Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Egyptians upset: Exodus story too sympathetic to Jews

An Egyptian TV preacher has brought up the apparently sensitive topic of the Exodus on his show being seen during Ramadan, causing controversy in Egypt.

According to Al Arabiya (Arabic), Amr Khaled created a Ramadan TV show called "Stories of the Koran." The second episode tackled the story of Pharaoh and the Jews, which very roughly parallels the Biblical story.

Khaled discusses Pharaoh's reasons for slaughtering the Jewish males. In his website, he asks the audience whether Pharaoh was justified (in the Koranic story, Pharaoh dreamed that the Jews would take away his property and this prompted his plans for genocide.) He also asks more general questions to prompt readers to think about the story, such as whether Musa (Moses) wanted to save the Israelites or if he wanted to convince Pharaoh to believe in Allah.

According to the article, Khaled (who is now in Saudi Arabia for the Umrah) is under pressure for airing a program that is so sympathetic to Jews, and he may not be allowed back into Egypt. Apparently the Interior Minister has asked Khaled to scale back his pro-Jewish views on TV, and Khaled refused. A colleague of his defends him, saying Khaled has no such sympathy for Jews, and future programs will talk about Israeli crimes to prove his loyalty to the Arab cause.

Don't play with firecrackers!

From PCHR:

...A family dispute took place between members of the al-Jamala family and those of the al-Bughdadi family in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, north Gaza city. The dispute took place when a member of the al-Jamala family asked children from the al-Bughdadi family, who were playing with firecrackers in front of his house, to leave the area. The issue developed into a dispute between the two families. During the dispute one of the parties opened fire, killing two civilians:

1. Ghazi Munir Deeb al-Jamala, 20, hit by a bullet to the heart; and

2. Shadi Nabil Deeb al-Jamala, 23, hit by a bullet to the forehead.

You see, kids, this is why it's dangerous to play with firecrackers. Your neighbors might just kill members of your family because of it!

The 2009 PalArab self-death count is at 171.

Shalom Sesame will return

From JPost:

Jake Gyllenhaal, Ben Stiller and Christina Applegate are just a few of the stars slated to appear in a new Sesame Street-style production geared at teaching Jewish-American children about Jewish culture.

"Shalom Sesame," a 12-part series for preschoolers featuring the globe-trotting Muppet Grover, will explore Jewish identity and traditions and will film on location at several Israeli sites, including the Western Wall.

Big-name guest stars, including actors Debra Messing, Greg Kinnear and Cedric the Entertainer, will join puppets and children in segments filmed in Israel and the U.S., according to the series' producers.

"Shalom Sesame" was first produced in 1986, selling more than 1 million copies on video and DVD. The new incarnation will tackle more issues of diversity for Jewish children and be accompanied by an interactive Web site and other outreach materials.

I just went to YouTube and found some of the older clips, bringing back many memories from when I watched it with my kids.

It also had stars, like this segment with Alan King:

But for some reason I cannot find any of the clips with a much younger Sarah Jessica Parker.

Nefesh B'Nefesh offering free blogger flights to Israel

Nefesh B'Nefesh is asking Jewish/Israeli bloggers to nominate other bloggers to fly to Israel on a NbN flight, with the proviso that they must write about their experience.

The catch is that we can only nominate other bloggers and must write a blog post as to why we chose that person.

So, as much as I'd like to win (hint, hint), I need to nominate someone else.

For the same reasons given by JoeSettler, I would choose Soccer Dad. He has done more than anyone else to promote the JBlogosphere and he has specifically promoted my blog numerous times. His postings are always well thought out and he would do a great job in reporting on NbN.

This is my official nomination post. Watching these types of posts over the next week is going to be amusing.

DFLP women terrorist training photos

Ma'an shows us pictures of DFLP female terrorists training:

Once again, Gaza just doesn't seem that crowded. Plenty of room - for practicing killing Jews.

Predicting the next Arab rumor

Rumor prediction is a very inexact science, but the fact that Ma'an chose to highlight a single story about an Israeli scientific experiment makes me think this one is on the horizon.

