Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, October 02, 2015

Mondoweiss' sickening equivalence

A Mondoweiss writer named Avram Meitner, who pretends to be struggling with the question of whether his oh-so-moral anti-Israel friends should condemn the murder of parents of six young children, thinks he is being evenhanded when he describes how he thinks people should react to the murders:

An error made by the vast majority of people from all parts of the political compass – we are more accepting of killings perpetrated by those wearing uniforms or flying an F16 than by those not wearing such uniforms. The doctrinal systems tell us that for violence to be legitimate, it must be carried out by agents of state. In other words, state terror ceases to be terror simply by virtue of it having been perpetrated under the auspices of a government and its so-called armed forces. It’s important to note this – from a moral perspective, whether you kill a child’s parents at point blank range, or from a few thousand feet in the air, the acts are equivalent.

The slaughter of Eitan and Naama Henkin is terrorism in the same way that the slaughter of hundreds of innocent men, women and children in Gaza is terrorism. Either oppose both equally, or accept that you are led by primitive tribalism rather than principles.

Meitner is a sickening piece of trash. He cannot find it in himself to condemn the murders without a caveat.

Meitner claims that evil Zionists support murdering civilians as long as the murderers are wearing uniforms. But no sane Israeli supports murder, whether the perpetrator is a soldier or not.

There is a world of a difference - legally, morally and logically - between cold-blooded, targeted murder and the tragic deaths of people who are killed when the terrorists hiding among them are being targeted. (There is a reason that every legal system on the planet distinguishes between murder, manslaughter and accidental death.)

If the IDF wanted to target civilians, Gaza would be a smoldering crater and there would be hundreds of thousands killed in 50 days.

No military expert on the planet says Israel targeted civilians. They know what Israel could do.

On the flip side, if an IDF soldier would shoot a Palestinian family at point blank range for no reason except a sense of dignity and revenge, Israeli society would rightly condemn him.

Meitner wants to politicize this murder of Jews and turn it into an anti-Israel screed. What a disgusting excuse for a human.

Here is the real equivalence: the murder of the Henkins is like the murders of Mohammed Abu Khdeir or of the Dawabashe family. In those cases the victims were targeted.

And when you compare apples to apples, the difference between the morality of those Zionists h despises and the Palestinians he loves becomes crystal clear.

Because Israeli society, from the Prime Minister to the people on the street, rose as one to condemn the murder of Abu Khdeir.

Because Israelis raised cash to pay the victims of the Dawabashe arson/murder.

Because the vast majority of Israelis are naturally disgusted and ashamed at the thought that one of their own could be responsible for such depravity.

And how did Palestinians react to the murder of the Henkins? They celebrated. They shot off fireworks. The expressed uniform happiness on Facebook.

I could not find a single Arabic voice in any message board or social media. As of this moment, a single article from Al Quds about the attack - showing the faces of the victims - has 4,500 Likes and 650 Facebook comments, every one uniformly happy that they were murdered. (UPDATE: There are very few fortunate exceptions, h/t DH).

What does it say about Palestinian society that seemingly no one, from Abbas down to the streets of Nablus, can condemn the murders of the Henkins? What does it say about Palestinian society that the Khaled Abu Toamehs and the Bassam Eids and the Muhammad Zoabis and the Mohammed Dajanis, people who actually think of Jews as human beings, are so rare - and roundly hated?

This is the difference between Israel and its Palestinian neighbors.

This is the difference between a moral society and one that is perverted.

That is the difference between a society that deserves respect and one that demands it.

That is the huge moral difference between the people Mondoweiss despises and those it supports. And if you want to see that difference in detail, read the comments of anti-Israel bigots who are applauding the murders.

But credit where credit is due. I have to thank Avram Meitner for helping me crystallize the difference between him and me.

10/02 Links Pt2: Israel’s risk aversion problem; The truth about J Street; A Succot scorecard

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: Israel’s risk aversion problem

This delusional thinking is what caused the IDF’s General Staff to convene immediately after Operation Protective Edge ended and try to figure out how to rebuild Gaza.
Ever since the cease-fire came into force, Hamas has diverted all the assistance it has received from Israel and the international community not to rebuild Gaza, but to rebuild its military capacity to harm Israel. And yet, from the IDF’s perspective, ever since the war ended our most urgent task has been to save Hamas and the Palestinians alike from reckoning with the price of their aggression.
Likewise, Israel continues to insist that we have a strategic interest in peace with the PLO. Even if this is true in theory, chances are greater that unicorns will fall from the sky and prance through Jerusalem’s Old City than that the PLO will agree to make peace with Israel.
Our continued defense of the PLO as a legitimate actor harms our ability to secure other strategic interests that are achievable and can improve Israel’s regional position. These interests include securing transportation arteries in Judea and Samaria and strengthening Israel's military and political control over the areas. These interests have only grown more acute in recent years with the rise of jihadist forces throughout the region and among the Palestinians themselves.
This brings us back to McCain and his strategic wisdom.
Israel must not allow the risks of action to lure us into strategic paralysis that imperils our future.
The more Israel allows other actors to determine the nature of the emerging regional order, the less secure Israel will be. The more willing we are to take calculated risks today the greater our ability will be to influence the future architecture of regional power relations and so minimize threats to our survival in the decades to come.

