Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Latest casualty of Egyptian/Algerian tiff

Arab entertainment company Rotana canceled the production of a comeback music video by a famous Algerian singer, known as Warda (who is 70 years old,) over fears of disturbances because of the still-heated feelings over the football matches between the two countries in recent weeks.

Abbas ensures he'll be president for life

Remember all those panicky headlines that said that Mahmoud Abbas would resign over his displeasure with the "peace process" that he personally stopped? Remember how the world freaked out, begging him to stay?

Well, it turns out that people misunderstood him. When he said he was considering resigning, he really meant that he was staying on in his multiple jobs (chairman and president of the PLO, leader of Fatah, president of the PA) until he drops dead:

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Wednesday he plans to stay on his post until the next election is held, but repeated he will not run for reelection.
"At any time we have the election I will go away and will not run," Abbas told reporters in the Chilean capital Santiago.

Palestinian authorities have said the election, which has been scheduled for Jan. 24, had been postponed.

Elections cannot be held unless Hamas approves. Hamas won't approve until it is certain it would win or if it changes PA policy to support Hamas' positions. Therefore, no new elections - and Abbas stays on forever.

Very few people publicly mentioned this scenario, although some did, during his dramatic theater designed to gain sympathy, take pressure off himself and boost his incredibly tiny ego.

The Great Zionist Bible Conspiracy

Middle East Online has an amazingly paranoid article, written by a Maidhc Ó Cathail, that has to be seen to be believed:

The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions for Palestine campaign should widen its scope to target non-Israeli companies who contribute significantly to the oppression of Palestinians. As part of this broader strategy, priority should be given to one of the most egregious offenders, the prestigious British publisher, Oxford University Press. As unlikely as it may seem, the world's largest university press is responsible for one of the greatest obstacles to justice for Palestinians – The Scofield Bible.

Since it was first published in 1909, the Scofield Reference Bible has made uncompromising Zionists out of tens of millions of Americans. When John Hagee, the founder of Christians United for Israel, said that "50 million evangelical bible-believing Christians unite with five million American Jews standing together on behalf of Israel," it was the Scofield Bible that he was talking about.

Although the Scofield Reference Bible contains the text of the King James Authorized Version, it is not the traditional Protestant bible but Cyrus I. Scofield's annotated commentary that is the problem. More than any other factor, it is Scofield's notes that induced generations of American evangelicals to believe that God demands their uncritical support for the modern State of Israel.

So here is his thesis: that Scofield's annotations to the Bible, published in 1909, somehow twists the Bible into making it into a more Zionist book than it already is.

How so? Here's an example.

Central to Christian Zionist belief is Scofield's commentary on Genesis 12:3. For the sake of clarity, Scofield's notes have been italicized in the following passage:

"'I will bless them that bless thee.' In fulfillment closely related to the next clause, 'And curse him that curseth thee.' Wonderfully fulfilled in the history of the dispersion. It has invariably fared ill with the people who have persecuted the Jew – well with those who have protected him. The future will still more remarkably prove this principle."

Drawing on Scofield's speculative interpretation, John Hagee claims, "The man or nation that lifts a voice or hand against Israel invites the wrath of God."

However, as Stephen Sizer points out, in his definitive critique, Christian Zionism: Road-map to Armageddon? "The promise, when referring to Abraham's descendants speaks of God blessing them, not of entire nations 'blessing' the Hebrew nation, still less the contemporary and secular State of Israel."

Apparently unaware of this more orthodox reading, The New Scofield Study Bible, published by Oxford University Press in 1984, enhanced Scofield's interpretation, by adding, "For a nation to commit the sin of anti-Semitism brings inevitable judgment." Reading such tendentious comments, a bible-believing Christian could easily assume, for example, that God will punish the 114 countries which endorsed the Goldstone Report.

At least Cathail implicitly admits that anti-Zionism is usually a manifestation of anti-semitism!

Scofield's interpretation of the passage, which actually can be found at Genesis 15:18, is pretty straightforward, and the idea that God cannot be referring to groups of people or nations is a bit tendentious itself.

Anyway, once Cathail has established that Scofield was a horrible Zionist, he needs to explain not only that he was a scoundrel, but also that he was really manipulated by a Jewish Zionist, the real Jew force behind this Zio-Bible:

Being a "born again" preacher, however, did not preclude Scofield from becoming a member of an exclusive New York men's club in 1901. In his devastating biography, The Incredible Scofield and His Book, Joseph M. Canfield comments, "The admission of Scofield to the Lotos Club, which could not have been sought by Scofield, strengthens the suspicion that has cropped up before, that someone was directing the career of C. I. Scofield."

