Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, January 15, 2015

01/15 Links Pt2: Saddam Hussein - Fatah and PA hero; Pat Condell: Nothing to do with Islam

From Ian:

According to a famous saying, you can "know a man by his friends." Just yesterday, Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party chose to remind Palestinians of the deep friendship between former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein and Palestinian Authority and Fatah leader Yasser Arafat. They posted a picture on the official Fatah Facebook "Main Page" of Arafat and Hussein warmly shaking hands.
The PA and Fatah's honoring of Saddam Hussein who was convicted by an Iraqi court and executed in 2006 for crimes against his own people, is nothing new. Last year, speaking in Mahmoud Abbas' name, Talal Dweikat commemorated Saddam Hussein as a "great leader and fighter" at a ceremony marking the anniversary of the establishment of the Arab-Iraqi army
Palestinian Media Watch has reported extensively on Palestinian glorification of Saddam Hussein, including Fatah publishing admiring comments and pictures such as this: "He smiled to deny the enemy the pleasure of victory. May Allah have mercy on you, Saddam Hussein."

Prosecutor claims Argentina’s president hid Iran role in 1994 bombing

The Argentinean prosecutor investigating the 1994 bombing of a Buenos Aires Jewish center on Wednesday accused Argentina’s president and foreign minister of covering up Iran’s involvement in the attack.
Alberto Nisman filed a 300-page complaint naming President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman and others of seeking to “erase” Iran’s role in the bombing at the AMIA community center offices in which 85 people were killed. He said he wants to question the president and other officials who he claims are involved in the cover-up.
Nisman claims that the president decided to “not incriminate” former senior Iranian officials for their roles in planning the bombing, and instead has sought a rapprochement with Tehran, “establishing trade relations to mitigate Argentina’s severe energy crisis,” the Buenos Aires Herald reported.
When her agreement with Iran was challenged in the Argentinean courts, “and here is the criminal (aspect), the president ordered to divert the investigation, abandoning years of a legitimate demand of justice, and sought to free the Iranians imputed (in the case) from all suspicions, contradicting their proven ties with the attack. She decided to fabricate ‘the innocence of Iran’,” the newspaper quoted Nisman as alleging. (h/t Vandoren)

Pat Condell: Nothing to do with Islam (h/t dabney)

2015 Hasby Award - Best Young Defender of Israel

The nominees for the Hasby Award for Best Young Defender of Israel are:

Ryan Bellerose

Chloe Valdary

Daniel Mael

Muhammed Zoabi

Sarah Bernamoff

Samantha Hamilton

Jake Birell

Another killer category, and one I am happy to have added this year. But, damn, this is hard to decide..

The 2015 Hasby Award for Best Young Defender of Israel goes to...

In the aftermath of CNN's Jim Clancy's bizarre anti-Israel meltdown last week on Twitter, we haven't heard much from him.

Many embarrassing tweets from that night of his rants had been quietly deleted - to see which ones of his are gone (not including his replies, alas) compare this snapshot from yesterday with this one from January 8.

Plenty of people who merely tweeted him once were instantly blocked. In fact, Clancy only discovered the block functionality of Twitter on that very same day:

CNN has been completely silent. But criticism has been mounting, most recently from disability rights organizations upset at his use of the word "cripple."

While one report of his did air last Friday, I don' t know if he has been on the air this week.

Now, his Twitter account has been taken down.

Yes, the media personality who praises the "block" function has been permanently blocked. To paraphrase him, let us praise the Lord's wisdom and grace!

It sure looks like CNN is quietly lowering the boom on Clancy, but trying very hard to do it under the radar.

Meanwhile, anyone tried to include Clancy's meltdown on his Wikipedia page have been stymied by one of his apparent fans who doesn't want this story to get any bigger than it already is.

(h/t Israellycool)

01/15 Links Pt1: French PM Issues Blistering Denunciation of Antisemitism

From Ian:

‘We Haven’t Shown Enough Outrage:’ French PM Issues Blistering Denunciation of Antisemitism

It was an electrifying moment: in a voice crackling with anger and pain, French Prime Minister Manuel Valls denounced the rise of antisemitism in France before the country’s National Assembly yesterday, pointedly observing, “We haven’t shown enough outrage.”
Valls was speaking following the funerals of seven of the victims of last week’s Islamist terrorist attacks in France, in which a total of 17 people, including four Jews trapped in Friday’s siege at the HyperCacher market in eastern Paris, were murdered in cold blood.
Though his speech covered a wide range of issues, and included an emotional plea to recognize that France is “at war with jihadism and terrorism…not against Islam and Muslims,” Valls was determined to highlight the threat posed by antisemitism, declaring: “I say to the people in general who perhaps have not reacted sufficiently up to now, and to our Jewish compatriots, that this time [antisemitism] cannot be accepted.”
The address brought to mind the impassioned “J’Accuse” letter, penned by the great French writer Emile Zola in 1898, in response to the antisemitism displayed by the French government during the infamous trial of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, the Jewish military officer who was convicted and publicly humiliated on fabricated charges of treason. In that letter, Zola spoke with disgust “of the hunting for the ‘dirty Jews,’ which dishonors our time.”
When Valls asked with anger, “How can we accept that cries of ‘death to the Jews’ can be heard on the streets?” the echoes of Zola’s words were unmistakable.
In his speech, Valls was explicit that the “first question that has to be dealt with clearly is the struggle against antisemitism.” (h/t Guest)

