Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Wednesday, April 06, 2011

Fatah groups ask Hamas to return their weapons

Fatah-affiliated militant groups in the Gaza Strip have asked the Hamas government to return the weapons seized from fighters in 2007 when the Islamist movement took control of the coastal enclave.

Twelve divisions of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades asked to be rearmed in a letter to the government.

"Our fighters are on alert to confront any Israeli aggression, incursion, or folly," the letter said, asking for the return of their weapons in order to fight the threat.

The signatories of the statement included the Ahmad Abu Ar-Reish Brigades, Jihad Amarein Brigades, Sami Al-Ghoul Brigades, Nabil Mas'oud Brigades, Ayman Juda Brigades, Faris Al-Leil Brigades, Engineering and Manufacturing Brigades, Muhammad Siyam Brigades, Raed Al-Karmi Brigades, Luay Qanna Brigades, Marwan Zalloum Brigades and Palestinian Commandos Brigades.

Look at all those peaceful-sounding Fatah divisions - all with allegiance to the leader of Fatah, that well-known peacemaker Mahmoud Abbas.

From YNet:

A mystery still engulfs the airstrike which took place near the airport in Sudan's main port city of Port Sudan on Tuesday, as the Sudanese media released first images of the strike's scene

According to a state government official, an unidentified plane bombed a car driving in the vicinity of the airport, killing two people. The aircraft flew in from the Red Sea but it was not clear to whom it belonged, Ahmed Tahir, the speaker of parliament in the Red Sea state where the port city is located, told Reuters.

The plane involved in the strike was "foreign", the Sudan media center said later. The report, quoting a member of parliament, said the car was on the road leading to the Port Sudan airport when it was attacked by the plane, which was following it.

In January 2009, a convoy of arms smugglers was hit by unidentified aircraft in Sudan's eastern Red Sea state according to Sudanese authorities, a strike that some reports said may have been carried out by Israel to stop weapons bound for Gaza.

A total of 119 people were killed in that strike near Sudan's border with Egypt, according to state media.

Sudan is a known as a smuggling route exploited by terror groups. Last month, Egyptian security forces claimed that they seized five vehicles transporting weapons to the Gaza Strip. It was reported the weapons were seized along the Sudan-Egypt border and included mortar bombs, grenades, rifles and explosives.

The IDF Spokesman’s Office declined to comment on Tuesday's attack.

Palestine Press Agency indirectly quotes Sudanese intelligence officials as saying that the two killed were a Palestinian Arab - and an Iranian.

More details on how terrorists infiltrated Itamar

YNet shows how Itamar's security failed on the night of the massacre:

The alarm system of the electronic fence surrounding the West Bank outpost of Itamar goes off at exactly 8:59 pm.

Over the next three minutes, seven more warning messages register on the computer screen in the settlement's operation room, indicating that someone might be trying to breach section 20 of the fence. A security officer scours the specified area, but does not find anything unusual.

Things return to normal, with the approval of the settlement's security coordinator, who does not arrive on the scene. No military force is alerted.

That same night, five members of the Fogel family are stabbed to death.

No one sees the terrorists slip in or out of Itamar. They walk around town undisturbed for over two hours.

Itamar is protected by guards provided by a private company, Nof Yam Security. The town's security coordinator, an IDF subordinate, is in charge of these guards. On the night of the attack, guard Yuri Antropov was securing the settlement, answering to coordinator Matanya Ben-Shitrit.

The infiltration took place at a blind spot, hidden by trees and unseen by the town's security cameras. "The area wasn't exposed because the Civil Administration objected," an element of the Samaria defense establishment said. "The IDF knows very well that it is a dead spot. I didn't ask for exposure because it wasn't something achievable." Only after the attack was the area cleared of trees.

If section 20 of the fence was under surveillance, the terrorists could have been identified. But Ben-Shitrit, the security coordinator, said that a camera was not installed because there was no one to finance it. "If the IDF agreed to install a camera here, it would have been here a long time ago," he said.

Moreover, the security guard, who arrived on the scene minutes after the alarm went off, surveyed the area using only his vehicle's head lights. He did not carry a searchlight or night vision equipment; he did not even have a flashlight with him.

According to the defense establishment element, the settlement and the regional council were supposed to equip the guards with flashlights and searchlights, while the army is supposed to provide the night vision devices.

