Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Palestinian Arab "refugees" wouldn't be citizens of "Palestine" - even if they live there!

Did you think that 63 years of Arabs using the "refugees" as political pawns would end if there was a Palestinian Arab state?

If you want to know the depths of cynicism of the Palestinian Arab leadership towards their people, you must read this article in The Daily Star Lebanon:

Palestinian refugees will not become citizens of a new Palestinian state, according to Palestine’s ambassador to Lebanon.

From behind a desk topped by a miniature model of Palestine’s hoped-for blue United Nations chair, Ambassador Abdullah Abdullah spoke to The Daily Star Wednesday about Palestine’s upcoming bid for U.N. statehood.

The ambassador unequivocally says that Palestinian refugees would not become citizens of the sought for U.N.-recognized Palestinian state, an issue that has been much discussed. “They are Palestinians, that’s their identity,” he says. “But … they are not automatically citizens.”

This would not only apply to refugees in countries such as Lebanon, Egypt, Syria and Jordan or the other 132 countries where Abdullah says Palestinians reside. Abdullah said that “even Palestinian refugees who are living in [refugee camps] inside the [Palestinian] state, they are still refugees. They will not be considered citizens.”

Let's read that again, shall we?

"Even Palestinian refugees who are living in [refugee camps] inside the [Palestinian] state, they are still refugees. They will not be considered citizens."

People who live in camps in their own state would be barred, by their own leaders, from becoming citizens of that very state!

Why? Because, to Palestinian Arab leaders, the "refugees" are not an oppressed group who must be helped. They are human weapons in a never ending war against Israel. Giving them citizenship removes their status as weapons.

The most important issue to the Palestinian Arab leadership is not to end the suffering of their people, or achieving independence. It is to destroy Israel, using the nonexistent "right of return." Nothing could be more obvious - yet most of the world refuses to believe that Mahmoud Abbas and his cronies could possibly be so indescribably cruel and callous to their own people.

Abdullah said that the new Palestinian state would “absolutely not” be issuing Palestinian passports to refugees.

Neither this definitional status nor U.N. statehood, Abdullah says, would affect the eventual return of refugees to Palestine. “How the issue of the right of return will be solved I don’t know, it’s too early [to say], but it is a sacred right that has to be dealt with and solved [with] the acceptance of all.” He says statehood “will never affect the right of return for Palestinian refugees.”

The right of return that Abdullah says is to be negotiated would not only apply to those Palestinians whose origins are within the 1967 borders of the state, he adds. “The state is the 1967 borders, but the refugees are not only from the 1967 borders. The refugees are from all over Palestine. When we have a state accepted as a member of the United Nations, this is not the end of the conflict. This is not a solution to the conflict. This is only a new framework that will change the rules of the game.”

And make it easier for Palestinian Arabs to achieve their real goal - the end of the Jewish state.

For 63 years, three generations of Palestinian Arabs are being brought up being told that they must return to a non-existent state that their ancestors came from, and nothing else is acceptable. And the potential establishment of a Palestinian Arab state would ironically make their wishes to become citizens even more remote.

If there is to be a Palestinian Arab uprising, it should be against leaders like these who are happy to tell their own people to stay in hell - and to be happy about it.

(h/t Effector)

Israeli youth plan to storm Egyptian embassy - with love

Israeli youth have responded via Facebook to the mob that attacked the Israeli embassy in Cairo - by calling for a demonstration of love and peace tomorrow outside the Egyptian embassy in Tel Aviv.

From the page:

It is very easy to rise up and be angry after the incident at the Israeli embassy in Egypt; it was a case of extreme violence that has no place and should be condemned. The Egyptian people, especially its younger generation, are in a period of identity crisis, after the coup. They are trying to find their place and vent their frustrations after many years of suffering. At the same time also here we have a generation that wants to live in a a fair and better world that opposes hatred and tyranny and that fights for the basic rights and a deep desire to live a better life in a better world ... It's time we stop hating based on money and religion. We all want a better world, and it will happen only if we do it together! Let's put out a call to the Egyptian people of peace and love, and tell them that we don't want to fight them or hate them. On the contrary, we want to live as good neighbors with love, and together make life in the Middle East and the world better.... Let's show them our real faces, and perhaps open their minds .. Friday, 12:30, show love and support peace at the Egyptian Embassy.

This initiative is being appreciated by many Egyptians, some of whom are writing messages of support on the Facebook page and on Twitter.

It was also written up in Al Masry al Youm. (A few of the talkbacks are a bit more cynical, thinking this is a Jewish ploy.)

