Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, August 06, 2015

Terror chic at UNRWA protest

There have been increasing protests against possible cutbacks in UNRWA services across its areas of operations. Instead of protesting, say, Arab embassies demanding that they pay their unfulfilled pledges to UNRWA, the protesters are protesting UNRWA itself.

This is because, to them, UNRWA represents the West, and the West owes them free services forever because it allows Israel to exist. The billions that UNRWA spends to help out Palestinians is not aid - it is a jizya tax that the dhimmis must pay, or else.

Yesterday there was a protest in Amman, Jordan.

UNRWA employees observed a one-hour stoppage and a sit-in in Amman on Wednesday, voicing their concerns over “schemes” concocted against the “incubator of millions of Palestinian refugees”.

Held in front of the agency's headquarters in Amman, the rally, which is part of series of measures to escalate protests, was called upon by the UNRWA workers union in Jordan.

"We are petrified over the options the agency's administration is entertaining now. UNRWA services, especially education, are what we thrive on," one of the agency's teachers, who preferred anonymity, told The Jordan Times.

The protest isn't over lack of education options for kids. It is the curtailment of a work program.

I found this photo from the Amman rally interesting:

The sign just says "Protest of the Jordanian Union of Workers in the Aid Agency [UNRWA]" - but why are they wearing masks?

Apparently, they cannot distinguish between terror and protests - protest is just a form of "resistance" and you must dress up the part.

They must have learned that terrorist costume is admirable from UNRWA schools.

Vic Rosenthal's weekly column:

Israel’s Cabinet has authorized security officials to use “administrative detention” and “aggressive questioning” against suspected “Jewish terrorists,” following the arson attack at Duma that left an Arab baby dead and other family members in the hospital.

This was done against a background of national mea culpas by everyone from the President and Prime Minister on down, both for this crime and for the stabbing murder of a young girl and injuring of several others at the Jerusalem Gay Pride march.

I know I’m not the first to point out that all of this is happening despite the fact that there are as yet no suspects, Jewish or otherwise, for the Duma arson. It is also true that no connection can be demonstrated between homophobic murderer Yishai Schlissel and any Jewish nationalist movement or ideology.

The coincidence of two terrorist murders, one committed by a Jewish fanatic whom I would call ‘criminally insane’ and the other by unknown perpetrators capable of spraying graffiti on a wall in Hebrew, has given rise to a national paroxysm of guilt.

President Reuven Rivlin, in particular, connected the murders, attributing both to “incitement” and “hatred.” He accused “Jewish terrorists” of the Duma firebombing. He called for Israeli Jews to express their shame (for being Israeli Jews?):

On the eve of the 15th of the month of Av, the Jewish festival of love, six Israeli citizens were cruelly stabbed, in the heart of Jerusalem. To my great horror and shame, the letting of blood, the path of hatred and murder, did not stop there. Over the course of the same night, Jewish terrorists burned down the house of the Dawabsheh family in the village of Duma, killing their baby son Ali.

On Friday, I visited the family in Tel Hashomer hospital, I visited, silently, ashamed, ridden with dread for the power of hatred. Ashamed that in a country which has known the murder of Shalhevet Pass, of the Fogel family, of Adele Biton, of Eyal, Gil-ad, Naftali and Muhammad Abu Khdeir, there are still those who do not hesitate to ignite the flames, to burn the flesh of a baby, to increase the hatred and terror.

This morning a Hebrew poem appeared on Facebook in which the writer described removing the mezuzot from his doors, putting them and other Jewish ritual objects in a plastic bag and throwing them out in the street. Take your religion, I don’t want it, he wrote.

It is a little early for all of this. There are good reasons to suspect that the Duma arson may not have been perpetrated by Jews. In addition, there are many other cases – the alleged shooting of Mohammad al-Dura in 2000 stands out as particularly successful – in which Jews have been accused by Arabs of crimes that they did not commit. In particular, false accusations against ‘settlers’ are a major part of the demonization enterprise against the Jewish state.

