Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, June 09, 2009

More on Islamic "tolerance"

From the NYT:

With all his references to the history of Islam and to its (questionable) “proud tradition of tolerance” of other faiths, Mr. Obama never said anything about those Jews whose ancestors had been living in Arab lands long before the advent of Islam but were its first victims once rampant nationalism swept over the Arab world.
Nor did he bother to mention that with this flight and expulsion, Jewish assets were — let’s call it by its proper name — looted. Mr. Obama never mentioned the belongings I still own in Egypt and will never recover. My mother’s house, my father’s factory, our life in Egypt, our friends, our books, our cars, my bicycle. We are, each one of us, not just defined by the arrangement of protein molecules in our cells, but also by the things we call our own. Take away our things and something in us dies. Losing his wealth, his home, the life he had built, killed my father. He didn’t die right away; it took four decades of exile to finish him off.
Mr. Obama had harsh things to say to the Arab world about its treatment of women. And he said much about America’s debt to Islam. But he failed to remind the Egyptians in his audience that until 50 years ago a strong and vibrant Jewish community thrived in their midst. Or that many of Egypt’s finest hospitals and other institutions were founded and financed by Jews. It is a shame that he did not remind the Egyptians in the audience of this, because, in most cases — and especially among those younger than 50 — their memory banks have been conveniently expunged of deadweight and guilt. They have no recollections of Jews.
In Alexandria, my birthplace and my home, all streets bearing Jewish names have been renamed. A few years ago, the Library of Alexandria put on display an Arabic translation of “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” perhaps the most anti-Semitic piece of prose ever written. Today, for the record, there are perhaps four Jews left in Alexandria.
When the last Jew dies, the temples and religious artifacts and books that were the property of what was once probably the wealthiest Jewish community on the Mediterranean will go to the Egyptian government — not to me, or to my children, or to any of the numberless descendants of Egyptian Jews.
It is strange that our president, a man so versed in history and so committed to the truth, should have omitted mentioning the Jews of Egypt. He either forgot, or just didn’t know, or just thought it wasn’t expedient or appropriate for this venue. But for him to speak in Cairo of a shared effort “to find common ground ... and to respect the dignity of all human beings” without mentioning people in my position would be like his speaking to the residents of Berlin about the future of Germany and forgetting to mention a small detail called World War II.

The UN. What a joke.

This press release from the UN tells you pretty much everything you need to know about that bloated, ineffective organization:

JAKARTA, Indonesia, 8 June -- The United Nations Asian and Pacific Meeting on the Question of Palestine this afternoon heard presentations of four experts, including Israeli and Palestinian, on the theme "International efforts aimed at achieving a comprehensive, just and lasting settlement of the question of Palestine".
A journalist from Israel pointed out that the two-State solution was generous to Israel, as it acknowledged that history could not be undone. The reason why Israel did not accept that solution was, according to her, because it would threaten Jewish contemporary thinking in Israel as it would leave the future out of control of the hegemonic Jewish authorities.

And who was this Israeli journalist who happily represented her country in this meeting?

AMIRA HASS, journalist for the Israeli daily newspaper Ha'aretz, said people were often lost in formulas. It was necessary to take the reality out of standard and confusing language. The two-State solution was not just a mantra, she said, but posed a deep historiography of the conflict, different from the one used by the Israelis or the Palestinians. That solution said that Israel was part of the colonialist period. Zionism was both a product of European colonialism and also of the prosecution of the Jews with its culmination in the Nazi industry of murder.

Ah, it's one of Ha'aretz' most pro-Arab and anti-Zionist reporters!

Besides the fact that the UN creates a "balanced" symposium by including three Muslims and a far-left anti-Zionist Israeli, think about the name of the conference:

The United Nations Asian and Pacific Meeting on the Question of Palestine

The UN cannot find enough calendar days in the year to overemphasize the plight of a single group of people who get a hugely disproportionate amount of attention, money and sympathy. It has to convene meetings about the issue all over the world in order to keep people's attention riveted towards this unique group of people, at the expense of the dozens of groups who deserve far more.