That someone, Canfield suspects, was associated with one of the club's committee members, the Wall Street lawyer Samuel Untermeyer. As Canfield intimates, Scofield's theology was "most helpful in getting Fundamentalist Christians to back the international interest in one of Untermeyer's pet projects – the Zionist Movement."

Others, however, have been more explicit about the nature of Scofield's service to the Zionist agenda. In "Unjust War Theory: Christian Zionism and the Road to Jerusalem," Prof. David W. Lutz claims, "Untermeyer used Scofield, a Kansas city lawyer with no formal training in theology, to inject Zionist ideas into American Protestantism. Untermeyer and other wealthy and influential Zionists whom he introduced to Scofield promoted and funded the latter's career, including travel in Europe."

Absent such powerful connections, it is hard to imagine "this peer among scalawags" ever getting a contract with Oxford University Press to publish his bible. Nevertheless, it remains a mystery why OUP chose to endorse such a sectarian work.

See? Those nefarious Jews didn't only give the Bible to the world...they kept manipulating it by controlling unsuspecting Christians and forcing them to write Zionist commentaries decades before the State of Israel was reborn!

How could Oxford University Press be so blind to have bought into this century-old Jewish conspiracy?

Sarah Obama in Mecca for Hajj

From Al Arabiya:

Sarah Obama, the wife of the American President Barack Obama's grandfather, arrived in Saudi Arabia where she is set to perform the annual Muslim pilgrimage, or Hajj, press reports said Wednesday.

Sarah was accompanied by her grandson and Obama's cousins who will all be hosted as guests of the Custodian of the two Holy Mosques, King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz.
Sarah's trip to Saudi, along with 10 villagers from Kogelo Kenya, where she will head to Mecca and Medina as part of her pilgrimage refutes published reports that she had converted to Christianity.

Failed post open thread

Sometimes, even I don't feel like posting anything.

Maybe because I spent time earlier today on a post that went nowhere. I thought that this was really interesting (click to enlarge):

The thought that there was a building full of yeshiva bochurim fighting Nazis in 1939 was intriguing, but it seems that Nazi newspapers are not very truthful. What a shock.

The Nazis did burn the entire contents of the bais medrash, but there did not seem to be a battle over Yeshiva Chachmei Lublin. More details about what did happen in Lublin here and here.

2 Gazans injured...by a Qassam

Palestine Press Agency reports that two Gazans were injured when a Qassam rocket that was aimed at Israel went awry and landed inside a house at the Nuseirat camp.

This is not that rare an event; perhaps 5-10% of rockets fall short in Gaza, and there have been many injuries and fatalities as a result. Last December, in the days before Operation Cast Lead, no fewer than four Qassam rockets caused injuries and deaths in Gaza.

For some reason, PCHR and Goldstone could not find a single case of a fatality in Gaza from Qassam fire during Cast Lead. They also didn't find a single case of death by friendly fire, accidental explosions, "work accidents," tunnel collapses or the like. 100% of Gaza deaths (outside of the Fatah members admitted killed by Hamas) were caused by Israel alone. (Even the number of natural deaths dipped in Gaza during the fighting!)

Amazing how that worked out, isn't it?

Arab League finds a mediator for Algeria/Egypt

Remember when the Arab League was ticked off at the joking suggestion that Israel mediate between Algeria and Egypt in their simmering dispute over football?

Well, maybe they do have a sense of humor after all. Al Arabiya (Arabic) reports that the Arab League has asked a prominent, honorable Arab to mediate the dispute.

His name? Moammar Qaddafi!

The Libyan news agency reported that the Secretary General of the Arab League, Amr Mussa, called Gaddafi on Monday and asked him to intervene as Chairman of the African Union on the basis of his "high visibility, which is distinguished by the leader of each of the parties to an Arab."

The agency said "that the Leader of the Revolution will work to bridge the chasm that has been seen the relationship between the two countries Egypt and Algeria due to the repercussions of the recent football game between the two countries."

OK, maybe the Libyan news agency isn't the most objective source for this story, but it is not out of the realm of possibility. Libya is right in between both countries, after all.

And from the Arab League perspective, Qaddafi is a lot better than any Israeli would be!

Abbas lashes out at Obama

From Al Arabiya:

American President Barack Obama is "doing nothing" to restart the stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace process, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas said in an interview published on Tuesday.

