Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Wednesday, June 08, 2016

Hamas: "Ramadan is a time for jihad." They don't mean the peaceful kind.

Hamas issued a video for Ramadan, with religious and spiritual imagery and music juxtaposed with terrorism activities like tunnel building and rocket deployment.

On the Qassam Brigades website, they wrote that "Ramadan is the month of jihad, fortification and victory over the enemy."

The importance of honor and shame comes through from this sentence: "Jihad for the sake of Allah is the pinnacle of Islam, and it allows one to gain honor in this world and the hereafter; it is one of the best tasks and acts of worship, and Muslims are only humiliated when they abandon the jihad."

Hamas also announced their summer camps to train teenagers in the finer arts of jihad, starting June 10. They are asked to register at the nearest mosque belonging to the al-Qassam Brigades.

The announcement states that "the camps will include training and military skills, shooting ammunition, the skills of civil defense, as well as sermons...the aim of these camps to ignite the flame of jihad for the liberation generation."

The video and articles make clear that when they say "jihad" they don't mean the peaceful, inner jihad that Muslims love to tell Westerners is the more important one. Hamas (and, indeed, Islam) does not distinguish between the military, political and religious aspects of jihad. Which is why apologists will never condemn Hamas' interpretation of jihad as wrong. (They'll condemn IS, but that's only because they attack other Muslims, not because they are against violence - and their silence on Hamas using Islam to justify its violence is the proof.)

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06/07 Links Pt2: Dershowitz: New York Is Right To Counterboycott Anti-Israel Boycotters; Pipes: Israel’s new enemy — the international left

From Ian:

Daniel Pipes: Israel’s new enemy — the international left

Since the creation of Israel, Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims have been the mainstay of anti-Zionism, with the left, from the Soviet Union to professors of literature, their auxiliary. But this might be in process of change: as Muslims slowly, grudgingly, and unevenly come to accept the Jewish state as a reality, the left is becoming increasingly vociferous and obsessive in its rejection of Israel.
Much evidence points in this direction. Polls in the Middle East find cracks in the opposition to Israel, while a major American survey for the first time shows liberal Democrats to be more anti-Israel than pro-Israel. The Saudi and Egyptian governments have real security relations with Israel while a figure like (the Jewish) Bernie Sanders declares that “to the degree that (Israelis) want us to have a positive relationship, I think they’re going to have to improve their relationship with the Palestinians.”
But I should like to focus on a small illustrative example from a United Nations institution. The World Health Organization churned out report A69/B/CONF./1 on May 24, with the enticing title, “Health conditions in the occupied Palestinian territory, including east Jerusalem, and in the occupied Syrian Golan: Draft decision proposed by the delegation of Kuwait, on behalf of the Arab Group, and Palestine.”
The three-page document calls for “a field assessment conducted by the World Health Organization,” with special focus on such topics as “incidents of delay or denial of ambulance service” and “access to adequate health services on the part of Palestinian prisoners.” Of course, the entire document singles out Israel as a denier of unimpeded access to health care.
This ranks as a special absurdity, given the WHO’s hiring a consultant in next-door Syria who is connected to the very pinnacle of the Assad regime, even as it perpetrates atrocities estimated at a half million dead and 12 million displaced (out of a total pre-war population of 22 million). Conversely, both the wife and brother-in-law of Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the Palestinian Authority, whose status and wealth assure them treatment anywhere in the world, chose to be treated in Israeli hospitals, as did the sister, daughter, and grand-daughter of Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas leader in Gaza, Israel’s sworn enemy.

Alan Dershowitz: New York Is Right To Counterboycott Anti-Israel Boycotters

If properly interpreted and enforced, Cuomo’s executive action would not undermine freedom of speech. The law would only impact those companies that refuse to do business with Israeli or pro-Israeli institutions and individuals. BDS activists would still be free to advocate bigotry—and that’s what singling out the nation state of the Jewish people for boycott is—in the marketplace of ideas. But in much the same way that businesses today are not allowed to refuse to serve someone because of their ethnicity, sexual orientation, or religion, so too would businesses that engage in BDS activities face economic consequences for discriminating on the grounds of nationality or political expression.
In some ways, Governor Cuomo’s anti-BDS executive action mirrors those of several states which refused to do business with North Carolina when that state passed legislation that discriminated against the LGBTQ community. It also emulates the counter boycotts of the 1930s against the Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses.
Moreover—and contrary to the shrill claims of the pro-BDS punditry—there is longstanding precedent for anti-boycott regulations. Since the mid 1970s, for example, the U.S. has enforced a number of anti-boycott laws through the Export Administration Act (“EAA”) and the Executive Administration Regulations (“EAR”). Among other provisions, the EAA and EAR penalize individuals and companies that participate in boycotts based on race, religion, sex, national origin or nationality. They have been repeatedly applied to companies participating in the now-defunct Arab League boycott of Israel, and to boycotts targeting other U.S. allies.
To call such regulations McCarthyite is to insult the victims of real McCarthyism who were punished for their ideas, speeches, and associations, not for their actions in refusing to do business based on national origin. Yes, there will be a list of companies that discriminate against Israel, just as there are lists today of store and building owners who refuse to do business with, for example, African-Americans, LGBTQ, or Muslims. There will have to be proof that a business engaged in a discriminatory boycott by singling out Israeli entities, or individuals based on their national origin, or political convictions, and a process for challenging inclusion on any list.
The only McCarthyist blacklist is that which has been complied by BDS enforcers—a list I am proud to be on—of supporters of Israel and of those who seek to “normalize” relations between Israelis and Palestinians.

Zionism: An irrational and misunderstood fear

Today, anti-Israelism under the guise of anti-Zionism has become the main expression of anti-Semitism, of enmity to Jews.
An entire nation is targeted, for verbal or physical violence, women, children, elderly, innocent and oppressed alike – simply because of their Jewish nationality, and their demand to be seated at the table of nations with all of their peers. Despite the presence of 22 Arab countries, tied to a single ethnic origin, only the desire of the Jewish people to establish its own sovereign state has been subject to fierce opposition.
Nevertheless, Israel is concurrently a safe haven for millions of persecuted people, those who fled the Nazi genocide, Soviet brutality or violence in many other countries.
Nearly one million Jews, leaving all of their assets behind, were forced to immigrate from Arab countries in the aftermath of the 1948 war.
Yet, Jewishness is not understood in racial or traditional ethnic terms in the State of Israel, unlike its counterparts. It is a country of multiculturalism, one which hosts varying faiths and diverse ethnic backgrounds, in contrast to its Arab neighbor countries. One-fifth of the Israeli population is Arab, while the overall, majority Jewish population is comprised of over 70 cultures speaking 35 languages and dialects. Additionally, Arabic is an official language, alongside Hebrew, in the state of the Jews. The sacred places of all faiths are protected: There are nearly 400 mosques, all safeguarded since the declaration of Independence of the State of Israel.
Despite this fact, Zionism is equated in ever widening circles with a conspiracy to control and exploit the whole world.

