Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Abbas: "If Israel would just give us what we demand, the entire world would be free of terror"

Mahmoud Abbas met with Moroccan Jewish leaders in Ramallah on Monday and he put on his moderate face for his guests.

He said that Palestinians seek to reach an agreement with Israel and yearn live alongside it in peace. He said that he wants an international conference with all the countries of the world, including Arab countries like Saudi Arabia, to decide what would be the best way to reach peace. he said that he's willing to meet with any groups like this one that might help bring peace. He claimed that if only Israel would make peace, then 57 Arab nations would normalize relations with Israel.

He didn't say that the one set of people he is unwilling to meet with are Israeli officials who would actually be the peace partners for any realistic plan. He didn't say a word about the so-called "right of return" where he insists in every single speech given to his own constituents that there can be no peace deal without Israel being destroyed demographically. He didn't address his inciting Palestinians to stab Jews under the guise of "defending al Aqsa." He didn't say that he refuses to normalize relations with Israel today, and neither has any Arab nation that signed a peace treaty with Israel. No, he played to his audience to try to get them to pressure Israel to make concessions for a "peace "that would end up ripping Jerusalem away and from there go to the next stage of destroying Israel.

But one thing he said stands out. It was not the first time that a top PLO official has said this, but it is important to point it out every time.

Abbas claimed that resolving the Palestinian issue with what they consider a fair solution would "ensure the end all forms of terrorism, remove the pretext of extremists who have taken the Palestinian issue as am excuse to spread terror and murder, like ISIS and al-Qaeda and others, so we must achieve peace and end the occupation."

Except that ISIS and Al Qaeda don't usually claim that their terror attacks have anything to do with Israel.

The old discredited theory of "linkage" is an important tool in Abbas' arsenal. He knows that Europe is afraid of Islamic terrorists and he is offering them, against all logic and facts, an idea to hold onto - the idea that the solution to terror is Israeli capitulation to Palestinian blackmail. The argument is absurd but very attractive, because people who feel helpless against an enemy who terrorizes them would naturally have a strong attraction to any simplistic solution that doesn't involve them doing anything.

Abbas is saying that ISIS has nothing against Brussels or Paris or Ankara - they are only attacking the Europeans because Israel refuses to dismantle some Jewish communities that Europe is against anyway!

This seductive argument trumps logic - there is no downside to pressuring Israel and if there is a chance that it will take the wind out of the sails of the jihadists, isn't that worth a try?

In fact, giving in to jihadist demands emboldens the jihadists to redouble their efforts. It helps recruit more of them. It feeds into the fantasy worldview that the world is at war, and the Muslim side is winning on its way to inevitable, Koranically prophesied victory.

Abbas may not be a jihadist, but he is using jihadist language in the PA's official media to justify terror against Jews, and he subscribes to the jihadist idea that concessions are signs of weakness. He knows how to play the game, but his plan is to convince the world to give to him for free what he refuses to negotiate for.

Israel wants peace and security. Abbas is pretending to offer "peace" without any promises, without any concessions, with every intent to use his free gains to begin the next stage of Israel's destruction.

His cynical use of linkage is a double-edged sword, if Western nations woke up.

Here is what the West should answer Abbas:

If ISIS is threatening and killing Westerners on behalf of 'Palestine,' then Palestinian leaders should clearly say that the jihadists are not helping them at all. They should denounce any terror attacks in their name and say that anyone who joins ISIS for that cause is deluded and counterproductive. he should say that in the war between the free world and Islamic terrorists, he and his people choose the free world. In other words, if the terrorists claim linkage, Abbas and the PLO can explicitly break that linkage by dissociating themselves from all terror attacks done in their name.

That would have the exact same effect as Israeli concessions. In fact, it would be more effective because Palestinians would be demanding not to be used as an excuse for terror even before they achieve their political goals.

Abbas would never do that. If France or Belgium demands that Abbas break the linkage that he insists is there, they will find out which side Abbas is really on.

Because Abbas wants his cause to be linked to ISIS. He wants jihadists to continue to attack Western targets. It allows him to use "linkage" to his advantage.

So which side is Abbas really on - the side of peace or the side of the terrorists whose acts, he believes, help him blackmail the West to achieve his aims?

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03/28 Links Pt2: Anti-Semitism on California Campuses; Ryan Bellerose At AIPAC; Reflections of a Lebanese woman in Israel

From Ian:

Anti-Semitism on California Campuses

The problem on campuses across the country is that pro-Palestinian activists, in their zeal to seek self-affirmation, statehood, and "social justice," have waged an extremely caustic cognitive war against Israel and Jews.
Being pro-Palestinian on campuses today does not necessarily mean that one is committed to helping Palestinians be productive, live well, build a free and open nation or create a civil society with transparent government, a free press, human rights, and a representative government.
What being pro-Palestinian seems to have come to mean is continually denigrating and attacking Israel with a false historical narrative and the grotesquely misused language of human rights. What is claimed to be anti-Israel sentiment often rises to the level of raw anti-Semitism.
It is enough to make Jewish students, whether or not they care about Israel at all, uncomfortable, unsafe, or even hated on their own campuses.

Police seek to charge activist who reported Palestinian land-sellers

Police said Sunday they recommend trying the left-wing activist Ezra Nawi, who was exposed in a television report saying he helped Palestinian officials track down and possibly execute Palestinians who were considering selling land to Jews.
Several days ago Judea and Samaria District Police passed on Nawi’s file and that of another activist, Guy Butavia, to the state prosecution, which will decide whether to accept the police recommendation and press charges against the pair for contact with a foreign agent and conspiracy to commit a crime.
Nawi was arrested in January at Ben-Gurion Airport as he tried to leave the country, days after an investigative report in which he was recorded saying he helps Palestinian authorities track down Arabs who attempted to sell land to Jews. Butavia, like Nawi an Israeli activist from the Ta’ayush organization, was also arrested at the time.
Both men were later released despite police requests for them to be remanded in custody.