Al Quds al Arabi editor, and BBC darling, was on Gaddafi's payroll

Abdel Bari Atwan, editor in chief of pan-Arab daily Al Quds al Arabi who often appears on the BBC and CNN, has been a big supporter of terror attacks on Israel. From Wikipedia:

Speaking about Iran's nuclear capability in an interview on Lebanese television in June 2007, Atwan stated, "If the Iranian missiles strike Israel, by Allah, I will go to Trafalgar Square and dance with delight."

In March 2008, Atwan said that the Mercaz HaRav shooting, in which a Palestinian gunmen killed eight students (aged 15 to 26), "was justified." He added that the Mercaz HaRav yeshiva is responsible for "hatching Israeli extremists and fundamentalists" and that the celebrations in Gaza following the attack symbolized "the courage of the Palestinian nation."

Atwan described the the attacks on Israelis in Eilat as correcting "the course of the Arab revolutions and refocused them on the most dangerous disease, namely the Israeli tyranny. This disease is the cause of all the defects that have afflicted the region for the past 65 years."

He seems to be one of those people who speak differently in Arabic and in English:

Following an October 2003 article in which Atwan claimed that the U.S. is to blame for the Arab world's hatred of it, a Yemenite journalist and columnist for the London Arabic-language daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, Munir Al-Mawari, stated: "The Abd Al-Bari Atwan [appearing] on CNN is completely different from the Abdel Bari Atwan on the Al-Jazeera network or in his Al-Quds Al-Arabi daily. On CNN, Atwan speaks solemnly and with total composure, presenting rational and balanced views. This is in complete contrast with his fuming appearances on Al-Jazeera and in Al-Quds Al-Arabi, in which he whips up the emotions of multitudes of viewers and readers."

In response to Atwan's legitimization of the Mercaz HaRav shooting in March 2008, Lior Ben-Dor, a spokesman at the Israeli Embassy in London, said: "The problem is that when addressing the British public, he tends to hide his true opinions and ideology - his support for terror and the murder of civilians. This article reveals Atwan's real colors, a supporter of fundamentalism and terror, and hence he should be treated accordingly."

He has also been a big critic of the Libyan uprising:

On 17th April 2011, speaking on BBC News Channel's Dateline London, Atwan claimed that "We know that Eastern area of Libya is almost a hotbed of extremist Al-Qaeda people. I know that personally".

It appears that his opinions on Libya were a bit...tainted.

Arabic media has been reporting that the new Libyan government has released documents showing that Atwan, as well as Jordanian Al-Dostour reporter Khairy Mansour, were being paid by Gaddafi a sum of $3000 every month.

Atwan vehemently denies it and is threatening to sue everyone who makes these accusations.

Saudi Embassy in Egypt was also attacked last weekend!

From Sky News:

Not many people know this, but the Israeli Embassy was not the only one attacked in Cairo last weekend.

The Embassy of Saudi Arabia was also stormed by a mob. Strangely the Egyptian media mostly kept quiet about it. The Muslim Brotherhood, which welcomed the assault on the 'murderous Nazi Jewish invaders' had nothing to say about the Saudi incident.

Several cars were set alight but there was only minor damage to the building. however, it begs the question - why the Saudi Embassy?

...The spark which led to the weekend's violence came in the first week of September when thousands of Egyptians were trapped in Jeddah airport while trying to return home after undertaking the minor pilgrimage of the Umrah.

The Egyptians claim they were deliberately held back for days because of the January uprising against Mubarak. Some said officials insulted them and referred to the ongoing trial of the former President.

Tempers flared and Jeddah airport was treated to the unprecedented scene of a mass protest in the terminal. The final insult came as the Egyptians arrived back in Cairo to discover that hundreds of pieces of luggage were missing.

The violence of Friday/Saturday has not been repeated, but there have been smaller peaceful protests outside the embassy demanding the Ambassador leave the country.

Indeed, the Saudi ambassador to Egypt complained, saying that he was assaulted, a number of Saudi embassy vehicles were burned and people tried to break into his embassy.

The BBC notes Egyptian anti-semitism

From the BBC' s Thomas Dinham:

...A strong and sometimes violent dislike of Israel is a fact of Egyptian life, something I was unfortunate enough to discover after a cross-border raid by Israel killed several Egyptian security personnel.

The Israelis had been chasing a group of gunmen who had attacked an Israeli bus close to the border between the two countries.

While walking in the street someone pushed me from behind with such force that I nearly fell over.

Turning around, I found myself surrounded by five men, one of whom tried to punch me in the face. I stopped the attack by pointing out how shameful it was for a Muslim to assault a guest in his country, especially during Ramadan.

Relieved that a seemingly random assault was over, I was appalled by the apology offered by one of my assailants. "Sorry," he said contritely, offering his hand, "we thought you were a Jew."

Shaking his head in disbelief on hearing the news, an Egyptian friend sympathised: "That's stupid, you are obviously not a Jew."