Can you imagine a more worthless organization than one that can come up with this idea for a meeting?

If life were discovered on Mars tomorrow, you can be sure that the UN-sponsored Martian symposium on Palestine would not be far behind.

"Islam can conquer Europe peacefully!!"

I just read an absurd article in Iran's PressTV, named "The Palestinian story: Judaization of our lands," that does an interesting job distorting the history of Zionism (one classic quote: "Although they had agreed to put the rest of Palestine under an undefined international administration, Britain decided to conquer the area and in late 1917 their soldiers laid foot on the lands of our beloved al-Quds -- which they now call Jerusalem." As if the name Jerusalem didn't exist before 1917!)

But even more interesting than the article was one of the comments afterwards:

Islam can conquer Europe peacefully!!
Mon, 08 Jun 2009 16:17:39 GMT
JUST BE SMART!! It is easy. No Suicide Bomber. No Terrorism attacks. Just marry Healthy Westerners and convert them to Islam, have as MANY CHILDREN AS POSSIBLE from them! Zionist jews are already doing this in Palestine! Jewish Rabbis are already encouraging Jewish women to have 12 children each in order to form MAJORITY and populate all Palestine with jews. Europe and America will be Muslim in 30 years if you do this. Good luck to all Muslims!

Jordanians insisting on examining brides' hymens

Islam Online (Arabic) has a story saying that in the past year in Jordan, potential in-laws have forced some 1200 prospective brides to undergo a "virginity exam" - and have the doctor report the results back to them.

A number of doctors and clerics are sharply critical of this system, saying that it is an unacceptable breach of women's dignity.

In some Arab countries, women undergo surgery to restore the appearance of virginity - and not doing so could cause them to be victims of "honor killings."

French company succumbs to Israel boycott

From Ma'an:

Under pressure from pro-Palestine campaigners, a French company is poised to withdraw from the controversial Jerusalem Light Rail project that links the city center to illegal West Bank settlements.

The company Veolia, which was supposed to operate the transport system after its construction, is now abandoning the project and also seeking to sell its 5% stake in Citypass light rail consortium, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.

Campaigners in Europe targeted Veolia and another company, Alstom, over their involvement in the project, ultimately causing Veolia to lose 7 billion US dollars in contracts in Bordeaux, Stockholm, and West Midlands, England. Dutch activists also convinced a Dutch bank to divest from Veolia.

The US government penalizes companies that adhere to the Arab boycott against Israel.

Veolia has many transportation projects in the US.

Perhaps someone should inform the Bureau of Industry and Security at the Department of Commerce?

Boycott Alert

U.S. companies continue to report receiving requests to engage in activities that further or support the boycott of Israel. U.S. companies may receive similar requests in the future. If you have questions, please call (202) 482-2381 and ask for the Duty Officer or you may contact us by email.

Open thread, plus "collaboration"

I keep forgetting about the Power of the Open Thread.

Feel free to post links, have civil discussions and order pizza for everyone.

Oh, and check this out: Hamas is accusing some Gazans of "collaborating" - with the Palestinian Authority.

Nice link

I have no time to blog but I liked this story at The Muqata.

The word "extremist" has radically different definitions when talking about the Jewish variety and the Arab one. One does everything he can to kill civilians on the other side; the other does everything he can to save them.

The "magic key"

From the Saudi Gazette:

King Abdullah told US President Barack Obama during last week’s meeting that Arab patience was “running out” and that solving the Palestinian issue was the “magic key” to finding solutions to all other problems in the region, according to sources quoted by Arabic daily newspaper Al-Hayat on Sunday.

Here are some news stories from today's Al-Arabiya:

* Two people were killed in demonstrations inYemen
* 88 people were arrested during recent unrest in Iran
* Four policemen and two civilians killed in Afghanistan
* Mortar rounds hit the Green Zone in Baghdad. Also a bus station was bombed, killing 7.
* More fighting in Somalia
* Syria is accused of sending drugs to Gulf states via Jordan
* Egyptians fear a coming wheat shortage
* Hezbollah was defeated in the Lebanese elections

Obama could have asked a reasonable question on exactly how resolving the "Palestinian issue" would magically solve all these other problems. But of course, he didn't.

