Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Saturday, April 11, 2015

04/11 Links: The Palestinian Statehood Idea Crumbles; Why Palestinians in Yarmouk Are Unlucky

From Ian:

The Palestinian Statehood Idea Begins to Crumble

A sea change began within hours of the Israeli election returns.
Thomas L. Friedman, who has devoted much of his life to promoting Palestinian statehood, declared in his New York Times column that the idea of a Palestinian state is “not possible anymore.” That was followed by his Times colleague David K. Shipler, another longtime advocate of a Palestinian state, announcing that the “the two-state solution looks dead.”
Just a couple of elite, pro-Palestinian journalists venting their frustration?
Don’t bet on it. The American public is losing faith in “Palestine” too. Friedman and Shipler’s declarations merely echo the latest poll numbers on the American public’s view of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
A new Washington Post-ABC News poll has found that Americans’ support for the idea of creating a Palestinian state has reached its lowest point in 20 years. Just 39 percent of Americans support it; 36 percent are opposed.

Khaled Abu Toameh: Why Palestinians in Yarmouk Are Unlucky

For Palestinian Authority (PA) leaders, the desire to punish Israel is stronger than the will to save the lives of thousands of Palestinians being killed in Syria by the Islamic State and starved by the Syrian army, which has been besieging Yarmouk for 700 days.
Instead of devoting their energies and efforts to stop the massacres in Yarmouk, PA officials were busy preparing a new draft resolution to be submitted to the UN Security Council, establishing a timeline for ending Israeli "occupation."
The Arab foreign ministers who met in Cairo earlier this week to discuss ways of backing the new Palestinian bid, deliberately ignored that, as they were chatting and sipping coffee, Palestinians were being slaughtered and forced to flee their homes in Yarmouk.
For the PA, Jews participating in a marathon seems to be more serious and life-threatening than Islamic State terrorists beheading Palestinians and destroying Palestinian homes in Yarmouk.
"All that is left for us to do is howl, slap and cry." — Ashraf al-Ajrami, former Palestinian Authority minister.

French Activist Praises Retirement of ‘Al Durah Hoax’ Architect Charles Enderlin

With reports that veteran France 2 reporter Charles Enderlin is stepping down from his job, the French-Jewish activist who spearheaded claims he falsely accused Israel in the death of a 12-year-old boy back in 2000 is relieved to see him go.
Phillipe Karsenty spoke to The Algemeiner regarding Enderlin’s departure from the state television network, though he expressed disappointment it was not over ethical issues regarding the infamous report on the death of Mohammed al-Dura.
“This is good news but it has nothing to do with any desire of the French authorities to stop incitement against Israel and the Jews. Enderlin is leaving his job because he is retiring. He will reach 70 years old in October 2015 and he doesn’t have the right to keep on working in a French public company, which France 2 is,” he said.
The 70-year-old Franco-Israeli correspondent will be replaced as France 2‘s bureau chief in Israel by reporter Franck Genauzeau. Karsenty noted that Enderlin’s “replacement by someone who doesn’t have any track record of anti-Israel or antisemitism is good news too,” and could allow the network to prove it doesn’t engage in systematic anti-Israel bias.
“From Genauzeau’s future attitude, we will know if Enderlin’s constant incitement against Israel was his own decision or if it was a state oriented political decision,” he said. (h/t Elder of Lobby)

Chag sameach, again

Passover's last days in the Diaspora start Thursday evening, so no blogging until Saturday night or Sunday morning.

Have a chag kosher v'sameach!

04/09 Links Pt2: Brendan O’Neill: Yarmouk exposes callous double standards of ugly Israel bashers

From Ian:

Brendan O’Neill: Yarmouk exposes callous double standards of ugly Israel bashers

If there were an award for double standards, for getting crazily angry about some people’s behaviour while turning a blind eye to other people’s behaviour, anti-Israel activists would win it every year.
These are people who take to the streets to march and holler whenever an Israeli warplane leaves its hangar, yet who say next to nothing about the militarism of France, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and too many other states to mention.
They bang on endlessly about Israel being an apartheid state, yet through BDS they have created a system of cultural apartheid. In their eyes, culture created by us, or by China, or by Zimbabwe, is fine, but culture produced by them, those nasty Israelis, must be hounded out of theatres and galleries lest it infect us all with its contagious Zionism.
These are activists who cry “Censorship!” when a conference of theirs is pulled, as happened at Southampton University recently. Yet they spend the rest of their time agitating for the No Platforming of Israeli representatives on campus and for the shutting down of pro-Israel university societies. “Free speech! (For nice people like me, not for rotters like you)” — that’s their fantastically hypocritical motto.
And now we can see that their double standards extend even to the people they claim to care for: the Palestinians.Even here, even on the question of Palestinian suffering, anti-Israel activists only care some of the time. If you’re a Palestinian whose life is made harder by Israeli forces, they’ll share pictures of you, march in the streets for you, write tear-drenched tweets about you. But if you’re a Palestinian under threat from a non-Israeli force, forget about it. You’re on your own.