Reflections of a Lebanese woman in Israel

My black and white image of Israel has been shattered. My understanding has increased. I am truly glad I visited. I am proud to have Israeli friends and I am grateful to my colleagues for their generosity and talent. I will never view that the Occupation is good for anybody, not even in the long run, for the settlers insisting on building there. But I see that there is tremendous decency in Israeli society, that there are people who I really, deeply like, with whom I have common interests and ideas. People who want to live peacefully, do their art, their science, their jobs, raise their children and see them happy. People I can genuinely relate to.
Some Arabs may view me as a traitor and in fact, I have already been called one. But my loyalty is to decency and to people living the best lives they possibly can, rather than to being on one side or another of a fight. I am grateful for the experience I had and am a better informed person as a result.
I am very proud to have taken the culturally bold step of crossing the bridge and experiencing Israel. I was moved deeply when I realized how many Israeli hands reached out to support me during my stay. My attachment to the region and my love for my family there shine as bright as ever but now, when I think of peace, I also wholeheartedly dream for the peace and well-being of Israel and its people.

Al Araby and other Arab media outlets have a strange article calling the menorah that was it in the Jewish Temples a "myth."

Apparently, they are upset that Israel uses that symbol, along with the olive branches on the side.

According to the writer, Dina Ahmed, ancient Jews and their stories are all a myth, as everyone knows that no Jews ever lived in ancient Israel and Judah. So by appropriating a picture of the Temple menorah they are attempting to forge a history that never happened.

Ahmed says that Palestinians are assaulted by these symbols (I suppose this would be called a "microaggression" if Arabic had such a word, as of now it is simply aggression.) The symbol just shoves in their faces the lies of Jewish history that, to her, erases Palestinian Arab history.

There are various Israeli stories that ascribe an origin to the menorah and that connect it to God and prophets "to prove the authenticity of the Jewish religion and history." But, without elaborating, Ahmed tells us that these stories are all misrepresentations and myths.

"We all see this, but few of us know and understand what is behind the machinations and objectives, how this shield with seven branches penetrates in the minds of intellectuals," she warns us.

The olive branches add more insult to injury since they symbolize peace and we all know how little the Jews care for peace.

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A couple of years ago, when he was president of Egypt, Mohammed Morsi was seen on video answering "Amen" after a preacher said this prayer:

Oh Allah, absolve us of our sins, strengthen us, and grant us victory over the infidels. Oh Allah, deal with the Jews and their supporters. Oh Allah, disperse them, rend them asunder. Oh Allah, demonstrate Your might and greatness upon them. Show us Your omnipotence, oh Lord.

This is actually a very prevalent prayer not only in Egypt but throughout the Arab Muslim world.

An Egyptian TV host, Youssef al-Husseini, has come out publicly against this prayer, saying that Judaism is a sacred religion and it is not appropriate to say this in mosques.

He suggests that Zionists, not Jews, should be the object of Muslim wrath.

The Egyptian-Israel peace treaty is in force, even if Egypt still tells its people in official state media that Israel is the enemy.

(h/t Ibn Boutros)

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03/28 Links Pt1: Western morality and Islamic jihad; Fatah sanctions stabbing attacks against Israelis

From Ian:

Vic Rosenthal: Western morality and Islamic jihad

In order to survive, we must adopt a different world-view, one that – just as a small example – embraces the Talmudic principle that “when they rise up to kill you, come and kill them first” and rejects the idea that “terrorists are people too.”
Survival will require a more particularistic world-view in which our culture is considered more worthy of continuing than theirs. In this view, enemies are enemies, people to fight, not empathize with. If they try to kill our civilian populations, we must kill theirs too. Deterrence comes from fear, and fear is created by disproportionate responses, not offers to surrender territory. Honor – a concept that has been all but forgotten by the West – is of supreme importance to the jihadists, and we must maintain ours. A man or a nation without honor becomes a target. Killing terrorists who have tried to murder our people, whether on the spot (preferable) or with a sure and speedy death penalty, is a way of preserving our honor.
This kind of moral system is not barbarism. It was commonly accepted several decades ago, and would have been recognized by Churchill, Roosevelt, Eisenhower and Thatcher. The ‘evolution’ of what we call morality since their day, which has brought us multiculturalism, post-colonialism, the insane political correctness in our universities, the UN Human Rights Commission, B’Tselem and Peace Now, has failed to stand against the assault of the Islamic jihad. It will not protect our culture, but rather will lead to its destruction at the hands of the true barbarians at our gates.
It’s time for a massive rethinking. Is it even possible that the West can turn itself around, can re-embrace the values that defeated Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan? And can it change attitudes and behavior in time to save itself? I have no idea.
But I suggest we start here in Israel by dropping the charges against the soldier who simply did the job of every soldier from the beginning of warfare: he killed the enemy.

Noor Dahri: The difference between Palestinian resistance and terrorism: Hamas aren’t freedom fighters

I am heeding to the baseless statement of every Muslim organisation and individual that advocates that the Palestinians are resisting for their rights, their freedom and their stolen land. I asked them many questions regarding the difference between terrorism and resistance, but they could not satisfy me. We cannot label any individual as a terrorist or a freedom fighter but have to examine them through a clear definition of terrorism and Guerrilla warfare.
No doubt, there are 109 definitions of terrorism in the universe but the basic elucidation of terrorism is that mostly civilians have been targeted to attain a political goal. The majority of Muslims experts understand that terrorism and killing of innocent people is prohibited in Islam. Therefore, they do not support any type of terrorism but when the matter of Israel-Palestine raises, they change their posture and support Palestinian terrorism and justify it by stating that Israel is committing atrocities against the Palestinians. Why do they have a double standard when the situation comes to the Israel?
This is the ideology of anti-Semitism. I call it an ideology because hatred towards Jews is their religious obligation to perform whatever the social condition of the person, s/he gives birth to hate Israel and its Jewish citizens.

