Kuwaiti bill to ban dealings with Israel

From al-Arabiya:

Five Islamist lawmakers in Kuwait introduced a bill on Thursday calling for a total ban on dealing with Israel and proposing up to 10 years in jail for violators.

All "dealing, establishing ties or contacts and opening representative offices of any type at any level with the Zionist entity, directly or indirectly" would be banned.

The bill would also prohibit government and private agencies, individuals and companies from striking agreements and protocols with Israel and from meeting with Israelis.

It stipulates a prison term of between three and 10 years and a fine not exceeding $17,500 for violators.

Parliament will later set a date to debate the bill, which must be passed by parliament and signed by the emir to become law. A similar one introduced two years ago never reached the floor for debate.

So if the bill passes and Mahmoud Abbas visits Kuwait, would he be arrested?

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"Kuwaiti female MPs must wear hijab"

Four women were recently elected to be members of parliament in Kuwait.

Two of them do not cover their hair.

This brings up an interesting problem:

The controversy over whether the four female members of the National Assembly should wear the hijab is likely to be revived soon after the Ministry of Islamic Affairs ruled yesterday that wearing the hijab is an obligation for Muslim women. The fatwa, or religious edict, was issued by the Fatwa Authority on the basis of a parliamentary question by Salafist MP Mohammad Hayef about whether wearing the hijab by Muslim women is one of rules of sharia law.

The Fatwa Authority stated that Muslim women are obliged to wear the hijab in front of men not related to them. Hayef sent the question to the Fatwa Authority after the opening of the previous term of the National Assembly in June and after Islamist MPs exchanged accusations with two of the four women MPs not wearing the hijab and their supporters.

Islamist MPs insisted that the female MPs were obliged by the election law to wear the hijab. The election law states that women must abide by the rules of sharia while participating in elections as a candidate or voter. Two of the four women MPs wear the hijab.

Luckily, it appears that Kuwaiti law is not obligated to listen to the fatwa:

But MPs and observers later said that even though the Fatwa Authority has ruled to make wearing hijab an obligation, wearing the hijab for the women lawmakers will not be compulsory. This is because the only authority entrusted to interpret laws and constitutional articles is the constitutional court and the Fatwa Authority ruling can simply be used as a reference.

I have a feeling that the Islamist MPs will not take this sitting down.

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Goldstone Report inaccuracies, part 19

The Goldstone Report talks about, and dismisses, Israeli accusations that Hamas used ambulances for military purposes. The entire section is very revealing as to the bias that the Commission had when investigating claims against Hamas. Here it is in its entirety:

2. Ambulances
470. The Government of Israel alleges that “Hamas made particular use of ambulances, which frequently served as an escape route out of a heated battle with IDF forces.”326 471. The Mission investigated cases in which ambulances were denied access to wounded Palestinians. Three cases in particular are described in chapter XI: the attempts of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) to evacuate the wounded from the al-Samouni neighbourhood south of Gaza City after the attack on the house of Ateya al-Samouni and after the shelling of the house of Wa’el al-Samouni; the attempt of an ambulance driver to rescue the daughters of Khalid
and Kawthar Abd Rabbo in Izbat Abd Rabbo; and the attempt of an ambulance driver to evacuate Rouhiyah al-Najjar after she had been hit by an Israeli sniper. In all three cases the Mission found, on the facts it gathered, that the Israeli armed forces must have known that there were no combatants among the people to be rescued or in the immediate vicinity.

Why is this paragraph here? The section is meant to discuss possible Hamas war crimes, but before Goldstone even starts looking at any evidence, he puts in this utterly irrelevant paragraph about alleged Israeli war crimes, whose only tangential relevance is the word "ambulances." The entire section this is under is called "VIII. OBLIGATION ON PALESTINIAN ARMED GROUPS IN GAZA TO TAKE FEASIBLE PRECAUTIONS TO PROTECT THE CIVILIAN POPULATION."

Before Goldstone even entertains the possibility of Hamas war crimes in context of ambulances, he feels compelled to throw in an unrelated dig at the IDF that he already covered at length elsewhere in the report. Is this supposed to be "unbiased?"

