Carl and Alfred):

In the early 1980s, the Strasbourg-based European Parliament held a conference on the "Right to Development," and I was the Reagan Administration's representative.
The Right to Development was an attempt by such knavish Third World dictatorships as Cuba, Algeria and Libya to create a new, internationally recognized human right -- the right of all nations to full economic development -- equal in status to such well-established civil and political rights as freedom of speech, freedom of association, and freedom of religion. The basic idea was that even if a regime systematically violated these rights, it still enjoyed an inalienable Right to Development.
...Tthe argument I made was that recognizing a human right also meant recognizing a corresponding obligation to enforce that right. For example, if I have a right to worship freely, and someone interferes with that right, then the government is obliged to step in and help me exercise my right. Similarly, if Cuba has a right to development, but remains sadly impoverished thanks to what enlightened opinion the world over recognizes as dastardly imperialist machinations, then the international community has an obligation to step in and help Cuba. That, I stressed, was the logic of the Right to Development. But did we really want to go down this road -- funding the world's worst dictatorships in the name of a newly concocted human right?
Although all of the other participants (with the surprising exception of the Swedish expert, who argued that human rights only belonged to individuals, and not to states) disagreed with me and strongly backed the Right to Development, we adjourned without achieving any sort of consensus. In that very limited sense, I suppose, my one and only foray into international diplomacy ended successfully.

But while the "Right to Development" has stalled, the Right to Development in Gaza has apparently won universal recognition. On March 2, the Egyptian government hosted an "International Conference in Support of the Palestinian Economy for the Reconstruction of Gaza." The Conference, attended by delegates from 71 states, raised $4.5 billion. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pledged $900 million.

Why is the international community so seized with the plight of Gaza? The conventional answer, that the people of Gaza are living in a virtual rubbish heap because of Israeli attacks, is false. As a recent visitor to Gaza, Yvonne Green, reported in the March 3 Jerusalem Post, "The Gaza I saw was societally intact. There were no homeless, walking wounded, hungry or undressed people. The streets were busy, shops were hung with embroidered dresses and gigantic cooking pots, the markets were full of fresh meat and beautiful produce…Mothers accompanied by a 13-year-old boy told me they were bored of leaving home to sit on rubble all day to tell the press how they'd survived…"

But even if Gazans were living in a rubble heap, why are Western nations obliged to help them out? After all, the Palestinians are part of the Arab world, Arab states are not exactly cash-poor and (so they never tire of telling us) are obsessed by Palestinian suffering. So why not let them pick up the tab for Gaza reconstruction, while we attend to our own needs?

But even if the Arabs were cash poor, why must we begin the Gaza reconstruction process now -- even before a ceasefire has been reached, and while Palestinian rockets continue to rain down on Israeli towns and villages? And why lift a finger to support the main beneficiary of the world's largesse -- the Hamas government of Gaza, a totalitarian regime that cynically uses its captive population as "human shields," while relentlessly seeking Israel's destruction?

Evidently, the world has bought into the logic of the Right to Development --not as a universal right for all (Darfurians and Tibetans, for example, need not apply) -- but as a right that applies solely to Palestinians. The reasoning goes like this: Palestinians have an inalienable right to development; Israeli aggression is preventing the Palestinians from exercising that right; Israel was foisted on the Arab world by the West -- therefore the West is indirectly responsible for Palestinian underdevelopment; hence, it must pay…and pay… and pay.

The only way out of this trap is for the West to tell the Arab states that it is their refusal to come to terms with Israel that is responsible for the Palestinian plight, and that it is therefore their responsibility, not ours, to fund Palestinian reconstruction. But no Western statesman (or stateswoman) has ever summoned up the courage to say anything so bold, and it is unlikely that anyone ever will.

Arab writer: Iran won, Gaza lost

A lengthy op-ed in Firas Press bucks the trend of praising Hamas that has become fashionable in Palestinian Arab circles. Instead, the writer, Mohammed bin Ali Al-Mahmoud, writes that the apparent victory of Hamas is really a stunning loss for Gaza and the Palestinian Arab people, and was a victory for Iran.

The writer sarcastically speaks of the deaths of innocents in Gaza as being part of Hamas' "victory." He calls it a completely theatrical victory, that has nothing to do with Gaza and everything to do with Hamas' political desires for legitimacy - legitimacy that is entirely dependent on Iran's largesse at theexpense of Palestinian Arabs.

He gives an example of how a small group can be considered a winner when the larger group has lost, pointing out that arms dealers are clear winners in proportion to the losses of their own side.
The Hamas "victory" is likened to someone who declares himself a leader of a sinking ship that symbolizes the Palestinian Arab cause altogether.

