Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, June 11, 2010

Updated: Bring some Vuvuzela's to Gaza. They need them.

Palestinians gather outside an electrical appliances store in Gaza City, to watch a live televised broadcast of the opening match of the World Cup soccer tournament between South Africa and Mexico in Johannesburg, South Africa, Friday June 11, 2010.

Palestinians sit in their tent as they watch the opening match of the World Cup 2010 taking place in South Africa, on June 11, 2010, in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip. There [sic] home was destroyed during one of the Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip:

and a foreigner behind his netbook in Gaza:

Mmm, perhaps Flotilla only wanted to bring them some Vuvuzela's?

UPDATE: Btw, I thought the people in Gaza had no televisions. At least that's what Anne de Jong (Dutch passenger on one of the boats of Flotilla tries to let us believe:

Turkish Journalist Who Took Cropped Pictures Hanging Out with Terrorists

Little Green Footballs has more information on the Turkish journalist who took the cropped pictures:

Adem Ozkose’s connections to Islamists go quite a bit deeper than this. A reader in London emailed a link to the following article about Ozkose published last month at Turkish media site haber5.com: Haber5.com - Gerçek ve Özgürlükçü - Son haberler | Adem Özköse’nin kitapları yolda…

It turns out that Ozkose, as well as working for the Turkish ‘Real Life’ magazine and helping IHH try to run the Gaza blockade, is also a writer of Islamist books with at least one publisher deal and possibly more.

And the article at haber5.com is accompanied by the following picture, showing Adem Ozkose with two of his associates.

Here’s Ozkose interviewing a Hamas spokesman, and openly expressing his support for jihad: Mehraba.com » Özköse Gazze’yi ve Hamas’ı anlattı. (Google Translation.)

Accompanied by this photo:

Here’s Ozkose with a spokesman for Islamic Jihad, spreading the message: “Insurgents who kill civilians is not a killer.”

Accompanied by this photo:

Here’s Ozkose with a very sympathetic article about the Taliban: “The Taliban won the hearts of the Afghan people.”

Accompanied by the following photos:

And here’s Ozkose interviewing Umm Nidal — a Palestinian mother and Hamas parliament member whose three sons were killed while murdering Israeli civilians, some of them children — and treating her as a heroine: “I thank God that seven Israeli soldiers kill Muhammad as my other two sons were killed.”

Accompanied by this photo and translated caption:

It would have been normal if these meetings were part of objective reporting, but it is not. As LGF notes that in all of the cases

the articles written by Ozkose are not merely reporting on terrorist groups — these articles are promoting the jihadist ideology.

Can you expect honest reporting from such a guy?

AP doesn't even try to match the caption to the picture

Here's a picture of a Gazan family going for a ride along the Mediterranean:

How do you think AP captions it?

A Palestinian family rides on a motorcycle at the Gaza City port in Gaza City, Friday, June 11, 2010. Gaza has been mired in poverty for decades, but the embargo by Israel deepened the misery, erasing tens of thousands of jobs and preventing repair of damage from the Israeli offensive.

When one thinks "poverty," this is the exact picture that comes to mind.

By the way, the only time since at least the 1940s that Gaza was not so poverty-stricken was when Israel occupied it. So when wire services complain about how Israeli policies are responsible for Gaza's poverty, are they really advocating that Israel go back in and rebuild farms, greenhouses and an industrial park that were regular targets of terrorists? After all, a great number of Gazans' jobs were working for either Israelis in Gaza or for Israeli factories in Gaza. They lost those jobs not because of the embargo but because Israel withdrew from Gaza and the terror only increased.

Notice also that Hamas actions are not blamed at all for Gazan poverty.

Friday linkdump

The Weekly Standard claims that the US will support an anti-Israel resolution in the UN next week, calling for an international investigation of the flotilla raid. No word on an international probe and war crimes trial for the people responsible for the deaths of 23 civilians killed by a US drone in Afghanistan in February. (UPDATE: The White House denies the story.)

Thousands held a pro-Israel rally in Finland. Finland only has 1500 Jews, total.

The "democratically elected" PA government (well, almost half of them, anyway) decided to postpone local elections indefinitely.

A new study shows that, wow, Sephardi and Ashkenazi Jews really do all come from the same place in the Middle East. So much for the Khazar theory and Shlomo Sand. The study can be found here, but you have to pay to get the details.

You won't find any articles in the Arab press about Israelis saving Arab lives. And because it happens every day, you won't see too many from Israel either. This one is heartwarming.

