Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Morning links

CAMERA notes how churches who love to condemn everything Israel does have been eerily silent after Itamar.

Also at CAMERA, a Ha'aretz editor's tweets show incredible contempt for Israelis mourning the slaughter of the Fogels.

Speaking of tweets, police are investigating a McGill University student who tweeted that he wanted to kill everyone who was watching a movie because they were all part of a Zionist satanic ritual. (It was not even a Zionist film.)

Israeligirl asks: Did you know that Israel transfers pension payments to eligable Gazans?

FresnoZionism fisks a ridiculous LA Times op-ed.

Someone else made a video out of my posters:

The poster page now has over 10,000 views, making it the most popular page ever on this blog (beating out Gabriel Latner's speech.)

Evil, extremist settlers save Arab baby's life. Leftists don't notice.

Only meters from where a Jewish baby's life was snuffed out by Palestinian Arabs, an Arab baby's life was saved by the community's Jews:

IDF forces and local paramedics helped save the life of a Palestinian woman and her newly born infant Wednesday, at the settlement where Fogel relatives are sitting Shiva for the five Israelis brutally murdered last week.

Just as IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz arrived in Neve Tzuf to offer his condolences, a Palestinian cab raced towards the community's entrance. In it, soldiers and paramedics discovered a Palestinian woman in her 20s in advanced stages of labor and facing a life-threatening situation: The umbilical cord was wrapped around the young baby girl's neck, endangering both her and her mother.

The quick action of settler paramedics and IDF troops deployed in the area saved the mother's and baby's life, prompting great excitement and emotions at the site where residents are still mourning the brutal death of five local family members.

Corporal Haim Levin, 19, an IDF paramedic, was the first medical team member at the scene and recounted the dramatic situation he faced.

"When I arrived, I saw a woman covered by a blanket in a yellow Palestinian van. I moved closer and saw the baby's head and upper body," he told Ynet. "The umbilical cord was around the baby's neck; the baby was grey and didn't move."

"I first removed the cord from the neck and at the same time asked paramedics to prepare the baby resuscitation kit. I pinched her to see if she's responding, and she started to cry," he said. Paramedics also treated the mother, who was in good condition at that point, Levin said.

Meanwhile, ambulance driver Orly Shlomo raced to the scene. "We joined the military paramedic and helped him cut off the umbilical cord…without the medical treatment, the fetus and woman faced genuine life danger," she told Ynet.

"It was touching, but I couldn't help but think that a few meters from there, people were sitting Shiva for another baby, who was murdered," she said. "I was touched to see the face of the new baby, but I also thought about the face of the murdered baby."

Gadi Amitun, who heads the Magen David Adom team at Neve Tzuf, said this was not the first time settlers assist Palestinians in distress.

"They know we have a skilled medical team here, and in any case of accident or injury they arrive and we help them," he said.

The paramedic noted that on the day of the Fogel massacre, settlers saw fireworks and celebrations in nearby Palestinian communities, but added that the local medical team is committed to assisting anyone in need.

Palestinians from the nearby village of Nabi Salah gathered around the paramedics along with the new grandmother and could not hide their joy.

"They thanked us and told us they named the girl Jude," Corporal Levin said.

Compare this article to how a Mondoweiss writer named Max Ajl describes what he think the left's reaction should be to the Itamar murders:

You want my condemnation? You will not have it. No one should respond to such demagogic moral blackmail. We killed those children. There are those who will warp my words. Good luck. I do not want children to die, no child deserves to die or deserves such parents or deserves to be born into such a society or such a state.

It is amazing that the Jewish anti-Israel left is less sympathetic to the Itamar victims than the neighboring Arabs whose land is supposedly being stolen. And to these sickening leftists, Jews who want to live in Judea and Samaria do not have the right to life.

I have news for Ajl: No child deserves to be born into his household, one that is filled with such hate. As we can see from the article above, a child born in the communities of Itamar and Neve Tzuf will be infinitely more kind, caring - and liberal - than sick moral midgets like Ajl.

(h/t Challah Hu Akbar)

(corrected community name)

Iran's "flying saucer"

From FARS News:

TEHRAN (FNA)- Iran unveiled a home-made unmanned flying saucer as well as a light sports aircraft in an exhibition of strategic technologies.

The unmanned flying saucer, named "Zohal", was unveiled in a ceremony attended by Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei.

Zohal, designed and developed jointly by Farnas Aerospace Company and Iranian Aviation and Space Industries Association (IASIA), can be used for various missions, specially for aerial imaging.