"I hope he'll take a more important role in the future," Abbas told the Argentine daily Clarin during a visit to Buenos Aires.

The Palestinians "are waiting for the United States to put pressure on Israel so it respects international law, so it takes up the road map" towards peace, he said, according to publication's Spanish translation.

"It can do two things: put pressure on the Israelis so they reject settlements, and put pressure so they accept withdrawing to the 1967 borders."

Ah, the honeymoon is over.

Of course Abbas is upset that Obama is "doing nothing" - that's Abbas' job!

Free Gaza: "We are against humanitarian aid"

From the Free Gaza mailing list:

On November 7 and 8, The Free Gaza interim board of directors met in London to plan our strategy for 2010 as well as to schedule the next mission to Gaza.

...Israel’s use of force to stop our last 3 voyages has made it imperative to revise our strategy. Instead of sending one vessel to Gaza, we are working on a flotilla, or mini fleet with more boats, including at least one cargo ship, more people, more supplies, and more media on the high seas. And around the world, tens of thousands of people engaged in the mission. Our intention is to build a truly international fleet that will reach Gaza, or, if stopped, be politically costly for Israel.

...The former Prime Minister of Malaysia, Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamed established a Free Gaza fund and secured the money for us to obtain a cargo ship. On this cargo ship, we will take construction supplies to Gaza. We had wanted to travel in October / November so that at least some people in Gaza could start rebuilding their homes before the cold weather hit. Unfortunately we could not meet this deadline.

We have the funds for one cargo ship, and one passenger vessel. However, we need at least one more passenger vessel plus the operating expenses before we can go. In financial terms, we need about €300,000, or someone to donate a passenger vessel and €100,000 in operating expenses (fuel, port fees, crew wages, etc.)

The efforts of the Free Gaza Movement are vitally important; we need to end the blockade, not just deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza. While many potential funders recognize the significance of our work, for various reasons they have not come through with funding. Most prefer their financial contributions go toward to humanitarian aid for Palestine. But Palestine is not a charity case! There are hundreds of millions being pumped into Palestine by aid agencies that are unable or unwilling to address the political issues, or by donor countries that shirk their political, legal, and moral obligations, by throwing money at Palestine.

This aid is paying for Israel’s occupation by alleviating Israel of the responsibility to care for the people it occupies. We firmly believe that activists and people who care about Palestine should not be raising money for humanitarian aid but should focus on direct action to confront the Israeli policies that leave Palestinians in need of this aid.

FGM is saying explicitly that "this aid" by the donor countries and aid agencies mentioned in the previous sentence "is paying for Israel's occupation."

It is very clear: FGM says that money should be spent on pressuring Israel instead of feeding Gazans and that the aid itself is part of the evil that is the nonexistent "occupation" of Gaza.

And, to FGM fanatics, if Gazans do actually starve to death in order to make that greater good happen, all the better. They just won't quite say that part out loud.

They are also very frustrated that money that could go to their vanity boats is going instead to feeding Gazans. They are a very sick class of people.

Something to keep in mind the next time your newspaper refers to Free Gaza as a "humanitarian" or "aid" group. It is nothing of the sort - it is an extremist political organization that is against the UN, Red Cross, Jordan, Qatar and Egypt giving aid to Gazans!

Notice also that these progressive people have no qualms accepting money from an anti-semite.

Send IDF soldiers sufganiot!

National Donut Week is coming up, where you can send IDF soldiers sufganiot for Chanukah and brighten their day!

Details here.

For those who are more into fine Italian cuisine, you can also send pizza to the people who dedicate their lives to defending Israel (the same organization also sends donuts and burgers.)

Today's PalArab news 11/24/09

Egyptian authorities seized a car full of explosives and weapons near the Rafah crossing on Tuesday. The explosives were already packaged in plastic bags to make it easier to smuggle them through the tunnels to Gaza terrorists. This is in addition to the ton of explosives caught yesterday in a pickup truck.

Israel today allowed the final shipment of calves into Gaza for the Eid al Adha holiday. A total of 7000 calves have been imported into Gaza in recent weeks.

Qatar is sending 250 tons of books and stationary items to Gaza in the coming days, after coordinating it with Jordan (who presumably arranged the passage with Israel.)

