Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

97% of Palestinian Arabs support Hezbollah terror

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AFP) - Nearly all Palestinians in the
West Bank and Gaza back Hezbollah against Israel and would oppose the unconditional release of captured Israeli soldiers to shorten the war, a poll has showed.

Hezbollah had the support of 97 percent of Palestinians, compared with three percent who said they were opposed to the group, according to the poll.

It said that 93 percent of Palestinians thought that two Israeli soldiers captured in a July 12 cross-border raid that sparked the war in Lebanon should not be released unconditionally even if it means an easing of the conflict.

Remember, previous polls showed only 4% of Palestinian Arabs opposed terror.

So no matter how the world wants to spin the Palestinian Arabs as a mostly peaceful people with a tiny minority of extremists, no matter how many politicians and clueless editorial writers say that Hamas' election was a fluke and most Palestinian Arabs only voted for them because of their social programs, just remember this.

When Arabs are killing Jewish innocents, they cheer.

MAJDEL KRUM, Israel (Reuters) - "Hizbollah has raised up our heads and lifted our spirits", said Israeli Arab Ali Manna as he mourned two nephews killed in a rocket attack by the Lebanese guerrilla group.

Despite the fact that Arabs make up a third of the 48 people killed by rocket fire on northern Israel, the sympathies of some of the Arab minority lie very much with the Lebanese group rather than the Jewish state.

Manna's nephews, Mohammad Manna, aged 25, and Baha Fayyad, 30, were killed when a rocket hit the town of Majdel Krum last week.

Although Arabs and Jews are coming under the same hail of rockets and sometimes share the same bomb shelters, the war has further strained ties between the communities.

"Hizbollah's popularity has increased immensely among the Arabs in Israel," said Rawda Atallah, head of the Arab Cultural Association in Haifa, a mixed Jewish-Arab city that has been one of the main targets of Hizbollah attacks.

"For the first time there is a sense of regained dignity. They feel for the first time a group is resisting and standing steadfast in the face of the Israeli army," she said.

Just after the start of the conflict with Hizbollah, sparked by the group's abduction of two Israeli soldiers on July 12, some Arabs would rush out and cheer when rockets fell on neighboring Jewish towns These days, they are more likely to take cover when the warning sirens sound. But the fear of coming under fire has not discouraged those who supported Hizbollah.
Some Israeli commentators have suggested that Arabs should be stripped of citizenship if they support Hizbollah.
Israeli media have published reports alleging that Israeli Arabs are colluding with Hizbollah and even helping the guerrillas direct their rocket fire through text messages.

What kind of a sick, depraved society cheers when their own people die, as long as innocent Jews die too?

How can anyone expect a real peace when there is such abject, naked hatred?

In one sense, this is even sicker than cheering suicide terror. At least suicide bombers chose to be "martyrs" - but here, some Arab Israelis celebrate the deaths of their own relatives who did not want to be killed. This is their "dignity."

Sick, twisted bigots.

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More wire service photo bias

Today, Amnesty International organized a series of rallies worldwide. Here is how Amnesty describs the rallies:

Civilians have been targeted in Lebanon by the Israeli Defence Forces and in northern Israel by Hizbullah leaving hundreds dead.

After weeks of fighting, bombs and rockets continue to fall indiscriminately on women, children, ambulances, rescue workers and other innocent victims of this escalating conflict. These deliberate attacks violate international humanitarian law and constitute war crimes.

Only an immediate, full and effective ceasefire will protect civilians on both sides, but calls for the warring parties to obey the laws of war and protect civilians have fallen on deaf ears.

Meanwhile, governments that could exert their influence to end the crisis have chosen instead to prioritize their own political and military interests over innocent lives of civilians.

We, the international community, are not powerless in the face of this crisis. We must stand up together to protect the lives of civilians and to ensure no more war crimes are commited.

What can you do? Take action now!

1. Join Amnesty International in our Ceasefire vigil on Monday 7th August

We call for a ceasefire;
We demand that all governments stop the supply of arms to the conflict; and
We stand in solidarity with the victims and survivors on both sides of the Israel/Lebanon conflict.

I have posted before about why I believe that in the context of this conflict, even-handedness is stupid. I strongly object to Amnesty's slanderous charge that Israel is deliberately attacking civilians and is guilty of war crimes.

Nevertheless, from the text above Amnesty is exerting a lot of effort to make the rallies appear even-handed, and they are meant to protest the violence on both sides of the conflict.

Somehow, AP in Madrid interpreted the rallies a bit differently:

Candles spelling out the word Stop are seen on the ground during a vigil in central Madrid, Monday, Aug. 7, 2006 to protest Israeli attacks on Lebanon and the Palestinian territories. The protest, organized by Amnesty International, called for an immediate cease-fire in the Middle East. (AP Photo/Paul White)

Most of the captions about rallies in other cities (Washington, Paris, Istanbul) reflected the intent of the Amnesty rallies, but the Madrid one was always described as "to protest Israeli attacks on Lebanon and the Palestinian territories." Interestingly, the rally had nothing to do with the Palestinian conflict. So who writes the blurbs? If the AP editors wrote them they would not have been inconsistent, so this bolsters my theory that photo stringers themselves - who are not journalists - give descriptions of photo captions to wire services and they are printed without any editorial oversight.

One other way that pictures lie are from what they don't show.

Here, for example, are two of many pictures taken by Reuters at an anti-Israel rally today in Santiago:

Pedestrians walk along a street decorated with black and Palestine flags next to an orthodox church in the Patronato neighbourhood in Santiago August 7, 2006, where members of the Palestinian community attended a mass against Israel's military offensive in Lebanon and Gaza. REUTERS/Ivan Alvarado (CHILE)

And another:

From the pictures, it appears that perhaps a few dozen people were in attendance.

Compare this to this pro-Israel rally that happened in Denver today:

The article that accompanies this picture says that hundreds of people rallied for Israel. But I cannot show you the wire service caption.

Because not a single wire service bothered covering the pro-Israel rally.

I have seen pictures of dozens of anti-Israel rallies on the news wire services, and very few pro-Israel rallies. Yet I know there are plenty of pro-Israel rallies worldwide.

Now, why would wire services extensively cover one kind of rally and almost ignore the other kind?

And when newspaper editors are putting together their editions for the next day and need a photo to fill up some space - which one is more likely to be published?

Keep an eye on Houla hoopla

See update below.

This morning, something happened in the Lebanese border village of Houla. Some people probably died. But it looks like this may easily be another Qana, and news organizations should be more skeptical now before publishing outrageous claims.

Here are the claims, from the Lebanese prime minister:

An Israeli attack on a Lebanese border village killed more than 40 people Monday, the prime minister said, raising the day's death toll to 55 in heavy fighting between Israel and Hezbollah guerrillas despite efforts toward a cease-fire.
Saniora said the attack occurred in the village of Houla, where heavy ground fighting between Hezbollah guerrillas and Israeli has been raging in recent days. The Israel army said it is checking the claims about Houla but repeated that residents in villages in southern Lebanon had been warned to leave.

Local TV stations also had reported that about 40 people were buried under the rubble of houses that collapsed after being targeted by Israeli airstrikes.

"An hour ago, there was a horrific massacre in the village of Houla in which more than 40 martyrs were victims of deliberate bombing," he said.

Saniora ripped Israel's attacks, saying: "If these horrific actions are not state terrorism then what is state terrorism?"

Right before his claims, the wire services were reporting the possibility that dozens were trapped underneath rubble from buildings that collapsed. To go from that to the certainty that more than 40 had died seems very, very fast.

Saniora has motive to exaggerate. It is clear that Hezbollah is pressuring him and his ministers to adhere to the terrorist line (notice his reference to the victims are "martyrs.") No information leaves southern Lebanon until Hezbollah allows it to leave. And, like Qana, Houla seems to be a center of Hezbollah activity, and inflating casualty figures can give Hezbollah fighters there a break from the constant battles over the past few days.

