Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Fisking Khalidi's "Iron Cage" - part two

Part one here.

Rashid Khalidi admits in the introduction to his book that he provided very little original research in writing it, and mostly relied on the works of other historians. This does not invalidate a book as a work of history, of course, but it does give the author a little more burden of proof as to which facts he chooses to highlight and which he chooses to ignore.

Arab historians, for understandable reasons, love Benny Morris. As one of the earliest post-Zionist historians, Morris broke new ground in demolishing the prevailing Zionist narrative of the events leading up the establishment of the State of Israel, using primary source materials as they were declassified by the Israeli government. Khalidi is no exception, as he praises Morris' "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem" as one of the best sources on the topic.

Yet one must wonder why Khalidi only cites Morris when his facts support the traditional Palestinian Arab narrative and he ignores him when he proves the opposite. Morris, by exploding myths on both sides, proves to be intellectually honest; one cannot say the same about Khalidi.

The most obvious example is the fact that Morris re-wrote his classic work in 2004, based on far more archival material that became available in the 1990s. Israel's laws seal classified material for fifty years, so anything declassified in the 1990s would be directly relevant to the issues that Khalidi is writing about. Yet Khalidi never references Morris' newer work - which is far harsher on the Arab narrative - and instead stubbornly sticks with his earlier work, something that Morris himself would argue is not as accurate anymore. Why would a scholar writing in 2006 (and referencing events that occurred in 2006 as well) ignore this updated information? Indeed, it appears that Khalidi is selective when referring even to Morris' earlier work, at at other times he offers the same slipperiness that we have already seen. (The following quotes of Morris comes from a New Republic article he wrote in 2005.)

While Khalidi blandly - and consistently - uses neutral terms like "fighting broke out" when describing Arab attacks, in 1948 as well as earlier, his revisionist hero Morris describes things as they were:

[T]he U.N. General Assembly voted by more than a two-thirds majority in favor of partition and the establishment of Jewish and Arab states. The Palestinians and the Arab states rejected the resolution and vowed to prevent its implementation. Throughout the Arab world the cry went up for "jihad." On November 30, 1947, the day after the partition vote, Arab gunmen ambushed two Jewish buses near Petah Tikva, killing seven passengers and wounding others, and Arab snipers began firing from Jaffa into Tel Aviv's streets, killing a passerby and wounding others. These attacks marked the start of the war. The Arab Higher Committee, the Palestinian Arab community's "government," called for a general strike, in the course of which an Arab mob poured out of Jerusalem's Old City and looted and torched the New Commercial District. The civil war had begun.

Similarly, Khalidi spends much time describing how poorly equipped and organized the Arab armies and Palestinian Arabs were compared to the Zionists:

Although it was not initially apparent, in the fighting during the first phase of the war between the Hagana and its Arab opponents, the former were considerably superior to the latter in weaponry, numbers, and organization. Their most important assets, besides these advantages, was unity of command.

Morris, the only one of them who is a true historian of primary sources, describes things quite differently:

In truth, the forces in Palestine during the civil war half of 1948 (November 1947 to mid-May 1948), were more or less evenly matched in terms of armed manpower. The roughly eight hundred Arab villages and towns of Palestine had, between them, some 25,000 to 30,000 armed men (albeit with inadequate ammunition stockpiles). Add to this the reasonably well-armed roving bands and the ALA, and one gets a force about equal to the Haganah's. The Haganah probably had fewer arms, but they were better munitioned.

But the real difference lay in organization and mentality. The Jews were relatively well organized, and thought and acted like a nation. The Palestinians were not organized, and mostly acted out of a village-centered mentality: there was no national mobilization; each village fought alone, and fell alone, and those not engaged kept their distance from the trouble. The Palestinians had only themselves to blame for their poor preparation and performance in 1948.

This next section shows Khalidi's biases and disregard for truth - while trying to be technically accurate - even more starkly:

For the first few months of the fighting, until March 1948, the Palestinians nevertheless appeared to be holding their own. They maintained control over most Arab-inhabited regions of Palestine, and managed repeatedly to cut the roads linking major cities and some of the isolated Jewish settlements, including at the end of March the critically important road from the cost to Jerusalem. However, as soon as the Haganah and its allies went on a nationwide offensive early in April 1948, on the basis of a military plan for linking up most of the major Jewish-inhabited regions of the country, known as Plan Dalet, they rapidly showed their overwhelming superiority. By the end of their offensive, they had overrun the major coastal cities with large Arab populations, Haifa, Acre, and Jaffa, as well as Tiberias, Beisan, and other cities and towns, and scores of villages, and set hundreds of thousands of Palestinians on the road to exile.

Compare with Morris' much more complete and accurate narrative:

...This hodgepodge of irregulars managed by late March 1948 to halt Jewish convoy traffic and to besiege, and to mortally threaten, isolated Jewish communities, notably Jerusalem. By then, tens of thousands of Arabs and Jews, fearing war's fury, had moved out of embattled or vulnerable urban and rural areas. For the Palestinians, this marked the start of the refugee exodus.

Between November 1947 and March 1948, the Jews remained strategically on the defensive, and did not conquer or destroy Arab villages. (There were two exceptions, Qisariya and Arab Sukrir.) Things changed radically in early April 1948: the Haganah, with its back to the wall, especially in Jerusalem and along the roads, and facing imminent invasion by the Arab states' armies, switched to the offensive, and within six weeks overran Arab areas, including Jaffa and (Arab) Haifa, and defeated the Palestinian militias, inducing chaos and mass flight.

Morris accurately describes how the fighting began - how the Zionists remained on the defensive while the Arabs attacked at will, starting the day after the partition vote. Khalidi describes the Hagana's defensive posture against brutally aggressive Arab attacks as the Palestinian Arabs "holding their own."

Khalidi mentions a number of times the "myth" of powerful Arab armies attacking Israel in May 1948, that "only" four armies set foot in Palestine in 1948, and he implies that they never stepped foot beyond the original boundaries of the partition:

...the only Arab armies that actually entered Palestine were those of Egypt, Transjordan, Iraq, and Syria." Moreover, by prior agreements between King Abdullah ant the Jewish Agency, and between 'Abdullah and Britain, the most powerful and combat worthy of these armies, the Transjordanian Arab Legion and the Iraqi forces that were under'Abdullah's command and control), never crossed into the territory allotted to the Jewish state. These two armies fought Israeli troops only in the area originally assigned to the Arab state, or in the area of Jerusalem —which according to the partition plan was supposed to have been an international corpus separatum -and thus they never invaded the territory of the Jewish state.

Notice how the impression one gets from reading this is that no Arab army invaded the Jewish state, although he doesn't really say it - Khalidi's hallmark of giving impressions at odds with the facts.

Now read what really happened:

The Syrian Army, after invading Israel and before being bested at the Deganias, conquered and destroyed two kibbutzim, Masada and Shaar Hagolan, on May 18, inside Israel; the Iraqi Army invaded Israeli territory and unsuccessfully assaulted Kibbutz Gesher and nearby positions before moving to the northern West Bank; and the Egyptian Army, while halting, or being forced by the IDF to halt, at Isdud (Ashdod) in early June 1948, invaded and conquered Israeli territory between the Gaza Strip and Beersheba and between Majdal (Ashkelon) and Beit Jibrin. Lastly, while the Jordanian Army did not invade Israeli territory, it did much more than take up "defensive positions" in the Old City of Jerusalem. It conquered, and razed, the Jewish Quarter of the Old City and took up positions in Latrun, Lydda, and Ramle, blocking the main Tel Aviv-Jerusalem road and laying siege to the holy city. And on May 12- 14, before the pan-Arab invasion began, the Legion attacked and destroyed the settlements of the Etzion bloc.

In short, the neighboring Arab states (save for Lebanon) and Iraq simultaneously, on May 15, attacked Israel, its settlements, and its territory. One of their aims was to destroy, or at least to mortally wound, Israel, if not to eradicate the Yishuv. The documentary proof is abundant. The Arab armies' actions in mid-May speak louder than a thousand atlases. That the Arab armies were "ill-prepared" and incompetent does not diminish the fact of their aggression. And there can be little doubt that had the invading armies, including Jordan's, encountered no or weak resistance, they would have pushed on to Tel Aviv.

Perhaps Khalidi's greatest misrepresentation is with regard to the comparative amount of land that the Jews and the Arabs owned:

[The Zionists] knew full well that as late as 1948, Jewish-owned land in Palestine amounted to only about 7 percent of the country's total land area (and only 10.6 percent of its privately owned land, including much of the country's best arable land), that the vast bulk of the country's privately owned land and much of its urban property was in Arab hands.

