Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Freedom of the Press, Hamas-style

Reporters Without Borders condemns the Hamas interior ministry’s decision to deny Palestinian and foreign journalists access to the southern city of Rafah and to all hospitals in the Gaza Strip until further notice. The ban was issued on 14 August, after fighting broke out in Rafah between the Hamas government and a radical Islamist group.

“The Hamas-led government’s interior ministry has again demonstrated a desire to control news and information in the Gaza Strip,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Only the presence of journalists would ensure independent information about what took place in Rafah on 14 and 15 August.”

Palestine Press Agency adds that Hamas broke into the offices of Reuters on August 14th following their coverage of the speech by Abdul Latif declaring Gaza an Islamic emirate. Hamas also accused Al Arabiya of broadcasting a report about the events “full of lies and slander,” that brought “harm to the Palestinian resistance.”

Abbas to embrace a mass murderer

From Ma'an:

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will travel to Sudan on Wednesday and meet with his counterpart Omar Al-Bashir, the country’s SUNA news agency said.

The meeting between the leaders will include discussions around ways of strengthening bilateral relations and developments in the Middle East, the report said. Abbas' visit with the leader comes despite a standing arrest warrant for him issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity.

What's a little genocide between friends?

A lot has been said recently to ensure that Jordan is never to be considered a part of a Palestinian Arab state.

Jordan itself has reacted strongly to the suggestion by MK Aryeh Eldad that Jordan should become the Palestinian Arab state, given that most of its population is Palestinian. Israeli president Shimon Peres publicly distanced himself from the idea as well, and Israel even sent a delegation to Jordan to calm Jordanian fears.

What I find more interesting is that the Fatah platform explicitly rejects the concept as well:

Emphasis on the rejection of ...advocacy of the alternative homeland ...in Lebanon [or] Jordan.

I can certainly understand the Hashemite kingdom's rejection of the concept, but why don't Palestinian Arab leaders want to see some part of Jordan or even Lebanon become a part of an Arab Palestine?

Historically, for the most part the East Bank was considered part of Palestine as was most of Lebanon. I'm not talking about the Sykes-Picot agreement; I'm talking about how most people would define Palestine before Balfour. As I've shown before, the Encyclopedia Britannica from 1911 describes both sides of the Jordan as being Palestine, with the East Bank being called "Eastern Palestine" and encompassing some 3800 square miles.

Arabs also considered the East Bank of the Jordan and Lebanon to be a part of Palestine. The Crusaders' "Kingdom of Jerusalem" included parts of the East Bank. Palestine never extended nearly as far east as British Transjordan did but the populated areas closer to the river were usually considered part of Palestine since the area was renamed by the Romans.

Not only that, but Palestinian Arabs carved out their own statelet in Jordan before September 1970 as well as their own autonomous areas of Lebanon in the 1970s and part of the 80s. It would be hard to imagine that the radical leaders at the time were not thinking that they were liberating parts of Palestine when they were fighting the Jordanians and other Lebanese factions.

The fact is that the Jordan River boundary was created by Western powers, not by the natives of the region, Jew, Arab or Christian. If Palestinian Arabs were to be honest in their characterization of themselves as having their own history separate from the rest of the Arab world, that history must include parts of Lebanon and Jordan.

It would seem exceedingly strange that their dreams to restore their homeland would not include their entire homeland.

Yet the Fatah platform is explicit that this is not the case. Why not? Why can they not dream of a return to this mythical area of Palestine in its entirety, even if it is not practical now?

The answer to that question is that the Palestinian Arabs are not dreaming of Palestine - they are dreaming about the destruction of Israel. They are not bothered that their territory is controlled by non-Palestinians but that parts of it are controlled by Jews. The borders that they draw for Palestine always coincide with the borders that happen to be under Jewish control.

Before 1967, they did not agitate to have the West Bank become independent from Jordan, because Jews did not control the West Bank. Except for a brief, embarrassing period in 1948 they did not try to create a state in Gaza either.