The chilling implication I was left with was that, had I been Jewish, the assault would have apparently been justified.

(h/t Challah Hu Akbar)

PalArab historical revisionism, philatelic edition

From AFP:

At the headquarters of the Palestinian postal service in the West Bank city of Ramallah, excitement is growing over the bid to see UN membership for a Palestinian state.

The post office has already inked a deal to begin extricating its delivery system from Israeli supervision, and is eagerly preparing for the reality that could emerge after the Palestinians go to the United Nations next week to seek full membership for their state.

... The new system might seem like a small step, but the postal service considers it enough of a revolution to be issuing a new logo with the words: "We emerge again."

Again? Was there an Arab-run Palestine post office in the past?

Of course not. The postal system in Palestine before 1948 was run by the British. Somehow, I don't think Arabs would have issued a stamp that looked like this, showing Rachel's Tomb:

AFP also writes:

The postal service is also planning to switch the currency marked on its stamps from the Jordanian dinar to the Palestinian pound, which existed before Israel's establishment in 1948, though it is no longer in circulation.

As CAMERA notes linking to an older post of mine, the Palestinian pound was also British currency with Hebrew and Arabic written on it:

By the way, while looking for stamps I came up with this beauty from Jordan n 1964:

Jordan embassy protests scheduled for 6:30 PM in Amman

The "million man" protest scheduled by Jordanian Islamists and anti-Zionists is scheduled for 6:30 PM Jordan time - 11:30 AM EDT.

JPost reports:

A senior official in the Foreign Ministry said that the security assurances from Jordan have reduced fears of a serious attack against the embassy, Israel Radio reported Thursday, despite evacuations of the mission on Wednesday evening.

The evacuation occurred hours before a Facebook organized march under the banner (in Arabic) of "No Zionist embassy on Jordanian territory."

Unlike in Egypt, where diplomats lived with their families, in Amman the Israeli delegation serves without their families, and comes home for weekends.

On Facebook and Twitter, the evacuation of the ambassador is already being celebrated as a victory.

The next few hours will be interesting.

Zionist colonialism extends to outer space!

First those colonial Israelis wanted to send their pernicious Zio-objects to the moon.

Now, these expansionist Zionists are setting their sights to even farther reaches of the solar system:

Boaz Ron-Zohar, a high-school physics teacher from the Western Galilee, has officially identified an asteroid previously unknown to the scientific community. Ron-Zohar discovered the asteroid in July, while conducting a research project with Israeli high-school students as part of the international Faulkes Telescope Project. Ron-Zohar and his students are now requesting the Israeli public's help in naming the asteroid.

What name would upset the anti-Israel crowd the most?

Leftist code-word: "Justice" means destroying Israel

This week, an anti-Israel group bought some ads in New York subways:

New York City subways have recently started to display advertisements calling for the end of US military aid to Israel, deliberately coinciding with the United Nations General Assembly sessions next week.

The 25 posters in 18 Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens and Bronx subway stations are part of a mass transit advertising campaign by Be On Our Side to remedy what the advertisements call “the flawed and skewed representation in mainstream media” of Israeli-Palestinian relations.

The small print says that the New York ads were paid by The Wespac Foundation.

Its website has articles that say that Mahmoud Abbas is a secret Zionist agent. Another posting, from September 2010 when Israel had frozen construction in the territories and the US was seeking to get the PLO back to the negotiating table, quotes the "Palestinian community" in rejecting negotiations with Israel.

This campaign was done in conjunction with Jewish Voice for Peace, the fanatically anti-Israel movement that supports a full set of boycotting, divestment and sanctions against Israel.

But look at the alleged photos of Palestinian Arabs and Israelis who want "peace and justice"! Who could be against such noble goals?

When people hear the word "peace," they usually associate it with the kind of peace that is agreed upon by two or more parties in order for them to live together in harmony. Such a peace requires, by definition, compromise on both sides. This is how marriages work, this is how businesses cooperate, this is how nations work together. This kind of peace comes through negotiations and good will on the part of both parties.

But when the word "justice" is added to the formula, people mean something quite different. Invariably, a demand for "justice" is not a call for negotiations or compromise; it is a call for an imposed solution where one side wins and the other loses.

Justice means there is a right and a wrong, not that both parties have valid claims. Justice in the context of international conflicts demands that one party be seen as pure and good and the other as oppressive and evil.

The word "justice" is a code word that is used by anti-Israel organizations to act as a cover to destroying Israel and denying the Jewish people the right to self-determination.

