Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, December 25, 2011

Archaeologists confirm detail of Chanukah story

Israeli archaeologists have uncovered the first archeological find to confirm written testimony of the ritual practices at the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem.

An Israeli Antiquities Authority archaeological survey at the northwestern corner of the Temple Mount yielded a tiny tin artifact, the size of a button, inscribed with the Aramaic words: “Daka Le’Ya,” which the excavation directors on behalf of the IAA, archaeologists Eli Shukron and Professor Ronny Reich of the University of Haifa, explain means “pure for God.”

Researchers believe the artifact, dated to the first century, towards the end of the Second Temple period, is a seal similar to those described in the Mishnah. If they are correct, this is the first time physical evidence of the temple ritual was found to corroborate the written record.

The team believes the tiny seal was put on objects designated to be used in the temple, and thus had to be ceremonially pure.

In this vein, and in the spirit of Hanukkah, Jerusalem District archaeologist of the Israel Antiquities Authority, said: “It is written in the Talmud that the only cruse of oil that was discovered in the Temple after the victory of the Maccabees over the Greeks, “lay with the seal of the High Priest” – that is: the seal indicated that the oil is pure and can be used in the Temple. Remember, this cruse of oil was the basis for the miracle of Hanukkah that managed to keep the menorah lit for eight days”.

In addition to this artifact, the dig also yielded other Second Temple artifacts, some older from the time of the Hasmonean Dynasty rule, including oil lamps, earthenware pots, and containers filled with oils and perfumes, as well as coins bearing Hasmonean kings such as Alexander Jannaeus and John Hyrcanus.

Wiktionary translates "Daka" as "to cleanse, to purify."

Intriguingly, Jastrow translates "Daka" as "humble" or "crushed." And the Genesius Lexicon translates it similarly:

Is it possible that "Daka l'Ya" doesn't only mean "pure for God" but perhaps "crushed for God" - meaning it is a seal meant specifically for olive oil produced for the Temple service?

(h/t Dan)

Fatah leader begs Christians to stop leaving "Palestine"

Mohammad Shtayyeh, a member of the Central Committee of Fatah, spoke at a Fatah-organized dinner in Bethlehem on Friday night.

During his speech, Shtayyeh asked Palestinian Christians to stay and to stop emigrating to other countries, quoting Matthew 5:13, "You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?" He said that no one deserves the land more than Palestinian Christians and that they are part of the "mosaic" of Bethlehem.

Ma'an English did not bother mentioning his appeal to Palestinian Christians. Their exodus from the territories, mirroring the Christians fleeing from every single Muslim-majority country, is something that must be downplayed.

He also threatened the Israeli government, saying that if it doesn't distinguish between Har Homa and Tel Aviv, the Palestinian Arab leaders will not distinguish between Ramallah and Jaffa.

Of course, judging from the Fatah logo, they never did. Except between 1964-1967, when they said they have no political interest in the West Bank.

Given that, Shtayyeh's Christmas card that he sent out to his friends is more than a bit ironic:

At Christmas, all roads lead to Jerusalem and Bethlehem

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year hoping that next year we celebrate together in liberated Palestine

Not a single Palestinian Arab leader ever expressed that wish when those areas were under Jordanian control. Which means that "liberated Palestine" doesn't mean an independent Palestine, but a land liberated from Jews.

(h/t SM)

Stone throwers for UNICEF

Every week we can find lots of photos of people throwing and slinging stones at high speeds towards Israeli policemen, in what are called "peace protests."

The irony gets lost after a while.

But sometimes, a protester will wear something that brings it all back.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find a repeat of this photo I found last year:

UPDATE: The UNICEF shirt is a Barcelona football shirt. (h/t Ian)

Egyptian tourism down; man cuts off penis

From Reuters Arabic:

An Egyptian newspaper reported that a young man from the city of Luxor in the south cut off his penis and buried in a graveyard after suffering depression as a result of the decline in tourism since the outbreak of popular protests that led to the removal of former President Hosni Mubarak in February.

Most residents of Luxor, about 690 km south of Cairo, work in the tourism trade as it has many of the most famous ancient Egyptian antiquities, including the Temple of Luxor and the Temple of Karnak, in addition to the large number of tombs of kings and queens of the Pharaohs from the era of the Egyptian empire (about 1567-1085 BC.)

The newspaper al-Wafd in the Sunday early edition reported that the man is 35 years old and married and that his psychological state worsened "due to lack of income due to tourism downturn."