Sarah Honig: That level of hatefulness

In all, during her inglorious State Department stint, Hillary functioned as an authentic representative of her boss, President Obama.
And now as a presidential candidate herself, she pretends to be far friendlier to Israel than she was. She is understandably after money and votes. Electioneering begets lots of affable blarney but the devil is in the details. As only expected, Hillary never mentions her chumminess with Suha Arafat and her failure to take Mrs. Arafat to task for odious propaganda that (in the words of Hillary’s own censure of trump) “not only was it out of bounds, it was untrue.”
There are no extenuating excuses for the fact that Hillary kept mum during her Gaza visit and especially afterwards. She didn’t object to outright lies about non-existent contaminants with which Suha insisted Israel literally polluted actual Palestinian wells.
Not to so much as intimate a suggestion of criticism lent a measure of legitimacy to Suha’s outlandish and ultra-false charges. It also subliminally lent the impression that somehow Israel is the figurative poison in the Mideastern well – an impression later wellhoned by Obama whose bias-laden diplomacy Hillary Clinton unflinchingly furthered and helped implement.
Clearly, owning up to even a faint trace of such skewed statecraft now would be politically super-stupid for her with elections in the offing. Besides, Hillary was anyhow never a remarkable stickler for the truth. That, though, doesn’t mean that we should forget her double standards.
Paraphrasing Hillary’s own sanctimonious admonition, she “should have from the beginning corrected that kind of rhetoric, that level of hatefulness.”

The truth about J Street (h/t Bob Knot)

Video: Molotov cocktail attack in Old City of Jerusalem (update)

Displayed At Proudly Al Quds Newspaper:

# Akadds_ alquds: # instant video targeting soldiers and settlers Molotov cocktails near the door of the chain in the Old City of Jerusalem # morning were lying bottles arrest at the age of 25 years from the Shuafat refugee camp
Posted by Jerusalem - Alquds On Friday, October 2, 2015

At commenters Of Hundreds That Facebook Site Happily Cheered The Murders Of The Henkins.

With not one person I could find disagreeing.

UPDATE: The terrorist was arrested. (H / t Bob K)

10/02 Links Pt1: Listen to the Deafening Silence; Win $1 Million If You Can Prove PLO Accepted Israel

From Ian:

Eugene Kontorovich: Grandnephew of ‘father of human rights law’ killed for being Jewish

Eitam and Naama Henkin, two Israeli civilians, were gunned down in a drive-by shooting on a road in the West Bank yesterday. Four of their children were in the backseat of their car at the time.
The name Henkin will be immediately familiar to those interested in international law, because of Louis Henkin. Prof. Henkin was one of the defining figures in post-World War II international law. In a five-decade career at Columbia University School of Law, he pioneered the modern field of international law and has been called “the father of human rights law.”
Eitam’s grandfather was Louis Henkin’s brother; his parents are prominent Orthodox figures, associated with liberal approaches to Judaism. Eitam himself was a graduate fellow at the Kohelet Policy Forum, a Jerusalem think tank I am also associated with. My colleagues there describe Eitam as “an extremely impressive scholar and human being.” The Fatah movement of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has apparently admitted organizing the attack. I assume Eitam was a U.S. citizen (his parents both are).

Khaled Abu Toameh: Abbas's Trap: The Big Bluff

Those who rushed to declare the death of the Oslo Accords fell into Abbas's trap.
Abbas's threats are mainly designed to scare the international community into pressuring Israel to offer Abbas more concessions. He is hoping that inaccurate headlines concerning the purported abrogation of the Oslo Accords will cause panic in Washington and European capitals, prompting world leaders to demand that Israel give Abbas everything he asks for.
Abbas knows that cancelling the agreements with Israel would mean dissolving his Palestinian Authority, and the end of his political career.
The tens of thousands of Arab refugees now seeking asylum in Europe could not care less about the "occupation" and settlements.
Ironically, Abbas declared that, "We are working on spreading the culture of peace and coexistence between our people and in our region." But his harsh words against Israel, in addition to continued anti-Israel incitement in the Palestinian media, prove that he is moving in the opposite direction. This form of incitement destroys any chance of peace.

Jpost Editorial: Abbas’s speech

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas intended to escalate the tension with Israel when he declared on Wednesday that Palestinians living in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip would no longer be bound by the Oslo Accords.
Perhaps his speech was a desperate attempt to gain the attention of a United Nations General Assembly rightly preoccupied with much bigger and more important issues, namely the sectarian bloodbath in Syria that has metastasized throughout the region and has created a major humanitarian crisis for Europe.
Whatever Abbas’s motivation, it is too early to know the operative ramifications of what he said. On the one hand, the Palestinian president was calling on the nations of the world to take punitive actions against Israel as a country that is supposedly illegally occupying another nation.
But, in what can be seen as a positive non-declaration, Abbas stopped short of calling for an end to security and economic cooperation between the PA and Israel. That’s because he understands that an end to such cooperation would lead to the collapse of the PA. And this would be a disaster for the Palestinians, as well as for Israel.
Tens of thousands of PA employees would stop getting paid. Everything from garbage collection to law enforcement would cease to function properly and Hamas and Islamic Jihad would take advantage of the situation.