Also, with what we've learned about Hezbollah and its preparations over the past six years, along with Syrian activities, it is a reasonable assumption that Hezb is running an effective "secret service" operation throughout Lebanon, terrorizing those who disagree with it and setting itself up for a political takeover backed by KGB-like tactics.

No doubt, Sinioira's claims are newsworthy, but to accept them as fact until real reporters have a chance to go and see for themselves would be irresponsible journalism.

UPDATE:

U.N. peacekeepers at a post near Houla reported Hezbollah fired rockets toward Israel twice Monday from positions near the UNIFIL base.

UPDATE 2:

Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said Monday that one person was killed in an Israeli airstrike on the southern village of Houla, not 40 as he had earlier reported.

"The massacre in Houla, it turned out that there was one person killed," Reuters quoted Siniora as saying. "They thought that the whole building smashed on the heads of about 40 people ... thank God they have been saved."

Siniora had earlier told Arab foreign ministers in Beirut that the attack "was a horrific massacre ... in which more than 40 martyrs were victims of deliberate bombing."

Saniora said he had based the initial tally on unspecified information that he had received, The Associated Press reported. He offered no other explanation for the error.

Lebanon, 1946

Here is an article from the Palestine Post in 1946 that shows how far Lebanon has fallen since its early days of independence.

Wisdom from the soldiers

Interesting article from the Times of London (H/T The Thought Mill):

AT FIRST light they filtered from the undergrowth, camouflaged, laden with captured hunting rifles and crested Lebanese scimitars, and high-fiving with relief at still being alive.
After nearly a week of vicious ditch-to-ditch fighting with Hezbollah fighters in the village of Taibeh, hundreds of exhausted Israeli soldiers slipped back across the border early yesterday after the hardest fighting they had ever experienced.
As they trudged across the brow of a hill in broken single file they were indistinguishable in their battle fatigues and green face paint — some even black out their teeth in Hezbollahland — and all were drunk on adrenalin. “I was hoping to go in and kill Hezbollonim. I killed three,” one shouted as he embraced colleagues from the Nahal Brigade.
As soon as they reached the outskirts of an Israeli hilltop town, which cannot be named for security reasons, they stopped and cleared their M16 automatic rifles in unison — the last task before they could relax. Some then reached inside their huge battlepacks for their mobile phones to call families and girlfriends. Others collapsed with exhaustion, washing away their fear with bottles of cola and lungfuls of cigarette smoke. A few grabbed newspapers to find out how their war was going. “What is happening in other places? What is happening in Gaza?” one asked The Times.
Down a sidestreet a cluster of Israeli tourist buses waited with drinks and packed lunches. Slowly the soldiers began morphing from death-bringers to nice Jewish boys preparing for the Sabbath, peeling off clothes and cavorting halfnaked with each other beside the bougainvillea.
As they did so, all the rainbow shades of Israeli society began to re-emerge — secular, Orthodox, Ashkenazi, Mizrahi, Sabra, Ethiopian, Russian, Brooklyn. To their matted hair they pinned all types of skullcap — knitted, military-green, Braslav, settler or none at all. But on one thing they were unanimous: the prowess of their foe.
“It was hell. They are really well trained. They’re not suckers, they know how to fight,” said one, slumped on the pavement. “You’re scared the whole time over there. We didn’t get any sleep the whole week.” There was not a voice of dissent.
The soldiers told how they had worked their way through the dry, scrubby hillsides towards Taibeh, facing continual attacks from Hezbollah sniper and anti-tank missile positions concealed in houses, farms, underground bunkers and seemingly deserted streets.
To counter this they called in frequent support from 155mm artillery batteries on the Israeli side of the border, which pounded Taibeh sending huge plumes of smoke into the sky.
“We killed ten, and the artillery must have killed thirty or forty,” said a soldier who, like his colleagues, was not allowed to give his name. He had simply lost count of Hezbollah’s attacks. “Many, many, it was very bad because you don’t know where they are coming from. But we succeeded.”
Another soldier said that serving in the Palestinian militant stronghold of Jenin in the West Bank, as he had, was nothing compared with fighting Hezbollah’s guerrillas. “It was horrible,” he said. “You don’t know what it’s like, with every second a rocket- propelled grenade shooting over your head.”
A third soldier said: “All the time, they fired missiles at us. They never come face to face, just missiles. When we find them we kill them. It’s just not right, the way we are doing it. Our air force can just bomb villages and not risk our lives fighting over there.”
Another, slugging cola as his friends posed for photos, added: “It feels good to do the job. And come out alive.”
More than 40 Israeli soldiers have been killed in the 25 days of fighting.
Watched by bemused Thai immigrants, who, post-intifada, have replaced the cheap Palestinian labour upon which the Israeli economy once relied, one soldier shouted: “I love this country.”
Some of the returned fighters were optimistic. “We will defeat all the Arabs,” said one.
But others, chastened by their experiences north of the border, were less sure. “It’s a lose-lose situation,” said one. “They’re a bunch of terrorists. We are an army. We can never beat them completely because we have to obey certain rules. They operate from within civilian populations, and can do whatever they like. They don’t give a shit about these things.
“So it doesn’t matter if we are there for another couple of days or two weeks. But what is very important is that this is a just war on our part. Because they are a bunch of f***ing terrorists.”

A few facts to highlight just from this vignette:

Hezbollah's claims of minimal casualties on their side is complete garbage, yet the media continues to report it as true.
Even in the heat of the hardest battles these soldiers have ever seen, they remain committed to keeping the rules of war, at the risk of their own lives.
Hezbollah likes to pretend that it is doing so well at hand-to-hand fighting but they are avoiding engaging the IDF directly.
Hezbollah continues to use civilians as shields and the world does not hold them responsible.
Say what you want about internal divisions in Israeli society, but everyone knows that this is a just war and everyone is working together.

Don't believe your eyes if Reuters takes the picture

We always knew that Reuters was tilted towards the terrorist side of every story. But over the weekend, a remarkable thing happened.

The blogosphere destroyed the integrity of Reuters' photographs.

On Saturday, Little Green Footballs noticed an obvious and poorly-done Photoshop edit of a picture showing smoke over Beirut, to make it appear that the smoke was worse than it really was.

This caused the blogosphere do what it does best - experts started looking at other photos to see other inconsistencies. And so far, two major ones were found:

EU Referendum (which did an amazing job showing that the Qana photos were staged) found that the same photographer Photoshopped another picture of an Israeli plane, adding what he thought were missiles. This was doubly troubling - first because he faked another picture, and who knows how many others that have been printed in major newspapers, but also because he supplied a caption that was clearly wrong. (See also Jawa Report.)
Drinking from Home showed a woman "grieving" over the loss of her home - twice, in two different locations and two weeks apart. (At least it was two different photographers.)

As EU Referendum points out, while photo manipulation can be detected when done poorly, who fact-checks the captions? When stringers are employed as photographers, presumably they provide the captions or at least the context of the photograph - and they probably have even fewer ethics than the journalists who work for wire services.

For example, using the same Photoshopping photographer, here is a picture he took on July 14 and the caption:

A rocket fired by Lebanon's Hizbollah guerrilla group makes its way to hit an Israeli naval vessel off Beirut July 14, 2006. REUTERS/Adnan Hajj (LEBANON)

How exactly does he know where the rocket will land? How does he know that this is the one missile that will hit the Israeli boat? Or was this a case where he had a nice night-time shot of a rocket/missile/flare/firework and chose a caption that would be the most dramatic?

We have already seen how Hezbollah not only manipulates the press in Lebanon, but even threatens them. As Tom Gross reported:

Writing on his blog while reporting from southern Lebanon, Time magazine contributor Christopher Allbritton, casually mentioned in the middle of a posting: “To the south, along the curve of the coast, Hezbollah is launching Katyushas, but I’m loathe to say too much about them. The Party of God has a copy of every journalist’s passport, and they’ve already hassled a number of us and threatened one.”

