Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, August 03, 2009

Open thread

I've been distracted by Real Life® issues lately, but that doesn't mean you have to be....feel free to paste any interesting links you've seen.

US policy on Jerusalem (Ami Isseroff)

From the Zionism-Israel website:

What George Mitchell is asking Israel to do is to give up its capital city. What are friends for after all, if not to oblige other friends with little favors like that? This is an even handed policy. The Saudis are asked to allow Israeli overflights (and refuse) and Israel is asked to renounce sovereignty over its capital city. Everybody is asked to do something for the cause, and to please smile while doing it.

The heart of the disagreement is that the US insists that Jerusalem is just another "settlement," that the US does not recognize Israeli sovereignty in any part of Jerusalem, and that they can and should dictate to Israel what policies to adopt in Jerusalem and when and where to build. The most recent "misunderstanding" was a public and ugly US protest against removal of illegal Palestinian occupants squatting in propery owned by Jews. It may not be wise for Israel to build in areas that might be subject to future negotiations, but it certainly understandable that Israel will enforce Israeli law, backed by a supreme court decision, in an area that is declared by Israel to be under its sovereignty. There is no misunderstanding. The problem is not that the United States wants Israel to negotiate, but rather that the US is telling Israel and the world that there is nothing to negotiate about in Jerusalem, since the city does not belong to Israel according to them, but to a hypothetical international administration or Palestinian state. This is not a disagreement among friends. It is a hostile diplomatic act. In the 19 years of illegal Jordanian occupation of East Jerusalem, the United States did not once protest any Jordanian action, including the building of King Hussein's summer house, or the wrecking of the last remnants of the Jewish quarter and the Jewish cemetery in the Mount of Olives.

Read the whole thing.

Fatah admitted its failure at getting the international community to pressure Hamas to allow Fatah members to go to the Fatah conference in Bethlehem that starts tomorrow. Hundreds of members are being kept in Gaza by Hamas, who also threatened to arrest any who manage to sneak out upon their return. (Egypt is opening the Rafah crossing today.)

For its part, Hamas continues to arrest Fatah leaders and members in Gaza.

A Christian gold dealer in Gaza was murdered and his body dumped at the beach. These murders always send shockwaves through Gaza's tiny Christian community.

The 2009 PalArab self-death count is at 132.

Hamas close to recognizing Israel? Um, no.

This week's breathless news of new Hamas flexibility came from The Economist:

“HAMAS is very close on recognition of Israel,” says Ahmed Yousef, the Islamist movement’s deputy foreign minister, speaking from the top floor of a high-rise building in Gaza City. “We show all sorts of ideological flexibility on this.”

And for the umpteenth time, Hamas immediately denies ever saying any such thing, in much more blunt language:

Senior Hamas official Ahmad Yousef said on Sunday that the Islamic movement will never recognize Israel, backtracking on remarks printed by the British magazine The Economist.

Yousef said that the magazine misunderstood him when it quoted him saying that Hamas is close to recognizing Israel. He characterized the report as “totally untrue.”

In a statement to Ma’an, Yousef, who is the deputy foreign minister in the de facto government of Gaza, said that “no law” can force Palestinians to recognize Israel. “We can’t admit the existence of the state and the nation that is occupying us. They are the ones that should recognize Palestinian rights,” he said.

Hamas continues to play the Western wishful thinkers like a violin, saying purposefully ambiguous comments that they know will be interpreted as relatively moderate and then insisting that they are just as radical as ever, explicitly, in Arabic.

A page from the Fatah playbook.

Crashed Iranian plane carrying Hezbollah arms?

From YNet:

An Iranian plane crash two weeks ago – which left 168 people dead – was caused by the explosion of sophisticated fuses slated to be delivered to Hezbollah, Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera reported Saturday, quoting sources in the Middle East.

According to the report, the pilot of the Tupolev plane, which was making its way from Tehran to Armenia, sent an emergency warning 16 minutes after takeoff. Shortly afterwards, the plane crashed in northwest Iran.

According to the sources, the aircraft was carrying a large number of modern fuses composed of 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds) of explosives and electrical instrumentation.

The report is in line with testimonies on explosion sounds heard before the crash. According to the sources, the plane was meant to transfer the fuses from Iran to Armenia, and from there to Syria through Turkey, and then on the ground to Lebanon. This route was chosen, according to exiled opposition sources, so as not to draw attention.

According to the report, the transfer of arms was a special operation of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, and some of its members were among the crash victims. It was also reported that the presence of security forces at the site of the crash was not a coincidence.