Killing an injured terrorist may be wrong, but it isn't murder either

Well, it wasn't. In fact, after half a year of daily attacks (and decades of brutal terrorism before that), that one soldier may have lost his calm and shot a would-be murderer in the head is far less worthy of outrage than the daily acts of Arab terror we have sadly become inured to. If anything, we should give pause for thought to just how few such incidents have occurred in spite of the huge pressure and constant dangers faced by IDF soldiers.
To those who answer with the predictable "we should be better than them," I would say that - apart from being a fundamentally racist sentiment (why are "we" better than "them"?) - I personally have no desire to be held to a "higher standard" than anyone else. "Higher standards," too, are a form of racism, particularly when - as is the case with Israel in the kangaroo court of international opinion - they magically apply only to our obligations, but afford us no greater rights or legitimacy.
So, as Israel navigates the difficult yet crucial task of enforcing the rule of law even on the complex and morally challenging battlefield, we must resist the urge to leap to uninformed conclusions, as well as the groupthink which pushes us to sympathize with the terrorist as a victim, and to view the soldier as a cold-blooded killer.
What happens subsequently is up to the military court to decide, and we should be proud of the State of Israel for that.

JTA hired a consulting firm to determine the most influential Twitter users in the Jewish world. It used an algorithm where the top 1000 individuals were (somehow) identified and then the ones who most influenced the others on the list went to the top of the list.

Here is the list:

William Daroff, The Jewish Federations of North America’s Washington office director, @Daroff
Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli prime minister, @netanyahu
Avi Mayer, Jewish Agency spokesman, @AviMayer
Danny Ayalon, former Israeli ambassador to the U.S., @DannyAyalon
Peter Lerner, Israel Defense Forces spokesman, @LTCPeterLerner
Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic correspondent, @JeffreyGoldberg
Ron Dermer, Israeli ambassador to the U.S., @AmbDermer
Dan Shapiro, U.S. ambassador to Israel, @AmbShapiro
Rabbi Jason Miller, rabbi, entrepreneur and writer, @RabbiJason
Barak Ravid, Haaretz diplomatic correspondent, @BarakRavid
Esther Kustanowitz, editorial director of Mayim Bialik’s Grok Nation and L.A. Jewish Journal contributing writer, @EstherK
Avital Leibovich, American Jewish Committee in Israel director, @AvitalLeibovich
Lahav Harkov, The Jerusalem Post Knesset correspondent, @LahavHarkov
Michael Dickson, StandWithUs executive director, @michaeldickson
David Horovitz, The Times of Israel founding editor, @davidhorovitz
Arsen Ostrovsky, human rights lawyer and journalist, @Ostrov_A
Mark Regev, Israeli ambassador to the United Kingdom, @MarkRegevPMO
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, rabbi, British lord and author, @rabbisacks
Shimon Peres, former Israeli president and prime minister, @PresidentPeres
Yair Rosenberg, Tablet magazine senior writer, @Yair_Rosenberg
Adam Milstein, Israeli real estate investor and philanthropist, @AdamMilstein
Reuven Rivlin, Israeli president, @PresidentRuvi
Khaled Abu Toameh, Arab-Israeli journalist, @KhaledAbuToameh
Peter Beinart, The Atlantic and National Journal contributor and Haaretz correspondent,@PeterBeinart
David Haivri, Israeli settler activist, @haivri

I don't know if I made the top 1000 of the initial list - they stress that these are individuals, not organizations, and they might not consider EoZ to be a human being - but I did some analysis of the top 25.

Of those, I have more Twitter followers than six of them.

I am followed by eleven of them.

And I am blocked by one, Peter Beinart.

So apparently I have a fair amount of influence on the influencers. However, as Yair Rosenberg noted:

Of course, as any true Elder of Zion knows, the real mark of being one of the "most influential Jews" is not appearing on any list, anywhere
— Yair Rosenberg (@Yair_Rosenberg) March 27, 2016

Exactly.

Anyway, this is a good list of people to follow.

JTA also published a list of 25 "guest stars" whose criteria are fuzzy, but they are worth checking out.

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

From Ahram Online (Egypt):

A Hamas delegation returned to Cairo on Sunday following a visit to Qatar's Doha with “positive” responses to Egyptian demands.

The visit to Cairo by officials from Hamas, which has ruled the Israeli-besieged Gaza Strip since 2006, comes less than two weeks after Hamas officials held similar talks with their Egyptian counterparts in Cairo.

Hamas is expected to respond on Sunday to Egyptian requests made in earlier talks.

Egypt has stipulated several demands to improve its relations with Hamas, according to Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper, including a pledge of non-interference by Hamas in Egyptian affairs; cooperation with Cairo on investigations over issues that affect Egyptian security; and stopping extremists and hostile parties from entering or leaving the Strip from Sinai.

The demands also include severing Hamas' ties with the banned Muslim Brotherhood and the prevention of cross-border smuggling activity.

A senior Palestinian diplomat told Ahram Online on condition of anonymity that there have been clear indications of Hamas’ intent to strategically repair its relationship with Egypt, making it a major priority due to pressures the movement has been facing.

"These pressures include accusations of involvement in the assassination of Egypt's top prosecutor, as well as an Egyptian media campaign that has harmed the movement's image in front of the Egyptian public, which is considered one of the most important incubators of the Palestinian issue,” the diplomat said.