But not only do we have to worry about slanted coverage from journalists who want to save their necks, and not only do we have to worry about staged scenes from terrorists where photographers don't know enough to dig beneath the surface to get at the truth, but we also have to worry about journalists and photographers who knowingly lie to advance their agendas.

The agenda isn't always "Israel is evil." Often it is "What can make this story more interesting?" Or, more cynically, "What can I get an award for?" Either way, it is rarely in Israel's interest for a journalist to be completely honest and provide a full context for the story.

3 Palestinian Arab kids killed. Oops!

Last Thursday, 3 Palestinian Arab kids were shot to death in Jenin.

For reasons that are unclear, there was no international outcry. Their deaths were barely mentioned in the newspapers. There were no UN condemnations, no shows of anguish from the EU, no peace protesters demonstrating, no pictures of crying mothers in the Reuters wire photos,, no huge funerals demanding justice.

Here's why:

Last Thursday, three children were killed in a wedding celebration during which gunshots were fired in celebration. PCHR's preliminary investigation indicates that at approximately 21:15 on Thursday, 3 August 2006, three children were killed in a wedding ceremony when a gunman lost control of his assault rifle as he was shooting in the air in celebration. The killed children are Naser Salim El-Asmar (13), Ahmad Samir Abu Jilda (15), and Ala Adel Faris Hardan (17). The wedding ceremony was in El-Marah Quarter in the eastern part of Jenin. Several gunmen were firing in the air during the wedding.

Ah, I forgot. People only care about dead Palestinian kids when they can blame Jews for their deaths.

Even when one tries to explain to these moral midgets that Israel is never aiming at the civilians and that their deaths are accidental, they always retort with "Every human life is precious! They are just as dead! How could you be so inhuman!"

But for some reason, dead Palestinian Arab kids who are killed by Palestinian men with assault rifles are not worth anything. Their blood isn't just cheap - it is worthless, based on how much the world ignores the phenomenon of Palestinian Arabs killing their own. After all...who in their right mind would demand that Arabs stop firing rifles at weddings? That would be imposing Western values on them!

So, these kids plus two more PalArabs who were killed in a "clan clash" means the PalArab self-death count since the end of June is now at ...46.

Jordan's Abdullah shows his support for terror

Like the wimp he is, Abdullah waited a few weeks before he decided that declaring support for Islamists who want to take over his kingdom is a smarter strategy than coming out against terror:

Amman, Aug. 6 (Petra)--His Majesty King Abdullah II said the core of the problem in the region is the continuation of the Israeli occupation of the Arab lands.

Addressing distinguished students from Jordanian universities at the Royal Court, the King said that Jordan's position on the Israeli aggression was frank and clear, indicating it condemned the aggression, and called for an immediate ceasefire and for full sovereignty of the Lebanese government on all Lebanese lands.

He linked the continuation of resistance with the continuation of occupation. "As long as there is occupation, there will be resistance," the King added.

His Majesty said that efforts he has been making over the past weeks and months on more than one level, were designed to crystallize and Arab position on events and the conflict in the region.

I guess none of the "distinguished students" bothered asking him some basic questions:

If occupation is so bad, how come Jordan occupied the territories and didn't bother giving Palestinian Arabs a state before 1967?
When he says "occupation" is he referring to only the West Bank or all of Israel, as Hezbollah does?
Is he acting out of fear for what would happen to him if he came out against unprovoked Islamist attacks against Israel?
Is it abundantly clear to him that he can never afford to offend radical Islam, but he can afford to offend Israel and America with impunity?
Does he have the ability to condemn any Jewish or Israeli deaths, ever?

Someone should ask Abdullah these questions. But no one will.

Pakistani women protestors wear headbands reading 'stop the killing children' and raise machine guns during a rally to show their support for Hezbollah and condemn the ongoing Israeli strikes against Lebanon and Palestinian territories, Sunday, Aug. 6, 2006 in Lahore, Pakistan. (AP Photo/K M Chaudhry)

Somehow, I don't think Israeli children are included.

If anyone thinks that this characterization is unfair, I will happily post pictures of any Muslim rally worldwide that condemns the deaths of all children including the ones murdered by Hezbollah.

I've looked at hundreds, and here is the closest I've ever seen, to the credit of at least one woman in Jordan who implies that Israelis are human:

Jordanians attend a silent sit-in against Israeli air strikes on Lebanon and Gaza Strip outside the United Nations office in Amman August 6, 2006. REUTERS/Ali Jarekji (JORDAN)

And not to be cynical, but the absence of hijabs makes me think that these women are more likely the American women from Code Pink who visited Jordan this weekend.

Adding another charity to the Challenge

AbbaGav writes a posting about the great work of Lema'an Achai, which is directly helping Israeli refugees from the North.

I am adding this worthy organization to the Elder "Double Your Donation" Challenge, so please send money to Lema'an Achai via secure credit card and send us a copy of the receipt so we can match it.

The situation in Israel is not getting any better, and even if you have given before, please give again and know that your money can go twice as far.

Thanks so much.

The Rules of War (Moshe Yaalon)

A great op-ed in today's Washington Post. Stuff I've said before but he says it better:

The Rules of War
By Moshe Yaalon
The conflict in the Middle East is about much more than Israel and Hezbollah, or even Hezbollah's Syrian and Iranian sponsors. What is at stake are the very rules of war that underpin the entire international order.
Sadly, judging from how most of the world has responded to Israel's military action against Hezbollah, these rules have been completely abandoned.
The rules of war boil down to one central principle: the need to distinguish combatants from noncombatants. Those who condemned Israel for what happened at Qana, rather than placing the blame for this unfortunate tragedy squarely on Hezbollah and its state sponsors, have rewarded those for whom this moral principle is meaningless and have condemned a state in which this principle has always guided military and political decision making.
Faced with enemies who openly call for its destruction and victimized by unremitting wars and terrorism since well before it was born, Israel has risked the lives of its citizens and its soldiers to abide by this principle in a way that is unprecedented in the history of nations.
Here is but one of countless examples: In 2003, at the height of the Palestinian terror war against Israel, our intelligence services discovered the location of a meeting of the senior leadership of Hamas, an organization pledged to the annihilation of the Jewish state and responsible for some of the deadliest terrorist attacks ever carried out against Israel.
We knew that a one-ton bomb would destroy the three-story building and kill the Hamas leadership. But we also knew that such a bomb would endanger about 40 families who lived in the vicinity. We decided to use a smaller bomb that would destroy only the top floor of the building. As it turned out, the Hamas leaders were meeting on the ground floor. They lived to terrorize another day.
Imagine for a moment that the United States had advance knowledge of the meeting place of al-Qaeda's senior leadership. Does anyone believe that there would be a debate about what size bomb to use, much less that any leader would authorize insufficient force to do the job?
So while it is legitimate to question whether Israel should go to such extreme lengths to avoid civilian casualties, it is preposterous to argue that Israel uses excessive force. Even more absurd was the shameful statement last week that Israel appeared to have deliberately targeted U.N. officials -- a statement fit for a knave or a fool, not for the secretary general of the United Nations. Rather than lead the fight against those who target civilians and use them as human shields, Secretary General Kofi Annan has strengthened them.
It is clear to any objective observer that Hezbollah is using Lebanese civilians as human shields. It builds its headquarters in densely populated areas, embeds its fighters in towns and villages, and deliberately places missiles in private homes, even constructing additions to existing structures specifically to house missile launchers.
The reason terrorist groups such as Hezbollah use human shields is elementary. They try to exploit the respect for innocent human life that is the hallmark of any civilized society to place that society in a no-win situation. If it fails to respond to terror attacks, it endangers its own citizens. If it responds, it runs the risk of killing innocents, earning world opprobrium and inviting diplomatic pressure to stand down.
Hoping to retain its high moral standards in the face of such a cynical enemy, Israel has made every effort to avoid harming civilians. We have dropped fliers, sent telephone messages and broadcast radio announcements so that innocents can get out of harm's way. In doing so, we imperil our own citizens since, by losing the element of surprise, we invariably allow some of the enemy to escape with their missiles.
But at Qana, Hezbollah responded to Israel's compassion with more cynical brutality. After launching missiles at Israel, the terrorists rushed inside a building. When Israel fired a precision-guided missile to strike at the terrorists, scores of civilians, including children, were killed.
The difference between us and the terrorists is clear: We endanger ourselves to protect their civilians. They endanger their own civilians to protect themselves.
If tragedies such as Qana are not to be repeated, then, rather than condemning Israel, the world should be directing its anger at Hezbollah and at the Syrian and Iranian regimes that support it.
Terrorists are fanatics, but they are not idiots. If the terrorist tactic of using human shields helps them achieve their goals, they will utilize it. If it undermines their goals, they will abandon it.
If we want to live in a world where civilians are never used as human shields, then we must create a world in which employing such measures results in the unequivocal condemnation of terrorists and in forceful action against them by the civilized world.
If the world were now blaming Hezbollah, Syria and Iran for the innocent Lebanese killed, hurt or displaced in this conflict, then it would be sending a powerful message to every terrorist group on the planet: We will not tolerate the use of human shields. Period.
Instead, those who condemn Israel have sent precisely the opposite message. They have told every terrorist group around the world that the use of human shields will pay huge dividends, thereby providing them with a powerful weapon that endangers innocents everywhere.
The writer, a retired lieutenant general, was chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces from 2002 to 2005. He is now a distinguished military fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