Which brings me to actual misbehavior by extremist Jews, ranging from graffiti to arson (usually of unoccupied buildings): it needs to stop.

“Price tag” attacks and similar acts aren’t going to drive Muslims and Christians out of the land of Israel or make Arabs stop committing acts of terrorism against Jews. They do nothing for our side. They simply provide the best ammunition for the demonizers. Every actual incident is used as ‘proof’ that ten made-up ones occurred. Every one is claimed as justification for ten acts of Arab terrorism.

It needs to stop, but we don’t need to go overboard. I have been reading about a “Jewish underground” made up of “hilltop youth” – teens and twenties that want to overthrow the state and replace it with a kingdom governed according to halacha (Jewish law). This isn’t going to happen. It’s a fantasy and some of the fantasists have already been arrested. I could be wrong, but I am willing to bet they are not the ones that threw the firebombs in Duma. We’ll find out.

If I am wrong, if it turns out that these are the ones that burned the Arab child to death, I will retract my words and apologize. But at this point I see a nation unnecessarily bursting at the seams with hysterical guilt.

Let me add a few words about the maniac, Schlissel. He exists, and so do others that share his beliefs, although very few would take violent action on them. But Israeli society is not so different from others; people are regularly murdered for being homosexual in the US and other countries. The fact is that Israeli society as a whole is far more tolerant than most of the others; we have no need to engage in collective self-flagellation.

There is a pathology here, and it’s in addition to the pathology of Schlissel and of whomever is responsible for the Duma arson. It is a pathology of self-hatred, a need to find a reason to leave the country, to renounce Judaism, to apologize, to agonize, to be ashamed of ourselves, to blame the whole society for the crimes of a few.

It is a sickness, a Jewish sickness.

Pathological guilt isn’t a problem only because it leads to stupid Woody Allen movies. The demonization of the Jewish state by our enemies has a purpose: to provide reasons to oppose our self-defense, which is presented as just another war crime. By feeding and supporting it, which we do every time we apologize for yet another non-existent ‘crime’ – al Dura, the Gaza beach incidents of 2006 and 2014, shelling the Lebanese village of Kfar Kana in 2006, the Mavi Marmara affair, etc. – we participate in our own demonization, and amplify it.

The damage isn’t confined to the international arena. What other country is so obsessed, in its public discourse, journalism, art and literature, with its supposed moral failings? While other countries – think of Turkey or Russia – try to write embarrassing episodes out of history books, our historians, sometimes very creatively, look for sins to put in. We have a major newspaper – Ha’aretz – dedicated to besmirching our nation, every day. How many serious films made in Israel have you seen that don’t suggest that something is rotten here? What do most academic researchers in the social sciences and humanities prefer to write about? Do we even need to ask?

Possibly because of my American background, I am really attached to the principle that an accused is innocent until proven guilty. Here a crime is committed and before there is even any evidence, we fall over ourselves demanding that we be punished!

Naftali Bennett was right: stop apologizing. We don’t need the unearned guilt. We live in a great nation, which, like any other nation, has some bad people in it. Let’s punish the criminals, not the nation.

08/06 Links Pt1: Obama is sincere, but he's wrong on Iran deal; Mr. President, you're no Jack Kennedy

From Ian:

3 Israelis hurt in vehicular terror attack in West Bank

Three Israeli soldiers were wounded when a terrorist plowed his car into them as they stood at a hitchhiking post in the northern West Bank on Thursday afternoon.
The attack took place at the Sinjil junction on Route 60, near the settlement of Shiloh and the Palestinian village of Sinjil, at around 3:10 p.m.
Two of the wounded were taken to Hadassah University Hospital in Jerusalem’s Ein Kerem neighborhood, both in serious condition; the third — with light-moderate wounds — was taken to Beilinson Hospital in Petah Tikva.
The terrorist was shot by IDF soldiers at the scene and trapped in his car when it subsequently flipped over. He was also said to be in serious condition and being treated by IDF troops at the scene, once security forces had established that his car was not booby-trapped.
Magen David Adom said the two victims in a serious condition were suffering from head and chest injuries, were sedated and being kept on respiration.