The newspaper added that the Luxor International Hospital received the young man with heavy bleeding and they performed surgery, but attempts to re-attach his penis were unsuccessful.

That will definitely increase tourism!

"Nittel-nacht" open thread

It is "nittel-nacht," and one of the time-honored customs is to avoid blogging all night. (Or something like that.)

Here's an open thread.

Egyptian gas line to Israel blown up again

For the eleventh time this year, the gas line from Egypt to Israel and Jordan was blown up.

The company responsible for the line, GASCO, sent investigators out to see the extent of the damage. It also informed the Misr Insurance Corporation of the damage so it could be compensated.

Hmmm.

Earlier this week, Jordan and Egypt negotiated new pricing for the gas.

Chanukah Video Night 4: The Avoda - Spread the Light

The Guardian: "Mary and Joseph wouldn't make it into Bethlehem" (updated)

Every year we are treated to stories where reporters use Christmas as an excuse to bash Israel.

Here's one from The Guardian:

If Joseph and Mary were making their way to Bethlehem today, the Christmas story would be a little different, says Father Ibrahim Shomali, a parish priest in the town. The couple would struggle to get into the city, let alone find a hotel room.

"If Jesus were to come this year, Bethlehem would be closed," says the priest of Bethlehem's Beit Jala parish. "He would either have to be born at a checkpoint or at the separation wall. Mary and Joseph would have needed Israeli permission – or to have been tourists.

"This really is the big problem for Palestinians in Bethlehem: what will happen when they close us off completely?"

Al Arabiya reports that some 30,000 Christian pilgrims are expected to visit Bethlehem this weekend.

There is no problem for Palestinian Christians to visit. There is no problem for tourists to visit. 500 Gazans are even visiting. Is it really so strange that Israel must give permits for people to cross from or through Israel to PA-controlled areas? And are these permits really difficult to obtain?

CiFWatch has much more.

UPDATE: Commenter Ira_rosen says:

Indeed, The Guardian is correct. If Mary and Joseph tried to get to Bethlehem today, it would be difficult. They were Jewish.

Latma video: Christmas in Eurabia

(h/t Basketballpro66)

Rock throwers hiding behind an ambulance

Tweeted by Captain Barak Raz of the IDF, about the weekly riots in Nabi Saleh:

We've seen this before here and in other riots - hiding behind an ambulance while throwing rocks

He also noted that an Israeli border police officer was hit in the face by one of those harmless rocks.

The YouTube videos of the weekly protests are carefully edited to cut out any rock throwing. For example, here's a screen shot from last week's riot, where you cannot see a single rock thrown - but you see plenty of rocks littering the road behind the Israeli police:

Linkdump - Hudson NY edition

There have been a bunch of great posts in Hudson-NY this week, so here are some of them:

Arab Apartheid by Khaled Abu Toameh

"Kairos Palestine": From Mendacity to Megalomania by Malcolm Lowe

Radical Islamic Television Arrives in Spain by Soeren Kern

Betraying Ben-Gurion by Efraim Karsh

The Muslim Brotherhood Unmasked by Herbert I. London

Turkey Reaffirms Its Support for Palestinian Cause And more from the Turkish Press by AK Group

Spain's Jew-Hating Majority by Anna Mahjar-Barducci

Muslim Persecution of Christians: November 2011 by Raymond Ibrahim

Canada's State-Sponsored Fight Against State-Sponsored Anti-Semitism by Christine Williams

Arab Spring Sending Shudders Through Christians in the Middle East

Khaled Abu Toameh

From Wikipedia, first round results

Al Masry al Youm reports on the second phase of the parliamentary elections in Egypt.

As with the first round, it looks like the Muslim Brotherhood has done exceptionally well, with the more extreme Salafist Nour party in second place.

The majority of the seats were won by the MB's Freedom and Justice party. In Giza, they scored an impressive victory; in Sohag, MB combined with Nour to win most seats. In the East, the MB swept, and this was the pattern for most districts.

Tomorrow the official results of one of the run-off elections are supposed to be announced.

At the moment, the Freedom and Justice party has 49% of the seats assigned by the election. Because of the way the runoff elections work, I think it is possible that the Muslim Brotherhood can end up with an absolute majority of seats, even without a coalition with Nour.

Erdogan's ironic quote of the day

From Bloomberg:

Turkey froze political and military relations with France in retaliation for the approval by the French parliament’s lower chamber of a measure that makes it a crime to deny genocide against Armenians a century ago.