The concept of "justice" is used (by groups such as "Students for Justice in Palestine" and many others) to claim that Palestinian Arabs have the only historic claim to the area, that Jews are Western colonialists, that Palestinian Arab suffering is solely the responsibility of Israel, that the descendants of Palestinian Arabs have the "right" to "return" to Israel and destroy the state demographically. Very often these same ""peace" groups will say that "justice" demands a Palestinian Arab right to terrorism ("armed resistance") as well.

If it was real "justice" they were after, they would demand that Jews continue to live in Gush Etzion and the entire Old City of Jerusalem where they were expelled in 1948. They would demand that Jordan compensate Israel for the destruction of dozens of synagogues in a single month. They would demand that residents of Sderot and Ashkelon be reimbursed by Hamas for the money spent on building rocket shelters. They would demand that convicted terrorists remain in jail for their full terms, and that Gilad Shalit be released immediately with no preconditions. They would demand payment of billions of dollars from Arab countries that expelled hundreds of thousands of Jews for the property they seized. They would demand that Jews be allowed to live in their historic homeland that they have always planned to return to. They would demand that the US stop funding a Palestinian Authority that praises terrorists and pays salaries to murderers in prison.

In order to have a true peace, there cannot be a demand for a one-sided and twisted version of "justice." That demand is completely antithetical to real peace between two parties, when each side has claims on the other that can never be reconciled.

In other words, the phrase "peace and justice" is an oxymoron in the way that it is being used by anti-Israel activists like this. They cunningly use a term with universally positive connotations, justice, and twist it to mean accepting the false narrative of only one party and the absolute defeat of the other.

There is no advertising-friendly way to expose the contradiction between what these Israel haters try to imply by using the term "peace and justice." A poster like the one pictured above goes straight into one's subconscious thought, associating peace with abandoning one side of the conflict.

Yes, a poster with smiling families and that calls for universally supported themes can be a cover for pure hate.

Similar campaigns have been answered pretty effectively with counter-campaigns that show that peace is impossible with people who raise their kids to love terror.

And Divest This! came up with a nice parody poster:

So I figured I have to join the party, with a poster showing what they are really after:

Will a popular uprising begin in Algeria this Saturday? (updated)

There's a Facebook page that started last month calling for a Day of Anger in Algeria on September 17th.

This event mostly slipped under everyone's radar, but the Algerian government is taking no chances. So, of course, it announced that the September 17 movement is orchestrated by Zionists.

The Algerian Minister of Interior and Local Government, Dahou Ould Kablia said that foreign parties are involved in order to cause unrest in Algeria September 17. The survey conducted by security services, confirmed a general reluctance on these malicious calls from foreign parties whose purpose is to destabilize the country.

In a statement to Ennahar, Ould Kablia said that the authorities, who surveyed the streets of Algeria, through social networking sites, like Facebook, have concluded that there was no impact of these nuisance calls on the Algerians. On the contrary, many people, especially youth, organize to combat these ideas by calling for wisdom and mobilization in order to bar the way to any attempt to destabilize the country.

According to the Minister of Interior, "the appeals find no echo and there will be no demonstrations or disturbances at that precise date."

Responding to a question as to the results of the survey which was conducted by the security services, to reach the authors of this appeal, Ould Kablia said that they were foreign parties, given the date chosen which coincides with the Camp David and also with the events of Sabra and Shatila. It is, in his view, a Zionist plan against Algeria. "If it was the work of people inside the country, we would have unmasked and arrested them, but the clues point us to foreign parties in relation to the Zionist entity."

They even came up with a theory as to who is behind this entire enterprise: French philosopher Bernard Henri Levy:

The date of September 17, 2011 of the alleged revolution in Algeria, to which call hundreds of Facebook and Internet users as the French journalist of Jewish origin, Bernard Henri Levy, for the overthrow of the regime in Algeria, coincides with the same day when Napoleon III had trampled Algerian soil. The choice of the date by the French philosopher is not accidental. According to an article by Daniel R. published in the French magazine “Histoire” in January 1991, Napoleon III came to Algeria September 17, 1760 [sic]. He dreamed of creating a Jewish state stretching from Algiers to Baghdad, under a French protectorate.

So the date chosen by the French writer and journalist Levy, of Jewish origins, and his consorts fans of Napoleon Bonaparte, those who belong to the new philosophical movement whose slogan "liberation of nations from domination" and follow a new modern way, using the youth of the Arab countries, and Algerians in particular, by encouraging them to revolt; a way to re-colonize these nations and put their people once again under the boots of Napoleon Bonaparte.

(UPDATE): T34 found an article about Napoleon III by Daniel Rivet in L'Historie, but it says nothing about him wanting to create a Jewish state. In fact, he wanted to create an Arab kingdom, with equal rights for all, although under the protection of France. And it does appear that he indeed came to Algeria on September 17th, 1860.

Chances are that this Saturday's actions will fizzle as the Algerian government is already on the offensive to stop the uprising before it starts. As always in the Muslim world, "Zionists" provide the pretext.

