Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Morning links

Amnesty International came out with another report slamming Israel, this time about water rights. From looking at it briefly it appears to be a skillful piece of propaganda. While the amount of water that the PA receives was determined at Oslo and there is no indication that Israel is violating that agreement, Amnesty conflates issues of "equality" with needs. Amnesty also goes the Goldstone route of referring to international treaties that do not apply at all (such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, Art. 14 para. 2(h), which explicitly refers specifically to discrimination against women and not to all access by women to water.) NGOs appear to think that if they throw enough references out there that no one will read them.

Anyway, I don't have time for a full fisking, but NGO Monitor makes some good points. And Israel's Water Authority blasted the report for inaccuracies and bias.

Israel Matzav translates a Maariv article by a doctor, an open letter to Richard Goldstone detailing how Palestinian Arab doctors lie and why one cannot accept their testimony without verification.

Egyptian security thwarted an attempted infiltration attempt into Israel from the Sinai - by a Palestinian Arab.

CSM looks at Hamas' increasing religious restrictions on Gaza.

WSJ has an article, written by Egyptians, on the tradition of anti-semitism by Egypt's "liberals."

(last two h/t Media Backspin tweets.)

"Syria and Palestine are one nation"

Just found this old New York Times article from August 31, 1921:

Isn't it funny that the Palestinian Arabs didn't want an independent state but wanted to be part of Greater Syria?

Eighth annversary of Qassam rocket

The Hamas al-Qassam Brigades website says that today is the 8th anniversary of the first Qassam rocket shot at Sderot. They reproduce their press release at the time:

In the name of God the Merciful

A military statement issued by the Brigades of the Martyr Izz el-Deen al-Qassam

Qassam rockets at the so-called Zionist city of Sderot in response to the Zionist terrorist crimes against our people in the West Bank.

Hey fans of the heroic Palestinian people ...

O Arab and Islamic nation: with the help of God the Brigades of the Martyr Izz el-Deen al-Qassam declares it claimed responsibility for bombing the city of the so-called "Sderot" Zionism northern Gaza Strip, several Qassam rockets (1) Friday, 26.10.2001 comes our operation of this In reply to the Zionist crimes against the Palestinian people, which was most recently in the town of Beit Rima.

O our Palestinian: We promise to God and promise to the Zionists to make their life a living hell for them to abandon settlements and towns and get them out submissively with the help of God, and invite you to always be aligned to the option of jihad and resistance and not to despair, and we promise to be loyal always to liberate the whole territory of Palestine.

It is a Jihad, victory or martyrdom

Brigades of the Martyr Izz el-Deen al-Qassam

26.10.2001

They are so proud of their war crimes!

J-Street stops publicly pretending to be pro-Israel

J-Street is the anti-"Israel lobby" lobby and real-life anti-Israel lobby. Other blogs get more into discussing them that I do but this story is just too funny:

J Street's university arm has dropped the "pro-Israel" part of the left-wing US lobby's "pro-Israel, pro-peace" slogan to avoid alienating students.

That decision was part of the message conveyed to young activists who attended a special weekend program for students ahead of J Street's first annual conference, which began on Sunday.
At their earlier weekend session, the 250 participating students mapped out strategies for bringing J Street's approach to college campuses and encouraging students to join in the effort.
"We don't want to isolate people because they don't feel quite so comfortable with 'pro-Israel,' so we say 'pro-peace,'" said American University junior Lauren Barr of the "J Street U" slogan, "but behind that is 'pro-Israel.'"
Barr, secretary of the J Street U student board that decided the slogan's terminology, explained that on campus, "people feel alienated when the conversation revolves around a connection to Israel only, because people feel connected to Palestine, people feel connected to social justice, people feel connected to the Middle East."
She noted that the individual student chapters would be free to add "pro-Israel," "pro-Israel, pro-Palestine," or other wording that they felt would be effective on this issue, since "it's up to the individuals on campus to know their audience."
Yonatan Shechter, a junior at Hampshire College, said the ultra-liberal Massachusetts campus is inhospitable to terms like "Zionist" and that when his former organization, the Union of Progressive Zionists (which has been absorbed into J Street U), dropped that last word of its name, "people were so relieved."