Great analysis by Walter Russell Mead.

More on Hamas' siege of Gaza

After pressure from President Obama, discussions have accelerated between Israel, the Quartet, the EU, the PA and Egypt to see if the Rafah crossing can be re-opened under a variation of the rules that were in place before Hamas' coup in Gaza.

These included an international team of European observers called EUBAM-Rafah, PA officers manning the crossing, and cameras that Israel kept an eye on from Kerem Shalom. Israel was never happy with the level of inspections, though.

After the coup, EUBAM went into paid hibernation, waiting to become relevant again and doing the occasional lecture to the PA to justify their paychecks.

How does Hamas look at these attempts to ease the restrictions on movement of people and goods into Gaza?

Why, they are spitting mad, of course.

Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri lashed out at the PA and Egypt, saying that they were using the Rafah issue as a pretext to weaken Hamas and facilitate the ultimate takeover of Gaza by Fatah.

Gee, do you get the impression that Hamas is more interested in staying in power and having complete control over all of Gaza's crossings than they are in the welfare of the people of Gaza?

More details on why Egypt is banning marriage to Israeli Jewish women

Al Masry al-Youm goes into an interesting detail of the justification for Egypt's new law that bans Egyptian men from marrying Israeli Jews (and, just maybe, Jews altogether):

The higher court's final--and irreversible--June 5 ruling is designed, according to Nabil el-Wahash, the lawyer who first raised the case, to protect Egypt's national security and prevent a new generation of Egyptians "disloyal to Egypt and the Arab world."

The case stems from the fact that, in Judaic tradition, religion is passed down through the mother, thus rendering Jewish all children born to Jewish mothers. Since, under Israeli state law, all Jews are eligible to become citizens of Israel--the self-proclaimed "Jewish state"--the offspring of Egyptian men married to Israeli women could theoretically apply for Israeli citizenship, which would oblige them to temporarily serve in the Israeli military. Seeing this as a potential conflict of interest, the Egyptian judiciary upheld the ruling to strip Egyptian men married to Jewish-Israeli women of their citizenship.

Under Egypt's citizenship law, three crimes can lead to the forfeiture of one's citizenship: if he or she is found to pose a threat to national security; is guilty of treason; or if he or she is a Zionist, explained Hafez Abu Saeda, head of the Cairo-based Egyptian Organization for Human Rights.

Discrimination aside, critics of the law say it contains a number of loopholes, including, among other things, the question of Egyptian men marrying Jewish women not carrying Israeli passports. With Jews anywhere in the world eligible to become Israeli citizens, might a new law be enacted to strip the citizenship of all Egyptian men married to Jewish women, Israeli or otherwise?

While this remains highly unlikely, Egypt and Israel remain neighbors--officially at peace since 1979--so Israeli women are therefore set to remain a common factor in Egyptian-Jewish marriages.

The logic of this law is exactly the same as a law that would outlaw Jews from living in Egypt.

Notice that Egypt has a law that makes being a "Zionist" a reason to strip someone of their citizenship. This means that even three decades after the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty, Egypt still does not fundamentally accept the right of Israel to exist - because that is what Zionism is.

I wonder if Jordan has a similar law.

(The article also quotes the highly exaggerated figure that some 30,000 Egyptians are married to Israeli Jews - a figure that was pretty much plucked out of thin air, and is probably exaggerated by one or two orders of magnitude.)

Israeli plot to steal water from the Nile revealed!

Al Masry al-Youm reports:

The ruling National Democratic Party's policies secretariat has reportedly received a confidential memorandum from a member of the Egyptian Council for Foreign Affairs detailing Israeli designs to gain access to the waters of the Nile River in exchange for completing construction of the Gongli Canal project in southern Sudan.

It is estimated that, when complete, the Gongli Canal project would increase Sudan's and Egypt's annual share of Nile water by between 10 billion and 15 billion cubic meters. According to the memorandum, Israel plans to ask for half of these amounts, for which it is prepared to pay US$0.1 per cubic meter.

According to these charges, Israeli expertise can increase the amount of fresh water available to Egypt and Sudan by a huge amount. In exchange, Israel wants to pay low rates to buy some of this water that would not exist without Israeli help.

Egypt would lose nothing, and would gain enormously. Yet the NDP would rather deny their own citizens access to water in order to keep Israelis from getting water!

How's that for hate?