He added that Hamas was also feeling “the loss of Egyptian leadership, which differs in importance from any other forms of leadership in terms of its general role in the Palestinian issue.”

The diplomat added that Gaza being on the Sinai border makes it imperative that Hamas presents concessions in its policies regarding Egyptian requests that the border be more tightly controlled, which could come through the stationing of Palestinian Authority presidential guards along the border.

The source said that the movement is also required to cooperate in investigations concerning Egyptian security by interrogating individuals wanted in Egypt and informing Egyptian authorities of the outcomes, or handing over fugitives to Egypt.

Egypt has reportedly also demanded the severing of Hamas' ties with the banned Muslim Brotherhood and the prevention of cross-border smuggling activity.

According to media reports, the Palestinian Islamist movement has removed posters and slogans of the Muslim Brotherhood and its leaders around Gaza streets following the first round of talks with Cairo in an act of reconciliation with Egypt.

"What Hamas did in removing these images is a formality, and Hamas still has a long test ahead of it where it has to overcome many obstacles,” the diplomat said.

“The Jordanian [offshoot of the] Muslim Brotherhood has severed ties with the [Egyptian] mother organisation, so why doesn't Hamas take the same initiative? We have to wait and see their policies following their return to Gaza after their series of regional visits."

Hamas will present its requests to the Egyptian side during the visit, including the opening of the Rafah border crossing, which has been closed most days of the year by Egyptian authorities since the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013; a halt of media campaigns against the movement, an end to the Egyptian flooding of cross-border tunnels; and the return of four Hamas members who "disappeared" last year in Sinai.

"We have to wait and see Egypt’s response to the requests by Hamas," he added.

Hamas seems desperate, as Egypt is more hostile towards Gaza than Israel is. Hamas has gone from being a valued partner with Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood government in 2012 to a despised group by the current government.

It is difficult to know how this will shake out, and what the role of the PA might be especially at the Rafah border crossing.

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Kikar Hashabat reports that Al Aqsa preacher Sheikh Omar Abu Sara was convicted of incitement and racism based on a 2014 sermon he gave at the Al Aqsa Mosque.

Here is the text of that sermon published by MEMRI:

Let me start by saying that talking about the traits of the Jews requires one to get into a special mode, because we are dealing with people to whom every single vile trait has been attributed. They were the masters of these vile traits, and they taught their secrets to others. These traits were registered in the Quran, which depicted all aspects of the lives of the Jews in the most abominable images.

These traits are the same today as they were in the days of yore. Nay, they have become even more vile and evil with the development of means of crime and corruption in this day and age. By Allah, the Jews are the most evil of Allah's creations. They are the most evil creatures to have walked this Earth.

They are the slayers of prophets. Ibn Al-Qayyim said that they had killed seventy prophets in one day, and that they had killed a total of over 10,000 prophets. They tried to kill our Prophet Muhammad twice, as far as we know.

It was the Jews whom Allah turned into apes and pigs, and afflicted with degradation and humiliation.

We are living in a time when the battle with the Jews has drawn near, as our Prophet Muhammad was reported to have said: "You fight the Jews until the trees and the stones will say: Oh servant of Allah, oh Muslim, there is a Jew behind me. Come and kill him."

I say to the Jews loud and clear: The time for your slaughter has come. The time to fight you has come. The time to kill you has come. Allah willing, we are ready for the task – we and the loyal and faithful Muslims, along with the armies of the state of the Islamic Caliphate, which will come to liberate this land from your filth.

We await the day – nay, the very moment – of your slaughter. We are ready. By Allah, we are. Do your worst. The balance of power is tipped in your favor. Go ahead and kill! Go ahead and slaughter! Stones, trees, and humans suffer at your hand. Please do not leave in our hearts a single grain of mercy towards you, oh Jews, because when the day of your slaughter arrives, we shall slaughter you without mercy.

Oh Allah, make that day come faster.
Crowd: Amen.

Omar Abu Sara: Oh Allah, hasten the day of the [slaughter[ of the Jews.
Crowd: Amen.

Omar Abu Sara: Oh Allah, hasten the day of their killing.
Crowd: Amen.

Omar Abu Sara: Oh Allah, hasten the day we fight them.
Crowd: Amen.

Omar Abu Sara: Oh Allah, hasten the day of their slaughter.
Crowd: Amen.

Omar Abu Sara: Allah, hasten the day when the Al-Aqsa Mosque is cleansed of their filth.
Crowd: Amen.

Omar Abu Sara: Oh Allah, hasten the establishment of the state of the Islamic Caliphate.
Crowd: Amen.

Omar Abu Sara: Oh Allah, make it a righteous caliphate in the path of the prophets.
Crowd: Amen.

Omar Abu Sara: Oh Allah, hasten the pledge of allegiance to the Muslim Caliph.
Crowd: Amen.

The judge noted that the Palestinian knifing spree is connected to this sort of rhetoric.

Two weeks ago another Al Aqsa preacher, Sheikh Khaled Al-Mughrabi, was convicted and sentenced to an eleven month prison term for similar incitement. He had claimed that Jews make matzah with gentile blood but his indictment came from calls to destroy Jews in accordance with the Koran.

The pro-Israel NGO Honenu has been instrumental in bringing these videos to Israeli police to force the arrest of the hate sheikhs.

It is nice to see that something is being done - finally - about open incitement to terror.

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Teen terrorist is praised by Haaretz because his martyrdom note wasn't monstrous

The bar for how little Palestinians have to do to be considered saintly keeps getting lower.