The flying machine is equipped with an auto-pilot system, GPS (Global Positioning System) and two separate imaging systems with full HD 10 mega-pixel picture quality and is able to take and send images simultaneously.

They illustrate the article with this picture:

Looks cool! Also, surprisingly fake!

It turns out that the actual device looks like this:

I'm bummed. I was hoping that Iran's leaders were getting some alien anal probes in exchange for the nifty flying saucer technology.

After all, Iran has said publicly that it shot down several UFOs in 2009. Really.

Video of clashes at Gaza "unity" rally yesterday (updated)

This video actually comes from a Hamas website, where they are claiming that the people attacking the demonstrators are Fatah!

Hamas also attacked students at Al Azhar University in Gaza yesterday.

The Foreign Press Association described the scene like this:

On a day ostensibly devoted to Palestinian unity, police brutally attacked photographers and cameramen, beating them, breaking equipment and confiscating photos and video footage.

Time magazine's disgusting Itamar story: "Murder by knife"

Time magazine's Karl Vick writes an article that is supposedly about the Itamar slaughter - but is in fact about how much he hates Israel.

Here's every word Vick wrote about the massacre:

The murder by knife of three children, including an infant of 3 months, and both parents in a West Bank settlement late Friday night rocked Israel terribly.

...The slaughter did not eradicate the family. Three of the Fogel children survived — two brothers who were asleep in another bedroom, and their 12-year-old sister, who discovered the scene when she arrived home at midnight from a meeting of a youth group. The means of entry into the settlement was apparently a hole cut in the perimeter fence, undetected by civilian guards. But the identity of the attackers remains unknown.

See? It wasn't so bad - three children survived! What are those Jews getting all hot and bothered about?

Out of a 922 word story, the actual murders, dealt with only peripherally, take up a mere 97 words. All without a single detail on what actually happened outside the two words "by knife."

By contrast, saying that Israel was consumed with revenge took 87 words.

240 words were about Israel's settlements and how they are the main obstacle to peace.

77 words about the release of gruesome photos of the victims and supposedly tasteless banner ads by victim aid organizations that referred to the attacks.

97 words were written on the "cycle of violence" between Palestinian Arabs who have killed settlers and reprisal attacks by Jews.

And 94 words on the funeral.

I searched Time's site and did not find any other articles that described the murders at all, so it is not as if this story was assuming that the readers knew about the details. These are all the details that Time felt necessary to give. In other words, the settlements and Israeli politicization of the murders are the story; the murders themselves are just a minor detail.

Vick also writes about the smallish, largely ineffective unity protests in the West Bank and Gaza yesterday.

While he didn't fall for the absurd estimate from Ma'an of between 200,000 and 300,000 protesters in Gaza, more accurately saying 10,000, he downplays the Hamas attacks on the protesters with the passive-voice trick:

Scuffles and injuries were reported.

However, check out this part:

Part of the problem Tuesday was the number of venues. Gaza had to demonstrate separately — it's separated from the West Bank by miles and Israeli barricades.

That's like saying that Canada is separated from Mexico by miles and American checkpoints.

Vick cannot even bring himself to mention that an entire country separates Gaza from the West Bank.

To him, Israel is merely an unjust obstacle stopping Palestinian Arabs from freely traveling to each other.

(h/t BtB)

Mid-day links

A surprising op-ed from Turkey:

Addressing Israel’s leaders from a public rally in Turkey, Mr. Erdoğan said in both Turkish and English: “You shall not kill.” Then he showed his linguistic capabilities and went on: “You still don’t get it? Then I shall speak to you in your own language: Lo tir’tsach!”

In various other speeches, Mr. Erdoğan claimed that his fits of anger toward the death of children were “indiscriminative” of race and religion. “Wherever, whenever,” he often said, “a child has been killed,” he would fiercely stand against the murderers. All the same, he has been mute since Saturday.
...
Most predictably, we have not heard Mr. Erdoğan saying "You shall not kill" in Arabic, and we probably never will. That’s hardly surprising since we have never heard Mr. Erdoğan speaking “indiscriminately” in the past against the killing of children and defenseless people in Itamar, or elsewhere in Israel – for Saturday’s attack in Itamar was not the first of its kind.

However, Turkey's Foreign Ministry did condemn the slaughter on Saturday night (not Tuesday as Ha'aretz writes) - even referring to it as terror (along with the compulsory mention of the settlements being "a clear breach of international law.")