Not only hat, but the NDP is so confident that this idea - of Israelis helping Egyptians and Sudanese get billions more cubic meters of fresh water - is abhorrent to average Egyptian that it leaks this alleged plan as a scandal!

Here is how Palestine Today illustrates the reported water plan - a stereotypical Jew cutting the veins of Egypt in the shape of the Nile river basin.

This is the difference between Arabs and Israelis in a nutshell. Israel keeps trying to find win-win solutions, things that would benefit everyone in the region. This is how they approach the peace process, relations with Arabs, and relations with the rest of the world. They will constantly seek solutions that not only help themselves but everyone else as well.

To Arabs, however, everything involving Israel is a zero-sum game, and if Israel gains anything, then, by definition, the Arabs lose.

This is no exaggeration - in fact, some Arabs will happily admit this fact.

The natural outcome from all this is that Arabs will hurt their own people in order to hurt Israel, and when Israel helps Arabs that is considered a defeat for the Arab nation - because this is what Israelis want to do. Peace itself is considered a loss for Arab honor!

Zionism itself was meant to be a win-win - where the Arabs of Palestine would be enriched and all boats would rise with the huge economic and social benefits that accompany the Jewish return to their homeland. Arab leaders and intellectuals couldn't think in those terms, because being helped by the hated Jews is an affront to their honor. (The ordinary citizens generally had no such problems, and remain today the main victims of their leaders' intransigence and dedication to the zero-sum game.)

The contrast between the two worldviews cannot be starker. One is enlightened and progressive, seeking solutions to problems; the other is primitive and archaic, preferring to exacerbate their own problems in order to inflict damage on a hated enemy.

And Israel has to figure out how to live in a region where "lose-lose" is considered, perversely, a victory.

Egyptian delegation upset Hamas served Israeli food

Palestine Press Agency reports on an argument that broke out between an Egyptian delegation to Gaza and their Hamas hosts.

Ismail Haniyeh hosted a fancy luncheon for the Egyptians, members of a parliamentary delegation to help reconcile Hamas with Fatah.

When the Egyptians saw that some of the food on the table was labeled "Made in Israel," they became upset. One exclaimed, "By Allah, shame on you."

The Council has Spoken

Once again, I am honored to have had a post nominated for the weekly Watcher of Weasel awards. (And once again, I lost.)

I had posted so much in the past week, I had to click on the link to remember what the nominated post was about. It just goes to show that sometimes, the posts that one doesn't think are very important end up making waves, and vice versa - posts that I think would go viral instead go nowhere.

Thanks to Snapped Shot for nominating me!

Newest videos shed more light on Mavi Marmara raid (part 2)

The Israeli Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center showed once again how closely aligned it is with the IDF, as it has posted two videos and one transcript of interrogations with the captain and the chief officer of the Mavi Marmara.

Here is their synopsis:

1. The videotaped statements of two Mavi Marmara crew members show that preparations for a violent confrontation with IDF forces were put in motion about two hours before the boarding began, when the Israeli Navy hailed the ship and told it to halt.

2. According to the statements, the atmosphere aboard the Mavi Marmara was tense and the crew noticed a gathering on the main deck. When they checked the upper deck they discovered that IHH operatives were cutting the ship’s railings with metal disks they had brought with them into lengths suitable to be used as clubs. The crew members said the activities worried them and that they tried to stop the operatives but were unsuccessful.

I put the two videos together; the captain is speaking English and the chief officer is subtitled:

Here's the transcript from the chief officer:

Statement: I was on the bridge after dark, before anything happened, the third captain and I were sent in the direction of the life boats, where there were a lot of people and a lot of noise. The captain told me something was happening down there, there are noises, go see what’s going on. There were a lot of people. I told the third captain, you are more senior than I, come with me.”

Q: When did that happen?

A: Around eight o’clock, I don’t know exactly when, but around eight. I went down the stairs with the third captain. We saw a senior person [from IHH]

Q: Who?

A: That guy.

Q: What guy?

A: That guy. Maybe the third captain knows his name.

Q: The guy from IHH?

A: Yes, from IHH.

Q: Whose name does he know? The name of the guy from IHH who cut the railings?

A: No, the third captain knows him from IHH. We [the third captain and I] went together, we saw a lot of people milling around and we asked what was going on.

Q: Did you see them cutting [the railings]?

A: They [the iron rods] were already cut. It was all over.

Q: Who did the cutting?

A: I didn’t see.

Q: Who was holding the disk?

A: The disks were lying in a corner of the stairs and the senior guy [apparently a reference to Bülent Yildirim] was next to them.

