Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

If I wrote this I would be called an Islamophobe

Elaph.com, a popular liberal pan-Arabic news site based out of London, has an article that you won't see in most Arab media:

A recent report from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life in America, has estimated the number of Muslims around the world as being one billion and five hundred and seventy million people.

Apart from the exaggerated number, something found in all the reports in which [Dalia] Mogahed is involved which are always clearly biased to the Muslims, the actual number is certainly at least one billion three hundred million people, while the number of Jews around the world is only about 14 million. Yet comparing what the Jews accomplished and what is done by Muslims over the last hundred years, in my estimation is the difference between mental health and serious mental problems saturated with religious bombast.

When you read the figures and statistics you immediately discover that science and scientific research is the one subject that elevates nations and creates glory for them.

There are 56 states calling themselves Islamic, but in all these countries there is not one university among the top 500 universities in the world, while small Israel has 6 universities on the list.

Islamic countries spend on average less than .02% percent of their GDP on scientific research, while Israel will spend 2.53% of their GDP on scientific research.

No wonder then that Jews have wons 180 Nobel Prizes in the last hundred years compared to only 9 Muslims.

No wonder then that the Jews excel in all areas as a result their respect for science and their investment in their children's education in the most important and best universities in the world. It is difficult to count the number of Jewish geniuses in all areas around the world from Albert Einstein to Sigmund Freud to Karl Marx to Paul Samuelson and Milton Friedman, Nobel Prize winner in economics ... and the list goes on.

[he then lists a whole bunch of prominent Jews in industry and science.]

In conclusion, the Islamic countries do not participate in the making of knowledge and do not participate in the dissemination of this knowledge, given that the number of books translated from all languages into Arabic since the time of Caliph al-Mamun is equivalent to those translated into Spanish in a single year, according to the Arab Human Development Report issued in 2002.

Islamic countries are busy complaining about the Jewish global conspiracy against the Muslims, while at the same time the Jews themselves are busy achieving more success and excellence through science and hard work.

Islamic countries are busy persecuting women and the non-Muslim minorities, and always blame the victims... The presence of a non-Muslim person in itself is a provocation to the Muslim extremist, while Muslim refugees from more than 90% of the number of refugees in the world, yet refugees to Israel from Muslim countries were absorbed.

There is no hope in the progress of Islamic science, except for scientific research, but this research is impossible when Islamic religion controls to all aspects of life ..... Here we go back to square one in which is the influence of religion causes the failure of these countries and communities.

The author, Magdi Khalil, is a liberal director of the Egypt-based Middle East Freedom Forum.

PA minister: Selling "settlement" goods is treason

From Ma'an:

The Palestinian Authority’s new minister of national economy vowed on Wednesday to bring to justice anyone who deals in products produced in Israeli settlements as traitors.

“Those who trade these products will bear the stigma of treason,” Hassan Abu Libdeh told private sector and civil society figures at the offices of the ministry in Ramallah.

The minister said that the top priority of one of the ministry’s organs, the Palestinian National Committee for Organizing Domestic Market, is to enforce a boycott of settlement products.

Boycotting products made by Jews east of the Green Line is a "top priority" for the PA?

You would think that building their own tattered economy would be a bit more important.

The ironic thing is that these boycotts never work. Enterprising Arabs will always find ways to buy the best goods at the lowest prices, no matter where they come from, and edicts like these will just ensure that the underground economy prospers and no taxes are paid, further destabilizing the already teetering PA.

As usual, this will only hurt ordinary Palestinian Arab businessmen and consumers, and the trials for "treason" will cause infighting and resentment. It's happened before and it will happen again, as long as Palestinian Arab "leaders" define themselves as being anti-Israel (trying to hurt Jews) as opposed to as a true people in their own right (trying to help Palestinian Arabs.)

Fayyad's plan exposes real Palestinian Arab goals

If one assumes that the goal of Palestinian Arab nationalism is the establishment of an independent state, the Arabs of Palestine have consistently made wrong decisions time after time again. From rejecting the Peel Commission recommendations in 1937 (where the Jewish State would have been minuscule and unsustainable) to the UN Partition through Camp David and Barak's offer, the answer has always been a resounding "NO!" This would appear strange, as the primary goal of nationalism is the establishment of a nation-state.

It has been pointed out many times that Israel was built by Zionists who created and expanded the institutions of statehood while under the control of the British. Their goal was a state, and they instinctively realized that the foundations must exist before such a state could be realized. So through the first half of the century, Jews built the infrastructure of the future Jewish state - hospitals, schools, quasi-government offices, social programs, an economic infrastructure, cultural institutions and more. They organized themselves and acted state-like way before 1948.

Palestinian Arabs have done no such thing. Any infrastructure they have has been mostly built either by Israel or by external parties like UNRWA.

Palestinian Arab prime minister Salam Fayyad is aiming to change that.

Fayyad is an anomaly in Palestinian Arab history; he has little following of his own and he did not come up through the terror ranks. His tenure as prime minister has been consistently pragmatic; he cleaned up a lot of the corruption and made the donor economy of the PA much more transparent to the West. He is not associated with any major political group.