And they seemed so proud of their purportedly pro-Israel positions!

Israeli company developing super-vaccine for flu

From Arutz-7:

Israel Radio reported Sunday morning that an Israeli company had developed a universal vaccine for all forms of flu – including bird and swine flu – and shares of Rehovot-based BiondVax trading on the Tel Aviv stock exchange went through the roof. But the ardor of investors was tempered somewhat when the company announced that it had not yet tested its vaccine on swine flu, nor had it conducted tests on pregnant women – one of the groups that is most susceptible to the disease, and for which developing a vaccine has been more difficult.

Nevertheless, the company says its universal multi-season/multi-strain flu vaccine will greatly enhance the average person's immune system, enabling patients to receive a single shot once every few years that will protect them against most forms of influenza. It turns out that most strains of flu have characteristics similar enough to enable development of one vaccine that contains the elements of the flu virus' downfall.

But it is not only Israelis who are working on a generalized cure for the flu. At least one Arab claims to have a cure as well.

(By the way, Biondvax shares, only traded on the Tel Aviv Exchange, are unbelievably volatile, with a 52-week low of 20 and a high of nearly 950. Right now it is at about 410.)

Carter to Saudis: I'm the antidote to the Jewish Lobby

From the Arab News:

Former US President Jimmy Carter visited Jeddah on Saturday to share his vision of the future of cross cultural and interfaith relations and peace in the Middle East with an invited audience.

Carter said that his return to Saudi Arabia reminded him that the Kingdom represented the common aspirations of many human beings.

“Peace, cooperation, forgiveness and ability to work together for common goals that are also common to all the major religions,” he said.

Carter described some of the activities of the Carter Center that are driven by those principles and said that he had a very deep commitment to several issues. He noted that since he was free of political office he could go where he chooses and say what he wants.
“The most important political goal of my life for 30 years is to bring peace to Israel and to all Israel’s neighbours with justice for the Palestinians,” he said.
Carter said that he had faith and confidence in the moral values of President Barack Obama and that he was well aware of the tremendous pressures on him by interest groups in the US.
Offering a glimpse of the way the Carter Center worked at both ends of the peace continuum, he said; “We try to provide an alternative voice to some of those groups. I have free access to President Obama and his advisers and we continue to pursue the goal of the US taking leadership to bring about the dream of peace.”

One doesn't have to read very much between the lines.

Fatah prisoners to give their "salaries" to de-Judaize Jerusalem

Firas Press reports that some Fatah prisoners are asking PA prime minister Fayyad to redirect their salaries to "defend" Jerusalem. In English, this means to do whatever they can to destroy any Jewish connection to the city.

Now, why do Fatah prisoners get a "salary" to begin with? These salaries are paid by the PA with funds that they beg and get from the rest of the world (just like they pay Gaza Fatah members not to work.)

In other words, this is how our tax dollars are spent.

Arab paper calls Jews on Temple Mount "rapists"

YNet reports:

The Jerusalem Police is gearing to reopen the Temple Mount compound for visitors and Muslim worshipers Monday. The compound was sealed off at noon following riots.

Palestine Today reports the story this way:

Israeli occupation authorities decided Monday to allow "visitors to enter the congregation of the holy Aqsa Mosque", that is, the entry of rapists and provocateurs.

This is after violent clashes on Sunday between the Palestinians stationed in the courtyard of the campus to address the storming settlers, and the occupation forces that were deployed in force on the Temple Mount and its surroundings to protect these rapists.

The Israeli police and security services on Sunday night held an evaluation session where it was decided to allow on Monday "visitors and worshipers" into the courtyard of the Temple Mount ..!

It is clear from statements by officials that the Zionist escalation in the recent days in the campus are due to declared Zionist goals to "open the Temple Mount to all believers", i.e., for the Jews just like the Palestinians.

Sunday saw violent clashes between Palestinians and Israeli occupation forces that were deployed in force on the Temple Mount and its surroundings to protect the rapists to enter the Temple Mount.