Q: The senior guy from IHH?

A: Yes.

Q: Who did the disks belong to?

A: I don’t know, they didn’t belong to the ship. We don’t have equipment like that on board. On deck there were metal poles with clips for cables, when I got there they had been cut.

Q: When did this happen?

A: When it was getting dark. I asked one of them who cut the poles, and he said he didn’t know.

Q: Was the man you asked a crew member?

A: No.

Q: Did he belong to IHH?

A: Of course.

Q: You seem to be saying that the people from IHH were in control of the ship. Did the crew need their permission to move around the ship?

A: Definitely, they [i.e. IHH operatives] didn’t let people they didn’t know move around.

Q: Did they prevent anyone they didn’t know from moving freely around the ship?

A: Yes, definitely.

Q: And was that from the first moment they went up on deck?

A: Yes, definitely.

Q: How did the IHH operatives communicate with one another?

A: When they [the IHH operatives] got on board in Istanbul they brought walkie-talkies with them. They were handed out to the IHH operatives and the crew.

Q: Did you [the crew] get them as well?

A: Yes, each one worked on a different frequency.

Q: I don’t understand, they didn’t let the passengers and crew go from one deck to another?

A: They could go anywhere except to the control center they set up on the bridge.

Q: How many IHH operatives were there on the upper deck.

A: Forty.

Q: The same forty all the time or did they change?

A: More of less the same forty.

Q: You’re referring to the group that joined the ship in Istanbul?

A: yes.

So it seems more and more clear that most of the passengers of the Marmara didn't know what the IHH plans were and possibly wouldn't have approved; yet they must have known that the IHH had taken control of the ship and was calling the shots - co-opting the European and American flotilla organizers.

It also appears that the passenger/witnesses have closed ranks around IHH, not willing to say anything bad about a group that had violent intent. Keep in mind that the crew here is saying that the IHH was already cutting iron bars and chains at nightfall; they say two hours before the IDF was visible but probably some 6-8 hours before the helicopters arrived (at around 4 AM.)

This brings up the question of, if the boats already saw the passengers with the chains and iron bars from the boat, why the first wave of soldiers still came only armed with paintball guns.

(h/t OR)

Newest videos shed more light on Mavi Marmara raid (part 1)

One of the activists aboard the Mavi Marmara managed to get a 15-minute video out showing the passengers before and during the IDF raid.

It can be seen at the "Cultures of Resistance" site.

Some interesting parts:

Starting at around the 3:00 mark, we see an IDF helicopter hovering, and then at least 7 soldiers are seen rappelling down to the deck, much more quickly than those that came from the first helicopter. It appears that the IDF figured out very quickly what was going on and ensured that the mistakes from the first drop, where the soldiers were beaten, would not be repeated.

That section of the video was taken from the deck below the main deck. Even though it appears from other evidence that the IHH had a core of some 40 members who were planning to do the heavy fighting and who effectively took over the top deck (see next posting and video), there were people on the second deck who were also supplied with slingshots (3:40)

They mention having two soldiers "bleeding and wounded" but I'm not sure I see them (6:00) They might have been edited out.

Some of the IHH fighters are seen, wounded and dying.

Most interesting to me was the sequence at about 12:30, where an Israeli boat is speeding alongside the ship. Even though it is now morning, and clearly at least an hour since the first soldiers dropped onto the ship, the activists are still throwing debris towards the Israeli navy - which runs very much counter to the flotilla members' accounts of a white flag being immediately raised and a PA announcement of immediate surrender and stopping resistance. In this video we hear the captain telling people to go to their rooms and remain calm after daybreak, but we never hear the audio saying that the ship has surrendered.

More in the next post.

Toameh: what about Hamas' Siege of Gaza?

Arab-Israeli journalist Khaled Abu Toameh asks What about Hamas' Siege of Gaza?

As Israeli naval commandos raided the flotilla ship convoy that was on its way to the Gaza Strip, Hamas security officers stormed the offices of five non-governmental organizations, confiscated equipment and documents, and ordered them closed indefinitely.

...

The raid on the NGOs in the Gaza Strip, which received little coverage in the media, is seen by many Palestinians as part of Hamas's ongoing crackdown on political opponents and human rights organizations.

Further, Hamas's recent decision to ban municipal elections in the Gaza Strip is yet another violation of one of the basic rights of its constituents.

Hundreds of Palestinians have been arrested by Hamas's security forces for daring to speak out against the state of tyranny and intimidation in the Gaza Strip. Over the past three years, dozens of Fatah officials and members have either been thrown into prison or killed.