From David Sarna Galdi at Haaretz:

[O]n March 9th, as live television broadcasts jumped between different scenes of attempted attacks, one news report caught my eye. Mid-morning at the Zawiya checkpoint in the West Bank, a 16-year-old boy, Ahmad Amer, from the neighboring village of Mas’ha, approached Israeli soldiers with a knife and was immediately killed. Nobody else was injured.

While the troubling details of the attack otherwise fit the familiar pattern, a Haaretz report mentioned that Amer had left a suicide note – an unusual detail. Driven by curiosity, I found a full copy of his letter.

“In the name of God, the most gracious, the most compassionate. May peace, God’s mercy and blessings be upon you.
Dear mother and father, forgive me and be pleased with me for I am a martyr by God’s will. Thank God for everything. I want you to recall my bad deeds and not my good deeds, so that people may forgive me.
I owe money to some people:
Rami Mohyee A-Din - eight shekels
My uncle Hamdallah - twenty shekels
Al-Beek Restaurant - thirty two shekels.”

The short note, in its humble, poorly scrawled simplicity, is a revelation. Not only does it portray complexity and humanity that is invariably lost between the headlines, but it shows us Israelis where we’ve gone wrong.

It's too late to ask 16-year-old Ahmad Amer why he made the poor decision to go up to an IDF checkpoint with a knife that morning - a long walk to what he knew would be his death. Before he could be arrested, interrogated and tried in court, which might’ve given us a clue as to the motive for his act, Amer was shot dead.

Despite Prime Minister Netanyahu and his right-wing government's determined efforts to ignore the deep-seated resentment and frustration behind politically motivated acts of violence, and to dismiss all attackers as zombies infected by incitement and hatred, equal to the Nazis or to ISIS, what emerges from the suicide note is a picture not of a hate-fueled killer robot, but of a boy. Amar believes in God. “Forgive me,” he begs, anticipating his parent’s disappointment. He seeks the forgiveness of his community. “Recall my bad deeds and not my good deeds,” is an unexpected, sophisticated twist of reverse psychology and penitence. This teenage boy believes he is sacrificing himself for what he feels is a greater good: his community’s historic struggle.

But the most astounding thing about the note is that this 16-year-old boy confesses to the money he owes a friend, a family member, and a local business, making one last request: that his parents pay it back. The sums of money in question are so small that the act of contrition would be laughable if it wasn’t so heartbreaking; For Ahmad Amer, a small-town boy with an adult's sense of responsibility and honor, those measly few shekels were crucially important. In the last moments of his life and, in his own moral world — incomprehensible to us — he was concerned with doing the right thing.

And then there is everything Amer’s message isn’t. It isn’t angry or hateful; it doesn’t speak about revenge or glorify killing. It is personal, casual and hauntingly resigned - a world apart from the scripted, Koran-wielding, politicized videos familiar to us from terror group-sponsored suicide attacks.

The suicide note makes it hard to write off Ahmad Amer as a homicidal jihadist monster; it reminds us that no person, even a violent person, is just one thing: good or bad, black or white. A Palestinian, it seems, is also a human being with beliefs, experiences, pathos, and motives that demand consideration. Yes, Palestinians are killing. But these killings are a twisted response to an equally twisted political and social reality that Israel has a strong hand in. In the words of Charles M. Blow, “You can’t condemn the unseemly howl and not the lash.”

Ahmad Amar teaches us that there is always a partner for negotiation, despite Israeli leaders’ claims to the contrary. As the powerful side of the equation, it’s easy to sit back, claim victimhood, blame — or just kill — the enemy and assert that there’s no possible path to a two-state solution.

Ahmad Amer’s suicide note teaches us that there is still hope for a renewal of the dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians founded on the basic mutual recognition of our humanity, and that there no excuse to stop trying to find a way. In another time and place, Ahmad Amer wouldn’t have attempted to kill and had to die for the sins of others, becoming a statistic in a fifty-year-old conflict. Like his death, his note is not eloquent, but conveys a message much more powerful than the sum of its words.

How much wishful thinking is crammed into this piece?

Because a kid who set out to murder Jews is also concerned about repaying debts, he is now considered the paradigm of a peace partner?

Osama Bin Laden was a fan of Whitney Houston, Charles Manson played a flute, John Wayne Gacy was a clown at children's birthday parties. Are they any less monsters because of these personal details?

Ahmad Amar was clearly not raised as a normal child to want to end his life this way. His decision to stab Jews seems to be a far more important detail of his life than his asking forgiveness in his martyrdom note. Also important was the fact that his mother greeted the news with "Thank Allah he is a martyr!"

I'd day that despite his idea that repaying a few shekels of debt is more important than life itself, Amar was closer to being a monster than a misunderstood moral actor.

But people who want to blame everything on Israel see someone who attempted murder as a victim and those who defended themselves - people who incidentally also have girlfriends, hobbies and other complexity in their lives - are the monsters.

The moral universe that Haaretz lives in is one where no matter what, Israelis are evil and Palestinians are saintly. And they don't even realize that they are engaging in the exact stereotyping that they claim Israelis are guilty of - with far less evidence to support that simple-minded conclusion.

Ahmad Amer woke up on March 9 intending to kill. The soldier who killed him did not. And that is a world of difference.

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03/27 Links: Maher: After attacks maybe Europe will lay off Israel; Another Palestinian disruption of Brussels Memorial

From Ian:

Bill Maher: After attacks maybe Europe will lay off Israel

Liberal comedian and commentator Bill Maher, who has become famous for his profanity-laced riffs on conservatives and organized religion, took aim at European treatment of the Jewish state on Friday.
During a panel discussion on his late-night HBO show Real Time, Maher blasted the UN and scolded Europe for its behavior towards Israel.
"Europe has been real a******s about Israel," Maher said.
"I mean, in general. The U.N. – as of 2015, the United Nations Human Rights Council had issued more official condemnations of Israel than the rest of the world's nations combined. I wonder now that Europe has been attacked four times now in a little over a year, and they say ISIS has 400 fighters that they are ready to introduce back into Europe, and they're trying to get a dirty bomb - maybe Europe will have a little more sympathy for what Israel goes through."
Maher has consistently bucked prevalent trends among fellow liberals, and is a strong critic of Islamic radicalism and a staunch supporter of Israel.

