Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, February 23, 2009

Bahrain's Crown Prince - pro-settlements?

Perhaps nowhere on Earth are sentences parsed for hidden messages as carefully they are in the Middle East. So the interview that Bahrain's Crown Prince gave to Sky News is curious indeed.

It starts off as one would expect - with the prince, Sheikh Salman Bin Hamad Bin Isa Al-Khalifa, trying to pressure Great Britain to be even more pro-Arab than it already is:

The crown prince of Bahrain said on Monday Britain was too pro-Israel in its outlook, but its contribution to the Middle East peace process was still needed.
"If we are to solve the Arab-Israeli issue then you cannot approach it as a friend of one side at the expense of another," Sheikh Salman Bin Hamad Bin Isa Al-Khalifa told Sky television.

When asked if he felt Britain had been too pro-Israeli he replied: "I think we all feel that."
"But that doesn't mean we don't want Britain's involvement, we need Britain's involvement and we need Britain to be more impartial, sure."

Isn't it funny that third-party Arab nations are not expected to be "impartial," but they complain if the West isn't (in their estimation?)

But the interesting part comes later:

To settle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, "you give up land for peace," he said. "Land that you haven't already built on. It can't be simpler."

Does this mean that Bahrain believes that Israel can hold onto the settlements that have already been "built on?" How about Greater Jerusalem?

I have a feeling that we will see some backtracking real fast.

2002: A socialist site bemoans leftist anti-semitism

An article at the socialist Worker's Liberty site, reprinted today, is harshly critical of the Left's tendency even then towards naked anti-semitism. It correctly points out that real socialists would never support Islamists nor the destruction of Israel.

As we see today, their complaints fell on deaf ears.

This was their report at the very first public appearance by the Muslim Association of Britain - in 2002:

ON 13 APRIL [2002] there was a big London march "for Palestine". What happened was shocking from a socialist standpoint, and harmful to the Palestinian cause.
The core organising group — "The Muslim Association" — has strong Islamic-fundamentalist links. For example, its web site links to the Pakistani fundamentalist party Jamaat-e-Islami.

The Trafalgar Square rally started with long readings from the Koran. Although speakers such as Labour left MP Jeremy Corbyn and Tony Benn were on the platform, their speeches were punctuated by chants — led by an Imam who used the stage microphone — of "Allah-o-Akbar" ("God is great").

"Allah-o-Akbar" was also one of the main chants on the march. Although the phrase "Allah-o-Akbar" is used by many non-fundamentalist Muslims in other contexts, to promote it as a political slogan on this march was a mark of fundamentalist politics, not Muslim culture or religion.

The organisers, marshalling the crowd at the start of the march, attempted to segregate the march along male-female lines. If the march had not been so large, and consequently so difficult for those stewards to organise, the demonstration might well have set off with men at the front, and women at the back. A smaller Hyde Park march on 9 December 2001 did that — and the segregation was obeyed by the SWP and RCG, who marched that day.

Leafleters freely gave out Islamist literature which called for "Putting the Jews to the sword". Other leaflets called for a boycott of "Israeli goods" while, in fact, demanding the boycott of businesses such as Marks and Spencers which have historically been owned by Jews.

Dominant on the march were banners equating Sharon to Hitler, Zionism to Nazism, and the Star of David to the swastika. Specific political demands such as "Israel out of the Occupied Territories" did not appear on the leaflet for the march, or prominently on the march itself. The dominant tone was simply hostility to Israel: "Death to Israel" and "From the river to the sea" (fundamentalists); "No compromise with Zionism" and "Two states, no solution" (from the SWP).

What did the left do? Workers' Liberty contacted the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) the day before the march to find out a little more about the organisers. We were told that the PSC did not know much about them, but they had been reassured that the march would not be "too Islamic". Despite not having been asked for their support or help, the PSC was backing it anyway.

The Socialist Workers Party (SWP) were energetic in winning Socialist Alliance support for this demonstration. Rather than supporting slogans which would contrast with the general march themes, they won agreement from the SA to carry placards saying, "Victory to the intifada! Free Palestine!". At the Socialist Alliance Executive, SWP leader John Rees argued, "It is most important that our slogans do not appear in any way antagonistic to this march".

On the march the SWP presented themselves as the most militant advocates of "smashing Israel": using megaphones to announce, "No compromise with Zionism" and "Two states is no solution!" After the march a prominent SWPer wrote to the Socialist Alliance email list that this was "one of the best and most uplifting marches I've ever been on".