Iran is the big winner here, as it manages to wage proxy wars against Israel via Hamas and Hezbollah without risking a single Iranian; it then positions itself as the leader of the Muslim world while Arab governments are more conflicted about supporting the extremist Islamist groups. Hamas is not really a winner; it has mortgaged itself as a vassal of Iran and it now sheds its own blood for its Iranian master. Gazans are the biggest losers, as well as Palestinian Arabs altogether.

The commenters on this article were very complimentary, indicating that Hamas did not fool every Palestinian Arab.

Here are the Jews who "stormed" the Temple Mount

Palestine Today publishes these scandalous pictures of Jews on the Temple Mount earlier today. As I wrote before, the Arab media said that the Jews "stormed" and "raided" the Al Aqsa mosque. Look at how the Jews are looting the area, harassing Muslim worshippers and showing how little regard they have for the holy site.

The caption says "A group of Jewish extremists during incursions into al-Aqsa mosque courtyards while guarded by the Israeli police."

Meanwhile, at another Jewish holy spot that Muslims belatedly claimed as their own, Arabs destroyed Jewish prayer books and Tehillim at the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron.

It doesn't appear that Muslim respect for "divine religions" is quite as extensive as they pretend.

Happy Eid al-Msakr!

As I mentioned yesterday, Purim was translated into Arabic as Eid al-Msakr. I was trying to figure out what hebrew word might be cognate to "mskr" to figure out what it meant, and Suzanne in the comments noted that the M might mean "of" in Arabic. Her guess was that "sakr" means "satire," but I think I came up with a much more likely root word:

שכר

It is the festival for getting drunk!

Have a freilichen Purim, everybody!

Galloway makes it to Gaza; aid goes through Israel

Despite George Galloway's insistence that all of the aid of his "Viva Palestina" convoy go through Rafah, he ended up caving - all the while declaring victory:

An agreement was reached late Sunday afternoon between the Egyptian authorities and Galloway that medical aid and all 500 convoy members were to go through Rafah, while non-medical aid such as food, toys, and clothes would be emptied from Viva Palestina trucks and repackaged by the Red Crescent to enter Gaza from the Awja border, which Israeli security controls.

Israel requires specific packaging of non-medical supplies so the trucks had to be emptied in Arish and the supplies repackaged in 120 cm. wide wooden boxes and wrapped, Ahmed Orabi, Head of the Red Crescent office in Sinai, told AlArabiya.net. Israeli security officials then scan them on the Israeli side of the Awja border before taking the boxes to Karam Abu Salem border to be delivered to Gaza.

This is exactly what Galloway vowed not to let happen just yesterday:

To give in to this would be to admit to Israeli command and control, which we can't do....we can't accept a special favour from Israel which, for almost two years, has sealed the borders and starved the Palestinian people, a communal punishment which is illegal under the Geneva Conventions.

Well, telling the truth was never exactly one of Galloway's strong suits.

Proving Islam is a religion of peace (Tawfik Hamid)

From the WSJ:

Many Muslims seem to believe that it is acceptable to teach hatred and violence in the name of their religion -- while at the same time expecting the world to respect Islam as a religion of peace, love and harmony.

Scholars in the most prestigious Islamic institutes and universities continue to teach things like Jews are "pigs and monkeys," that women and men must be stoned to death for adultery, or that Muslims must fight the world to spread their religion. ...We must blame the leading Islamic scholars for having failed to produce an authoritative book on Islamic jurisprudence that is accepted in the Islamic world and unambiguously rejects these violent teachings.

While many religious texts preach violence, the interpretation, modern usage and implementation of these teachings make all the difference. For example, the stoning of women exists in both the Old Testament and in the Islamic tradition, or "Sunna" -- the recorded deeds and manners of the prophet Muhammad. The difference, though, is that leading Jewish scholars agreed to discontinue these practices centuries ago, while Muslim scholars have yet to do so. Hence we do not see the stoning of women practiced or promoted in Israel, the "Jewish" state, but we see it practiced and promoted in Iran and Saudi Arabia, the "Islamic" states.

...So, Islamic scholars and clerics, it is up to you to produce a Shariah book that will be accepted in the Islamic world and that teaches that Jews are not pigs and monkeys, that declaring war to spread Islam is unacceptable, and that killing apostates is a crime. Such a book would prove that Islam is a religion of peace.

This has been one of Robert Spencer's main points for years - there is as of yet no authoritative denunciation of the more barbaric of Islamic practices from within a valid interpretation of the Quran or of Sharia itself. Islam can only reform in ways that are consistent with its source materials, and until recognized Islamic scholars find a way to do that, all of the Muslim apostates and reformers will never make a dent.

Of course, Islam as a personal religion is not nearly as problematic as Islam as a political movement. Islam itself does not distinguish between the two, even though Westerners automatically consider religion to be a personal matter.