Again we see a combination of choosing convenient sources and purposefully ignoring salient facts. Morris again:

In reality, Jews owned about 6 to 7 percent of Palestine's land surface, and the Arabs owned around 20 percent, and the rest was public or state-owned.

Notice how easily one gets the impression that 90% of the land belonged to Arabs from Khalidi's description, as he ignores the amount of public land that shows that Arabs didn't own most of the land of Palestine - exploding one of the biggest and most pervasive myths there are from the Arab narrative.

Khalidi doesn't have any regard for the truth, except in the sense that he is too clever to say too many explicit lies. He clearly knows the truth because of the wordplay he employs to get his point across, and his failure to mention these topics that he so assiduously avoids is the best proof of his mendacity.

Here we see how selectively and dishonestly Khalidi uses his secondary sources. Morris is a good source for him only when he supports Khalidi's preconceived notions; when Morris disagrees Khalidi will ignore those facts or selectively use them. This is a fundamental methodological flaw in Khalidi's work and it shows his disregard for truth, even as he takes pains to portray himself as being fair.

These quotes prove the contrast between a true historian and a very good propagandist.

Sunday links

My Shrapnel, a new blog of a terror victim

Another PA music video inciting hatred against Israel

Interesting analysis of the possibility of Hamas terrorists going after the multi-national forces in the Sinai

The Second Draft looks at last year's Gaza beach tragedy

HH CLI hosted (and now sponsored) by Jack's Shack

Aussie Dave continues liveblogging the situation in Israel

Fisking Khalidi's "Iron Cage" - part one

In 2006, Columbia Professor Rashid Khalidi published "The Iron Cage: The Story of the Palestinian Struggle for Statehood." Khalidi, an American of Palestinian Arab descent, occupies the prestigious Edward Said Chair in Arab Studies at Columbia University and he heads the Middle East Institute of Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs.

Khalidi's book has been lauded for its supposed even-handedness in being critical of Palestinian Arabs and in describing their missed opportunities, in addition to the usual blame given to the British and Zionists for their troubles.

However, a closer analysis of the book shows that Khalidi is deceptive in his writings, and one cannot escape the fact that he is knowingly dishonest in pushing through his narrative. While he is certainly guilty of omitting and downplaying many facts of Palestinian Arab history, he is also guilty of sleight of hand where he will string together sentences that contain mostly truth but give the reader an impression that is wholly false.

An early example of such dishonesty comes from a close reading of this passage on page 39 meant to show British pro-Zionist sympathies during the mandate period:

In fact, access to those levers (of state power) was systematically denied to anyone of Arab background. The low ceiling that Arab functionaries came up against is best illustrated by the case of George Antonius, an urbane, articulate Cambridge-educated (but Lebanese-born) official of the mandatory government, who...was repeatedly passed over for responsible posts, as mediocre British subordinates were promoted over his head, until he finally resigned in disgust. Similar limitations did not apply to Jewish officials, if they were British by origin rather than Palestinian: among them were the first high commissioner, Sir Herbert Samuel and Norman Bentwich, attorney general of Palestine until 1930, both deeply committed Zionists. By way of contrast, although a few senior British officials might well be considered anti-Zionist, pro-Arab, or even anti-Semitic, from the beginning of the British occupation of Palestine in 1917 until its bitter end in 1948, none of the top appointees of the mandatory administration outside the judiciary were Arabs.

Khalidi's dishonesty is subtle but representative: he decries the lack of Palestinian Arabs in high positions of the mandatory government but rather than contrast that with the number of Palestinian Jews (which would be the exact analogy) he instead mentions that some of the officials were British Zionists. He then goes on to admit that some of the senior British officials were pro-Arab - the exact analogy with those who were pro-Zionist. In other words, from parsing his sentences one can see that he has proven nothing about British pro-Zionist leanings from his proofs; he purposefully conflates British Zionists with Palestinian Zionists and he refuses to do the same between British Arabists and Palestinian Arabs, thus subtly using his command of the language to give an impression that is not borne out by his own facts, but one that the reader could be forgiven for not noticing.

Khalidi shows similar dishonesty when dealing with the British-installed Grand Mufti, Haj Amin al-Husayni. He claims in a number of places that al-Husayni kept his end of the bargain with the British by keeping his 1921 promise to "maintain tranquility" among the Arab population (p. 62.) Khalidi claims that Husayni only reluctantly abandoned his pro-British actions when he could no longer contain the "popular" uprising. Khalidi doesn't mention the evidence that the mufti was himself behind anti-Jewish pogroms in the early 1920s as well as the 1929 riots, and he only passingly mentions the Mufti's Nazi alliance during World War II. He accepts, when it is convenient for his thesis of the pro-Zionist British Mandate, that Husayni was a moderating force when in fact he was the opposite - even as Khalidi admits that the British directly subsidized Husayni's position.

Khalidi does give some evidence that the British were more pro-Zionist than pro-Arab until the 1939 White Paper but he misses the point of those leanings. For the first decade and a half of the mandate, the British were following the explicit terms of the mandate, to create a Jewish national home in Palestine. This is not as much evidence of pro-Zionist leanings as it is for British feelings of responsibility. During the 1936-39 strike and revolt, of course, the British were on the same side as the Zionists against the Arabs. The manifestly anti-Zionist 1939 White Paper showed that, rather than being inherently pro-Zionist, the British were mostly concerned with their own self-interest, and the Arab riots had changed the British calculus towards maintaining the peace in the false hope that acceding to Arab demands to limit Jewish immigration would put a lid on their anger. A pro-Zionist government would not have caved that easily.

Worse yet, Khalidi completely dismisses Arab anti-semitism - which is most properly embodied by the Mufti - and claims throughout the book that the Arabs were only anti-Zionist. The fact that the 1929 pogroms were primarily against the old yishuv - Jews whose families were in Palestine before modern Zionism - is ignored as Khalidi spends much of his book claiming that Palestinian Arab nationalism was only fighting against Zionism, not Jews.

In the coming days, I will explore some more of the specifically dishonest claims made by Khalidi, as well as the problems with his larger theses.

Egypt catches Gazans with explosives

Palestine Press Agency reports (autotranslated):

Egyptian sources revealed that the security authorities had detained several Palestinians in the Egyptian governorates of possession of explosives and advanced mobile phones capable of penetrating Egyptian security communication networks.

Deputies of the prominent ruling National Democratic Party in Egypt warned of the seriousness of leaving open the border with Gaza, without controls, saying that Palestinians carrying explosives, and a sophisticated communications, caught the night before last, and warned deputies also what it called "a blueprint for the settlement of Israelis in Sinai, Gaza residents.

During a meeting of the Egyptian People's Assembly was held yesterday evening, said deputy ruling party and the President of the Court of the President, Dr. Zakaria Azmi, "said 30 infiltrators from Gaza were arrested in possession of explosives," adding that "were found inside a belt taxis after going down in the Palestinian Sinai, will also present 18 security guards Egyptian officers were in danger of attack by armed Palestinians tried to blow up the crossing 5 times "(referring to the Hamas militias), reiterating that" Sinai will not be a substitute for Gaza. "

For its part, Egyptian security sources said the seizure of more than 20 Palestinians aged between 20 and 40 years, said: "They infiltrated into the country and was caught with someone quantity few primitive explosives, in addition to a sophisticated communications networks capable of breaking the security in Egypt, and that the security bodies are high investigate what is happening in the search for other suspects. "

I have not yet seen this in any other press reports, but there are enough specifics here to make it appear that PalPress is reporting fairly accurately.

UPDATE: Confirmed.

Iranian official threatens Jews worldwide

From the Iranian Mehr News:

International Institute for Holocaust Research Secretary General Mohammad-Ali Ramin has called on the Jewish community to break their silence on Israel’s crimes against Palestinians and give up their support for the Zionist regime.

“If the world’s Jews keep silent on the blatant genocide of Palestinians, the entire human community will hold Jewish people responsible for the crimes,” Ramin told the Mehr News Agency on Friday.

He said, “The presence of a blood-thirsty enemy at the heart of the Islamic world like the Zionist regime which poses a threat to all Islamic countries provides the best opportunity for the Islamic Ummah to preserve unity and return to its religious identity.”

Referring to Israel’s “organized massacre of Palestinians”, Ramin said, “Silence on these crimes will have irreparable repercussions for Muslims.”