Workers Liberty believes that the left has made a big mistake in blending itself into such a march. The Islamists are our enemies, not our allies, and we should not back their protests and campaigning. We should see our role in intervening into such a movement and winning to socialist politics those influenced by the fundamentalists.

We also believe that the left's blending into the 13 April march was a step backwards from where it stood before this march took place.

Groups like the SWP stand for 'smashing Israel' and replacing the existing state with a single, Arab, "democratic secular state".

The Israeli Jews are surrounded by hostile Arab states. They will not freely allow themselves to become an unarmed minority in an Arab state. That could only come about after the forcible subjugation of the Israeli Jews. A merging of different nations into multinational states is very desirable, but must be done only on the basis of free consent.

The reasonable-sounding democratic secular state programme could only be completed against the wishes of the Israeli Jewish people. This "solution" is, in fact, not democratic. Such an outcome would replace the oppression of the Palestinians with the oppression (the murder or expulsion) of the Israeli Jews.

The left's programme is — in reality, and against the intentions of some of its advocates — for a war against the Jews of Israel.

The fundamentalist march organisers make hostility to the Jews of Israel quite explicit and aim to replace the Israeli state with a totalitarian, clerical state which would not only purge the Jews, but force women into "gender apartheid" and smash the left and the unions. That is the lesson from Iran, 1979.

Against the demand for "a Islamic theocracy without democracy", even calling "for a democratic secular state" would be positive! Yet even that slogan was not raised by the SWP on the march. Nothing like it. Their priority was not to be "antagonistic".
Why did the left disgrace itself in such a way? For two reasons: first the left, to its shame, shares some of the politics and ideas of the Islamists; second were opportunistic reasons — wanting to go with the flow, wanting to recruit a few Arab and Asian people without confronting prejudice.

The left's use of such language [equating Zionists with Nazis] is calculated to offend every Jewish person — even those many Jews who hate Sharon and who are sympathetic to the Palestinians. Very many will have lost family in the Holocaust. All know very well the difference between the Nazis and Likud.
The parallels with the Nazis are more or less reserved for Israel. The implication is that there is something special about Jews which makes them parallel to Nazis. This is both deliberately offensive and aimed to obliterate the fact that the Holocaust is unique in history.

The SWP have also helped to picket M&S. That exposes the nakedly anti-Jewish drive in much "left" campaigning.

Generally the far-left avoids calling for consumer boycotts, instead advocating international workers' unity. The left knows that boycotts can alienate the very workers it is attempting to help (by making them unemployed). In this case, however, the left adopts the boycott campaign because it does not give a damn what the Israeli workers think; the left see the Israeli workers as "not real workers" and as part of the problem, not part of the solution.
They are not just for the Palestinians — as we are — but against the Israel too. They are not just against the actions of the Israeli government, but against the very existence of Israel.
This is not just speculation. This was the character, for example, of the Stop the War march on Palestine held in London on 26 January. It had no Islamists on it. This was a march of the left — organised by the same groups which will be marching with the PSC on 18 May. But the chants were similar — they sang: "Sharon, Hitler, you're the same/All that's different is the name." These are the reasons which we cannot back such protests. We have two choices: either to go with the flow of the left (and no-so-left) on this issue, or aggressively to assert the need for consistently democratic and socialist politics. We will take the second course.

And, seven years later, we see that the tiny bit of consistency within leftist/socialist circles that this article pushed has almost completely disappeared. The far Left, driven by an insane hatred of Jews, have embraced values from Islamists that would be anathema to orthodox socialists.

Yemen Jews desperate to go to Israel

From that Zionist paper, The National (UAE):

AMRAN, YEMEN // Jewish community members in Amran who have been living in fear following a wave of threats and hate attacks have stepped up their efforts to migrate to Israel.

“We are all fed up. All of the Jews are willing now to migrate to Israel but some prefer not to speak up their desire,” said Yahia bin Yaish, the rabbi of the Jewish community in the northern governorate of Amran, about 60km north of the capital Sana’a.

“We have faced intimidation, attacks and threats. Some have even faced hand-grenade attacks. I myself have received SMS threats on my mobile.

“We are no longer secured. We are afraid to go to the market and even at home. We have reported this to the local authorities but they are lenient with the people behind the threats,” said Mr bin Yaish.

Last week, a Jewish Yemeni family was taken to Israel in a secret airlift organised by the quasi-governmental Jewish Agency for Israel.

Said bin Yisrael, the head of the Jewish community in Rydah, and his eight children and wife arrived at Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv last Thursday following attacks and death threats.