Because, based on his statements, he really believes it.

Once he showed his belief in magic keys, the least he should have done would be to ask the Saudi king for a magic carpet, too.

Egypt bans marriage to Israelis

President Obama said in his speech in Egypt that "Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance."

Was he aware of this when he spoke those words?

After the verdict was read in the Cairo courtroom, Nabih al-Wahsh, an Egyptian attorney, jumped for joy and received an avalanche of telephone calls from friends congratulating him on his latest legal victory.

Al-Wahsh has managed to extract a ruling from Egypt’s Administrative Court — which rules in disputes between citizens and the state — that would force the Egyptian government to strip Egyptians married to Israelis of their Egyptian citizenship. The May 19 ruling was met with the cheers of millions in this populous Arab country.

“This is an historic ruling,” al-Wahsh said to reporters after the ruling. “Egyptians married to Israelis are dangerous to Egypt’s national security, acting in ways that contradict the constitution of their country and Islamic laws,” he said.

Calls flooded into TV talk shows discussing the verdict and readers posted comments on Web sites of newspapers that wrote about it.

Everyone appeared united in elation at the ruling, as well as in hatred of the Jewish state and everything that related to it, even if it was originally Egyptian.

“Israel clamors to become an integral part of the Arab world and to do so it lures Egyptians to get married to its women,” one reader wrote to a local newspaper, commenting on the ruling.

A second writer warned against Israeli plans to use Egyptians married to Israelis as spies, while a third said the sons and the daughters of these people would one day claim property in Egypt, something that would “ease Israel’s hegemony over Egypt yet again.”

It turns out that this verdict from late May affects mostly Egyptian men who marry Israeli Arab women.

Shukri Shazly, who has lived in Israel for the last 15 years, says he won't be stripped of his Egyptian citizenship without a fight.

Shazly, who is married to an Israeli Arab and has four daughters here, was "embarrassed" but not surprised by the Cairo Administrative Court decision last week that called for the implementation of an old law that would strip citizenship from Egyptians married to Israelis, as well as from their children.

"This judge didn't study the issue correctly. And that is the reason for my embarrassment and regret. This is all ignorance and backwardness… Egypt is like that," he told The Jerusalem Post Thursday from the home of an Egyptian friend.

"The superficiality is clear from the decision... They always forget human rights. They always forget about freedom… They always do everything according to their mood and their feelings. But laws should be the determining factor, not our moods, nor our opinions."

Only the eldest of Shazly's four daughters has Egyptian citizenship, while the others are Israeli citizens. While he prefers that his daughters only have Israeli citizenship, he believes no one has the right to strip him or anyone else of their Egyptian citizenship.

"I don't care about the certificate [passport] but we are Egyptian," he said. "Being Egyptian is something inside of us."

Shazly, who is the president of the Association of Egyptians in Israel, estimates that he is one of between 6,000 to 7,000 Egyptian citizens married to Israeli women and living in the country legally.

He believes that another 4,000 to 5,000 Egyptians, either married or single, are living in the country illegally.

So there are about 10,000 Egyptians living in Israel.

There are about 100 remaining Jews living in Egypt.

What a great example of Islamic tolerance!

(Arab comments from Al Arabiya on this story are classic.)
(h/t Andre)

PalArab woman facing death for "collaboration"

From Ma'an:

A Palestinian woman is currently on trial on charges of collaborating with Israel, court officials told AP on Sunday.

The woman could face the death penalty for passing information to Israel, according to the same report. It is rare for women to be convicted as Israeli spies.

Court officials told AP that the 22-year-old woman was recruited as a collaborator after obtaining a divorce from her husband, who forced her to work as a prostitute, making her a social outcast.

The issue of collaborators is sensitive, because Palestinian fighters have been jailed or killed by Israeli forces based on information supplied by spies.

Of course, many innocent Israeli lives have been saved because of "collaborators," but you won't ever hear Palestinian Arabs consider that a good thing.