Summing up:

* If Jews don't publicly declare that the Islamist viewpoint on "the Zionist regime" is correct, the entire world will be justified in punishing the Jews.

* Jews aren't human, as the "entire human community will hold Jewish people responsible."

* Israel is a direct threat to every Islamic country from Malaysia to Bahrain.

* If Israel didn't exist, Muslims would all be fighting each other, so the Zionist regime is the best hope for Muslims to unify - and get religion.

* Muslims cannot be held responsible for their actions if Israel has the audacity to continue to exist.

* The Muslim that holds these viewpoints is the leading Holocaust "researcher" in Iran.

Glad he cleared that up!

Great moments in UN history

During the discussion around yesterday's routine UNHRC one-sided condemnation of Israel came this exchange, which pretty much says it all about how serious one should take that august institution:

HILLEL NEUER, of United Nations Watch , said that the proposed draft resolution constituted a case of psychological projection. It was Hamas which deliberately fired rockets into Israel. They were the ones rejecting the very notion of distinction between combatants and civilians. Israel did the opposite by protecting its citizens. It should also be considered who had initiated this session. They included the lowest possible rated States in the annual world survey released by Freedom House. Were these the arbiters of human rights in the world today?

JUAN ANTONIO FERNANDEZ PALACIOS ( Cuba ), speaking in a right of reply in response to the statement of United Nations Watch, said the organization was a lucrative organization amply funded by the CIA and Mossad aimed to degenerate certain States on the Council. There was nothing more barbaric than the occupation of the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

When one cannot tell the difference between websites written by loony conspiracy theorists and official UN delegates, perhaps it is time to rethink the legitimacy of the latter.

Is Gaza occupied?

Yesterday, the ever-reliable UN "Human Rights" Commission did what it literally always does - it condemned Israel and no one else. As Israellycool points out, the resolution used the terminology "occupied Gaza Strip" no less than four times.

Is Gaza legally occupied?

It is hard to find a good definition of "occupied territory" in international law. The best one is perhaps from the Hague Convention of 1907, which the Geneva Conventions seems to rely on:

Art. 42. Territory is considered occupied when it is actually placed under the authority of the hostile army.
The occupation extends only to the territory where such authority has been established and can be exercised.

From the specifics of both the Hague and Geneva Conventions, it is clear that "occupation" means control over the day to day lives of the citizens of the territory. For example:

Art. 55. The occupying State shall be regarded only as administrator and usufructuary of public buildings, real estate, forests, and agricultural estates belonging to the hostile State, and situated in the occupied country. It must safeguard the capital of these properties, and administer them in accordance with the rules of usufruct.

Other provisions talk about maintaining public order and the like.

From these many provisions in the Hague and Geneva, as well as in normal use of the word in English, it is clear that "occupation" means physical presence as well as the effective takeover of functioning governmental institutions and tasks, like collecting taxes.

From Israel's perspective, its (legally ambiguous) declaration of Gaza as a "hostile territory" is far more accurate, as is clear from this article by two legal experts at The American Thinker last year:

If Gaza is territory under the control of the enemy -- as it manifestly is under Hamas -- then the Israeli government is both within its rights and arguably obliged by its responsibilities to its citizens to treat the strip as "hostile territory." Siege and blockade of a hostile territory is a legitimate tactic of war, used in declared and undeclared (e.g., Cuban) conflicts and explicitly recognized by the 1949 Geneva Conventions. The Conventions' sole limitation is that there be "free passage of all consignments of food-stuffs, clothing and tonics intended for children under fifteen, expectant mothers, and maternity cases" (Fourth Convention, art. 23) -- and even this exception was conditioned on there being "no reasons for fearing... [t]hat a definite advantage may accrue to the military efforts or economy of the enemy" (for example, if resources destined for humanitarian aid will be commandeered by the enemy). Israel has carefully respected this requirement.

In fact, if anyone is occupying Gaza, it would appear to be Hamas.

Hamas never legally seceded Gaza from the PA and both Hamas and the PA keep declaring that both Gaza and the West Bank are a single legal entity. In fact, Hamas and the PA keep negotiating over where the PA might be able to take over some functions in Gaza, as well as their ultimate rapprochement, thus fulfilling another essential portion of the definition of occupation - that it be temporary.

In addition, Hamas clearly acted against the wishes of the PA and against PA laws in its takeover. Beyond that, Hamas is fully acting like an occupier, taking over the governmental institutions in Gaza like the police and the courts and collecting taxes.

Obviously Hamas has never accepted any international legal conventions. And Hamas is not a country, which complicates the definition further. Even so, as the effective occupier, it clearly violates many of Geneva's laws, including forcibly taking hospital supplies from the civilian population for its own purposes (Geneva IV, Art. 56)

Hamas' status under international law needs to be clarified, and its obligations spelled out. The current situation where a terrorist occupying force (or quasi- government) has no legal obligations is absurd, and it directly leads to travesties like this UNHRC resolution.

Two terror attacks near Jerusalem

One Israeli was killed and another wounded Thursday night in a shooting attack near the entrance to the Shuafat refugee camp in northern Jerusalem.

One of the wounded died after resuscitation attempts and the other, a female, was listed in serious condition.

IDF sources said that terrorists had approached the entrance to Shuafat by foot and opened fire at a group of Israelis nearby and then fled the scene. Military forces and Border Policemen immediately dispatched search parties to catch the gunmen.

In another simultaneous incident, two terrorists were killed after they infiltrated a high school in Kfar Etzion, south of Jerusalem.

The terrorists, armed with knives and possibly with a pistol, infiltrated the kibbutz - in the Gush Etzion settlement bloc - and snuck into a building used by the Makor Haim High School, run by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz.

“The terrorists came inside and began stabbing students,” a defense official said. Three students were injured, including two moderately. They were all evacuated to Hadassah Hosptial in Jerusalem.

Shortly after the infiltration, a number of the school’s counselors, armed with guns, arrived at the scene and shot and killed the terrorists. IDF sources hailed the student’s quick response.

“This could have ended much worse,” a source in the Central Command said.

YNet says

Fatah’s military wing, the al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, claimed responsibility for the attack. A Fatah spokesman told Ynet that the organizations “Black September” activists carried out the attack.

This is of course the Fatah faction that the PA declared “dismantled” a few weeks ago and then “disbanded” a week later.

This must all be part of the celebration of breaking down the Rafah wall.

4,200 Balloons

From YNet:

The Israeli consulate in New York released 4,200 red balloons Thursday, equal to the number of Qassam rockets fired at Sdeort since the Gaza disengagement, outside the United Nations headquarters in the city. The display aimed to protest the international community's disregard for Qassam fire at Israel.

Consul for Media and Public Affairs in New York, David Saranga, said that the protest aimed to place the distress faced by Israelis on the American and global agenda.

"To this day, all attempts to place this issue on the American media's agenda have failed," Saranga said.

So far, none of the major wire services have posted a single photo of this protest.

But protests against Israel that appear to have attracted a dozen or so people get prominent coverage, like this one from Lebanon. AP posted no less than 10 pictures of this protest, each one cropped in such a way so that you cannot see how tiny it really is.

Which proves Israel's point precisely.

This of course begs the question - why does AP consider a small protest of Hezbollah-supporting college students in front of the Egyptian embassy in Beirut to be infinitely more newsworthy than Israel's more creative and innovative protest taking place opposite the United Nations?

From FARS
(h/t NRO Corner)

An interesting "martyr"

Palestine Today keeps up the tradition of finding roughly one person a day who dies in a hospital in Gaza and blaming his death on Israeli travel restrictions:

Palestinian medical sources announced last night on the death of a patient due prevented by the Israeli authorities from leaving the Gaza Strip to receive the necessary treatment abroad.

The same sources stated that the young Naji Hamdan Cream (36 years), resident of the Rafah governorate joined the caravan of martyrs of patients travel ban after suffering from heart disease.

What makes "Number 77" interesting is that he died while the border to Egypt was open. In fact, he is a resident of Rafah!

Did anyone notice in the crowds of hundreds of thousands of supposedly desperate Gazans streaming to Egypt whether any of them were transported by ambulance or stretcher to go to Egyptian hospitals? I have yet to find any such picture, among the photos of the "starving" Gazans carrying large-screen TVs back to their homes. If the medical crisis is so acute (and of course it isn't - Israel is still allowing dozens of ill Gazans to enter Israeli hospitals daily) then why haven't we seen a surge of sick PalArabs being escorted through Rafah to Egyptians happy to help them out?