472. The Mission is aware of an interview reportedly given by an ambulance driver to an Australian newspaper, in which he describes how Palestinian combatants unsuccessfully tried to force him to evacuate them from a house in which they were apparently trapped. The same driver reportedly told the journalist that “Hamas made several attempts to hijack the ambulance fleet of al-Quds Hospital”. He also describes how the PRCS ambulance teams managed to avert this misuse of ambulances. According to this report, relied on by the Israeli Government, the attempts of Palestinian combatants to exploit ambulances as shield for military operations were not successful in the face of the courageous resistance of the PRCS staff members.327

For some reason, Goldstone doesn't refer to the actual article; the footnote refers to Israel's report. The paragraph vastly waters down the Sydney Morning Herald's article, using words like "reportedly" to dilute what was said:

Mohammed Shriteh, 30, is an ambulance driver registered with and trained by the Palestinian Red Crescent Society.

His first day of work in the al-Quds neighbourhood was January 1, the sixth day of the war. "Mostly the war was not as fast or as chaotic as I expected," Mr Shriteh told the Herald. "We would co-ordinate with the Israelis before we pick up patients, because they have all our names, and our IDs, so they would not shoot at us."

Mr Shriteh said the more immediate threat was from Hamas, who would lure the ambulances into the heart of a battle to transport fighters to safety.

"After the first week, at night time, there was a call for a house in Jabaliya. I got to the house and there was lots of shooting and explosions all around," he said.

Because of the urgency of the call, Mr Shriteh said there was no time to arrange his movements with the IDF.

"I knew the Israelis were watching me because I could see the red laser beam in the ambulance and on me, on my body," he said.

Getting out of the ambulance and entering the house, he saw there were three Hamas fighters taking cover inside. One half of the building had already been destroyed.

"They were very scared, and very nervous … They dropped their weapons and ordered me to get them out, to put them in the ambulance and take them away. I refused, because if the IDF sees me doing this I am finished, I cannot pick up any more wounded people.

"And then one of the fighters picked up a gun and held it to my head, to force me. I still refused, and then they allowed me to leave."

Mr Shriteh says Hamas made several attempts to hijack the al-Quds Hospital's fleet of ambulances during the war.

"You hear when they are coming. People ring to tell you. So we had to get in all the ambulances and make the illusion of an emergency and only come back when they had gone."

While Mr. Shriteh's account shows that Hamas was unsuccessful in his case, he makes it clear that this was not an isolated incident and that Hamas tried (and, he implies, succeeded) on numerous occasions to use ambulances to transport its members.

473. This is consistent with the statements of representatives of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society in Gaza who, in interviews with the Mission, denied that their ambulances were used at any time by Palestinian combatants. Finally, in a submission to the Mission, Magen David Adom stated that “there was no use of PRCS ambulances for the transport of weapons or ammunition … [and] there was no misuse of the emblem by PRCS.”328

There is a bit of sleight of hand going on here. Shriteh spoke of Hamas' attempts not only to commandeer PRCS ambulances but also hospital ambulances; MDA and PRCS are only speaking of PRCS ambulances. Other organizations also had ambulances in Gaza, such as Oxfam. It is probable that Hamas' own medical wing has ambulances as well.

474. While it is not possible to say that no attempts were ever made by any armed groups to use ambulances during the military operations, the Mission has substantial material from the investigations it conducted and the enquiries it made to convince it that, if any ambulances were used by Palestinian armed groups, it would have been the exception, not the rule.

When Hamas is accused of a war crime, Goldstone brushes it off as "an exception, not the rule." Nowhere in the report does Goldstone give Israel the same benefit of the doubt; on the contrary, the cherry-picked examples that Goldstone concentrates on specifically take the larger context out of the framing of the accusations. Potentially problematic Israeli actions are characterized as the rule and barely ever placed in the context of a complex military operation where thousands of decisions need to be made instantly; Hamas' crimes - when they are considered at all - are considered the "exception."

None of the ambulance drivers that were directly interviewed by the Mission reported any attempt by the armed groups to use the ambulances for any ulterior purpose.

Did Goldstone attempt to contact Mohammed Shriteh?

Moreover, of the ambulance staff members and their volunteer assistants that were killed or injured in the course of their duties, none was a member of any armed groups, so far as the Mission is aware.

Mr. Goldstone, allow me to introduce you to Anas Fadel Na’im: medic, nephew of Hamas' health minister, and al-Qassam Brigades member:


And another: Ra'afat Sami Ibrahim (Muharram), medic, whose Al Qassam Brigades obituary describes him as leaving his cell phone and personal belongings at the hospital right before he was killed, telling everyone that he would return as a "martyr."

Not to mention ‘Azmi Hisham ‘Azmi Abu Dalal, medic, Al Qassam member.

Or Ahmed Abdullah Salem Al-Khatib, nurse, and also PRC-Saladin Brigades field commander.

Or Ihab ‘Umar Khalil al-Madhoun, physician and al-Qassam member.