UNRWA together with the American University of Beirut released a 240 page report on the situation of Palestinians in Lebanon, both the population that has been there since 1948 and the more recent refugees from Syria.

While it correctly mentions the institutionalized discrimination against them, it obscures one important point:

More than 67 years after their initial presence in Lebanon, Palestine refugees are still considered as foreigners under Lebanese law, which does not grant them any special legal status and deprives them from basic rights enjoyed by the Lebanese. This prolonged foreigner status mainly stems from the strong rejection by the Lebanese authorities of the naturalization of Palestine refugees, which is sometimes used as justification for the various discriminatory policies against them. On a political level, Palestine refugees have also opposed naturalization. Accordingly, despite their longstanding presence in the country as refugees, PRL remain excluded from key aspects of social, political, and economic life. They face legal and institutional discrimination; they are denied the right to own property and face restrictive employment measures such as a ban from some liberal and syndicate professions.

Palestine refugees in Lebanon (PRL) face one of the worst socioeconomic conditions in the region, and these have been deteriorating given the country’s weakening socioeconomic situation and the prolonged Syria crisis. A little short of two thirds of the PRL population is poor, a proportion that has not changed since 2010, and the discriminatory laws against them hinder their ability to improve their living conditions and livelihoods. Decaying infrastructure, a dearth of recreational spaces, insufficient access to roads, deteriorated water and sewage treatment systems, contaminated water, and jerry-rigged electrical wires along with open drainage ditches paint a gloomy picture of camps where over 63 per cent of PRL reside.

UNRWA is not being entirely truthful when it says "On a political level, Palestine refugees have also opposed naturalization." Yes, self-appointed leaders keep saying that they don't want to become citizens in order to keep the dream of destroying Israel through "return" alive, but in reality Palestinians in Lebanon are clamoring to become citizens and whenever a loophole opens up, tens of thousands of them apply.

The report also admits that UNRWA inflates the figures of "refugees" in Lebanon, keeping hundreds of thousands on its rolls who no longer live in Lebanon:

Some 495,985 Palestine refugees are registered with UNRWA in Lebanon.58 However, it is estimated that the actual number of Palestine refugees who still reside in the country ranges between 260,000 and 280,000 following the results of the 2010 socioeconomic survey conducted jointly by UNRWA and AUB.

UNRWA has no mechanism to remove people from its list of "refugees" so even the ones who live permanently in Europe are considered "refugees" - phantoms who are still useful in agitating against Israel.

The report issues no recommendations as to how to fix the situation. Lebanese discrimination and apartheid is considered normal and not worth making a stink about. Because Lebanon might respond by making things worse.

Unlike other UNRWA reports, this one has barely been mentioned in the media and certainly hasn't been publicized much by UNRWA. Mostly because Israel cannot be blamed for Lebanese discrimination against Palestinians.

So this report will sink into obscurity, and do nothing to help the actual lives of actual Arab who remain as pawns between their leaders, Lebanese leaders, the Arab world, UNRWA and the anti-Israel Westerners who claim to care about Palestinians but whose concern doesn't go beyond blaming everything on Israel.

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Describing the close of the First Zionist Conference at Basle, at which the Zionist movement espoused political Zionism – “At Basle I founded the Jewish State,” Herzl would note – the London-based Pall Mall Gazette (3 September 1897) reported:

‘An historic and unique conference ended this evening … For the first time in Jewish history the dispersed members of Israel have been momentarily united, and the closing scene illustrated well what this meant … Herzl himself, whose labours have been immense, made his farewell speech. It was a simple, unaffected speech. It was strange to listen to the apologetic words – to this Jew, with his aristocratic manner, his proud bearing, to this leader, offering excuses for possible presidential mistakes. Then he raised the note slightly: the Congress had been worthy of itself and worthy of Israel, it had been unanimous, it had been enthusiastic; from the ends of the earth they had gathered together, the brotherhood of Israel was a reality. They dared not read the future, but their programme augured well; by their efforts they would realise all their desires.
Further words were drowned in applause, the silence maintained gave way suddenly, men mounted chairs, and ladies rushed forward… Doctors and jurists, Russian and English, German and Palestinian, cheered, even the gallery caught the infection: it was a scene better seen than imagined... “The Congress is at an end.” Men looked at each other with solemn faces and tear-dimmed eyes. The last handshake, the last greeting, the barely reunited were to be re-dispersed. The breaking up of a large family, and that as it were all of a sudden, was affecting in the extreme. Herzl and Nordau shook hands with everyone in turn; men invited each other to homes at the four corners of the globe. They kissed each other affectionately; even journalists felt this was no common parting. “To the next Congress,” “A year to come in Jerusalem”; farewell was too harsh a term. ‘

An affecting scene indeed.

Some weeks earlier, the Daily Mail (30 March 1897), had reported the views towards political Zionism of certain Anglo-Jewish communal leaders, as follows.

Chief Rabbi Hermann Adler: “I consider that the holding of this congress is an egregious blunder. While I yield to none in being an ardent lover of Zion, while I lay the greatest possible stress on the importance of establishing colonies in Palestine … I believe that Dr Herzl’s idea of a Jewish State there is absolutely mischievous.”
Sir Samuel Montague: “I am an Englishman, and all my aim is to anglicise the Jews with whom I come in contact. I therefore view the internationalism of Dr Herzl and his supporters with great disfavour.”
An unnamed member of the Rothschild family: “If the Jews ever return to Palestine, I hope they will let me be their ambassador to London.”

We all know what those personages meant, of course. The idea of political Zionism was anathema because it threatened to imperil the citizenship of Jews in the respective lands in which they were domiciled. It risked raising the spectre of dual loyalties. It might mean that hard-won rights of citizenship would be taken away, and Jews told to go to Palestine. It might impede the conferral of citizenship in lands of persecution, with taunts to the persecuted that they must tolerate their lot or leave for their real country. It might entail the forced emigration of all Jews, including the comfortably off, those of professional and mercantile standing, to a land whose probable national language, Hebrew, they did not know, and for whose agrarian pursuits they had no taste. Their lines, to invoke the Psalmist, “had fallen in pleasant places” and they wanted to remain: England was their heritage, London their Jerusalem.