France envoy to JPost: Jewish crisis has 'nothing to do with Israel and the Palestinians'

In a modern synagogue in the capitol on Tuesday, alongside members of Congress, Obama administration officials and hundreds of deeply troubled Jewish Americans, France's ambassador to the United States apologized for his country's conduct last week.
"We failed," Ambassador Gérard Araud told the audience. "We have not done enough. It's obvious."
Araud, once France's envoy to Israel, said he was "ashamed" at the prospect of his Jewish compatriots fleeing France out of fear, after the latest anti-Semitic attack in his homeland on Friday claimed the lives of four Jewish shoppers at a kosher supermarket.
"We have to consider that we are at war," he said, warning that the very soul of France is at stake. "The first line of democracy is the journalists and the Jews."
In an interview with The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday night, Araud expanded on the dimensions and targets of that war.
France's challenge, he said, is delineating between criticism of the Israeli government and a growing, radical opposition to the existence of Israel as a vehicle for hatred against the Jewish people.

French Muslim Students Yell “Allahu Akbar,” Dishonor Moment Of Silence For Charlie Hebdo Victims

Throughout many schools in France, Muslim students refused to comply with a moment of silence to honor the victims of the Charlie Hebdo massacre. While some spoke obnoxiously loudly during the 60 second period, others yelled “Allahu Akbar!” or “God is great.” In another incident, a group of young Muslims dishonored the moment of silence, telling their teacher, “You reap what you sow,” the Washington Post reports.
At another school in Seine-Saine-Denis, some 80 percent of students refused to honor the moment of silence, saying that the Charlie Hebdo staff “deserved what they got” for insulting Islam’s Muhammad, reports Le Figaro. In another incident in Lille, a young boy threatened to shoot his teacher “with a Kalashnikov” for asking him to remain silent during the minute of remembrance. Others spoke highly of jihadists who had joined ISIS and fought on behalf of Islam abroad.
“You do not understand the Prophet, they should not have drawn it… He is above men,” was another student’s explanation as to why he was not going to respect the minute of silence.

People seem surprised that Hamas pretended to condemn the murder of Jews in Paris saying there was "no justification for killing innocents." (A close reading of the Hamas statement shows that they didn't condemn the murder of Jews, but only of the Charlie Hebdo employees.)

Since Palestinian Arab groups celebrated the murder of Jews praying in Jerusalem so recently, and Hamas students even made a music video about that attack, obviously killing Jews is not considered a bad thing for these terrorists and their supporters.

But there is something that they do consider a bad thing: the idea of Jews moving to Israel. And when attacks on Jews i Europe prompt more Jews to consider making aliyah, the Arabs get very upset.

Dr. Hanna Issa, Secretary General of the Islamic-Christian Committee to Support Occupied Jerusalem and Holy Sites, condemned Netanyahu's and Lieberman's calls inviting French Jews to move to Israel, saying that they will all be moved into the territories. His statements were reported in dozens of Arabic media outlets.

But it is not only living Jews who enrage Palestinian Arabs when they move to Israel. Dead ones are just as bad.

Supreme Islamic Council head Sheikh Ekrema Sabri railed against the Paris Jewish victims being buried in Israel. he called the idea "unacceptable" and characterized it as "a direct attack on the city of Jerusalem."

Adnan Husseini, who calls himself the "governor of Jerusalem," said that the idea of bringing the bodies of Jews to be buried in Jerusalem is "an Israeli superstition" that reflects the Israeli government's "tension and confusion and inability to deal with political issues" they face.

By coincidence, one of the stories from this date in 1948 being tweeted out by 1948 War was this one, that explains how things really haven't changed:

Arab Nat Com Saleh Ed-din Abbasi says Haifa Arabs are 'now united, paying with precious blood to keep country purely Arab' [15 Jan 48]
— 48 Arab Israeli War (@1948War) January 15, 2015

Today is the 13th anniversary of the death of Raed Karmi, one of the major Fatah terrorists of the second intifada. Fatah's Facebook page has a number of posts and videos celebrating his life of murdering Jews.

Here is his terror history:

Since the beginning of the current wave of Palestinian violence in October 2000, Karmi had been the leading member of a murderous Tanzim cell that was responsible for numerous shooting attacks in the Tulkarem area, in which both Israeli civilians and soldiers were killed and wounded.