The government recalled its ambassador to Paris for consultations, canceled a joint meeting of economy and trade ministers in January and halted all programs for training and cultural affairs, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said yesterday in televised remarks in Ankara following the vote.

The quote:

“People will not forgive those who distort history, or use history as a tool for political exploitation,” [said Erdogan.]

Yes, those 1.5 million Armenians just caught the flu.

And the IHH members aboard the Mavi Marmara were wielding "peace batons" and stabbing Israeli soldiers with flowers.

Last week, Turkey's foreign minister said that Turkey's policies have isolated Israel and helped bring it to its knees. But yesterday, Israel canceled a $141 million military contract with Turkey - not exactly the actions of a nation on the ropes.

Next week the Knesset may pass a bill saying the Jewish people will never forget the Armenian genocide and asks that the Knesset mark the event with a special memorial session held every year, in a move sure to anger Ankara further.

But meanwhile Turkey is at loggerheads with its former allies in Iran and Syria, the EU has been cool to its moves and this latest French law has it in a tizzy.

Which means that Turkey's actions have isolated Turkey a lot more than it has isolated Israel.

The purposeful ambiguity of terrorists joining the PLO

Reuters reports that Hamas and Islamic Jihad plan to join the PLO.

Rival Palestinian factions took a significant step towards reconciliation Thursday as the Islamist group Hamas said it planned to join President Mahmoud Abbas's Palestine Liberation Organization.

Abbas held a meeting in Cairo with leaders from the factions, including Hamas chief Khalid Mashaal, where a committee was formed to prepare for the inclusion of Hamas, as well as the smaller Islamic Jihad, in the PLO.

Hamas has refused to recognize Israel or renounce violence, while the PLO has signed interim peace accords. It was unclear how Hamas would be included in the PLO, given the discrepancy.

The committee will now prepare for an internal election of the PLO parliament in order to facilitate Hamas and the Islamic Jihad membership.

One official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Hamas's Mashaal had told Abbas that his group was "in favor of peaceful resistance and a truce in Gaza and the West Bank at this stage".

The official offered no further explanation on what that might mean. Hamas has said in the past it would agree to a long-term truce with Israel, but remains sworn to its destruction.

Islamic Jihad clearly sees this as a method to restructure the PLO - away from its signed peace agreements with Israel:

An Islamic Jihad leader said Thursday that joining an "interim leadership framework" of the PLO did not necessarily mean it had formally joined the Palestinian body.

Khaled Al-Batsh told Ma’an that joining the organization requires a clear framework for how the PLO will be restructured.

He added that if there was an agreement concerning these issues, Islamic Jihad would become a member in the organization. However, if there was no agreement, the group said it was still willing to contribute.

“We’re now in the phase of national dialogue," he said. "We’re in the interim leadership framework, which will handle restructuring the PLO, and we hope to succeed.”

Batsh also said "We support reconciliation on the basis of building a unified Palestinian authority in the framework agreement on a national project that meets the need of the Palestinians, as part of upholding our right to resistance and national principles."

Hamas takes a similar stance, saying that this is an opportunity for the PLO to include all Palestinian Arab factions (meaning, terror groups) and elect new members for its national council and executive committee. Meshal also railed against the PLO's unilateralism.

Abbas and his cronies, of course, will do everything they can to present this to the West as if the PLO is not reneging on its signed agreements while they will say in Arabic that the PLO can accommodate the inclusion of unrepentant terror groups.

Their strategy will be to find an ambiguous enough formula that desperate Western leaders can embrace with their eyes wide shut, using their penchant for wishful thinking to patch over the gaping divide between Hamas and PIJ and any possible peace process and then to blame Israel for showing reluctance to negotiate with its would-be exterminators.

It might take a couple of years, but soon we will see op-eds in major newspapers asking exactly what is wrong with Hamas' idea of a "long term truce" before annihilating Israel, or saying that Islamic Jihad has embraced the peace process. Things that are still considered somewhat absurd will become mainstream thinking by dint of repetition of sound bites by the new PLO leadership.

After all, that's what happened with the PLO itself. Remember that it has been over a decade since the PLO supposedly changed its charter to remove all references to destroying Israel and armed resistance - and yet in the meantime it has never published a revised charter!

The Palestinian Arab leadership is skilled at creating just enough ambiguity to allow credulous Western leaders and pundits to mentally fill in the rest with what they fervently hope the terrorists and their supporters are saying. They know that Western wishful thinking goes a long way to help their cause.