Fertilizer for bombs and terrorists going through Rafah

From the Daily Telegraph:

And somewhere in the teeming crowd, came people anxious to exploit the day for their own less innocent purposes.

Fertiliser, broken down into half bags for lugging through the many tunnels that arms smugglers normally use for delivery into Gaza, was to be seen as it was manhandled overland.

It was white, oily, crystalline and a dab on the tongue left a sharp, burning sensation.

In most countries fertiliser has a perfectly innocent function but in Gaza militants use it to make explosive.

"Hey, hey, hey," shouted a man as I took a photograph of a pile of fertiliser half bags.

His aggressive tone jarred with the mood the crowd as he grabbed my camera lens firmly.

From the Washington Post:

Along one teeming road in the Egyptian part of Rafah, a Hamas security official who had been stranded on Egypt's side of the border since June -- fearing arrest by Israel during a crossing if he tried to return -- met his mother and sisters in the surging crowd. "Eight months I haven't seen him!" his mother exclaimed after a flurry of hugging and kissing.

The man excused himself for not talking. "I'm on the wanted list," he explained.

Israel accuses Egypt, increasingly sharply, of allowing smugglers to bring arms and explosives into Gaza. It was clear Wednesday that contraband and gunmen could cross the border that day with little chance of being stopped.

... Seven or eight Egyptian border guards stood lined up along one stretch of no man's land, which was thick with milling Palestinians and livestock.

The Egyptian guards watched but did not move. "Don't speak to us! Don't even look at us!" one Egyptian officer shouted after someone in the crowd moved toward them.

(h/t Backspin)

Morning links

Israellycool continues his liveblogging of the situation in Gaza, Sderot and vicinity.

Egypt Today on the Israeli film The Band and why Egypt refuses to screen it.

YNet and BackSpin on anti-semitic Arab cartoons.

Canada decides not to attend Durban II : "We'll attend any conference that is opposed to racism and intolerance, not those that actually promote racism and intolerance"

Brazilian singer: "I constantly ask myself why I need suffer so. I am not Jewish, I did not crucify Jesus.”

Sderot Reality

And. from what I can tell, it's been about 36 hours since the last Qassams, although mortars have continued. B'li ayin hora.

More Hamas staged stunts - candlelight edition

From the Jerusalem Post:

On at least two occasions this week, Hamas staged scenes of darkness as part of its campaign to end the political and economic sanctions against the Gaza Strip, Palestinian journalists said Wednesday.

In the first case, journalists who were invited to cover the Hamas government meeting were surprised to see Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and his ministers sitting around a table with burning candles.

In the second case on Tuesday, journalists noticed that Hamas legislators who were meeting in Gaza City also sat in front of burning candles.

But some of the journalists noticed that there was actually no need for the candles because both meetings were being held in daylight.

"They had closed the curtains in the rooms to create the impression that Hamas leaders were also suffering as a result of the power stoppage," one journalist told The Jerusalem Post. "It was obvious that the whole thing was staged."

Hamas also seems to have timed its Sunday night blackout for prime-time TV:

Fortunately for those who wanted all-Gaza, all-the-time, there was still Al-Jazeera, which had been on the scene with live broadcasts and commentary from the very moment that Hamas had decided to cut the power in Gaza and send it into darkness on Sunday night.
Indeed, so ready was Al-Jazeera with live coverage of candle-bearing Palestinian children and immediate reaction from across the Arab world, that Israeli officials said Tuesday they strongly suspect the Arab news network had coordinated its coverage in advance with the Hamas leadership.
"They were so prepared, it's hard to believe they didn't know this was going to happen," said the official. "Although it's already dark in Gaza by 6 p.m., they waited two hours to shut their generator down so that the lights going out in Gaza could be carried live on Al-Jazeeera during prime-time viewing."

Others noticed the fortuitous timing of a "spontaneous" candlelight demonstration only minutes after the power plant shutdown:

Minutes after the power plant shutdown, Gaza residents started a candlelight march. Live Associated Press TV pictures showed dots of light moving slowly up a darkened main street.

So when the media talk about how Hamas won the PR war with Israel, it is a bit disingenuous of them not to admit their own responsibility for that victory - the news organizations are not only susceptible to obvious staging, they welcome being manipulated if they can get a good picture or story out of it.

See also my posting "Baking a crisis" on a similar theme.

Rafah blasts were planned for weeks

From Dion Nissenbaum of McClatchy Newspapers:

Before dawn, Palestinian militants blew up and tore down large sections of the concrete and iron walls separating the Gaza Strip from Egypt.

They had apparently been planning the attack for weeks. With the knowledge of locals, militants had spent weeks methodically using blow torches to cut along the bottom of the 30-foot-tall corrugated iron wall along the Egyptian border.

Before dawn on Wednesday, militants blew holes in the adjacent concrete slabs and then toppled the iron wall.

It looks like yesterday's clashes between Gazan women and Egyptian border guards were staged specifically for the purpose of doing this pre-planned operation in such a way that Egypt would be unwilling to interfere.

And it seems probable that everything we've seen over the past few days - Hamas closing bakeries, shutting the fuel plant, perhaps even the rocket barrages themselves last week - were all meant to play to world opinion, create a fake "crisis", all ultimately to force Egypt to open Rafah, something that Hamas has been trying to do for months.

(h/t Backspin)

UPDATE: The Times (UK) reports that this has been going on for months!

a Hamas border guard interviewed by The Times at the border today admitted that the Islamist group was responsible and had been involved for months in slicing through the heavy metal wall using oxy-acetylene cutting torches.

That meant that when the explosive charges were set off in 17 different locations after midnight last night the 40ft wall came tumbling down, leaving it lying like a broken concertina down the middle of no-man's land as an estimated 350,000 Gazans flooded into Egypt.

The guard, Lieutenant Abu Usama of the Palestinian National Security, said of the cutting operation: "I've seen this happening over the last few months. It happened in the daytime but was covered up so that nobody would see."

Asked whether he had reported it to the government, he replied: "It was the government that was doing this. Who would I report it to?"

Abu Usama, who normally works from a small guard cabin in no-man's land, added: "Last night we were told to keep away from the wall. We were ordered to stay away because they were going to break the blockade."

Just remember, it is all Israel's - and the Joooz' - fault

I haven't been spending too much time lately looking for absurd misozionistic and anti-semitic rants, but that is not a reflection of any sort of moderation in the Arab and Islamic world - these rants are still printed daily in Arab and Muslim media.

Two examples from today, the first from the ever-reliable Iranian IRNA:

Majlis Speaker Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel said here Wednesday that Palestine is the main problem of the world of Islam.
"It is for 60 years that criminal West has imposed Israel on the world of Islam like a dagger and occupied the first Qibla of Muslims," said Haddad-Adel in an address to a group of parliamentarians.
He said today, Muslim world has been awakened and Muslims have regained their identity.
He added that Americans too intend to deceive public opinion by their lies, which are broadcast by the media run by the Zionists.

Our second comes from that moderate ally of ours, the UAE:

ONE of the basic principles of war is that one must have a plan. One of the even more basic principles is that in order to win the war, one must know the enemy's plan!

This is impossible, unless one has first identified the enemy and has taken whatever measures are necessary to know him as well as he can possibly be known. This leads to an old, probably Chinese, injunction; "To succeed, keep your friends close; but your enemies even closer!"

If you are going to fight for the Palestinian, the Middle East, the Arabic, the Islamic, the Pakistani, the Lebanese, the Iraqi, the Iranian cause, or any of the many causes of "the people" in the Middle east, or even understand the conflicts in the region, it is imperative that you not only know all about the enemy, and his plans, but first that you recognise and acknowledge exactly who the enemy actually is!

I am not sure this has been done, for I see little mention of him in the media which seems to be flowing out of the region. ...

No one seems to want to address this major issue, which for years has been behind the Balkanisation of so many countries in the region, and the establishment, installation, stabilisation and solidification of one great foreign and aggravating element, Zionist Israel!

To know the enemy is half the victory. No victory or defence can be devised or pursued without knowing whom one is fighting. Since the "enemy" in this case is right there on the home grounds of the people he is invading and attacking, it should be obvious who he is.

I ask, of the people who live in the region, the Press who write about it, and Muslims particularly, what would the Prophet have done faced with such a scenario? What are you doing?

Read a rare and refreshingly clear voice of startling and exceptionally clear vision on this “unmentionable topic,” by an American. He, and what he has to say on the matter, may be a good platform from which to search for the truth of the enemy, and get an ID on him.