Win $1 Million If You Can Prove PLO Accepted Israel

New York businessman William Langfan has offered an unprecedented $1 million prize to anyone who shows that the Palestinian National Council (PNC) has ever changed the PLO charter to accept Israel's existence, as is widely believed.
The offer is particularly timely, less than 24 hours after Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas announced that he no longer sees himself as bound by the Oslo Accords.
Probably the most important obligation in the “Peace Process” was a promise to annul the onerous clauses of their 1964 Palestinian National Charter. “The importance of the charter to the Palestinians can not be exaggerated,” according to Langfan. “To the Palestinians, it is virtually their 'Junior Koran.' These clauses in the charter declared the establishment of Israel illegal and void and called for armed resistance until Palestine is liberated.”
In an exclusive interview with Arutz Sheva's Baruch Gordon, Langfan explained that in 1993, when Israel and the PLO were about to sign the Oslo Accords, then-PLO chairman Yasser Arafat sent a letter to then-Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, in which he agreed to cancel the clauses in the charter that called for an armed struggle against Israel, and promised to submit the matter to the PNC for approval.
That letter was then used for years as supposed proof that the PLO had recognized Israel.
However, Langfan noted that according to the charter itself, a two-thirds majority vote would be necessary to make changes in the charter.

The demand for undeserved "dignity" is part of the Arab honor/shame culture that drives nearly all of their actions.

The opposite of honor is shame, and one of the most potent ways to be shamed is to be ignored, to be shuffled aside as irrelevant.

In Mahmoud Abbas' interview with Al Quds two weeks ago, when he threatened to drop his bombshell at the UN, included his saying that the Arab world is preoccupied with their own problems and are no longer interested in prioritizing the Palestinian issue. The entire point of announcing his supposed bombshell was to redirect attention away from Yemen, Syria and the other major issues in the Arab world and to reclaim center stage.

To reclaim his sense of "dignity."

He is right - the Arab world increasingly doesn't give a damn about Palestinians. They are sick and tired of their tantrums. Some of the Arab nations paid lip service to the Palestinian issue at the UN but, significantly, the topic was ignored by Morocco, Iraq and especially Jordan.

If Arab nations are going to ignore their Palestinian brethren, then the PLO leaders need to ensure that the West still buys into the "linkage" argument that somehow their issue is linked to Syria, Yemen and ISIS.

Saeb Erekat was incensed that President Obama ignored the Palestinian issue in his UN speech, saying that ISIS cannot be defeated while Israel continues settlement activity and allowing Jews to ascend to the Temple Mount.

Being ignored by the Arabs is badm but being ignored by the West is an affront to their dignity.

Abbas' aide Mahmoud Habash announced only two days ago that if the world would ignore the issue of the Temple Mount in the UN meetings, it could spark "dire consequences" including World War III. Again, this is both a threat and a demand to be considered relevant by the world.

Arab coverage of the raising of the PLO flag at the UN was filled with happiness at the "dignity" that it supposedly brought to them.

Abbas' speech itself included a demand for his people's "human dignity." But his "bombshell" was a dud, and even the Palestinians recognized it as a worthless stunt.

So Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party upped the ante.

And all of these threats, incitement and demands for honor and dignity brings us to the horrific terrorist attack yesterday.

The Fatah group that took responsibility for the murder of the Henkins yesterday ended their statement with this:

Long live the unity of our people and our struggle to regain our dignity and homeland.

Note that they place "dignity" higher than "homeland." To them, murdering a Jewish couple was mostly an attempt to regain "dignity." They are relevant again! They are in the headlines! And some stupid Westerners will once again use this attack as a weapon against Israel by claiming that the "occupation" is what causes violence in the Middle East, just like Erekat said it did!

The Arab nations already know better, because they are seeing first hand that one cannot compare Syrian barrel bombs to Israeli roadblocks.

But the rest of the world has not yet caught on to the truth. Many non-Arab countries such as Japan and Italy dutifully mentioned "Palestine" in their UN speeches this week.

So the Palestinians demand their "dignity." Dignity can only be achieved by showing that they matter, that they are relevant.

And terror attacks - planned and financed by Mahmoud Abbas' own Fatah party - are the easiest and most efficient manner to achieve relevance and their twisted idea of "dignity."

(h/t Irene)

This @UNRWA deputy principal loves shooting rockets at Israeli civilians

Khaled Arjah works for UNRWA near Nablus. He is probably a math teacher and appears to be a deputy principal.

Here are some of the wonderful, peaceful things he has posted on Facebook:

"Breaking the Silence" (meaning, rockets are more powerful than words)

"If we were to reveal what (weapons) we have, both enemies and friends would be surprised"

The banners of our victory have appeared, and the singing of the weapons has risen high

Allah said: "Enter upon them by the gate, for when you have entered it, you shall surely be victorious." (Quran 5:23)

"The Mourabitoun at Al-Aqsa"

Of course, all of these violate UN and UNRWA principles.

Of course, nothing will happen to fix the problem.

I have started to put all of these examples in a single tag, UNRWA Hate.

(h/t Ibn Boutros, Bob K)

Times of Israel reports:

A unit within Fatah’s armed wing assumed responsibility for the murder of an Israeli couple near the West Bank settlement of Itamar.

The Abdel Qader al-Husseini Brigades, a group affiliated with Fatah’s al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, announced on Friday that its men on Thursday night opened fire on the car of Eitam and Naama Henkin, a couple in their 30s, while they were driving home with their four children, aged four months to nine. The children were not wounded in the attack.

Fatah, headed by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, is the largest faction within the Palestine Liberation Organization, which is the governing body in West Bank areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority.