Bill Maher: "Maybe now Europe will have more sympathy for Israel" [NSFW]

PreOccupiedTerritory: After Brussels Attacks, Europe Promises Stronger Cowardice (satire)

The deadly terrorist attacks in the Belgian capital Tuesday have sparked a fierce desire across the Continent to depart from the complacency and accommodation of the past in the face of growing Islamist violence, and instead engage in a new form of more severe, harsher cowardice.
After dozens of people were killed in bombings at an airport and subway station in Brussels Tuesday morning, political leaders in the European Union voiced frustration with the multicultural model that has for so long defined Europe’s attempt to foster tolerance, and called for a sharper practice of avoiding potential offense to Muslim immigrants by implying that Islam has anything to do with the deadly Islamist violence that has plagued France, Germany, Sweden, Britain, Belgium, Denmark, Turkey, and other European countries.
“We’re going to have to step up our game,” admitted EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini at a press conference in Amman, Jordan. “When terrorist opposition to European values of tolerance, liberalism, and democracy rears its head in ever-increasing fury, we have no choice but to find the strongest possible way of shrinking from confronting it.”

Abbas is coming to the US. Will reporters ask him these questions?

According to Hanna Amira, a member of the Executive Committee of the PLO, Mahmoud Abbas is planning to visit the US next month, and is hoping to meet with President Obama.

I have long been frustrated by the fact that reporters and others who meet with Abbas rarely ask him any tough questions. The record shows that he has said and done some particularly disgusting things in recent years yet his statements and actions are not treated with 1% of the scrutiny of those said by Israeli leaders.

I have a list of dozens of questions and followups that reporters rarely ask Abbas.

Any Western reporters who fail to ask Abbas any of these questions should be asked why they don't want to do their jobs.

Here's a poster with some of those questions.

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Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah organization continues to openly embrace violence and terror even as Abbas insists that he only supports "non-violent resistance."

This weekend, the Abdul-Qader al-Husseini Brigades of Fatah held a joint military exercise with the National Resistance Brigades, the military wing of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, on Friday evening, in Rafah, Gaza.

A similar exercise between another Fatah armed group, the Nabil Massoud Brigades of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, and the DFLP was held last weekend.

The exercises included practice for shooting rockets at Jewish communities.

Video for the exercises can be seen here.

The DFLP National Resistance Brigades openly supports terror attacks against civilians.

I have yet to see a reporter ask Mahmoud Abbas about his support for Fatah terror groups.

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Pet project: The £8million palace built by Palestine, which has received £72million of foreign aid (Daily Mail)

The Daily Mail has finally noticed that UK and EU taxpayer money helps support Palestinian terrorists and corruption. Excerpts:

The scandal of how Britain fritters away billions in foreign aid – including paying salaries to convicted terrorists who have murdered hundreds of innocent people – is exposed today by a major MoS investigation.

The shocking revelation that thousands of Palestinian terrorists, including men who have masterminded suicide bombings and murdered children, are given cash handouts from aid money will cause anger and disbelief, particularly in the wake of the Brussels massacres.

Our probe exposed how huge amounts of taxpayers’ cash, that critics say should be spent in Britain, is being ‘squandered’ on wasteful schemes elsewhere by the Department For International Development (DFID) and Foreign Office.

We dug beneath the headline figures on DFID’s websites to reveal waste and misguided largesse which seemed to extend to virtually every corner of the globe and which will shock readers. In the West Bank and Gaza, despite promises by the ruling Palestinian Authority (PA) to end the practice of paying aid money to convicted terrorists, our investigation revealed that they had simply duped the West by allowing the Palestine Liberation Organisation to hand out the cash instead.

Britain gives £72 million a year to Palestine, more than one-third of which goes straight to the PA. It openly admits supporting terrorists whom it hails as heroes for fighting illegal occupation, awarding lifetime payments that rise depending on time spent in jail and the seriousness of crimes.

One Hamas master bomber has reportedly been given more than £100,000. Other ‘salaries’ go to the families of suicide bombers and even teenagers involved in the latest upsurge of deadly attacks on Israel.

DFID and the European Union are still effectively supporting these payments to thousands of terrorists – despite claims to have ended such links two years ago. This was confirmed to the MoS by former prisoners and families receiving the cash, and in official statements by the PA.

We also visited a lavish £8 million palace that Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas is having built on the West Bank.

Ahmad Musa sits beside me, a convicted double murderer sentenced to life in prison. As we talk, I ask him if he did indeed kill the two men. ‘Yes, I shot them dead,’ he replies.

Yet we do not meet in a jail cell. Musa is free, released after just five years. For he is a Palestinian terrorist and he was liberated under a peace deal.

Like thousands more Palestinian prisoners, including jihadi bombers and killers of children, Musa enjoys his freedom after being awarded a ‘salary’ for life.

He gets £605 every month, others get far more. If they die, the cash goes to their family. These men are seen as terrorists, certainly by Israel, and many in the West
But, astonishingly, the money behind these payments – described by some as ‘rewards for murder’ – flows from British and European taxpayers.

The UK cash comes from the Department for International Development, which will give up to £25.5million this year to the ruling Palestinian Authority (PA) as part of a £72million aid package. Our investigation discovered that the PA passes millions on to the infamous Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) – which in turn gives it to convicted terrorists locked up in Israeli prisons and their families.