Vic Rosenthal's weekly column:

I just listened to an interview with Tuvia Tenenbom, author of Catch a Jew and I Sleep in Hitler’s Room. Although the interviewer talks far too much — I always wish they would just shut up and let the subject talk, especially when it’s someone as engaging as Tenenbom — I strongly recommend it. Be prepared to be upset, angry or depressed (depending on your personality) by what he reports.

Among the truths that Tenenbom discovered in his travels in Europe and Israel in the guise of a non-Jewish German journalist were a) many Europeans are really anti-Jewish and anti-Zionist, b) so are some Jewish Israelis, and c) they are getting together to work towards the replacement of Israel by some kind of non-Zionist state in which Jews will be a minority.

This isn’t news — NGO Monitor has been documenting the massive flow of Euros to anti-Zionist organizations run by left-wing Israeli Jews or Arabs for years — but Tenenbom emphasizes how pervasive the influence is, extending from large organizations like the Red Cross to small operations like the tour guide (a self-described ‘ex-Jew’) who brings groups of Europeans to Yad Vashem, where he explains that this is what the Jews are doing to the Palestinian Arabs.

It’s hard to see how a tiny country, which doesn’t threaten anyone and only wants to be left in peace deserves this. But the NGOs are only a tiny part of it. There is also the phenomenon of the worldwide academic onslaught on Israel, in which critical standards and honesty are thrown to the winds in the production of ‘scholarship’ that is no more than political polemics against Israel and the Jewish people; while, at the same time the professors replace teaching with indoctrination, and use university resources for political activity such as promoting boycott-divestment-sanctions against Israel. Jewish faculty are in the forefront of the effort.

Tenenbom also notes how many of the Jewish Israelis that gnaw away at the state that protects them — one of his interviewees is writer Gideon Levy of Ha’aretz — positively venerate Palestinian Arab Muslim culture. But, he points out, they don’t know a word of Arabic and haven’t read the Qur’an. What can they know about Arab culture or Islam?

Tenenbom uses the expression “self-hating Jews” to describe Jews like Gideon Levy, but I think that’s misleading. They don’t hate themselves — they see themselves as better than the others, the ones that have all the ‘Jewish’ characteristics that they hate (religious belief, for one). They identify with their enemies that want to kill them, even to the point of adopting their anti-Jewish beliefs, because they subconsciously think it will protect them.

Upset, angry or depressed yet? I haven’t even mentioned the United Nations, which spends millions of dollars each year on events, exhibits and production of materials that present the Arab narrative of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (in which Israel is entirely at fault), or the Human Rights Commission which generates more resolutions condemning Israel than those for all other nations combined.

Then there is a multiplicity of smaller groups, trade unions, professional organizations, church groups (the Presbyterian Church USA comes to mind) which allow themselves to be used as vehicles for delegitimizing the Jewish state.

All this, despite the fact that there is no objective basis for it. Most anti-Israel arguments revolve around the alleged mistreatment — even ‘genocide’ — of Palestinian Arabs under Israel’s control. But the Arab population continues to increase, and its levels of health and nutrition are among the highest in the Arab world. More than 95% of the Arabs in Judea and Samaria live in areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority (and of course 100% of Gazans are ruled by Hamas). Even during wars, objective analysis has shown that Israel’s actions to reduce civilian casualties areunmatched by those of any other nation.

At any given time there are numerous wars, rebellions, insurgencies, occupations, massacres, etc. throughout the world which receive far less attention in the media and academia despite hundreds, thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of casualties (the Boko Haram uprising killed almost 11,000 in 2014 and almost 5,000 already this year). Did you know that the Second Congo War (1998-2003) caused more than 350,000 violent deaths, and 2.7-5.4 million excess deaths, with low-level violence still continuing to this day? The Israeli-Arab conflict is comparatively very small potatoes.

And then there are the positives: the remarkable number of scientific and technological advances by Israelis, the almost full-employment economy, the democratic political system, the high degree of personal freedom enjoyed by Jewish and Arab Israelis despite the pressure of wars and terrorism, the degree of equality for women and gay or otherwise unconventional people, the production of art, music and literature, and more.