“Said went crazy after an attack on his house with a hand grenade last December,” a Jewish Yemeni, who is believed to have orchestrated Mr bin Yisrael’s migration, said on condition of anonymity.

“He was scared for his family. He will be back for his father and brothers who are still here.”

Mr bin Yaish said his family did not want to leave Yemen.

“This is our home and we prefer to live here, even on mountains if there is security. Life here is better because we can make sure that our kids are brought up well in line with our religious teachings.”

For those who do want to leave, Mr bin Yaish said about 150 of their passport applications have been held up in Sana’a for over two months.

“Whenever we go to them, they keep telling us the computers are not working,” he said.

Moshe Yaish al Nahari, a Jewish teacher and father of nine, was shot in Rydah’s market in Amran in December.

Abdulaziz Hamud al Abdi, a former military pilot whose family claims he is mentally ill, admitted in a hearing in December that he killed al Nahari following a warning that Jews should either leave the area or convert to Islam.

Attacks and threats against Yemeni Jews in Amran governorate flared up again following Israel’s attack on the Gaza Strip.

“The offensive was in Gaza and we were blamed. Some used to threaten me, telling me to stop the war. These attacks are meant to force us to leave our houses which tribesmen want for themselves,” Mr bin Yaish said.

After al Nahari’s murder, Ali Abdullah Saleh, the president, discussed with Jewish community leaders a plan to relocate Jews from Amran to Sana’a, where each Jewish family would receive a plot of land.

The Jewish community, however, said the government has taken no action.

Government officials declined to comment.

Mahmud Taha, an Amran-based journalist who has been following the issue of Yemeni Jews, said the migration of the Jewish family to Israel was not unexpected.

“There is no option for the Yemeni Jews but to migrate. The local authorities have failed to protect them and the promises of relocation have not been serious. The Jews are fed up and have reached intolerable situation,” Taha said.

Taha said the verdict against al Abdi, which the court has set for March 2, will likely absolve the defendant on mental health grounds.

“This will drive the Jews crazy and will be a driving force for their migration,” he said.

But I thought that dhimmi Jews were honored members of Arab society, that there was no discrimination, and that Arabs aren't anti-semitic but only anti-Zionist!

Al Arabiya reported that Leonardo DiCaprio may consider converting to Judaism to please girlfriend Bar Refaeli's father before marrying her.

And the Arab commenters are freaking out.

In English:

Leonardo you better get a lawyer and a prenup these MAGGOTS are after your money.

By doing so, he will get more success in a jew dominated hollywood, but does he know that judaisam is a religion not a political party, what an idiot !

But the Arabic page is where things get to be fun:

Jews used this method for a long time to attract men from other religions to Judaism and the Jews also sell to the sex trade in the occupied territory to the adolescent youth

This new evidence of Jewish racism

Would of course religion, it is weak and climber, who would want their future security in the world of cinema, representation and Hollywood, an industry dominated by Jews, fully 100%.

How are these topics to the benefit of the Arabs and Muslims? News is trivial and meaningless news channel, landing such topics

This is part of Protocoles of Elders of Zion To controle media and celebrities

He was an atheist and I think this is the Jewish conversion is an improvement in his career I hope to one day he will enter Islam

I know you're a wonderful actor and a world star is one of the star in the film in this era, but you manipulate religion, what is the use if converted to the Jewish conviction you really a hypocrite ...... But to be honest, at least your wife shows your taste in women.

Either half to give Israel bombs to buy or phosphorus release and the rear half of the wealth of the divorce

Sure after the change of religion in Palestine and Bistotun shall have the right to confiscate land for the Palestinians

Going through the responses to the frequent readers of the many Arab and world news events, has reached a conviction that the Arab peoples (Arabs) and the people stupid deserve. They do not know do not know that they do not know and think they know, and that is the seventh heaven of dementia and his country in mind. (Morocco)

It is known that the Jews falsely claim they are God's chosen people, they do not claim to profess their religion does not accept that he is not entitled to any of the Jewish people to be as Maktkdathm

Until the Jews would not Iradw by the Dean family Valehudyp closed on children Jacob (Israel) and believe they are God's children and the rest are animals, human beings like human beings created by God to serve them no rights, as was stated in the Torah that is the constitution of Israel, and Abu the first girl who knows and believes as long as intolerant. How can you be Jewish?

Although there are some commenters who don't see a big problem with it.

(h/t HuffPo)

New LG netbook feature: Built-in Quran!

