Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, June 20, 2008

The bicycle and the kite

The relative calm in Gaza gives us a chance to look yet again at how news photographers and editors use their biases to either evoke a mood or subtly tilt a story. They use a combination of selecting the photos and choosing the captions to get their point across.

Here are two pictures from Gaza:

In the first picture we see a a young man flying a kite on top of a ruined building. The second shows a man riding a bicycle in what appears to be a fairly idyllic town.

The caption for the first:

A Palestinian boy flies a kite as he stands on a building destroyed in recent years of conflict with Israel in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, June 19, 2008. Guns went quiet as a six-month truce between Israel and Gaza Strip militants took effect early Thursday, but there was widespread skepticism about its ability to hold. The cease-fire, which Egypt labored for months to conclude, aims to bring an end to a year of fighting that has killed seven Israelis and more than 400 Palestinians — many of them civilians — since the Islamic militant group Hamas wrested control of Gaza a year ago

In what is almost certainly a staged photo, the youth chooses to fly a kite in a place where he cannot easily run and the kite could probably get caught in a building or pther ruin. The caption together with the contrived photo subtly make the point that Palestinian Arab youths just want to play like all kids, but Israel has created a situation where that is all but impossible.

How about the second photo? It can certainly be used to evoke the same idea, that of Palestinian Arab lives slowly returning to normalcy during the cease fire. But it was taken a month ago, before the cease-fire, and its caption means to blame Israel for something else:

A Palestinian man rides a bike with his child on board in the Jebaliya Refugee Camp, northern Gaza Strip, Tuesday May 20, 2008. Defiant Gaza residents are persistently finding ways around Israeli-imposed fuel restrictions. Owners of gas-run cars are converting to liquid gas. Drivers of old diesel cars use vegetable oil mixes, and two engineers converted a car to run on electrical batteries - and are now open for business.

Did no Palestinian Arabs ride bikes before fuel shortages? Did none of them fly kites before the cease-fire?

The implication in both cases is no, they did not. They are forced to ride bikes because of Israel and they were all cowering in fear before the cease fire.

For further indications of media bias, do a Google image search on "Jabalya refugee camp." You will see many violent images - bombed out buildings, people firing guns. You will be hard-pressed to find any images like the one above, of a clean, wide residential street with no visible damage, in what looks more like a small town than a refugee camp.

When photographers want to blame Israel for all of Gaza's problems, they will make sure that their photos reflect the idea that all of Gaza is a war zone with constant fear of Israeli bombings. But when one wants to blame Israel in a different frame of reference, his image of Jabalya is suddenly different - we are accidentally seeing a side of Jabalya that almost certainly represents how it really looks and that few news photographers would ever purposefully reveal.

Egypt grabs more weapons meant for Gaza

Part of the "truce" between Israel and Hamas includes a halt to all smuggling of arms to Gaza. At least that's what Israel's negotiator is claiming:

Gilad described the conditions according to which the terror organizations were to be judged during the ceasefire. "We need a total ceasefire – all included. If tomorrow morning one single rocket is fired, it will be a violation of the agreement. There is no room for interpretation, and no mediating body is needed. We will not accept the firing of even one Qassam.

"Egypt, on its side, is committed to preventing the smuggling activity from Gaza. It's simple; Egypt has a border with Gaza, through which weapons and terrorists are smuggled. Smuggling is a serious violation of the terms. Any such infraction will lead to a change in Israel's stance from the way in which it was presented to the Egyptians," he said.

Well, Hamas didn't seem to waste any time in trying to break that condition. From AFP:

Egyptian authorities on Friday found a large cache of weapons and explosives hidden in the mountains of the Sinai peninsula, a security official told AFP.

North Sinai authorities found "25 anti-aircraft missiles, 12 anti-personnel and anti-armour grenades, eight mortars, as well as five surface to surface and surface to air missiles," the official said.

"A large number of gun barrels and large amounts of detonators used for explosives and mines were also found," the official added.

For every cache found by Egypt, how many are missed?

Likely terrorist's family donates his organs to Israelis

Ma'an reports:

The family of an 18-year-old Palestinian civilian, who died after being shot by Israeli security guards a few weeks ago, have donated his organs to save the lives of six Israelis.

Patient "A" was clinically dead when he was transferred to the intensive care unit in Shiba medical center in Tel Hashomeir. But doctors were unable to resuscitate him.

The Hebrew daily newspaper Ma’ariv reported that his family decided to donate his organs to those who needed them, regardless of their race, religion or identity.