This story, released yesterday, has barely made a ripple in the media. I've only seen it mentioned in Israeli media and Al-Arabiya. Even in the immediate post-election Iran, the media is treating the Islamic Republic with kid gloves.

No matter how many people die because of its support of terror.

YouTube video proof that Saudis are really Jews!

If you thought that the video I posted yesterday wasn't proof enough that Saudis really like Jews, then you need to see this YouTube video that proves that Saudis really are Jews!

Because their noses are so similar!

Can't argue with that logic! I guess it is time to convert all Mecca mosques into synagogues...

The stupidity of a pro-Arab professor

The Gulf Daily News had an article by someone named Paul Balles about the fictional disease "Islamophobia." The entire article made no sense, but the upshot is that it is Zionists who are keeping the idea of Islamophobia alive:

Have you ever been short of breath, shaking, nauseated and light-headed in elevators, closed rooms or crowded places? Experienced a panic attack in a high-rise? Do you have an irrational fear of germs? Of strangers or foreigners? Of shadows? Of thunder or lightning? Of spiders? Of public speaking? Afraid of flying?
If you've experienced any of these, you're suffering from a type of irrational fear called a phobia. These are some of the most common phobias. People suffer from literally hundreds of phobias.
A relatively recent irrational phobia that hasn't even appeared on all the lists is Islamophobia - fear of Islam.

Why, after more than a decade, do Westerners still believe these false assumptions about Islam? What are the sources of the baseless fears feeding these perceptions?
Many of the distorted impressions come from Zionist propaganda:

Now look at the examples he gives from "Zionist propaganda:"

Israel's use of words like "disputed territory" rather than occupied, "redeeming" for stealing land, "terrorists" rather than resistance fighters for Palestinians, "anti-Semites" for critics of Israel (or "self-hating Jews" if the critics are Jewish).
American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) bulletins and lobbying - AIPAC's only purpose is to ensure American support for Israel. No matter what Israel does, it cannot do any wrong.
American Jewish Committee newsletters - despite efforts by Jewish organisations to stifle criticism of Israel and objections to Zionism, anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism. Not all Jews are Semites. Most Arabs are.

So, according to Balles, Israeli nomenclature of calling terrorists "terrorists" and of calling disputed territory "disputed territory" are obvious manifestations of Islamophobia. He goes on from there down an irrelevant path that shows his complete misunderatdning of basic English, and from there to conflating Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter with Zionist propaganda.

Now, a nonsensical op-ed in a Bahraini newspaper isn't that noteworthy, until you look up Balles' bio:

Dr. Paul Balles has lived and worked in the Middle East for 40 years - first as an English professor (Universities of Kuwait and Bahrain), and for the past ten years as a writer, editor and editorial consultant.

So this is not some Arab writing gibberish, but a Western Arabist professor.

You know - an intellectual.

Slight research shows how rigorous his research methods are. From another article of his, published in The Radical Press:

Israeli educators, scholars and politicians openly advocate the annihilation of all Palestinians. Dr Nachum Rakover, a legal scholar, opined: “They voted for killers and sent them to kill us. To call them [civilians] innocent is a tragic comedy… [C]ivilians are partners of the killers.”
Many other politicians called for the need for “wiping off Gaza from the face of earth”, and “annihilating of every moving thing there”. The right-wing Israeli politician Avigdor Lieberman proposed nuking Gaza following the US example when it dropped the atomic bomb on Japan during World War II.
“All of the Palestinians must be killed; men, women, infants and even their beasts,” cries the religious opinion of Rabbi Yisrael Rosen, the director of the long-established Tsomet Religious Institute.
According to the Pakistan Daily, “Israeli spokeswoman Tzipora Menache stated that she was not worried about negative ramifications the Israeli onslaught on Gaza might have on the way the Obama administration would view Israel. She said ‘You know very well, and the stupid Americans know equally well, that we control their government, irrespective of who sits in the White House.”
Adding to her own boasts, Tzipora Menache said:
You see, I know it and you know it that no American president can be in a position to challenge us even if we do the unthinkable. What can they [Americans] do to us? We control Congress, we control the media, we control show biz, and we control everything in America. In America, you can criticize God, but you can’t criticize Israel. [all bold is mine. ed.]

As we have previously discussed the Rabbi Yisrael Rosen quote is wholly fictitious, and as far as I can tell, made up by Egypt's Al Ahram newspaper.

The Lieberman quote is similarly a lie. Lieberman called for Israel to force Hamas to surrender the way that the US forced Japan to surrender, and anti-Israel pundits immediately changed that into "Lieberman calls on Israel to nuke Gaza."