Or Issa Abdul Rahim Saleh, physician, who also shot rockets and planted bombs according to his al-Qassam obituary.

It appears that there were plenty of physicians and medics in Gaza who also happened to be members of armed groups. Yet Goldstone wasn't "aware" of any of them.

There are other facts that would make an objective observer question whether Hamas was using ambulances and military installations for combat purposes.

After the Gaza operation, while Goldstone's mission was underway, the Palestinian Ministry of Health charged Hamas with confiscating ambulances and medical equipment donated by Arab countries and converting them to military vehicles.

There were reports during the operation that Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar had escaped to Egypt in an ambulance.

Hamas had confiscated aid trucks, including medical aid meant for PRCS, both in 2008 and immediately after the operation.

Hamas even converted medicine bottles into Molotov cocktails.

Putting these facts together, all of which were reported in English-language media, should make one skeptical about Hamas' separation of medical and military tasks. Yet Goldstone simply waves away any of these concerns by implying that if the mission is not aware of them, there is no reason to believe them.

The overwhelming impression one gets is that Goldstone tried very hard to find any Israeli "war crimes" he could, but he wouldn't go out of his way to find anything wrong with what Hamas was doing. The mission, supposedly sent to do fact-finding, seems to have only taken the information that fell into its lap and didn't make any effort to do any independent investigation that would go beneath the surface.

Beyond that, this section shows that circumstantial and hearsay evidence was given great weight by Goldstone when it was against Israel and it was summarily dismissed, or ignored altogether, when it was against Hamas.

UPDATE: Mahmoud Abbas also accused Hamas leaders of using ambulances to escape to Egypt.

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Saudi sex braggart sentenced

Remember Mazen Abdul Jawad, the Saudi who went on Lebanese TV to brag about his sexual exploits and who got into hot water in his home country as a result?

Turns out that he received a pretty harsh sentence from the Saudi court system:

The Summary Court here sentenced Wednesday the 32-year-old Saudi sex braggart Mazen Abdul Jawad to five years imprisonment and 1,000 lashes to be executed in installments for boasting about his sexual exploits on the LBC weekly program “Bold Red Line” in mid-July.

Judge Sheikh Muhammad Amin Mirdad also confiscated the car Abdul Jawad is seen in the program using to cruise the streets looking for girls. The mobile phone Abdul Jawad said he used to hit on women using Bluetooth was also taken by the state. Once he has completed his prison time, Abdul Jawad will be forbidden from traveling abroad for five years.

Abdul Jawad’s lawyer, Sulaiman Al-Jumaie, described the verdict as “hasty and made under public pressure.” In a statement sent to Arab News, the lawyer said the case is not yet closed and that he would appeal the verdict within 10 days.

Three other men, who also appeared in the TV segment but did not make any statements, were determined by the judge to be accomplices and sentenced to two years and 300 lashes each. All four men will also be subjected to court-ordered counseling.

Saudi Arabia is a safer place nowadays, as the only way to get some quick sex there is to "marry" a girl for a couple of hours or days for money, which is of course much more moral.

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Jordanian sheep spontaneously combust

According to the Arab News:

Jordanian authorities were on Wednesday conducting an investigation to try to explain an unusual phenomenon whereby the heat of a plot of land rose dramatically to more than 400 degrees Celsius.

The drastic overheating occurred in an area of about 2,000 square meters in the Balqa province, about 15 km west of Amman, according to Balqa Gov. Abdul Jalil Sleimat.

“The phenomenon was discovered by accident when sheep entered the plot while grazing,” he said.

Sleimat quoted the shepherd attending the herd as saying that the sheep caught fire and “completely burned and disappeared”.

He said any material thrown into the area burned quickly and flames came out.

The authorities have deployed police in the area, which was also sealed off with phosphoric tape. The area’s people were evacuated to ensure their safety, Sleimat said.

The government has also set up an ad hoc panel involving several departments and academic institutions to study the phenomenon.

As good a reason as any to link to this:

Jordan now believes that it was from methane gas.

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Goldstone plays pretend to the Jewish press

From the Forward:

Goldstone’s findings themselves have, meanwhile, been left largely unexamined. The 36 specific incidents he focuses on in his report paint a disturbing picture of an Israeli army purposefully targeting unarmed civilians. But the facts of the report are built mostly on testimonies of Palestinian eyewitnesses, which have received little scrutiny or verification. Critics also call attention to parts of the commission’s work that they say was sloppily done, without sufficient cross-examination and double checking of information. Alternative interpretations of the incidents described are not considered, let alone fully explored.