Ha'aretz changes headline to make PLO sound less anti-semitic

Google's news cache shows a Ha'aretz headline that says

PLO Official: Palestinian state to be free of Jews

Even the URL of this link shows the headline:

http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/plo-official-palestinian-state-to-be-free-of-jews-1.384493

But when you try to go to that link you get redirected to a new page, with a new headline, and even a new URL!

As we have shown, the first headline is completely accurate - and is consistent with statements that Areikat made last year. Even the Ha'aretz article itself - which does not appear to have been changed - makes that clear.

But Ha'aretz is so heavily invested in the false meme that the Palestinian Arab leadership wants to have peace with Israel that they couldn't stomach that original, accurate headline that showed that their idea of "peace" is the ethnic cleansing of all Jews from "Palestine."

A Ha'aretz editor decided to tone it down, so as not to offend the delicate sensibilities of Ha'aretz readers who have come to expect a certain kind of news that conforms to a pre-existing viewpoint.

(h/t Reb Mordechai of Chelm)

Ahmadinejad rants at Zionist pharmaceuticals

From Iran's FARS agency:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad blamed the world Zionists for commercializing and misusing the pharmaceutical knowledge, and called for the revival of traditional medicine.

"The Zionist and western capital holders have changed all human and cultural concepts in the world so widely that treatment is completely considered as a business in the world today," Ahmadinejad said in a meeting with the World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Director, Hassan Abdolrazzaq Jazzayeri, in Tehran on Tuesday night.

He underlined the high potentials of different natural herbs in curing different diseases and treating people, and said, "We should try to revive our own traditional medicine."

I agree 100%. Iranians should be using their own natural herbs to combat cancer, Alzheimer's, and AIDS.

Not to mention impotence.

Who is the US partnering with on counter-terrorism? Turkey!

From The State Department:

As stated in President Obama’s National Counterterrorism Strategy, the U.S. is committed to strengthening the global counterterrorism (CT) architecture in a manner that complements and reinforces the CT work of existing multilateral bodies. The Administration’s signature initiative in this area is the Global Counterterrorism Forum (GCTF), which is intended to ensure the necessary international architecture is in place to address 21st century challenges.

The U.S. proposed the creation of the GCTF to address the evolving terrorist threat in a way that would bring enduring benefits by helping frontline countries and affected regions acquire the means to deal with threats they face. It is based on a recognition that the U.S. alone cannot eliminate every terrorist or terrorist organization. Rather, the international community must come together to assist countries as they work to confront the terrorist threat.

The 30 founding members of the GCTF are: Algeria, Australia, Canada, China, Colombia, Denmark, Egypt, the European Union, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Morocco, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

The GCTF will consist of a strategic-level Coordinating Committee, co-chaired initially by the United States and Turkey; five thematic and regional expert-driven working groups; and a small administrative unit that the U.S. will host for the first few years.

Official Launch: The GCTF will be launched officially in New York at the level of foreign ministers on the margins of the upcoming UN General Assembly meetings in September 2011. In addition to adopting the GCTF’s founding documents (a political declaration and terms of reference) and short speeches from the Co-Chairs (the U.S. and Turkey) and other GCTF members, the event will include the announcement of two concrete deliverables, thus highlighting the GCTF’s practical, action-oriented focus from the outset.

It is the ultimate in multilateralism - when fighting terrorists, include countries that support and sponsor terrorists!

Barry Rubin has lots more.

More from the announcement:

In addition, the Global Survivors Network will premiere a short film of interviews of survivors of terrorism from around the globe. The film will depict the different ways in which survivors are now helping to prevent terrorism by speaking out against violent extremist ideologies.

Do you think that this film mentions a single Israeli victim of terror? One only needs to look at the list of members of this esteemed forum to know the answer without bothering to watch it.

It reminds me of this insightful piece last week by Marty Peretz at TNR.

I wish it would be historically possible—that is, historically honest—for Israel to be omitted from the long list of target countries that have been the victims of terrorism. Alas, it is not. But President Obama has a habit of making such lists, and he always fails to include Israel (or anyplace within its borders) as a target of this distinctive and most vicious form of warfare.

And he brings examples.

Latest Syrian torture video

This video, bouncing today around Syrian opposition websites and Al Arabiya, shows what is said to be a teenager being forced to kneel before and worship a photograph of Bashir Assad. He refuses and spits on the picture.

I have no doubt that there is such cruelty, but I cannot vouch for the authenticity of the video.