The National Center for Organ Transplants promised to keep information concerning his identity confidential for the safety of his family who live in the Palestinian Authority area. The families of the recipients were told about the identity of the donor but have also agreed to keep the information confidential, according to the newspaper.

On Wednesday evening the Patient "A"'s father had an emotional meeting with the patient who received his son’s heart.

Patient "A"'s father described his son as "a great person who was loved by everyone. He was big-hearted and I didn’t hesitate to donate his organs to needy patients, even though he was killed by Israeli security guards.”

“At first it was hard for me, but God inspired me to take the right decision to help the patients by donating my son’s organs. I’m happy with this decision and I don’t differentiate between Jews and Arabs. All I care about is saving people's lives. That’s why I didn’t ask about the patients' identities,” he added.

My best guess is that this is how the man was killed (from PCHR's weekly reports of Palestinian Arabs killed and arrested by Israel):

on 9 May, a Palestinian civilian was shot dead and another was arrested by the guards of “Ofra” settlement, northeast of Ramallah. IOF claimed that the victim attempted to get close to the settlement in order to fire at it from a hunting rifle.

This is the only West Bank death I could find that remotely fits the description in the Ma'an/Maariv article, so it appears that "Patient A" was a terrorist who tried to kill as many Jews as possible - and his family ended up saving them.

UPDATE: More details on the Ofra incident from Ma'an:

A Palestinian gunman was killed and another detained in Ein Yabrud village north-east of Ramallah on Friday after an alleged attack on five Israelis.

Unofficial Israeli sources told Ma'an that five Israelis were vacationing in the mountains near Ein Yabrud village when they were attacked by a Palestinian gunmen who opened fire on them. Israeli armed men then responded and opened fire on the gunmen. One was seriously injured and later bled to death. Another Palestinian was arrested.

Official sources have still not confirmed the details of the incident.

The Al-Aqsa Brigades affiliated to Imad Mughniyya later claimed responsibility for the attack. They told Ma'an that their resistance fighters survived the counter attack, but that the Palestinian who was killed and the other who was detained were bystanders and were not part of their armed group.

They said in a statement that the Brigades opened fire on a group of settlers and clashed with them in Ein Yabrud.

Amazing video of smuggling tunnels in Rafah

From Israel's Channel 10 (in Hebrew).

It shows a tunnel 20 meters deep and 900 meters long, used for smuggling. It also shows the construction of another.

The Gazans repeat a claim I've seen lately that Egypt is pumping poison gas in the tunnels and killing people, although I have never seen anyone specify who exactly was killed in such a way.

Gaza groups criticize journalists - then shoot one

A political forum was held in Gaza today called "The role of media intellectuals in the dialogue and the restoration of national unity." Hamas spokesman - and former newspaper editor - Ghazi Hamad said that "the Palestinian media has become part of the problem rather than a solution" and they are too negative and partisan.

Almost as if to underscore how bad journalists are in the minds of some Gazans, a prominent media personality, Mostafa Alsua, the editor of the Journal of Palestine, was shot in his office in Gaza City today.

That'll teach 'em!

Hezbollah goes back to its roots

More recently, in the aftermath of the 2006 war, Hezbollah has stated that it only uses weapons for the "resistance" and implied that this was a temporary state of affairs:

"No army in the world will force us to drop our weapons, force us to surrender our arms, as long as people believe in this resistance," said Hassan Nasrallah, who claimed Hezbollah victorious in the fighting.

But he added, "We do not wish to keep our weapons forever," because they should not be part of domestic life.

"When we build a strong and just state that is capable of protecting the nation and the citizens, we will easily find an honorable solution to the resistance issue and its weapons," he told the flag-waving crowd gathered in Beirut's bombed-out southern suburbs.

Hezbollah has, for years, used the Shebaa Farms as its excuse to keep its weapons, saying that part of Lebanese soil is still being "occupied" in spite of the UN ruling otherwise. And its constant harping on the issue has gained them apparent support from the US State Department:

US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice spent the weekend in Israel and on Monday made an unannounced visit to Lebanon, where she said "the time has come" to deal with the Shebaa Farms, an area occupied by Israel and claimed by Lebanon. Hizbullah has long cited the liberation of the Shebaa Farms as a reason for its men to keep their arms...

So when the issue is put back on the table, what does Hezbollah say?

The Shiite movement Hezbollah said on Thursday that Lebanon would still need its armed presence even if Israel finally quit the disputed Shebaa Farms district in the south.

"Any Zionist retreat from the Shebaa Farms would be a big achievement for the 'resistance' for this would be the result of its role and its pressure," Hezbollah MP Hassan Fadlallah was quoted as saying by the state-run National News Agency.