Their ambitions for territory always coincided with the land ruled by Jews, not with land ruled by Arabs (except for the examples given above in the 1970s and 1980s.)

The question is not whether Jordan or Lebanon should be the Palestinian Arab state. The question is why Palestinian Arabs themselves don't even consider the topic. The fact that they don't shows that their current claims are not based on historic rights or control, but simply on the negation of a Jewish political entity in the Middle East.

Highlights of the Fatah platform

I finally got to see the full Fatah platform in Arabic from the recent conference. Some of the parts have not been publicized, such as:

* Fatah's insistence that terrorism ("armed struggle") is legal under international law

* Fatah rejecting the idea that Palestinian Arabs could become citizens of any other Arab country and preferring that they remain stateless

* Once again reaffirming that Islam is their official religion while at the same time saying that Israel is a Jewish state is "racism"

* Their glee at President Obama's attitudes towards them and assumption that the US will start to pressure Israel

* Their continued insistence that all "refugees" should "return" to Israel proper

* Their plan to continue to keep their people in miserable refugee camps as a symbol of their plight and to continue to take aid from the UN indefinitely

* The fact that the Israeli "peace" camps are an integral ally in their fight against Israel.

Here are some autotranslated highlights:

2. Methods and forms of struggle

Based on the struggle of the Palestinian people's right to resist occupation, and in the struggle against the settlements and the expulsion and deportation, and racial discrimination, a right guaranteed by laws and international laws. Launched our revolutionary armed struggle in the face of armed rape of our land, but not limited to never, and a variety of tools and methods to include the peaceful struggle, as practiced by the Intifada, demonstrations and protest and civil disobedience and confrontation against the gangs of settlers, and the struggle of political, media and legal, diplomatic, and negotiations with the occupation authority, and therefore, the right of the Palestinian people in the practice of armed struggle against the armed occupation of their territory is an inalienable right by the law and international law. The choice of method of the fight in time and space depends on ... internal and external conditions, the calculation of purchasing power and the need to maintain mobility, and on the ability of people to the revolution and resistance, and to continue the struggle.

3. Personal and independent national Palestinian identity:

Fatah's strategy is based on the Palestinian people and their struggle, and that there is no alternative to him from his homeland, and their movement have been made in all fields to confirm the independent national identity, and to stabilize the Palestinian identity, this identity is based in our our country, and our rejection of resettlement in neighboring Arab countries (as Arabs in our country and our neighborhood), or in any alternative homeland. The Movement believes that the affirmation of personal interest, the need to belong to the public and the nation and the basic social components.

6.Religions

Palestine is the holy land of the heavenly religions, Islam is the religion of the majority of the Palestinian people, which is the official religion of the authority of the state, and for the Christian the same sanctity and respect, do not allow the opening of any distinction between the Palestinians on the basis of religion, faith or the amount of faith, and respect freedom of worship for all, including Jews, our movement has been launched calling for a democratic, not sectarian Muslims, Christians and Jews.

Functions of the next phase:

The winds of change blowing in the United States, under new management, and it is likely to move away from the world single view, and is heading toward more balance and pluralism and dialogue, and commitment to international law.

In total there are strengths and weaknesses in our reality. There are the dangers we face, or avoid, the most important internal divisions, and centralization levels, and we must seize the opportunities there, including the opportunity offered by the defeat of the American project in the Middle East, and the end of an era which President Bush based on the use of excessive force in the conduct of American policy in the region, through the vision single of the world refuses to multilateralism, and international participation in decision-making, has also modified its policy to the U.S. on the conflict - the Iranian, the brightest flames of discord and division in our country and our region. may have a better chance under the new U.S. administration. The opportunities of new national and regional, is Arab reconciliation and the positive role of Turkey and the improvement in Iran's position towards us, the regional forces in the past, she was standing by the enemy and to establish closer alliances with him.