It’s revealing that the haters object to pro-Israel people mentioning any of this. One is not allowed to say that Israel is the most (the only) LGBT-friendly country in the Middle East, because that is “pinkwashing,” using this undeniable truth to ‘cover up’ the oppression of Arabs. But if no empirical fact can count against the proposition that Israel is an oppressor, then that’s a clue that the proposition is itself not based on empirical facts.

So what is behind the irrational hatred for Israel and the amount of resources — Western, enlightened resources — devoted to an attempt to destroy it and to replace it with another unstable, undemocratic, racist Arab-majority state?

There are lots of reasons. American academic institutions have been infused with Arab oil money, and Arab countries have supplied many of them with activist foreign students. The UN is dominated by the non-aligned movement, which is controlled by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, which in turn is led by the Arab League. ‘Progressive’ ideology includes a large serving of guilt for Western colonialism, and the Arab narrative that presents Israel as a Western colonialist resonates with the Left.

But I’m afraid that Tenenbom’s experiences in Europe and among Israel’s academic and media elite are the most important indicator. I said the hatred is ‘irrational’, and an irrational attitude has an irrational cause: in this case, pathological Jew-hatred, deeply implanted in so many Europeans, and paradoxically also in the best-educated Israelis.

This could be a lesson for those Jews who can’t decide to stay in Europe or leave. Don’t expect the Europeans to stick up for you if you stay. They don’t like you.

04/09 Links Pt1: How I learned to stop loving Obama and worry about the bomb

From Ian:

How I learned to stop loving Obama and worry about the bomb

Finally the Iran deal began to take shape. And with it several truths started to poke through the soil: The US did not view Iran’s Islamic revolution as a disaster that needed to be curtailed and combated globally, tirelessly, like communism. It saw Iran, under the regime of the ayatollahs, as a legitimate actor in the region, despite its annihilationist rhetoric. It did not believe former Israeli Military Intelligence chief Amos Yadlin when he said that a US strike against Iran would be, on the spectrum between the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the 1981 strike against the Osirak nuclear reactor, far more similar to the latter. “It’s one night’s work,” Yadlin said on several occasions, noting that the regime would not risk all-out war with the US, imperiling its very survival. Instead the Obama administration viewed the military option as a disaster; one it had no fortitude to pursue.
And so, after the sanctions brought the regime to the table, the lack of a credible military option brought the world the framework deal reached last week in Lausanne. From an isolationist American perspective, the deal makes a great deal of sense. This week, President Obama explained his rationale to The New York Times’ Thomas Friedman. He said that America’s size and strength enabled it to take chances, to engage with Castro’s Cuba and Khamenei’s Iran. “We are powerful enough to be able to test these propositions without putting ourselves at risk,” he said. Iran’s military spending is $30 billion; the US’s is $600 billion. “Iran understands that they cannot fight us.
The deal, he told NPR, is better than no deal because even if engagement produces no shift in the attitude of the people and the leadership toward western democracy, it rolls back the nuclear program and places it under a verification regime for 10-15 years. If 13 years down the line, Iran turns its back on the agreement and employs modern centrifuges, though, the president conceded, “the breakout time [to a nuclear weapon] would have shrunk almost down to zero.”

State Dept Downplays Kissinger/Schultz Op-Ed as ‘A Lot of Big Words and Big Thoughts’

Harf sparred with AP reporter Matt Lee, interrupting him several times as he tried to get a reaction to the op-ed from the State Department.
“Really, you don’t think it’s nuanced?” Harf asked Lee.
“Is there a question or are you just commenting?” Harf replied. “I’m not going to go line by line.”
The Obama administration has repeatedly challenged critics of the deal to offer an alternative. This response has been used to rebut Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Republicans, foreign leaders, and even some from his own party.
“I didn’t hear a lot of alternatives. I heard a lot of–sort of a lot of big words and big thoughts in that piece, and certainly there is a place for that. But I didn’t hear a lot of alternatives about what they would do differently,” Harf said.
The same administration that asked questioners for their own solutions insisted that there are only three options in dealing with Iran: To bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities, leading to war, to negotiate a deal with Iran that will cap their enrichment capabilities, or to increase sanctions on Iran in hopes it will force them to accept a better deal.

Iran supreme leader: Nuclear framework no guarantee of deal

A framework nuclear deal reached with world powers last week is no guarantee a full agreement will be secured by the end of June, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Thursday.
“What has been done so far does not guarantee an agreement, nor its contents, nor even that the negotiations will continue to the end,” Khamenei, who has the final word on all matters of state, said on his official website.
In the first comments by the supreme leader since the Lausanne framework agreement, an evasive Khamenei said he was “neither for it or against it.”
The supreme leader also addressed the discrepancies between the US and Iranian accounts of the terms of the framework agreement, accusing the White House of lying.