Also, does anyone think that her ex-husband is in jail or under investigation for forcing her into prostitution?

The elephants are still in the room

In January 2008, I wrote a post called "Ignoring elephants" that listed ten major issues that those who are hellbent on a "peace process" find convenient to ignore. With the new administration's emphasis on this same failed "peace process," it is worthwhile to update it.

Sadly, seventeen months later, it requires very few changes, and we can even add a few.

In the reckless chase for Middle East peace, the number of elephants in the room is increasing exponentially. But the ability of the "peacemakers" to ignore them rises to the occasion.

Elephant 1: Hamas controls Gaza

Every peace plan includes Gaza in a Palestinian Arab state, and none of them has any provision on how to handle the fact that Gaza is a terrorist haven, in much worse shape since Israel uprooted the settlements there, controlled by a terrorist group that has no interest in restraining the even-more extremist terror groups that thrive there. Peace is impossible with this elephant, so it is easier to pretend it isn't there.

Elephant 2: Palestinian Arabs elected a terror government

In the only fair, democratic elections in the territories, the Hamas terrorists were chosen by the people. Poll after poll shows that Palestinian Arabs support terror in Israel itself. The elections proved that the conventional wisdom was wrong - and the conventional wisdom proceeded to ignore it.

Elephant 3: The current PA government was not elected

This corollary to Elephant 2 means that the current people negotiating for the Palestinian Arabs do not represent the people. Even if they sound moderate or compromising, they have no mandate. Negotiating with them is, literally, meaningless.

Elephant 4: The current PA government has almost no power

Outside of Ramallah, the Fayyad/Abbas government has little popular support and little power. Hamas is a very real threat to the PA in the West Bank and is quietly building its base. The attitudes that forced the PA to abandon Gaza - a lack of passion by people for its positions - could very well play out in the West Bank as well.

Elephant 5: The PA is being kept alive by artificial methods

The PA budget is bloated from "payroll" of non-working workers - but if they would slash the payroll, the people on international welfare would revolt. So the very basis of the organized Palestinian Arab workforce is a fiction being kept barely alive by ever-increasing infusions of cash with no real plan to fix the problem.

Elephant 6: Fatah remains a terrorist group paid by the PA

Despite the recent claims that the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades has dismantled, it is a joke meant to appease the wishful-thinkers. There has been no serious move by the PA against terror except for its tit-for-tat arrests of Hamas members in the West Bank, and its moves have been almost wholly cosmetic and aimed for Western consumption rather than real fighting against terror.

Elephant 7: The first - and second - stages of the roadmap were never implemented

The entire point of the road map was to slowly build confidence, starting with the end of terror and incitement on the Palestinian Arab side, afterwards building a "provisional" state and only then going to final-status negotiations. By skipping to Phase III as if the other two phases were already in place, the entire exercise is simply a joke. Incitement remains at full blast and the slight lull in terror is tactical, not a sea-change in Palestinian Arab attitudes.

Elephant 8: The PA's goal remains the destruction of Israel

Whether it is by "right of return" or not changing the Fatah charter or by printing map after map showing no Israel, even the most moderate Palestinian leader clings to the idea of destroying Israel, and looks upon a Palestinian Arab state as only one stage in the process.

Elephant 9: Jerusalem

Most Israelis want a unified Jerusalem under Israeli sovereignty. Most Palestinian Arabs refuse to accept anything less than all of Jerusalem as the capital of a Muslim state. The positions are not compatible and a compromise will not reduce the chances for violence - it will increase it.

Elephant 10: What happened to Gaza

Forgetting Hamas for now, the time period between Israel's dismantling settlements in Gaza and the Hamas takeover is instructive as to how Palestinian Arabs take advantage of territory they gain. They didn't build new houses or communities to reduce the "refugee camp" population, no schools or hospitals. They destroyed the greenhouses purchased for them by American Jews; they turned beautiful former settlements into training camps for terror - in other words, Israel's last major concession not only didn't help achieve peace, it ended up encouraging terror. Any claims that something similar wouldn't happen in the West Bank is the triumph of wishful thinking over experience.