Our goal is to defeat the central occupation and liberation of the country, and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital and to ensure the right of refugees to return and compensation. For the next stage of our analysis shows the progress of tasks to be performed to achieve this goal are summarized in the face of occupation, settlement and the preservation of the land and the holy sites and its Arabism, and particularly in Jerusalem, and work on the release of prisoners, and to uphold the Bthoaptna[?], and the awakening of the various forms of struggle to defeat the occupation, and negotiating a course correction, but not limited acceptance, or to continue to no avail, and try to get through on the progress towards our goals, and to explore strategic alternatives if it failed to address the peace process in its current form, and continue to build the self - for the continuation of this confrontation.

2. Refugees: Fatah is committed to including the following:

A - to work hard to achieve the right of refugees to return, compensation and restoration of property, and the unity of the refugee issue, regardless of their whereabouts, including refugees in the territories (48).

The Movement believes the need to preserve the camp[s], a key witness to the political refugees who have been deprived from returning to their homes until a solution to their cause, and the need to adhere to the title of an international relief agency and a recognition of the cause of refugees until they return to their homes and their country, while working to improve the situation of refugees and the camps, with confirmation that the PLO is a political reference to Palestinian refugees.

B - emphasis on the rejection of the principle of forced resettlement, or advocacy of the alternative homeland, then resettled in Lebanon, nor an alternative homeland in Jordan.

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The right of resistance: stick to the Fatah movement against the Palestinian people to resist occupation by all legitimate means, including the exercise of their right to armed struggle, which is guaranteed by international law, as long as the occupation and settlement, and dispossession of the Palestinian people of their inalienable rights.

Forms of struggle in the current stage: adopting the Fatah movement of all forms of legitimate struggle, with the option of adhering to peace, but not limited to negotiations to achieve it, and it is this struggle between the forms of exercise that can be successful at the current stage of negotiations for the assignment and activated or alternatively that it did not achieve its goals:

# The awakening of the popular struggle against the settlements and the contemporary model is successful in the continuing confrontation Naalin and Bil'in against the settlements and the wall, and to save Jerusalem and the refusal of judaizing. Our mobilization of all citizens to engage in their activities, and participation of Arab and foreign roots, and provide all the help from the organs of the Authority for the success, leadership and issue mobility and popular and official of the main events.

# Innovation of new forms of struggle and resistance over the initiatives of grass-roots initiatives and the cadres of the movement, and the design of our people's resilience and resistance, including guaranteed by international law.

The restoration of our relationship with the direct and powerful Israeli peace camp, and re-activate it to work for a just peace without mixing with the unacceptable policy of normalization under occupation.

Arab analysts try to figure out why Gaza creates extremists

There have been a number of articles in the Arabic press that attempt to analyze why there is a proliferation of Al-Qaeda-oriented extremist groups in Gaza. Typical is this one from Al Arabiya [autotranslated]:

Palestinian analysts said that the Gaza Strip has turned into a breeding ground for the emergence of extremist Islamic groups, as a result of the growth of religious institutions, which created many roles and trends after the militant Hamas-controlled Gaza under the Israeli siege to be in a tight semi-isolation from the world, expecting the emergence of extreme manifestations of violence in it.

[A professor at Al Azhar University] pointed out that "the growth of extremism is a result of the spread of poverty, unemployment and the blockade."

Most articles of this type miss the read reason, but I saw one that touched upon it.

Hamas mobilized thousands in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank with a culture of the suicide bomber, and built a huge army of the martyrs who are racing to be the first to blow up their explosive belts in Israel to go to heaven by the shortest and fastest routes. It is natural that is a proportion of those frustrated by the current truce will search for other jihadist organizations, to transcend this situation and achieve their aspirations of martyrdom. It is not strange that there should be a component of the armed wing of Hamas among the Jund Allah' members, or that their leader is the nephew of Dr. Mousa Abu Marzouk, deputy head of the Political Bureau of Hamas.

This comes much closer to the truth. Hamas (as well as Fatah) has raised up generations of Palestinian Arabs with the idea that martyrdom is ideal, that Israel is anathema, and dying while fighting Jews is the shortcut to Paradise. Hamas added on a layer of supposed adherence to Sharia law and the concept of creating a unified 'Ummah.