All you need to know about Iranian negotiating tactics

From David Frum in The Atlantic:

Back in the Bush years, negotiations with Iran were entrusted to a three-power contact group: Germany, France, and the United Kingdom. I once spoke with one of the lead negotiators during a dinner at his nation’s embassy. He told me that repeatedly he and his Iranian counterpart would agree on some point—only for the counterpart to open the next meeting by denying that anything had been agreed the day before, casting them back to zero.

After this had happened more than once, the Western negotiator introduced a new tactic. He would have a member of his delegation take notes on the discussions in Farsi. At the end of the day, the Farsi-language notes would be presented to the Iranian counterpart for his review. “Have we understood everything correctly?” The counterpart nodded. “Would you then please kindly sign these notes to confirm that understanding?” The pen was produced, the document signed.

The next meeting opened as usual, with the Iranian counterpart rescinding everything that had been agreed at the last meeting. The Western negotiator triumphantly produced the signed minutes. The Iranian glanced contemptuously at the paper. “That’s not my signature,” he said.

(h/t Eli Tabori)

Feminism, PLO style: Mother of 4 murderers honored for "International Women's Day"

From Palestinian Media Watch:

On the occasion of International Women's Day, the PLO Commission of Prisoners' Affairs held an event to honor its female employees as well as female prisoners in Israeli prisons. Among the guests of honor was Um Nasser Abu Hmeid, who the official Palestinian Authority daily described as "mother of four prisoners sentenced to life in the occupation's prisons." What the paper did not mention was that Hmeid's four sons are all terrorist murderers who have either murdered Israelis themselves, or participated in murderous terror attacks and are serving a total of 18 life sentences.

At the event, PA Parliament Member and Director of the PLO commission Issa Karake venerated "the Palestinian woman" for her being "a maker of men and of the future":

"The honoring of the Palestinian woman on her special day stems from loyalty to her role as a maker of men and of the future, and in recognition of her long-standing sacrifice which no one can deny, through giving birth, education and orientation. She is the Martyr (Shahida), the prisoner, the wounded and expelled one, the mother, sister, wife and daughter of all of those."

[Website of the Commission of Prisoners and Released Prisoners' Affairs, March 10, 2015; and Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, March 11, 2015]

Karake presented Hmeid with a rose and a plaque of honor at the ceremony.

Palestinian Media Watch has reported in the past when the PA has honored this mother of 4 terrorist murderers. This latest event is at least the fifth time she has been honored.

From Wikipedia:

12 October 1994: the United States and North Korea signed the "Agreed Framework": North Korea agreed to freeze its plutonium production program in exchange for fuel oil, economic cooperation, and the construction of two modern light-water nuclear power plants. Eventually, North Korea's existing nuclear facilities were to be dismantled, and the spent reactor fuel taken out of the country.

18 March 1996: Hans Blix tells the IAEA's Board of Governors North Korea has still not made its initial declaration of the amount of plutonium they possess, as required under the Agreed Framework, and warned that without the declaration IAEA would lose the ability to verify North Korea was not using its plutonium to develop weapons.

3–5 October 2002: On a visit to the North Korean capital Pyongyang, US Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly presses the North on suspicions that it is continuing to pursue a nuclear energy and missiles programme.

16 October 2002: The US announces that North Korea admitted in their talks to a secret nuclear arms programme.

4 December 2002: The North rejects a call to open its nuclear facilities to inspection.

12 December 2002: The North pledges to reactivate nuclear facilities for energy generation, saying the Americans' decision to halt oil shipments leaves it with no choice. It claims the US wrecked the 1994 pact.

13 December 2002: North Korea asks the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to remove seals and surveillance equipment - the IAEA's "eyes and ears" on the North's nuclear status—from its Yongbyon power plant.

27 December 2002: North Korea says it is expelling the two IAEA nuclear inspectors from the country. It also says it is planning to reopen a reprocessing plant, which could start producing weapons grade plutonium within months.

6 January 2003: The IAEA passes a resolution demanding that North Korea readmit UN inspectors and abandon its secret nuclear weapons programme "within weeks", or face possible action by the UN Security Council.

31 January 2003: White House spokesman Ari Fleischer delivers a stern warning that North Korea must not take "yet another provocative action... intended to intimidate and blackmail the international community"

9 April 2003: The United Nations Security Council expresses concern about North Korea's nuclear programme, but fails to condemn Pyongyang for pulling out of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.

3 October 2006: North Korea announces plans to test a nuclear weapon in the future, blaming "hostile US policy".[27] Their full text can be read at BBC News.