Report: Hamas nervous about the future

Palestine Press News Agency reports that it has obtained the results of an internal Hamas survey discussing the group's predictions and options for the future.

According to the story, this survey was initiated because of pressure on Hamas in Gaza, as well as fear that a political solution will arise that would exclude Hamas.

One paragraph of the story is telling:

The survey results suggest that the current situation is difficult and harsh, particularly in terms of attrition of the capabilities of Hamas. The movement also fears that people's priorities are changing towards improving conditions of life at the expense of national aspirations, and this is expected to increase pressure in the next phase of movement to allow for the ascendancy of the Fatah movement. "

The bolded part needs to be emphasized to the world: Hamas (and, historically, many Palestinian and other Arab leaders) are so insecure in the nationalism of Palestinian Arabs that they want to keep them in a misery-induced unity. To them, happy Palestinian Arabs will no longer identify as "Palestinian" and will not be useful for their own political and terrorist aspirations.

This next paragraph is more difficult to understand in autotranslation, but I believe my restatement is accurate. If someone who knows Arabic could check it, I would appreciate it and correct it if necessary.

The study shows that that Hamas believes it is capable in the foreseeable future to bring about major breakthroughs in the field of conflict, and thus be able to primarily address more [military] steadfastness and stability, and it is betting on time waiting for [improvement of] the quality of weapons [autotrans: "variables"] [manufactured] within the country or [smuggled from] abroad.

(PPNA is very anti-Hamas and occasionally errs, but most of their stories turn out to be accurate.)

Egypt captures more weapons meant for Gaza

From Ma'an:

Egyptian security forces said on Sunday that they discovered and seized a major weapons cache and arrested a suspected smuggler in near the border with the Gaza Strip.

Egyptian security officials said police stopped the suspect when he was driving in the area. The suspect, Ahmad Abu Maleeh, 30, from the Egyptian side of the city of Rafah, told interrogators that he had just driven another smuggler to tunnel in the area.

Security forces also discovered a tunnel in the same area, and confiscated what they said was a large quantity of firearms and ammunition. The officials said that the security presence in the area was increased as a result of the discovery.

Egypt has found tons and tons of explosives and weapons in recent months. Yet the Western media rarely mentions these regular finds by Egypt. Instead, they talk about how the tunnel trade is being used for consumer goods with barely a mention of the major reason that Gaza is under a blockade.

Daily Goldstone 10/25b

"Trevor Norwitz has written an impressive and extensive response to the Goldstone report. According to information received from reliable sources Trevor grew up in Cape Town where he attended SACS and UCT before going on to Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. He is now a successful attorney in a leading corporate practice in New York."

Here is part of the lengthy letter, which can be read as a PDF file here.

Your Selection of Incidents to Investigate
A closely related point is your Mission's selection of which matters to investigate and which to ignore. Your Mission investigated 36 incidents in Gaza and stated that it "considers that the report is illustrative of the main patterns of violations." (17) Since virtually all of these incidents were cases involving Israeli actions and Palestinian casualties or damage, it is clear that the "pattern of violations" that interested you most were those where Israel could be condemned. As discussed above, the efforts you made to find the relevant facts underlying the operation left much to be desired. Very little effort was made to investigate the behavior of Hamas and the other "Palestinian armed groups": did they direct attacks at civilian targets? Did they use
civilians as human shields? Did they hide weapons in civilian buildings like mosques, schools and hospitals? You do not even raise as a possibility the question of whether Hamas and the other "Palestinian armed groups" intentionally drew fire towards civilian objects to score public relations victories (I do not believe in their wildest dreams they ever expected the PR and strategic windfall that you have awarded them), although this appears to be a central element of their moqawamma ("resistance") strategy. I understand that seeking those facts was difficult the people you were talking to would not talk about that (because of both bias and intimidation)
and the people who would talk about it (the Israelis) refused to talk to you but that should not relieve honest fact-finders of their obligation to try find the facts. Reviews by others of the video clips of interviews with Palestinian witnesses posted on your website suggest that you did not even press witnesses for answers to these questions19. Instead you simply relied on the absence of countervailing evidence to validate the "facts" reported to you by those biased and intimidated witnesses.