You see, Israeli scientists have a joint research project with the University of Hawaii where they detonate tons of explosives underground in the Negev to simulate a small earthquake. Even more nefarious is that this research is being paid for by the US Defense Department.

Meanwhile, Sheikh Tamimi continues his daily screeds against Israel, today saying again that Jerusalem is an Islamic and Arab city and that there is not a shred of evidence that Jews ever lived there, that the Temples didn't exist, and that Israel is furiously trying to purge all signs of Muslim presence in the city. (And every time he opens his mouth it makes headlines in the PalArab press.)

I think it is only a matter of time before Tamimi or one of the other anti-Jewish crusaders accuses Israel of planning to create an earthquake in Jerusalem meant to demolish the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.

Hell, there's more evidence for this than for stealing the organs of dead Palestinian Arabs!

Erekat and the "Jewish State"

Ha'aretz has an interesting interview with chief Palestinian Arab liar/hypocrite/negotiator Saeb Erekat where all the questions come from readers around the world. One of his answers is:

Will you ever recognize Israel as a Jewish state? Thank you
Asked by Jon P, from Buffalo, U.S.A.

Saeb Erekat: That's so amazing of Israel. The birth certificate of Israel as embodied in the UN is called the State of Israel so I'm asked to recognize the State of Israel. I'm a Palestinian, Muslim, Christian, I don't think about converting to Judaism or joining the Zionist organization.

I'm not going to call the shots for you. I'm not going to stop you from circumcising your boys, I'm not going to stop you from going to synagogues. You can call yourself whatever you want.

If you want to call yourself the biblical, united, eternal, holy, milk and honey land of Jewish Israel, submit your name to the UN. Your name is the State of Israel. It's unbelievable to ask Palestinians.

It is the Jewish State that called itself Israel, not the UN.

I would argue that the "birth certificate" of Israel from the UN's perspective is United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181, which called for a partition of Palestine into two states.

That resolution uses the term "Jewish state," by my count, 30 times.

(h/t Mustafa, who points out that Erekat avoids answering whether the PA would accept a land swap.)

Saudi husband is 80, wife is 10

From the Arab News:

AL-LAITH: A 10-year-old bride was returned last Sunday to her 80-year-old husband by her father who discovered her at the home of her aunt with whom she has been hiding for around 10 days.
A local newspaper said the husband, who denies he is 80 in spite of claims by the girl’s family, accused the aunt of meddling in his affairs. “My marriage is not against Shariah. It included the elements of acceptance and response by the father of the bride,” he said.
He added that he had been engaged to his wife’s elder sister and that this broke off as she wanted to continue with her education. “In light of this, her father offered his younger daughter. I was allowed to have a look at her according to Shariah and found her acceptable,” he said.

This may be a new record in Saudi depravity: a groom eight times the age of the bride.

Who do you think has a lower opinion of the girl: the father who sells her to a dirty old man and forces her to return to him when she runs away, or the dirty old man himself who finds her looks "acceptable" for his nightly rape?

But who are we to disapprove? It is acceptable under Sharia!

Israeli dates being eaten for Ramadan

Al Quds has an article about how Jericho-area farmers are trying to market their dates in competition with Israeli dates grown in settlements.

Arab farmers have increased their date yields this year so that Muslims can more easily avoid eating the imperialistic Israeli dates. The article seems to imply that Israeli dates are cheaper and more plentiful, as they are an export product. If I am reading it correctly, Arab farmers are also saying that their dates are healthier than the evil Israeli dates.

In previous years, Muslims in England, Egypt and Morocco were aghast to find out that their yummy Ramadan dates originated in Israel.

I wonder if some of the dates in Gaza came from Israel.

PFLP not happy with Hamas

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a Marxist terror group that thrives in Gaza, is less than happy with the slow Islamization of Gaza by Hamas.

The latest edict by Hamas mandating that girls in government schools cover up their hair is being criticized by the PFLP:

[The PFLP statement said these are] "irresponsible actions occur that crack the Palestinian social fabric and will reflect negatively on the situation of education, and is a blatant violation of human rights that are guaranteed by law.