I had missed this important article by Martin Sherman in YNet last week.

[T]he unpalatable - and unfashionable - truth is that between the (Jordan) River and the (Mediterranean) Sea, there can prevail (and eventually will prevail) either total Jewish sovereignty or total Arab sovereignty.

From JPost:

A think-tank affiliated with Germany’s Social Democratic Party issued a new report last week that revealed high levels of anti-Semitism in Germany, Poland and Hungary, as well as varying manifestations of racism, homophobia and prejudice in eight European countries.

CIFWatch on anti-Israel bias from the BBC.

(h/t O, PostWest)

Incredible story from the Fogel shiva home

From A Soldier's Mother blog:

For now, the Fogel family is sitting Shiva, the hardest, most intense part of the mourning. People come to visit and usually, food is put out somewhere. Some people spend hours sitting and talking - and many try to encourage the family to eat something. You talk of the loved ones, you see pictures. People come and tell you stories you had never heard before about how special they were. Your heart breaks a thousand times, and then a thousand times more.

Quietly, over the last few days, a man has been coming to the house bringing food and stocking the kitchen. His name is Rami Levy and he owns a chain of supermarkets. I've heard amazing stories about him in the past but this one beats all I have ever heard.

Every day, Rami Levy comes by the shiva house to the Fogel family and fills the cupboards and refrigerator himself with food for the family and guests. Today, one of the relatives thanked him for this incredible kindness and his response brought me to tears,"You will get used to my face," he told this family in mourning, "I have committed myself that every week I will deliver food and stock your home until the youngest orphan turns 18 years old."

The youngest orphan of this tragedy is a young 2 year old boy...

What Rami Levy has done is commit to 16 years of kindness. If this was a week in which the Palestinians should be ashamed, and it was, than this is a week in which we Jews have the right to be so proud.

Iran denies arms shipment, says Israel will drown (UPDATED)

From UPI:

Iranian military commander Maj. Gen. Ataollah Salehi denied Israeli charges a ship seized by Israeli commandos carried 50 tons of Iranian weapons.

"Israel is a regime made of lie, making lies and fabrications," Salehi told the Iranian state news agency IRNA Wednesday.

"The Zionist regime will drown in the waters of the Mediterranean Sea, God willing, after the collapse of the Egyptian pharaoh," Salehi said, rejecting Israel's claims the weapons found aboard the ship headed for Gaza were from Iran.

He also insulted Europe and the US, but that part didn't make it into the UPI report:

"The arrogant countries of the nineteen century condemned militarism, but now, they all resort to militaristic means and seek to repress regional wronged nations," he said referring to the regional turmoil.

But not to worry. Iran's message is one of peace!

"Last year we successfully sent our vessels to the Mediterranean Sea and we expect our navy will navigate in the oceans which will manifest our power carrying a message of peace and friendship," he added.

Meanwhile, an intriguing report:

Turkey's government says a cargo plane from Iran has been required to land in Turkey so its shipment could be searched.

But the Foreign Ministry denied a Dogan news agency report that Turkish military jets forced the plane to land at Diyarbakir airport on Tuesday night to search it for an alleged cargo of arms from Iran to Syria.

The ministry says it is standard procedure for Iranian cargo planes to request permission to fly over Turkey and sometimes be required to make unscheduled landings to be searched.

Turkey's official Anatolia news agency confirmed that the plane, heading from Tehran to Aleppo, Syria, was searched Wednesday.

But Anatolia and the government did not say what the cargo plane was found to be carrying.

I can't wait for the peaceful Iranian regime to extend its benevolent hegemony over the entire world!

UPDATE: From Ha'aretz:

The plane, which allegedly contained weapons connected to Iran's nuclear program, was forced to landed in the city of Diyarbakir. Security officials arrived at the airport to check the plane's contents, Turkish news agencies reported.

From Trend.AZ:

Turkish air forces forced a cargo plane carrying military supplies from Iran to Syria to land in southeast Turkey on Wednesday after receiving a tip-off warning of nuclear weapons onboard, local media reported.

But the latest from Zawya:

The plane, instructed to land at Diyarbakir airport as it overflew eastern Turkey on its way to Syria, was found to be carrying 150 tons of food but no "material contrary to international standards," the sources added.

After several hours of search on the plane for military or nuclear related cargo onboard, the aircraft took off at 1330 GMT, an AFP correspondent at the scene saw.