For thousands of youths who have assimilated this message from Hamas itself, is it surprising that they cannot accept the current pause of terror attacks? Hamas' actions do not jive with their words and Hamas does not try very hard to justify their hudna in Islamic terms. This creates an ideological vacuum that other groups rush to fill.

The core of the conflict is incitement to terror. It takes decades to erase the effects of brainwashing kids to desire to blow themselves up, and Hamas media continues to glorify killing Israeli women and children. To a large swath of Arab Muslims, simple-minded dedication to violence is attractive and intuitive (not to mention natural,) and anything that obstructs their desire to murder is to be resisted.

It is easy to blame extremism on "occupation" and the "siege" and so forth, but the simplest explanation is the one that most people are not willing to face: extremism is taught, and that Pandora's box cannot be closed in this generation.

Another Zionist cow crisis in Lebanon

We already know about the terrible crime of Zionist cows invading a pond supposedly in Lebanon and drinking water, thereby proving Zionist imperialism and expansionism.

Now, a Zio-cow has upped the ante, having the unmitigated chutzpah to die on Lebanese territory! From the Daily Star, at the tail-end of a story about how UNIFIL is building a fence to protect Lebanon from the cows:

A decision has yet to be reached concerning the disposal of a cow cadaver recently found near the lake. While Lebanese authorities refused to burry [sic] the cadaver in its territories and requested that it be moved to the occupied part of Kfar Shuba, the Israelis so far ignored the matter.

This must be the Zio-cow equivalent of suicide bombing.

Neo-Nazi ads return to Google

Once again, I am seeing ads from Google AdWords for NSM88records, a neo-Nazi group that sells T-shirts for "white power" as well as with swastikas and pictures of Hitler.

You can complain to Google here.

Indian Muslim women speak out against bigamy

From The National (UAE):

While some Muslim clerics have disagreed with a recent Indian Law Commission report saying bigamy is against the “letter and spirit” of true Islam, many Indian Muslim women, both single and married, say bigamy and polygamy should not be accepted in any society.
In the report presented to government last week the commission said: “We fully agree with the fact that traditional understanding of Muslim law on bigamy is gravely faulty and conflicts with true Islamic law in letter and spirit.”

Even though the commission stopped short of recommending reforms, fearing it could trigger an “unhealthy controversy”, a powerful clerical body said that it could not tolerate any criticism of Islamic law, or Sharia.

“Justice is the basis of bigamy. The commission should also know that this issue is outside its purview,” Syed Qasim Rasool Ilyas, the spokesperson of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, said in an interview.

Some Muslim women, however, believe married men commit bigamy or polygamy out of lust and take advantage of Sharia to justify their behaviour.

“My husband suddenly married a younger woman and began living with her some months ago without divorcing me. I could not get any action taken against him simply because of the Muslim law, which allows him to keep four wives,” Azra Begum, the first wife of a Muslim butcher in West Bengal, said. “I have been forced into miseries since he was the sole breadwinner for our family. His new marriage has also been humiliating and embarrassing for me and my daughter.”
The commission report was prepared in connection with a legal case in which a Hindu man converted to Islam to be able to marry a woman without divorcing his first wife.
Earlier this year, the Delhi-based Allama Rafiq Chariatable Trust conducted a survey among Muslim women in Delhi and western Uttar Pradesh and found that 96 per cent were against bigamy.

“Very surprisingly, except for just five women, all of them said that they did not approve that their husband, father or brother married more than once,” said Maqsood Ahmed, the president of the trust.

Ms Begum said until a woman experiences what she went through, it is impossible to fathom the repercussions that a husband’s additional marriages can have.

“People in our village called us ideal lovers, until my daughter was born. Then, suddenly, 15 years after the marriage, he fell in love with a younger woman and dumped me last year,” said Ms Begum, who recently joined a bulb-making factory as a labourer.

“He has taken a second wife illegally. I loved my husband, I was healthy and I was able to perform all duties that a wife is supposed to do. But I know I cannot get justice now simply because he is Muslim and has the so-called right to keep up to four wives. I am devastated.”