In media interviews, Karmi had made it clear that he was determined to continue terrorist attacks against Israel and that he wanted to expand them. In a CNN interview on August 23, 2001, Karmi stated firmly: “We train the teenagers to carry out terrorist attacks inside Israeli territory.We train 17- and 18-year-olds to attack settlers, kidnap soldiers inside Israel.” In other interviews, he also described his involvement in the kidnapping and murder of two Israeli restaurateurs in Tulkarem.

Raed Karmi acted directly under Marwan Bargouti, head of the Tanzim in Judea and Samaria and was under his direct supervision.

Raed Karmi was involved in the perpetration of many terrorist attacks, including:

Numerous shooting attacks on IDF and Border Police bases in the area of Tulkarem.

Oct 20, 2000: participated in shooting attack on bus of Golani soldiers that mistakenly entered the city.

Dec 7, 2000: Shooting at an Israeli vehicle near the village of Burke, seriously injuring soldiers and a female civilian.

Jan 23, 2001: Kidnapping and murder of two Tel-Aviv restaurant owners, Motti Dayan and Etgar Zeitouny, in Tulkarem.

May 31, 2001: Karmi participated in a shooting attack on an Israeli vehicle in Baka el-Sharkia, in which Zvi Shelef of Mevo Dotan was killed.

June 18, 2001: Shooting attack near in Einav, in which an Israeli civilian, Dan Yehuda of Homesh, was killed and Alex Briskin was injured.

July 4, 2001: The murder of Eliahu Na’aman near the village of Suweika.

July 30, 2001: Shooting attacks near the Israeli Arab village of Bir Saha, in which three Border Policemen were injured – one, Hani Abramov, a female officer, was severely wounded.

Aug 26, 2001: The murder of Dov Rosman of Netanya near the village of Zaita.

Sept 6, 2001: Shooting attack on an Israeli vehicle near Kibbutz Bahan, in which an off-duty IDF officer, Lt. Erez Merhavi was killed and a fellow female officer was injured.

Oct 5, 2001: Shooting attack in which an Israeli citizen, Hananya Ben-Avraham of Elad, was killed.

Oct 28, 2001: Karmi was involved in a shooting attack near Kibbutz Metzer in which an IDF officer, Yaniv Levy, was killed.

Oct 29, 2001: Attempt to detonate a bomb in the home of a naval officer in Raanana.

Nov 19, 2001: Shooting attack on a taxi near the Shavei Shomron junction, in which three Israeli citizens, including the rabbi of Shavei Shomron, were injured.

Nov 28, 2001: attempt by two suicide bombers to infiltrate into Israeli territory, foiled by reinforced IDF forces along the Green Line near Tulkarem.

Dec 15, 2001: An abortive suicide attack in which the explosive charge blew up prematurely near Shaar Ephraim; only the terrorist was killed.

As the terror trial against the PLO gets underway, it is important to note that Karmi was supposedly in PA prison while he was carrying out his attacks. As Haaretz noted at the time:

Israel demanded that the PA arrest Karmi on June 14, 2001, one day after signing the Tenet Document. The PA held Karmi in "defensive detention," which allowed him to leave prison and take part in shooting attacks.

So the PLO would tell its European friends that Karmi was in jail, while they were actually promoting his terror career and using the jail as a means to protect him from Israel!

I mentioned last month that the Gisha NGO, the "legal center for freedom of movement" which is well-funded by many European governments and organizations, goes out of its way to avoid condemning Hamas for its restrictions on freedom of movement into and out of Gaza.

The last time it condemned Hamas for blocking Gazan;s movement, as far as I can tell, was in 2011. The many examples since then have gone unremarked by this "freedom of movement" organization.

Here is how Gisha reported on the closing of the Erez crossing last week:

Erez Crossing closed last Thursday, January 8, following a disagreement between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority (PA) and is operating only for exceptional cases: Medical patients, Israeli citizens, and UNDP and UNRWA staff. According to Palestinian sources, the crossing was closed after Hamas placed a container on the Palestinian side of the crossing designed to be used as an office for its employees. The container is said to obstruct passage, and both Israel and the PA objected to its installation. PA employees on the Palestinian side of Erez refuse to work until the container is removed. Gisha calls on all parties to immediately resolve the matter, which is impacting on the civilian population and its ability to travel.

Hamas effectively installed an additional gateway for travelers to go through before entering and leaving Gaza. Yet it took three days for Gisha to even mention this on its site, and when it did it studiously avoided blaming Hamas for its unilateral move that caused the crossing to be closed. The entire press release was clearly only published reluctantly. Erez remained mostly closed for an entire week until it was re-opened today, and this is Gisha's only mention of it.

On the other hand, within one day of Israel closing the crossings last November due to rocket fire, Gisha immediately and expansively condemned Israel, calling it "collective punishment."

It is interesting that this EU-funded organization shows so little regard to Gazans when Hamas is the party guilty of restricting their freedom of movement.