5 October 2006: A US envoy directly threatens North Korea as to the upcoming test, stating "It (North Korea) can have a future or it can have these (nuclear) weapons, it cannot have them both." The envoy also mentions that any attempt to test a nuclear device would be seen as a "highly provocative act".

6 October 2006: The United Nations Security Council issues a statement declaring, "The Security Council urges the DPRK not to undertake such a test and to refrain from any action that might aggravate tension, to work on the resolution of non-proliferation concerns and to facilitate a peaceful and comprehensive solution through political and diplomatic efforts. Later in the day, there are unconfirmed reports of the North Korean government successfully testing a nuclear bomb."

9 October 2006: North Korea announces that it has performed its first-ever nuclear weapon test.

Which makes this Obama quote from NPR even more of a joke:

And then in years 13 and 14, it is possible that those breakout times would have been much shorter, but at that point we have much better ideas about what it is that their program involves. We have much more insight into their capabilities. And the option of a future president to take action if in fact they try to obtain a nuclear weapon is undiminished.

Today's "desecrations" by women and children being screamed at by Muslims

Today a small number of Jews, including women and children, were followed and hounded by screaming Muslim women who harass them as they walk peacefully around the area that the Jewish Temples stood:

In a related story, some Jews visited Solomon's Pools today, which caused Palestine Today to say:

Dozens of settlers under the protection of the occupation forces stormed the Solomon Pools tourist area.

Khader municipality Chairman Tawfiq Salah said that the settlers broke into the ponds and set up Talmudic rituals between the second and third pools, and this is part of their belief that it is part of their history and is listed on the tourism map of the settlement of Gush Etzion south of the city.

Solomon's Pool, while not built by Solomon, were started during the Hashmonean era to bring water to the Temple Mount and until the 20th century the cisterns on the Mount still received water from them.

Murderer of two Israeli civilians gets his masters degree in prison (update)

On January 23, 2001 - Motti Dayan, 27, and Etgar Zeitouny, 34, were abducted and executed by masked Palestinian gunmen as they dining in Tulkarem.

The terrorists took them out to a field, and summarily executed them. Israel immediately clamped a curfew on Tulkarem and vowed to capture the murderers.

The two cousins, both single, were co-owners of the "Yuppies" sushi bar on Tel Aviv's trendy Rehov Sheinkin. They had come to Tulkarem with an Israeli Arab acquaintance who owns a vegetable stand close to their restaurant, to shop for flowerpots for the restaurant. Afterwards they stopped to dine at the Abu Nidal Restaurant on the outskirts of the Palestinian-controlled town.

As they were eating, word spread through the town that Israelis were there. A short time later, the gunmen arrived and dragged the three out of the restaurant, and drove them out of town toward the villages of Iktaba and Bala'a, still in the Palestinian-controlled zone. They reportedly halted at the side of the road near the Nur Shams refugee camp, shot dead the Israeli Jews and let the Israeli Arab go.

One of the murderers was Maslama Thabet.

From Ma'an:

On the 13th anniversary of his detention by Israeli forces, Palestinian prisoner Maslama Thabet has obtained his Master's degree in Israeli Studies from the al-Quds Open University in Abu Dis.

The Thabet family congratulated Maslama and thanked the jailed Fatah senior leader Marwan Barghouthi for supervising his Master's thesis.

The article goes on to say that the free education given to these murderers often prepares them to better fight Israel in the future:

Frequent Israeli targeting of political figures, activists, and educators for arrest often results in high concentrations of educated and politically motivated prisoners in Israeli jails, according to director of the Palestinian Prisoners Society's Ramallah branch, Abd Ala'al Al'anani.

Al'anani added that such educational activity within jails often prepares Palestinian prisoner's for life after they are released, the majority of Palestinians in positions of power today having served long sentences in Israeli jails or faced repeated arrests.

(h/t Yenta)

UPDATE: Thabet's family has complained in the past about how inhumane his prison conditions supposedly are. (h/t Bob K)

04/08 Links Pt2: When Hitler and Islam found common cause; When Muslims murder Palestinians

From Ian:

When Muslims murder Palestinians

While the Israeli Defense Force were storming into Gaza the streets of Europe were overrun with demonstrators. There were virtual riots outside of the Israeli embassy in London, tens of thousands of people marched there in support of Palestinians as they did in Paris, Madrid and elsewhere. With every march came cries that the IDF were perpetrating a massacre in Gaza. The pictures of dead Palestinian children filled Facebook feeds.
There was no massacre of Palestinians at the hands of the IDF last Summer. But in Syria there is. Right now as you read this. But you would be forgiven for being unaware of it. For this time there aren’t tens of thousands demonstrating on the streets. There are no demonstrations at all. There are no rallies. There are no screams of massacre. There are no demands on governments to take action.
There is simply a sad, deafening silence.
It’s not as if people don’t know what’s happening in the largest Palestinian refugee camp in Syria, Yarmouk. The story took pride of place on Sky News, it has been published by every major newspaper around the world. Yet there is no action. The heat, the friction, the activism of the Summer is nowhere to be found.
In the United Kingdom there is no shortage of organizations dedicated to the Palestinian cause. The Palestine Solidarity Campaign, was the main organizer of the demonstrations and of a boycott campaign against Israel and yet the cause of Palestinian suffering in Syria is noticeable only for its absence from their website. There are no events planned, there are no calls for aid, there are no plans to lobby Members of Parliament to take action.
There is silence.

When Hitler and Islam found common cause

The close relationship between Hitler’s top generals and policy planners and the devout Muslim soldiers who fought in Nazi Germany’s army was strange and unnatural. The two groups shared almost nothing — except common enemies. David Motadel’s “Islam and Nazi Germany’s War” tells how this unique relationship evolved and survived notwithstanding deep-rooted differences.
The Nazis’ approach to Islam was creative and original. They organized — and aggressively publicized — the all-Muslim troop units within the German army. These units were given special privileges: Fridays off from duty, menus without pork and Ramadan fasting concessions. The fuhrer’s propaganda machine made the worldwide Muslim community aware of how Hitler’s army included all — Muslim troop units where their religion’s rites and ceremonies were honored and treated with respect.
Additionally — and maybe more importantly — the Nazis established schools for the training of Islamic religious leaders (imams and mullahs) in occupied sections of the USSR. Two-and-a-half decades of rigid, doctrinaire communism had depleted the number of the mullahs and imams with theological and ritualistic training. Few, if any, were younger than 50. The army’s “chaplain schools” were welcomed by the Muslims throughout the world. In addition to their military duties the German-trained mullahs advanced the Nazi cause within the sacred confines of mosques.
Hitler’s well-publicized friendship with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem gave his program cachet throughout the Islamic world. The Grand Mufti (who lived in Berlin during much of World War II) was a revered figure. Before moving to Berlin, he was an anti-colonial political leader in the Middle East and a direct descendent of the Prophet, who had made an official pilgrimage to Mecca.
During Hitler’s last days in his Berlin bunker, he confessed to Martin Bormann, the head of the Nazi chancellery and his personal secretary, that one of the great mistakes in Nazi strategy during the war was not making a greater effort to mobilize Muslim support, and promote local insurrections. Hitler told Bormann, “All Islam vibrated with news of our victories.” He believed the Mohammedan world was ready to rise in revolt, and the Nazis’ failure to capitalize on Islam’s unrest was an important error. He attributed this to Germany’s deferral to Italian, Spanish and Vichy French interests in North Africa and the Middle East.

Paris kosher mart killer’s initial target was a Jewish school

The Islamist who killed four Jews at a kosher supermarket in Paris may have attempted to murder children at a Jewish school shortly beforehand, French media reported.
The report Tuesday on BFMTV is based on an interview with a woman who witnessed the Islamist, Amedy Coulibaly, make a traffic accident and then kill a police officer south of Paris after the officer approach the scene of the accident.
Coulibaly killed his Jewish victims on Jan. 9, one day after killing the officer and fleeing the scene of the accident in Montrouge south of Paris. He was killed by police hours after taking over the Hyper Cacher supermarket on the city’s eastern edge.
“Police told me that this man was armed and following a plan,” said the witness, who was also involved in the accident and was only idenitifed as Anne. “That he had a Jewish school right next to where I had my accident and that the accident messed up his plans so instead of killing children at a Jewish school, he killed a police officer.”

Obama To Rescind Sanctions Against Prince Humperdinck (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

Florin, April 7 - Royal representatives announced today that the US had agreed to remove its trade sanctions against Florin in exchange for guarantees that its ruler Prince Humperdinck would desist from starting wars with neighboring Guilder for at least two years.

Spokesman for the prince convened a press conference at the palace this afternoon to discuss the deal, under which President Barack Obama will order the removal of the sanctions effective immediately, while Humperdinck will pinky-swear not to hire Sicilian mercenaries to frame other nations for crimes committed at the prince's own behest.

White House spokesmen confirmed the agreement Monday, saying that the president insisted on strong guarantees for Florin's side of the agreement, such as forming a brute squad to clear the Thieves' Forest before any major national event. Other monitoring measures include the hiring of independent consultant Tyrone Rugen to oversee the clandestine portions of the Florinian international relations program, and entrusting the lone gate key to where Florinian records are kept to a fearless man named Yellin.