From Middle East business site AMEInfo, a press release from LG Electronics:

LG Electronics, global leader and technology innovator, provides the LG Netbook X110 equipped with Holy Quran software and with the benefits of better, faster access to information and communications technology.

The software provides e- Holy Quran in 10 different languages. Recitation of the holy Quran is by Sheikh Abdul Rehman Sudas & Sheikh Saoud Al Shuraim. This software unites the requirements of every Muslims with high technology.

LG strives to improve the religious education, academic education, connectivity and access to technology.

It will be recalled that last year LG introduced a TV with the Quran built in as well.

And Nokia provides copies of the Quran for its mobile phones as well, although they are not built-in.

Once again we are seeing a multinational company specifically endorsing a single religion.

"Gas the Jews"

On Sunday, an IDF reserves captain spoke in Holland, and before he even said a word three protesters threw shoes at him. The venue for the speech had to be changed because the original hotel received threats about hosting it, and decided in that typically European way that anyone who threatens free speech is far more important than free speech itself. But one detail in the story that got overlooked by most media reporting it:

According to Edelheit, "The Palestinian organizations learned of the change, and then a rush of emails pressured the second hotel as well. There was a protest of some 50 people outside the hotel screaming, 'Gas the Jews'."

This has become a fashionable statement among the "pro-Palestinian" crowd. Even as they insist that they are not anti-semitic, the number of times that this or similar phrases have popped up at protests is increasing. In Germany last month:

The mass anti-Israel demonstrations in Germany in January were largely organized and supported by Arab, Turkish and Palestinian groups. Left Party politicians in the Bundestag urged their members to attend the rallies, which turned into displays of Jew and Israel hatred, including calls to "gas the Jews," "Jews out of Germany," "Kill, kill Jews," and "Kill, kill Israelis."

Also in Holland:

A court in Utrecht convicted two men on Friday for chanting the slogan 'Gas the Jews' (Joden aan het gas).
The 30-year-old Ibrahim I. was sentenced to 30 hours of community service plus a suspended three-week prison sentence. The 25-year-old Mohamed B. was fined 400 euros.

In Sweden:

Police in Sweden are on heightened alert following a spike in anti-Semitic attacks around the country in the wake of Israel's campaign against Gaza-based Hamas militants. A wooden staircase at a Jewish center in Helsingborg in southern Sweden was set alight twice in three days in the past week in a blaze police suspect was caused by flammable liquid spread over the stairs, according to the Svenska Dagbladet (SvD) newspaper.

In Denmark:

A Muslim saying, "We want to kill all the Jews, all the Jews should be slain, they have no right to exist!" (at 1:10); and chants of "Khaybar, Khaybar, ya Yahoud, jaish Muhammad sawfa yaoud” -- that is, “Khaybar, Khaybar, O Jews, the army of Muhammad will return.” That chant is a reference to a celebrated incident in the life of Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, when he massacred a town full of Jewish farmers.

Mere Rhetoric has many more.

There is no question that the impetus for the less politically-correct versions of pure anti-semitism in Europe comes mostly from Muslims, but it is being not only tolerated but encouraged by the European Left. (Not that we haven't seen similar feelings in the far-Left on the other side of the Atlantic.) Certainly there have been few public calls from the European Left against Muslim anti-semitism - we have yet to see any articles from them saying "yeah, we passionately hate Zionism and Israel and consider the Jewish state to be uniquely evil in the annals of history, but calling for Jews to be gassed crosses the line." The self-described liberals cannot seem to find a problem with public calls for genocide.

Perhaps they feel that to criticize them would be an unacceptable threat to free speech. Similar to the free speech exercised by those who call up hotels to threaten them with violence for hosting, um, a speech.

"Storming" Joseph's Tomb

Every once in a while, Jews in Israel get together to pray at the Tomb of Joseph in Nablus/Shechem.

Under the Oslo Accords, Joseph's Tomb was meant to stay under Israeli control, but the IDF evacuated it in 2000 when it was immediately ransacked and burned. It has since been rebuilt.

Because of the danger involved in traveling there, those who want to visit the holy site need to go under armed protection. So once a month or so, a group of Jews will go there, usually in the middle of the night, to pray, accompanied by IDF soldiers.

Inevitably, this visit is reported in the Arab media this way:

Palestinian security sources reported on Monday that dozens of Israeli settlers backed by the army stormed the tomb of Prophet Joseph near Balata refugee camp, east of Nablus.