Tellingly, in an interview with the Forward on October 2, Goldstone himself acknowledged the tentative nature of his findings.

“Ours wasn’t an investigation, it was a fact-finding mission,” he said, sitting in his Midtown Manhattan office at Fordham University Law School, where he is currently visiting faculty. “We made that clear.”

Goldstone defended the report’s reliance on eyewitness accounts, noting his mission had cross-checked those accounts against each other and sought corroboration from photos, satellite photos, contemporaneous reports, forensic evidence and the mission’s own inspections of the sites in question.

For all that gathered information, though, he said, “We had to do the best we could with the material we had. If this was a court of law, there would have been nothing proven.”

Goldstone emphasized that his conclusion that war crimes had been committed was always intended as conditional.

Nevertheless, the report itself is replete with bold and declarative legal conclusions seemingly at odds with the cautious and conditional explanations of its author. The report repeatedly refers, without qualification, to specific violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention committed by Israel and other breaches of international law. Citing particular cases, the report determines unequivocally that Israel “violated the prohibition under customary international law” against targeting civilians. These violations, it declares, “constitute a grave breach” of the convention.

It is this rush to judgment based on what critics believe to be unsubstantiated allegations that has angered some who have delved into the details.

When speaking to a Jewish newspaper, Goldstone is claiming that the report does not any legal validity. Yet the report itself has many sections entitled "Legal Findings" that have flat statements like this one:

810. In reviewing the above incidents the Mission found in every case that the Israeli armed forces had carried out direct intentional strikes against civilians. The only exception is theshelling o f the Abu Halima family home, where the Mission does not have sufficient information on the military situation prevailing at the time to reach a conclusion.

As far as I could tell, nowhere in the report itself does it say that these "legal findings" are not meant to be interpreted as anything other than legal findings. And one can be sure that regular readers of the report are not making these fine distinctions that Goldstone now claims were clear.

Similarly, Goldstone says to the Forward that "Ours wasn’t an investigation, it was a fact-finding mission." Yet the report itself does refer to its own gathering of facts as an "investigation:"

21. The Mission conducted field visits, including investigations of incident sites, in the Gaza Strip. This allowed the Mission to observe first-hand the situation on the ground, and speak to many witnesses and other relevant persons.

36. On the basis of its own investigations and the statements by United Nations officials, the Mission excludes that Palestinian armed groups engaged in combat activities from United Nations facilities that were used as shelters during the military operations.

48. Based on its investigation of incidents involving the use of certain weapons such as white phosphorous and flechette missiles, the Mission, while accepting that white phosphorous is not at this stage proscribed under international law, finds that the Israeli armed forces were systematically reckless in determining its use in built-up areas.

And even though the mission was officially termed "fact-finding," the mandate itself calls it an investigation:

131. On 3 April 2009, the President of the Human Rights Council established the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict with the mandate “to investigate all violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law that might have been committed at any time in the context of the military operations that were conducted in Gaza during the period from 27 December 2008 and 18 January 2009, whether before, during or after.”

A legal scholar must be very attuned to the exact meaning of his words. The report, and the mandate, specifically refers to its own mission as an "investigation" numerous times. Saying that it really isn't weeks afterwards is meaningless and more than a little deceptive.

---

The Forward article also gives me my 15 nanoseconds of fame, unfortunately without a link:

But critics have also questioned whether the clear cut version of the attack that appears in the report is the whole story. According to Halevi’s research, as well as the investigative work of an anonymous blogger called “Elder of Ziyon” — both of whom crosschecked websites for Islamic Jihad and Hamas — among the 15 dead were six men who they contend were members of the Al Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s paramilitary wing.

If you want to know what I told the reporter, see here. Last night I also sent him more info on my research into terrorists that the PCHR categorized as civilians.)

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"Glorious"

Islamic Jihad's website Saraya.ps has an article on the ninth anniversary of the beginning of the second Intifada. The exact words the article uses are "the ninth anniversary of the glorious Al-Aqsa Intifada in Palestine."

Think about this for a minute. The intifada resulted in the deaths of over 5000 Palestinian Arabs. As a direct result of the uprising, Israel built a wall to protect her citizens and that made the lives of Palestinian Arabs more difficult. The political goals of moderate Palestinian Arabs were set back by years. Yasir Arafat turned from a respected international figure into a joke, hiding terrorists in his compound. The Palestinian Arabs themselves suffered a huge split between Gaza and the West Bank and between Hamas and Fatah.

By the standards of any normal observer, the second intifada was anything but "glorious."

In order to comprehend the mentality of Palestinian Arabs, it is critical to understand the reasons they think that the intifada was a victory.