PCHR is "astonished" at Hamas terrorists

PCHR made a big deal about the "policemen" killed during Cast Lead, saying that they were "civilians." The fact that a majority of them were also members of terror groups didn't matter to this "human rights" group - to them, a fake police force that is identical to an armed terror group is still worthy of civilian protection.

So there is a little irony at PCHR's report on the unpleasantness that happened last Friday between Hamas and the Jund Ansar Allah group. One of their statements is:

[The PCHR] reiterates its astonishment by the involvement of members of the 'Izziddin al-Qassam Brigades in these incidents, emphasizing that the brigades cannot be a law enforcement body, and its very involvement in the incidents is an encroachment into the powers of law enforcement bodies.

Isn't it astonishing that Hamas doesn't distinguish between its law enforcement and its terror group? Only to PCHR, which clings onto a fiction that would allow it to consider Hamas police to be civilian to begin with, and to consider Hamas to be a normal political leadership of Gaza and not a terror group.

So much for HRW's "objectivity"

Forgetting that HRW claims to have "forensic evidence" that Palestinian Arabs waved white flags while being mowed down by heartless IDF soldiers (without providing any such evidence,) the author of that report has a history of, shall we say, extreme antipathy towards Israel - and support of terror. From Maariv, translated at Commentary:

AUTHOR OF REPORT AGAINST ISRAEL SUPPORTED MUNICH MASSACRE
By Ben-Dror Yemini, Ma’ariv, 16.8.09, p. 13

Joe Stork, a senior official in Human Rights Watch, which accuses the IDF of killing Palestinians who waved white flags, is a fanatical supporter of the elimination of Israel. He was a friend of Saddam, ruled out negotiations and supported the Munich Massacre, which “provided an important boost in morale among Palestinians.”

Last Thursday, many world media outlets covered the press conference in which a senior Human Rights Watch official, Joe Stork, presented the report accusing Israel of killing twelve Palestinians in the Gaza Strip who waved white flags during Operation Cast Lead. Stork, the person identified with the report, has a unique history of Israel-hating: He supported the murder of Israeli athletes in Munich, was an avid supporter of Saddam Hussein and more.

Several times in the past, Stork has called for the destruction of Israel and is a veteran supporter of Palestinian terrorism. Already as a student, Stork was amongst the founders of a new radical leftist group, which was formed based on the claim that other leftist groups were not sufficiently critical of Israel and of the United States’ support of it. Already in 1976, Stork participated in a conference organized by Saddam Hussein which celebrated the first anniversary of the UN decision that equated Zionism with racism. Stork, needless to say, arrived at the conference as a prominent supporter of Palestinian terrorism and as an opponent to the existence of the State of Israel.

He also labeled Palestinian violence against Israel as “revolutionary potential of the Palestinian masses”—language that was typical of fanatical Marxists.

In articles which he authored during the 1970’s, Stork stated that he was against the very existence of Israel as an “imperialistic entity” and, to this end, provided counsel to Arab regimes on how to eliminate the Zionist regime. He also was opposed to any negotiations since this meant recognizing its existence: “Zionism may be defeated only by fighting imperialism,” wrote Stork, “and not through deals with Kissingers.”

On other occasions, Stork expressed his position that the global Left must subordinate itself to the PLO in order to strengthen elements that opposed any accord with Israel. It would seem that he has not changed his ways since then. He is still conceptually subordinate to those who have maintained their opposition to the existence of the State of Israel. Once the world’s radical left supported the PLO. Today, part of the global Left supports Hamas.

Where does Stork stand regarding matters of objectivity and neutrality? He criticized Professor Ibrahim Abu-Lughod, himself a PLO figure, because he edited an anthology which tried, at least seemingly, to produce a balanced presentation. “Academic neutrality is deceitful,” wrote Stork. And what about factual accuracy? Stork claimed that Menachem Begin said that, ‘The Palestinians are two-legged animals.” In fact, Begin said that those who come to kill children are “two-legged animals.” The difference is, of course, huge. Stork, time after time, justifies his high standing in the industry of hate and lies against Israel.