Elephant 11: Palestinian Arab "unity"

Related to Elephant #1. No peace plan can work unless Hamas and the PA/Fatah reach some sort of unification agreement. This is not possible in the foreseeable future. Moreover, Hamas is powerful enough that any such agreement must include a hardening of positions that would be completely incompatible with the basic demands for peace - renunciation of terror, recognition of Israel and acceptance of previous agreements.

Elephant 12: The Palestinian Arab "diaspora" and Arab intransigence

Any final peace agreement would mean that Arab countries could no longer justify keeping Palestinian Arabs in "refugee camps" not could they justify their continued refusal to discriminate against Palestinian Arabs from becoming citizens of their countries should they want to stay. The millions of PalArabs in the Middle East becoming citizens would not be accepted by many Arab countries as it would endanger their own tenuous holds on power.

Elephant 13: Economics

Some 16 years after Oslo, the economy in the territories is still close to non-existent and wholly dependent on foreign aid. Not only is there no free market, there is no incentive to build one as the very mentality of Palestinian Arabs and their leaders is one of welfare rather than responsibility. All the plans to create a Palestinian Arab state do not consider Day 2 and how such a state would be able to sustain itself. The expected influx of hundreds of thousands of people from "refugee camps" would make it even worse. It would take at least a generation to turn the poisonous attitude of entitlement around.

Elephant 14: Gaza demographics

Gazans have no room to expand as their numbers continue to grow. Theoretically they could move to the West Bank but only a small percentage would. This is another Day 2 powder keg that is being ignored in the interests of a "solution" of a "Palestinian state."

Elephant 15: Palestinian Arab leaders never showed interest in independence

The West assumes that the goal is an independent Palestinian Arab state where Arabs no longer have to live under "occupation." But the actions and words of Palestinian Arab leaders have never borne that goal out; they have not worked towards building the institutions and infrastructure that would be necessary in an independent state. Their insistence on "right of return" and "Jerusalem" as issues that must be resolved before independence betray their thought processes - inconsistent with independence (neither of which require those two issues to be resolved) and consistent with a desire to destroy Israel in stages.

Interesting Photoshop at Palestine Today

I just saw this picture illustrating an Arabic story in Palestine Today about the "peace process."

At least some Palestinian Arabs are feeling that Obama is on their side....

Saudis confiscate, destroy women's camera phones

From the Saudi Gazette:

Women teachers and schoolgirls in Al-Ahsa were taken aback by a surprise inspection tour of their schools and the confiscation of their camera phones by the Eastern Province’s General Administration for Education.

Dr. Muhammad Al-Milhim, Director of Girls’ Education Administration in Al-Ahsa, said these inspection tours came after the administration had received a number of complaints from the guardians of schoolgirls and women teachers regarding violations taking place in schools including the taking of pictures by some female students and teachers.

Al-Milhim pointed out that education inspectors confiscated the camera phones of schoolgirls and women teachers in schools. He added that only camera phones having women’s pictures were destroyed. However, camera phones that did not contain any violating pictures were handed back to the guardians of the female owners of the phones after making the women and schoolgirls sign a pledge not to violate the regulations.

Al-Milhim added that if schoolgirls and women teachers are caught in possession of camera phones, the penalty for the student might be dismissal from school while a deduction would be made from the salary of the teacher. He stressed that all must abide by the regulations.

Al-Milhim said his administration would continue to carry out inspection tours. He warned against camera phones being taken into girls’ schools in order to protect the interests and rights of both teachers and students.

You read that correctly - the Saudi Education Administration is saying that they need to destroy the private property of women, and punish those who are in possession of camera phones, in order to protect the women's rights!

Notice that they didn't return the "non-offensive" phones to the girls, but to the girls' male guardians. Because, after all, how can they trust such sensitive electronic equipment to mere females?

Rule 5 Sunday (early edition): A Lebanese hookah

(Rule 5 Sunday is my occasional attempt to gratuitously show pictures of attractive women, a la Rule 5 of The Other McCain, while still trying to keep to the themes of my blog, whatever they might be.)