The answer is quite simple, and disheartening for those who think that there is any realistic chance for peace.

From the start, Palestinian Arabs never showed any real interest in building their own state, but rather in destroying the Jewish state. The majority of them happily accepted Jordanian sovereignty in 1949 and their nationalism has always been one based on the negation of Jewish nationalism in Palestine.

In other words, victory to them is not what helps Palestinian Arabs, but rather than what hurts Israelis.

Once this simple fact is understood, all the seemingly counterproductive decisions and celebrations that Palestinian Arabs make are easy to understand. The Intifada was bad for Israelis, of course - over a thousand murdered, and restrictions on Israeli movement; armed guards at supermarkets, people nervous about taking buses, and a much more difficult life in general for all Israelis.

Since it hurt Israelis, it must be - by their definition - a glorious victory.

This explains why terror attacks are greeted with glee by so many Palestinian Arabs. That is not an anomalous way of thinking - it is mainstream, as we have seen from polls since the 1990s. If Israelis are hurt, then it must be good for Palestinian Arabs.

There is one other factor that acts as a multiplier effect, that makes every counterproductive decision appear to be a victory. The honor/shame culture is a large part of this psyche.

To Arabs, honor is indistinguishable from importance, and when Palestinian Arabs do something relevant that is noticed by the world, it is a badge of honor. This is why terror and the intifada is so celebrated. Not only were Israelis hurt and killed, but also Palestinian Arabs made world headlines. Headlines translates into relevance, which equals importance, which equals honor. Nothing hurts PalArabs more than the thought that they are irrelevant. Like second graders, they need to act up once in a while to get attention, and negative attention is better than nothing at all.

This is not only why the intifada is celebrated but also why the Palestinian Arabs are rioting now, while Israel did nothing to change the status quo. The current mini-outbreak was instigated by the Islamists but it is being continued by the mainstream of PalArabs, encouraged by their leaders from Fatah, the PA, Hamas and the other terror organizations. They do not see a downside.

Is it any wonder that peace is so elusive? One cannot make peace with people whose goals are so diametrically opposed to real peace.

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Hamas: Gaza's Madoffs

From Bloomberg:

Investment opportunities are rare in the Gaza Strip. So when Nabila Ghabin saw one last year, she pawned her car and jewelry and put $12,000 into a network of tunnels that brought in supplies smuggled from Egypt.

She was one of about 4,000 Gazans who gave cash to middlemen and tunnel operators in 2008 as Israel blocked the overland passage of goods. Then Israeli warplanes bombed the tunnels before and during the Dec. 27 to Jan. 18 Gaza offensive and the investments collapsed.

Now investors, who lost as much as $500 million, want their money back from Hamas, which runs Gaza. Hamas Economics Minister Ziad Zaza says about 200 people were taken into custody in connection with the tunnel investments; most have been released. Hamas is offering a partial repayment of 16.5 cents on the dollar using money recovered from Ihab al-Kurd, the biggest tunnel operator.

The imbroglio over the 800 to 1,000 tunnels has deepened Hamas’s decline in public opinion in Gaza and highlights the Wild West nature of the underground economy that supports this jammed enclave of 1.4 million people.

“When you compare the U.S. economy with ours and see how dependent we have become on the tunnels, I assure you that our scandal is much worse than Madoff,” said Omar Shaban, director of Pal-Think, an economic research institute in Gaza City, speaking of New York financier Bernard Madoff’s $65-billion Ponzi scheme.

Top Hamas leader Ismail Haniya has not commented publicly on the losses to tunnel investors.

“There is no transparency, no public records, no regulators, none of the mechanisms that would let you trace what happened to all the money that people invested in the tunnels,” said Samir Abdullah, the Palestinian Authority’s former planning minister. “The smugglers provide essential revenue for Hamas.”

Hamas, classified by the U.S. and the European Union as a terrorist organization, isn’t offering enough to cover losses, said Ghabin, 43, whose husband is blind and who has five children. She blames Hamas for encouraging the investments.

“The imam told us that we wouldn’t regret joining this blessed business,” she said in her apartment in an unfinished 12-story high-rise overlooking the Mediterranean as her husband played the lute. “This happened in mosques all over Gaza.”

“You can feel the frustration because thousands of families lost their money and they hold Hamas responsible,” Pal-Think’s Shaban said.

Ghabin said her imam in Gaza City recommended that worshippers invest in the tunnels, saying he was acting under instructions from the Hamas Ministry of Religious Affairs. Her daughter was pitched by an imam at the al-Bureij refugee camp, where she lives. Officials at the ministry declined to comment.

h/t EBoZ

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Israeli to buy 50% of Al Jazeera?