The "smart" fence surrounding the settlement was designed to identify movements caused by touch, cutting or shaking. The computer screen registers the time of the breach, the time that the alarm was turned off by the guard, and the time that the breach was terminated.

"This case did not seem suspicious because animals sometimes touch or collide with the fence for many minutes," Antropov said.

"It was irrelevant because it was a routine occurrence," Ben-Shitrit added. "There can be a shift with 200 fence collisions caused by animals."

But a security source claimed that if the guard was properly trained, he would have realized that it wasn't an animal rocking the fence.

While the fence does not differentiate between animal and human touch, the length of the alarms should have raised suspicion. Out of the eight warning messages that registered on the screen that evening, the longest one lasted 18 seconds.

"According to a test done after the terrorist attack, it takes 10 seconds on average to get through the fence," Antropov said. "A fat tracker got past the fence with a jump, and there was a shock that lasted maybe a few seconds."

Antropov noted that he and his fellow guards did not train extensively on the fence system.
"We were ordered to treat each warning in the dead spot in the same manner, regardless of how long it lasted, by sending a patrolman out," he said. "Only after the attack did the technician explain to us the different lengths."

This security failure had deadly consequences.

All of this is entirely consistent with what Itamar's mayor and his wife said in my interview with them.

The execrable Mondoweiss has a thread where they claim, based on their expert knowledge of course, that Itamar's mayor is lying, that it is impossible to climb such a fence, that there are no blind spots, and that Itamar's security was unbreakable. Comparing that thread with the YNet story is a nice lesson in how much practitioners of misoziony will cling to lies - and even still insist that it was a Jew or a foreign worker that massacred the Fogels.

Video: Babies discuss the Middle East situation

Elder poster sighting at NYU

Atlas Shrugs has photos of a BDS protest and pro-Israel counterprotest at NYU today.

One of the counterprotesters decided to use my advertisement that has been making the rounds in some California papers as a placard - something I never really thought of.

Here are the pro-Israel rally-ers:

And a close-up of the person who is holding my poster:

Nice to know that my efforts are paying off!

(h/t BH in Iowa)

Palestine, 1792

From The New Universal Gazetteer; or, Geographical Dictionary. [With] Atlas, By Clement Cruttwell, 1792, under the entry for Palestine:

The population of this country is also greatly diminished; but at present no certain calculation can be given of it, as the number of inhabitants continually varies, on account of the Bedouin Arabs, who always come hither at certain periods from Arabia, and the country beyond the Jordan, in. order to feed their flocks.

If this country has lost its ancient splendour by the destruction of its cities, and the decrease of its population, it still retains its natural advantages, being beautifully variegated with mountains, hills, and delightful plains.

Its climate is exceedingly good. It seldom rains here ; but this deficiency is supplied by most abundant dews. The cold is never excessive; and if the summer heats are great, they are, however, mitigated by a periodical breeze, which renders them supportable.

Palestine abounds with every thing almost that is useful or necessary for the life of man. It produces wheat, barley, pulse of all kinds, fruits, wine, and oil, in such plenty, that though a part only of the country is cultivated, great quantities of these articles are distributed in the neighbouring provinces of Syria, and even transported to Europe, particularly wheat, barley, and pulse.

With regard to domestic and wild animals, it produces various kinds, many of which are not known in Europe. Cotton grows bere in great perfection, particularly in Samaria and Galilee. Among its productions may be reckoned also silk, tobacco, drugs, and aromatic herbs. The fields and woods, m the proper seasons, abound with flowers of every species ; but notwithstanding those advantages which it enjoys, all Palestine is not cultivated with the fame care as the vast plains of Galilee and Samaria. I observed that the mountainous country towards Jerusalem was more barren than any other part; but there is no reason to suppose; that it has always been in the same condition. The cause of its being at present neglected is, the want of population; for the inhabitants have abandoned the mountains, and retired to the plains, where agriculture is attended with less labour, and where they find mor econveniencies for their cattle.

Even in Galilee and Samaria there are many parts still uncultivated; but, as they abound with grass, they afford pasture to the cattle, which form the whole riches of the Arabs. These people, therefore, would quarrel much sooner for a sheep-fold than for a large tract of country; and, indeed, the only wars which they carry on are undertaken in order that they may rob each other of their oxen, camels, sheep, horses, or goats.