But any retreat "will not change the fact that Lebanon needs the resistance," he said.

Resistance against what?

Rice, as all people who suffer from wishful thinking about Arab terror groups, is not looking at the big picture. She is not taking into consideration Hezbollah's own stated objectives, listed at its founding over two decades ago. Like all terror groups, Hezbollah espouses a philosophy that needs to be revisited in order to understand its actions.

In Hezbollah's case, its guiding principles were formed in 1985 with a letter called "The Hezbollah Program" which enumerated three objectives:

(a) to expel the Americans. the French and their allies definitely from Lebanon, putting an end to any colonialist entity on our land;
(b) to submit the Phalanges to a just power and bring them all to justice for the crimes they have perpetrated against Muslims and Christians;
(c) to permit all the sons of our people to determine their future and to choose in all the liberty the form of government they desire. We call upon all of them to pick the option of Islamic government which, alone, is capable of guaranteeing justice and liberty for all. Only an Islamic regime can stop any further tentative attempts of imperialistic infiltration into our country.

Because of Hezbollah's constant anti-Israel rhetoric, people think that it will just disappear if its enemy surrenders. But Israel is only a part of Hezbollah's program, and its real goal has been to replace Lebanon's multi-ethnic government with an Islamic state (and eventually a pan-Islamic ummah that includes Palestine, Syria and probably Jordan as well.) Its weapons are a critical part towards achieving this goal, and it will not hesitate to use them (all in the name of Lebanese "unity," of course.)

Rice is utterly ignorant of Hezbollah's real positions and goals, and she is willing to sacrifice America's best friend yet again in order to support her ignorance.

Minor victory in Google News

Uruknet.info, one of the most virulent anti-semitic and pro-jihadi sites on the Internet, has finally been removed from Google News as a legitimate news source.

The People's Voice, a similar rag that we have written about before, is freaking out:

One of my Associates, Uruknet.Info, is once again the victim of Google’s zionist inspired polices. Just a month ago, the co-founder of Google was in Israel to ‘celebrate’ its 60 years as an occupying power… he obviously was inspired by his visit as his Company’s policies seem to have shifted even more to the right than they were before his trip.

Uruknet has been hacked, taken of Google News indexing and now, the latest… taken off Google completely. How can this be done? We really don’t know, but we do know that Google has refused to respond to the thousands of requests by readers to reinstate Uruknet on Google News. They came up with a response after weeks only to the site itself where it “reasoned” that Uruknet was “only” an aggregator. All of us know that it is an exceptionally important aggregator, but it is far more than that! It contains original material, has editorial choices and space for commentary and it presents for an international public much material that otherwise would not be translated or disseminated.

Indeed, uruknet is pretty much the major place on the Internet to disseminate direct translations of Osama Bin Laden's audio tapes. Whether they do this as news or as a mouthpiece for OBL is a different story.

The writer is not even competent enough to know how to use Google, as clearly uruknet.info is available through Google search. But its exclusion from Google News is welcome and much overdue, and The People's Voice and similar pro-terror rags should hopefully follow.

Why Americans support Israel

A very nice article in Foreign Affairs shows quite well that Americans have overwhelmingly supported the right of Jews to have a state, well before modern Zionism, and that this is why America has had pro-Israel policies - not because of the "Israel lobby" or an influential Jewish minority.

Highlights:

The story of U.S. support for a Jewish state in the Middle East begins early. John Adams could not have been more explicit. "I really wish the Jews again in Judea an independent nation," he said, after his presidency. From the early nineteenth century on, gentile Zionists fell into two main camps in the United States. Prophetic Zionists saw the return of the Jews to the Promised Land as the realization of a literal interpretation of biblical prophecy, often connected to the return of Christ and the end of the world. ...
Other, less literal and less prophetic Christians developed a progressive Zionism that would resonate down through the decades among both religious and secular gentiles. In the nineteenth century, liberal Christians often believed that God was building a better world through human progress. They saw the democratic and (relatively) egalitarian United States as both an example of the new world God was making and a powerful instrument to further his grand design. Some American Protestants believed that God was moving to restore what they considered the degraded and oppressed Jews of the world to the Promised Land, just as God was uplifting and improving the lives of other ignorant and unbelieving people through the advance of Protestant and liberal principles. They wanted the Jews to establish their own state because they believed that this would both shelter the Jews from persecution and, through the redemptive powers of liberty and honest agricultural labor, uplift and improve what they perceived to be the squalid morals and deplorable hygiene of contemporary Ottoman and eastern European Jews. As Adams put it, "Once restored to an independent government and no longer persecuted they would soon wear away some of the asperities and peculiarities of their character and possibly in time become liberal Unitarian Christians." For such Christians, American Zionism was part of a broader program of transforming the world by promoting the ideals of the United States.
In 1891, these strands of gentile Zionists came together. The Methodist lay leader William Blackstone presented a petition to President Benjamin Harrison calling on the United States to use its good offices to convene a congress of European powers so that they could induce the Ottoman Empire to turn Palestine over to the Jews. The 400 signatories were overwhelmingly non-Jewish and included the chief justice of the Supreme Court; the Speaker of the House of Representatives; the chairs of the House Ways and Means Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee; the future president William McKinley; the mayors of Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, and Washington; the editors or proprietors of the leading East Coast and Chicago newspapers; and an impressive array of Episcopal, Methodist, Presbyterian, and Roman Catholic clergy. Business leaders who signed the petition included Cyrus McCormick, John Rockefeller, and J. P. Morgan. At a time when the American Jewish community was neither large nor powerful, and no such thing as an Israel lobby existed, the pillars of the American gentile establishment went on record supporting a U.S. diplomatic effort to create a Jewish state in the lands of the Bible.

The United States' sense of its own identity and mission in the world has been shaped by readings of Hebrew history and thought. The writer Herman Melville expressed this view: "We Americans are the peculiar, chosen people -- the Israel of our time; we bear the ark of the liberties of the world." From the time of the Puritans to the present day, preachers, thinkers, and politicians in the United States -- secular as well as religious, liberal as well as conservative -- have seen the Americans as a chosen people, bound together less by ties of blood than by a set of beliefs and a destiny. Americans have believed that God (or history) has brought them into a new land and made them great and rich and that their continued prosperity depends on their fulfilling their obligations toward God or the principles that have blessed them so far. Ignore these principles -- turn toward the golden calf -- and the scourge will come.

Both religious and nonreligious Americans have looked to the Hebrew Scriptures for an example of a people set apart by their mission and called to a world-changing destiny. Did the land Americans inhabit once belong to others? Yes, but the Hebrews similarly conquered the land of the Canaanites. Did the tiny U.S. colonies armed only with the justice of their cause defeat the world's greatest empire? So did David, the humble shepherd boy, fell Goliath. Were Americans in the nineteenth century isolated and mocked for their democratic ideals? So were the Hebrews surrounded by idolaters. Have Americans defeated their enemies at home and abroad? So, according to the Scriptures, did the Hebrews triumph. And when Americans held millions of slaves in violation of their beliefs, were they punished and scourged? Yes, and much like the Hebrews, who suffered the consequences of their sins before God.

This mythic understanding of the United States' nature and destiny is one of the most powerful and enduring elements in American culture and thought. As the ancient Hebrews did, many Americans today believe that they bear a revelation that is ultimately not just for them but also for the whole world; they have often considered themselves God's new Israel. One of the many consequences of this presumed kinship is that many Americans think it is both right and proper for one chosen people to support another. They are not disturbed when the United States' support of Israel, a people and a state often isolated and ostracized, makes the United States unpopular or creates other problems. The United States' adoption of the role of protector of Israel and friend of the Jews is a way of legitimizing its own status as a country called to a unique destiny by God.
Besides a direct divine promise, two other important justifications that the Americans brought forward in their contests with the Native Americans were the concept that they were expanding into "empty lands" and John Locke's related "fair use" doctrine, which argued that unused property is a waste and an offense against nature. U.S. settlers felt that only those who would improve the land, settling it densely with extensive farms and building towns, had a real right to it. John Quincy Adams made the case in 1802: "Shall [the Indians] doom an immense region of the globe to perpetual desolation ... ?" And Thomas Jefferson warned that the Native Americans who failed to learn from the whites and engage in productive agriculture faced a grim fate. They would "relapse into barbarism and misery, lose numbers by war and want, and we shall be obliged to drive them, with the beasts of the forest into the Stony mountains."