On a few occasions, you accepted the "possibility" that there might be another side to the story that you "could not entirely discount," that is, that there may have been inappropriate actions on the Palestinian side. For example: "The Mission finally notes that it cannot entirely discount the possibility that Palestinian civilians may have been killed as a result of fire by Palestinian armed groups in encounters with the Israeli armed forces, as argued in a submission to the Mission, although it has not encountered any information suggesting that this was the case." (361) "[W]hile the Mission would not rule out the possibility that there might be individuals in the police force who retain their links to the armed groups, it believes . . ." (417) "[T]he Mission accepted, on the basis of information in the reports it had seen, the possibility of mortar attacks from Palestinian combatants in the vicinity of the school." (444) The Mission cannot discount the possibility that Palestinian armed groups were active in the vicinity of such [United Nations] facilities." (483)

However these matters were never investigated to the point of ascertaining whether they amounted to war crimes or whether they justified the Israeli actions under investigation. For the most part, you were satisfied simply to state that you were unable to make any determination regarding these matters: "The Mission is unable to make any determination on the general allegation that Palestinian armed groups used mosques for military purposes." (484) "On the basis of the investigations it has conducted, the Mission did not find any evidence to support the allegations that hospital facilities were used by the Gaza authorities or by Palestinian armed groups to shield military activities . . ." (485) "On the basis of the information it gathered, the Mission found no indication that the civilian population was forced by Hamas or Palestinian armed groups to remain in areas under attack from the Israeli armed forces." (486)

On other occasions, where the evidence of bad behavior on the Palestinian side was so clear you could not deny it or profess ignorance, you proceed astonishingly to justify it or explain it away.

Example: Firing rockets from civilian areas: "[T]he Mission finds that there are indications that Palestinian armed groups launched rockets from urban areas . . . Palestinian armed groups do not appear to have given Gaza residents sufficient warning of their intention to launch rockets from their neighbourhoods to allow them to leave and protect themselves against Israeli strikes at the rocket launching sites . . . Given the densely populated character of the northern half of the Gaza Strip, once Israeli forces gained control of the more open or outlying areas during the first days of the ground invasion, most if not all locations still accessible to Palestinian armed groups were in urban areas." (480) In other words, you explain and even seek to justify Hamas' actions endangering civilians because it would have been dangerous for it to fight Israel otherwise.

Another example: Booby trapping houses: "From the information it gathered, the Mission does not discount the use of booby traps by the Palestinian armed groups. The Mission has no basis to conclude that civilian lives were put at risk, since none of the reports records the presence of civilians in or near the houses that were allegedly booby-trapped." (482) Your willingness to accept a "no-harm-no-foul" defence for booby trapping civilian houses is as telling as your reluctance to find improper intentions on the Palestinian side.

These few examples (of the many more that could be cited) should suffice to demonstrate that your Mission chose only to investigate one side of the conflict (Israel), and made its findings based on evidence presented by only one side one the conflict (the Palestinians).

Fundamental but Dubious Assumptions
Without denying that there are matters raised in your report that deserve further investigation and explanation by Israel, it appears that your wholesale condemnations of Israel and accusations of "war crimes" rest in large part on certain fundamental premises or a "world view" shared by you and your fellow Commissioners. These premises reflect assumptions that underlie much of your
Report, but their validity is not incontrovertible. Indeed they are highly contentious and to the degree these assumptions are wrong, your Report's conclusions are invalid.

Legitimizing Hamas. One of these fundamental assumptions that permeates your entire analysis is that Hamas is a nonviolent political organization distinct from its military wing. This characterization of Hamas is entirely implausible. It requires more than naiveté to reach that conclusion, in light of all the readily available evidence, including that organization's refusal to renounce the use of violence or even to recognize the existence of the State of Israel (which together torpedoed the peace process and damned Gaza to its present state of destitution), the express statements of Hamas' own leadership regarding the use of violence and terrorist tactics, and the fact that the Hamas charter calls for the destruction of Israel and genocide against the Jewish people (which remarkably does not merit a mention in your Report).