Israeli report on PA economy contradicts World Bank

The World Bank came out with a report on the Palestinian Arab economy a couple of days ago. Among its major points was this one:

Economic growth in WB&G has slowed down in 2011, and together with the shortfall in external financing, this has led to a fiscal crisis for the PA. No significant easing of Israeli restrictions has taken place in 2011, so that the Palestinian private sector’s potential remains thwarted. In addition, the PA’s inability to pay its bills to suppliers in a timely manner has hurt business confidence. Though the PA has sought to reduce its need for external assistance, lower economic growth and lower-than-expected donor assistance have resulted in an acute fiscal crisis. The crisis has meant that the PA is now also struggling to meet its wage payment obligations.

Everyone agrees that the PA is too heavily dependent on donor money in the public sector and that the private sector is the key to any chance for economic independence for the PA.

Even Israel.

In a new report released by the Government of Israel, it says:

The PA now faces a financial crisis. The factors fueling the crisis include: the Palestinian budget’s ongoing dependency on foreign aid and the shortfall in aid in 2011; the PA’s inability to finance the shortfall through bank loans; the lack of sufficient internal resources to generate income; and a relatively large public sector which consumes a large portion of the budget.

But contrary to the World Bank's assertion that Israel does nothing to help the private sector of the PA economy, Israel's report details a large number of initiatives done in the past year:

According to data collected by Israel's Ministry of Finance, trade between Israel and the PA continued to grow by 7% during H1 of 2011. Overall Israeli sales to the PA grew by 8% while overall Israeli purchases from the PA grew by 2%. The total volume of bilateral trade exceeded NIS 7.5 billon in the first half of the 2011.

The number of permits for traders has been increased by 1,000 and is currently 16,000.24

A growing number of Israelis are now entering Area A in order to procure goods and services. They provide a significant contribution to the Palestinian economy in the West Bank.25

According to data issued by the Israel Customs Directorate, in the first half of 2011, Palestinian imports (except Israel) amounted to NIS 3,127,395,640, a 17.44% increase compared to the parallel period in the previous year. Palestinian exports (except Israel) amounted to USD 45,458,095 in the first half of 2011, a 23% increase compared to the parallel period in the previous year.

Palestinian employment in Israel is one of the West Bank economy's major sources of income. According to the PCBS, compensation for employees in Israel in 2009 totaled USD 627 million, more than 9% of the West Bank GDP. The increasing importance of Palestinian employment in Israel is due to the high wages earned in the Israeli economy, and to the Israeli policy of increasing the number of employment permits (see below). Notably, the increase in the share of permit holders among employees in Israel is one of the reasons for the increase in the wages.

As of September 1, 2011, the number of West Bank Palestinians employed in Israel stood at 29,851. The maximum number of employment permits for Palestinians working in Israel, which amounts to 36,650, is not utilized in full. The number of Palestinians employed by Israelis in the West Bank is 24,503.

In 2011, Israel increased the number of permits for both seasonal and permanent employment of Palestinians from the West Bank in Israel. Working permits were issued as follows:

o Construction – 4,000 new permanent permits.

o Agriculture – 1,250 new permanent permits, 3,000 seasonal olive harvest permits for families39, 750 seasonal almond picking permits for families.

The validity of employment permits for factories and industrial zones in the West Bank was extended from six months to one year.

9% of the PA's GDP comes from Arabs working in Israel...and Israel is increasing the number of permits. Similarly, even though some 90% of the PA's exports go to Israel, there was a huge increase of exports to other markets. And Israel is facilitating this growth.

I'm not sure whether the 9% figure includes those who are working in Judea and Samaria communities, but any way you look at it the PA's push to stop workers from being employed by Jews in the territories would have a major negative impact on the PA economy.

The World Bank did not mention any of this, nor other Israeli moves to help the PA economy like upgrading crossings, transferring frequencies to the Wataniya Telecom Company and giving West Bank IDs to Gazans who live there.

The World Bank report seems to spin the truth; it will combine the West Bank and Gaza when convenient and separate them when that would make Israel look worse. But here we see that it simply ignores direct Israeli contributions to helping grow the PA's private sector.

Now, why might that be?

(I updated the font and colors after people complained that it was a bit too hard to read.)

PLO ambassador confirms: Palestine would be Judenrein

From USA Today:

The Palestine Liberation Organization's ambassador to the United States said Tuesday that any future Palestinian state it seeks with help from the United Nations and the United States should be free of Jews.

"After the experience of the last 44 years of military occupation and all the conflict and friction, I think it would be in the best interest of the two people to be separated," Maen Areikat, the PLO ambassador, said during a meeting with reporters sponsored by The Christian Science Monitor. He was responding to a question about the rights of minorities in a Palestine of the future.

Such a state would be the first to officially prohibit Jews or any other faith since Nazi Germany, which sought a country that was judenrein, or cleansed of Jews, said Elliott Abrams, a former U.S. National Security Council official.