Of course, such attitudes also imbued Jewish communities of France and Central Europe, grateful for the emancipation so relatively recently won, and – with the question “ma yomru ha-goyim?” (“what will the gentiles say?”) – at the back of their minds, anxious about the presence of non-assimilated Ostjuden among them. And, as we all know, for these continental Jewries the catastrophe came soon enough, the Westjuden sharing the fate of their co-religionists from and in lands to the east.

Assumptions were shattered. Eretz Israel beckoned to desperate refugees and displaced persons; the Israeli state was born; Zionists rejoiced; sympathisers with Jewry were glad. Former Western non-Zionists – all but the most hardline and perverse – were won over, the state having shown that fears it would be a Soviet satellite in the region were groundless. All but the most incorrigible and wicked Western antisemites abandoned or at least muzzled their Jew-hatred, the Shoah having demonstrated to what degenerate depths antisemitism could lead. Beset by Arab recalcitrance and hostility, always imperilled and not infrequently attacked, the tiny Jewish state survived, a David to the Arabs’ Goliath. In 1967 – the first of Israel’s defensive wars that I can call to memory – non-Jews volunteered to fight and non-Jews sent unsolicited donations to Israeli embassies to express sympathy with the valiant endangered country.

And then, in the ensuing years, the murderous villain Arafat and his ilk, unable to vanquish Israel by violence, conceived the idea of rebranding themselves Palestinians, conning succeeding generations into believing that Palestine had been a sovereign entity stolen by evil Zionists. The 1967 ceasefire lines became represented as imperialistic borders, and a set of mendacious maps, made into placards, became ubiquitous – a street rallies, at indoor meetings, and online sites including many a Facebook profile. The unacceptability of the 1948 ceasefire lines – so well-voiced by Israeli ambassador to London Michael Comay in 1970 when he declared “The choice before us is not between victory and defeat, but between victory and annihilation. We therefore have not the slightest intention of allowing the re-creation of the conditions of vulnerability in which we found ourselves, abandoned and alone, in the summer of 1967” – morphed, in the twisted minds of the “pro-Palestinian activists” conned by PLO propaganda, into the “One State Solution” that the chant “From the River to the Sea, Palestine shall be Free” signifies, a solution that originated in the “Democratic Secular State” vision of such 1970s campaigners as the odious Peter Hain and has grown ever shriller as the Muslim population of the West continues exponentially to rise.

Bizarre in the extreme it is, that today’s Left, largely contemptuous of religion, ignorant of or disdainful of scripture, and hostile to “fascism” and “patriarchy”, should make common cause with Islam. We had yet another reminder of this strange yet by now utterly predictable alliance this past weekend in Sydney’s Bankstown, when members of Socialist Alliance, Anti-Fascist Action, and other ratbag groups, clenched fists raised in a totalitarian-like salute, held a so-called anti-racism rally. The Socialist Alliance, one of the principal Israel-demonising groups in Australia, carried a banner proclaiming “Stand with Muslims against Racism” (the letter S in the latter word in the shape of a swastika surmounted by a stop sign.) One grinning hoodie posed for his picture proudly opening his jacket to reveal a tee-shirt bearing the taunting words “Have you considered Islam?” and another young white bloke posed similarly, displaying one stating “Apartheid. Wrong for South Africans. Wrong for Palestinians.”

Yes, anti-“Zionism” (the national liberation movement of the Jewish People and vehicle for Jewish self-determination) has become the default position of today’s Islam-supporting Left, Israel its whipping boy, and with it a perception that the only Jews to be tolerated are the “good Jews” who condemn and spurn Israel, while pro-Israel Jews are deserving of abuse and obloquy. The crises over antisemites in Corbyn’s Labour Party have shown that clearly. So have the abusive messages and death threats levelled at the two bloggers – Edgar Davidson and Israelly Cool’s Brian of London – who over the past week or so have shown so bravely and eloquently why London schoolgirl Leanne Mohamad’s prize-winning speech for a schools’ competition under the auspices of the respected Speakers’ Trust is antisemitic and why it matters.

As the left-leaning British journalist Jonathan Freeland observed in The Guardian (29 April 2016): “On the left, black people are usually allowed to define what’s racism; women can define sexism; Muslims are trusted to define Islamophobia. But when Jews call out something as antisemitic, leftist non-Jews feel curiously entitled to tell Jews they’re wrong, that they are exaggerating or lying or using it as a decoy tactic – and to then treat them to a long lecture on what anti-Jewish racism really is.”

Distinguished British journalist Charles Moore argued six years ago (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/charlesmoore/7803919/Why-has-Israel-disarmed-itself-in-the-battle-for-world-opinion.html):

‘Israel is understandably obsessed with security, but its greatest security lies ultimately not in the Israeli Defence Forces, but in political warfare.... Most of the world is not deeply interested in what happens in Israel, and probably does not want to be deluged with legalistic defences of particular actions. What it wants is a clear, calm, repeated case. It is a case – aimed more at public opinion than at foreign ministries – about freedom, democracy, a Western way of life and the need for the whole of the free world to fight terrorism. Sometimes you hear Israelis say: “It doesn’t matter what we say. The whole world is against us.” You can see why they say it, for they are indeed unfairly treated. But when they say it, they are uttering a self-fulfilling prophecy. If they won’t say what needs saying, no one else will say it for them.’

Too true.

On my own blog’s sidebar I’ve taken to posting rebuttals of anti-Israel slurs such as the “Apartheid state” libel. Thus I’ve quoted David Singer:

‘The division of Judea and Samaria (West Bank) into three separate areas “A”, “B” and “C” was agreed on by Israel and the PLO pursuant to the Oslo Accords. 95% of the West Bank Arabs live in Areas A and B and their daily lives are under the total administration and control of the PLO since the Palestinian Authority was disbanded by Abbas in January 2013. The PLO has total security control in A and shares security control in B with Israel. Israel has total administrative and security control in C. Israel is entitled to and will continue to take responsibility for the security of Jews living in the West Bank. Jews were given the legal right to settle in the West Bank under article 6 of the Mandate for Palestine and article 80 of the UN Charter. They did so for decades until they were driven out in 1947 and not able to return there until 1967.’