Scott Ritter is not only a clear-sighted and perceptive visionary, he is a brave man who writes exceptionally well. Worth reading!

“Israel at present can have no friends, because Israel does not know how to be a friend. Driven by xenophobic paranoia and historical grievances, Israel is embarked on a path that can only lead to death and destruction. ...” writes Ritter.

America's inability to resolve the question of Palestine is one of the gravest tragedies of our times. This is primarily because the US administration and the US Congress have succumbed to the demands of the Zionists and the Zionist regime. This is a lethal ailment that afflicts the US. The American politicians have fallen captive to the Zionist network. Even though Jews only make up 2.9 per cent of the country's population, an astounding 56 per cent of Clinton's appointees were Jews. Let me assure you the situation was the same in the Bush administration. A coincidence? I don't think so. You have to ask yourselves what motivates American Jews to gain such political power. Is it a genuine care for American interests?

The proportion of 56 per cent in the administration, compared to 2.9 per cent in the populations, says it all without going into the specific numbers. Surely fair-minded Americans the likes of Scott Ritter prefer US-inspired policies to those perpetrated by the Zionists. Regretably little is being done to cure this fatal disease.

Hamas mimicking Arafat

Yasir Arafat was infamous for directing terror attacks while denying any responsibility as he used other front organizations to do the work. (And Arafat was copying his mentor, Haj Amin al-Husseini, who instigated anti-Jewish pogroms in the 1920s and '30s while denying any responsibility to the British.)

The events of the past two days shows that Hamas is following the same game plan.

Yesterday's demonstration by women at Rafah was orchestrated by Hamas, as they bussed hundreds of women from all over Gaza. The goal was to embarrass Egypt into allowing Rafah to open.

Then, this morning, 17 simultaneous explosions by "masked gunmen" took down the Rafah border wall with Egypt - and Hamas denied responsibility.

But Hamas immediately "took control" of the border, and even allowed a Caterpillar tractor to clear the debris so cars can pass through. This "control" has been what they have been demanding for months.

The denial is telling. It shows that, while Hamas used to be unusually honest about its actions and goals before it took over Gaza, it has now started subscribing to using other terror groups to do actions that might be considered distasteful to the international community and to Arab countries.

Yesterday's barrage of 20 rockets - which Hamas did not take credit for - indicates the same thing.

Arab countries sick of Hamas

Despite the manufactured "humanitarian crisis" in Gaza and (perhaps because of) extensive al-Jazeera coverage, Arab countries have been muted in their support for Gazan Arabs - and Hamas is frustrated, as Iranian al-Aram reports:

A senior member of the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas has criticized Arab and Islamic states' stance towards Gaza blockade by the Israeli occupying regime.

Speaking to Alalam TV Tuesday, Hamas representative at the Palestinian Legislative Assembly, Ahmed Abu Halbiyeh lashed out at Arab countries, asking them to rise and save the Palestinian people as soon and effectively as possible.

"Hamas movement calls on the leaders of all Arab and Islamic countries, parliaments, political parties, and people to help save the Palestinian nation," Hamas official said.

"Unfortunately, Arab and Islamic countries have not so far given a positive response to our calls, and there has been only little talk for putting pressure on the Zionist regime or for encouraging the Palestinian groups to resume internal negotiations and find a resolution to the Zionists' blockade", Abu Halbiyeh said.

He further noted that "it seems the Palestinian blood is not important for the Arab and Islamic countries".

Hamas legislator said that the Palestinian nation would fulfill their duties concering resistance against occupation by every possible means, and "criticism goes to those countries which make no effort to help the Palestinian people".

Sounds like a spoiled teenager screaming to his parents "You don't love me!"

Politically incorrect Porky Pig

From 1940, "Ali Baba Bound":

Check out the suicide bomber - and the protester.

Great moments in Iranian media's due diligence

A particularly funny article from Iran's Al-Alam:

Al-Yamani Group Linked With Israel

BASRA, Iraq, Jan 22--A security official in Iraq city of Basra says the so-called al-Yamani cult might have been linked with foreign countries and the Zionist regime of Israel.

Bassem al-Moussavi told Alalam, "The so-called al-Yamani cult wants to turn holy cities and southern parts of Iraq insecure and assassinate the country's clergymen, security and political officials as well as attacking mourners of Imam Hossein (AS), the third Imam of Shiites."

He said the group also planned desecrating sanctities of Iraq, murdering the innocent people and attacking the security forces.

He added, "Studies show possible link of the group with the internal and external powers, including the Zionist regime of Israel. One can not however raise any comment on the issue before completion of due research."

Al-Moussavi said some regional and international sources say the cultists might have been lined with the Zionist Regime of Israel, announcing that the Regime might have extended financial, training and military aid to them.

Is the Iranian media all of a sudden afraid of lawsuits?

Gazans reject fuel

From Ma'an:

The Federation of Gaza Oil and Fuel Companies denounced Israel's decision on Monday night to allow bare minimum quantities of diesel fuel and natural into the Gaza Strip.

The General owners, oil and gas companies in Gaza today, Tuesday, rejected receiving mere quantities of diesel allocated to the humanitarian needs of the Agency for relief and received only diesel for electricity and natural gas for cooking.

Mahmoud Al-Khaznadar, the vice president of the Federation said: "The occupation allocated only 45,000 liters of diesel … for humanitarian purposes to hospitals and UNRWA and so on, except for quantities power station, which received 250,000 liters, except for the receipt of 200 tons of natural gas for cooking."

Al-Khaznadar said that 45,000 liters of dieselis not enough for civilian life in Gaza Strip.

He said Israeli Prime Minister Olmert's decision to provide just 2 million liters of diesel to the Gaza Strip's power plant is a circumvention of international law, treaties and conventions governing the treatment of a population under occupation.

When a people say explicitly that they'd rather die than compromise, whose fault is it when they die?

Video of Israel TV crew under fire from Gaza

Giyus links to a video showing an Israeli news crew, covering the fatal shooting of an Ecuadoran kibbutz volunteer by Hamas last week, getting shot at themselves by sniper bullets and mortars:

I follow the news fairly closely and didn't see any mention of Israeli reporters being shot at from Hamas. Needless to say, there was no condemnation of Hamas by any human rights or reporters' rights organizations. And, of course, the Israeli news correspondents were not in "occupied" territory at the time.

Shooting at Israelis is apparently quite acceptable to the world.

Part of the blame must go to Israeli news organizations themselves for not making a big deal over this. Every violation of the Geneva Conventions by Israel's enemies should be publicized, cataloged and placed in easily accessible databases.

Even though these violations occur numerous times a day.

Hamas' goal: open the Rafah crossing

Israel Matzav reported yesterday on a Debka article (no longer available) that Hamas is trying to use this manufactured "crisis" in Gaza in order to pressure Egypt to open the Rafah crossing.

Today, there is some evidence that Debka is correct. Palestine Press reports that Hamas has sent hundreds of women to Rafah to provoke and embarrass the Egyptians at the border (autotranslated):

Clashes erupted this afternoon between anti-riot forces stationed on the Egyptian crossing point of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip and between women from Hamas demonstrating and picketing in front of the crossing and creating anarchy at the border in order to embarrass the Egyptian leadership and incite public opinion.

Eyewitnesses said at the border women were brought in buses belonging to the Hamas movement after appeals sent them yesterday in mosques.

Hamas used women as a way to reach the goals that mostly lead to the destruction and loss of the Palestinian people oppressed under this provision unjust in Gaza and to embarrass the Egyptian leadership to the public opinion and Arab public.

Eyewitnesses said, "Ambulances rushed to the area of the crossing after the injury of a number of female supporters of Hamas were injured and were transported to the congestion of Rafah hospital to receive treatment."

The Hamas movement called for a demonstration of supporters of women's wives and female relatives of troops and Islamic bloc in the universities and schools near the Rafah crossing this morning, after Jmathn in buses from different areas of the Gaza Strip and they went to the crossing to demonstrate against the Egyptian authorities and demand to open the crossing closed since the Hamas coup in the Gaza Strip seven months ago.

The Egyptian police announced yesterday on the strengthening of security presence on the border of the Gaza Strip to 300 anti-riot forces in preparation to deal with Hamas demonstrations in the light of threats to use non-peaceful means to open the crossing in the event of the Egyptian authorities refused to adhere to their demands.

Ma'an adds that the Egyptians used batons and water cannons against the women as they shouted "Allah Akbar."