PalArabs keep killing each other

I haven't done an update in a while of the PalArab self-death count, , so for you fans keeping score here are some more:

An assassination in Khan Younis
One dead in an explosion in Gaza City
One dead in "friendly fire" in Khan Younis
A bullet to the head in a family dispute, again in Khan Younis
Another assassination in Khan Younis
Six prisoners shot dead by "gunmen" disguised as police.

So our grand total of PalArabs who were killed by other PalArabs since the Gaza incursion began is now at....41!

But if they get their own state, we know they will behave like human beings. It's all that oppression that forces people to shoot their own people. I mean...it has to be Israel's fault somehow.

So when Hamas says that they welcome Al Qaeda with open arms, we know they are interested in building a stable, safe government for their people.

Domino theory

The "domino theory" was popular during the Cold War. Wikipedia summarizes it like this:

The domino theory was a 20th Century foreign policy theory that speculated if one land in a region came under the influence of Communists, then more would follow in a domino effect. The domino effect indicates that some change, small in itself, will cause a similar change nearby, which then will cause another similar change, and so on in linear sequence, by analogy to a falling row of dominoes standing on end. (See butterfly effect.)
The theory was used by many United States leaders during the Cold War to justify U.S. intervention in the Vietnam War. The domino theory was applied by President Dwight D. Eisenhower and his top advisers in 1954 to describe the prospects of communist expansion in Asia if Indochina were to fall. Eisenhower argued that all of southeast Asia could fall. The theory's ultimate validity remained mixed, and debatable. After the U.S. left Vietnam, the North took over the South, and Cambodia and Laos had also turned to Communism, although Cambodia is no longer a communist state. This limited spread of Communism in Indochina provides ammunition for opponents of the theory, but both sides argue that the historical record overall supports their position.

In the 1980s, the domino theory was used again to justify the Reagan administration's interventions in Central America and the Caribbean region.

From its first conception, many have disputed central assumptions of the domino theory, for instance by arguing that Communist States lacked the tradition of cooperation the theory assumes (eg Cambodia attacked Vietnam, to which Vietnam responded by overthrowing the Khmer Rouge government). Supporters however have continued to argue it was a sensible policy in the context of the times.

Then at the end the article mentions

Similarly, another new form of the domino theory has been advocated by those who seek to oppose Islamic terrorism. Some foreign policy advocates in the United States refer to the potential spread of both Islamic theocracy and liberal democracy in the Middle East as representing a sort of domino theory. During the Iran-Iraq war, the United States and many other western nations supported Iraq, fearing the spread of Iran's radical theocracy throughout the region. In the 2003 invasion of Iraq, neoconservatives argued that by invading Iraq a democratic government could be implemented, which would then help spread democracy and liberalism across the Middle East.

As I've argued 18 months ago, this push to democratize without first ensuring basic freedoms is not only useless, but counterproductive. In this case just the existence of democratic elections has not brought about the hoped for domino effect of democracy - it achieved gains instead for fanatical Islamic theocracy.

Radical Islam is the one place where the domino theory really does appear to exist. Thirty years ago, Islamism as a political movement was relegated to the fringes of the Arab and Muslim world, but since then (starting with the 1979 revolution in Iran) it has grown into a major worldwide political force, threatening not only the Western world but also the secular Arab world. It also has an advantage over Communism - the ascetism it demands and the religious virtues it claims makes it somewhat less vulnerable to internal dissent.

One cannot understate the fact that the goals of radical Islam is nothing short of world domination, with the infidels dead and the dhimmis subjugated.

This is why the war with Hezbollah is not just a regional conflict, not just a local spat. A victory (or perceived victory) by the terrorists is a huge boost tothe worldwide Islamicist movement in terms of recruitment and prestige. It is all too easy to imagine an Islamist revolution in Jordan, Egypt, Pakistan, Morocco and the Gulf states. And the idea that one would cascade into the next doesn't seem far-fatched - it seems inevitable.

So even if one tries hard to forget that Iran is racing to get the Bomb, the threat on the horizon is having a much-more empowered Iran or similar minded Islamists turn off the spigot of oil just to punish the West for not enforcing UN resolutions on Israel, or tolerating cartoons, or allowing R-rated movies, or any of a thousand other perceived injustices against Islam.

The fight against Hezbollah is a fight on behalf of the entire civilized world.

The compassion of the left

A couple of days ago when I was getting lots of hits and comments from Huffington Post readers on a posting that was linked there, I decided to try a little test in the comment section:

I also invite my new lefty fans to donate money to Israeli charities that help out Israeli refugees and victims of terror. I have a program that matches donations - check out my latest blog entry. (I'll understand if you don't want to donate to Friends of the IDF )

I'm sure that as compassionate people you donate money to help innocent victims, no matter whose side they are on. Right?

OK, it was obvious baiting, but I still wanted to see a reaction.

Most ignored it, but one of them took the bait:

You've got to be kidding. Israel already gets 1/3 of the U.S. taxpayers' foreign aid even though the last I heard it was the 12th or 16th richest country in the World.

Give me a break. How about spreading some of that wealth among the poor Palestinians instead of stealing the money that Israel owes them because Israel doesn't like the democratically elected politicians they chose?

So by this stunning logic, there must be no poor people who need help in the US or Canada either, since our nations are so rich.

While I usually do not like to generalize a group of people based on a single comment, this appears to be illustrative of the hypocrisy of those who claim to be equally compassionate towards those who need help.

Although if you are a liberal and want to prove me wrong, feel free to donate - I'll get the money matched.

Amazing Fox News coverage this morning

Fox right now has Jeff Goldblatt covering live Katyusha rocket fire in Kiryat Shmona. The whizzing of the rockets and explosions could be clearly heard. At least one house was on fire; the rest landed in the forest. At one point a rocket itself could be seen flying by on its downward trajectory.

The hosts were asking why Hezbollah is shooting at Kiryat Shmona when it has been essentially deserted. Goldblatt answered "pure terror" and he is partially right, but I think that the video I posted yesterday shows that Katyushas (as opposed to the longer-range rockets) are generally being shot very hastily from wherever the terrorists can find cover, meaning they are just aiming south, firing, and hoping to hit some Jews.