The statement from the Husseini Brigades says:

With Allah’s help and in keeping with our people's right to struggle to recover our usurped homeland and our duty to sacred jihad, our forces on Thursday night carried out a necessary action in which they fired on a car of occupying settlers outside the Itamar settlement, built on Palestinian lands south of Nablus, firing directly on the car, killing a settler and wounding his wife according to enemy media, and the group returned to the safety of the camps.

We warn the enemy against carrying out any action against innocent civilians, wherever they are, because our troops will respond with similar attacks, and we will consider their actions to be war crimes.

Long live the unity of our people and our struggle to regain our dignity and homeland.

Brigades of the Martyr Abdul-Qader al-Husseini Storm Troopers

The Husseini Brigades also shot many rockets from Gaza last year, a fact that practically no media noted, as they want to pretend that Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah is a "moderate" group.

And the Al Aqsa Brigades of Fatah are not a rogue group. Their Abu Nidal Brigades has an article from yesterday about how the Fatah leadership thanked them for their work in general, reproducing the letter on Fatah stationery.

These Fatah groups are paid for and supported by Fatah, and Fatah is led by Mahmoud Abbas, who has never dissociated himself from their actions.

Which means that Mahmoud Abbas is a terrorist leader.

But world leaders, world media, NGOs and "Middle East experts" are so invested in the myth of Abbas as a peacemaker that they simply ignore the straight line from "Palestinian President" Mahmoud Abbas to depraved terror attacks like this one.

10/01 Links Pt2: The Progressive Left and Israel's Right to Exist; Finnish MP: Most of Europe is Anti-Israel

From Ian:

The Progressive Left and Israel's Right to Exist

At bottom, the bien-pensant view is that (a) Israel is wrong because it's strong; (b) Israel has no right to exist because it is a European state in the Muslim Middle East; and (c) Palestinians and fellow Muslims are not responsible for their fate, or their crimes, because they are oppressed victims.
The left hates Israel’s military strength and its willingness to use it for the same reasons it hates American power. As right-thinking cosmopolitans, they would never approve such brutality. Obama captured this perspective in a Freudian slip. “Whether we like it or not,” he explained, “we remain a dominant military superpower.” The left doesn’t like it. They don’t like it in America, and they don’t like it in Israel. As for Russia, China, Iran, or North Korea brandishing military threats, well, let’s not think about that. The threats may vanish from their minds, but they still threaten everybody else with working synapses.
Not only is Israel powerful, the left (like the Muslim world) sees Israel as a remnant of Europe's crimes: imperialism and the Holocaust. University faculties are preoccupied with imperialism and post-colonial legacies, which they blame for many of the world’s ills. They see Israel through that lens, as a colony of white settlers in an Arab-Muslim region. They blithely ignore the Jewish people’s age-old connection to the land, its continuous presence there, and its central religious significance. And they ignore how many Israelis were driven out of Arab countries, which have become virulently anti-Semitic.
The combination of Israel’s religious heritage, its nationalism, its prosperity, and its unapologetic self-defense combine virtually everything loathed by secular, cosmopolitan intellectuals. That’s why Obama's 2009 Cairo speech offered such a tepid “defense" of Israel's right to exist. Israel was needed, he said, because Jews needed somewhere to go after the Holocaust. That is the view of the average professor of French literature: Israel is the bastard child of Europe’s crimes.
In the left’s worldview, Palestinians and fellow Muslims are not seen as agents of their own history, for good or ill. They are righteous victims. This condescending view is grounded in Jean Jacques Rousseau's gauzy, romantic vision of "noble savages," not yet cursed by civilization. What can be expected of such people? Their crimes are merely "weapons of the weak.” And who are we, the oppressors, to criticize them? That would commit an unforgivable sin, blaming the victim.
For years, this coalition of anti-Zionists has marched across campuses shouting "Palestine, Palestine, must be free, from the Jordan [River] to the sea." The state they demand, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean, means Israel should disappear completely. So, when Bernie Sanders says Israel has a right to exist, they sit on their hands. Their shameful silence says Israel's very existence is a no longer a "progressive position." (h/t Cliff)

MEMRI: In Eid Al-Adha Editorial, Qatari 'Al-Quds Al-Arabi' Daily Laments State Of Arab World: Muslims Are Slaughtering One Another, Export Nothing But Murder And Terror

The Eid Al-Adha (September 24, 2015) editorial of the London-based Qatari daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi discussed the current state of the Muslim world, and bemoaned how many Muslims are slaughtering their brethren in Arab and Islamic countries. It added that Muslims today are in the throes of an unprecedented catastrophe that surpasses even the loss of Andalusia and of Palestine.
The following are excerpts from the editorial:
"How sadly misleading is this picture, which does not reflect the true state of this nation: One million Muslims in simple white garb, symbolizing a state of abstinence and purity, equality and compassion, stand in a single place as one, praying and offering pleas to a single deity. Despite their differences in color, nationality, tongue, and cultural and political schools of thought, they help each other bear the effort of the pilgrimage to Mount Arafat at high noon...
"Are these pilgrims, these submissive believers, who praise Allah morning and night, among those Muslims who slaughter each other in more than one country, to the point that their lands are awash in blood and tens of thousands of them have been killed or wounded since the last Eid Al-Adha?...
"Have we reached a situation in which we must redefine the term 'Muslim'? Do we even remain an 'Islamic ummah'? And are we still 'the best nation established for mankind' [Koran: 3:110]? Or have we become 'a nation of refugees?' Are Muslims still 'a single body, in which if one organ complains the rest of them hasten to treat and protect it,' [as the hadith says]? Or have they become one body in which one organ kills another and conspires against it?