Reaction to the announcement has been mixed, with political allies of Humperdinck lining up to support it, and opponents of him and of Obama voicing objections to the deal. "As captain of one of Prince Humperdinck's four fastest ships, I can attest that when he commits to something, he sees it through. I believe his exact words were, 'May I live a thousand years and never hunt again,' or something to that effect. He would never lie. We are men of action. Lies do not become us."

Local magician Miracle Max declined to comment directly on the issue, attempting to prevent reporters from mentioning the prince's name. He professed little knowledge of the agreement. "Nobody's hearin' nothin'," he insisted.

International responses to the deal have also come down on both sides. "Guarantees? You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means," said a Spaniard, noting that a better deal was possible - all the negotiators had to do was start over. "When a job goes wrong you go back to the beginning," he explained.

The Turkish response was also lukewarm. "Not very sportsmanlike," said Fezzik, a Turkish representative, in describing the conduct of Humperdinck's negotiators during the bilateral talks.

An Albanian representative, however, praised the agreement's terms as ironclad. "Don't even think about trying to escape" them, he said. The alternative scenario was too horrible to think about, he warned, and would plunge a person into a pit of despair.

White House officials commented sparingly on the deal, speaking only to correct what they characterized as lack of comprehension on the part of those challenging the agreement. "You're reading it wrong," said spokesman Fred Savage in an uncharacteristically forceful tone.
At press time, President Obama had called a meeting of advisers on how to proceed with the ongoing land wars in Asia.

In idiotic editorial, NYT prioritizes Iranian pride and jobs over Israeli concerns

While many, many newspapers, from both the left and the right, are publishing strong reservations about the Iranian nuclear deal, the New York Times is firmly in line with the Obama administration - and even more in line against Binyamin Netanyahu.

Which causes some interesting logical inconsistencies:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has gone into overdrive against a nuclear agreement with Iran. On Monday, his government made new demands that it claimed would ensure a better deal than the preliminary one that Iran, President Obama and other leaders of major powers announced last week. The new demands are unrealistic and, if pursued, would not mean a better deal but no deal at all.

...As outlined on Monday by Yuval Steinitz, Israel’s minister of intelligence and strategic affairs, the Israelis are now insisting that Iran end all research and development on advanced centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium; reduce the number of operating centrifuges at its Natanz plant beyond what was agreed to in the framework; and close its underground enrichment facility at Fordo. Also, Israel has demanded that Iran allow inspections “anywhere, anytime” by international monitors, ship its stockpile of enriched uranium out of the country and disclose past nuclear-related activities that might involve military uses.

In any negotiation, there could never be a deal without compromise. It would be preferable if every vestige of Iran’s nuclear program were eradicated. But that was never going to happen, not least because Iran’s know-how could never be erased.

Iran’s leaders would not accept a deal in which they did not maintain some elements of a nuclear program tailored for energy and medical purposes — not weapons. Ultimately, Mr. Obama had to make many judgment calls in getting a deal that would prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.

Now, where exactly does Israel's demands listed in this very editorial contradict Iran maintaining "elements of a nuclear program tailored for energy and medical purposes?"

Not one of the conditions proposed of stopping R&D on advanced centrifuges, reducing the number of centrifuges at Natanz, closing Fordo, insisting on truly comprehensive inspections, reducing its stockpiles of enriched uranium, and disclosing military dimensions of its nuclear program is inconsistent with a peaceful nuclear program.

Instead of insisting that the US make the best possible deal while allowing Iran to have a peaceful nuclear program, the NYT wants that Iran have more freedom to build nuclear weapons.

And one of the reasons they give? Because the specter of Iranian unemployment from closing Fordo is just too horrible to contemplate.

The alternative is no deal, and Iran simply moves forward on its nuclear program without any limits. Shuttering Fordo was an early goal, but, in the end, the agreement would allow Iran to keep a small number of centrifuges spinning and to produce medical isotopes at the plant. For the Iranians, it was a matter of political symbolism and jobs to keep the plant open; Mr. Obama apparently felt there were enough protections that he could agree.

No, the alternative is to enforce sanctions until Iran agrees to a program that can only be used, verifiably, for peaceful purposes.

Iranian jobs and pride are not and must not be a factor.

Ideally, more of the 10,000 centrifuges operating at the Natanz enrichment plant would be stopped, as Israel has demanded, but the agreement would halt 5,000 — a significant reduction.

The NYT editors are, frankly, idiots.

5000 first generation centrifuges are the exact amount Iran needs to build nuclear bombs. They are way too few for a nuclear power program and way too many for peaceful medical research.