DailyMuslims.com supports Mel's remarks

DailyMuslims.com, "the voice of Muslim America," has this to say about Mel's anti-semitic rant:

Mel Gibson is telling the truth when he said to a Los Angeles County Sheriff July 29, 2006 that "The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world" during the early morning hours of July 28 near his home in Malibu, California. God bless Mel Gibson for his courage!
Mr. Gibson, producer and director of the highly successful film "The Passion of the Christ", has again provided a great service to the world by utilizing his celebrity status in stating a truth that most ordinary gentiles are afraid to say. Mel Gibson is now being crucified, as was done during the production of his film on Jesus Christ, for saying a very inconvenient truth about world Jewry, especially during the current Israeli murderous rampage in Lebanon.
It did not take long for the Jewish dominated media to inflict pain on Mel Gibson for his statement. One reporter by the name of Harvey Levin said, "Mel Gibson is garbage. What an awful person he is. True enough, I'm Jewish, so the grotesque remarks didn't please me none". The truth never matters to Jews even when confronted by irrefutable evidence.
Do they ever ask themselves, "what is it that we do that makes the world dislike us"? Why do they have to have such high security in their Jewish centers? Why did a Muslim shoot up the Jewish Federation in Seattle two days ago? There is no doubt, Jews suffer from "collective denial!"
There are many questions concerning the incident that occurred on Friday when Mel Gibson, driving in his automobile, was stopped by a Los Angeles County Sheriff near his home. There is no doubt that certain Jews were out to get Mr. Gibson ever since he produced "The Passion of the Christ". Was Sheriff's Deputy James Mee, a Jew, lying in wait for Mel Gibson. Pacific Coast Highway in this part of Malibu is a well known police trap. Here they can wait for celebrities that live in Malibu and that they know are coming home from restaurants, social engagements and parties where drinks are served. Why was Deputy Mee ordered to redo his police report by his superiors? Most important of all, how did Jewish reporter Harvey Levin end up with a copy of the original and unapproved report written by Deputy Mee and which Levine used to justify calling Mel Gibson "garbage".
Was there collusion here between Deputy Mee, Levine and other Jews?

To be fair, DailyMuslims didn't write this insane bigoted rant. It was written by La Voz De Aztlan, which followed this up with an even more bizarre conspiracy theory that you've got to read to believe.

But the fact that DailyMuslims chose to publish it shows that many American Muslims are on the same page as the nutcase that wrote this.

And it was then picked up by KavkazCenter, my new favorite place to see what radical Muslims are really thinking.

Bill Maher: "The world IS Mel Gibson"

From his column in the Huffington Post:

As I watch so much of the world ask Israel for restraint in a way no other country would (Can you imagine what Bush would do if a terrorist organization took over Canada and was lobbing missiles into Montana, Maine and Illinois?) - and, by the way, does anyone ever ask Hezbollah for restraint. you know, like, please stop firing your rockets aimed PURPOSEFULLY at civilians? - it strikes me that the world IS Mel Gibson. Most of the time, the anti-semitism is under control, but that demon lives inside and when the moon is full, or there's been enough alcohol consumed, or Israel is forced to kill people in its own defense, then it comes out.

Andrew Sullivan agrees.

Tim Dickinson of Rolling Stone disagrees:

The reason the world doesn’t ask Hezbollah for restraint is precisely because they’re a terrorist militia that purposefully targets civilians. These people are not reasonable; they are a vicious anti-Semitic virus, an organization with American blood on its hands that needs to be disarmed and defanged, if not annihilated.

But what is supposed to differentiate a civilized democracy like Israel from the enemy they face is precisely a sense of restraint: an unwillingness to massacre women and children and U.N. peacekeepers in pursuit of its righteous goal of eliminating Hezbollah’s army.

Now don’t, please, purposefully misunderstand me. I do not believe that Israel intentionally targets civilians. (I reserve judgment, however, about the intention behind the strike on UNIFIL). But Qana happened because Israel has opted for a strategy of collective punishment of Lebanon for the sins of Hezbollah. And in so doing it has debased itself.

Yes, Hezbollah hides out among the civilian population. But, under all but the most extreme of circumstances, that does not excuse bombing apartment buildings and towns that are home to desperate civilians unable or unwilling to abandon their homes. Israel’s apparent indifference to the “collateral damage” that is the inevitable consequence of its urban bombing campaign might — might — be excusable if these attacks were sure to produce a swift victory: three weeks of death and destruction to eliminate a pernicious threat once and for all.
But Israel appears to be having little luck in degrading Hezbollah’s leadership or its military might. Indeed, with 200 rockets fired into Israel yesterday, the campaign seems to be most successful at defanging the dogs of Hezbollah by goading them into mauling Haifa with their katyushas.

I commented there:

What should Israel do?
Seriously. It is easy to criticize - but if you can find a more moral alternative that doesn’t involve Israel letting its citizens die for the sake of your “morality”, please let the world know.

Also, it is a little sanctimonious to declare that since the “Party of God” shot 200 missiles yesterday then Israel’s strategy is counterproductive. Let the Israeli people who are under attack make that decision, not you.

This has been my main question for the critics of Israel who don't hate Israel. What is the alternative? No one is happy that Lebanese civilians are dying (although the numbers are somewhat suspect, certainly way too many are dying.) But not to attack Hezbollah heavily means that they, and the Islamists who will copy them, now have a surefire way to achieve any aim they want against the West - just hide behind civilians.

The world reaction should be horror at Hezbollah, and despite Dickinson's justification, one can be sure that when Israel is criticized in Europe and elsewhere it is not out of concern for Israel's losing the moral high ground. Because if the world is so concerned about morality, the EU would not hesitate to declare Hezbollah a terrorist organization, depriving it of funds used to kill Jews. If the world was concerned about morality, it would not have grieved over Arafat.

It is obvious that Israel should act far better than her enemies. But from reading the news, what is not so obvious is that Israel always has, and clearly always will. Criticizing only Israel for defending itself - which necessarily means sometimes making mistakes and adjusting tactics to the evolving threat - gives the impression that only one side is doing something wrong. Over time of reading coverage filled with such "loving" criticisms inevitably makes people think that Israel is in the wrong, or that at best "both sides do immoral things."

This is the worst and most dangerous kind of misrepresentation of the conflict, and it is one that Dickinson is unconsciously a part of.

Terror rockets being shot from within a house (video)

Along with a happy ending.

Of course, this would be reported by most media as "Civilians killed in Israeli airstrike."

From the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs website, I uploaded it to YouTube.
Hat tip: Israellycool

A reason to keep mourning on Tisha B'Av

Ha'aretz published a typical anti-religious op-ed yesterday about Tisha B'Av. Here is a large part of it:

After the Six-Day War in 1967, a few important rabbis from the national-religious camp proposed making changes to the Nahem prayer recited on Tisha B'Av. The idea was that since we had established a sovereign state and resumed control of Jerusalem, it was no longer appropriate to continue to speak about "a desolate and vacant city... laid waste and deserted." Most Orthodox rabbis, however, wanted to continue to mourn the destruction, even when Jerusalem was quite rebuilt, and were unwilling to lend a hand in even this small and very sensible reform. It is unlikely that anyone thought about turning this day of mourning into a festival.

Tonight, many non-observant Israeli Jews will be wondering why the cafes are closed. Yes, indeed, tomorrow is Tisha B'Av, a day of mourning over the destruction of both the First and Second Temples and the dispersion (as well as a long list of other calamities). It is interesting to consider how many of our readers knew that it is tomorrow, how many will feel themselves to be in mourning, and how many of them even deem it significant. It is doubtful that anyone should even feel bad about this, with the possible exception of the rabbis, who have not bothered to make the fast day relevant.

It is no accident that so many non-observant Jews feel no connection to Tisha B'Av. Some people say it is because it falls during summer vacation, so children do not learn about it in school. But the source of the resistance seem to be deeper. In many ways, Tisha B'Av is the negative of Independence Day. Everything that a secular Zionist could wish for -- an independent, sovereign, democratic, Jewish state, the in-gathering of the exiles of the Law of Return, a strong army, model academic and scientific institutions -- already exists. That is why Independence Day is celebrated.
[...]
Is it really possible to create a secular alternative to Tisha B'Av?