Anti-nuclear, biological and chemical material unit of civilian defence teams took part in the inspection of the plane as well, Anatolia news agency reported.

Egypt claims to have uncovered a Mossad spy ring

From Al Masry al-Youm's daily newspaper roundup:

Al-Wafd’s front page sheds light on the first case of uncovering an Israeli spy network in Egypt since the 25 January uprising.

The opposition newspaper says that Egyptian security forces have arrested an Egyptian and two Israelis on suspicion of belonging to Israel’s Mossad Intelligence Agency.

The public prosecution is currently conducting extensive investigations, which show that the Israeli-spy ring is accused of harming Egypt’s public interest and its national economy.

The report says the prosecutor refused to reveal more details about the case to the paper until the investigation finishes.

Bloomberg adds:

Egyptian prosecutors ordered the detention for 15 days of a foreign citizen accused of spying for Israel, the state-run Al Ahram newspaper reported today without saying how it got the information.

The suspect entered the country after the Jan. 25 uprising to “collect information related to the security of the country,” the newspaper said. He confessed to spying, the paper said. Investigators are looking into the possibility of partners working with the suspect, it said. The newspaper didn’t identify the nationality of the suspect.

Egypt had announced in December that it had arrested an Egyptian who had been giving information to Israel in August, 2010.

Real PalArabs seem genuinely upset at Itamar slaughter

I mentioned in passing on Sunday that I did not see too much support for the slaughter of the Fogel family on Palestinian Arabic forums, even those that are pro-Hamas. This is in great contrast to the universal reactions of joy that we've seen after other terror attacks.

This observation has been strengthened by a Hebrew video report by Shlomi Eldar in Shechem (Nablus.) Yaakov Lozowick summarizes:

I've been reporting in the Palestinian territories for many years, and the responses I recorded today in Shchem (Nablus) really surprised me. They seem to show a substantial distance between the PA leadership and regular people. The leadership (he cites Abbas and others) are muttering a condemnation of the murder, mostly not in Arabic and not in front of their public, and then they're condemning Israeli settlements. Nothing new here. On the other hand, I went to Shchem today, and was very surprised. People on the street were willing to condemn the murder unequivocally, in Arabic and in Hebrew, with no embarrassment, in front of the camera, and even identify themselves. [He shows some examples]. I've been covering the Palestinian territories for years, but this I've never seen before. In the middle of town, publicly, people had no compunctions openly to condemn the murder of children.

At this point one of the two anchormen asks if this is real, or perhaps a one-off encounter with unusual townsmen. Eldar insists: the interviews I've just shown were representative, and I made lots of them, not only the snippets I just screened. Moreover, I didn't find anyone saying the usual things about how it's settlers and Israelis and IDF violence and all that. The atmosphere in Shchem today is that the murder of the Fogel family was a terrible crime.

Yaacov goes on to give possible reasons for the change, including:

1. Netanyahu's economic peace is working. Look at the store fronts of Shchem: the economy is obviously booming, people are beginning to live normal lives, and this allows them to think normal thoughts. The fact that the IDF has largely moved out of the West Bank and has dismantled most of the roadblocks, even as the settlements aren't growing, no matter what the international media reports, is creating a new breathing space for the Palestinians, and they're beginning to breathe normally.

...

4. Settlements aren't as aggravating as we've endlessly been told. If there really is a sea change underway in the West Bank, it has started even though the Jewish settlements are still there. This doesn't necessarily mean the Palestinian populace is willing to have them stay there, but it may mean they're open to a process where reconciliation happens in the minds before the reality is foolishly and irrevocably changed.

He concludes:

Over the past few months, perhaps a year, I've been wandering a lot through East Jerusalem, and occasionally through parts of the West Bank, and the calm and normality have been striking. I've also had more simply normal human interactions with Palestinians than in many years. Something may be happening - unreported in the media, in a dynamic which contradicts the endless chatter of the diplomats - but potentially very important.

If so, it needs to be carefully and warily nurtured. Carefully, warily, and nurtured. And patiently. Not words that are easily compatible with the instincts of the people who've got it wrong so far, who need to see their pet solutions applied NOW, and are intoxicated with their certainties.

It would be nice if this represents a change in attitude. I'm not quite so optimistic.

It may be as simple as the mental image of a baby being slashed to death is a lot more gut-wrenching - more personal - than a bomb or bullet is.