And

‘There are Arab roads only in the West Bank that Jews are not allowed to use. Jews are also forbidden from entering Area “A”. Selling land to Jews is forbidden by the PLO under pain of death. 3. The PLO runs the daily lives of 95% of the West Bank Arabs and Hamas runs the daily lives of 100% of the Gazan Arabs. They have been under occupation – and subjugation – by these two evil groups for the last ten years and given no say in their future or any opportunity to elect others to lead them following the disastrous political decisions of their leaders over the past ten years. 4. Hamas and the PLO do not accept the continued existence of a Jewish State and call for its disappearance. The narratives did not begin in 1948 – they began in about 1917. How do you make peace with an enemy that has been obsessed with not recognising any Jewish national rights in former Palestine for the last 100 years?’

But perhaps it’s time to heed Edgar Davidson’s advice to friends of Israel (http://edgar1981.blogspot.com.au/2016/05/on-appropriate-response-to-antisemitic.html).

Abhorring the reactive approach, which ensures, he says, ‘The lies and blood libels ("Israel massacres children", "Israel is an Apartheid state" etc) become the focus of the discussion; The lies and blood libels get repeated ad nausea and hence become intrinsically associated with Israel; The systematic lying and psychopathic behaviour of the Palestinians and their supporters is totally ignored’ we must, he continues, shift from concentration on what Israel isn’t, and rely on attack as the best means of defence:

‘Since almost all of the lies against Israel are simply a reflection of what her accusers really do, the accusations should be turned back against them; for example, here are the kind of things that the banners should say: "There are 58 apartheid countries in the world: they are the 58 Islamic countries." "Palestinians glory in the murder of Jewish children" "The greatest honour in Palestinian society is to kill a Jew in cold blood.” "Believing Palestinian lies inhibits peace." "Accepting Palestinian lies encourages them to kill." "Arabs ethnically cleansed Jews from every one of their countries" etc. We should also be telling the stories and showing the faces of the many Israelis murdered by Palestinians including the hundreds of children.’

There’s merit in that message.

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06/07 Links Pt1: Fatah leader praises terrorist stabbers; Why Iran’s Post-Deal Terror Matters

From Ian:

PMW: Fatah leader praises terrorist stabbers

Although the number of Palestinian terror attacks has lessened, Fatah leaders continue to praise the attacks of the terror wave. Recently, Fatah Central Committee member Abbas Zaki glorified the individual terrorists who chose to attack and murder Israelis with knives, saying they had “performed a miracle” causing Israelis to live under “curfew”:
“This people is greater than its leadership. The determination, willpower, and willingness to die for a dignified life are present among the youth who carried a knife after the disappearance of the Arab leadership, including the Palestinian. They performed a miracle by imposing a curfew within Israel with knives and rocks. Blessings to the mothers and fathers who gave birth to those who are marching on the path of light, without anyone having demanded it of them.”
[Fatah Central Committee member Abbas Zaki’s Facebook page, May 16, 2016]
Zaki also condemned peace promotion, saying that anyone who “talks about renewing the relations with Israel is not a Palestinian and not a member of Fatah!” Zaki gave this speech at the UNRWA Ramallah Women’s Training Center and Educational Science Faculty’s graduation ceremony held at the Palestinian Red Crescent headquarters in Ramallah. Palestinian Media Watch has documented that UNRWA and the Palestinian Red Crescent have hosted or made their facilities available for terror promoting events.

Khaled Abu Toameh: Palestinians: The Fatah Mess

After many years of being gagged, Fatah's young guard is finding its voice. But while members of this faction wish to see a "changing of the guards at the Palestinian palace," this does not mean that they have changed their attitude towards Israel.
Fatah's young guard is neither interested in, nor authorized to, give up the "right of return" for Palestinian refugees -- or even take the basic step of recognizing Israel as a Jewish state. In short, the actors might change, but the same show will go on.
The international community, meanwhile, is busy burying its head in the sand of Abbas's very messy backyard. The participants at the Middle East peace conference held in Paris last week may have missed the latest revolt against the PA president. Had they been paying attention, instead of calling for a two-state solution, they might have demanded that Abbas and his Fatah faction get their acts together, and include Israel in the show. Perhaps they also would have mentioned that this ought to happen before Hamas takes over the West Bank and creates another Islamist regime there, too.

JPost Editorial: Peace education

Surveys carried out over the past few decades by respected Palestinian research institutes, as well as by international bodies such as the Pew Research Center and the Arab Barometer initiative, have consistently found Palestinians to hold bigoted and highly negative opinions of Israel and Israelis.
In nearly every single opinion poll that has been conducted among Palestinians, well over half surveyed have consistently expressed the opinion that Israel’s aspiration is to extend its borders to cover all the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea and to expel its Arab citizens.
Palestinians also think Jews have no historical roots in what they refer to as Palestine.
In 2011, the American political consultant Stanley Greenberg commissioned a survey of Palestinian opinions on behalf of the Israel Project. Seventy-two percent declared it morally right to deny that “Jews have a long history in Jerusalem going back thousands of years,” while 90% said denying that Palestinians have “a long history in Jerusalem going back thousands of years” is morally wrong.
Similarly, in a 2015 survey commissioned for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy by David Pollock, fieldworkers from the Palestinian Center for Public Opinion asked residents of the West Bank and Gaza about Jewish rights to the land. Only 12 percent agreed that “Both Jews and Palestinians have rights to the land,” while more than 80 percent asserted that, “This is Palestinian land and Jews have no rights to it.”
These findings and others were compiled in a comprehensive essay by Daniel Polisar entitled “What do Palestinians Want?” that appeared in the November 2015 edition of the online magazine Mosaic.
Why is it that Palestinians hold such slanted opinions about Israel and Israelis? At least part of the answer lies in the educational messages taught to Palestinian children from a very young age, even at institutions belonging to the more “moderate” Palestinian leadership.

Al Masry al Youm is a well-respected, independent newspaper in Egypt. It is considered liberal and it appeals to Arab intellectuals. Part of the reason it was founded in 2002 was as a reaction to the tabloid-type sensationalist stories in other Egyptian media. It is the 20th most popular website in Egypt. It also has an English edition called Egypt Independent.

On Monday, it published an op-ed by Salah Montasser, himself a well-known and respected writer, that minimizes, and then justifies, the Holocaust.

The Jews promote and drive the discussion by accusing German leader Adolf Hitler, who took over the leadership of Germany in 1933, killed a large number of Jews. They claim some proof that he killed six million Jews, a figure that seems impossible in its size, but Jewish propaganda was able to publish and implant that figure. But the question that no one asks, and perhaps they do not allow, is: why did Hitler do what he did to the Jews?

A friend of mine sent me a recording from a German expert speaking in English to address the question: What did the Jews do to cause Hitler's revenge on them?