Amjad Awad (pictured) and his cousin Hakim Awad killed Ehud and Ruth Fogel and their three children in their West Bank home in 2011. They have been getting foreign aid since they were convicted for life (Dailu Mail)

Among them are Amjad and Hakim Awad, cousins who killed Ehud and Ruth Fogel and their three children in their West Bank home in 2011. It is estimated that Amjad alone may have been paid up to £16,000 from the fund so far.

Also on the payroll is Abdallah Barghouti, the Hamas bomb-maker who was sentenced to life after attacks in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. It is thought he has received payments totaling £106,000.

Dfid confirms that the PLO makes such payments, calling them ‘social welfare’ provisions for prisoners’ families.

It denies, however, that any British cash reaches terrorists, with the PLO taking over such payments two years ago from the PA after an international outcry.

But a Mail on Sunday investigation has found that Britain funded the PLO until last year and that the PA openly boasts of still funding salaries of convicted terrorists, even in its own official statements.

Former prisoners and the families of terrorists we have spoken to also confirmed receiving cash from both the PA and the PLO.

British aid money is supposed to be rebuilding and developing the Palestinian territories. However a devastating new report to be released this week by Palestinian Media Watch, an Israeli NGO, suggests that Western donors have been duped by assertions that the Authority no longer funds terrorists.

Some Hamas terrorist masterminds have reportedly been given more than £100,000.

Other ‘salaries’ go to relatives of suicide bombers and even teenagers involved in the latest upsurge of deadly attacks on Israel. Several ex-prisoners confirmed to me that they were paid monthly stipends that started in jail.

One said they also received a ‘bonus’ on leaving prison and lucrative civil service job offers, the most senior posts going to those serving more than 15 years behind bars, even though they are not qualified.

PA officials openly defend such stipends. Amr Nasser, adviser to the minister of social affairs, said: ‘It is not a crime to be fighting occupation. These people are heroes.

‘We could be giving them much more money and it would not be enough.’ Nasser added that, if Palestine won independence, the government would seek reparations from Britain for its historic role in encouraging Zionism, saying ‘You should pay us more money.’

Tory MP Andrew Percy said last night: ‘How can we justify foreign aid as a noble endeavour when taxpayers money goes to pay terrorists? The government has got to get a grip.’

The four million Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza receive the highest aid support per head in the world.

Tzipi Hotovely, Israel’s deputy foreign minister, said: ‘This serves as a huge financial incentive to carry out acts of terror against Jews.

‘Is it imaginable for a Western government to contemplate subsidising acts of mass murder and terror in this fashion? Yet that is effectively what is happening.’

Among those paid is Abdallah Bargouti, a Hamas leader given 67 life sentences for lethal attacks in 2001 and 2002, including a restaurant bombing that killed 15 diners. He is thought to have earned more than £100,000 since conviction, handed to his family.

The cash-strapped PA relies on foreign aid for nearly half its budget. Yet it gives £79 million a year to prisoners locked up in Israeli jails, former prisoners and their families.

Although DFID says the salaries are ‘social welfare’ provisions, they go to people convicted of ‘acts of resistance’.

The department also insists payments come from the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), which was handed responsibility for prisoner welfare two years ago after concerns over aiding terrorism were raised in Westminster and Brussels.

Yet the father of two brothers jailed for gun attacks on Israeli settlers and soldiers told me he received monthly payments of £428 from the PA as well as £285 from the PLO.
Britain has provided aid in the past to the PLO, although this ceased last year.

The Palestinian Media Watch report suggests that Western donors have been misled by detailing documents and official statements exposing how the PA still funds the salaries of convicted terrorists.

Evidence includes the Ministry of Finance saying in an official statement last year it transfers almost half its budget to Gaza, adding this includes ‘the salaries of prisoners, the released and the families of the Martyrs and wounded.’

The report also reveals the PA transferred an extra 444m shekels to the PLO in 2015 - significantly, only marginally more than the 442m shekel budget given to its own Ministry of Prisoners’ Affairs the previous year before it transferred responsibility.

Itamar Marcus, the report’s author, said: ‘There is wilful blindness by the UK and EU, who were happy not to even carry out the simplest investigation.’

The group also claims to have discovered two cases of individuals who carried out attacks for cash.

In one, Khalad Rajoub, a father of seven arrested for attempted murder two years ago, told police he had big debts and planned to die during an attack.

He is reported to have said: ‘My family would get money and live comfortably… my children would get a monthly allowance.’

A DFID spokesman denied funding terrorism and defended aid support to the PA. ‘This helps build Palestinian institutions and promotes economic growth.’

The sprawling building sits high on a hill, a presidential palace looking down imperiously on thousands of beleaguered West Bank residents crammed in below.

When I visited the impressive mansion on six acres of land, builders were putting finishing touches to its fine limestone walls and water displays. ‘This is like a five-star hotel,’ one security guard told me. ‘It has two helipads, two swimming pools, a Jacuzzi, restaurant… all the latest technology.’

This £9 million palace in Sudra, just weeks away from opening, was designed for Mahmoud Abbas – a president whose domain is so dependent on aid that last year his Palestinian Authority had to pass an emergency budget when some was held up by Israel.

In Gaza – a place where there is rampant poverty – I witnessed bizarre scenes: long queues of people at bank cashpoints.

It was pay day for thousands of civil servants whose salaries are supported by Western aid, even though they have had no jobs since 2007.

Mahmoud, an accountant, said he was given more than £1,000 a month. ‘I just sit at home, spending time with my family. Sometimes I travel abroad to visit relatives,’ he said.