Is the Pope Ending Catholic Anti-Semitism?

"Nostre Aetate," released in 1965, called for friendship and dialogue between Catholics and Jews, instead of the centuries-long repudiation of Jews by Catholics; St Joseph's University became the first to respond by establishing the Institute for Jewish-Catholic Relations. Is Pope Francis picking up where Pope Paul VI left off?
Can Pope Francis' hopes and dreams for reconciliation of Catholics and Jews override some unfortunate but pressing realities, such the Church's desire to placate the Palestinians?
If Pope Francis is serious about a "journey of friendship" with the Jewish people, perhaps he would not be so quick to approve President Obama's Iran nuclear deal in the name of a hoped-for peace that will most certainly ignite an unhoped-for war between Iran and Israel.
By assisting the UN in establishing the "sustainable development platform," the Pope is offering his permission to the UN -- one of the most anti-Semitic, anti-Israel bodies on the face of the earth -- to usurp power on behalf of a shared utopian agenda. Sustainable development notwithstanding, the UN should be encouraged to clean up its own house before it tries to clean up the world.

Godlike aliens reveal nefarious Israeli plots to Raelians

From Yahoo News/PR Newswire:

Following an August 6 revelation that led Rael, spiritual leader of the Raelian Movement, to announce the end of protection for Israel by the Elohim, which he explained as "the advanced civilization that created life on Earth," Rael shared additional revelations in a statement released by the International Raelian Movement (IRM).

The new revelations concern what a spokesperson for the IRM called "the serious threat represented by current world leadership, especially the Israelis."

"Henceforth, under the title 'Elohimleaks,' I will immediately post the most recent information from the Elohim about what is happening on Earth in the most secret government services," Rael said on August 20. "The people governing this planet must know that the Elohim are watching us and know everything. No 'top secret' information or state secrets of any government can be hidden from them.

He said he had received the following information from the Elohim:

"To counter world sympathy for [residents of] Gaza and Palestinian suffering, some members of the Israeli government are thinking about creating a 'false flag' attack in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem in which a powerful bomb will kill thousands of Israeli citizens. They will then blame the event on 'a Palestinian terrorist.' This will be a psychiatric patient manipulated by the most recent mind control techniques, making him believe he is receiving direct orders from his god.
...

On August 22, Rael conveyed an additional revelation:

"Since Israel controls most of the water supply in the Palestinian territories, the Israel army is studying the possibility of poisoning this water with highly infectious diseases. Then, after an outbreak kills thousands, the Israeli army would be sent in to 'help the population' with intentionally ineffective medicines and vaccines. Thus Israel would have a good image as a 'savior' of the poor Palestinian people while creating a horrific genocide disguised as the outbreak of a known disease. In fact, it would be a manmade disease, but one that produces the same symptoms as known natural diseases. The media will therefore propagate the official lies without inquiry.

Rael has released other top secrets from Elohimleaks on his Facebook page and on the Elohimleaks website. For example:

ELOHIMLEAKS # 5 : IsraHell is preparing a false flag operation attacking US ships in the Persian Gulf with weapons who will simulate coming from Iran either from stealth airplanes, new stealth drones, or new stealth submarines or all in order to have the US attack Iran.

This is the Rael logo:

(h/t Omri)

Bibi's UN speech (video, transcript)

Address by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the UN General Assembly

October 1, 2015

Ladies and Gentlemen, I bring you greetings from Jerusalem. The city in which the Jewish People's hopes and prayers for peace for all of humanity have echoed throughout the ages.

Thirty-one years ago, as Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, I stood at this podium for the first time.

I spoke that day against a resolution sponsored by Iran to expel Israel from the United Nations.

Then as now, the UN was obsessively hostile towards Israel, the one true democracy in the Middle East.

Then as now, some sought to deny the one and only Jewish state a place among the nations.

I ended that first speech by saying:

Gentlemen, check your fanaticism at the door.

More than three decades later, as the Prime Minister of Israel, I am again privileged to speak from this podium.

And for me, that privilege has always come with a moral responsibility to speak the truth.

So after three days of listening to world leaders praise the nuclear deal with Iran, I begin my speech today by saying:

Ladies and Gentlemen, check your enthusiasm at the door.

You see, this deal doesn't make peace more likely.

By fueling Iran’s aggressions with billions of dollars in sanctions relief, it makes war more likely.

Just look at what Iran has done in the last six months alone, since the framework agreement was announced in Lausanne.

Iran boosted its supply of devastating weapons to Syria.

Iran sent more soldiers of its Revolutionary Guard into Syria. Iran sent thousands of Afghani and Pakistani Shi’ite fighters to Syria.

Iran did all this to prop up Assad's brutal regime.

Iran also shipped tons of weapons and ammunitions to the Houthi rebels in Yemen, including another shipment just two days ago.

Iran threatened to topple Jordan.

Iran’s proxy Hezbollah smuggled into Lebanon SA-22 missiles to down our planes, and Yakhont cruise missiles to sink our ships.

Iran supplied Hezbollah with precision-guided surface-to-surface missiles and attack drones so it can accurately hit any target in Israel.

Iran aided Hamas and Islamic Jihad in building armed drones in Gaza.

Iran also made clear its plans to open two new terror fronts against Israel, promising to arm Palestinians in the West Bank and sending its Revolutionary Guard generals to the Golan Heights, from which its operatives recently fired rockets on northern Israel.