Turkish police deploy to protect...Mohammed

From Hurriyet Daily News:

Police raided the printing press of Turkish daily Cumhuriyet on Jan. 14, as it prepared to distribute a four-page selection of Charlie Hebdo’s new issue in an act of solidarity with the French satirical magazine targeted last week in a deadly attack that claimed 12 victims.

The police also took extreme security measures ahead of the scheduled publication of the supplement.

Police cars were sent to the printer of the daily in Istanbul early on Jan. 14 and halted trucks to prevent the distribution of the Jan. 14 edition. The distribution was eventually allowed after the prosecution made sure that cartoons representing the Prophet Muhammad were not included in the selection.

Cumhuriyet editor-in-chief Utku Çakırözer stated earlier that they had decided not to publish a cartoon on the cover featuring the Prophet Muhammad in tears holding a “Je suis Charlie” banner, in reference to solidarity protests with the magazine.
...

Despite the daily’s decision not to publish the most controversial cartoons, police extended security measures in the surroundings of its offices in Istanbul’s central Şişli neighborhood.

An employee of daily Cumhuriyet told the Hürriyet Daily News on condition of anonymity on Jan. 14 that the newspaper had received hundreds of death threats.

Despite the official message of support to the victims, the magazine has been chided by many officials and commentators for publishing cartoons of Muhammad.

“Daily Cumhuriyet will be complicit with a magazine that insults sacred values and commits hate crimes against Muslims, slamming religion,” said conservative daily Yeni Şafak, known for its closeness to the government.

You don't want to mess with Mohammed. Good thing the Turkish police can protect his honor for him.

(h/t Irene)

01/14 Links Pt2: After Paris, Whither the BDS Movement?; Frankenstinians Unleashed

From Ian:

Michael Lumish: Frankenstinians Unleashed

The Frankenstinian people have lived in Frankenstine since time immemorial.
When the Euro-French occupiers of Frankenstinian land marched onto their sacred soil and started ripping olive groves from the earth with their bare fangs they let loose a righteous wave of resistance that continues to this day.
The Euro-French imperialist invaders will not know a day of peace so long as they continue to oppress the native Frankenstinian population. The Frankenstinians are a noble and peaceful people who want nothing more than to tend their sacred olive groves and build a decent and prosperous life for themselves and their children, but they are living under a brutal occupation.
France must become a state for all of its people, not merely the Euro-French. The Euro-French racists in the illegal French Occupation Government (FOG) have created an unsustainable situation. The status quo, which enshrines the Frankenstinians as a permanent underclass under Euro-French law, cannot long continue. Nor should it.
The native population of Frankenstine have their rights and the French Occupation Government is responsible under international law to implement those rights. So long as the racist Euro-French government insists upon punishing an innocent people on their own land then they will continue to receive well-deserved scorn from the rest of the world community.

After Paris, Whither the BDS Movement?

Such uncaring, coming at this particular moment from anyone professing to be an activist working on behalf of universal values is deafening. As it happens, however, it beats the alternative.
That would be the attempt to hurry past the actual killings of actual human beings and milk the situation for every possible drop of bilious propaganda. Enter Ali Abunimah, one of the most vocal—and noxious—opponents of Israel and the co-founder of a website called The Electronic Intifada, a name that does very little to distance the site’s writers from the memory of the two violent Palestinian uprisings that claimed the lives of nearly a thousand Israeli civilians.
Observing the situation in France, Abunimah promoted a novel theory: Because the gravest danger we face is Islamophobia, and because Islamophobia feeds on a false belief that European Muslims aren’t trying hard enough to fit in, French Jews rushing to leave France in the wake of the Paris attacks are the real and unsung villains.
“[I]mmigrants and their European-born descendants from Muslim-majority countries are routinely accused by those who hate and fear them of ‘refusing to integrate’ in Europe,” Abunimah wrote, and therefore “those who say that Jews must leave Europe for their own safety are saying in effect that it is impossible for Jews to integrate and ever be safe in their home countries.” And that, Abunimah triumphantly concludes, is “a fundamentally anti-Semitic” idea.
In other words, when the victims scurry for safety, they’re really only digging their hole deeper and are therefore to blame for making a bad situation worse. And, of course, it’s all Israel’s fault: The title of Abunimah’s piece is “Israel Moves Quickly To Exploit Paris Attacks.”
To those among us unfortunate enough to follow the BDS movement closely, such vitriol is no news. But cataclysmic events have a way of rattling people into sudden awakenings. And so here’s a simple suggestion: before you engage in conversation with critics of Israel, take a moment and check their digital footprint from the past week. If they’ve taken the time and the trouble to condemn these horrific murders without equivocation, if they sound genuinely remorseful, proceed. But if all they can muster are musty cliches or steely dogmas, if they can’t take a moment away from their politics to be ordinary, feeling humans, and if they can’t miss an opportunity to see even this tragedy as yet another proof of the exceptional nefariousness of the Israeli regime, then they’ve proven that the true object of their vitriol is not the Jewish state but the Jewish people.