Eyewitnesses told Ma’an’s correspondent in Nablus that the settlers who came to the area were backed by Israeli soldiers late on Sunday, around midnight. The settlers, as reported; entered the tomb under the pretext of performing religious rituals.

The witnesses added that a number of Israeli military vehicles accompanied the buses by which settlers arrived to the area and waited two hours until they finished their rituals.

The imagery of a violent takeover of a supposed Muslim holy place, with the accompanying implicit dismissal of its importance to Jews, pretty much tells you what you need to know about the honesty of the Palestinian Arab media.

Ma'an uses the same terminology for Jews visiting the Temple Mount.

Hamas ghosts, and other Arab bedtime stories

The Jawa Report mentions bizarre Arab rumors about mysterious "white forces" who harassed the IDF in Gaza. Their article was only a tease, so I had to find the original.

I had earlier mentioned this rumor of Angels from Allah protecting Hamas terrorists in a news roundup on January 26, and variants of the story seem to be multiplying.

It was first mentioned in English at a really way-out Arab blog called Prisoner of Joy. The post, which is unintentionally hilarious, talks about these Hamas members wearing white uniforms that were only visible to Israeli soldiers:

The Israel forces broke into the house, the entire family members were huddled and forced to sit in one space, one of the sons was interrogated and asked about the identities of the Al-Qassam fighters.

The boy answered that the fighters of Al-Qassam wear black uniforms. However, the soldiers were angry instead and beat him senseless, and that happened continuously for three days. Every time he was asked, the boy replied that the fighters of Al-Qassam wear black uniforms.

In the end the soldiers were enraged and said angrily, “Hey liar! They wear white uniforms!”

These angels of Allah had a great sense of humor, playing practical jokes on the hapless IDF soldiers:

There was an ambulance driver who was stopped by the Israeli forces. He was asked of which camp he belonged to, the camp of Hamas or Fatah? And the unfortunate driver answered, “I am not from any camp, I am just an ambulance driver,” he said.

However, the Israeli forces still asked, “The group in white uniforms behind you just now, which camp did they join?” The driver was puzzled as he was sure that he did not see anyone else behind him. “I don’t know” was the only answer he could give.

Which is pretty much what one would expect an all-powerful enemy to do - why kill the soldiers when you can play hide and seek with them?

(If only Jews could see these supernatural beings, does it mean that Muslims agree that Jews are on a higher spiritual plane?)

But, who can blame the supposedly incompetent IDF for being scared? After all, as our blogger helpfully points out....

"The cost of the Israeli military aggression in Gaza at least reaches 10.5 trillion dollars," an Israel reporter said.

That's right - Ten TRILLION Dollars! Right out of the IDF soldier paychecks, coming to some half a billion per soldier! And that was stated by an Israeli reporter, so it must be true!

The same blogger has PROOF that Israel injected Arab prisoners with dangerous viruses!

And the George Bush family is not Christian, but Jewish, who study the dastardly Talmud!

Thank Allah for the Internut, or I wouldn't have learned so many fascinating facts!

Abu Dhabi in $20M deal with Israeli satellite company

From YNet:

Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates' second largest member, stands to sign a multi-million dollar deal with Israel's ImageSat International, the American Defense News magazine reported recently.

ImageSat, which is co-owned by the Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) and several private investors, owns and operates two EROS satellites, whose services will now be open to the Gulf state as well.

According to the report, Abu Dhabi and ImageSat signed their first imagery cooperation agreement back in 2006, enabling the country to subscribe to ImageSat's Eros-A satellite services. The new agreement will allow the UAE state access to images generated by Eros-B, which was launched into orbit in April of 2006.

Both satellites were manufactured by Israel – the frames by the IAI and the imagery cameras by Elbit Systems' subsidiary, Elop. The new contract is said to be worth $20 million a year.

According to the Defense News, ImageSat will allot Abu Dhabi a deciphering station and allow it to get images of pre-specified areas. The magazine further alleges that the contract will fortify Israel unofficial business ties with Abu Dhabi.

Perhaps they need to keep track of the UAE's suddenly worthless real estate.

UPDATE: Al Quds reports a new poll that 46% of the foreigners currently living in the UAE want to leave.

Let's hope that ImageSat gets paid in advance.

Another member of the Zionist Attack Zoo

Firas Press is reporting that a plague of vicious dogs has descended on Jericho, and the residents have no doubt who is behind it.

According to these "insiders," IDF dogs who are too old for work are being released into the West Bank to harass the poor Palestinian Arabs. They claim to have killed some 150 literal Zionist dogs so far, who seem to travel in packs.