Israel will continue to respond forcefully to any attacks against it from Syria.

Israel will continue to act to prevent the transfer of strategic weapons to Hezbollah from and through Syrian territory.

Every few weeks, Iran and Hezbollah set up new terror cells in cities throughout the world. Three such cells were recently uncovered in Kuwait, Jordan and Cyprus.

In May, security forces in Cyprus raided a Hezbollah agent’s apartment in the city of Larnaca. There they found five tons of ammonium nitrate, that's roughly the same amount of ammonium nitrate that was used to blow up the federal building in Oklahoma City.

And that’s just in one apartment, in one city, in one country.

But Iran is setting up dozens of terror cells like this around the world, ladies and gentlemen, they're setting up those terror cells in this hemisphere too.

I repeat: Iran’s been doing all of this, everything that I've just described, just in the last six months, when it was trying to convince the world to remove the sanctions.

Now just imagine what Iran will do after those sanctions are lifted.

Unleashed and un-muzzled, Iran will go on the prowl, devouring more and more prey.

In the wake of the nuclear deal, Iran is spending billions of dollars on weapons and satellites.

You think Iran is doing that to advance peace?

You think hundreds of billions of dollars in sanctions relief and fat contracts will turn this
rapacious tiger into a kitten?

If you do, you should think again.

In 2013 president Rouhani began his so-called charm offensive here at the UN. Two years later, Iran is executing more political prisoners, escalating its regional aggression, and rapidly expanding its global terror network.

You know they say, actions speak louder than words.

But in Iran’s case, the words speak as loud as the actions.

Just listen to the Deputy Commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Quds Force. Here's what he said in February:

“The Islamic revolution is not limited by geographic borders….” He boasted that Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine and Yemen are among the countries being “conquered by the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

Conquered.

And for those of you who believe that the deal in Vienna will bring a change in Iran’s policy, just listen to what Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei said five days after the nuclear deal was reached: “Our policies towards the arrogant government of the United States will not change.”

The United States, he vowed, will continue to be Iran’s enemy.

While giving the mullahs more money is likely to fuel more repression inside Iran, it will definitely fuel more aggression outside Iran.

As the leader of a country defending itself every day against Iran’s growing aggression, I wish I could take comfort in the claim that this deal blocks Iran’s path to nuclear weapons.

But I can’t, because it doesn’t.

This deal does place several constraints on Iran’s nuclear program.

And rightly so, because the international community recognizes that Iran is so dangerous.

But you see here’s the catch:

Under this deal, If Iran doesn’t change its behavior, In fact, if it becomes even more dangerous in the years to come, the most important constraints will still be automatically lifted by year 10 and by year 15.

That would place a militant Islamic terror regime weeks away from having the fissile material for an entire arsenal of nuclear bombs.

That just doesn’t make any sense.

I’ve said that if Iran wants to be treated like a normal country, let it act like a normal country.

But this deal, this deal will treat Iran like a normal country even if it remains a dark theocracy that conquers its neighbors, sponsors terrorism worldwide and chants “Death to Israel”, “Death to America.”

Does anyone seriously believe that flooding a radical theocracy with weapons and cash will curb its appetite for aggression?

Do any of you really believe that a theocratic Iran with sharper claws and sharper fangs will be more likely to change its stripes?

So here's a general rule that I've learned and you must have learned in your life time - When bad behavior is rewarded, it only gets worse.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I have long said that the greatest danger facing our world is the coupling of militant Islam with nuclear weapons.

And I’m gravely concerned that the nuclear deal with Iran will prove to be the marriage certificate of that unholy union.

I know that some well-intentioned people sincerely believe that this deal is the best way to block Iran’s path to the bomb.

But one of history’s most important yet least learned lessons is this:

The best intentions don’t prevent the worst outcomes.

The vast majority of Israelis believe that this nuclear deal with Iran is a very bad deal.

And what makes matters even worse is that we see a world celebrating this bad deal, rushing to embrace and do business with a regime openly committed to our destruction.

Last week, Major General Salehi, the commander of Iran’s army, proclaimed this:

“We will annihilate Israel for sure.”

“We are glad that we are in the forefront of executing the Supreme Leader’s order to destroy Israel.”

And as for the Supreme Leader himself, a few days after the nuclear deal was announced, he released his latest book.

Here it is.

It’s a 400-page screed detailing his plan to destroy the State of Israel.

Last month, Khamenei once again made his genocidal intentions clear before Iran's top clerical body, the Assembly of Experts.

He spoke about Israel, home to over six million Jews.

He pledged, “there will be no Israel in 25 years.”

Seventy years after the murder of six million Jews,

Iran’s rulers promise to destroy my country.

Murder my people.

And the response from this body, the response from nearly every one of the governments represented here has been absolutely nothing!

Utter silence!

Deafening silence.

(42 seconds of silence)

Perhaps you can now understand why Israel is not joining you in celebrating this deal.

Vic Rosenthal's weekly column:

As a Zionist, I believe that a Jewish state is a necessary condition for the continued survival of the Jewish people. Our state faces some acute challenges, including the direct military threat from Iran and its proxies and the recent coalescence of a global anti-Jewish conspiracy of the Left. But there is another, chronic, struggle, and that is with the Arab Muslims of the land of Israel.