Baking a crisis

I mentioned yesterday Palestinian Arab press reports that Hamas forced the bakeries of Gaza to be closed even though they had a month of supplies. I wrote on Sunday about similar reports that Hamas was stealing fuel meant for hospitals.

Today, a PA official confirmed these stories:

A top PA official in Ramallah told The Jerusalem Post that Hamas was "holding more than 1.5 million Palestinians hostage" in an attempt to rally the Arab and Muslim masses against the PA and Israel.
"Of course, we strongly condemn the Israeli measures against the residents of the Gaza Strip, but Hamas is also responsible for what's happening there," he said. "Unfortunately, the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are paying a heavy price for Hamas's irresponsible actions."
The official also accused Hamas of ordering owners of bakeries to keep their businesses closed for the second day running to create a humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip. "Hamas is preventing people from buying bread," he said. "They want to deepen the crisis so as to serve their own interests."
The official said that contrary to Hamas's claims, there is enough fuel and flour to keep the bakeries in the Gaza Strip operating for another two months. "Hamas members have stolen most of the fuel in the Gaza Strip to fill their vehicles," he said.

From Hamas' viewpoint, it is all worth it as long as they can get their stooges at AP and Reuters to file pictures such as these:

Palestinians queue to buy bread from a bakery in Gaza City, Monday, Jan. 21, 2008.

And credulous reporters from major newspapers shamelessly parrot Hamas propaganda as they look for that "human angle":

Four days into an Israeli blockade that has cut off food and fuel to the Gaza Strip, residents of the strip contemplated Monday how long it would be until disaster hit. One family of 13, shivering in the cold, counted its eight remaining candles. A bakery that normally feeds thousands had three days' worth of flour.

Hospital generators with enough fuel for three days and no spare parts powered incubators in which twin boys born 2 1/2 months prematurely were being kept alive, their thin chests heaving convulsively.

Because, after all, if reporters have a nice juicy story of cute babies in imminent danger that can be conveniently blamed on Israel, or they have to dig a little to find what is really going on, which story will they choose?

As the Jerusalem Post's Khaled Abu Toameh reports, Hamas has convincingly won a PR victory with staged photos and stories such as these.

January Qassam calendar

As usual, this is far from complete, and it is more to show how ignored the Qassam issue is rather than to show how many are being fired. Many Qassams never make it in the news, and the rare times that the IDF publishes statistics shows that I am usually undercounting by about 50%. Also, these are Qassams that make it to Israel; many that are fired explode in Gaza itself.

This list does not include mortars being shot from Gaza, which are usually much more numerous on any given day. It also does not count the occasional rocket from Lebanon.

262 this month

Previous calendars:

December 2007
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
March
February

MSM can't resist pictures of cute terrorists in training

In Beirut:

A Palestinian child carries a rifle as he joins a demonstration at Shatila refugee camp in Beirut January 21, 2008, to protest against the Israeli blockade on the Gaza Sstrip.
REUTERS/ Jamal Saidi (LEBANON)

In Syria, via AP:

A Palestinian boy holding the Muslims holy book the Quran in one hand and a replica rifle in the other, during a protest against Israeli tactics in the Gaza Strip in al-Yarmouk refugee camp a major refugee camp some 10 km (6 miles) south of Damascus Monday Jan. 21, 2008. Some 1,500 people headed by Hamas deputy leader Mousa Abou Marzouk and members of other Damascusbased Palestinian factions took part in the rally.
(AP Photo/Bassem Tellawi)

And because Reuters couldn't stand to see AP have an exclusive on that kid:

A Palestinian child holds the Koran and a toy gun during a rally against a fuel blockade which led to power cuts in Gazaat al-Yarmouk Camp near to Damascus January 21, 2008.
REUTERS/Khaled al-Hariri (SYRIA)

You just have to wonder if any Muslims look at the last picture and get really upset over the imagery of a Koran in one hand and a rifle in the other. They spend so much time arguing that Islam means peace - what do they think when they see this picture? Is it a manifestation of Islamic justice or is it a mockery of Islamic beliefs?

And if they get upset, is it because they disagree with the symbolism or only with it being seen publicly?

Malaysian Muslims allow a corpse to be buried after 18 days

Today's Sharia news. from Compass Direct:

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, January 21 (Compass Direct News) – After 18 harrowing days of battling with Islamic religious authorities, Ngiam Tee Kong on Friday (January 18) finally won the right to bury his wife, who died last December 30, according to Christian rites.

High Court Judge Lau Bee Lan made the decision to allow the Christian burial of Wong Sau Lan after Islamic religious authorities from the Federal Territory Islamic Religious Council (MAIWP) dropped the claim to her body, saying that her alleged conversion to Islam was not in accordance with sharia (Islamic law).

Zulkifli Che Yong, who represented MAIWP, told the Sun newspaper that the Council decided to drop the claim after taking into account the views of the mufti (Muslim clergy) and testimony from traditional healer Siti Aishah Ismail, from whom Wong had sought treatment.

Ngiam’s tussle with Islamic religious authorities began when his wife died of kidney failure at the Malaysian National University Hospital (Hospital Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia).

Following her death, MAIWP directed the hospital through the police not to release her body to her husband unless he admitted that she had converted to Islam on December 24, 2007. The Islamic religious authority claimed that Wong had converted to Islam by reciting Arabic verses during a session with a traditional healer a week earlier.

Ngiam, who is a Buddhist, challenged the claim and decided to take the matter to court. Ngiam maintained that his wife was a Christian and was baptized in November 2007.

Following the court decision, Ngiam’s lawyer, Karpal Singh, told reporters outside the courtroom that the body would be cremated according to Christian rites after a two-day wake.
...
In the last few years, there have been at least two other cases in which families of the deceased have had to battle Islamic religious authorities in court over the right to bury their loved ones.

In December 2006, the widow of Rayappan Anthony was involved in a nine-day dispute with Islamic religious authorities over whether her husband was a Muslim at the point of death before she was granted the right to bury him as a Christian.

In 2005, the widow of Mount Everest climber Moorthy Maniam lost the legal battle to bury her husband as a Hindu when the civil court ruled that it had no jurisdiction over decisions made by the sharia court. Islamic religious authorities gave her husband a Muslim burial.

Testing new feature: ratings

Haloscan just added the ability to rate individual post ratings on a scale of one to five. It looks like it is worth trying out, as the only feedback I get is through comments and only a small percentage of my readers ever comment. It would be nice to know which of my postings resonate with people and which ones don't.

So if you get a chance, please rate any of the posts here you see with the star system on the bottom of each post.

It looks like it makes the site slower than it already was, so I don't know how long I'll keep this feature, but we'll give it a shot...and any feedback you can give is appreciated as well.

Strike - no spares

One would think that Palestinian Arabs would know by now that their oft-declared "general strikes" hurts no one but themselves.

I have referred a number of times to the strike of 1946-47 when an Arab boycott of Jewish goods ended up hurting many Arab shopkeepers - while the Jews increased their marketing to other countries, ending up making more money and being less dependent on the Arabs.

The 1936 strike, which Arab historians generally consider to be the high point of Palestinian Arab unity and resolve, resulted in the Jews building a port in Tel Aviv to work around the Jaffa port that was closed by the strike. The consequences for the Arab economy were severe.

A two-hour strike in 1947 to protest the anniversary of the Balfour Declaration resulted in Jewish shops and cafes being busier than ever, serving Arab customers.

And yet these strikes continue as a major rallying factor by the so-called Arab "leaders." Each strike throughout history was roundly ignored by many of the people whose lives were directly affected by these calls. And each time - in the 1936-39 "Great Revolt", in the 1946-47 strike, in the December 1947 strike in response to the partition plan - self-appointed, self-righteous Arabs would decide to "enforce" the strike, if necessary by murdering the people who choose not to participate.

Today, nothing much has changed:

Jerusalem police on Monday detained four Arab residents of the city suspected of threatening east Jerusalem shopkeepers to take part in a solidarity strike in support of the Palestinians in Gaza, police said.

I would venture that the reason that PalArabs continue to go down the same self-destructive path that has proven disastrous for decades is because they don't learn any sort of objective history. One would be hard-pressed to find any Palestinian Arab who considers the 1936-9 "Great Revolt" to be anything but an historic victory, when in fact its consequences directly translated to their "naqba" in 1948, not to mention infighting that killed hundreds of them at the time.

Some people never learn.

Clan clash!