Alan Dershowitz: Dershowitz: Obama gets personal about the Iran deal

President Obama, in his desperation to save his Iran deal, has taken to attacking its opponents in personal ways. He has accused critics of his deal of being the same republican war mongers who drove us into the ground war against Iraq and has warned that they would offer “overheated” and often dishonest arguments. He has complained about the influence of lobbyists and money on the process of deciding this important issue, as if lobbying and money were not involved in other important matters before Congress.
These types of ad hominem arguments are becoming less and less convincing as more democratic members of Congress, more liberal supporters of the President, more nuclear experts and more foreign policy gurus are expressing deep concern, and sometimes strong opposition to the deal that is currently before Congress.
I, myself, am a liberal Democrat who twice voted for President Obama and who was opposed to the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Part of the reason I was opposed was because I considered, and still consider, Iran a much greater threat to the security of the world and to the stability of the Middle East than Iraq ever was. In my newly published e-book The Case Against the Iran Deal: How Can We Now Stop Iran From Getting Nukes?, I make arguments that I believe are honest, fair and compelling. I recognize some advantages in the deal, but strongly believe that the disadvantages considerably outweigh them and that the risks of failure are considerable. My assessment is shared by a considerable number of other academics, policy experts and other liberal Democrats who support President Obama’s domestic policies, who admire Secretary Kerry for his determination, and who do not see evil intentions in the deal.
The President would be well advised to stop attacking his critics and to start answering their hard questions with specific and credible answers. Questions that need answering include the following:

Mr. President, you are no Jack Kennedy

In stark contrast with Kennedy's inspired address in 1963, the current president was belligerent and argumentative, attacking opponents of the Iran nuclear agreement both domestically and abroad. Instead of being presented with a new vision of the world order he hopes to achieve, his audience was treated to the same old tune. A tune designed to mock political rivals and terrify the American public with all sorts of apocalyptic scenarios that would unfold as a result of Congress thwarting the deal.
Indeed, at the heart of Obama's speech was the warning that the failure of the agreement would lead to war. The threat implicit in this warning was directed first and foremost at the Democrats in the Senate who are still on the fence about the deal and whose votes will ultimately decide the entire debate in September.
But then, after a long, detailed and exhausting overview of the reasons to support the deal, sounding more like an attorney's closing argument than a visionary president, the cat came out of the bag. Obama the politician called on the American public to exert pressure on their representatives in Congress, thereby stripping away any vestige of the official tone he was going for. By doing so he also pushed himself further and further away from Kennedy's memorable address.

Why Obama Is Wrong to Compare Himself to JFK

Speaking at American University today in defense of his nuclear deal with Iran, President Obama twice invoked President John F. Kennedy. To paraphrase Lloyd Bentsen, while we did not serve with Jack Kennedy, here are five reasons why President Obama is wrong to compare himself to Jack Kennedy:
4. During his speech, Obama said the world was “more dangerous” during the Cold War. True, the threat of mutually assured destruction (MAD) was a palpable fear. But however aggressive and even evil the Soviets might have been, they did not believe in martyrdom — they did not believe that sacrificing their lives for their revolution would bring great rewards in the afterlife. The fundamentalists of Iran — and their Arab proxies, such as Hezbollah — most emphatically do. As historian Bernard Lewis has pointed out, for religious extremists, mutually assured destruction is not a deterrent — it’s an inducement.
5. President Obama ended his remarks by citing President Kennedy’s “wisdom” and lauded Kennedy’s “warning” that we should see conflict as inevitable. But President Kennedy also said that there was “one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender or submission.” Iran’s rulers have caused thousands of Americans to be killed and maimed in Lebanon, Iraq, and Afghanistan. They continue to openly proclaim their long-term goal: “Death to America.” They believe that the U.S. has indeed submitted. If Congress approves this agreement, that perception will not be without justification.
So much for following in the footsteps of JFK.