Once again we must marvel at how Israel manages to train animals to distinguish between Jews in the West Bank and Palestinian Arabs.

These dogs join a long line of attack animals that Palestinian Arabs have blamed Israel for, including pigs, wolves, lions, rats and sheep.

Arab Cheesecake

I just read a brilliant post by The Other McCain on How to Get A Million Hits on Your Blog in Less than a Year. Since I have not yet gotten a million hits in four years, it sounded like this guy knows what he is doing.

Indeed he does, as he is entertaining as well as smart, and far less concerned with political correctness than I am.

Anyway, McCain has five rules on how to get more hits. My mind immediately focused on Rule 5, which is to gratuitously throw in pretty women.

But since my blog is so single-focused, I need some sort of flimsy excuse to post pictures of scantily-clad women that is consistent with my blog.

The easy way out would be to throw in pictures of hot Israeli babes, but others do that much better than I ever could.

And, let's face it, I just can't pull off the "gratuitous" part convincingly.

So, in the interests of fulfilling Rule 5 and yet keeping with my blog's themes, here is a Serious Post about Arab women.

It is easy to pigeonhole the Arab world as single-mindedly Islamist and opposed to any display of female flesh. But Egyptian, Jordanian and even Palestinian Arab newspapers will include Western-style features with models and actresses, both from the West and from the Middle East.

The PalArabic newspaper Al Quds, for example, shows this model from a recent Beirut fashion show:

Not exactly what one would find in a Hamas newspaper.

Similarly, this picture was taken at an Amman fashion show:

Not to my taste, but that ain't no chador either.

Here's one of a Lebanese actress from Firas Press:

And a final photo at Al Quds features this beauty:

OK, so maybe I'm not cut out for this type of blogging.

A few more interesting Arab articles

Arab News publishes a ridiculous analysis by a British writer trying to prove that IDF policies control everything that happens - in Pakistan.

In order to maintain its military dominance in the region, Israel has for years set about destabilizing any Muslim country that poses a threat to its dominance. Pakistan is the only Muslim country with nuclear weapons and Israel is within range. So Pakistan must be weakened to the point at which it ceases to operate militarily as a nation. Pakistan is supposed to be the West’s foremost ally in the fight against Islamic militancy, so Israel cannot attack Pakistan directly, and, if Israel did, she would certainly be defeated. So what to do? Well, two strategies come to mind: One, use America to attack Pakistan for you; and two, train and send into the border regions of Pakistan gangs of thugs willing to commit atrocities that will then be blamed on “barbaric Muslim militants”, suggesting that Pakistan has lost control of its territory to dangerous extremists and so may lose control of its nuclear weapons. Is there any evidence that these policies are being pursued by Israel in Pakistan? Yes, though regrettably my sources must remain anonymous. Perhaps the best-informed person in Afghanistan has said that he knows for sure that the Israelis are training teams in Badakhshan and are sending them into Pakistan’s border regions to commit atrocities. Two British friends who have covered Afghan wars since 1980, tell me the same thing. Rumors of Israeli-trained provocateurs amongst the tribesmen in the Khyber Agency and in Swat are rife.

There ya go!

The Egyptian Information Minister has been banning free-speech advocates from appearing in the Egyptian media, thus proving the point.

A rich UAE playboy has apparently murdered his Egyptian lover and cut her up into eight pieces, which he stuffed in the garbage. He then fled back to the Emirates.

An Egyptian editorial is upset about the Shahar Peer incident in the UAE, and offers this amazing logic:

The UAE and the Arab world as a whole have nothing against Peer; she previously played in a tournament in Doha, Qatar. Ergo, it was nothing personal. And even if it was, can the UAE really be blamed? We'll say something the Dubai organizers did not: If the refusal to issue a visa to Peer violated WTA Tour rules, was not the three-week Israeli onslaught against the Gaza Strip, which killed 1,300 Palestinians, a violation of every human right in the book?

There ya go!

Anti-Muslim video game sold in Saudi Arabia

From the Saudi Gazette:

A PlayStation game requiring players to kill Muslim characters and destroy mosques to reach higher levels is being sold to the public across the Kingdom.

A man said that he saw his son playing the game in which he had to kill Muslim characters and destroy the last mosque minaret to be a winner. The man said he bought the game from a shop in Batha in Riyadh.

The soundtrack of the game is the call for prayer, he said.

The man asked for the withdrawal of these offensive games from the Kingdom.