Hence the liberal reticence to criticize Islam. As long as religion is considered a private matter, it is natural for Westerners to be reluctant to criticize people's personal beliefs. But Islam is not just a personal religion in the Western sense; it is a dangerous worldwide political movement that is absolutely antipathetic towards liberal ideas like equal rights, freedom of speech and freedom of religion.

To ask Islamic scholars to re-interpret Islam as a purely personal religion is to ask them to abandon a major part of Islam. Islam is not going to be remade into a personal religion; it cannot be. Muslims living in the West have to accept their status as "just another religion" because they have no choice, but those in Muslim-majority countries - or Muslim-majority areas where they can begin to practice some level of autonomy - will invariably start to add the pan-national, political aspects to their religion as they believe it must be practiced.

And as a political movement, Islam is worse than communism and comparable to Nazism. It is way past time for the West to recognize that the danger of Islam is not so much in its private, West-defined religious aspects but in the political and military sphere.

Jews "storm" their own holy site

Ma'an reports:

Dozens of Jewish settlers entered the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound from the Moroccan Gate (Bab Al-Maghariba) Monday afternoon, according to the Al-Aqsa foundation for Waqf and Heritage.

The foundation said in a statement that Israeli police guarded settlers who were led by a Rabbi. The group toured the compound starting from the southern mosque to the Marwani mosque in the east. Then they went to the Bab Ar-Rahma (Compassion Gate) in the north, then they headed west then to the (Chain Gate) near the Dome of the Rock staircase. Several settlers tried to enter the Dome of the Rock, but were prevented by the guards.

During the tour, settlers performed prayers and rituals, and a heated argument was observed when Muslim worshippers tried to prevent the settlers from performing some of the rites on the holy Islamic area. Israeli police intervened in the altercation and prevented it from escalating.

The Arabic version is a bit more strident:

Dozens of members of Jewish groups stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque via the Moroccan Gate and held prayers before noon on Monday.

Notice that the Arabic version doesn't use the word "settlers", since the intended audience is offended by any Jews who decide they want to go to the holiest spot on the planet. The English-speaking readers of Ma'an wouldn't see the big problem with Jews in the Temple Mount, so Ma'an needs to refer to them as "settlers."

Islamic Jihad's mouthpiece Palestine Today is even more upset:

Dozens of members of extremist Jewish groups on Monday afternoon after prayers, 9-3-2009, broke into the Al-Aqsa Mosque through the gate, under the custody of the Israeli police, and led by one of the "rabbis" of Jews.

During the raid, the members of these groups began to perform religious rituals in several places, and when some of the (Muslim) congregation tried to prevent the settlers from carrying out this ritual, Israeli police intervened in favor of the extremists and the Jewish groups completed their rituals under strict protection.

It is almost as if they pretend not to know what was on the Temple Mount way before the Quran was written.

Roger Cohen: Hamas wants peace, Israel doesn't

Roger Cohen, heady from all his newfound publicity and trying very hard to supplant Thomas Friedman as the NYT's wise man of the Middle East, decides that Hamas and Hezbollah need to be legitimized by the West:

The 1988 Hamas Charter is vile, but I think it’s wrong to get hung up on the prior recognition of Israel issue. Perhaps Hamas is sincere in its calls for Israel’s disappearance — although it has offered a decades-long truce — but then it’s also possible that Israel in reality has no desire to see a Palestinian state.

This paragraph is the perfect example of anti-Israel bias.

Hamas says explicitly, in many ways and at many times, that its goal is to destroy Israel. Israel, for better or worse, has explicitly accepted the idea of a Palestinian state for the past sixteen years.

Yet Cohen is willing to overlook Hamas' position - in fact, its entire raison d'etre - and assume that Hamas really wants to live in peace with Israel. His assumption, not borne out by even a wisp of a fact, is his basis for accepting Hamas.

But Israel really wanting peace? No, no, that's crazy! When Israelis says they want peace, they are lying! You can't trust those Israelis! They are much worse warmongers than Hamas terrorists are! As Cohen helpfully adds:

The Gaza war was a travesty; I have never previously felt so shamed by Israel’s actions.

Cohen, in a single paragraph, bends over backwards to exonerate Hamas for terror and implacable hate while at the same time accusing Israel of worse terror and implacable hate.

When Cohen calls for negotiations, he is asking for a process to begin where people's words have meaning; where the representatives of each side are assumed to be telling the truth and are putting their positions forth in good faith. Negotiations without the ability to trust the words of one of the sides is worthless. Cohen, however, calls Hamas leaders liars for saying they want to destroy Israel and calls Israeli leaders liars for saying they want to live in peace with Palestinian Arabs.

And he wants both sets of liars to negotiate!