How about the quote by "Tzipora Menache"? Here, the scholar Balles goes one better - not only is the quote made up, so is she! Even rabidly anti-semitic websites acknowledge that "Tziporah Menache" does not exist, and they blame this quote on Zionist propagandists (who, they bizarrely claim, are trying to get people to click on Google links with her name to place a virus on their computers.) See this Google search for "Tzipora Menache hoax".

And Balles believes a website with zero credibility, the Pakistan Daily, which regularly publishes anti-semitic articles.

The upshot is that Professor Paul Balles is dumber than the average Rense or Stormfront anti-semite.

Saudis build world's largest menorah!

You have got to see this YouTube video. Even if you don't understand a word of Arabic, you'll get the idea. And the music is just so great.

It is entitled "Wahhabi Saudi Arabia's largest tribute to the land of the Jewish symbol of the Hijaz."

If you want to find this on Google Maps, look for the road that leads from Saudi Arabia to Bahrain; it is just north of that.

From the ground, it is a fairly attractive promenade:

Fatah official calls for closer ties to Iran

Palestine Today reports that Fatah official and former PA minister Hatem Abdel Qader has called on Fatah to forge a strategic alliance with Iran.

He recalled that even though most Arab and Muslim leaders were critical of Arafat's rejection of the Clinton proposal at Camp David, only former Iranian president Mohammad Khatami supported Arafat in his rejection of peace.

Qader also decried how Hamas has taken the initiative in having closer relations with Iran, saying that Iran could help bridge the gap between Hamas and Fatah.

At the very moment when Iran's reputation on the world stage is at an historic low is when Fatah decides this would be a good time to choose to get closer with that regime.

These "moderates" keep getting less and less moderate.

Egypt's argument against normalization

Firas Press quotes an Egyptian official who mentions that the White House is trying to get the Arab world to normalize relations with Israel as part of a peace agreement. Disingenuously, he provides a new reason why the Arab world can never truly be at peace with Israel:

Because it would destabilize the Arab regimes!

The official said that in the view of Egyptian and Arabs said that this pressure has reached the stage of an unacceptable and threatens the security Arab regimes and their stability.The sources mentioned "the beginning of tensions" in the relations between the administration of President Obama with many Arab capitals, including Cairo and Riyadh, on the background of Obama's attempts to convince the Arab world to normalize relations with Israel immediately.

The sources hinted that the "unofficial messages exchanged between Riyadh and Cairo, concluded that the American efforts ...would threaten the stability of the ruling regimes in the Arab region."

An Egyptian official told the newspaper, that "Americans want immediate normalization, which could put many of the Arab rulers in the line of fire in a direct confrontation with their people, and will lead to destabilization. If pressure is put in this direction it will only benefit the Islamic extremists in the region."

In this context, the Secretary-General of the ruling party in Egypt, Safwat al-Sharif, said that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, refused to establish any (US) military bases on Egyptian soil, whatever the reasons, saying that "Egypt has a strong army capable of defending its territory against attacks."

Actually, this is not a new excuse. It is one of the oldest Arab excuses ever made, normally referred to as "the Arab street." The rulers, whenever they are feeling pressured to do something they dislike, say that their people would have a popular revolution and overthrow them if they follow Western advice.

This argument is one of the oldest and most effective in the Arab lexicon, one that never fails to sway the West. The West has a huge fear of large numbers of strange, irrational, kaffieyeh-wearing men whose actions cannot be predicted (by Westerners.) Just as the British acquiesced to Arab demands in the wake of Arab leaders clandestinely fomenting riots in the 1930s, so does the rest of the West want to avoid any appearance of instability - and to reward the threat of it.

Of course, the argument is a joke. These are the same rulers who have no compunction against suppressing these same people violently and ruthlessly whenever they feel like it. Their entire leadership is maintained by force and by the armies under their command, not by popular will. They own their media and they play their people to act in ways they want them to. There are no mass riots against them because the despots don't allow them.

In other words, the people are not independent players in this drama, but pawns.

If the leaders would decide that they want to normalize relations with Israel, they could get their people on board in a matter of months. They could simply say, "The Palestinians have been homeless for sixty years; it is time to allow them to have their own state and to stop the senseless hate." The vast majority of the people only care about Palestinian Arabs because of the endless incitement in the Arab media; if the incitement ended so would the issue. Most Arabs care more about how to feed their own families than about a group of Palestinian Arabs who have said "no" to peace and compromise for over seventy years.

Sure, there would be some who are unhappy, there would be a brief uptick in terror recruiting, but the regimes could ensure that nothing happens - if that is what they want.

A very big "if."