Last December, Sony delayed its game Little Big Planet after lines from the Qur’an were found to be included in the accompanying music. The game was scheduled to be re-programmed without the offending song – a track by Mali-born singer Toumani Diabate that contained two lines from the Qur’an. – Okaz/SG

Here's a neat example of the selective outrage that Muslims show against "insults "to Islam. A video game whose targets are Muslims and Muslim symbols barely gets any press at all, while at other times much smaller (or imaginary) provocations result in deadly rioting throughout the Muslim world.

The reason is that the Muslims aren't nearly as sensitive to insults as we think they are. They are only sensitive when the insults come from societies that they already loathe. The violent riots are not in defense of "the Prophet," they are against the West.

It all comes down, as it often does, to shame. Islam still has a self-image of being the vanguardin science, philosophy, art as well as military superiority, a position that has been in steady decline for six centuries. The world leaders in all those fields today are in the Western world. Our very existence as being pre-eminent in all these fields are a constant insult to Muslims who feel that this leadership is their right. Moreover, it is a not-so-subtle proof that Islam itself is a fundamental failure, as it envisions a world under Islamic rule that should have been completed by now.

So it is not that the occasional novel or cartoon grievously insults Islam; it is that these items remind Muslims how far they have fallen, and of their unrelented shame. The obvious reaction to being confronted with such shame is rage and violence - because Islam today is impotent to do anything constructive and stay within its ancient guidelines.

A video game found in Saudi Arabia might have been written by a Muslim apostate or maybe it was written by a Hindu and smuggled in, we don't know yet. By any objective measure, this game is far more insulting to Islam than anything that can be found in the mainstream of the West. But until the target is identified and found to belong to an already-identified enemy, there will be no huge outbreaks of outrage. The "prophet" and his god can take care of themselves, but their followers need a target for their pent-up anger, an anger that has nothing to do with defending their religion and eerything to do with reclaiming a tiny amount of relevance in a world that has passed them by.

Today's must-reads

There's really a lot of good stuff out there:

Israel Matzav has a damning look at President Obama's nominee for Director of National Intelligence, Chas Freeman. He is simply another Jimmy Carter - supporting legitimizing Hamas and blaming all of America's international problems on Israel.

Pajamas Media points out the obvious - if Iran can propel a satellite into space, it can shoot a nuclear bomb pretty much anywhere it likes worldwide. Yet the world continues to treat the prospect of Iranian nuclear ambitions as being directed "only" towards Israel.

David Bogner looks at Tzipi Livni's attempts to become Prime Minister, and is happy that such a person won't get that chance so soon.

Natan Sharansky defines modern-day anti-semitism: "Live and be hated, or die and be loved."

Sultan Knish neatly demonstrates the hypocrisy of Muslims who are so thin-skinned about "Islamophobia" but happily defend routine Muslim violations of human rights.

I used to spend lots of time dissecting the Iranian press the same way I do the Arab press today. The main reason I don't anymore is because Judeopundit does such a nice job.

The Augean Stables reproduces an article about Taqqiya, the Muslim practice of institutionalized dishonesty, by Stuart Green.

He also points to an article by James Kirchick on how the world rationalizes terrorism against Israel.

Tunnel collapse, and more PalArab news

Ma'an seems to have backtracked from its bizarre claim yesterday that a tunnel collapse was due to Egyptian "gas bombs." Three more bodies were pulled from the rubble from the illegal tunnel, and one more was found later in the day.

In other PalArab self-death news, an Arab man was stabbed to death while “sitting together in a friendly atmosphere” with pals in Qalqiya.

There are reports that Hamas stole medicine from a PA Ministry of Health storage facility last week.

George Galloway's British aid convoy for Gaza, traveling through north Africa, crossed the border from Morocco to Algeria, the first time that any traffic has crossed between the two countries in 15 years. No word on whether that means that Morocco's closing of its border with Algeria means that Algeria is "occupied" by Morocco, which is apparently the UN definition of "occupation" - even when it isn't.

The PalArab self-death count climbs to 38.

PalArab news roundup 2-21-09

Work accident! Two Hamas members were killed in another of those "mysterious explosions" in Gaza.

Tunnel accident! One died, five injured in a Rafah smuggling tunnel. Ma'an claims that Egypt had fired something called "gas bombs" but the other PalArabic press just say that they suffocated. I will not count this as a self-death yet, but if Ma'an is correct, that means that Egypt just killed a Palestinian Arab and no one cares.

"Collaborators" no more: Two Gazans were executed for being suspected of collaborating with Israel. I couldn't find any mention of an arrest or trial. It's almost as if Hamas doesn't subscribe to normal standards of behavior and human rights!