This must be an example of that nuance that we keep hearing about from enlightened liberals - it means that they can read minds and extract the real, deeper truth that is at odds with all facts and explicit statements.

There's lots more to find disgusting about this piece; see Soccer Dad.

Galloway ties himself up in his own "logic"

Moonbat George Galloway explains why all that "desperately needed aid" for Gaza has strings attached:

The problem is that the authorities are insisting that some of the vehicles, led by the big red Manchester fire engine and the truck carrying a generator, should cross through an Israeli checkpoint, rather than this one.
Egypt is extremely sensitive to Israeli demands, no doubt with US leverage as well. But our attitude is that we've come all this way together and we're not going to be split now. All for one, one for all.

Now, there's an attitude that "starving Gazans" can understand: a quote from The Three Musketeers!

Perhaps sensing that this reason might not fly, Galloway offers another:

To give in to this would be to admit to Israeli command and control, which we can't do.

And yet, he just admitted that Egypt controls the border, by allowing some of the vehicles to cross through Rafah. So Galloway needs to offer yet a third reason to keep those Gaza residents waiting for their aid:

But we can't accept a special favour from Israel which, for almost two years, has sealed the borders and starved the Palestinian people, a communal punishment which is illegal under the Geneva Conventions.

So the ambulances, generator, food and medicine is less important than Galloway's pride at accepting a "special favour" from Israel, which during the course of his trip from England has delivered 47,000 tons of aid and millions of liters of fuel.

Not only that, but much of the aid that Israel sent through its crossings came from Jordan and Dubai - whose interest in helping Gazans is more important to them than the fact that Israel is the conduit. Is Galloway more pro-Gazan than the Arabs who send aid through Israel?

Or is his own ego more important than Gazans getting aid? After all, he happily reports being greeted by sheep and goats:

It's frustrating, but we wait. A game of football has started between Brits and Libyan drivers who have joined our convoy. Earlier, a massive cheering crowd of thousands of local people, as well as hundreds of goats and sheep, greeted us when we arrived.

He pointedly didn't mention the Egyptians who pelted his convoy with stones and sprayed anti-Hamas slogans on the trucks. As is often the case with moonbats, their own sense of self-importance trumps the needs of the people they pretend to want to help.

More proof of Galloway's ego taking precedence over the aid:

This has been an amazing journey. The only slight blemish has been the neglect of it in the press back home, with some notable exceptions.
The Guardian even unearthed a Trotskyist in Egypt - the only one, surely - to pour ordure on me. I bet it wouldn't have happened to Bono.

And I bet Bono would have happily sent aid through Israel.

The intifada against Galloway's convoy

It is amazing how one's perspective on stone-throwers can change when you are the target:

A British convoy led by MP George Galloway with medical relief for Gaza was pelted with stones and vandalised in the Egyptian town El-Arish on Sunday, an organiser said.
The convoy, which set out from London last month carrying relief supplies valued at one million pounds (1.4 million dollars), arrived in El-Arish, about 45 kilometres (28 miles) from the Rafah passage to Gaza, on Saturday.
"It's an absolute disgrace," convoy organiser Yvonne Ridley told AFP. "The power was cut. During cover of darkness members of our convoy were attacked with stones.
"Vandals also wrote dirty words and anti-Hamas slogans," she said. "Several people in the convoy were injured in the attack."
A security official told AFP that during a power cut, which is a frequent occurrence in the town, children had pelted the convoy with stones.

How can Ridley call children throwing stones a "disgrace?" Isn't that what she and her fellow moonbats tell each other is how the proud Palestinian Arab "resistance" brings Israel to its knees?

(Iran's PressTV is reporting that the stone-throwers were associated with Fatah, which hardly seems likely.)

Egypt is telling the convoy that medicines can go through Rafah but food needs to go through the Israeli crossing at Kerem Shalom. And here is where the moonbats let the world know that Gazans really don't need food that much.

Apparently, ordinary Egyptians are not so enamored of Hamas' beliefs and methods as the Europeans are. The closer you are to Hamas, it appears, the less you like Hamas..

In the shameless pursuit of gratuitous page hits, I once again present Rule 5 Sunday, where I follow The Other McCain's Rule 5 and find interesting pictures of women that I can somehow pretend belong on this blog.

Today's entry comes from a Lebanese fashion show, shown in Al Quds newspaper.

Apparently, one of Al Quds' readers associated such filth with...Jews. Here's the auto-translated comment, which I must confess I don't quite understand:

The Jews only Msoat including the gain back on your hands

No wonder why the punishment inflicted on you ... . Box of sex work.

Cryptic, yes, but I think we might be getting the gist of it.

Speaking of fashion, Hamas members have now introduced a new type of mask. Much more comfortable than the standard ski mask, it appears to be made out of...panty hose?