Hamas threatens to overthrow PA

Bubbling beneath the surface, the animosity between Fatah and Hamas is increasing every week.

For a while they were holding unification talks in Cairo, but the talks went nowhere and even though they have not been officially called off, recent weeks has seen an uptick of rhetoric and tit-for-tat arrests, with the background of the Fatah conference next week.

Hamas has been systematically arresting Fatah members that want to go to the conference and is refusing any Fatah members from leaving Gaza. (Interestingly, Israel is allowing Fatah members to attend from many Arab countries, including Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and even Syria.) The PA offered to release a number of Hamas members to facilitate the coference, although it is unclear if they did.

The rhetoric became more severe today as a Hamas leader said that the coup that happened in Gaza could be repeated in the West Bank. The leader, whose name seems to be al-Raquob, led a rally in Khan Younis accusing the PA of collaborating with Israel and the US. He said repeatedly that Fatah leaders have not "learned the lessons of Gaza" and that Hamas could take over the West Bank if the PA remains set in its ways.

This is, of course, only one of the major obstacles to peace that Americans and Europeans seem not to grasp at all.

I scoop Commentary by two years

Commentary points to an article in NRO's Corner noticing that the US Consulate in Jerusalem webpage caters exclusively to Palestinian Arab activities and events, without a word mentioned about Israel.

Something I blogged about over two years ago, and then had a related post last year which generated a lively discussion about whether its two offices, in both the western and eastern portions of the city, cater to Jews (they do.)

Maybe I can get the writers for NRO and Commentary to go through my archives to find a whole bunch of material!

Anti-semitism on Egyptian TV

MEMRI puts together an amazing collection of pure Jew-hatred that can be seen on the al-Rahma TV network of our moderate Egyptian allies. Some of these have been seen before, but there is certainly a pattern of intense and systematic anti-semitism and incitement against Jews on that channel.

The full report can be seen here.

Here are just some screen shots:

I wonder if this topic ever comes up when the US hands billions over the Egypt every year.

(h/t Suzanne in the comments)

IDF report on Operaton Cast Lead

The IDF has released an official report on Operation Cast Lead. It is a seemingly exhaustive document, 159 pages long, that addresses every specific criticism of IDF activities during the war. (Even so, the IDF promises to release more information as investigations are still going on.)

The report describes the circumstances of every specific incident of major civilian casualties, attacks that damaged UN facilities, and attacks on mosques. It candidly admits its mistakes and why those mistakes were made. It describes the IDF methodology of investigating the incidents, the legal foundations for its actions, and a huge amount of background information that was previously not available or easily found.

Some interesting highlights:

In the worst incident of the war, where the al-Daia family was killed, the IDF intended to destroy the house next door to them, which was a weapons depot:

The IDF has concluded that this tragic event was the result of an operational error. An investigation determined that the IDF intended to strike a weapons’ storage facility located in a building next to this residence. However, the IDF erroneously targeted the Al-Daia residence, rather than the weapons storehouse. Although the IDF did provide warning shots to the roof of the Al-Daia residence, other warnings (such as the warning phone call) were made to the building actually containing the weapons, not the Al-Daia residence.

The IDF didn't target Nizar Rayyan, even though he would have been a legitimate target:

During this episode, which was widely reported by NGOs, Ri’an and members of his family were killed in an aerial strike that hit their home. Ri’an was a senior Hamas operative, but he was not the target of the attack, although the IDF legitimately could have treated him as a military target due to his central role in planning and executing terrorist attacks. Instead, the operational goal of the strike was to destroy Hamas’ central compound in the Jabaliya refugee camp. The compound included several buildings that served as storage sites for large quantity of sophisticated weapons. The IDF limited the planned attack to the weapons storage site and did not seek to injure or harm Ri’an or, of course, any members of his family.

In an effort to ensure that it destroyed only the storage facilities, and did not harm civilians residing in the buildings, the IDF issued several warnings before the attack. These included not only general leaflets and telephone calls, alerting civilians to avoid facilities serving Hamas and other terrorist groups, but specific phone calls to the residents of the targeted buildings, notifying them of the planned strike and warning them to evacuate the premises. The IDF also fired two separate rounds of preliminary warning shots with light weapons, 13 minutes and 9 minutes before the strike, providing sufficient time for residents to evacuate. The residents evidently understood these early warnings, as a group of them did leave the building, a fact confirmed by IDF surveillance before proceeding with the strike. The IDF observed this group evacuation and drew the reasonable conclusion that the buildings (including Ri’an’s house) were empty. Only then did the IDF launch the strike.