If Iran wants to assure the world of its peaceful intentions, it should not insist on thousands of centrifuges.

This is pretty clear logic, but apparently too difficult for New York Times editors, who cannot grasp that "fewer" and "more than enough" are not mutually exclusive concepts.

While the deal does not grant international monitors the right to go anywhere, anytime, it does impose a tough inspection regime and establishes a commission to resolve disputes if Iran blocks access to a suspected site.

The editors are again too blinded by Obama's brilliance not to understand that there is a major contradiction between "tough inspection regime" and "a commission to resolve disputes if Iran blocks access to a suspected site." If Iran can block access then it is not a tough inspection regime.

Iran’s hostility and threats toward Israel and its involvement in terrorist activities are heinous and unacceptable. But those issues should be dealt with separately; resolving them should not be made conditions of the nuclear agreement.

I missed the NYT editorial that said those words when Obama himself linked Iran's aggression with its nuclear program in his 2008 AIPAC speech.

In short, this editorial proves that the editors of the New York Times are unable to do the slightest amount of critical thinking when its mind is made up beforehand.

The problem is that so many people think that the New York Times editorials represent the epitome of intellect and correct thinking.

(h/t Norman F)

04/08 Links Pt1: The unfolding farce of Obama’s deal with Iran; Decoding the Obama Doctrine

From Ian:

David Horovitz: The unfolding farce of Obama’s deal with Iran

In an NPR interview gone horribly wrong on Monday, the president did honestly admit a huge, dire, failing of the accord — the fact that, even if Iran keeps to the deal (and what a colossal, improbable “if” that is), it will be able to break out to the bomb in next-to-no-time when key provisions expire after a decade. (The president had gone part-way down the road to that admission in his New York Times interview on Saturday, saying: “I’ve been very clear that Iran will not get a nuclear weapon on my watch.” — D.H. emphasis)
But there can be no candid acknowledgement of so momentous a flaw, for that would be to confirm Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s endlessly reiterated indictment of the deal as paving Iran’s way to the bomb. And so a State Department spokeswoman was pushed out in front of the cameras on Tuesday to stammer her way through an absurd reinterpretation of Obama’s remarks, an attempt at revisionism that insults our intelligence.
It gets worse. The Iranians’ latest contention is that the deal gives them the right to start injecting gas into their most sophisticated centrifuges — the IR-8s — which they say can enrich uranium 20 times faster than their current IR-1s. And therefore, that smiling, avuncular Foreign Minister Zarif and his nuclear expert colleague Ali Akbar Salehi told Iranian MPs on Tuesday, Iran will begin working with the IR-8s on the first day that the deal goes into effect. This, according to Iran’s own news agencies.
Needless to say, that makes a mockery of the entire deal.
Doubtless there is more of this travesty to come. That’s what you get when you allow a brutal, murderous regime to smell your hesitancy, your weakness, your neglect of your own and your allies’ essential interests.
“This is our best bet by far to make sure Iran doesn’t get a nuclear weapon,” Obama asserted to The New York Times. Really, Mr. President? It doesn’t look like that from here. From here, it looks like you could have done a whole lot better.
In fact, it looks like the very outcome you promised you’d avoid: A deal that lifts the economic pressure on an evil regime, and clears its route to the bomb. A bad deal. Far, far worse than no deal at all.

Daniel Pipes: Decoding the Obama Doctrine

The Obama Doctrine is simple and universal: Warm relations with adversaries and cool them with friends.
Several assumptions underlie this approach: The U.S. government morally must compensate for its prior errors. Smiling at hostile states will inspire them to reciprocate. Using force creates more problems than it solves. Historic U.S. allies, partners and helpers are morally inferior accessories. In the Middle East, this means reaching out to revisionists (Erdogan, the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamic Republic of Iran) and pushing away cooperative governments (Egypt, Israel, Saudi Arabia).
Of these actors, two stand out: Iran and Israel. Establishing good relations with Tehran appears to be Obama's great preoccupation. As Michael Doran of the Hudson Institute has shown, Obama during his entire presidency has worked toward rendering Iran what he calls "a very successful regional power ... abiding by international norms and international rules." Contrarily, his pre-presidential friendships with truculent anti-Zionists such as Ali Abunimah, Rashid Khalidi and Edward Said point to the depth of his hostility toward the Jewish state.
The Obama Doctrine demystifies what is otherwise inscrutable. For example, it explains why the U.S. government blithely ignored the Iranian supreme leader's outrageous "Death to America" yelp in March, dismissing it as mere domestic pandering, even as Obama glommed onto the Israeli prime minister's near simultaneous electoral campaign comment rejecting a two-state solution with the Palestinians during his term of office ("We take him at his word").