The Arabic Al Quds newspaper often goes out of its way to publish gratuitous pictures of beautiful women, and its readers react in interesting ways.

Here is an article about how cheap tobacco is in Lebanon, how the health warnings are too small to read and how children can get cigarettes easily.

And here is how it was illustrated: with a picture of a woman in a bikini smoking a water pipe poolside at a hotel:

The autotranslated comments are mostly impossible to understand but amusing nonetheless:

By God, it Mowoowoowoowoowoowoowoowoowoowoz Mezzeh Mezzeh

Zail, but you, Al-Quds Al-do an annex of the girls who Ptaamln sex phone numbers and addresses and Heck Petkonowa Yedioth Ahronoth as Srth

Thank you for this photo-Hulwah

God and the strangulation of a girl Btaknq Iajmall

Time God's time,,, put in pictures, there is no picture of this naked for the expression of smoking in Lebanon . Time Aalllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllah

If the rest of Cyebsit all the best for that Bacon Bacon uninteresting

They just don't get it

From the Lebanon Daily Star:

US Central Command Chief General David Petraeus told Al-Hayat newspaper in comments published on Monday that the administration of US President Barack Obama considered Hizbullah a terrorist organization, adding that the party did not participate in fostering stability in Lebanon. "Hizbullah's justifications for existence will become void if the Palestinian cause is resolved. Reaching an agreement over a peace process in the Middle East will eliminate several groups' justifications for existence," he explained. Petraeus added that resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict will pave the way for Arabs and Muslims to help the US in its war against terrorism.

The biggest single mistake that well-meaning Westerners make when analyzing the Middle East is when they assume that everyone thinks the way they do.

To a Westerner, it seems obvious that organizations that have no logical reason for existence would become irrelevant. In the Arab world, things are quite different.

Westerners look at problems and instinctively try to find optimal, logical solutions. They want to draw a straight line from point A to point B. They create project plans, hold conferences, debate issues, and attempt to make everybody happy - all with the underlying mindset that everyone is like them.

Arabs do not think like we do. Westerners have to stop trying to place the square Arab peg in the round Western hole and actually understand an entirely alien mindset.

(This is not to be judgmental. I am not saying that either way of thinking is superior, just that they are vastly different.)

Westerners need to understand the Arab attachment to symbolism, to pride, and to religion before making such wrongheaded analyses.

To Western eyes, Hezbollah has had no reason to exist ever since Israel withdrew to the UN-drawn Blue Line nearly a decade ago. Yet they do exist today, and they are more powerful than ever. This should be reason enough to look again at what Hezbollah is all about.

The direct method is often the easiest. This is from the Hezbollah Charter:

Our primary assumption in our fight against Israel states that the Zionist entity is aggressive from its inception, and built on lands wrested from their owners, at the expense of the rights of the Muslim people. Therefore our struggle will end only when this entity is obliterated. We recognize no treaty with it, no cease fire, and no peace agreements, whether separate or consolidated.

Experience has shown that when Arab terror organizations make statements like these, they never retract them.

From an Arab perspective, the "justification" for Hezbollah is crystal clear and explicit: they will continue to exist until Israel is destroyed. For a large number of Arabs, a peace treaty would be, by definition, between Israel and Arab traitors - a useless gesture whose only possible purpose would be to destroy Israel by stages. To them, Israel's very existence is an unpardonable affront to their honor as Arabs. Hezbollah is not Palestinian.

Even forgetting about Israel, Hezbollah has two other purposes that keep them relevant after any "peace treaty:" they aim to turn Lebanon into a fundamentalist Islamic state, and (more recently) they are enabling Iran to increase its influence in the Middle East. (Syria also finds Hezbollah useful to advance its own interests.)

Looking at things from this perspective - most of which Hezbollah says in very clear language - the idea that a Palestinian Authority peace treaty with Israel would weaken Hezbollah is laughably, and dangerously, naive.

UPDATE: Barry Rubin noticed the statement as well.