From PCHR:

On Sunday evening, 20 January, Marwan Awad El-Gharabli from Sheja’eya Quarter in Gaza City was killed and two others were injured in an armed clan clash between members of El-Gharabli and Abu Amr clans.

I did not see this in any Palestinian Arabic news site, and since the Gaza takeover I'm sure I am missing many murders and Hamas torture-deaths (no word on the fate of some "collaborators" found a couple of weeks ago, for example.)

But from the ones I can check, the 2008 PalArab self-death count rises to 11.

I am also not counting a man who was killed on the Egyptian side of a Gaza tunnel yesterday.

Reports that Hamas closes Gaza bakeries

The anti-Hamas Palestine Press Agency reports that Hamas is forcing bakeries in Gaza to close - even though they have enough supplies to stay open for a month (autotranslated, cleaned up):

Reliable local sources in the Gaza Strip said that the illegal Hamas militia's supreme political leadership ordered bakery owners in the towns and camps sector prevent the sale of bread for citizens and closing doors, in a continuation in its scheme aimed to deepen the humanitarian crisis it is going through the Gaza Strip in order to achieve narrow partisan gains.\

A number of bakery owners in the sector were quoted as saying, "they had received orders from Hamas militias to close immediately and prevent the sale of bread for citizens, and not presented themselves to brutality and vengeance of those militias in the absence of Anasiallm orders."

The bakery owners said "that the stocks of material sufficient to meet the precise needs of the population of the Gaza Strip of bread for one full month and more", who indicated that they are able to provide this basic commodity for the Palestinian citizen throughout this period of no orders militia Hamas, which prevented them from doing so.

I take much of what PalPress says about Hamas with a grain of salt but very often their claims are corroborated. In addition, since Hamas' takeover of Gaza it is clear that the campaign of intimidation against the press is working and other Palestinian Arab newspapers have become very reluctant to publish anti-Hamas stories.

This story in particular is consistent with how we have seen Hamas act in the past, as well as earlier reports that Hamas has confiscated fuel meant for hospitals for its own use.

Recent anti-semitism stories

Australians against Jews from South Africa

Threats against Jewish centers in Berlin

Israeli academic anti-semitism

Government attacks on Jewish institutions in Venezuela

Anti-semitic hate crime suspect found with pipe bombs and other weapons in Brooklyn

A Gazan child cries. Reuters is there to blame Israel!

Pity Reuters. They want so much to find pictures that illustrate that "humanitarian crisis" in Gaza that they will grasp at any straw they can find, even a child who apparently skins his knee:

A Palestinian boy cries outside his house in the Gaza Strip January 20, 2008. Gaza's main power plant began shutting down on Sunday due to a fuel shortage caused by Israel's closure of the Hamas-controlled territory's borders in response to Palestinian rocket attacks. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa (GAZA)

I'm surprised that they didn't caption this photo "Palestinian children forced to draw their own crude Israeli and American flags for burning because of a severe flag shortage due to Israel's total, uncompromising blockade of Gaza's innocent citizens."

MSM lies, Israel still supplies Gaza with electricity

The headlines from around the web:

Israel cuts off Gaza's electricity
Gazans reel under power shutdown
Gaza City Goes Dark After Power Cut
Gaza in power cut as blockade bites
Gaza Residents Plunged Into Darkness

Sure sounds like Israel has cut all electricity to Gaza, doesn't it?

And, as happens too often, the MSM is lying, sometimes explicitly and sometimes by broad implication.

The truth?

The Israeli Electric Company (IEC) is supplying nearly 70% of electricity to the Gaza Strip despite Palestinians' claims of a power shortage in Gaza, said Miko Zarfati, the chairman of the workers' committee at the power company.

"This is Palestinian spin. No one has stopped the supply of electricity to the Strip," Zarfati told Ynet. He claimed that his employees worked day and night in a power plant in Ashkelon while putting themselves in danger of being hit by Qassam rockets falling in the area.

The Gaza power plant only produces 30% of the electricity consumed in the Strip while Israel supplies the rest.

"It is simply offensive and arrogant for them to claim that there is shortage," Zarfati said.

The IEC employee was upset that Israel continues to supply electricity to Gaza while the Qassam rockets continue to land in the western Negev.

"The situation is totally absurd. We're continuing to supply them electricity despite the (demand) overload for electricity in Israel and despite the fact that Israeli residents and Electric Company workers that are being sent to Gaza Vicinity communities are under threat from Qassam rockets," Zarfati railed.

"The Electric Company sends people to fix power outages that are caused from the Qassam barrages everyday in Sderot and the Gaza vicinity and more than one worker has already been injured in these rocket attacks."

According to Zarafti, the workers have been pressuring him to cut off the flow of electricity to the Strip: "I am being pressured to disconnect the electricity, but I am of course a law-abiding man and I cannot do this.

The decision to disconnect the electricity to Gaza is a decision which can only be made by the Israeli government and I understand the consideration sagainst shutting off the power."

The workers' committee chairman has been thinking of ways to improve the lives of the employees on the front line. "I explode with anger and feel hopeless in the face of the workers' situation and in the face of the whole situation in the Gaza vicinity and in Ashkelon," Zarfati continued.

"I appealed to the Finance Ministry and asked them to approve a plan to reward these employees in some way, a few cents for everything they're going through. Unfortunately, I received a negative response."

The Treasury responded saying "no precedents will be created with regards to salary bonuses for workers living in dangerous areas."

Not only is Israel still supplying Gaza with 70% of its electricity directly - it forces its electric utility employees to endanger their own lives, under Qassam and Katyusha fire, to keep that electricity supply up and running.

This is an astonishing bit of dishonesty from the mainstream media in spinning the story the way they are.

We already knew that Gazan terrorists have been shooting rockets not only at Israel but at the border crossings as well, limiting their own ability to get humanitarian aid, for months. But the MSM doesn't mention it.

We already knew that even though Israel is under no obligation to provide food, fuel or medicine to Gaza, it still accepts dozens of medical patients daily (70 on Sunday alone.) But the MSM barely addresses this.

And now, we learn that Israel puts its own citizens in danger in order to keep the electricity flowing to Gaza. And the MSM happily accepts the Palestinian lies as gospel as it hammers Israel for creating a crisis that doesn't exist.

UPDATE: Honest Reporting covers this well.

Another example of "no coercion in Islam"

From Al-Arabiya:

Egypt's top religious body has called for tough penalties on people who convert to Islam for personal reasons, only to re-convert to their old religion, Quds Press news agency reported on Saturday.

The religious ruling, issued by the fatwa committee at Al Azhar, affects mostly Coptic Christians, who often convert to Islam in order to get a divorce, to remarry, or to marry a Muslim. They then convert back to Christianity once they have achieved the desired result.

According to the fatwa, the practice of re-converting after converting to Islam is "a grave crime that cannot be met with leniency."

It says offenders should be penalized according to Sharia (Islamic law), but did not specify the penalty.

Some scholars say there is no specific punishment for apostasy in Islam, while others claim it is an offense punishable by death.

The head of the Fatwa Committee, Sheikh Abdul-Hamid Al-Atrash, said people are never forced to convert to Islam, but once they do, it has to be out of absolute belief in the religion and total conviction of its principles.

Therefore, he said the decision to convert should not be retractable.

The fatwa says offenders will first be given the chance to "repent," and if they insist on leaving Islam, they should be penalized.

In April 2007, Egypt's Administrative Court ruled that people re-converting to Christianity will not be allowed new identification documents, a decision that infuriated Copts.

"This is an inhuman decision that violates the right of citizenship granted to all Egyptians according to Article 1 of the constitution," said Coptic secularist activist Kamal Zakher.

So many converts to Islam are not altogether sincere. Rather than annulling their conversions - because of this lack of sincerity - the fatwa is saying that they need to be punished as full Muslims when they revert to their original religion.

Of course, they are being forced to pretend to convert to begin with because of sharia-flavored legal systems to begin with.

And we all know the time-honored penalty for apostasy is death.

Apparently the oft-quoted Muslim maxim that "there is no compulsion in religion" is a bit more limited than those words imply.