Egyptian presidential candidate obsessed with Israel

From FARS News:

Secretary-General of Egypt's Amal Party Magdi Hussein said confronting Israeli plans in occupied Palestine and supporting the Palestinian nation stand atop his agenda for presidential campaign.

Speaking in an interview with FNA on Tuesday, Hussein announced his candidacy for the upcoming presidential election in Egypt to help establish democracy in his country and materialize people's demands.

Hussein said "confrontation against the Zionist plans in occupied Palestine", among others, is his top priority on the scene of foreign policy.

He viewed Egypt's relations with the Zionist regime as detrimental to his country.

He said "contents and clauses of the agreements signed between Egypt and Israel will certainly be revised" if he is elected president.

Perhaps he is trying to outdo ElBaradei.

It is certainly heartwarming that Egyptians are so unified on one issue: how much they hate their peace partner.

Why do I have the impression that the US will continue to give $2 billion a year to Egypt even if they completely abrogate Camp David?

Worst. Ethnic. Cleansing. Ever.

Hamas' Palestine Times website reports that according to Gaza's Ministry of the Interior, 1142 children were born in Gaza last week.

And the same source claims 100 people died during the week.

(Historically, many Palestinian Arabs would cover up deaths in UNRWA camps in order to get more food and services for their families. Because the only way to lose your refugee status, according to UNRWA, is to die.)

More girls getting abducted in Egypt

Al Masry al Youm is quoted in Arabic media as saying that there has been an increase in the number of girls who are being snatched in Egypt since the revolution.

Five girls have disappeared in recent weeks.

EoZ Hasbara article published (UPDATED)

The Spring 2011 issue of Young Israel Viewpoint has just come out, and it deals with Zionism today.

It has many well-known contributors: Danny Ayalon, Yudi Edelstein, Nobel-Prize winner Prof. Yisroel Aumann, Melanie Phillips, the people who run LatmaTV, StandWithUs, Honest Reporting, Camera...and one other guy:

It is funny to see my anonymous self in print:

The PDF of this issue is now online but why should you have to wait to read what I wrote? Here's my article:

It is no secret that Israel has a severe problem with hasbara. Over the past forty years, the Jewish state has been slowly but surely been transformed in the public eye from a tiny nation proudly defending itself from annihilation into a state that is perceived as an oppressor, a human rights violator, and – to many of its detractors – to one of the most evil regimes on the planet.

Most Zionists who follow the news know how absurd these characterizations are. We also know that Israel is, to put it charitably, inconsistent in getting its message across properly to the world. Everyone complains about it, and everyone has their own ideas on how to fix it – but very few people are actually doing anything about it themselves.

This is a shame, because everyone who is reading this article can help Israel, starting today.

I have a pro-Israel blog, Elder of Ziyon. I have written thousands of articles about Israel and the Arab world over the past six years, and I get a fair number of readers. Lately, I have been using my blog as a laboratory to test out different ways of getting the message across. I can track the number of readers for any particular post, how many times people “tweet” the post and how many link to it on Facebook and other social media sites. Using these methods I can see what works and what doesn’t. The lessons are valuable not only to bloggers but to everyone who cares about helping Israel.

One problem that we Jews have is that we are too logical. Thousands of years of studying Gemara may have made us good at arguing, but it also convinced us that anyone can be swayed by a good argument. So we happily read and write long texts explaining why the “settlements” are legal, why US Resolution 242 does not imply that Israel must stay within the Green Line, and why a blockade of Gaza does not flout international law.

Our enemies, on the other hand, spend their time reaching people on an emotional level. They show photos and videos of crowded camps, of bombed out buildings, of old women crying.

In the real world, the emotional argument wins.

As much as we like to pretend that everyone shares the Jewish love for an innovative and logical thought process, in reality people usually make up their minds about Israel (and everything else) based on their gut. If a person who is not already emotionally invested in the argument one way or the other sees a tear-jerking film that pushes one side of the story, nine times out of ten that person will instinctively gravitate towards the side that pulled at his or her heartstrings.