Former Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg proposed changing Tisha B'Av, making the first half a time for mourning and the second half a meal of thanksgiving, in a combination that echoes the rapid succession of Israel's Memorial and Independence days. But Burg's proposal cannot be implemented without cooperation from the Orthodox. You cannot celebrate while many of your co-religionists are mourning, even if they are mourning an exile that has ended, and even if it is unclear whether they are mourning for the Jerusalem that was destroyed or for the ruins that no longer exist and to which they cannot say goodbye.

And anyway, the religious community does not need to celebrate the liberation of Jerusalem on Tisha B'Av. It has demonstrated a remarkable ability to celebrate Jerusalem Day as if there was no Tisha B'Av, and commemorates Tisha B'Av as if Jerusalem had not been liberated.

Until a logical, current, relevant and Zionist way to mark Tisha B'Av can be found, perhaps the right way to behave on that day is exactly the way that most non-observant Jews do: to ignore it, as if it did not exist. But even those who ignore this day of mourning find it difficult to ignore the fact that our religious brethren insist on behaving as so many of the things that are so important and precious to us are not even worthy of their attention.

I cannot give the author a good reason why secular Israelis should commemorate Tisha B'Av, for the same reason I cannot give him a reason for them to light Chanukah candles or not work on Saturday. By definition, if you reject the religion, the importance of matzoh on Pesach is exactly the same as the importance of turkey on Thanksgiving, and if you think hard about it there really isn't much reason for Jews to keep identifying as Jews, except in the quaint sense that Irish-Americans show pride for their heritage by drinking green beer on St. Patrick's Day.

But I will answer his implicit question as to why religious Jews continue to mourn over a Jerusalem that is rebuilt. The answer can be seen in a Haaretz editorial from June that I quoted (original is not online):

Israel is having trouble formulating a logical and consistent stance with regard to East Jerusalem, and therefore it has been taking inconsistent and hypocritical steps. The decision to allow East Jerusalem residents to participate in the PA elections is part of this same duality. East Jerusalem's residents live here, vote for the PA and are citizens of Jordan. Instead of removing Palestinian parliamentarians from the eastern part of the city, it would be better to remove East Jerusalem from the State of Israel and transfer it to the Palestinian Authority.

In the Israel that Haaretz writers occupy, Jerusalem has no inherent value, and it can and should be traded for the same kind of peace that Gaza was traded for. In that mindset, the fact that Jews cannot ascend to their own holiest site in a city that they say they control is smart politics, not a tragedy.

Tisha B'Av commemorates many tragedies besides the destruction of the Temples, and unfortunately we can add the deaths of 12 more today to that list. But perhaps the biggest recent tragedy is that the modern state of Israel never truly acted as if all of Jerusalem is ours. The center of Jewish longing has been the Temple Mount for two thousand years but the Jews that this author represents - the ones in charge of Israel today - discount all of this with a wave of the hand, as their new, "improved" Zionism has replaced the old, antiquated Judaism that they despise.

This is indeed a reason to mourn on Tisha B'Av.

Those amazing non-flammable missiles

Here is what a vehicle looks like after an Israeli missile hits it:

Here's what a Red Cross vehicle looks like when a not-too-credible Red Cross worker convinces the MSM that it was hit by an Israeli missile:

This image taken from video made by Lebanese Red Cross workers Sunday, July 23, 2006 in Qana, south Lebanon, and made available to AP Television, shows the roof of a Lebanese Red Cross ambulance destroyed in what they say was an Israeli airstrike.

(Don't be fooled by the tone of the caption above - by Thursday, the AP stated that it was an Israeli airstrike as a fact.)

Notice the very neat "missile" circular hole right in the middle of the Red Cross symbol? Notice the rust?

Now, here's a picture of an intact Red Cross vehicle from the Red Cross website. Look at the one on the right:

See anything interesting right in the middle of the Red Cross symbol?

Riehl World View does a masterful job of destroying the credibility of the story that the Red Cross worker said, along with links to pictures of the inside of the ambulance showing no fire damage, nor floor damage, at all. Thsi reflects only a small part of his proof that the "destroyed ambuance" was probably taken from a junkyard.

Willful denial of Jihadist goals is a psychosis

Today, as every day, many prominent Muslims are calling for the utter destruction of Israel as well as Jihad against the West:

Cairo, Asharq Al-Awsat- Supreme Guide of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood (MB), Muhammad Mahdi 'Akif, called on all Muslims to "help the resistance in all its forms," both in Lebanon and in the Palestinian areas, describing the current "official" Arab position as "shameful." .

The Islamist leader praised Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Palestinian areas, and Hezbollah in Lebanon, calling on his followers to prepare themselves to fight "the Zionist gangs." According to 'Akif, Israel was "planted within the Palestinian lands by the Western crusaders, to perform as representatives of the Western superpowers headed by the United States."

TEHRAN –– Iran's hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Thursday the answer to the conflict in south Lebanon was the "elimination of the Zionist regime," ISNA agency reported.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei blasted United States policy in the Middle East and warned of an impending Muslim “jihad”, or holy war, against the West.

“Today, it is clear for everyone that the aggression against Lebanon was a premeditated U.S.-Zionist action as a key step in the path of dominating the Middle East and the Islamic world”, Khamenei said. His comments were reported in the official news agency IRNA and aired in part on state television on Wednesday.

“Today, Muslim nations more than ever despise the U.S.”, he said.

“With its support of the Zionists crimes and criminals and its blatant aggression against the rights of Muslim nations, the U.S. regime must be prepared for a hard slap and a destructive punch by Muslims”, Khamenei said.

The mainstream media reports these things occasionally, but always in a sort of secondary, backhanded way, in one of the bottom paragraphs and glossed over as if it is not really news when the "supreme leader" of a nation threatens the entire Western world.

The liberals read things like this and think, "well, it is just rhetoric, just Arab bluster, it is not serious." No matter how many terror attacks occur against the West, no matter how many 9/11s and Balis and Madrids and Londons and Bombays, no matter how clear the Islamists make their position that they are not distinguishing between Western liberals and Western conservatives, and that we are all targets for death - the left remains in utter denial. If they are forced to confront real terror, they are unable to see that the jihadists are to blame for their actions.

Because the truth is hard to take. It is easier to belittle those who see evil for what it is, those who see that Lebanon is not a regional spat over land but a spark of a global conflagration between Islamists and the Western world. It is hard to accept that hundreds of millions of people want to see you dead or subjugated - even if you accept that fewer than half of worldwide Islam subscribes to these views.

It is an understandable psychological defense mechanism, to try to take the easy way out. If only Israel would agree to all Arab demands then the Arabs won't bother us, they say. If only we do what they say, it won't affect my life right now today. The direct jihadist threats are not to be taken seriously.

Because to believe the threats means that something must be done about it, and all the other justifications for appeasement and blaming of Israel and US policy is an intellectual equivalent of hiding one's head in the sand.

If there is one thing that Jews have learned through history, it is that if someone says they want to kill you, take them seriously. It is a lesson that the "enlightened" West needs to learn very badly.

Three blog milestones

Since this blog should pass three milestones this month, I might as well combine all of them in this post.

Sometime today, both this blog and Yoni's blog will hit the 50,000 hit mark (according to Site Meter, which seems more accurate than the inflated StatCounter figures.) The only difference is that it took me almost two years hit this milestone, while Yoni is doing it on his third day.

This gives me a healthy dose of humility, after my recent flirtation with the semi-big time. I had a few days with over a thousand hits, so fully one-third of my total hits have come about only in the past six weeks.

On August 15, I will hit my two-year blogoversary. The blog has evolved from exclusively a news linker to what is now almost exclusively original content. I am gratified that there are people out there who actually read what I have to say, and seem to enjoy it.

And also later this month, if current trends continue, I should write my 2000th post.

I am most proud of the money I've been raising for Israel in the "Elder Challenge" (a rotten name that I hope to replace as soon as I find a new one.) So thanks again to everyone who has donated, and please take the latest "Elder challenge" to have your money donated to Israel matched, dollar for dollar. The more generous can also offer to sponsor an upcoming phase.