Because it openly embraces terrorist tactics, Hamas is widely condemned as a terrorist organization. In light of all the readily available evidence, the suggestion that Hamas can be neatly separated from its military wing is spurious.

Earlier I stated that your Report not only legitimizes but whitewashes Hamas. Although the press has chosen not to highlight this, a close review of every reference to Hamas throughout your Report will reveal that, while there are some perfunctory condemnations of "armed Palestinian groups" (which include Hamas' Al-Qassam Brigades) and some measured criticism of the "Gaza Authorities" regarding things they could have done better (sins of omission rather than commission), Hamas itself gets off virtually scot-free in your Report and even emerges looking like an innocent victim. My point here is not to refute as a substantive matter that highly troubling aspect of your Report I shall leave that to others but simply to observe that a critical assumption underlying many of your claims of "war crimes" is that Hamas should be considered independent of its infamous military wing. To the extent that this assumption is flawed, the conclusions on which it is based are invalid. But the very fact that you approached your fact-finding mission with this as a basic assumption indicates a perspective that calls the conclusions drawn by your Mission into question.

Gaza Still Occupied? A second fundamental assumption, discussed above, is the notion that Gaza remains occupied by Israel notwithstanding its complete unilateral withdrawal four years ago which, in your view26, has "`done nothing' to alter the character of Israel as an occupying Power." 27 Again, I will leave it to others to debunk this dubious legal conclusion, noting simply that it is one of the foundations on which you build your case for the prosecution. The implications of your position are dramatic. For example, although Israel facilitated the supply of significant humanitarian aid to Gaza and even your Report acknowledges "that the supply of
humanitarian goods, particularly foodstuffs, allowed into Gaza by Israel temporarily increased during the military operations" (72), you nevertheless condemn Israel as violating the Fourth Geneva Convention for not doing enough "as Occupying Power" to provide such supplies. In other words, your report twists Israel's humanitarian efforts (done from its perspective out of kindness rather than legal obligation) into a war crime because you reached a different legal conclusion on the status of Gaza. If you are wrong in your conclusion that Gaza remains occupied, then rather than being condemned as war criminals, Israel should be commended for its humanitarian efforts to support the Palestinian civilian population even while that it was in the midst of a bloody war to root out the terrorists who had converted their homes into rocket launching sites.

Placing Blame. Perhaps the most fundamental and flawed assumption underlying your Report is the position that the tragic situation of the Palestinian people, and especially those in Gaza, is all Israel's fault. That your Mission is of this view is clear from the way you characterize (or rather mischaracterize) the history of the region; it is clear from your use of language throughout your Report; it is clear from your failure to seek to understand why actions were taken why Israel shut border crossings? Why Israel built the security barrier? Why Israel felt the need to
undertake the Gaza operation at all? And it is clear from your refusal to acknowledge what Hamas and its charter say unequivocally that Hamas exists to destroy the Jewish State. Your perspective is also clear from specific statements, including the curious analysis you offer in one of your concluding paragraphs where you say: "After decades of sustained conflict, the level of threat to which both Palestinians and Israelis are subjected has not abated, but if anything increased . . . The State of Israel is therefore also failing to protect its own citizens by refusing to acknowledge the futility of resorting to violent means and military power." (1711) It is telling
that it is Israel you criticize in this regard, and it is unclear what you expect Israel to do in the context of a foe that refuses to negotiate but only wants to fight.28

There are other elements of the "world view" with which you and your fellow Commissioners approached your assignment and which impacted your Report assumptions regarding Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state at all, for example, or regarding the legitimacy of a separation barrier to protect Israeli civilians from terrorist attacks, or whether Israel is a decent country (for example at 132 you state: "The Mission is also of the view that the Israeli system presents inherently discriminatory features that have proven to make the pursuit of justice for Palestinian victims very difficult.") This is not the place to debate these interesting topics; I mention them solely to make the point that there are perspectives and prejudices that underlie your investigation that cannot but influence your findings.