'We want to offer sharia law to Britain'

From the Telegraph (UK):

[Sharia judge] Dr [Suhaib] Hasan, who is also a spokesman for the Muslim Council of Britain on issues of sharia law, says there is great misunderstanding of the issue in the West.
"Whenever people associate the word 'sharia' with Muslims, they think it is flogging and stoning to death and cutting off the hand," he says with a smile.
He makes the distinction between the aspects of law that sharia covers: worship, penal law, and personal law. Muslim leaders in Britain are interested only in integrating personal law, he says.
"Penal law is the duty of the Muslim state - it is not in the hands of any public institution like us to handle it. Only a Muslim government that believes in Islam is going to implement it. So there is no question of asking for penal law to be introduced here in the UK - that is out of the question."
Despite this, Dr Hasan is open in supporting the severe punishments meted out in countries where sharia law governs the country.
"Even though cutting off the hands and feet, or flogging the drunkard and fornicator, seem to be very abhorrent, once they are implemented, they become a deterrent for the whole society.
"This is why in Saudi Arabia, for example, where these measures are implemented, the crime rate is very, very, low," he told The Sunday Telegraph.
In a documentary to be screened on Channel 4 next month, entitled Divorce: Sharia Style, Dr Hasan goes further, advocating a sharia system for Britain. "If sharia law is implemented, then you can turn this country into a haven of peace because once a thief's hand is cut off nobody is going to steal," he says.
"Once, just only once, if an adulterer is stoned nobody is going to commit this crime at all.
"We want to offer it to the British society. If they accept it, it is for their good and if they don't accept it they'll need more and more prisons."
...
"The introduction of sharia law in Britain raises complex questions, as some of its basic tenets are incompatible with the fundamental principles of our liberal democracy and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights," says Baroness Cox, a leading human rights campaigner.
"There is no equality before the law between men and women and between Muslims and non-Muslims; and there is no freedom to choose and change religion."
Ibrahim Mogra, chairman of the Muslim Council of Britain's inter-faith committee, admits that to non-Muslims some laws may seem harsh on women. Those who are married to a man with a number of wives can be treated badly, for instance. But he insists that sharia is an equitable system.
"It may mean that a woman married under Islamic law has no legal rights, but the husband is required to pay for everything in marriage and in the case of a divorce all the woman's belongings are hers to keep."
In fact, Sheikh Mogra argues that sharia in Britain would give rights to women. "A Muslim man can take a second wife under sharia law and treat her as he wants, knowing that she has no legal rights in Britain. It means that she is regarded as no more than a mistress and he can walk out on her when he wants."
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Critics warn, however, that in giving even parts of sharia law official status, Britain would be associating itself with a system that in many ways was intolerable according to Western values.
Professor John Marks, author of The West, Islam and Islamism, points out that apostates from Islam can suffer severe punishment, even honour killings.
"There are more violent cases that are being related to people who choose to convert from Islam," he says.
A survey by Policy Exchange found that 36 per cent of young British Muslims believed that a Muslim who converted to another religion should be "punished by death".
"This clearly goes against the laws of our country. If they come to live in this country they should live by our laws," says Prof Marks.

And here is a new, backhanded argument for making some form of sharia law official in Britain:

Perhaps the strongest argument in favour of some form of recognition of sharia in Britain is that it would help to regulate a system that operates beyond the law.
The Government has expressed concern about imams who may be using the Koran to justify fatwas that clash with British law.
Leaders of four major British Muslim groups published a government-backed report in 2006 that accepted that many imams were not qualified to give guidance to alienated young people.
They agreed to set up a watchdog aimed at tackling extremism and monitoring mosques, but Yunes Teinaz, a former adviser to the London Central Mosque, warns that one of the greatest problems is the imams who arrive in Britain unable to speak English, and with no regard for British law.
"The absence of anyone regulating the mosques and sharia courts means that they can act as a law unto themselves, issuing fatwas that breach people's human rights because they have no knowledge of the law," he says. "They can take people's money despite having no proper qualifications, but worse they can harm the communities that they are in."
Zareen Roohi Ahmed, the chief executive of the British Muslim Forum - one of the four groups on the Mosques and Imams National Advisory Body - concedes that sharia courts in Britain are still poorly organised.
"They need development - the government should be supporting them to deliver their service more effectively," she says.

Who would have thought that Muslims, in their zeal to spread sharia in a secular system, would mirror the arguments of those who want to legalize marijuana?

As Melanie Phillips notes:

It is very important that people realise the crucial difference between allowing a minority the right to practise its own precepts while fitting in with the law of the land, and allowing members of a minority to force the law of the land to fit in with them. It is very important that people understand that the pressure to sharia-ise Britain is far more dangerous even than terrorism because – see the government’s embrace of ‘sharia finance’ – its implications simply aren’t understood and it is likely therefore to be accepted. Salami-slice by salami slice, this is how British society will be dismembered.

Hamas' circle of death

Here's how it goes - a portent of things to come in the Palestinian Arabic media:

* Hamas proudly shoots some 160-odd rockets to Israel since Tuesday, and some 100 mortar shells not only at Israel but also towards Gaza crossing points where humanitarian aid enters.

* Israel decides that allowing these terrorists to continue to receive supplies via Israel, and endangering those who try to supply Gaza with supplies, is somewhat problematic.

* Hamas seizes fuel meant for hospitals (from PalPress):

One of the owners of petrol stations in the Gaza Strip this evening said to our correspondent that Hamas beyond the law in the Gaza Strip by the seizure of a large quantity of fuel had entered the Gaza Strip.

The source confirmed "one of the fuel stations", who asked not to be identified: "These quantities seized by Hamas was necessary to cover the needs of hospitals, where Hamas [is taking them and using them for] putting them in camps in the Gaza Strip for use in Hamas leadership lighting and ceiling space, and houses of Hamas leaders and security headquarters only."

* And now Hamas is anxiously awaiting people dying in Gaza hospitals whose deaths they can blame on Israel.

By the way, even though there were reports that Hamas had stopped firing rockets this weekend, it took credit for one of the rockets Saturday night.

Saudi Arabia anti-semitic? Naaaaah.

From EJP:

An international organization fighting to defend press freedom has denounced Saudi Arabia’s refusal to issue a visa to a Jewish journalist who was to accompany French President Nicolas Sarkozy during his trip to the country earlier this week.

’’The discrimination practiced by Saudi Arabia with respect to Israeli journalists is unacceptable,’’ the Paris-based “Reporters Sans Frontières” (Reporters Without Borders), said.

French-Israeli journalist Gideon Kouts, who is a Paris correspondent for the second Israeli tv channel and writes for Jewish magazine ‘L’Arche’ presented his French passport but the Saudis refused on January 10 to grant him a visa because he writes about Israel.

Of course it isn't because he is Jewish - it is because he writes about Israel!

In the interest of furthering Saudi consistency on banning journalists who write about Israel, here is a link to 9427 articles that mention Israel in the Saudi-based Arab News English edition. I fully expect them to expel Mohammed Mar’i, Abdul Jalil Mustafa, Tariq A. Al-Maeena, Hisham Abu Taha, Walid M. Awad, Sarah Abdullah, and the many other reporters who dare mention Israel's name on the hallowed pages of Arab media.

Bloggers' block Sunday links, plus

It's bad enough not finding interesting, original stories to blog about.

But it's worse when I see others managing to find them!

Judeopundit, who comments here often, finds a wacky left-wing article that claims that Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar has saved countless Israeli lives.

He also found a wonderful English Q&A at the Hamas website with its spokesman.

And for a hat trick he discovers exactly why Al-Jazeera maintains contacts with Israel. Hint: It isn't for "even-handedness."

Israel Matzav notices a British watchdog group who finds that - believe it or not - British taxpayer money is being used to fund Palestinian Arab incitement against Israel. What a shock!

Backspin digs up a real, honest to goodness news story about Israel that describes....Israel.

Israellycool continues his liveblogging of what's going on in Israel and Gaza (with a smattering of Nasrallah for extra-special disgusting flavor.)

Daled Amos reports on a story I should have blogged last week on Yasir Arafat's famous blood donation for victims of 9/11 being a hoax - the great champion of terror evidently hated needles.

What can I add to such great stuff? Not much. We have the moderate leader of the Fatah-flavor PA condemning Israel for killing a terrorist that belongs to a Fatah group that the PA denies existing anymore while planning a non-existent terror attack.

An interesting article on Yiddish curses.

And the anti-Hamas Palestine Press Agency reports that Hamas has decided to stop shooting rockets at Sderot for now. I cannot find any other sources for this, although rocket fire has cooled down over the weekend to "only" five yesterday and two so far today. As has been the Palestinian Arab habit for decades, they are trying to find just the right amount of damage they can do without risking massive retaliation.

That's about it. I'll keep updating my Qassam calendar and I'll check back later to see if I can find any other interesting stories...