We need to prioritize our emotional arguments. We need to talk about our deep connection to the land of Israel. We need to emphasize how we have cried every year over the destruction of the Temples. We need to show the human toll that would result from hundreds of thousands of Jews who the world wants to uproot from their homes. We need to describe the pain that would result from losing Har HaZeitim again, and what happened to it during those tragic 19 years that Arabs had control.

Not only is our emotional connection to the Land far deeper than anyone else’s, but no one can argue against love and fear. Emotions are our most potent weapon, but one that we are ceding almost completely to those who hate Israel. We know that we are right from a legal, historical and moral perspective – but we need to humanize the message.

It is not only the message that must hit emotional chords – but also the media that the message is communicated in. People respond to messages that are visceral, and that hit all of their senses. Powerpoints, posters, songs, poetry, film, novels, plays, even cuisine - all need to be employed to impact people on every possible level. Text alone generally does not have the same impact as more visual media.

On the Internet, the goal is to create something that will “go viral” – that ordinary people will see and want to forward to their friends. Videos do better than written articles, and humor is possibly the biggest weapon of all. Most of us have seen Latma’s “We Con the World” video created last year, and it was hugely effective with millions of views on YouTube. Why? Because it was funny, timely, and visceral.

While defending Israel is important, it is vital to go on the offensive. No one wins any games by only playing defense. The fact is that every accusation made against Israel – true or false – can be made much more plausibly and effectively against Israel’s neighbors and enemies. Attack the abysmal human rights records of the Arabs themselves. Publicize how nearly every Arab country has laws that specifically deny citizenship to Palestinians alone.

Arab nations constantly attack Israel to distract their people from their own human rights violations. The recent riots in Tunisia, Algeria, Libya, Bahrain, Yemen Egypt and Jordan – and the deadly police responses – prove that Israel is not the problem in the Middle East, not by a long shot. The Arab and Islamic dictatorships, where there is no freedom of expression or of the press, are the ones who need to be put on the defensive.

Beyond that, we need to publicize the good things that come out of Israel every day. Art, dance, fiction, scientific achievements, medical advances – we know it is amazing, but the world doesn't get to see these parts of the country.

So how can you, personally, help?

There are two basic ways to help: by creating pro-Israel content, and by publicizing the best content that is made by others.

For those who have the ability, creativity and time, by far the best thing to do is to apply the concepts of emotional and visceral media to the creation of pro-Israel videos, songs or song parodies, articles, comics, or even video-games and phone apps. One of my readers says that a good romance novel with a strong, masculine Zionist protagonist could do wonders to change Israel's image among those that read them.

Challenge yourself to distill a pro-Israel argument into a 140-character tweet (or even a bumper sticker.) Think outside the box and use your talents! Then send your efforts to popular Zionist websites to get publicized.

Think of ways that Zionist messages can be made available to the world. Do you have interesting video of your last visit to Israel that shows a side of the country that the news media ignores? Upload it to YouTube!

Once one of my readers sent me a photo taken in the Rami Levy supermarket in Gush Etzion, showing a smiling religious Jew joking with an Arab woman. I put it on my blog, to show how life really looks in Judea and Samaria, and a number of European websites picked up the story. A simple thing like that humanizes the “settlers” that the world regards as faceless, evil creatures.

Are you going to a fundraising dinner with a terrific speaker? Take video of the speech and upload it to YouTube. I did this with a speech by Mike Huckabee and thousands of people viewed it – people who would never have even known about it otherwise.

Don’t just write letters to the editor of a local paper – post them on the Internet, too. Make sure that everything you write remains somewhere permanent on the web so that search engines can find it. Put them on a blog (easy to set up) or email them to influential sites, so your points can be seen by many more people.

If you are multilingual, translate the best pro-Israel articles you see into other languages and post or forward them to spread the message. There is a real hunger for pro-Israel content in Europe, and if you can break the language barrier, it can make a big difference.

If an anti-Israel article bothers you, take the time to examine where the logical fallacies are - they are often subtle and such an exercise can hone your own ability to defend Israel. Learn how to take apart an argument from anti-Israel writers, point by point (called “fisking” on the Internet) and expose the lies that they build their essays on. When a good criticism is written quickly after an influential anti-Israel article, it can blunt the effect considerably – but speed is of the essence.