I am deliberately not distinguishing between the Arabs of Judea/Samaria, Jerusalem, or the rest of Israel, because the difference is only a matter of degree of hostility. In some cases the hostility is explicitly based on religion, insofar as it is unacceptable for a Muslim to live under non-Muslim (especially Jewish!) sovereignty. In others, it is nationalistic, either a broader Arab nationalism or the ‘Palestinian’ version; and finally there is simple ethnic/cultural rejection of the Other. It wouldn’t be wrong to add that there is an element of envy and greed to take for themselves the fruits of development that have come to the Jewish population as a result of their enterprise.

Be that as it may, the violent behavior of Arabs toward Jews in the land of Israel has a long, ugly history, including a murderous pogrom in Tzfat in 1834, riots in Mandate Palestine in 1921, 1929 (including the Hevron massacre) and 1936, the intifadas, and of course the long history of terrorism – both the ‘official’ variety of the PLO and Hamas and the ‘personal’ kind – here.

Recently, the ‘Oslo Generation’ of Arabs influenced by Palestinian Authority media and the educational system established by Yasser Arafat have been engaging in activities ranging from harassment to assault to murder of Jews. Social media have taken the place of inflammatory speeches by the Mufti, to great effect, but the idea is the same. They’ll make our lives hell, they think, and we’ll leave.

Ze’ev Jabotinsky recognized early that the Arabs will not reconcile with a Jewish state unless there is absolutely no alternative. In his 1923 essay “The Iron Wall,” he wrote,

To imagine, as our Arabophiles do, that they will voluntarily consent to the realisation of Zionism in return for the moral and material conveniences which the Jewish colonist brings with him, is a childish notion, which has at bottom a kind of contempt for the Arab people; it means that they despise the Arab race, which they regard as a corrupt mob that can be bought and sold, and are willing to give up their fatherland for a good railway system. …

As long as the Arabs feel that there is the least hope of getting rid of us, they will refuse to give up this hope in return for either kind words or for bread and butter, because they are not a rabble, but a living people. And when a living people yields in matters of such a vital character it is only when there is no longer any hope of getting rid of us, because they can make no breach in the iron wall. Not till then will they drop their extremist leaders whose watchword is "Never!"

As in so many things, Jabotinsky was prescient.

What is the solution? Is there one?

Historically, a conqueror either killed a conquered people, enslaved them, or expelled them. The first and second options are morally unacceptable, and the third impractical and probably politically impossible (although it’s certain that if the Arabs had won any of our wars they would have implemented a combination of all three).

Meir Kahane suggested (Uncomfortable Questions for Comfortable Jews, 1987) that those Arabs who would agree to “accept the Jewish state of Israel as the exclusive state of the Jewish people” could stay as resident aliens with civil but not political rights, while others could accept compensation and leave or – if they refused – be expelled. This is a somewhat kinder solution than killing or slavery, but was still considered beyond the pale.

And that is unfortunate, because – as Jabotinsky made clear – there is no voluntary solution possible. The more we try to conciliate the Arabs and compromise in order to try to satisfy their national aspirations, the more we display to them our weakness and inability to hold on to the land that we’ve taken possession of.

Today, anti-Zionist Arabs are confident that they are winning. We continue to send them the message that for whatever reason, we are weak, we are paralyzed and can’t do anything to stop them. The only way to stop Arab terrorism and harassment is to change the rules, to turn things upside down. To create an iron wall. To make the actions of the terrorists – the big ones and the little ones – themselves negate the Palestinian project.

So what do I suggest?

First, take away the oxygen of publicity. Israel is full of foreign ‘journalists’ with agendas, international activists, operatives of hostile NGOs, and so forth. Get rid of them, and don’t let them back in. Declare flash points like Nabi Saleh military zones and arrest ‘Palestinian’ and left-wing journalists when they enter them. Take away press credentials from the provocateurs. Don’t allow foreign sources to bankroll Israeli subversives. If Palestinian radio and TV are guilty of incitement, take them off the air. Why should Israel be as much of an open society as the US is when the threats facing it are so much greater?

Second, whenever possible, expel troublemakers. We can’t implement Kahane’s solution in general, but we could for specific cases, like the Tamimi family. Bassem Tamimi was born in Judea/Samaria in 1967 prior to Israel’s conquest of the area, and may have Jordanian citizenship. If so, he should be deported. Israeli Arabs involved in terrorism could have their citizenship revoked and be sent to Gaza or the Palestinian Authority. Those actively working to destroy the state should forfeit the privilege of living in it. And while we are talking about troublemakers, throw European ‘charities’ out of the territories.

Third, make terrorism unproductive. New construction in Judea and Samaria should be undertaken in honor of the victims of terrorist atrocities. The homes of terrorists should be destroyed. Israeli Arabs whose family members are caught throwing rocks should be barred from receiving National Insurance payments, as MK Miri Regev has suggested. Symbolic terrorism, like the vandalism at the Mount of Olives cemetery, should be taken seriously and the perpetrators punished. Needless to say, there should never, ever, be a prisoner release for political reasons or in exchange for hostages.

Fourth, although we shouldn't exclude all Arab residents of the state from participating in politics as Kahane wanted to do, there should be no anti-Zionists in the Knesset. What is the message sent by the presence of Haneen Zoabi, when she has clearly violated the Basic Law which excludes anyone who negates the existence of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state? Ask the Supreme Court, which voided a law passed to expel her on just these grounds.