Others admitted to second jobs as shopkeepers and taxi drivers. One ex-teacher, who still draws his £6,000-a-year salary, confessed to running a dairy, completing a master’s degree in Britain and working as a journalist.

‘Getting paid from Britain while living here means you can have a good life,’ he said, although he added that his home was devastated in Israeli air strikes two years ago.

The salary payments are a legacy of the Palestinian divisions since Hamas took control of Gaza from Fatah, the rival faction recognised by the international community.

At least 60,000 officials were told to stop working by Fatah yet are still being paid. Many of them have been replaced by Hamas officials.

Mohammad Aboshair, 37, a police officer, said: ‘We hoped it would not last long. It is really wrong to stay in our homes and get paid without jobs. I wanted to serve my country, not become a burden – this is crazy.’ Three years ago auditors urged the EU to stop the salaries. Critics condemned ‘blatant misuse of taxpayers’ money’ that undermined the credibility of Brussels when millions of Europeans were jobless. Dfid sources said the cash went only to civil servants on an approved EU list and insisted they took precautions to ensure British aid did not support Hamas.

Of course, by paying for the PA salaries in Gaza, the UK and EU are effectively supporting Hamas indirectly.

We've been talking about this for years - my first post on this was in 2005 - and Palestinian Media Watch has been reporting on specifics for quite a while, but it is nice to see that Western media is finally picking up on this.

(h/t Yoel)

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What everyone missed about the "AIPAC Trump kippot" story

A small story from the AIPAC conference last week attracted some major attention.

Haaretz, the New York Post , Politico and Arutz-7 all had the story that originally came from the Washington Free Beacon:

If yarmulke sales are any indication of voter attitudes, Donald Trump was the clear winner at AIPAC on Monday night.

Marc Daniels, a vendor selling campaign logo kippas outside the American Israel Public Affairs Committee conference in Washington, D.C. on Monday evening, said the “Donald Trump 2016” cap was his most popular item by far.

Daniels said he was “inundated” with requests for the Trump yarmulkes from conference-goers and sold out almost immediately.

“I totally underestimated the degree of support that Jewish people who are attending this event have for Trump,” said Daniels, who runs an online yarmulke shop called Marc’s Garden Jubilee. “I probably had about 50 inquiries for Trump yarmulkes that I could not fulfill.”

Daniels said he sold two or three Ted Cruz yarmulkes and three or four for John Kasich. By 8 p.m. on Monday, the vendor said he only had Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders caps left over, and was finding those tougher to unload.

JNI media concluded:

So, this is probably not scientific, but the yarmulke market has spoken: the Orthodox Jewish vote is committed to Trump. Because, unlike a button or a sticker, a yarmulke requires a special dedication, which means that, as Daniels put it, “If someone is going to buy a yarmulke, you have to assume they support the candidate.”

But there is something that everyone is missing.

Last week was Purim!

A Donald Trump kippah is a perfect thing to wear on Purim, when people look for the funniest costumes and accessories. It is far funnier than a Ted Cruz or even Bernie Sanders yarmulka would be. (I saw someone with a Donald Trump wig on Purim.)

To say that this is proof of Orthodox support for Trump is not to know how to read a calendar.

It is true that American Haredi Jews seem to like Trump, but they are not the type that would ever wear a red kippah (except, again, on Purim) and very few would go to AIPAC. Among modern Orthodox Jews who are likely AIPAC attendees, a Trump kippah would be a perfect, relatively inexpensive last-minute Purim costume.

To give an idea of how outrageous Purim costumes could be, there was brief panic in a Paris synagogue during Purim when someone dressed as a jihadist with a fake Kalashnikov entered and shouted "Allahu Akbar!" The congregants then realized that they know the man and laughed, but it was probably not the smartest idea.

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03/26 Links: The Israel That Arabs Don’t Know; The Lie of Academic Free Speech; Israel ranked 24th in ‘Global Terrorism Index’

From Ian:

The Israel That Arabs Don’t Know

When the Israeli Ministry of Exterior invited me to visit Israel as part of a delegation of European-based Arab journalists and media representatives, I accepted without hesitation. The goal of the invitation was to provide us with an opportunity to freely explore the different dimensions to life inside the state of Israel. Located in the heart of the Middle East and one of the region's central and enduring conflicts, Israel receives a large amount of attention from neighboring peoples curious about the state itself and its management. Although major developments in international communication and accessibility of knowledge have transformed the world into a connected community that now sometimes resembles a small village, Arab media coverage of Israel continues to be characterized by a lack of clarity and misrepresentation, making it difficult for Arab citizens to truly understand the country. The persistent and recurring problems in the West Bank and Gaza are of major concern to many Arabs, but media sources often conflate the State's controversial foreign policy with life inside the the country itself and produce dystopian visions of life inside its borders.
While not an article or analysis, the following is an honest testimony of what I saw during my visit, without influence by any person or institution. I hope to present an alternative perspective from other Arab media outlets that I have found to exaggerate and mischaracterize the realities of Israeli life.

Israel ranked 24th in ‘Global Terrorism Index’

Israel has been placed 24th in a new global terrorism index which ranks 162 of the world’s nations from most affected to least affected by terror.
Based on a 5-year average, the index takes into account such criteria as the number of terrorist incidents endured by a country, how many fatalities were suffered in those attacks, how many injuries were caused and the level of damage to property. It also weights the scores for each nation according to the long-term psychological damage of the attacks.
The list is compiled by the Institute for Economics and Peace, using information from a global terrorism database at Maryland University, which includes more than 125,000 terrorist incidents.
Israel received an overall score of 6.03 out of 10. Its “GTI indicators” for 2015 included 260 attacks, 20 fatalities, 115 injuries and 290 instances of damage to property.
The United Kingdom ranked at 28th, and the US at 35th.