SA Jews blast BDSers for hosting double hijacker

The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement has announced that it will bring convicted terrorist Leila Khaled to South African next month for a speaking tour, drawing harsh condemnations from the country’s Jewish community.
Khaled, now 70, is a former member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and took part in two airplane hijackings between 1969 and 1970.
Arrested after the second incident, she was later freed in exchange for hostages held by the PFLP.
“By bringing Leila Khaled to South Africa, BDS aligns itself with savage gunmen who murder civilians in Paris, France, with terrorists who send 10-year old girls to bomb markets in Potiskum, Nigeria, and barbarians who butcher school children in Peshawar, Pakistan,” South African Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein told The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday.
In an email to supporters, the South African BDS movement termed Khaled an icon of the Palestinian struggle, showing an image of her clutching an automatic weapon and comparing her to late South African president Nelson Mandela.
“Many Palestinians including Leila Khaled are today considered terrorists like the ANC and Nelson Mandela were once classified as terrorists,” the group declared. “The picture of a young, determined looking woman with a checkered keffiyeh scarf, clutching an AK-47, was as era-defining as that of Che Guevara, Ruth First and other political figures from our recent past.”
The South African Jewish Board of Deputies responded by issuing a statement deploring the extension of an invitation to a “notorious plane hijacker” in the wake of terrorist attacks carried out in Africa, Asia, Europe and Australia.

Leila Khaled and the hijacking of human rights

So how should we respond?
For one, South Africa needs to draw a red line when it comes to harboring terrorists. A flippant attitude in this regard previously allowed Al-Shabaab terrorist, Samantha Lewthwaite (known as the White Widow), to take refuge in South Africa; now another terrorist is going to be allowed access to South Africa – only this time out in the open, with the audacious claim of being a human rights activist.
Leila Khaled should not be allowed to come to South Africa. Universities should ban her from their campuses – if not on principle then in the interests of ensuring a feeling of security for all students.
Secondly, there needs to be a much more severe backlash against the BDS movement, which is not only wholly undemocratic in its ideology and actions, but is a tangible danger.
BDS itself should be inspected for having close ties with open proponents of Radical Islam. Media Review Network is just one of these affiliates; its leader, Iqbal Jasset, recently justified the brutal massacre of the Charlie Hebdo staff in Paris. South African security authorities should cut out the Radical Islamic threat now, even in its infancy, before it grows to the proportions we are currently seeing in Europe.

Today's Arab antisemitism even ropes in Claudia Schiffer as a Jewish conspirator

Dr. Fayez Abu Shamala, a "political analyst," writes in Gaza-based Al Wafa about that ever popular "Jewish character."

Is the Jewish mind behind the malignancy of the events in France? Has Israeli intelligence arranged the recent cinematic-style events? Especially that the head of the Mossad and all the Shin Bet crew resides in France these days

A viewer sees ridiculous large demonstration organized by the Jewish Hollande, President of France, and his call for tens of presidents of the Friends of the Jews for his participation in the funeral with slapping and tears...

Claudia and the Koran dress, 1994

Up to this moment, Islam is innocent of terrorism, and historical evidence confirms that the distortion of Islam is not new in the eyes of the Jews, whose abuse to the Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him is not born of this stage, the hatred of Jews emerged while demanding financial compensation for damage to the Jews of the Arabian Peninsula from the time of the Prophet, and up through casual German Jewish fashion icon Claudia Schiffer who thirty years ago wore a beaded evening gown with verses from the Koran.[Schiffer is not Jewish - EoZ]

The advocates of extremism in the world are the Jews, who are practitioners of terrorism in the land of the Arabs, and who have spread religious extremism in the world, and the Jews are the source of bigotry in their superstitious beliefs...and live in communities meant to elicit hatred of others, especially when they see them as inferior.

Jews have succeeded in using world peace symbols, and they succeeded in transforming the hatred of the Jews planted in the hearts of people throughout history and geography; they managed to turn it into a war between Christians and Muslims, so Jews come out of these battles unharmed.

Wen people talk about the war on terrorism, it is in fact a Jewish war against Islam, Christians are pawns, with the help of some of the Arabs and the Palestinians, and this is what requires caution.

The elite intelligent Muslim scholars need to call for a reconciliatory meeting Christians and tolerant Muslims, in order to circumvent the cunning Jews.

How much projection can you find in this little diatribe?

Officials Insisting France Welcomes Jews Can't Keep Straight Face (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

Paris, January 14 - French government officials making declarations to the effect that the French Republic remains and will always be a place where Jews can feel at home have been unable to complete those statements this week without bursting into laughter.

Following the captivity and slaughter of four French Jews last Friday, and a series of antisemitic attacks over the last several years, the Parisian government has been keen to maintain some sense of security for the country's 500,000 Jews. The attacks, however, have taken place despite surveillance of the perpetrators by the authorities, and in an atmosphere of increased vitriol and violent intimidation by French Muslims. The reality of the situation now forces officials to struggle mightily to maintain composure when trying to assure Jews and their supporters that they have a future in France as individuals and a community.