Under Hamas, the Gaza Strip is being transformed into a fundamentalist Islamic entity resembling the regimes of the Ayatollahs in Iran and the Taliban in Afghanistan.

...

Instead of searching for ways to improve the living conditions of the 1.5 million Palestinians of the Gaza Strip, Hamas is busy enforcing strict Islamic rules on the population, such as Hamas policemen, for example, often stopping men and women who are seen together in public to inquire about the nature of their relationship.

...

Hamas, however, is more interested in clinging to power than in serving its people; and in light of increased calls for lifting the blockade following the flotilla incident at sea, the movement's leaders in Syria and the Gaza Strip are now convinced that they are marching in the right direction.

It is one thing to help the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, but it is another thing to help Hamas. Those who wish to deliver aid to the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip can always find better and safer ways to do so - either through Israel or Egypt. But those who only seek confrontation with Israel in the sea are only emboldening Hamas and helping it tighten its grip on the people of Gaza Strip.

The Forgotten Rachels

Rachel Corrie's death was a tragic accident, but the death of these Rachels could have been avoided. In light of the Rachel Corrie recently embarking for Gaza, the Jewish Virtual Library created this video as a tribute to "The Forgotten Rachels" who all died as a result of Palestinian terrorism:

(h/t sshender)

Hamas strengthens siege on Gaza

You remember, so many days ago, that humanitarians were up in arms because Gazans were not able to get coriander from Israel?

Israel has been derided for its seemingly arbitrary policies that seemed to allow certain items into Gaza while disallowing others.

Well, Israel just tried to ship a bunch of new items into Gaza, like snacks, spices (maybe even the dreaded coriander!) and sodas.

And Hamas rejected them.

As Al Arabiya reports:

Hamas said they will not let newly approved food items into the Gaza Strip as long as Israel maintains its blockade of the territory, as Arab League Chief Amr Moussa plans to visit the Strip on Sunday.

Israel slightly eased the much-criticized blockade on Wednesday by permitting snacks, spices and some other previously banned food items into Gaza.

Hamas' economy minister, Ziad al-Zaza, said on Thursday that Gaza doesn't need soda and soft drinks.

So are we going to be hearing about Hamas' siege on Gaza in the media?

Well, they didn't notice last year, so I don't think they'll notice it now.

By the way: there is no Israeli blacklist of items allowed in Gaza that includes coriander or jams. Gisha made up a list that they "deduced" from speaking to Gazans; that list was publicized by reporters and activists who thought it was too good to check. In fact, the IDF works on a day-to-day basis with various NGOs and others in Gaza to see what can make it in the upcoming shipments. Israel does have a list of allowed items that will always be allowed in; everything else is done on a case by case basis. If UNRWA made a special request for coriander or chocolate, there is no doubt that it would be allowed in. Right now, the problem is bureaucratic and practical, not policy.

U.S. Army Col. (Ret.) Ann Wright, on a speaking tour of the United States on behalf of radical pacifist women's group Code Pink, bills herself as an eyewitness to the IDF raid on the Mavi Marmara and the "murder" of "nine innocent civilians." However, in an interview with Aaron Lerner of IMRA, she admits she did not actually see the clash between the IDF soldiers and the armed passengers on board the Mavi Marmara.
In a promotional e-mail on behalf of "Code Pink: Women for Peace," Wright says: "I just returned from the Gaza Freedom Flotilla and started my speaking tour last night in NYC to share what I witnessed aboard the flotilla, and what people can do to end the siege."
"I witnessed the Israeli attack that killed 9 persons and wounded 50 on the Gaza Flotilla... the murder of nine persons... Tragically, it took another example of disproportionate use of force by the Israeli military that resulted in the deaths of nine innocent civilians to force many governments of the world to call for the Israelis to end the siege of Gaza."
In the interview with Lerner she admitted that she was not aboard the Mavi Marmara but on a different ship, the Challenger, which was about 150 yards distant from the Marmara.
The confrontation took place between 4:30 and 5:00 a.m., in the dark of night (IDF footage of the raid was carried out with night vision equipment).

She admits:

My witness will be specifically what happened on our ship, the
Challenger. And then I can comment on what happened in the very first three
or four minutes as the Israeli commandos were trying to board the ship. We
saw that from the stern of the ship. But after that that's when my
witnessing from my own eyes of what happened on that ship would end.

Read the whole article...