"Jewish messiah is a terrorist"

JTA reports:

Egyptian attitudes about Jews are changing. Egyptians are reassessing 1950s-era nationalization policies that squeezed out the Jewish community and other ethnic minorities. The word “Jew” is used less frequently as a curse word, and the historical TV drama “Jewish Quarter” was a breakout hit during Ramadan. The series cast the Islamist group the Muslim Brotherhood as a greater threat to Egypt’s unity and security than the Jews and, sometimes, even the Zionists.

This is true, and I have reported on this phenomenon a few times.

But it doesn't mean that antisemitism in Egypt is not tolerated. There is still plenty of it and there is no stigma attached to it.

El Badil has an article by Gaza-based Mustafa Yusuf Leddawi that says that, unlike the messiahs of Christianity and other religions, the Jewish messiah is supposed to be particularly depraved.

He says that the Jewish messiah would be an "assassin terrorist, and usruper aggressor, and a liar, filled with evil, bloodthirsty, and calls for war, and fights peace, and kills the weak, and fights the oppressed, and champions the oppressor, and assaults all righteousness and honesty, supports all falsehood, an unjust tyrant..."

Leddawi, who we have shown previously shown to promote the classic blood libel, is particularly worried about the Jewish messiah destroying the Al Aqsa Mosque in order to rebuild the Temple, and he thinks that every Israeli wants to do this themselves.

There is a huge irony here in Leddawi saying that the Jewish messiah is particularly violent. Last Christmas, he described Jesus admiringly as the "first Palestinian fedayeen," the term used for Arab terrorists.

Amnesty's Twitter obsession with Israel by the numbers

Yesterday I tweeted:

46 of @AmnestyOnline's last 100 tweets were about last year's Gaza war, overwhelming majority anti-Israel. Priorities.http://t.co/vmVOASrcLG
— ElderOfZiyon (@elderofziyon) August 5, 2015

That is quite an obsession with a year-old war.

And Amnesty's comparative social media silence on Yemen, Syria and other areas is not only telling, but chilling.

Although a few of the tweets mentioned Hamas rockets and execution of "collaborators," the vast majority of Amnesty's Gaza anniversary tweets were against Israel. None of the tweets about Hamas linked to any relevant stories - on the contrary, they linked to the Gaza Platform that does not have a single episode of Hamas violence mentioned among several thousand anti-Israel items in its database.

I sent a series of tweets to an Amnesty-UK's Kristyan Benedict when he said he had nothing to apologize for by retweeting Hamas:

Hillel Neuer ‏@HillelNeuer 17 hours ago

.@KreaseChan If you believe you're justified in retweeting a terrorist org, say so. Otherwise, please apologize.

kristyan benedict @KreaseChan

I'll post you a dictionary @HillelNeuer - look up 'dictionary' in a dictionary if you don't know what one is.
kristyan benedict ‏@KreaseChan 17 hours ago

There is increasing evidence of Israel's war crimes & accountability is certainly needed. Nothing for me to apologize for x @HillelNeuer
ElderOfZiyon ‏@elderofziyon 15 hours ago

Actually, @KreaseChan, there is a lot for @AmnestyOnline to apologize for http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/search/label/Gaza%20Platform … But you won't address them @HillelNeuer ElderOfZiyon ‏@elderofziyon 14 hours ago
So, @KreaseChan, why does the Gaza Platform ignore all research done by the Meir Amit Center? http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2015/07/even-more-bias-revealed-in-amnestys.html … @amnesty @HillelNeuer
ElderOfZiyon ‏@elderofziyon 14 hours ago