Write your own articles for so-called "citizen journalism" sites that already have a built-in audience. Such sites are often indexed prominently by Google and Bing, and they often lean against Israel so that pro-Israel articles can make a splash.

I don't think that on-line comments on articles in newspapers is necessarily the best way to spend your time, but it is worthwhile to put short pro-Israel messages in the comments if only to show that not everyone agrees with the haters who flood these sites. And don't only put Zionist messages in political sites – if it is appropriate, mentioning Israeli companies in financial sites or Israeli novelists in book sites is very powerful.

If you love to read, Amazon book reviews are a very good way to reach an intelligent, articulate audience.

If you don’t have the time or talent to create content, you can still be a wizard at publicizing good pro-Israel articles and videos. Twitter and Facebook are the major tools you cannot ignore, and they can help make good material get tons of views. Grow your “friend” lists so that your own influence grows, and copy or link to the best articles and videos on Facebook and Twitter.

It is also worthwhile to join social bookmarking sites like Reddit, PopURLs and Delicious. If some material is interesting, people will read it, rate it and link to it themselves.

Similarly, take good material you find and post them to popular message boards. Old fashioned email is essential as well – share your discoveries with friends.

The important point is to publicize the best material. This amplifies the effectiveness of the pro-Israel message immensely - and it only takes a few seconds to retweet or click a Facebook "Like" button that most websites and online magazines have.

Don’t complain about how others aren’t doing enough to help Israel. The Internet allows you to do it yourself, and you can make a real impact!

UPDATE: The magazine is online and you can download it as a PDF.

Israeli weapons in Libya? Stupid rumor debunked

The Arab and far left press has been abuzz the past few days with allegations that Israel has been supplying weapons to Libyan forces to fight the rebels.

The original source for this version of the rumor came from this photo that was posted on the Al Manara Facebook page, showing weapons that Libyan rebels captured:

The weapon has a six pointed star imprinted on it, hence, it was assumed to be from Israel.

Al Jazeera also showed video of these weapons and highlighted the six-pointed star as proof that they came from Israel (go to 0:22)

Iran's Press TV jumped on the bandwagon:

The opposition forces in the Libyan city of Misratah displayed weapons that they have seized from the forces supporting Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, Al Jazeera reported Thursday.

They said that some of the confiscated rockets and bombs had signs imprinted on them, clearly indicating that they are manufactured in Israel.

Based on this, a Libyan rebel leader has accused Israel of sending weapons to Libya via former Fatah leader Muhammed Dahlan, a much reviled figure. And idiot moonbats are happily spreading this rumor. Fatah has called for an investigation.

However, in a fascinating Twitter thread, the entire basis for this rumor was demolished in minutes.

The upshot is that this is a universal symbol for an illuminating flare (star) that uses a parachute (umbrella symbol). From a NATO manual:

The six-pointed star has been used for identifying illumination rounds since at least World War I.

The rumor is completely and provably false. And not one of those who spread the rumor will ever recant, because truth is not their objective.

(What has not been proven false is whether Dahlan had been involved in weapons smuggling for Libya in general. I have no information either way on that.)

Palestinian Arabs among world's highest in home ownership rates

From Ma'an:

The vast majority of Palestinians own their homes, living with an average of 1.6 people per room, while those who rent pay an average of 115 Jordanian Dinar ($162) per month, a housing survey found.

Only 0.9 percent of households lived in large manor homes, while 48 percent said they lived in a house, with 50 percent in apartment buildings. Home ownership in the West Bank was at 82 percent, and at 87 in Gaza.

Ninty-seven percent of homes had refrigerators, 94 percent had satellite dishes, and 47 percent have computers.

This would make the PA #2 in the world in the category of home ownership, and Gaza would be tied for #1 with Singapore.

Israel's home ownership rate is 71%. The US is at 68%.

I think we need to give them a few billion more dollars. After all, only 0.9% live in "large manor homes."

I also wonder how they define "large manor homes." Because from a drive through Judea and Samaria, one can see many large Arab houses. Do those qualify?

Hypocrisy from UC-Davis student newspaper

I mentioned that the UC-Davis student newspaper, the California Aggie, had placed two conditions on publishing a pro-Israel ad I designed:

1) We put the words "Paid Advertisement" at the top of the ad.
2) The Aggie will run a box next to the ad giving readers their response options (Where to buy an ad of their own, where to send a guest opinion, etc...)