Arabic media are reporting that Israeli media mogul Haim Saban is negotiating with the government of Qatar to purchase 50% of the Al Jazeera channel.

Negotiations are reportedly going through and Egyptian intermediary.

Similar rumors occurred in 2006. According to the article, Saban withdrew from the 2006 offer in the wake of a Price Waterhouse audit of the channel, but is now offering double what he offered then.

It seems equally likely that someone wants to make Al Jazeera or Qatar look bad in the Arab world.

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"Honor killing" novel dropped due to fear of Muslims

From Reuters:

A German publisher said Tuesday it had canceled the printing of a murder mystery about an honor killing because it contained passages insulting Islam and may have prompted Islamist retaliation.
Droste publishers dropped the book by author Gabriele Brinkmann entitled "To Whom Honor is Due" after she refused to change several passages, including one where a fictional character is portrayed making abusive remarks about the Koran.

"After the Mohammad cartoons, one knows that one can't publish sentences or drawings that defame Islam without expecting a security risk," said Felix Droste, head of Droste publishers.

In 2006, violent protests broke out in several Islamic countries after cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in a Danish newspaper sparked outrage among Muslims.

The publisher's decision has prompted criticism that it is bowing to Islamist intimidation and curtailing freedom of speech. The firm has also received threats from far-right groups against its employees for being "friends of Islamists."

German newspapers ran headlines: "Publisher self censors" and "Fear of Islamist attacks."

The atmosphere of fear that Islamists have instilled in the West is so pervasive that they don't even have to threaten violence any more - scared Westerners will do the censoring pre-emptively.

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Niqab controversy in Egypt

A fascinating article in The Daily News Egypt about dueling clerics and women covering their faces:

Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar Mohamed Sayed Tantawy says he plans to ban the full face veil (niqab) at Al-Azhar schools, educational institutions and universities.

According to a statement he made in Al-Ahram Sunday, he was upset to see many preparatory school students (aged 11-12) wearing the niqab inside the classroom.

In an interview with a local news channel on Sunday, Tantawy said that “the niqab is not obligatory and there is no need for those young girls to wear it inside the classroom.”

Commenting on Tantawy’s statement, Sheikh Mahmoud Ashour, member of the Islamic research Center said that the Sheikh’s decision is not a fatwa, but a move aimed at preserving security among students.

“Muslim women are allowed to show their faces and hands,” Ashour said.

Allowing the niqab in academic institutions can cause problems, he added, since anyone can use it as a disguise to enter the university, even terrorists.

Muslim Brotherhood MP Hamdy Hassan couldn’t disagree more. He told Daily News Egypt Monday that he denounces Tantawy’s anti-niqab statement.

According to Dar El-Iftaa, the official authority charged with issuing religious edicts, the niqab is not obligatory but is “allowed and accepted according to the interpretations of some Islamic scholars.”

In a related note, on Monday the Minister of Higher Education Hani Helal banned the niqab inside Cairo University dorms.

However neither Ain Shames University nor Helwan University issued similar decrees.

In 2007 Helwan University was the subject of a huge controversy when university security guards prohibited the entry of some female students wearing the niqab into the university dorms, even though they agreed to reveal their face to the female security guards for an identity check.

In the same year, Minister of Religious Endowments Hamdy Zaqzuq dismissed an employee from a meeting for refusing to remove her niqab.

Zaqzuq publicly maintains his denouncement of the niqab stressing that “it is a tradition, not an Islamic practice.”

In 2004 the American University in Cairo (AUC) caused a similar stir after a decree prohibiting the entry of students wearing the niqab into the university campus.

A year later some of these students won a court case against the university allowing them to enter provided they show their face to security guards to check their identity.

As a reaction, the university issued a new internal regulation prohibiting the niqab.

Tantawi has been in hot water before, for shaking hands with Shimon Peres. But before you think of him as some sort of moderate, keep in mind that he also supports terror attacks against Israeli civilians.

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Israel's economic miracle

Fantastic article in The City Journal. Here's only a small part:

In under 25 years—starting from those first modest tax reforms of the mid-1980s—Israel has accomplished the most overwhelming transformation in the history of economics, from a nondescript laggard in the industrial world to a luminous first. Today, on a per-capita basis, Israel far leads the world in research and technological creativity. Between 1991 and 2000, even before the big reform of 2005, Israel’s annual venture-capital outlays, nearly all private, rose nearly 60-fold, from $58 million to $3.3 billion; companies launched by Israeli venture funds rose from 100 to 800; and Israel’s information-technology revenues rose from $1.6 billion to $12.5 billion. By 1999, Israel ranked second only to the United States in invested private-equity capital as a share of GDP. And it led the world in the share of its growth attributable to high-tech ventures: 70 percent.