Nearly 40% of French officials addressing the issue and reiterating the government's commitment to Jewish safety have managed to get through their prepared statements with little more than a smirk and a stifled snort, but almost 20% have been unable to complete their first two sentences without working so hard not to laugh that tears run from their eyes. The other 40% apparently expended no effort at all to suppress laughter at both the pointlessness of that commitment and the at very notion that France actually cares.

"We've had people breaking down right there at the podium," acknowledges Prime Minister Manuel Vall. "It's a serious challenge to keep a straight face when you know there's absolutely no way this country is going to do anything but try to assuage its guilt over Nazi collaboration by subtly and not-so-subtly treating Jews and Israel as deserving of whatever mistreatment befalls them."

Vall noted the absurdity of claiming that safety and security for Jews is - or ever was - a French priority while the French government does whatever possible to undermine security for Jews in Israel and to empower Israel's enemies. "It's a joke to claim we want Jews to feel safe when we endorse a movement dedicated to destroying the one place you'd think Jews should never have to worry about feeling secure," he explained, referring to France's recent recognition of a Palestinian state. "I myself had difficulty keeping from cracking up as our government invited Palestinian President Abbas to Sunday's demonstration against terrorism. And I only managed to do so because of special breathing exercises I've been practicing."

Other officials have not been as fortunate, or prescient, as to have such exercises at their disposal, leading to embarrassing and dismaying encounters between those officials and Jews. The mayor of Toulouse, where several Jews, including children, were killed in a shooting attack several years ago, had to leave the room rather than force himself not to laugh while promising that he would keep Jews and their institutions protected.

Congratulations to PreOccupied Territory for being mentioned in The Atlantic!

01/14 Links Pt1: From Salman Rushdie to Charlie Hebdo; Under Standing Charlie Hebdo

From Ian:

Clifford May: From Salman Rushdie to Charlie Hebdo

Let's get a few things straight: The slaughter of eight satirical journalists in Paris last week was not a tragedy. It was an atrocity. And while you may have been shocked by the attack on Charlie Hebdo, anyone who was surprised has not been paying close attention to the events unfolding over recent decades.
In 1989, 10 years after the start of Iran's Islamic Revolution -- always intended as a global revolution -- Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini began to set down the Islamic laws he expected both Muslims and non-Muslims to follow -- not just in Iran but everywhere on Earth. He forbade criticism of the Quran and the Prophet Muhammad and issued a fatwa calling for the execution of Salman Rushdie, a British subject, for having written a novel that, in his eyes, was "against Islam."
European leaders had a choice: They could have stated forcefully that no foreign leader -- religious or political or, in this case, both -- would be permitted to restrict European freedoms. They could have conveyed that message by suspending diplomatic relations, imposing economic sanctions or threatening military action. Instead, they advised Rushdie to lay low and employ bodyguards.
Such fecklessness soon became routine. To take but one example: A year ago, the 32-year-old Iranian poet, Hashem Shaabani, a member of Iran's Arab minority, was hanged. He had not mocked Muhammad or made fun of the Quran. Indeed, it is not clear what he did to incur the ire of Iran's rulers. All we know is that he was found guilty of moharebeh -- war against God -- as well as "sowing corruption on earth." We also know that his death sentence was approved by Iran's president, the "moderate" Hassan Rouhani.
Though some human rights organizations issued strongly worded statements, Western apologists for the clerical regime were unmoved. Nor did Western diplomats revise their approach to Iran, their ardent quest to achieve detente with the Islamic republic. Within months, U.S. President Barack Obama was expressing confidence that "Iran can play a constructive role" in regard to the conflict in Iraq.

Kristol Blasts Iran for Hypocrisy on Charlie Hebdo Criticism

The Iranian government has condemned the newest cover of Charlie Hebdo, which depicts the prophet Mohammed holding a sign reading “Je suis Charlie” and with the title saying “that all is forgiven.”
Bill Kristol appeared on Morning Joe where he called out the hypocrisy of the Iranian Foreign Minister.
“The Iranian Foreign Minister condemning Charlie Hebdo, that’s rich,” said Kristol. “Iran began the business in 1989 of deciding that they could issue a fatwa in other countries. This is unbelievable! It’s one thing for them to have different views of free speech and blasphemy in their country. They are trying to export that to the West.”
NBC correspondent Bill Neely agreed with Kristol and mentioned evidence he saw when he was in Iran.
“The state run, the main state run newspaper, shows the crudest anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic cartoons. Thing that would make the staff of Charlie Hebdo blush,” Neely said. “It’s a bit rich for the Foreign Minister to say this latest cover is a little unhelpful.”