Under the Third Reich between 100,000 and 600,000 Jews were directly or indirectly killed by the Nationalist Party, a figure that despite its size is much lower when compared to the victims of the Algerian war of independence with France, and the victims of the Palestinians at the hands of the Jews, and what Americans, British and the Russians have done in killing people by the millions.

So what did the Jews do in Germany? Indeed, since 1850, Jews dominated the top posts in the German Reich at that time, they made three dramatic changes to Germany.

First, understand they were a minority that did not exceed 2% of the German population. When Hitler came to power in 1933 there were about 500 thousand Jews among the 60 million Germans. But this small minority succeeded in controlling 50% of the media and consituted 70% of judges and imposed their presence in the press, film and theater, as well as literature. During their control there were economic meltdowns that occurred to the banks in the period between 1870 and 1920.

At that time, caused in several economic collapses. This is not a Nazi propaganda speech but the words of the Jews themselves. In this period millions of Germans lost their savings and investment opportunities because of the Jewish gangs banks.

The other point was their influence on the psychology of the Germans, which is the most dangerous factor at all. They planted in the press and media, theater, and literature, a culture of moral degradation. The first theaters of homosexuality were in Berlin in the twenties, the first pornographic performances were in 1880 and 1890 at the hands of Jewish authors .. .. adultery, homosexuality .. all kinds of sexual obsession .. art is decadent morality. This absurd art that is today called Modern Art. All of this has been paid and planted by the Jews.

This created a state of anger and revolution within the German society as they wrote graffiti mocking of Christianity and make fun of Jesus, just as Salman Rushdie did with the Muslims.

The Nazis, of course, benefited from this anger and revolution. When Adolf Hitler came to power the population of unemployed has reached six million Germans. Hitler was able to in two years (from 1933 to 1935) to employ them all. Six million jobs in two years, a stunning achievement. That is why the Jews wanted to tarnish the success of the Hitler, and said that if Hitler had created six million jobs, it is because he burned six million Jews. And Jewish propaganda triumphed and even become prevalent in all the media that six million Jews were victims of Hitler, while all the number of Jews in Germany was less than a quarter of that number who they say that Hitler burned!

This is the kind of thing that the mainstream Arab press publishes every damn week. But it is kryptonite to speak about institutional antisemitism among Arabs - you will have far more Western articles about how they are only anti-Zionist and how much they love Jews than you will have about this lying, sickening filth that literate, supposedly liberal Egyptians are spoon fed all the time.

Where is the New York Times or AP or Reuters? Why aren't stories like this considered news?

The only way to change Arab attitudes is by exposing it and shaming them. And that is exactly what the major media refuse to do.

They have nothing against shaming Christians or Jews, Europeans or Americans. Any Westerner who would write such a piece of garbage would be blacklisted instantly and forever. But Arabs and Muslims are expected to be bigots, and therefore their bigotry isn't news, and Arabs who insist to Western media that they distinguish between Zionists and Jews are never challenged.

By treating Arabs as if they are inherently bigoted, the news media proves that it is not only the Arabs that are bigoted.

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I could not find this in English as of this writing, but Arab media is reporting a "scandal" where Israel has been nominated to become the head of the Sixth Committee of the General Assembly of the United Nations on combating terrorism and issues of international law.

According to the report, which is the top story at Ma'an Arabic as of this writing, Israel was nominated by Western European nations to head this legal committee. The leadership rotates among the different geographic groups and this year the Western European group, which also includes Israel, Australia and New Zealand, gets to choose the leader.

They unanimously chose Israel.

The Arab and Muslim bloc bitterly opposed the nomination they couldn't do anything about it.

The Arabs tried to get Turkey to run against Israel, but a Turkish diplomat in New York stingingly responded, "What unites Israel and Turkey in the fight against terrorism is far greater than what brings together Turkey with other Islamic and Arab countries."

The Arab/Muslim block claimed that Israel wasn't qualified to head a legal committee "because of its shameful record of crimes and violations."

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This was supposed to be a landslide victory for the Israel haters, and although the vote was very close, the defeat is resounding.

From JPost:

In a massive blow to the Boycott, Divestment, Sanction (BDS) movement, the American Anthropological Association voted to reject a resolution for the academic boycott of Israel, it was announced Tuesday.

The resolution, which sought to officially adopt a boycott to refrain from formal collaborations with Israeli academic institutions, though not of individual academics, was narrowly defeated by 2,423 votes against and 2,384 votes in favor.

88% of AAA members in a meeting in Denver last year voted to have this referendum, which seemed to indicate that a majority of actual members supported boycotting Israel. As usual, the haters lobbied the smaller group to make it appear like they had massive support within the organization at large.

The BDSers are trying to put a positive spin on their devastating loss:

Despite this setback, the decision to hold this vote in the first place marks a historic step forward in opening spaces for critical discussion of the U.S. role in enabling Israel’s widespread and systematic abuses against the Palestinian people. The past three years of debate about the boycott have brought exponentially more discussion of Palestinian rights in the AAA than ever before in the Association’s history. This includes a ground-breaking report by a AAA Task Force recognizing the settler-colonial practices of the Israeli government. These represent important first steps towards opposing Israeli human rights violations. Separately, over 1,300 anthropologists have signed a petition pledging to uphold the boycott through their own personal practice.

The BDSers, who routinely make death threats against musicians who want to play in Israel, are also accusing the pro-Israel side of intimidation tactics. Examples include that the pro-Israel side "lobbied university presidents across the country to intervene in the vote; paid AAA membership dues for boycott opponents; called for the firing of Israeli scholars accused of supporting the boycott; and, just as the AAA began voting, filed a frivolous lawsuit against the American Studies Association for its own endorsement of the boycott in 2013."

The AAA will do some symbolic anti-Israel moves anyway, including writing letters of censure to Israeli ministries. It also says

Considering the ways in which Israeli government policies and practices make it difficult for Palestinian academics, including anthropologists to travel to international conferences, and considering the ways in which Israeli policy emplace obstructions on Palestinian and dissenting Israeli academics, AAA will establish fellowships to enable the travel of Palestinian and/or Israeli academics to AAA conferences, and of academics and/or visiting scholars in anthropology to act as teachers, mentors or research collaborators with colleagues in the West Bank and Gaza, assuming financial feasibility and/or successful fundraising efforts.

I'm willing to bet that this never happens, because the haters aren't interested in raising money for actually helping their Palestinian colleagues but in attacking Israel.

I'm also not so sure that any Palestinian anthropologists have problems traveling anyway. I found a single lecturer in anthropology at the English-language Al Quds University website, who received his PhD from Hebrew University.