Even a year or two later—while the rest of the world slumped after the millennial telecom and dot-com crash and Israel suffered an acute recession—its venture capitalists strengthened its lead in technological enterprise. During the first five years of the twenty-first century, venture-capital outlays in Israel rivaled venture-capital outlays in all of the United States outside California, long the world’s paramount source of entrepreneurial activity in high technology.

Today, Israel’s tech supremacy is even greater. A 2008 survey of the world’s venture capitalists by Deloitte & Touche showed that in six key fields—telecom, microchips, software, biopharmaceuticals, medical devices, and clean energy—Israel ranked second only to the United States in technological innovation.

Venture capital is the most catalytic force in the world economy. In the United States, venture-backed companies produced nearly one-fifth of GDP in 2007. At a time when American venture capital is flagging under the financial crisis, the emergence of a comparable venture scene in Israel, linked closely to Silicon Valley, is providential for both the American economy and its military defense.

This development makes Israel one of America’s most important economic allies. Israel’s creativity now pervades many of the most powerful and popular new technologies, from personal computers to iPods, from the Internet to the medical center.

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Hamas forbids women as motorcycle passengers

Palestine Press Agency reports that Hamas is forbidding (presumably male) motorcyclists from allowing women passengers sitting behind them.

The Hamas government in the Gaza Strip is forbidding motorcyclists from carrying women behind the driver of the bike "based on the requirements of public interest."

The government said, "This decision is to preserve the safety of citizens and the stability of customs and traditions in Palestinian society."

The phenomenon of carrying women and children behind the motorcycle driver has spread in the Gaza Strip recently, as this is a common sight on Egyptian streets.

Clearly, safety is not the reason for this rule, or Hamas would forbid any back-of-seat passengers, not only women. The problem is evidently that the women have to hold on to the male driver, in public, and this is a violation of "customs and traditions in Palestinian society."

The creeping Sharia-zation of Gaza continues....

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Daily Goldstone 9/6

A doubleheader.

Moshe Arens:

While the Goldstone report is being eagerly read in Israel and in capitals around the world, it is also being intensively studied by terrorists bent on destroying the State of Israel - and they must be breathing a sigh of relief.

This is not only because the Hamas terrorists in Gaza are in effect getting off scot-free in the report - they, in any case, did not have to be concerned about being brought before the International Court of Justice.

They can also interpret the report as international approbation for carrying out military operations from civilian population centers - schools, hospitals, refugee camps, etc. - as they did in the years when they were launching rockets into Israeli towns and villages in the south of Israel, and as they continued to do during the Israeli military operation in the Gaza Strip.

The report is in effect a license to kill - for Hamas, for Hezbollah, and for terrorists all over the world. No less.

And Ami Isseroff:

Beyond all its irregularities, the Goldstone report made one claim that cannot be refuted: That Israeli policy and war tactics were deliberately designed to kill civilians. It can't be refuted because it is not logical or based on any facts. Like medieval accusations of well poisoning or the blood libel, it is obvious that the persons making the accusation already have all the information needed to refute it, and simply ignore it because of malevolent mendaciousness. The man claims your sister is a lady of easy virtue. But you have no sister, and he knows it!

Goldstone's report claimed:

1211. Statements by political and military leaders prior to and during the military operations in Gaza leave little doubt that disproportionate destruction and violence against civilians were part of a deliberate policy.593

In a real report, one might expect that reference 593 would include the statements by political and military leaders that left no doubt etc. Instead, the footnote (like much of the Goldstone report) simply references a report by an anti-Israel NGO:

Highlighting the pattern of military actions targeting civilian shelters and shelter seekers, the Habitat International Coalition concludes: “The official statements that accompany these actions […] seem to reflect a presumption that any source of brutality against the indigenous inhabitants would convert the victims into agents of the attackers’ preferred outcome: defeat of resistance” (submission, cited, p. 40).

One unsupported conclusion is used to support another and the Hamas terrorists, who seized power illegally, are elevated to the dignity of "resistance."

The Goldstone report further states:

The operations were carefully planned in all their phases. Legal opinions and advice were given throughout the planning stages and at certain operational levels during the campaign...[T]he Mission concludes that what occurred in just over three weeks at the end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009 was a deliberately disproportionate attack designed to punish, humiliate and terrorize a civilian population, radically diminish its local economic capacity both to work and to provide for itself, and to force upon it an ever increasing sense of dependency and vulnerability.