Kristol Blasts Iran for Hypocrisy on Charlie Hebdo Criticism

In Paris’s Muslim Suburbs, Some Blame Jews for Charlie

But even though the flags of Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia were flying at the rally in Place de la République and Muslims were well represented among the marchers Sunday, Boular said the attacks in Paris were part of a plot masterminded by Jewish conspirators.
“The Kalashnikovs, the identity cards the [killers] supposedly left behind, it was all staged,” said Boular, as his friends nodded in agreement. “It was a conspiracy designed by the Jews to make Muslims look bad. We’d rather just stay where we are.”
No use arguing. No use pointing out that one of the terrorists murdered four Jews. Conspiracy theories have their own unassailable logic, and this is a world apart from the displays of unity in Paris after the carnage of last week. French newspapers reported that some students in these neighborhoods—as well as other heavily Muslim areas near cities like Lille—refused to participate in Thursday’s national moment of silence for the victims of the terror attacks. One teacher said up to 80 percent of his students didn’t want to observe the silence, and some said they supported the attackers. “You reap what you sow,” a student who refused the moment of silence told his teacher in reference to the terrorists’ victims, according to Le Figaro.
Many spoke out against Israel and Jews as well as the United States but did not seem to have much of a grasp of geopolitics nor did they appear to be very religious in the traditional sense of the word.
Another young man of French-Algerian descent interviewed outside a gas station in the Saint-Denis suburb reacted angrily to a reporter’s presence and demanded to know her religion. “The worst thing is to be atheist,” he said.
The man, who gave his named as “Mohamed,” also said he was a devout Muslim but then changed his demeanor and added, grinning, that he was also “a delinquent.” Then he said he was a drug dealer and without prompting, invited the reporter into the (also very clean) gas station to show an array of hashish for sale in broad daylight on a shelf next to the ATM.
He also called the Paris terrorist attacks “un complot,” or conspiracy, and launched into a lengthy explanation of the “magical Jews” behind it. They were not ordinary Jews, he said, but a “hybrid race of shape shifters” who have extraordinary abilities. “They know how to get in everywhere,” he said. “They are master manipulators.”

The stupid argument that "Israel kills journalists, too"

There is a certain type of person who, upon hearing that something horrendous happened, reflexively tries to come up with ways to prove that Israel is worse. (When that doesn' t work, they usually fall back to saying that Israel was behind the atrocity to begin with.)

These people, by viewing all world events through their "I hate Israel" glasses, show that they don't give a damn about the lives lost in the original event. No, everything bad that happens must be used, however tenuously, as anti-Israel incitement.

Such haters of Israel - including some Israelis - have been using a new anti-Israel meme, saying that Israel has killed more journalists than the Paris jihadists did at Charlie Hebdo.

This cartoon was published in Haaretz counting 13 "journalists" killed in Gaza compared to 10 killed in the Charlie Hebdo attack::

Do I have to point out the difference between specifically targeting journalists to be killed because what they wrote offends you, and being killed in a war zone?

(There have reportedly been threats against the Haaretz cartoonist that made this sickening equivalence. That is of course wrong, but Internet masses saying they wish someone was dead is not usually a credible threat. If Haaretz staffers feel threatened, then they should go to the police to arrest those who are making the threats. If it is simply the sort of stupidity that Internet users spout every day it is hardly in the same league as the death threats of jihadists.)

The other problem with the equivalence between the journalists killed in Gaza and those murdered by French jihadists is that some of the "journalists" were terrorists themselves.

The cartoon referred to an IFJ count during the Gaza war saying that 13 journalists had been killed so far. They include Izzat Dheir, who was an Islamic Jihad fighter.

They count Abdurrahman Abu Hina, a Hamas member (#875.)

Other journalists that appear on lists of those killed by Israel in Gaza after this IFJ list was published include Abdullah Murtaja:

Other "journalists," like Khaled Riad Mohammed Hamad, weren't journalists in any real sense. They worked for terrorist media outlets, where journalistic ethics are nonexistent - they were propagandists paid by Hamas or Islamic Jihad. If the IFJ wants to consider them part of their profession, that's fine, but it really waters down the definition of "journalist." International law definitely distinguishes between legitimate media and propaganda outlets that could contribute to the war.

Other journalists killed in Gaza were not killed by Israeli bombings. At least three were killed when Gaza "bomb disposal experts" took them to see them work - and they did not distance the journalists far enough, nor did they give them any protective gear, as the munitions exploded. Yet they are also often listed as being killed by Israel by the haters.

UNESCO only counts 8 journalists killed that fit their criteria. Two of them (Simone Camilli and Ali Shehda Abu Afash, a translator) were killed by munitions that exploded while supposedly being disarmed. They counted at least three "journalists" for Hamas media (Khaled Riad Mohammed Hamad, Sameh al-Aryan and Mohamed Daher.) One of the remaining was a driver, not a journalist.

Any objective observer would conclude that there is no possible comparison between Israeli actions and those of the Charlie Hebdo terrorists, and inded such a comparison is obscene.