From Al Arabiya:

A college in the United Kingdom has banned a Muslim student from enrolling because she refused to take off her burka, or face veil, press reports said Saturday.

Shawana Bilqes, 18, was turned away from enrollment after she refused a staff member's request to remove her burka for identity fraud purposes, Britain's the Sun tabloid reported.

Bilqes said she tried to compromise with staff but could not remove her burka because of her religious beliefs. Muslim scholars say the burka is not obligatory in Islam and is a cultural practice rather than Islamic.

"I tried to compromise but they wouldn't. The college sent me a letter to say I could continue with my course if I stopped wearing the veil," the paper quoted Bilqes as saying.

Ironically, her choice to wear a pink headcovering over the veil would be seen in parts of Saudi Arabia as being way over the line of acceptable clothing.

Some of the Muslim Al Arabiya commenters got it right:

Why is she being so stupid for? she doesnt need to wear the niqaab or the burka its a cultural practice not an islamic one. just because she got refused from the college for wearing one she gets all huffy and tells the entire world, i am a muslim too and i dont wear the niqaab or the burka and my religion is very important to me and i practice it too. Wearing the burka and niqaab may hinder communication between staff and students a little but its not the end of the world. Plus i dont blame the college for doing what they did - it is for security reasons and they have every right to do so. why doesnt she just take it off - its not going to make her any less islamic or prevent her from practicing her religion is it? she is just being stupid and wants attention. get a life!!!

AS A MUSLIM I AM HAPPY THAT SHE WAS NOT ALLOWED IN SCHOOL, THE BURKA IS NOT ISLAMIC THEREFORE IT SHOULD BE BANNED.THESE PEOPLE ARE GIVING THE ENEMIES OF ISLAM MORE REASON TO HATE US EVEN MORE.i AM ALL FOR HIJAB BUT BURKA NO WAY.

Arabs keep trying to light the spark of a new intifada

The pattern of incitement to violence continues, and the world media ignores it.

Yesterday, in a clear move to start more riots today, Sheikh Tayseer al-Tamimi called on all Arab to go to the Al Aqsa mosque today and defend it against an alleged "storming" by Zionists.

As we've seen in the past, this "storming" means only one thing: visiting the Temple Mount respectfully, and at most meditating there.

Tamimi pre-emptively said that Israeli police would be responsible for any violence that happened on Sunday.

Naturally, in light of the clear incitement, the Israeli police geared up for trouble, committed to ensuring that the status quo is not changed on the Temple Mount. And naturally, their very presence was regarded as a green light for Arabs to riot, throw stones - and lie by saying that the police shot tear gas at them and that they entered the Al Aqsa mosque itself. These lies were then used in a call for more people to come and riot - using the mosque's loudspeakers, which the Israeli police then turned off.

Ha'aretz reported the facts:

Early Sunday morning, police were patrolling near the Temple Mount, in the Old City of Jerusalem, when the youths began to hurl stones at them. Officers subsequently stormed the compound and arrested 12 people on suspicion of disorderly conduct.

A large wall of riot police, holding glass shields, closed in on the crowd, sending many of the rioters running into the mosque for cover.

Arab youths hurled a firebomb at police during clashes at the site, but no one was wounded.

A Jerusalem police spokesman, Shmuel Ben-Ruby said police did not enter the Al-Aqsa mosque atop the compound.

The violence came after Jerusalem police announced Saturday that they would beef up their forces on Sunday around the Temple Mount, after Muslim leaders urged Arabs to defend Jerusalem against "Jewish conquest."

There have been repeated rumors among Palestinians that Jewish extremists are planning on harming the holy site. No such attempt has been made.

Keep in mind that these lies, plus the lie that Israel is digging under the Temple Mount, made their way into the UNHRC resolution that was passed against Israel a week ago.