Thanks again to everyone for dropping by!

Hezbollah's spin makes them look worse

As a result of the IDF raid in Baalbek, Hezbollah is making some claims:

'This hospital was empty when they got here. We lured them into this operation,' one Hezbollah guerrilla on the scene said.
Hezbollah claimed to have spread rumours about the presence of an important Hezbollah figure inside the hospital, which had been empty since the start of the Israeli offensive....
Journalists were only allowed to take pictures at the ground floor of the hospital Wednesday.

'We fear for your safety. The Israelis might have left booby trapped bombs in some sectors of this hospital to target us (Hezbollah), so we do not want you venturing in,' a separate Hezbollah official in Baalbek told dpa.

So, Hezbollah is saying that they came up with a brilliant plan to lure many Israeli soldiers into a trap, very far from Israel, presumably to massacre them.

And even with all that preparation, they didn't manage to get anyone?

Hezbollah says they emptied the hospital, again far from the border. If you believe them, it sure sounds like they control the hospital and use it for, shall we say, "militant" purposes. There might be a Geneva Convention about that.

But the reason journalists can't see the rest of the hospital is for their own safety.

Yeah, this all sounds real credible. Almost as credible as IRIB's reporting of the war.

Advice for Mel

Sammy at the Die Welt blog has a brilliant suggestion for Mel Gibson:

If you seriously want help, and I can image you might, my suggestion is that you come to Israel. Come to Jerusalem and show us you mean it. Right now. Now that Israel is at war, bombarded by Hizballah missiles and attacked by misguided critics around the world. Show us you're not afraid to confront either the issue of anti-Semitism or the calumny that will no doubt accompany your visit. Be a Daniel and step into the lion's den.
Here you'll see Jews of every colour and every corner of the world, from deeply religious to virulently atheist, from aggressively Zionist to absurdly anti-Zionist, from boorish and pushy to gentle and kind. Beautiful people, vibrant, curious and intriguing, generous and caring. Jews are just like everybody else, only more so. Israel is an intense place. You'll love it. And when you've met us, if you still blame the Jews for everything that's wrong in the world, at least you'll know what you're talking about.
Come and visit. Please.

Just imagine - he goes to Israel and forces himself to say nice things publicly about Jews and Israel, the Jew-haters write vitriolic articles and boycott his movies for doing it - and then he has a slight clue of what it is like to be Jewish.

And he's a tough guy, so he can take it - at least as well as the Jewish kids in bomb shelters in the North.

Come on, Mel - visit Israel and show how much of your apology is heartfelt and how much is just PR.

This news should really confuse the moonbats

Hezbollah managed to shoot rockets near Jenin, in the West Bank:

Some of the long range rockets that were fired at Israel Wednesday noon landed across the Green Line, in the West Bank. The rockets fell near the Palestinian village of Pqua, in the Jenin area.

Ynet has learned that parts of the rockets fell off while they were in transit, but caused no injuries or damage.

The rockets' landing site in the Palestinian territories is the most southern point Hizbullah has managed to hit so far. A week and a half ago, an improved Fajr-5 rocket landed in Afula.

OK, should a moonbats be happy that Hezbollah still has long-range deadly rockets, or should they be suddenly concerned about possible Palestinian Arab casualties?

If a PalArab had died, would it be good news or bad? And, most importantly, how can they blame Israel?

Luckily, the PalArabs themselves (through their "moderate wing") were nice enough to instruct the moonbats how to react:

A Fatah activist from Jenin added that the rocket hit was heard clearly around the city, and a spark and a flame were also clearly seen.

The Fatah member related that local residents cheered when they heard the rocket fall and saw the resulting flames. “Even if it were to fall on our heads, it wouldn’t have spoiled our joy. All of us here are praying for Hizbullah’s success and victory," he said.

Whew. Another ethical conundrum solved before Lefties would be forced to think a little about their indefensible and contradictory positions.

Now they know to cheer if Hezbollah kills Palestinian Arabs.

Double Your Donation to Israel: Elder Challenge, version 2

Thanks to a very generous sponsor, the Elder Challenge is continuing on with a new goal!

Here's how it works:

Choose an Israeli charity from our list.
Donate money via the Web.
Email me (elderchallenge -at- gmail.com) with some sort of proof that you donated - a screen capture of the receipt with your credit card number edited out, or something similar that indicates how much you gave
I will contact the donor, he will match it, and confirm to me that it is matched.
I reply back to you with confirmation and update the total amount donated on the sidebar.

This way you can double the money you donate to your favorite charities!

The new goal is to reach a total of $2000 by August 11.

The charities are:

PizzaIDF	Delivers great food and morale to the brave soldiers defending their land.
Friends of IDF	Provides equipment and morale-boosting for the soldiers.
Zaka	World famous organization that offers first response service to terror attacks.
Yad Sarah	Bringing medical equipment to the northern communities that are under attack.
Magen Dovid Adom	The Israeli Red Cross.
JNF Operation Security Blanket	Sends kids from the North to summer camps in central Israel for a few days at a time
One Family Fund	Directly helps victims of terror and their families.

(If one of your favorites is not on this list, let me know and we can consider adding more.)

Also, if you want to be a sponsor to keep the challenge going, please contact me at the same email address: elderchallenge -at- gmail.com.

Feel free to use the button above on your own blog and link it to this post. Pass the word along, tell others to take the challenge!

Thanks so much, a special thank you to the very generous Mitch at Tuvel Communications, and
!תזכו למצוות

UPDATE 8/8: We are now aiming for $2500.

Moonbat/Terrorist Supporter Dictionary (via BEAJ)

Bacon Eating Atheist Jew has come up with a politically incorrect yet strangely accurate dictionary. Oh, and it's very funny, too.

All the world's a stage. Especially Qana.

I am not a big fan of conspiracy theories, but this post from Confederate Yankee based on this Israel Insider report is convincing me that Qana is a staged bit of theatre, with the building collapse being done by Hezbollah and the dead bodies being sent from Tyre to Qana for the benefit of the gullible world press. (Warning - pictures of dead people.)

What is indisputable is that Hezbollah, especially the "Green Helmet Man", paraded the same dead baby in front of cameras for a very, very long time.

Keep in mind that Hezbollah keeps very tight control over what reporters can see and when.

Read those articles along with this one from Riehl World View. The evidence isn't "Loose Change" stuff - I know how easy it is to "raise questions" about any historic event, and Holocaust deniers have done it for decades. The problems with this story are far deeper than that, and the alternate explanation passes Occam's Razor. Recent history shows that it is more than plausible that Hezbollah would stage everything from the building collapse to the transportation of bodies - and possibly the Beirut protests as well.

UPDATE: Backspin brings more evidence, although it does not appear as credible to me :
1. A huge anti-Qana poster was erected in Beirut in a remarkably short amount of time. I'm a little skeptical of this only because it would assume a much, much larger conspiracy. My guess is that a large inkjet plotter could make a sign in that timeframe but Iam no expert.

2. The Red Cross says that 28 bodies were recovered, not 57. This is something but in general I would discount that as well without any other evidence - exaggerating the number dead is not nearly as egregious as staging the entire event (except in the case of Jenin, when dozens turned into hundreds.)

3. Christians in Lebanon are claiming that Hezbollah staged it, transporting disabled children to the building in Qana for Israel to bomb it. This doesn't make sense at all to me - Lebanese Christians are not the most reliably truthful people either, and it sounds more like propaganda than a verifiable report.

I would love tosee a real reporter who was on the ground at Qana look at the evidence mentioned above on the other blogs and comment. Someone on the ground can much more easily disprove or bolster those arguments.