Haaretz defends the cartoon as "freedom of speech" but real journalists should prize accuracy and honesty over blind, hateful Israel bashing, which is what that cartoon really is. No one should be threatened over its publication, but no responsible media outlet would publish such an inaccurate piece to begin with. Haaretz has the absolute right to publish lies, but its defense of publishing lies indicates that Haaretz is not so much a newspaper as it is dedicated to anti-Israel propaganda itself

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The PLO terror trial that is now underway in New York should be lots of fun if the PLO keeps defending itself like this:

A lawyer for the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Palestinian Authority told a jury in an opening statement Tuesday that the groups are not to blame for seven terror attacks in Israel from 2001 to 2004.

Attorney Mark Rochon said the attacks were carried out by suicide bombers and gunmen "acting on their own angry, crazy reasons" and that the organizations are victims of guilt by association.

The $1 billion lawsuit was filed in 2004 over attacks in or near Jerusalem that killed 33 people and wounded hundreds more, including scores of U.S. citizens.

Given that these attacks were happily claimed by Fatah terrorists on the payroll of the PLO, this argument is going to be demolished easily.

Shurat HaDin's head, Nitsana Darshan-Leitner , predicted in December that the PLO would mount this defense:

When asked what possible defense could be offered against such a charge, Darshan-Leitner predicted that the PA will attempt to spin the Second Intifada as a series of "lone wolf" attacks outside their realm of control.

"The PLO's defense would be that it could not control the attacks, the perpetrators of the different attacks, that they were sporadic events which the PLO had no control over [and] did not encourage in any way, and basically that even attacks carried out by Palestinian policemen or Palestinian security officials were wrong and not authorized by the Palestinian Authority," she explained.

"It's a very weak defense, because we have thousands of [pieces of] evidence - documents - that prove otherwise, prove that the Palestinian Authority not only controlled the attacks, but wanted to initiate the attacks and set up a policy to carry out attacks, wanted to direct their officials [and] their commanders to perpetrate attacks against Israelis, and incited to carry out attacks."

"I think the Palestinian Authority's argument will not hold," she concluded.

In 2008, the PLO - trying to avoid this trial - argued that the terror attacks were acts of war, not terrorism - the exact opposite of the current claim! If they are acts of war that means that they were centrally controlled and managed by the Palestinian Authority government at the time.

The judge threw out that claim:

[District Judge George] Daniels rejected the PLO's argument that two machine-gun attacks and five bombings were acts of war. The Jerusalem-area incidents killed 33 people and wounded hundreds, including scores of U.S. citizens.

Daniels said the attacks targeted public places - not military or government personnel or interests. Two bombings were on downtown streets; others occurred at a crowded bus stop, a cafeteria at the Hebrew University and a passenger-filled civilian bus.

"The use of bombs in these circumstances indicates an intent to cause far-reaching devastation upon the masses," the Manhattan judge said," with a merciless capability of indiscriminately killing and maiming untold numbers in heavily populated civilian areas.

"Such attacks upon non-combative civilians, who were allegedly simply going about their everyday lives, do not constitute acts of war," he said.

Daniels also said the violence meets the legal definition of international terrorism.

I wonder if the PLO's previous arguments are admissible as evidence in the current trial.

At any rate, this means that according to the PLO's own statements, they are guilty of war crimes by targeting civilians.

No, Israel didn't jail a cartoonist because of his cartoons

On Monday's Daily Show with Jon Stewart, besides the absurd charge by Jimmy Carter that jihadists in France were really motivated by Israeli policies, we saw Stewart accuse Israel of jailing a Palestinian cartoonist because of his work and ironically pointing out that this terrible, freedom hating state was allowed to send Bibi to Paris:

Al Jazeera is such a trustworthy source!

The cartoonist says one story now, and his lawyer said another one at the time.

Mohammad Saba’aneh the cartoonistm who of course can be trusted not to be biased at all, was quoted in Electronic Intifada:

In the end, the focus of the interrogation became a book about Palestinian political prisoners that Saba’aneh’s brother — a member of Hamas — wrote and published. Because several of Saba’aneh’s cartoons were published in his brother’s book, “I was charged with collaboration with Hamas.”

Of course, he says, it was all an excuse to jail him for his cartoons.

But Saba’aneh's lawyer said something quite different at the time he was jailed:

According to his lawyer, Mohammad is accused of accepting money in Jordan for his brother Tamer, a member of Hamas who is currently in an Israeli prison. Mohammad denies this, and claims he handed the money to another person while still in Jordan, because he suspected the funds were linked to Hamas.

So Saba’aneh admitted that he accepted money that he thought was meant to go to Hamas! (And he disingenuously claims that he simply handed the money to someone else. Was that someone else going to give it to Hamas too? How does that make him less guilty?)

Of course, he no longer tells anyone that story, because the idea of his being a martyr for freedom of expression sounds so much better - and makes Israel sound so much worse.

Of course, The Daily Show doesn't claim to be a real news show so it doesn't do corrections - allowing it to have no responsibility for lying about Israel even when it is not joking.