So, @KreaseChan, why does @amnestyonline use a researcher who admires airplane hijackers? http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2015/07/amnesty-researcher-loves-terrorists.html … @HillelNeuer
ElderOfZiyon ‏@elderofziyon 14 hours ago

So, @KreaseChan, why does @amnestyonline call terrorists "civilians" in Gaza Platform? http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2015/07/todays-amnesty-deceptions-and-lies.html … @HillelNeuer
ElderOfZiyon ‏@elderofziyon 14 hours ago

You, @KreaseChan, have the audacity to say you have nothing to apologize for? How about answering my points?@amnestyonline @HillelNeuer

Of course, Amnesty has been studiously ignoring all of my findings about how false and deceptive their tweets and articles have been.

Because they know that they cannot argue with the truth. They'd rather bury it.

One of the more astounding parts of the speech that President Obama gave on Wednesday defending his Iran nuclear deal was this:

Fifty-two years ago, President Kennedy, at the height of the Cold War, addressed this same university on the subject of peace. The Berlin Wall had just been built. The Soviet Union had tested the most powerful weapons ever developed. China was on the verge of acquiring the nuclear bomb. Less than 20 years after the end of World War II, the prospect of nuclear war was all too real.

With all of the threats that we face today, it is hard to appreciate how much more dangerous the world was at that time. In light of these mounting threats, a number of strategists here in the United States argued we had to take military action against the Soviets, to hasten what they saw as inevitable confrontation. But the young president offered a different vision.

OBAMA: Strength, in his view, included powerful armed forces and a willingness to stand up for our values around the world. But he rejected the prevailing attitude among some foreign-policy circles that equated security with a perpetual war footing.

Instead, he promised strong, principled American leadership on behalf of what he called a practical and attainable peace, a peace based not on a sudden revolution in human nature, but on a gradual evolution in human institutions, on a series of concrete actions and effective agreements.

Such wisdom would help guide our ship of state through some of the most perilous moments in human history. With Kennedy at the helm, the Cuban Missile Crisis was resolved peacefully.

If Barack Obama had been president during the Cuban Missile Crisis, war would have been far more likely.

Kennedy saw that the Soviets had lied about what they were doing in Cuba and he made clear that the US was prepared to do whatever is necessary to ensure that the missiles would be removed. Obama found out about secret Iranian nuclear facilities - and did nothing.

Kennedy made sure that the enemy knew that war was a very real possibility, although one that he did not take lightly. Obama made it clear that attacking Iran was never on the table and he assured Iran that he would not only never go to war, but he would actively prevent any other nation from attacking Iran as well.

If Obama had negotiated with the Soviets the way he negotiated with Iran, he would have caved to every single Soviet demand. He would have concluded that it would be unrealistic to expect the Soviets to remove the missiles as long as the Us had missiles in Europe. He would have ended up defending every aspect of the Soviet aggression, and minimized the Soviets' lies about the nature of the missiles in Cuba.

Kennedy was able to preserve peace because he was willing to enforce American red lines with military strength. Obama has allowed Iran to cross many red lines, making it clear to Iran and US allies that he had no willingness to back up his statements with any kind of stick.

The only real concession that Kennedy made to the Soviets, to secretly dismantle the Jupiter missiles in Turkey and Italy, was no concession at all - because the US was planning to scrap them anyway.

By any yardstick, Kennedy forced the Soviets to back down. Obama backed down to Iran on numerous points.

Obama wants to compare himself to Kennedy? No, Mr. President, you're no Jack Kennedy.

Who's lying - Obama or Iran? (poster)

Source.

Since Iran can control who can physically visit the sites, it seems pretty clear who is lying.

Meanwhile,

The U.S. intelligence community has informed Congress of evidence that Iran was sanitizing its suspected nuclear military site at Parchin, in broad daylight, days after agreeing to a nuclear deal with world powers.