Stork reached his peak in a statement published by the Middle East Research and Information Project, which dealt with gathering information on the Middle East conflict, and in which Stork was a leading figure. This was a statement that included explicit support for the murder of the eleven Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics:

“Munich and similar actions cannot create or substitute for a mass revolutionary movement,” the statement said, “But we should comprehend the achievement of the Munich action…It has provided an important boost in morale among Palestinians in the camps.”

Murder and terrorism, if so, are a matter of morale.

This is the man. A radical Marxist whose positions have not changed over the years. On the contrary. Objectivity, neutrality or sticking to the facts are not Stork’s strong suit. He even proudly exclaims that there is no need for neutrality.

Is it possible to relate seriously to a report against Israel which this man stands behind? Both Camera and Professor Gerald Steinberg have revealed worrying data on the leaders of Human Rights Watch and on the two people who head its Middle East Department—Sarah Leah Whitson and Joe Stork—even before its latest report and unconnected to it. The organization, as part of its false presentation, issued polite condemnations of Hamas rocket fire. But it seems that such blatant anti-Israel bias leaves room for doubt. A Stork-produced report on Israel is about as objective as a report by Baruch Marzel on Hebron.

Israel is called upon to provide explanations in the wake of Human Rights Watch reports. It is about time that Israel publicly exposed the ideological roots of several of this organization’s leaders and demands the dismissal of these supporters of terrorism and haters of Israel. Until then, Israel, justifiably, cannot seriously comment on criticism from such a body.

Book review: "Saving Israel"

Daniel Gordis of the Shalem Center has written an intriguing book with an ambitious goal: to save the Jewish State and, by extension, Judaism.

The full title is "Saving Israel: How the Jewish People Can Win a War That May Never End."

For most of the book, Gordis describes the problems facing Israel, and the problems seem insurmountable: peace with Palestinian Arabs is a chimera, young American Jews no longer identify with Israel and have increasingly become immersed in anti-Israel leftism, the ability of Jews to articulate the reasons that Israel is needed is deteriorating, Israel will never be at peace as long as Hamas and Hezbollah and similar groups exist, the number of prominent people who are against the very existence of Israel keeps increasing, Iran and increasing technology ensures that Israel will always live under a cloud of worry about total annihilation, Israel's Arab minority is increasingly radical and hostile to Israel's existence, Israelis themselves have lost passion for Zionism, and an Israel that doesn't embrace its Judaism has little chance of survival.

The problems are laid out well. Gordis doesn't pull any punches and he doesn't hide from any problems. He acknowledges and does not try to minimize the real pain that Palestinian Arabs have and the real problems in Israeli society today. He explores and pokes holes in simple solutions and stopgaps that people have suggested (like Israel trading the Wadi Ara area for settlement blocs to help reduce the demographic problem - even anti-Israel Arabs that live there would end up moving elsewhere in Israel rather than become members of a Palestinian Arab state.)

His description of the problems is so good that they are almost overwhelming.

Gordis brings up two disheartening stories that set up his solution. In one, his son is paired up with a non-religious Israeli at a post-high school class where they taught Talmud. The subject was the very first page of the first tractate in Brachot. The teacher wanted them to go through the daf and list all the questions they could, and the non-religious Israeli's first question was "What's the Shema?" A Hebrew-speaking Israel went through all his years of schooling without knowing the most basic information about Jewish life.

The other story was about a girl from Sderot who was sent to America as a respite from the incessant rocket attacks. Upon her return, she was angry - asking why she had to go to California to see a havdalah ceremony for the first time in her life.

The Zionism of early Zionist poets and thinkers was explicitly anti-religious. Gordis mentions a children's song written by famed Chaim Bialik, about a see-saw, which actually denies the existence of God due to its playful use of a Mishnaic phrase (mah le-ma'alah, mah le-matah? "Who is above and who is below?") He brings other examples of rabid anti-religious sentiment in major early Zionist leaders.