(h/t David A, Leonard K)

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06/06 Links Pt2: UK professors refuse “Israeli money” but merrily take Arab funds; The Roots of American Support for Israel

From Ian:

NGO Monitor: The Dangers of Subcontracting EU Foreign Policy to Fringe NGOs

In 1995, the European Union’s Barcelona Conference launched the grand-sounding Euro-Mediterranean Partnership, a massive effort encompassing the countries of North Africa, Israel, Syria and Jordan. The main objective was to establish economic and political frameworks to stabilize the Arab regimes; the second goal was to compete with the US in Arab-Israeli peace making after Oslo.
Both missions failed. But in the process and through a very large budget, the EU built alliances with a number of highly politicized NGOs. Through frameworks such as Partnership for Peace and the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights, and via delegation offices in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Amman, the EU began bankrolling dozens of NGOs, including the Israeli B’Tselem, Breaking the Silence and Adalah and the hard-core Palestinian political NGO, Applied Research Institute Jerusalem (ARIJ), a hard-core Palestinian political NGO receiving close to €1 million annually. This NGO funding was and still is decided in great secrecy and without external oversight.
Within post-Cold War Europe, NGOs, known collectively as civil society, are seen as important contributors to the democratic process, providing alternative voices which are, in theory, untainted by party politics and narrow interests. To this end, select NGOs active in EU member states receive an estimated two billion euros annually from government budgets – a huge amount by any standard.
But not all this funding goes towards strengthening European democracy; the Barcelona framework extended the relationship between EU governments and NGOs to the very different realm of foreign policy –especially with regard to the complex Israeli-Palestinian issues.
Engagement with a narrow group of political NGOs became a substitute for direct EU interaction with Middle Eastern governments and the wider political spectrum. Thus, the EU-NGO relationship took the form of policy outsourcing or subcontracting, particularly as EU experts and resources in this realm are very limited compared to major countries like the US, UK, France and Germany.

UK professors refuse “Israeli money” but merrily take Arab funds

The Israeli Dan David Foundation annually awards a prize of one million dollars to scientists, writers, musicians, thinkers, politicians. The British historian Catherine Hall, a feminist chosen for her research on the British empire, shared the prestigious Israeli Prize this year with two other scholars, the French Arlette Farge and Australian Inga Clendinnen.
The prize is named after philanthropist Dan David, it is administered by Tel Aviv University and has been awarded to former US Vice President Al Gore, former British prime minister Tony Blair, the city of Istanbul, the Warburg Library of London, theatrical talents such as Tom Stoppard and Peter Brook, novelists such as Margaret Atwood and Amitav Ghosh, Muslims such as Goenawan Mohamad. Professor of History at University College London.
Catherine Hall, however, refused the prize, along with $300,000, because it is Israeli money and she had joined the boycott movement against the Jewish State.
In Great Britain, “Islamic studies centers” have been set up in the major universities. A report by Anthony Glees, director of Brunel University’s Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies, estimates that the Saudi rulers have spent 233 million pounds in these English universities. Including that University College London of Catherine Hall, which also has a campus in Qatar and has recently accepted a loan from Abu Dhabi.
This is the reason these English barons, who are shamefully boycotting the Israeli Jews, never raise the veil on abuses in the Islamic crescent.

June 1967: anti-Jewish riots in Tunisia

Anti-Jewish riots broke out in Tunisia on 5 June 1967. Although no deaths resulted, the Jews took the hint - and 13, 000 Tunisian Jews left within the year. David B Green writes in Haaretz (with thanks: Lily):
Unlike other Arab and Muslim states, which effectively expelled their Jews in the period surrounding Israel’s establishment, Tunisia went to some lengths to keep its Jews from leaving. There were several waves of departures, but they had more to do with the overall policies of the revolutionary government of Habib Bourguiba than with explicitly anti-Jewish actions.
Bourguiba (1903-2000), who became president when Tunisia was granted independence from France, in 1956, was a benign dictator who was determined to modernize the economy and society. Among other moves he eliminated the Ottoman-era system that gave significant powers of self-rule to protected religious communities and dissolved the rabbinical courts. He also ordered the unification of the country’s network of Jewish organizations into a single “Jewish Religious Council,” whose members he appointed. And, under the pretext of slum clearance, the Jewish Quarter in Tunis was bulldozed under.

Some fascinating glimpses on the future of the IDF. From Israel Defense:

Maj. Gen. (res.) Avi Mizrachi, former commander of the IDF Ground Arm and GOC Central Command and now executive VP of Elbit Systems, opened earlier today (Wednesday) the special session held by Israel Defense and Bynet Company regarding the digital revolution in the defense establishment. According to Mizrahi, Elbit Systems is an active partner with the defense establishment and IDF in the Tzayad (Digital Land Army) program, aimed to expand the digitization levels of the individual soldier in the IDF and to improve his integration with other military functions. Elbit Systems also shares this knowledge with other countries around the world. It is involved in two major projects (designated "The Future Soldier") in Australia and in the Benelux Union.

As for the IDF "future soldier", he already carries only three kilograms of military equipment on his back, compared to dozens of kilograms in the past. The radio gear carried by the soldier enables him to connect to his squad, platoon, company, and even higher echelons. The IDF's operational requirements, says Avi Mizrahi, are for the "digital soldier" to have high survivability, mobility, lethality (in the sense of the "first round on target" concept), and command and control (C2) capabilities. Elbit systems are developing solutions to meet these requirements, with an emphasis on urban warfare and the underground arena – namely tunnels.

Another important element of the "digital soldier" is the operation of precision-guided munition. In the future, soldiers will be equipped with a weapon system that would allow them to identify a target, and then simply to aim and shoot. They will receive relevant data, and will be equipped with night vision equipment.

Another key element is the ability to identify the soldier. Soldiers will be equipped with a system that would allow their commanders to identify them when they operate inside a building. The system will transmit data on the physiological condition of a soldier to his commanders, to let them know if he has been injured. Additional equipment will allow the soldier to identify fellow troopers so to prevent incidents of 'friendly fire'. All this is part of the great network that will encompass the entire fighting force: ground, air and naval.

Chen Azoulay, CEO of Bynet, opened the conference and said that his company is cooperating with the defense establishment in the development of digital solutions for control rooms, contact centers and smart cities. Some of these solutions have already been implemented in the defense establishment.

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Religion, Politics and the Origins of Palestine Refugee Relief
Asaf Romirowsky & Alexander H. Joffe

This is a meticulously researched book that concentrates on a very small bit of history: the time period from 1948-50 when the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker group, was organizing refugee relief in Gaza.