In a later email to the ad's sponsor, written on Saturday, the editor of the paper wrote:

In the future, as long as I'm Editor in Chief of The Aggie, any advertisement regarding such an important issue will need to be fair, as yours is, and must meet these two conditions. Whether it's a politician running for office or a direct response to your ad, these conditions will be enforced consistently from this point forward.

Yesterday, the Aggie published this ad:

Needless to say, this ad did not adhere to either of the two conditions that the editor promised - even though Amnesty International is hardly an uncontroversial organization.

Again, for comparison, here is the "controversial" ad that is being subjected to restrictions by the newspaper:

As I mentioned previously, I have no problem with the first condition. The second condition, however, is insulting. It is insulting both to the pro-Israel community and to the Aggie community. I would hope that college students would be smart enough to know the difference between an ad and an editorial, and also smart enough to know that ads can be responded to. The very idea that a pro-Israel ad needs to be specifically highlighted so that people who want to bash Israel are given every possible opportunity to do so is in itself evidence of bias. What other newspaper makes such a demand for a paid ad?

Ken Roth keeps on slandering Israel based on pure ignorance

Ken Roth of Human Rights Watch is predictably perturbed at Goldstone's Washington Post op-ed. Almost as predictably, he writes a letter about it - not to the Washington Post, but to the New York Times.

Here's one part that shows how disingenuous Roth is:

Mr. Goldstone has not repudiated his panel’s findings that Israel committed numerous serious violations of the laws of war. Israeli forces, according to the Goldstone report, indiscriminately used heavy artillery and white phosphorous in densely populated areas and deliberately destroyed civilian buildings and infrastructure without a lawful military reason. That conduct was so widespread and systematic that it must have reflected policy.

Israel has yet to investigate the policies behind the indiscriminate attacks that caused so much civilian harm.

HRW's central thesis is that Israeli policy is to attack civilians. And their evidence is that based on their deeply flawed investigations, "it must" be so.

Yet HRW did not have a single real military expert doing its investigations. It came up with these conclusions based not on knowledge, but on ignorance. Their one "expert" they loved to trot out as a fig leaf for their pseudo-investigations has left HRW in disgrace, he had no real-world experience in how urban warfare is waged, and even so his concerns about how HRW was "sexing up" military claims against Israel were reportedly disregarded by his supervisors.

A comparison between how Goldstone (and HRW) investigated specific incidents of the destruction of civilian infrastructure, and the IDF's report on the same incidents, shows conclusively that Goldstone and HRW both know next to nothing about military matters - yet they both made false conclusions about how Israel must have had a policy violating Geneva conventions because they couldn't imagine otherwise.

Israel has been spending the past two years painstakingly investigating not only HRW and Goldstone's claims, but hundreds of other complaints about Cast Lead. Yet somehow we have not heard about any deliberate Israeli policy to target civilians. So is HRW saying that the investigations are a huge cover-up for an immoral and illegal Israeli policy that they are sure exists but that no one has been able to produce?

At least Goldstone belatedly realized, to a small degree, his own limitations. HRW has too much hubris to ever issue a correction.

So-called "human rights organizations" cannot fairly judge how a war is waged without basic knowledge of how wars are fought. Ken Roth runs an organization that makes conclusions based on pure ignorance.

When will HRW become as transparent in its methodologies as it demands from those it loves to condemn? When will HRW ever admit that they perhaps didn't have all the information needed to draw their flawed conclusions?

We know the answer. HRW doesn't care about the truth as much as it cares about its own reputation and its own self-image as an arbiter of morality for (selected) nations of the world. So any legitimate criticisms of HRW will be denied, ignored, and downplayed rather than investigated and fixed. It's happened before and it will continue to happen, and we can expect Ken Roth to continue to dissemble rather than do what he demands of others.

How do we know Jews were stoned and injured Monday night?

Because a Hamas website tells us so!

Hamas' Palestine Times quotes Israel radio as saying that Jews were injured by stones thrown by Palestinian Arabs on Monday night near Qaryut, which appears to be near Shiloh. I can find nothing about this on any other website.

I guess that there aren't armies of international observers with cameras around to document Arab violence when Jews are the targets. And if they had witnessed it, they sure wouldn't admit it.