Following the strike, secondary explosions were visible. This confirmed that Hamas used the buildings for weapons storage, and therefore it was a legitimate military objective according to the Law of Armed Conflict. Only later was it discovered that, Ri’an and his family chose to remain in the building after others had evacuated, leading to their death.

The IDF similarly describes its use of white phosphorus as a smokescreen, the specific military advantages it gave them, and the carefulness of when deciding to use it:

Hamas’ anti-tank units, equipped with advanced anti-tank missiles, were operating in this
area. These units were located mainly near the northern side of the UNRWA compound,
so that the compound was placed between Hamas’ anti-tank units and IDF forces. The
threat to Israeli forces was credible and imminent.

The IDF’s primary rationale for deploying smoke screening munitions containing white
phosphorous was to produce a smokescreen to protect Israeli forces from the Hamas antitank
crews operating adjacent to the UNRWA headquarters. Such a smokescreen has
proven an effective response to the anti-tank threat, since it effectively blocks the enemy’s
field of view and prevents it from using visual observation tools (including infra-red). As
discussed in Section V.D(3)(a)(i) below, the IDF’s use of the standard smoke projectile —
which is commonly found in the arsenal of other armed forces of States worldwide — is
lawful for this purpose.

The smokescreen created during the fighting in Tel al-Hawa was effective in achieving its
military objectives. It prevented most of Hamas’ attempts to launch anti-tank missiles,
although one missile did hit an IDF tank. Hamas’ anti-tank units, which are mobile, had to
change their positions in order to be able to attack IDF forces. In the absence of the
smoke-screen, the fight would have continued in this area, and the IDF would have had to
use reactive fire to engage anti-tank units, with the likelihood of greater civilian harm.

The report is filled with such details about controversial incidents. The impression one gets overall is that the Human Rights Watch and Amnesty reports criticizing Israel were written by people who have little experience in how actual wars are fought. They make sweeping statements saying that there was no legitimate reason for the IDF to have acted in certain ways without knowing what they are talking about. They automatically assume that the IDF is acting maliciously or negligently despite the IDF's incredible (and improving) record of dealing with civilians in a war zone, which is second to none. As the IDF writes:

The final core proposition that runs through this Paper is that, while the principles of
customary international law may be “basic” and can be simply stated, they nevertheless
must be applied with analytical rigor. Reports by non-governmental organisations and
rapporteurs and committees acting under mandates from international organisations too
often jump from reporting tragic incidents involving the death or injury of civilians during
armed combat, to the assertion of sweeping conclusions within a matter of hours, days or
weeks, that the reported casualties ipso facto demonstrate violations of international law,
or even “war crimes.” Often, these leaps of logic bypass the most basic steps, such as
identification of the specific legal obligation at issue and explanation of how it was
violated. The depth of feeling in the face of civilian losses is understandable, but it does
not excuse this rush to judgment. It is a fundamental precept of the rule of law that any
legal inquiry about events relating to armed conflicts cannot assume the conclusion,
particularly a conclusion that — as shown below — proper application of the law does not
sustain.

The IDF report goes into aspects of international law, into details of Hamas war crimes, and into most other relevant information about the operation. It is well worth reading for anyone who wants to know all sides of the story.

Another fascinating detail uncovered in the report of particular interest to this blog was a footnote referring to a Hebrew report that determined that over 90% of all "police" killed in Gaza were in fact terrorists, far higher than the 67% we have identified. A synopsis of its findings are here (autotranslated), the actual report listing all the names of the terrorists in Hebrew is here. (The file downloads as a ZIP file but it is a PDF file; rename it and then you can view it.)

(h/t t34zakat)

Today's PalArab news 7-30-09

Another two were killed in two separate tunnel collapses in Rafah. Palestinian Arab "human rights" groups blame - Israel, of course, for not allowing free entry of weapons and weapons materials into Gaza.

Hamas arrested a number of Fatah leaders in Gaza, including a number of people who wanted to go to Bethlehem to attend the Fatah conference next week.

Our friends the Egyptians, in response to the idea of the US pledging to defend all countries from Iranian nuclear weapons, pre-emptively said that there is no way they will host any US bases on Egyptian soil. And Egypt can't stand Iran.

The Palestinian Arab finance minister declared Netanyahu's "economic peace" plan a failure. I guess the fact that the West Bank economy has made serious, visible gains since Netanyahu became PM is the evidence.

PalArab police warned people not to keep embarrassing pictures on their mobile phones. Thieves have stolen mobile phones and then blackmailed mostly women by threatening to publicize pictures of them that would mortify them.

The 2009 PalArab self-death count is now at 131.