Before UNRWA, the UN created the United Nations Relief for Palestine Refugees (UNRPR). It outsourced refugee relief to three other groups: the International Committee of the Red Cross, the League of Red Cross Societies, and the AFSC, which had won accolades for its non-political relief activities during the 1930s and 1940s.

The AFSC was in charge of relief for some 200,000 refugees in Gaza. Even though it was not fully successful in keeping itself above the fray of Middle East politics, it did an admirable job with very few resources in providing food, medical care and even education to this huge population that fled Israel. In fact, the 25,000 native Gazans were in worse financial shape than their 200,000 forced guests.

The AFSC initially wanted the refugees to be repatriated to Israel, but eventually it accepted that the majority would have to be resettled in Arab countries. Of course, the Arab countries did not want to settle them.

The AFSC is interesting in a number of ways. The Quakers, alone among the UNRPR NGOs, actually tried and to a large extent succeeded in performing a census of the refugee population, foiling the elaborate schemes that the Arabs used to inflate the numbers of members of their families (sending kids from one home to another to be counted multiple times, not registering deaths, and so forth) in order to maintain a fair and equitable distribution system. Even so, they allowed some additional food parcels to be distributed, as the food rations created a mini-industry of trade in the camps.

An AFSC member realized early on that some 200,000 of the then-assumed 670,000-700,000 refugees were not refugees at all, having lived on the other side of the Green Line the entire time, but they applied for refugee relief to take advantage of the free food.

The group also emphatically did not want to be stuck in the Middle East forever. They set a deadline by which they would leave, and UNRWA exists partially because of that ultimatum. The AFSC was keenly aware of the facts that the refugees themselves did not want to resettle at that time, and their desire to "return" was predicated on Israel being destroyed first. The refugees also felt that the aid that they were receiving was their right, and they blamed the UN as being responsible for their homelessness and therefore responsible to house and feed them until they return victoriously to their homes.

The AFSC quickly realized that this was a quagmire that they did not want any part of. The AFSC noted, prophetically, that withdrawing aid is actually the best thing that could happen to the refugees as the alternative of perpetual aid "contributes to the moral degeneration of the refugees and may also, by its palliative effects, militate against a swift political settlement of the problem."

As they left and handed over the reins of Gaza relief to UNRWA, the FSC members naively thought that now a professional organization would be able to do things that they could not - but they quickly realized that UNRWA officials were completely incompetent and often political hires who thought that the assignment was to drink scotch all day with Egyptian officials.

For a short time the AFSC was an UNRWA contractor to help the transition. One mentioned in a letter that the Egyptians had taken over the education of the Palestinian children under UNRWA in 1950, where "the kids are learning reading, writing and bombing tactics."

The AFSC is also, as the authors point out, a precursor to today's powerful and very political NGOs. The Committee itself became very political in the decades since, taking on US involvement in Vietnam and the Cold War, and in recent decades they became implacably anti-Israel, which some but not all of their volunteers were in 1948.

The book is dense with facts and footnotes, and it is often difficult to keep track of all the players. It places the AFSC in context of the many American, mostly Protestant groups with ties to the Middle East, whose members were often antisemitic (and many of whom ended up working for the State Department.) But it tells a story that simply had not been previously told about the history of the refugee problem and how it turned from something that might have been solvable into today's intractable problem of descendants of the original refugees still stateless, still pawns and still believing that they are entitled to free food, medicine and education forever.

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06/06 Links Pt1: Abbas falsely claims 6,000-year-old Palestinian nation; How Khomeini suckered Jimmy Carter

From Ian:

PMW: Abbas falsely claims 6,000-year-old Palestinian nation

Mahmoud Abbas:
"The Bible says that the Palestinians existed before Abraham"
"The invention of the Canaanite-Palestinian alphabet [was] more than 6,000 years ago"
Abbas' advisor claims 5,000-year Palestinian history in the land:
Mahmoud Al-Habbash: "We have been here for the last 5,000 years, and have not left this land"
"Our forefathers are the monotheist Canaanites and Jebusites"
In order to make Palestinians believe that they have an ancient history that precedes Jewish history in the land of Israel, Palestinian Authority leaders regularly fabricate tales of a 5,000- or sometimes 6,000-year-old Palestinian nation. Recently, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and his advisor Mahmoud Al-Habbash each spoke on two different occasions about a Palestinian nation that they claim preceded Abraham in the land of Canaan. Abbas even misrepresented the Bible by claiming biblical support for his claims:

Mahmoud Abbas fabricates history: "The Bible says the Palestinians existed before Abraham..."

Transcript: PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas: "Our narrative says that we have been have been in this land since before Abraham. I am not saying it. The Bible says it. The Bible says, in these words, that the Palestinians existed before Abraham. So why don't you recognize my right?
[Official PA TV, March 21, 2016]
PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas: "This land was never without a people, as we have been planted in its rocks and dust and hills since the beginning of civilization and writing and the invention of the Canaanite-Palestinian alphabet more than 6,000 years ago."
[Official PA TV, May 14, 2016]
Abbas’ Fabrication #1: The Bible says that Palestinians predate Abraham.
Fact #1: The Bible says Abraham dwelt “many days in the land of the Philistines.” (Genesis 21: 34). The Bible’s “Philistines” have no connection to today’s Arabs called “Palestinians.” The Philistines were a people of Greek origin who settled in the land of Canaan and lived beside the Israelite tribes. Both nations were exiled by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, the Philistines in 604 BCE and the kingdom of Judah in 586 BCE. The Philistines ceased to exist as a nation soon afterward, while the Judeans returned 70 years later, and rebuilt the Jewish/Judean national home.
Abbas’ Fabrication #2: There was an ancient Palestinian- Canaanite people connected to today’s Palestinian Arabs.
Fact #2: The land of “Judea” was renamed “Palestine” by Rome in 136 CE, as a punishment to the Jews for participating in the Jewish Revolt against Rome, known as “The Bar Kochba Rebellion.”
Arabs first arrived in the land of Israel/Judea with the Muslim invasion in 637 CE.
Arabs of “Palestine” first identified themselves as “Palestinians” in the 20th century.
Abbas’ Fabrication #3: Canaanite-Palestinians invented an alphabet 6,000 years ago.
Fact #3: Writing was invented around 3,500 BCE. The earliest Canaanite alphabet, considered to be the ancestor of most modern alphabets, is dated to around 1,500 BCE.

In 2013, a geneticist named Eran Elhaik published a study that claimed that, based on his interpretation of existing genetic studies, Ashkenazic Jews were descended from Khazars.