Was he misquoted? Could he have really said "Israelis" or "Zionists"?

Nope. Areikat was interviewed in Tablet last year and said this explicitly:

So, you think it would be necessary to first transfer and remove every Jew—

Absolutely. No, I’m not saying to transfer every Jew, I’m saying transfer Jews who, after an agreement with Israel, fall under the jurisdiction of a Palestinian state.

Any Jew who is inside the borders of Palestine will have to leave?

Absolutely. I think this is a very necessary step, before we can allow the two states to somehow develop their separate national identities, and then maybe open up the doors for all kinds of cultural, social, political, economic exchanges, that freedom of movement of both citizens of Israelis and Palestinians from one area to another. You know you have to think of the day after.

About two thirds of the nations of the world represented in the United Nations supports the establishment of a state that is, by definition, anti-semitic.

It would not just an "apartheid" state - it would be a state whose very basis would be the ethnic cleansing of every single Jewish man, woman and child.

We should be hearing the outraged condemnations from human rights groups any minute now. Of course.

Erdogan calls for a secular state, upsets the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt

Palestine Press Agency reports that the Muslim Brotherhood and other Egyptian Islamist parties are very upset at one sentence in Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan's speech in Cairo yesterday where he said "I call on Egyptians to build a secular Egypt."

They are complaining that Erdogan is interfering in Egypt's internal affairs.

Some believe it was a mistranslation from Turkish to Arabic, and others are saying that when Erdogan says "secular" he doesn't mean it in the normal sense but he was really speaking to his constituents at home.

PalArab statehood bid unilateral - even within the PLO!

A quick rundown of Palestinian Arab politics:

The Palestinian Authority is the supposedly democratic institution that has administrative and some security responsibilities over sections of the West Bank.
Fatah is the terror group/ political party that dominates the PA.
Hamas is the terror group/political party that controls Gaza.
In the last election, Hamas took over the PA but then the PA's president gave the power back to Fatah.
The PA's president, Mahmoud Abbas, is also the leader of Fatah and of the PLO.
Abbas has been president of the PA well past the date that elections were due to be held. Hamas does not recognize him as president of the PA.
The PA works for the PLO. It is not independent at all.
The PA has no ability to engage in international diplomacy, only the PLO speaks to the international community concerning "Palestine."
Hamas, which controls some 40% of the Arabs in the territories, opposes the bid.
The PLO has a Palestinian National Council that is supposedly its main legislative body. It has not met since 2009.
The PNC chooses the PLO Executive Committee which is the main executive branch of the PLO.
The two groups are somewhat incestuous, as the Executive Committee is the main group that nominates candidates for the PNC and the Executive Committee is elected by the PNC.
The PLO is supposedly the party that is bringing the unilateral statehood bid to the UN.

All of this is necessary to understand the irony of this news story:

PLO central council member Nabil Amr said Tuesday that the Palestinian request for full UN membership is not a "bid" but rather a diplomatic activity.

The former ambassador to Egypt expressed reservations over the plan to seek state membership of the United Nations at the annual General Assembly meeting in New York, which opens on Monday.

...Regarding the PLO, Amr said members of the PLO executive committee "knew nothing" about what the Palestinian leadership was doing and had "no real, effective role."

If this is true, it means that the UN bid is not legal according to the PLO's own rules. The PNC never voted to approve the UN bid, and it is supposed to make all policy decisions.

The only conclusion?

Mahmoud Abbas is a totalitarian dictator, and the current UN bid is being led by someone who cannot even abide by the rules of the organizations he heads.

Richard Falk freaks over Palmer, lies as usual, says Israel has no right to self defense

From Reuters:

Israel's naval blockade of the Gaza Strip violates international law, a panel of human rights experts reporting to a U.N. body said on Tuesday, disputing a conclusion reached by a separate U.N. probe into Israel's raid on a Gaza-bound aid ship.

The so-called Palmer Report on the Israeli raid of May 2010 that killed nine Turkish activists said earlier this month that Israel had used unreasonable force in last year's raid, but its naval blockade of the Hamas-ruled strip was legal.

A panel of five independent U.N. rights experts reporting to the U.N. Human Rights Council rejected that conclusion, saying the blockade had subjected Gazans to collective punishment in "flagrant contravention of international human rights and humanitarian law."

It is not until paragraph 10 that we find out the name of one of these "experts" - Richard Falk!

Richard Falk, U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories and one of the five experts who issued Tuesday's statement, said the Palmer report's conclusions were influenced by a desire to salve Turkish-Israeli ties.

Ah, Richard Falk. A man who is a the proven liar and twister of international law who explicitly supports terror against Israel and compares Israel to Nazis is opining about the impartiality of someone else's report.