Daily Goldstone 10/25

Israel Matzav shows a Bill Moyers interview with Richard Goldstone, and then quotes an Israeli legal expert demolishing his claims. For example:

1. The Goldstone report draws its conclusions on the basis of 36 incidents it says it investigated. The report says that incidents are illustrative and therefore justify the broader conclusions made by the report. But Goldstone admits that the report lied in saying that the incidents are “illustrative” and in saying that the Mission worked according to its self-described neutral mandate rather than the official biased one. Goldstone says “We chose those 36 because they seemed to be, to represent the most serious, the highest death toll, the highest injury toll. And they appear to represent situations where there was little or no military justification for what happened.” In other words, the Mission chose incidents that were seen as NOT ILLUSTRATIVE, and, rather, most likely to support a finding of war crimes.

2. Goldstone repeatedly misstates the law in the interview.

a. Goldstone implicitly misstates the rule of distinction. Goldstone rightly says that the rule of distinction requires combatants to distinguish between “combatants and innocent civilians.” But then, he “proves” that Israel violated the rule of distinction by saying “We found evidence in statements made by present and former political and military leaders, who said, quite openly, that there's going to be a disproportionate attack. They said that if rockets are going to continue, we're going to hit back disproportionately.” Stating that a counter-attack will be disproportionate to the attack isn’t a violation of the rule of distinction. The rule of distinction requires that Israel not aim its fire at civilians as such. It has nothing to do with how much fire Israel can aim at legitimate targets.

b. Regarding the rules of distinction and proportionality, Moyers asks Goldstone, “Who is to say that? Who is to make that distinction?” Goldstone answers, “Well, that distinction must be made after the event.” That is absolutely, positively, not the law. The law is that commanders must make judgments on the basis of knowledge they have at the time, not that one second-guesses them after the event and judges them guilty on the basis of knowledge they may not have had. Thus, for example, Newton testified “In order to properly assess a real proportionality assessment therefore, the relevant question is what did the commander know? What information was available to him?”

Read the whole thing.

Israelis barred from Komen cancer event in Egypt

The news over the past few days about this have been muddled, but the upshot is that Israelis have been banned from attending events sponsored by the Susan G. Komen for the Cure organization in Egypt this week.

A couple of days ago, Egyptian authorities announced that they will not allow Israeli doctors to attend, and the Komen people said that they would do everything they could to ensure that the Israelis would be able to attend in a press release last Thursday:

Susan G. Komen for the Cure Pleased to Announce Egyptian Events to Welcome All Advocates, Including those from Israel Statement by Nancy G. Brinker, Founder, Susan G. Komen for the Cure

“Breast cancer advocates from the United States and across the Middle East are meeting in Egypt from October 21-27 for breast cancer awareness events. There have been reports that some of the invited participants would not be allowed to attend these events. Susan G. Komen for the Cure has now received confirmation that all advocates, regardless of their country of origin, are invited to fully participate in events to bring breast cancer to the forefront of public discussion in the Middle East.

It was still unclear whether any Israelis would be able to attend at that point, and a number of people on the SGK bulletin board felt that the organization should pull out of the Egyptian events if the Israelis could not attend.

The ADL praised Komen for their position on Friday.

Today, though, the Daily News Egypt is saying that the Komen Foundation has withdrawn the invitation to Israelis:

The Susan G. Komen for the Cure organization has withdrawn its invitation to Israeli doctors to attend a conference in Egypt upon the request of Egypt’s Minister of Health.
The conference was organized as part of the American NGO’s breast cancer awareness month activities on Oct. 21-22 in Alexandria, which brought together breast cancer awareness advocates from 10 Middle Eastern countries.
According to the Israeli news portal J Weekly, the Anti-Defamation League’s national director, Abraham Foxman, wrote a letter to the NGO’s President Hala Moddelmog, condemning the decision, describing it as “shocking and contrary to the stated purpose of these programs.”
Susan G. Komen for the Cure is the world’s largest breast cancer advocacy organization and is holding the breast cancer awareness month in cooperation with the Breast Cancer Foundation of Egypt and the Suzanne Mubarak Regional Center for Women’s Health and Development in Alexandria, with support from the governments of Egypt and the United States.
Representatives of the organization were unavailable for comment.

The J weekly article was published on Wednesday, though, and it did not indicate that the Komen Foundation had rescinded the invitations but rather that Egypt had, so it appears that the Egyptian newspaper is not being completely accurate.