Goldstone's "proof" is that the operation was planned. Planning and asking of legal opinions in any military operation are evidently valid evidence that civilian casualties resulting from that operation must have been planned. Goldstone evidently believes that nothing can even go wrong in any military operation and everything always occurs exactly according to plan. Presumably, legal advice was asked before soldiers left obnoxious graffiti and vandalized Palestinian property. Before each little girl was killed, the lawyers were called in to certify that killing the little girl was not against international law.

The death of Israeli soldiers by friendly fire was also presumably part of the plan according to Goldstone, , also approved by IDF legal counsel, as was the constant rain of rockets on Israeli towns and cities - civilian targets - by the Hamas "resistance." One wonders what book of military history Judge Goldstone and his fellow committee members read.

...The claim that the IDF or the Israeli government had a deliberate policy of harming civilians is therefore malicious nonsense. There are no additional facts that any Israeli investigation or any other investigation could unearth that would "disprove" it, because the claim doesn't depend on any facts. In the same way, those who made the blood libel accusation knew that Jews are forbidden to consume any sort of blood and especially human blood. They knew the accusation had to be false, and Goldstone knows this accusation is false. Those who believe this claim do so because they are evil and uninterested in truth. Proving that this or that incident described by the Goldstone mission did or did not occur, or that this or that officer was or was not guilty of war crimes, could never erase the terrible false accusation that Israel deliberately set out to kill civilians.

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The diplomacy of fear, 2009

Ha'aretz publishes facts that you just won't see the mainstream media mention:

Palestinian clashes with Israeli police on Sunday and on the day before Yom Kippur near the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem's Old City have made foreign diplomats wonder whether Israel is enacting a new policy on the Temple Mount, which is serving to exacerbate tensions.

Media outlets and senior Palestinian Authority officials have contributed significantly to this perception after repeatedly claiming that Israel is planning to allow a group of "extremist settlers" to pray at the mosque. Even the Egyptian foreign minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, has blamed Israel for implementing a dangerous policy on the Temple Mount that is liable to lead to a conflagration.

Yet, reality, as always, is a bit more complicated. The status quo in the plaza surrounding the Al-Aqsa Mosque has in fact not changed since 2003. The entry of Jews and tourists is permitted on the Temple Mount from 7:30 to 10 A.M., and from 12:30 to 1:30 P.M. These visits do not have to be coordinated with officials of the Waqf (Muslim trust) and take place without any interference. Indeed, last Thursday, for example, the area was totally calm. At 1 P.M., dozens of tourists could be seen wandering around the plaza.

The advent of the holiday season in Israel, combined with the desire of Palestinian politicians to win a few minutes of fame, has recently led, however, to various violent incidents.

At present, the PA is not doing enough to ease tensions, while the Islamic Movement's northern faction is apparently working in concert with a number of Palestinian figures in an effort to spark an escalation of hostilities on the mount.

Sheikh Azzam Al-Khatib, the head of the Waqf, said that just before Yom Kippur, a number of Jewish groups distributed notices announcing that they planned to visit the Temple Mount on the eve of the holiday. In response, the former mufti of Jerusalem, Sheikh Ikrima Sabri, called on Muslim worshipers to gather at Al-Aqsa Mosque last Sunday, to defend it against the Jews. His call was also taken up by Hatem Abdel Khader, the Fatah official who holds the Jerusalem portfolio, and other factions belonging to the Islamic Movement.

After morning prayers that day, some 200 people gathered at the square waiting for the Jews to enter.

"The police knew about this," Al-Khatib said. "One of the officers who is responsible for police coordination with the Waqf, called me and I warned him not to open the Temple Mount to Jewish worshipers."

At 7:30 A.M., the Mughrabim Gate was opened and a group of tourists entered the compound. Muslims began hurling stones at them and at the police officers who tried to hurry the tourists away from the scene.

Sunday, however, it seemed as if the appropriate conclusions had been drawn: After learning that dozens of Muslims planned to await the arrival of "extremist Jews" at the Temple Mount, the police decided that the entire area would remain closed to non-Muslim visitors.

Meaning that the time-honored method of threatening and instigating violence has allowed Muslims to support their bigoted goal of keeping the holiest Jewish site free of Jews.

Back in 2006, I called this Islamic method of using threats of violence to get their way "the diplomacy of fear" and it hasn't changed one bit. (I even found an example from 1877.)

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