So what does Gordis suggest? He wants the very definition of what it means to be Jewish to change. He wants Israel to become a central part of diaspora Judaism and he wants Judaism to become the central part of Israeli life. He is equally upset at how Israeli schools ignore all Jewish history between the Bible and the birth of Zionism as he is at how the Chief Rabbinate of Israel ignores the opportunities to lead the entire country in debates about the religion, choosing instead to concentrate only on the religious sector.

Only when Judaism returns as the centerpiece of the Jewish state can Zionists articulate the purpose of Israel. Only a people who know who they are and how they became that way can justify their existence and their self-defense.

Gordis, ordained as a conservative rabbi, couches his suggestions in a pluralistic Jewish way. He doesn't refer to his beliefs in the book and one could argue that Conservative or Masorti Judaism has not exactly inspired masses of Jews in America. Nevertheless, his ideas make sense. Israelis need to become Jewishly literate and there need to be public debates about every difficult issue not (only) from a Western perspective but from the rich Jewish tradition. The divide between the religious Zionist, the haredi and the secular Israelis is too large and the religious have been too insular. Gordis shows that non-religious Israelis seem to want to learn more about Judaism as well but all too often do not have the tools.

Although he doesn't suggest it, there should be TV shows in Israel where Jews of all denominations debate current issues from a Jewish perspective. What is the proper Jewish response to Gilad Shalit's kidnapping? Should Israeli shops sell chametz (leavened products) on Passover? What is the balance between defending Israeli lives and the lives of enemy civilians? How much separation should there be between Jewish and Arab Israelis? The number of topics is endless and it can start a real debate, as well as encourage a Jewish renaissance in Israel. This renaissance might not be traditionally Orthodox but it is far preferable to raising a generation of Jewishly illiterate Israelis.

It is certainly possible to be passionate about Judaism even if one is not Orthodox, and the Orthodox should not be afraid to publicly debate others if they are confident about their own beliefs.

Do these suggestions solve the problems that Israel has? Hardly. Gordis' questions are better than his answer. But his ideas are a prerequisite to solving Israel's problems. Israeli Jews need to be confident enough and conversant enough in their own Jewishness to rely on it to inform their decisions. Without that, the Jewish State could, God forbid, turn into just a Hebrew-speaking America that has nothing unique to offer the world and world Jewry.

It is curious that this book was published in the US and Canada, but apparently not yet in Israel. He doesn't spend much time on what can be done in the diaspora to revive Judaism as well as Zionism among Jewishly illiterate youngsters. Perhaps he is uncomfortable with the fact that most outreach in the US is done by the Orthodox and that Conservative Judaism has largely failed in that regard. Nevertheless, this is a large and glaring omission in this book.

His arguments are centered on what Israel needs to do, and he needs to make these arguments to Israeli society, not English-speaking Jews. Those arguments are compelling.

Saving Israel might overreach a bit in its goals, but that doesn't make it any less important as a starting point in creating a framework that could indeed save Israel.
--
A good interview with Gordis can be found here, and his webpage is here (h/t joe5348)

Birth of a new rumor: Israelis selling PalArab kidneys?

In the comments section of an interesting pro-Israel article by Stephanie Gutmann in the Telegraph we see this:

I’m still waiting for Gutmann’s blog on the recent arrests of the 5 main Rabbis from the NY/NJ area ; one of those arrested stands accused of traficking in human kidneys (some people say the kidneys came from freshly culled stone throwing Palestinian children in Gaza to be sold in the US for $160,000).

I should have seen this coming - the convergence of the story of corrupt rabbis in the New York area and a blood libel.

Sure enough, a couple of weeks ago someone from Uruknet mightily tried to prove that the kidneys came from unwilling Arabs. His "evidence" is literally nonexistent but he managed to place enough verbiage around the topic with irrelevant quotes that his audience can suspend all independent thought and believe him since he obviously did so much "research."