When homemade projectiles turn deadly.... A Qassam rocket, invariably described as a mere nuisance when shot against Israel, fell short in Gaza - and now it is a big deal:

Two families said narrowly escaped death when a Palestinian homemade projectile hit their apartments in Al-Farahin, east of Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip on Friday night.

The official Palestinian news agency WAFA quoted the owner of the apartments, Ahmad Abu Duqqa, as saying, “The projectile drilled through the roof causing serious damage."

"Only the heavens prevented a massacre," said Abu Duqqa, "as the projectile hit a bathroom next to my four grandchildren and their mother, who live with us after they fled their home because it is in the range of Israeli fire.”

Working to make Hamas respectable: Representatives from the Carter Center are working on reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah. They met with Hamas leaders today in Ramallah. No doubt they are trying to find ways that Hamas can keep its desire to destroy Israel but can convince Europe that they don't really mean it.

The 2009 PalArab self-death count is now at 32.

New mosque in Sri Lanka named after Arafat

Palestine Press Agency has a lengthy article about a new mosque in Sri Lanka named after the "martyr" Yassir Arafat.

In an interesting autotranslation, the article says

Ambassador Agha added that the Minister of Religious Endowments has made a statement on that occasion that he was happy with the overwhelming opening of the mosque which bears the name of the immortal martyr leader Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian suicide revolution and commander of the Palestinian national project, which has devoted his life to serving the Palestinian cause.

Do they mean that he oversaw the idea of using suicide bombers against kids in pizza shops, or that he started a suicidal Palestinian Arab movement?

And will the mosque start sporting a consistently three-day old beard?

More intrigue from Jabalya UNRWA school

The Jerusalem Post reports:

The IDF's Gaza Coordination and Liaison Administration (CLA), which earlier this week told The Jerusalem Post that 12 Palestinians were killed in the shelling near a UN school in Jabalya, north of Gaza City - and not 42 as claimed by Palestinian officials at the time - has now given the Post the names of seven of those fatalities.

The incident at the UN school was a key case in point, said the CLA's head, Col. Moshe Levi, since initial reports erroneously stating that the IDF had fired at the school, and putting the death toll at 42, were widely adopted at first by the UN and various NGOs. Earlier this month, the UN corrected its position and confirmed that the shelling and all of the fatalities had taken place outside the school compound.

Within hours of the incident on January 6, the IDF named two Hamas operatives, Immad Abu Askar and Hassan Abu Askar, as being among the dead.

Levi said nine Hamas operatives and three noncombatants died in the incident near the school. The seven names newly released by the CLA were: Ranin Abdullah Sameh, 12, Hadifa Jihad Kahloud, 17, Faris Mahmoud Faraj Allah, 21, Nafed Abu Abid, 22, Abed Muhammad Kadas, 25, Ayman Ahmad el-Khourd, 35, and Basem Abdel Gabin, 40.

The CLA would not specify how it had obtained the names. Officials said these names were being checked and categorized as combatants or noncombatants.

This sentence doesn't make much sense - if they already announced that 9 of them were combatants and three civilian, why don't they know which of the names are in each category?

But the next sentence is more intriguing:

On the day of the incident, officials further said, officers from the CLA contacted the Palestinian Health Ministry and were told that three Palestinian civilians had been killed and that Hamas was hiding the identities of the remaining casualties.

If the Palestinian Health Ministry never claimed the initial count of 42 deaths, then who did? The UN said 30, and PCHR said 27 civilians, so it wasn't either of them. Was this just another case of some reporter or bystander making up a number and having the world believe them without question? And if so, how many other times has this sort of thing happened?

And if the IDF turns out to be correct - and so far, they are the only ones to release names of the victims - then we have solid proof that the UN and PCHR are not reliable. All the other groups need to do to prove the IDF wrong would be to give us their own list of more than 12 victims.

PalArab news roundup 2-20-09

For the third time in two months, someone opened fire at the Fatah newspaper headquarters Al Hayat al-Jadida. And for the third time, Ma'an tries to imply that it came from a Jewish settlement, not from the many Hamas supporters in the West Bank.

An illegal fuel pipeline between Egypt and Gaza exploded, injuring two on the Egyptian side; the fire is still burning.

Islamic Jihad claims to have shot at a "settler" car on the West Bank.

Ten mortar shells shot from Gaza this morning. A rocket launched today was claimed by the "Hezbollah Brigades" of Gaza.