For senior lawmakers in both parties, the evidence calls into question Iran’s intention to fully account for the possible military dimensions of its current and past nuclear development. The International Atomic Energy Agency and Iran have a side agreement meant to resolve past suspicions about the Parchin site, and lawmakers' concerns about it has already become a flashpoint because they do not have access to its text.

08/05 Links Pt2: A One-Sided Shame; Outrage as DOJ May Intervene in Terror Judgment Against PA

From Ian:

Stand With Us: A One-Sided Shame

One might look at the above as an opportunity to "re-ignite" the peace process and to try, once more, to bridge the gap between Israelis and Palestinians. To unite in pain, against more pain.
However, I myself remain doubtful. Such events do a lot to dispirit me about the possibility of peace between our neighbors and us. It is on such occasions that the moral gap between the two societies is most evident, and the level of political maturity (or lack of) is painfully visible.
On December 2014, 11-year-old Ayala Shapira was sitting by her father as they were driving the family car on their way home. A Molotov cocktail was thrown at them by Palestinian terrorists, seriously injuring Ayala (it fell right unto her lap), who is still struggling with tremendous difficulties and will unfortunately continue to struggle for the rest of her life. At least she made it alive.
On March 11, 2011, 2 young Palestinian murderers penetrated the home of the Fogel family in the Israeli town of Itamar. They massacred all 5 family members in their beds: the father Ehud Fogel, the mother Ruth Fogel, and three of their six children -- Yoav, 11, Elad, 4, and Hadas, the youngest, a three-month-old infant (who according to some sources was decapitated).
On those 2 occasions, and on many others, NO major protests were seen on the streets of Ramallah, Hebron or Jenin in the West Bank, crying out against violence and for justice. No Palestinian leader came to visit and condole the bereaved families of the victims. And could you even imagine -- in your remotest of dreams -- a possibility of an Israeli standing in the Mughrabi Square in Ramallah, crying for their murdered loved ones?! And just in case you were wondering, the name "Mughrabi" belongs to a Palestinian terrorist, Dalal Mughrabi, a leader of a group of Palestinian murderers who butchered 37 Israelis on a bus in 1978, 12 of whom children. This is who Palestinians chose to dedicate the square after.
Today I am reminded by the famous words of Israel's late Prime Minister, Golda Meir, who said: "We will only have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us."
May we love all children, whomever they are.

Haaretz's Gideon Levy Chooses a Classical Antisemitic Trope

"Historically it has been antisemites, not Jews, who have read 'chosen' as code for Jewish supremacism," wrote the readers' editor of the Guardian in response to a writer's 2011 charge that Israelis regard their lives as more valuable than others'.
But it's not only card-carrying antisemites like David Duke who have invoked the notion of “chosen” as code for Jewish supremacism. Gideon Levy, a Jewish veteran journalist at the Israeli daily Haaretz, invoked the centuries-old antisemitic trope in his Aug. 2 Op-Ed ("All Israelis Are Guilty of Setting a Palestinian Family on Fire"):
At the end of a terrible day, it is this that leads to the burning of families whom God did not choose. No principle in Israeli society is more destructive, or more dangerous, than this principle. Nor, unfortunately, more common. If you were to examine closely what is concealed beneath the skin of most Israelis, you would find: the chosen people. When that is a fundamental principle, the next torching is only a matter of time.

Oprah Winfrey Rejects Israel Boycott of diamond producer Lev Leviev

Executives at O, the Oprah Winfrey magazine, refused on Monday to receive a small group of activists accusing Israeli diamantaire Lev Leviev of involvement in human rights abuses in the Middle East and Africa.
Representative and activists affiliated with Adalah-NY, an advocacy group focused on boycotting Israel and Israeli products, sought to meet O executives at the magazine's headquarters at the Hearst Corporation in Manhattan.
The non-profit group said that they chose to focus on Winfrey after she wore Leviev's diamonds on the cover of the May 2015, 15-year anniversary issue of O, The Oprah Magazine. (h/t Bob Knot)

Hamas says it will force UNRWA not to delay school year

Palestine Press Agency reports that Hamas said it will take legal action against UNRWA to ensure it doesn't reduce services and postpone the beginning of the school year in the Gaza Strip as it has considered.