"There is no item in the Palestinian Basic Law, allows any party whatsoever to impose its vision of Palestinian society...

The PFLP apparently missed Article 4 of the Palestinian Basic Law, which states:

Islam is the official religion in Palestine. Respect for the sanctity of all other divine religions shall be maintained.

The principles of Islamic Shari’a shall be a principal source of legislation.

Legally, Hamas seems to have the right to impose Shari'a on Gaza (and, inshallah, on the West Bank and all of Palestine) unless it violates the precepts of another religion.

Sorry, PFLP. Your Marxist radicalism just doesn't fit as well with Islamic radicalism as well as you like to believe.

Seth Freedman eliminates anti-semitism!

Seth Freedman, one of The Guardian's house Jews whom we last saw trying hard to dissociate himself from those "other" Jews who support Jewish self-determination, has just singlehandedly eliminated almost all anti-semitism in the world today.

According to him:

Last week's allegations in a Swedish newspaper sparked an inferno in diplomatic circles, the flames of which are being fanned higher with every passing day. Despite dealing specifically with the behaviour of Israeli troops in the West Bank, rather than being a broad-stroked attack against Judaism, the indictment against the Israeli army has been held up as a shining example of modern-day "blood libel", as though the forces of antisemitic darkness are amassing once more against the Jewish people in their entirety.

On reading the original story, it is clear that the article's content is journalism of the worst kind: based on the flimsiest of evidence, making tenuous connections on little more than pure conjecture and relying on dubious testimony in the absence of hard fact and proof. However, bad journalism does not automatically an antisemite make, especially when the allegations were directed at the Israeli army, rather than at Judaism and its practices. Had the article claimed that Jewish teaching encouraged the killing of gentile children and the use of their blood for ritual purposes – the classic definition of blood libel, and the origin of the phrase – it would be another matter, but in this case the accusations are clearly made against a subsection of Israeli society, not against Israelis per se, let alone the worldwide Jewish community.

So Freedman's test of anti-semitism is whether the accusation is against all Jews based on a libelous interpretation of Jewish religious teachings.

Which means that The Protocols of the Elders of Zion cannot be considered anti-semitic! After all, it was claimed only that some Jews wrote it, not all of them, and it was not a religious text but a political one. Some Jews, like perhaps Seth Freedman himself, never accepted the Protocols as guiding his life, so by (his) definition, it is simply a forgery, nothing at all to do with anti-semitism.

And when some otherwise good people claim that Jews control the worldwide banking industry to the detriment of "goyim," that isn't anti-semitic - because clearly not all Jews are bankers, only a very small percentage.

Jews controlling the media? Please! Even the biggest anti-semite knows that many Jews aren't in the news business. (Like the ones in Hollywood, for example.)

Jews having big noses and flat feet? Guess what - people who convert to Judaism don't have those genetic characteristics, so people who say it cannot possibly be Jew-haters! and the Torah says nothing about big noses, so it cannot be anti-semitic!

People who mistranslate the Talmud to accuse Jews of raping little girls? Well, most Jews today don't have the foggiest idea of what the Talmud is, so they cannot possibly be considered victims of that acusation, and therefore it cannot be anti-semitic!

Once again, Freedman is trying oh-so-hard to prove that he isn't one of "those" Jews. He is setting the groundwork for his own future. Because when "itbach al-Yahud" is changed (out loud) to "kill the Zionists," he wants to make sure that he isn't one of the targets.

Freedman then goes on to write one of the dumber statements he ever made:

Given the paucity of hard facts provided in the Aftonbladet report and its author's shortcomings when it comes to adhering to journalistic standards, the story is in all likelihood a complete fabrication, and the Israeli authorities ought to be able to easily prove the army's innocence.

Um, Seth - it is impossible to prove a negative. Even if every single dead Palestinian Arab is dug up and opened up in front of a world tribunal, counting their organs, people will believe the accusations anyway. And this is exactly why the accusation is so pernicious - it means that a single journalist can unleash torrents of latent hate by writing a single lie. Characterizing it as simply "bad journalism" is disingenuous.