The increasing news of an imminent deal to swap prisoners for Gilad Shalit is making Fatah very nervous, and their accusations against Hamas are growing more hysterical (in both senses of the word.) Today, PLO official Yasser Abd Rabbo accused Hamas of "allying with the devil" to embarrass the PA. (He also mentioned the little known fact that the PA is an extension of the PLO, something very relevant when considering Mahmoud Abbas' threats to quit as PA president - he is still the Fatah leader, and Fatah dominates the PLO.)

Another Fatah spokesman went even further, accusing Hamas of negotiating final status issues with Israel, even going so far as to accuse Hamas of being ready to recognize Israel in June 2010.

Notice that the PA and Fatah is attacking Hamas - from the more extreme position. It does not escape the PalArabs that the PA has recognized Israel since 1993, and when they bizarrely accuse Hamas of doing the same horrible crime they are making themselves look even sillier.

Millions of your tax dollars going to terrorists

Ma'an reports:

Palestinian prisoners will receive 550 New Israeli Shekels for the Eid Al-Adha holiday and for October and November, according to a statement released by Palestinian Minister of Prisoners and Ex-Detainees Issa Qaraqe on Monday.

Qaraqe added that the ministry was successful in raising prisoners’ canteen allowance to 50 NIS to allow detainees to purchase sweets during the Muslim Feast starting on Friday.

Qaraqi’ further stated that 35,000 Shekels were sent to 34 detainees in poor health held at Ar-Ramla prison hospital, in addition to 225,000 Shekels for tuition fees. Another payment will be forwarded to prisoners following the Eid Al-Adha holiday, he said.

Since the PA budget is dependent on money from Western countries (far outstripping oil-rich Gulf nations) this means that well over a million of our tax dollars are going towards terrorists in the next month alone.

Notice that taking care of people who tried to kill Jews is a major priority for the "moderate" PA, a cabinet-level position. Hamas and Islamic Jihad prisoners are paid as well.

Work accident!

Hamas' Al Qassam website reports that two commanders were killed in an explosion while performing a "jihad mission" in eastern Gaza.

Palestine Press Agency mentions a huge explosion that also wounded four. One of the commenters who says he witnessed the blast said that one of the bodies was hurled 200 meters from the blast, headless.

A toast to "martyrs" who turn to toast!

The 2009 PalArab self-death count is at 215.

Israel offered to mediate between Egypt and Algeria?

From Al-Arabiya:

The Arab League is currently mulling several proposals after it was forced to step in, rebuffing a provocative Israeli offer, to end a bitter tit-for-tat spat between Egypt and Algeria following their 2010 World Cup qualifier playoff match in Sudan.

An Arab League spokesman, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that since the tension has been rising Secretary General Amr Moussa h+as been receiving several phone calls from member states calling on the league to solve the crisis.

Arab initiatives to solve the problem intensified in the wake of a provocative statement made by Israel in which it offered to mediate between Egypt and Algeria.

Did Israel really offer to mediate between Egypt and Algeria? The idea is preposterous, as Israel and Algeria do not have any diplomatic relations themselves. Not to mention that Egypt and Algeria would probably prefer all-out war to the indignity of being counseled by Israel.

My guess is that some Israeli pundit or politician made that suggestion as a joke to tweak the Arabs on their internal international football crisis, and that the super-sensitive Arab League took it as a real offer, one which would of course cause add to the embarrassment they feel for the actual kerfuffle itself.

This brings up an entirely new avenue for world diplomacy: whenever Westerners have a problem with an Arab country, or when Arabs have their own internal disputes, the UN should threaten to send Israeli mediators to resolve the issues. They can justify it by saying that Jewish lawyers are well-known to be sly and smart. The thought is so scary to Arabs that they would redouble their efforts to solve their problems peacefully.

Let's try it with the Saudis and the Houthis!

A "metal foundry" in Gaza

On Saturday night, Israel struck a number of targets in Gaza in retaliation for a rocket attack. Wire services described the target in Jabalya as "a metal foundry" which Israel claimed was a weapons factory.

Pictures from Palestine Today might shed light on the matter. First they show the usual staged pictures of dejected people sitting in the rubble for no reason except to look dejected for the photographer:

That wasn't sad enough, so the photographer had to move to a new angle and repose his subject:

Then we get to the inside of the poor, destroyed metal foundry.

Hold on...what is that poster above the door?

Sure looks like a "martyr" poster, complete with a photo of heroic fighters aiming their guns from the top of a building!

Just the sort of decoration one would expect in a regular metal foundry!

I'd say that Israeli intelligence did a fine job in this case.