Also, keep in mind that unlike the August 2010 murder of a carload of Jews near Kiryat Arba, including a pregnant woman, this attack was not claimed by any major terror group. Since there was a vacuum where the bragging used to be, there was no reason for the public to follow their leaders' party line and support the attack - and no reason to fear publicly condemning it.

Did the weapons on the Victoria come from Iranian ships last month?

From the IDF:

Below is a preliminary list of weaponry and weaponry systems discovered and unloaded this morning at the Ashdod Port hidden in the cargo of the “Victoria” vessel.
230 mortar shells, 120 mm

2,270 mortar shells, 60 mm

6 C-704 anti-ship missiles

2 radar systems manufactured in England

2 launchers

2 hydraulic mounting cranes for radar system

66,960 bullets for the Kalashnikov, 7.62 millimeter

It is important to note that the C-704 shore-to-sea missiles have a range of 35 kilometers and according to assessments, their intended destination to the Gaza Strip would have constituted a significant gain in the weapons capabilities of terror organizations operating there.
The identification document for the anti-ship missiles was in Persian and contained emblems of the Iranian government throughout. In addition, the ship left from the Syrian port of Lattakia before stopping in Turkey to make its way to Egypt. To the IDF’s understanding, Egypt and Turkey had no prior knowledge of the weaponry.
This incident further demonstrates Iranian and Syrian involvement in strengthening and arming terror organizations in the Gaza Strip and elsewhere.

It is notable that the Iranian ships that went through the Suez Canal last month docked at the same Syrian port. Here's how Iran's PressTV described it:

Two Iranian ships, Khark and Alvand, docked at Syria's Lattakia Port following their passage through the Suez Canal, a strategic international shipping route in Egypt, for the first time since the victory of the Islamic Revolution in Iran in 1979.

The 1,500-ton patrol frigate Alvand is armed with torpedoes and anti-ship missiles, while the larger 33,000-ton supply vessel Khark has 250 crewmembers and can carry three helicopters.

Tehran has announced that the two Iranian warships in Lattakia are “on a routine and friendly visit and carry the message of peace and friendship to world countries.”

On Friday, Sayyari signed a navy cooperation deal with his Syrian counterpart General Taleb al-Barri aboard Iranian vessel Khark.

Syrian navy officials toured the two Iranian ships on the same day.

Are the 50 tons of weapons on the Victoria part of the "message of peace and friendship" that was carried by the Khark?

More weapons caught en route to Gaza

It is nice to know that Egypt seems to still be adhering to its security policies:

Egyptian security officials said Tuesday that Egypt's armed forces have seized five vehicles carrying weapons into the country from Sudan, apparently headed for Gaza.

The officials say the vehicles were intercepted inside Egypt Sunday near the border with Sudan, following a shootout during which the truck drivers fled. They said the trucks were carrying large quantities of mortars, rocket propelled grenades, rifles and explosives.

They said they were headed to Hamas-ruled Gaza through smuggling tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border.

The officials spoke Tuesday on condition of anonymity under government regulations.

Israeli intelligence officials say Sudan is a major route for Hamas weapons.

J-Street co-founder: Maybe Israel isn't a good idea if Arabs reject it

From Lori Lowenthal Marcus at The American Thinker:

"Maybe, if this collective Jewish presence" -- that is, the Jewish State in the Middle East -- "can only survive by the sword, then Israel really ain't a good idea." So said Daniel Levy, one of J Street's founders, at the 2011 J Street Conference. You can hear him, and the lack of any objection from even one of the 2000-strong audience, here, at 1:26:15 on the J Street Conference video, on J Street's own website.

Are we there yet? Is this clear statement by one of J Street's founders -- that if the Arabs will force Israel to defend herself, then the Jews should abandon the Middle East -- enough to prove that J Street is not "pro-Israel" at all? Is this confession enough to enable (or force) people to see that it is this belief: that the Jews are simply wrong to defend themselves ever, including against Gazan terrorism or a nuclear Iran, that constitutes the foundation of J Street?

I clipped the quote itself from the much longer video:

Ma'an claims up to 300,000 Gaza protesters. Photos disagree.

From Ma'an:

Estimates said between 200,000 and 300,000 Palestinians in Gaza gathered in Al-Khatib Square after Hamas protesters drove those calling for unity out of the Square of the Unknown Soldier.

Ma'an doesn't tell us who said there were so many people, but it does provide us with photos. Here's the photo that shows the most people:

Based on this and other photos at the site, it looks like an estimate of 10,000 would be an exaggeration.

Meanwhile, Reuters has noticed Hamas attacking the protesters.