But it is consistent with Freedman's worldview.

CORRECTION: I was taken in by "folk logic" about the impossibility to prove a negative. The argument should have been that the people who want to believe these sorts of things will not be swayed by any amount of proof, as the nature of conspiracy theories implies that the evidence is being carefully hidden, so in this and similar cases it is extraordinarily difficult if not impossible to prove that Israel is not guilty of whatever arbitrary crime it is being accused of.

Saudi women: "My guardian knows the best for me"

From the Arab News:

RIYADH: Describing themselves as activists, a number of Saudi women have launched a campaign supporting the Kingdom's male guardianship system.
As part of the campaign — entitled “My Guardian Knows The Best For Me” — the women have written a letter to Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah in which they confirmed their full support for an Islamic approach in administering the Kingdom.
The campaign has been launched to counter calls to abandon the Kingdom's guardianship or wali system. In a statement published on the Internet, Rawdah Al-Yousif, the campaign's supervisor and organizer, wrote about “her dismay at the efforts of some who have liberal demands that do not comply with Islamic law (Shariah) or with the Kingdom's traditions and customs.”
Al-Yousif also pointed out in her statement that the campaign’s mission is to promote the voices of Saudi women who reject the “ignorant and vexatious demands” of liberals to do away with the guardianship system. She said guardians protect women and the stipulation that women can only travel with their walis’ approval is in their interests, giving them protection.
Al-Yousif said the campaign is supported by Saudi women belonging to all sections of society and it is currently working to collect votes on its website.

But did Rawdah Al-Yousif's guardian tell her to make this website?

And do the the women who sign up at the website rely on their all-knowing male guardians to tell them how to vote?

A new, old honor killing?

Palestine Today reports on an 86-year old man who murdered his 50-year old daughter in his house in Tulkarem.

Maybe he thought she was talking to a man on the phone.

The 2009 PalArab self-death count is at 169.

Another step towards Hamastan

Hamas has denied repeatedly that they want to turn Gaza into an Islamist regime. For example, in this interview last year with Hamas senior advisor Ahmed Yousef:

Q: Some people have claimed that Hamas is trying to establish an Islamic emirate and is about to impose Sharia law in the territories under its control. Is this true?

AY: It's totally false, and from the time of the Hamas takeover of Gaza I don't think any Palestinian observed any change in daily life. This claim is used just for propaganda to satisfy Israel and maybe some of the American agenda. We live the same life here, and we are facing the same problems with sanctions, occupation and isolation. Nothing has changed. It is the same life. People can wear a head scarf or not wear it and nobody will force anyone to abide by Islamic law. Life here is very democratic and we hope to stay like this.

Since then, Hamas has forced female lawyers to put on a headscarf in court, it started inspecting the luggage of visitors and confiscating alcohol, it cracked down on lingerie shops with immodestly clad mannequins, and Hamas police on horseback started enforcing modesty rules on the beaches.

Now, Hamas has added one more:

Hamas has instructed schoolgirls in the Gaza Strip to wear the jilbab (Islamic long-sleeved dress) and head scarves or face being expelled from school.

The cases are seen in the context of Hamas's efforts to enforce strict Islamic laws throughout the Strip.

A veteran journalist in the Gaza Strip said that most girls who returned to
schools that reopened on Sunday were seen dressed in traditional Islamic clothes.

He noted, for instance, that at the Maghazi Girls Secondary School in the center of the Gaza Strip, "about 95 percent" of the girls showed up wearing jilbabs.

"The few who came to school wearing jeans were warned that they would be expelled if they did not wear jilbabs," the journalist told The Jerusalem Post.

So why exactly do people who pretend to be liberal and pro-human rights support Hamas again?

Notable commenter blogs

Two commenters have interesting blogs of their own.

The Definition of a Horse (not sure if I have permission to say who writes it) is a new blog that goes in depth on a number of topics, in more detail than I do, and with copious footnotes. It is definitely worth checking out.

Also, Charlie H. Ettinson brings us Thoughts: A Buck Each, which also has some nice original essays.

Check them out!