The media ran with this story without doing a modicum of fact checking, and I showed at the time that Elhaik had set out to prove this theory before he even did the research - the exact opposite of what a real scientist should do. His paper was sloppy and the actual researchers who created the data that he misused wrote a later paper debunking his theory.

Elhaik wasn't finished yet. He suddenly changed from a genetics expert into a linguistics expert and in April put out a paper and video claiming that Yiddish is actually derived from Slavic languages and not from German. This was a new attempt to buttress his debunked theory, and to gain maximum publicity he invoked Yoda from Star Wars.

Again, the media jumped on this, and it took a couple of weeks before this cockamamie theory was also shown to also be junk science. (By the way, "cockamamie" is not a Yiddish word.)

This weekend an interesting story came out about a community of over a hundred people in Madagascar who converted to Judaism.

A nascent Jewish community was officially born in Madagascar last month when 121 men, women and children underwent Orthodox conversions on the remote Indian Ocean island nation better known for lemurs, chameleons, dense rain forests and vanilla.

The conversions, which took place over a 10-day period, were the climax of a process that arose organically five to six years ago when followers of various messianic Christian sects became disillusioned with their churches and began to study Torah.

Through self-study and with guidance from Jewish internet sources and correspondence with rabbis in Israel, they now pray in Sephardic-accented Hebrew and strictly observe the Sabbath and holidays.

The conversions were facilitated by Kulanu, a New York-based nonprofit that specializes in supporting isolated and emerging Jewish communities, but were initiated by the residents.

“Now that we’ve re-established the State of Israel, it is time to re-establish the Jewish people, especially in the Diaspora,” said Bonita Nathan Sussman, vice president of Kulanu.

Her husband, Rabbi Gerald Sussman of Temple Emanuel on Staten Island in New York, added: “We are in the process of reconstituting the Jewish people, which would have been more numerous had it not been decimated by the Holocaust and had we not lost millions of Jews in Arab lands.”

Beginning on May 9, members of the community came before a beit din, or rabbinical court, convened for the occasion at the Le Pave Hotel here, the Madagascar capital. The court comprised three rabbis with Orthodox ordinations: Rabbi Oizer Neumann of Brooklyn, Rabbi Achiya Delouya of Montreal and Rabbi Pinchas Klein of Philadelphia. All three belong to a group of rabbis who serve far-flung Jewish communities and support converting emergent Jewish groups.

Delouya, whose background is Moroccan, spoke with the converts in their second official language, French, and also provided Sephardic influences for which the Madagascar community feel an affinity.

The conversion process included periods of intensive Torah study, interviews by the beit din and full body immersions in a river located a 90-minute drive from Antananarivo. A privacy tent was hastily erected beside the river for the occasion, and a festive atmosphere ensued as men, women and children, ranging in age from 3 to 85, lined up to take the ritual plunge.

What this story highlights is that it takes years of intense effort, education and desire to become a Jew according to Jewish law. The Khazar story of the king who forced his people to "convert" en masse may or may not be true (most evidence is that only some leaders and aristocrats converted), but large numbers of converts would not have been accepted as Jews by the existing Jewish communities in Europe without a lot of controversy - controversy that has not been recorded anywhere in rabbinic or responsa literature.

The old Yiddish expression is "es iz shver tsu zayn a Yid," it is hard to be a Jew. Well, it is even harder to become a Jew. That simple fact is simply never addressed by the academic frauds with an agenda like Eran Elhaik.

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Last week I reported on an interview that BDS leader Omar Barghouti had with the Lebanese TV channel "Palestine Today TV" in April.

It turns out that the TV station violated Lebanese law against speaking to residents of Israel.

Barghouti was born in Qatar, raised in Egypt and married to an Arab-Israeli woman, so he is a resident, although not a citizen, of Israel.

According to the 1955 Lebanese Boycott Law, it is against the law for Lebanese to speak to or communicate with "institutions or persons having residence in Israel."

There was some discomfort in Lebanon in 2012 when an Israeli spokesperson was interviewed on a TV station. Legal experts said that Lebanon could have prosecuted the interviewer. Even tweeting to an Israeli is a punishable offense.

However, the law is not limited to dealing with Israelis, but it explicitly says that any entity that “conducts a direct agreement, or through an intermediary, with entities based or people residing in Israel” can be prosecuted.

If Omar Barghouti respects boycott laws against Israel, then he must ensure that he never gets interviewed by Lebanese TV again. And if he wants other Arab states and the PA to pass similar laws - which he apparently does, based on this interview - he must avoid any contact with any non-Israeli Arabs via video, telephone, email or social media.

Barghouti must be boycotted by the people he wants to see boycott Israel.

(h/t David Abrams)

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Baqaa camp archive photo

BBC reports:

Five people have been killed in an attack on Jordanian intelligence officers at a Palestinian refugee camp on the outskirts of the capital, Amman, government officials say.

They described the incident as a "terrorist attack".

At least three of the five people killed were intelligence officers, the officials said.

The attack took place at the sprawling Baqaa camp north of Amman at about 07:00 local time (04:00 GMT).

The Baqaa camp was one of six set up in 1968 for Palestinian refugees fleeing the West Bank and Gaza Strip as a result of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

Government spokesman Mohammed Momani said the "cowardly" attack targeted the intelligence agency office at the camp. No other details have been given so far.

The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) says Baqaa is the largest camp in Jordan.

It is believed to house more than 100,000 refugees.

UNRWA says the camp continues to face major challenges, including unemployment, poverty and the need for structural repair.

Al Arabiya adds:

“This attack was obviously a deliberate attack that the group, whoever is responsible, that they are present in Jordan and are capable of carrying attacks,” Former Jordanian Minister of Information Samih al-Maaytah told Al Arabiya News Channel.

“They clearly chose to attack the intelligence group as the Jordanians are one of the best intelligence groups in the Arab world,” he added.

Maaytah also added that the attack should not be seen as a major attack as the office was administrative in nature serving Palestinian refugees.

“There is a chase currently taking place against the perpetrators of the attack. Investigations are currently taking place. It is not sure as of yet if this was the work of organized group or a lone wolf attack,” Al Arabiya News Channel’s correspondent Ghassan Abuloz reported.

Al Arabiya sources reported that Jordanian security forces captured two attackers a few hours after the attack.

Last month Jordan killed 8 ISIS members who were planning an attack, an there were fears that there would be more attacks in revenge.

It seems unlikely that this was a "lone-wolf" attack, and it remains to be seen if Palestinians were behind it.

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