For Jabotinsky, Zionism was a given, “moral and just.” Before we can demonstrate to the Arabs that the land of Israel belongs to us, we need to believe it ourselves. Unfortunately the legal establishment in Israel, especially the Supreme Court, seems to have de facto accepted the idea that Israel is already a ‘state of its citizens’ and not primarily a Jewish state. It’s quite likely that most of my suggestions above would run afoul of the Court. A new Basic Law declaring that the state belongs to the Jewish people and exists for their benefit could make it easier to fight back.

The Arab terrorists justify their violence by asserting that the land is theirs and they are “resisting occupation” when they throw their firebombs (they often falsely claim that such “resistance” is legitimate under international law). International opposition to Israel is based on the idea that we are “illegal occupiers.” So why doesn’t the government adopt the Levy report, which presents a juridical opinion that Israel’s presence in Judea and Samaria is not a belligerent occupation, and Jewish communities there are legal? Why isn’t there an official, well-funded information campaign underway to present Israel’s legal and moral position to the world? And why isn’t there a similar campaign to delegitimize the false ‘Palestinian narrative’?

To answer the question I posed earlier, yes there is a solution to Arab hostility. It is to understand that we will never make Zionists out of most of the Arabs, but we can give them a choice: they can be good neighbors despite their animosity – or they can leave.

10/01 Links Pt1: It's Jihad, Stupid; Will Obama Call Abbas’s UN Bluff?; Incitement is a weapon

From Ian:

Mordechai Kedar: It's Jihad, Stupid

Abbas' UN speech is part of a master plan and it's name is Jihad. The doctrine of Islamic Jihad mandates the inclusion of an element of deceit, and Mahmoud Abbas is a master of deception.
Shimon Peres, Yossi Beilin, Alon Liel and the other hallucinatory figures tried to convince us that there is a difference between the bad Jihadists of Hamas and the "charming", "pleasant' PLO ones, those true lovers of peace and tranquility, those whose arch-Jihadist leader Yasser Arafat was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace. Even Abbas' incendiary UN speech will not change their minds.
Theirs was an unfounded and utterly delusionary point of view, but it cost the lives of over 1500 very real Israelis, because the only difference between Hamas and the PLO is that Hamas declares openly that it is a Jihad fighter organization, while some PLO members hide the fact that they are as well. Some of them – those in the el-Aksa Brigades - don't bother to hide it and their president, Mahmoud Abbas, finances them. Those of us who are battle-weary attempt to kosher the Jihadist PLO vermin just as they attempted to gloss over Haj Amin al Husseini's part in the Holocaust of European Jewry.
Let's wake up and tell the truth – to ourselves and to the world. Only the truth can help us understand reality and deal with it properly. The truth is that we are a Jihad target for Hamas and the PLO, each one using its own methods of trying to dissemble and pull the wool over our eyes, and if we fall – thanks in part to the European money pouring into the arteries of the PA Jihad – Europe will be the next objective of that very same Jihad, which is already in the midst of exporting itself to Europe by means of massive Muslim immigration to the aging and deteriorating continent.
This is a Jihad. Our enemies, no matter what else they are, are all Jihad fighters. We have to adapt our way of talking about this situation and deal with it accordingly. The faster we do so the better it will be for us and the world.

Obama brushed off Reid's plea on Palestinian state

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid on two different occasions this year went to White House chief of staff Denis McDonough seeking a public commitment from President Barack Obama that he would veto any U.N. resolution calling for an independent Palestinian state.
Both times, Obama did nothing.
The requests from Reid came as he was trying to line up Democratic support for the Iran nuclear agreement. If Obama explicitly sided with Israel against the possible U.N. resolution, Reid’s thinking went, it would give nervous Democrats cover to back the Iran deal, which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vocally protested.
The repeated requests by Reid and Obama’s unwillingness to make a statement on the issue — confirmed by White House officials and Senate aides — highlights how wide the gulf between the Obama administration and Israeli government has become. It unfolded in the context of a personal relationship between Obama and Netanyahu that’s become highly toxic, poisoning U.S.-Israeli relations more widely.
The issue gained new significance Wednesday as Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas declared that his government was no longer bound by any agreements with Israel, including the Oslo peace accords and other settlements related to a possible two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

JPost Editorial: The Russia-Iran link

The fact that Iran is finally off the American/Western nuclear hook and is flushed with cash made this unabashed partnership with Moscow possible. Russia, let’s not forget, is Iran’s primary weapons purveyor and builder of its nuclear facilities. It made sure that Iran would be treated indulgently during the recent nuclear negotiations.
In all, Iran is emboldened as never before and Putin is heartened by Obama’s phlegmatic response. One superpower – America – appears in retreat, whereas a reawakening Russia regains prominence.
The itineraries of a significant number of Middle Eastern leaders include Moscow – Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu is only one. Also traveling to Moscow are potentates from such unlikely ally countries as Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, the UAE, Morocco, Jordan, and of course Egypt, which was unaccountably jilted by Obama.
Putin even plans a visit to Riyadh. All this speaks volumes.
The danger to Israel isn’t only that Iran can now openly become a key player in Syria, but that aggression will be indirectly funded by the resources the US has consented to release and by the vast business opportunities it steers to Tehran. Those funds, combined with unimpeded Russian ambition will thus not only help ensure Assad’s survival, but will also allow the further arming of Hezbollah and Hamas.
Netanyahu’s conversation with Putin last week dealt not only with military coordination regarding Russia’s actions in Syria, but also with Israel’s warning that it cannot allow a massively reinforced Hezbollah menace on its doorstep in Lebanon.