Fayyad has put together a two-year plan of massively building Palestinian Arab institutions with the goal of unilaterally declaring an independent Palestinian Arab state in 2011. In a very real sense, this plan is a far bigger challenge to Israel than decades of terror have been. And it has not been lost on observers that Fayyad is using Zionism as his blueprint.

Fayyad's goal (at least initially) is clearly to build an independent nation-state. This is in direct opposition to the primary goal of Palestinian Arab leaders since Haj Amin al-Husseini - the destruction of Israel. Although they cloaked this goal in nationalist terms, their decisions over the years have proven that statehood was a political cover for their real aim. As such, Fayyad poses a challenge to the traditional Palestinian Arab mindset no less than it does to Israel.

In today's Comment is Free, former Palestinian Arab negotiator Ahmad Samih Khalidi tries to articulate to a Western audience why he is against Fayyad's plan. His article is convoluted and bizarre, as he attempts to hide the ingrained PalArab goals of destroying Israel while also trying to find a logical problem with statehood. It reveals much about the Palestinian Arab psyche. (Khalidi cannot even mention Fayyad's name.)

At the heart of the PA's programme lies a basic contradiction: while it claims to be building a state against the occupation, it is in practice building state-like structures with the occupation. No genuinely sovereign state has been or can be built while still under occupation, and nothing in Israel's current stance on the basic issues of Palestinian sovereignty (territorial extent, control over borders, the right to self defence, and so on) suggests otherwise.

Yet somehow Israel was built while under British occupation and with the presence of hostile Arabs surrounding the Zionists from within and without. Khalidi pretends to explain that:

The second problem stems from a total misreading of history. The Zionist movement may indeed have developed its state-building capacity while under the British mandate, but Israel only came into being as a state by using force against British and Palestinians alike. By way of contrast, the only military capability the PA is building under US supervision is directed against those who seek to take up arms against the occupation. The "Zionist" option of military self-reliance and readiness to use force for political-territorial ends is totally absent from the PA's new approach and is inimical to its political outlook.

In other words, Khalidi (besides making up a history where Israel was the aggressor in 1948) is saying that a Palestinian Arab state must by definition come into existence by successfully defeating Israel in battle.

The state-first approach carries other significant risks: it threatens to transform any final status negotiations into a prolonged state-to-state dispute whereby the fate of Palestinian refugees, the future of Arab Jerusalem and other critical issues will be indefinitely deferred. The urgency of dealing with Palestinians' national grievances as a whole will diminish, and their interests will be gradually pushed to the margins of international and regional concerns on the grounds that they have already fulfilled their major aspiration by being granted statehood.

Here Khalidi admits, in a backhanded way, that statehood is not the goal for the vast majority of Palestinian Arab leaders and thinkers: it is "dealing with Palestinians' [national] grievances." Addressing grievances are the goal: destroy Israel demographically with a "right of return," making Jerusalem Judenrein, and do everything necessary to avoid having a real state where the world will notice that Palestinian Arabs really do not have the will to be independent.

To Khalidi, and to generations of Palestinian Arabs, the goal is the negation of Israel, preferably by violence:

The first essential duty of a state is defending its citizens against foreign incursions and threats.

He believes that an army defines a state and that infrastructure is secondary. Terrorism, in this mindset, is more honorable than a negotiated peace, and humiliating the enemy trumps helping your own people. This is the reason that one hears the words "justice" so often in the words of Palestinian Arabs and their supporters: "justice" is a keyword that ensures that there will never be a compromise and that PalArabs (especially those who remain stateless in Arab countries) will remain in misery indefinitely.

Generations of a mindset where Palestinian Arab "nationalism" was defined in terms of what Jews control, rather than what would help ordinary Palestinian Arabs live their lives honorably, cannot be easily erased by Salam Fayyad.

Hamas website brags about "humiliating the Jews"

The Hamas al-Qassam Brigades website has a long article bragging about how successful they believe they have been in kidnapping Israeli soldiers over the decades.

The headline is most instructive as to their goals in such operations:

Al-Qassam Brigades ... a long history of abducting soldiers and humiliating the Jews

Of course, this is another attribute of the psychological projection that most Arabs have; they are deeply humiliated every day by Israel's existence and they think that this is Israel's raison d'etre; and their goal is likewise to pay back that humiliation.

Goldstone Wordle

Here are the top 250 words in the Goldstone report's conclusions and recommendations section, in graphical format using Wordle. The size of the words indicates how often they were used.

Can you find "Hamas"? (Click to see full size.)

(h/t Daughter of Ziyon)

Work accident!

From Ma'an:

A Gaza armed group said two of its members were killed while carrying out a “Jihad mission” on Tuesday.

A spokesman for the An-Nasser Salah Ad-Din Brigades, the armed wing of the Popular Resistance Committees, said in a phone call, “Ahmad Abu Darb and Ibrahim Qatasha died while they were implementing a jihadi mission” without explaining the nature of this mission.

Meanwhile local sources said that two people were killed in an unexplained explosion in that set fire to a house north of the city of Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip.

It was not immediately clear if the explosion was related to the deaths of the two fighters.

The Palestine Press Agency assumes that these are the same people.

An explosion in Rafah indicates that some explosives that were recently smuggled in to Gaza went off a bit earlier than intended.

The 2009 PalArab self-death count is now at 203.

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.)