Hamas MP Abdul Rahman Al-Jamal said that the UNRWA crisis is "fabricated" and aims to end the refugee issue altogetherm and that it has no financial crisis. He said the Legislative Council will not allow the school year to be postponed.

He also criticized the Palestinian Authority's attitude toward the UNRWA crisis, describing it as weak and lukewarm compared to the seriousness of this issue.

Meanwhile, UNRWA employees staged their own protest at the idea of having their salaries cut or being forced to go on leave.

This is an interesting story to follow as UNRWA keeps attempting to take money that otherwise would go to actual crises.

Tinder App For Muslim Countries Lets Only Men Swipe Left (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

New York, August 4 - A new version of the matchmaking app Tinder for Muslim countries has adapted the software to meet local cultural expectations, reserving the ability to reject a suggested suitor exclusively for male users.

Users and community leaders in Muslim countries and in heavily Muslim enclaves in Europe complained to IAC, the company that developed and owns Tinder, that the one-size-fits-all approach to matchmaking did not suit the mores of societies in which women are not given any say in whether marriage arrangement will go forward. Repeated petitions and inquiries led the company to develop Al-Tindr, which eliminates the swipe-left function for any user registered as female, in addition to several other changes.

Tinder is available in over 30 languages worldwide, but the current reworking for Al-Tindr represents the first adaptation for a new market that goes beyond mere translation. Users will be allowed to configure their profiles only to accept suggested matches of the opposite sex, unlike the original version of the app, which makes no such restriction. A beta release of Al-Tindr earlier this year uncovered several bugs, among them that the option for females to select other females had not been properly muted, resulting in a system malfunction when certain registered female users were unable to swipe left on any of the suggested matches, overloading the software.

A second important adaptation for Muslim countries involves the elimination of profile photos that display any more than a woman's eyes. Abstracted statistics will be made available, and male users will be allowed to select an option that renders the color of a woman's eyes in words, lest he be tempted by immoral thoughts as a result of seeing the actual image.

CEO of IAC Barry Diller told reporters he hopes the launch of Al-Tindr would be just the first in a series of cultural adaptations for non-Western users. "Our developers are currently working on a patch that would completely remove the female user from direct interface with any potential suitors, as some of our audiences in the Middle East have requested," he explained. "If a woman is not allowed to drive, or even be seen in public not in the presence of a male relative, there is no reason that standard should not be accommodated online as well, and our product will soon allow for that extra layer of modesty." Diller said the patch will give those male relatives a way to manage their female charges' Tinder profiles and interactions while clarifying for potential suitors that the person on the other end of the app is a male authority over, and not the actual, woman.

08/05 Links Pt1: Obama: without deal rockets will hit Tel Aviv; Kerry: doubts Iran’s desire to annihilate Israel

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: This isn’t about Bibi and Obama

It was obvious the fight over President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran would get very ugly, very quickly. And so it has.
It was obvious that it would be ugly because the fight over Obama’s appeasement policy toward Iran has been going on since he took office six-and-a-half years ago. And it has always been ugly.
Every time Obama has sided with the mullahs against domestic opponents he has played the Jew card in one way or another. He has blown more anti-Semitic dog whistles than many in Washington even realized existed.
Now the stakes are far higher than a mere sanctions bill. Obama has gotten his deal with Iran. And he’ll be damned if he allows it to go down.
So it is open season on Israel and its supporters.
Secretary of State John Kerry made this clear two weeks ago when he said it will be Israel’s fault if the deal goes down. Since the administration threatens that torpedoing the deal will cause war, Kerry is threatening that the administration will blame Israel if war breaks out.
As for Obama, in his conference call with leftist supporters last Thursday, he attacked AIPAC and the other Jewish organizations for daring to lobby Congress to vote against removing US sanctions from Iran and conflated their opposition to the deal with Jewish Republicans’ support for the invasion of Iraq.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Kerry Warns Congress About Risk of ‘Screwing’ the Ayatollah