It is only a matter of time before we will be reading that Gaza is a huge organ factory meant to enrich the greedy hook-nosed Jews.

Meanwhile, in Yemen....

There's a major civil war going on in the Middle East, and it has nothing to do with Israel.

Don't be surprised if you haven't heard about it. After all, it is Arabs killing Arabs, and that doesn't make news.

From the pro-government Yemen Observer:

Five Yemeni soldiers and 16 from al-Houthi rebels were killed in the clashes between the Yemeni military and Shiite rebels of al-Houthi in the governorate of Sa'adah in the early hours of Friday morning.

Clashes between the warring parties entered into its fourth day in which the government forces have tightened its siege around Sa'adah. According to official sources the al-Houthi rebels have opt for violence and rejected all calls for peace.
Governor of Sa'adah Hassan Mana'a accused al-Houthi rebels of kidnapping 15 local aid workers working for the Red Crescent when they attacked the refugee camp in the al-Anad district.

The al-Houthi followers attacked on Friday the agriculture office in the al-Anad district damaging equipments, furniture and irrigation network that supposed to be distributed to hundreds of farmers, said Mana'a.

As a result of the war in the area around 17,000 families were forced to leave their villages in 10 districts of the province's 15 districts over the past four days.

Military sources said the rebels of al-Houthi killed four tribal chiefs and 15 civilians, among them were women and children.

So is the Yemeni government going after the Houthis in ways that would make human rights organizations happy? Apparently not:

The latest attacks came a day after air force planes hit an outdoor market in the provincial town of Haydan as people were doing their early morning shopping, killing several civilians, according to rebels and local officials.
They also claimed that in a renewed bombardment, with sorties overnight and into early Thursday, military planes bombed several other Saada towns and rebel positions. "Dozens" of people were killed and wounded, including in the towns of Sihar, Miran and Al-Maqash.
A statement from the rebel leader Abdel Malik al-Hawthi, posted on the group's Web site, described the attack as "a mass carnage" and appealed to Yemen's political parties to condemn the government strikes. It said an unspecified number of civilians died and posted gruesome photos of victims allegedly killed in the bombardment.

The Houthis are also claiming that the government has dropped white phosphorus munitions on them, which the government denies.

Over the years, thousands have died in this Yemen civil war.

Of course, everyone knows that. It is on the front pages of all the newspapers, right?

Jew-turned-Muslim Uri Davis elected to Fatah council

From Ma'an:

oud applause broke out Saturday evening as it was announced that "brother" Dr Uri Davis had been elected to the Fatah movement's largest governing body.

Fatah conference spokesman Fawzi Salamah announced that the Jewish professor, who teaches Judaic studies at Al-Quds University in the West Bank, won 31st place out of 81 new members of Fatah's Revolutionary Council.

Ha'aretz also refers to Davis as a Jew.

The only problem is that Davis converted to Islam a year ago and married a Muslim woman.

And, as I mentioned last week, his Jewish roots ensured that he was considered a "non-Palestinian" by Fatah, even after he renounced his Israeli citizenship, and even though he was born in Palestine!

So while Fatah trumpets Davis' election as an example of their inclusiveness, it actually is proof of their anti-Jewish stance.

Update on Rafah mini-war: 28 dead

The Jerusalem Post says that 28 have been killed in the clashes between Hamas and the Jund Ansar Allah group in Rafah. PCHR says "at least" 28 have been killed.

One cute factoid: the leader of the ultra-radical group, Sheikh Abdel Latif Mousa, was an Egyptian-educated physician and was also an employee of the Health Ministry belonging to the "moderate" PA government.

Bullets and mortars from the fighting reached the Egyptian side of Rafah, and an Egyptian child was hit by a bullet.

By sheer coincidence, a member of the Doghmush family was killed in Gaza City at the same time. Hamas battled that family last year. Hamas claims that they had nothing to do with his death, and that it was a clan clash. For some reason, he was driving a police car when he was offed. Hmmm.

So now the 2009 PalArab self-death count is at 167.

UPDATE: At least four of the dead are under 18.