But let's look at the legal arguments of his team. Their press release says:

“In pronouncing itself on the legality of the naval blockade, the Palmer Report does not recognize the naval blockade as an integral part of Israel’s closure policy towards Gaza which has a disproportionate impact on the human rights of civilians,” stressed the experts.

“As a result of more than four years of Israeli blockade, 1.6 million Palestinian women, men and children are deprived of their fundamental human rights and subjected to collective punishment, in flagrant contravention of international human rights and humanitarian law,” they said. “Israel’s siege of Gaza is extracting a human price that disproportionately harms Palestinian civilians.”

Their main argument in this press release is that Israel's naval blockade cannot be separated from its closure of Gaza. Yet Palmer addresses this issue head-on, in paragraph 70:

At this juncture, a word of clarification is necessary. The naval blockade is often discussed in tandem with the Israeli restrictions on the land crossings to Gaza. However, in the Panel’s view, these are in fact two distinct concepts which require different treatment and analysis. First, we note that the land crossings policy has been in place since long before the naval blockade was instituted. 239 In particular, the tightening of border controls between Gaza and Israel came about after the take-over of Hamas in Gaza in June 2007. 240 On the other hand, the naval blockade was imposed more than a year later, in January 2009. 241 Second, Israel has always kept its policies on the land crossings separate from the naval blockade. The land restrictions have fluctuated in intensity over time 242 but the naval blockade has not been altered since its imposition. Third, the naval blockade as a distinct legal measure was imposed primarily to enable a legally sound basis for Israel to exert control over ships attempting to reach Gaza with weapons and related goods. 243 This was in reaction to certain incidents when vessels had reached Gaza via sea. 244 We therefore treat the naval blockade as separate and distinct from the controls at the land crossings. This is not to overlook that there may be potential overlaps in the effects of the naval blockade and the land crossings policy. 245 They will be addressed when appropriate. Likewise, the restrictions on the land crossings to Gaza are part of the context of our investigation, and our recommendations in Chapter 6 address the situation there. 246 But the legal elements of the naval blockade are analyzed on their own.

As usual, Israel bashers ignore the substance of the argument and just use repeated assertions as proof. These "international law experts" cannot marshal a single argument against Palmer so they resort to calling themselves experts and assuming that people are too stupid to actually compare the arguments.

But Falk himself is even more deceptive. He just co-wrote an article that also attacks Palmer and pretends to address the legality of Israel's naval blockade.

The most significant finding of the report is its most dangerous and legally dubious: the conclusion that Israel’s blockade of Gaza, in effect since mid-2007, was somehow, despite being severely harmful to the 1.5 million Palestinians living in Gaza, a legitimate act of self-defense.

The word "blockade" has a very specific legal meaning, and almost always refers specifically to a naval blockade (sometimes air.) When Falk says that Israel's "blockade" started in 2007 he knows he is lying - it started in 2009, during the Gaza war.

Falk then says something that would be considered incredible if he already hadn't made a career of trampling on international law to demonize Israel:

The report gives considerable attention to the illegal rockets fired into Israel by Palestinian militants mainly associated with Hamas, and notes, appropriately, that “stopping these violent acts was a necessary step for Israel to take in order to protect its people.” But while that justifies protective action, it does not make the case for a valid claim of self-defense under international law.

Yes, Falk is making another argument that Israel is not allowed to do anything in self-defense beyond sitting there and trying to shoot rockets out of the sky.

Palmer disagrees:

74. Israel was entitled to take reasonable steps to prevent the influx of weapons into Gaza. With that objective, Israel established a series of restrictions on vessels entering the waters of Gaza. These measures culminated in the declaration of the naval blockade on 3 January 2009. There were a number of reasons why the previous restrictions were inadequate, primary among them being the need for the measures to be legally watertight.

Falk, characteristically, is silent in responding to the actual legal arguments and instead makes up lies about the naval blockade - which is, in the end, not preventing a single shipment of humanitarian supplies from getting to Gaza.

Palmer has the last word:

80. As a final point, the Panel emphasizes that if necessary, the civilian population in Gaza must be allowed to receive food and other objects essential to its survival. However, it does not follow from this obligation that the naval blockade is per se unlawful or that Israel as the blockading power is required to simply let vessels carrying aid through the blockade. On the contrary, humanitarian missions must respect the security arrangements put in place by Israel. They must seek prior approval from Israel and make the necessary arrangements with it. This includes meeting certain conditions such as permitting Israel to search the humanitarian vessels in question. The Panel notes provision was made for any essential humanitarian supplies on board the vessels to enter Gaza via the adjacent Israeli port of Ashdod, 281 and such an offer was expressly made in relation to the goods carried on the flotilla. 282

81. The Panel therefore concludes that Israel’s naval blockade was legal.