Congress is the target of Kerry’s feistiness, as is his close friend and staunch adversary, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who is leading the charge against congressional ratification of the deal. In the course of a lengthy and freewheeling interview—which you will find published in full, below—Kerry warned that if Congress rejects the Iran deal, it will confirm the anti-U.S. suspicions harbored by the Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and eliminate any chance of a peaceful solution to the nuclear conundrum:
“The ayatollah constantly believed that we are untrustworthy, that you can’t negotiate with us, that we will screw them,” Kerry said. “This”—a congressional rejection—“will be the ultimate screwing.” He went on to argue that “the United States Congress will prove the ayatollah’s suspicion, and there’s no way he’s ever coming back. He will not come back to negotiate. Out of dignity, out of a suspicion that you can’t trust America. America is not going to negotiate in good faith. It didn’t negotiate in good faith now, would be his point.”
Kerry also said that his chief Iranian interlocutor, the foreign minister, Javad Zarif, and Zarif’s boss, the (relatively) reformist president, Hassan Rouhani, would be in “serious trouble” at home if the deal falls through. Zarif, Kerry told me, explicitly promised him that Iran will engage with the United States and its Arab allies on a range of regional issues, should Congress approve the deal. “Zarif specifically said to me in the last two weeks, ‘If we get this finished, I am now empowered to work with and talk to you about regional issues.’” Kerry went on, “This is in Congress’s hands. If Congress says no, Congress will shut that down, shut off that conversation, set this back, and set in motion a series of inevitables about what would happen with respect to Iranian behavior, and, by the way, the sanctions will be over.”

Kerry casts doubt on Iran’s desire to annihilate Israel

Regarding Iran’s open animosity to Israel, Kerry said that while “they have a fundamental ideological confrontation with Israel at this particular moment” that doesn’t necessarily mean “that translates into active steps” and pointed out that Iran has not ordered Hezbollah to use its arsenal of 80,000 missiles in Lebanon against Israel.
The discussion about Iran’s hostility toward Israel in connection with the nuclear deal is “a waste of time here,” opined Kerry.
The secretary of state also defended comments he made last Friday in which he warned that should Congress vote against the Iranian nuclear deal signed last month in Vienna, Israel could find itself more isolated in the international arena and “more blamed.”
It was, he explained, more of a head’s up to Israel than a threat.
“If you’ve ever played golf, you know that you yell ‘fore’ off the tee,” he said. “You’re not threatening somebody, you’re warning them: ‘Look, don’t get hit by the ball, it’s coming.’”

US Airstrikes on ISIS Kill 459 Civilians, Show Double Standard on Israel

Four hundred and fifty-nine innocent civilians have been killed by U.S.-led air strikes on ISIS targets in Syria and Iraq over the past year, according to a new report. It will be interesting to see how the international community reacts.
The new figures were released on August 3 by Airwars, an independent monitoring group that tracks and reports on air strikes against ISIS. Airwars says that it verifies its information by using “two or more generally credible sources, often with biographical, photographic or other evidence.”
The Obama Administration, however, has acknowledged only two civilian deaths from its air strikes. That’s a pretty significant discrepancy – 459 versus two. One wonders how the news media will treat that anomaly. When Arabs accuse Israel of killing large numbers of civilians, and the Israelis say that only a small number were killed, the Israeli position is routinely met with scoffing and derision from reporters .
Whether the number is 459 or 2, reasonable people would agree that the Obama Administration is surely doing everything it can to avoid civilian casualties, so whatever the number, it must be an inevitable byproduct of war, not the result of American recklessness.