Crack Cocaine for Koranic Crazies

No, I didn't make up this phrase - it comes from an article by Greg Strange:

At the recent Arab Conference of Iraqi Neighbors in Tehran (sounds so innocuous, doesn‘t it?), Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad imparted these words of wisdom to his audience: "The basic problem in the Islamic world is the existence of the Zionist regime, and the Islamic world and the region must mobilize to remove this problem. It is a . . . regime that prevented the progress of the region's nations . . ."
It's the kind of talk that absolutely brings the house down at conferences in that part of the world. It's like pushing a button that sends impulses directly to the pleasure centers in the radical Islamic brain. Call it crack cocaine for Koranic crazies.

Actually, given the subject matter of this particular conference, you wouldn't think the main focus of discussion would be the need to eliminate Israel. But you can bet your sweet Koran that if a conference gets hosted in Tehran about anything from sturgeon fishing in the Caspian Sea to thirteenth century Persian poetry, somebody's going to find an excuse to bring up the Zionist regime.

Very funny, but if you think he is exaggerating, you haven't been following the GoozNews from Iran.

The Iranian media is foaming at the mouth even more than usual in falling over itself to denounce the "Zionist regime." But since it gets so, well, repetitive to hear Ahmadinejad's latest attempts to top himself, they need to find other spokespeople who are willing to demonize Israel.

It's like a who's who of nobodies and Iranian flunkies:

Iran's embassy in Armenia condemns Zionist crimes in Lebanon
Cleric says Israel 'politically dead'
Assembly of Experts condemns Zionist regime's crimes in Qana
’I ask God to arouse the dignity of Muslims and destroy America, Israel and their associates,’ says General Safavi.
Asefi Terms Israel Greatest Violator of Human Rights
Iran embassy in Riyadh condemns crimes of Zionist regime
Iranian embassy (in Athens) condemns Israel's attacks on Lebanon
Iran's Swiss embassy condemns Israeli's savage air raids on Qana
Embassy condemns Israeli crimes as being against int'l conventions (Moscow)
Iran embassy condemns Israeli war crimes in Qana, southern Lebanon (North Korea)
Judiciary chief condemns Zionists' Qana bombing
Iranian Embassy in Jakarta condemns Israeli war crimes in Qana
Iranian children condemn Zionist regime's crimes in Lebanon
Iran's Embassy in Kabul condemns Qana bombing
Iranian Embassy in Manila grieves at Israeli war crimes in Qana
Iran Embassy in New Zealand voices outrage at Israeli war crimes
Elham says Qana killing shows Zionists' weakness
Iran’s military chief suspects Bush is a “Zionist”
Indian Parliamentarians outraged at Zionist's action on Lebanon
Hamas Calls on World Muslims to Stand up to Israeli Crimes

...and on and on it goes. Every single time any Muslim says anything bad about Israel, the crack Iranian press is right on that scoop. Truly a model of journalistic excellence.

My minor Huffington Post adventure

For some reason, the left-wing Huffington Post called me an Israeli blogger and posted a link to this posting. As a result, I have been getting quite a bit of traffic as well as comments.

In addition, there were some comments left on the HuffPo site itself criticizing my posting.

The funny thing is, all the criticisms completely ignore the post itself. Not one has yet disputed any of my facts. Apparently, just the existence of a pro-Israel post is enough to get certain people in a non-thinking, mantra-spewing mode where all they can think of are the old canards about Israel. Here are a few:

WTF? Why is this even on HuffPo? It's pure poison propaganda. Blogger even admits he's not even in Israel.

This gentleman evidently didn't notice that I wrote that myself on the posting well before he wrote this. Perhaps he didn't actually read my article - yet he feels qualified to criticize it. (The word "poison" was a bonus.)

I remember once about a jointly agreed upon UN resolution 242, and another 338....I wonder if they were enforced .....?????????

Here's someone who has no clue what the text of 242 and 338 are.

This is THE GRAND GUIGNOL OF HYPOCRISY, considering it's coming from a nation holding the world record for violating UN resolutions.
Not to mention a country ILLEGALLY armed with *NUCLEAR WEAPONS*, in defiance of the entire world.
Of course the US is even more hypocritical (if that's possible...), because our government provided the Israelis with the know-how to build them, but at the same time invaded a sovereign country for the mere (and totally baseless) suspicion they might have been considering tinkering with nuclear power (which of course they NEVER did. As EVERYBODY knew, including the neocon cabal.)

Again, not addressing a single point I made, but quick to jump on the "Israel and the US are evil" mantra.

I admit that I had to look up what "Grand Guignol" meant, and I was not surprised to see that the reference made no sense. But it sure sounded intellectual!

And, of course the "zinger":

What law does israel follow when it massacres children?

Yes, those bloodthirsty Jews again, always massacring children. Oooh. What wit.

And in my own comments section, I get things like

Steal land, ignore world opinion, bribe American politicians through AIPAC, collect billions of American tax dollars, repeat ad nauseum.

While each of his "arguments" can be demolished rather easily, is it utterly impossible for Israel-bashers to stick to the topic?

It would have been nice for someone to actually disagree with the points I was making, or perhaps to correct a mistake. It is possible (though not easy) to criticize Israel in a skillful and non-hypocritical manner.

Apparently, HuffPo readers are not quite on that level.

Where are the peace demonstrations?

Of all the so-called anti-war and pro-peace groups that exist worldwide, how come none of them have managed to have a rally where they condemn Hezbollah along with Israel? (Peace Now is the possible exception to this.)

Makes one wonder how committed to "peace" these groups really are....

Three more asymmetries

I've recently posted about the asymmetry in international law where terrorist organizations have no incentive to follow the law while states do. I also posted on the asymmetry of tactics when one party in a conflict has an interest in seeing its own civilians die. In addition, I posted about the asymmetry of outside parties treating a terrorist organization and a state "evenhandedly."

These are not small advantages in a war. When one party has its hands tied behind its back because of legal and moral constraints while the other is free to do whatever barbaric acts it pleases, it becomes far more difficult for the moral party to truly win.

There are more asymmetries that Hezbollah takes to full advantage:

Hezbollah lies while Israel tells the truth. Since the war began we have seen Hezbollah consistently lie - about its supposed destruction of many Israeli tanks, about how only a tiny number of terrorists have been killed, about how they do not shoot from mosques. We have seen Hezbollah stage demonstrations and ambulance scenes for TV cameras. And there is more and more evidence that the Qana tragedy may have been the result of Hezbollah actions - and maybe even Hezbollah planning. Or at the very least, a carefully choreographed manipulation of facts by Hezbollah.

On the other hand, it takes Israel hours or days to research and disseminate the truth to counter terrorist lies, and by the time they can accurately show the facts, the world has already passed judgment.

There is literally nothing that can be done to fix this, although the world media is complicit in uncritically reporting clearly staged events and statements from people who have a track record of lying. Until the press acts more responsibly we have a clear disadvantage to those who care about the truth.
The definition of victory. While Israel has been rightly criticized over not being clear as to its objectives, Hezbollah merely needs to survive to be able to declare victory. So a core group of Hezbollah fighters who stay in bunkers and who don't even bother to fight can emerge after the war as heroes - which has huge geopolitical implications, pushing the balance of power in the Middle East towards Iran and Syria.

A prizefight where one boxer only has to live to be declared the winner is a difficult fight to win.
Susceptibility to pressure. Israel, as a member of Western civilization, has to worry to some extent about what the world thinks. It has to worry about sanctions and calls for a cease fire and about public opinion, both from without and within.

Hezbollah, on the other hand, has the full support of rogue terror states. Immoral acts do not pressure Hezbollah to moderate - quite the opposite. In the moral universe they inhabit, terror is rewarded and co-existence with Israel is regarded as the biggest evil. The only pressure that may have worked would have been from the Lebanese, but Hezbollah has effectively used its media manipulation and human shields to ensure that they support the terrorists.

Putting these together, and we have a war like no other, that will almost undoubtedly result in Iran being strengthened as the center of the Islamic world, poised to become a superpower.

And the West is largely clueless as to the importance of this war.

UPDATE: Welcome to those coming from the Huffington Post and AlterNet, but unfortunately I do not live in Israel.