Through much of U.S. history, such views resonated not just with backwoodsmen but also with liberal and sophisticated citizens. These arguments had a special meaning when it came to the Holy Land. As pious Americans dwelt on the glories of ancient Jerusalem and the Temple of Solomon, they pictured a magnificent and fertile land -- "a land flowing with milk and honey," as the Bible describes it. But by the nineteenth century, when first dozens, then hundreds, and ultimately thousands of Americans visited the Holy Land -- and millions more thronged to lectures and presentations to hear reports of these travels -- there was little milk or honey; Palestine was one of the poorest, most backward, and most ramshackle provinces of the Ottoman Empire. To American eyes, the hillsides and rocky fields of Judea were desolate and empty -- God, many believed, had cursed the land when he sent the Jews into their second exile, which they saw as the Jews' punishment for their failure to recognize Christ as the Messiah. And so, Americans believed, the Jews belonged in the Holy Land, and the Holy Land belonged to the Jews. The Jews would never prosper until they were home and free, and the land would never bloom until its rightful owners returned.
The Prophet Isaiah had described the future return of the Jews to their homeland as God's grace bringing water to a desert land. And Americans watched the returning fertility of the land under the cultivation of early Zionist settlers with the astonished sense that biblical prophecy was being fulfilled before their eyes. "The springs of Jewish colonizing vigor, amply fed by the money of world Jewry, flowed on to the desert," wrote Time magazine in 1946, echoing the language of Isaiah.

...One thing, at least, seems clear. In the future, as in the past, U.S. policy toward the Middle East will, for better or worse, continue to be shaped primarily by the will of the American majority, not the machinations of any minority, however wealthy or engaged in the political process some of its members may be.

Read the whole thing.

Go crazy

I once had a coworker who would occasionally erupt in anger during department meetings and start yelling at the boss about something. He was a friend and he explained to me that these episodes were deliberate - designed to keep our boss on edge and to create an environment where he would be treated with kid gloves.

As he was an essential member of the team and the boss was relatively weak, this strategy worked perfectly. The boss would give my friend a wide berth and would not push him too much, out of fear.

In this case, my friend used the threat of acting irrationally in a rational manner, to put himself in a better negotiating position. And it was effective.

The reason I am thinking of this is from this quote from Ehud Olmert:

"I send a warm hug to all of the residents of the south, who have withstood the long and difficult months, and years, with great courage and strength, facing the daily threat and allowing the government to act in an intelligent, restrained, and responsible manner," he added.

Israel has been doing a lot of acting in an "intelligent, restrained, and responsible manner," mostly with an eye to keeping its Western audience happy. But Israel's opponents have no such restrictions on their behavior, and this gives them a competitive advantage in any interaction.

When Hamas knows that Israel is likely to act in a predictable way, it can use that knowledge to calculate exactly how much damage it can cause and how many Jews it can target on any given day without great fear of serious repercussions. They know that Israel will not target their leadership, they know that Israel will try to stay away from bombing residential areas, they know that Israel will not re-occupy land. This knowledge gives them great latitude in deciding how to act.

The Arabs, on the other hand, make their own assumed irrationality a central part of their collective psyche when trying to gain more concessions from the West. I have called this the "diplomacy of fear," and it is so ingrained in our thought processes that it has become accepted as fact. We are always in fear that the Arabs of Muslims will act crazy and we subconsciously adapt to it by pandering to them - and pressuring the rational side to do the same.

If the West isn't going to start treating Arabs as responsible human beings whose actions have consequences, then perhaps it is time for Israel to start acting a bit less rationally to even the playing field.

Peaceful PalArab Poll

Once again, a poll from the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research shows that most Palestinian Arabs are anything but "peaceful."

Some interesting results:

While Al Jazeera is by far the most popular satellite station among Palestinian Arabs, number 2 is Hamas' terrorist "Al Aqsa TV", with 50% more viewers than Fatah's TV station. In addition, given a choice, most people trust Hamas' TV station more than Fatah's (although most didn't trust either.)

96.6% of all Palestinian Arabs consider themselves either "religious" or "somewhat religious."

57.2% of all Palestinian Arabs, and 54% of those in the "more moderate" West Bank, support rocket attacks against Israeli civilians.

54.8% of all support terror attacks against civilians in Israel proper.

Of course, most also say that they support the "peace process" which just goes to show that there is nothing in common between the "peace process" and real peace.

Clan clash!

A 60-year old was murdered in a "family quarrel" in Gaza yesterday.

Our 2008 PalArab self-death count is now at 96.

UPDATE: There were another clan clash today, with another death. 97.

Flashback: The November 2006 "cease fire"

Now that Israel has admitted that it has accepted a "cease fire" agreement with Hamas murderers, it makes sense to look at what happened during the last major one, that supposedly began November 26, 2006.

Not only did Hamas and the other terror groups ignore the cease-fire, but the number of rockets actually increased in December 2006 compared to some other months in 2006 when there was no "calm."

My monthly Qassam calendars started in February 2007 and documented the numerous and constant violations of this "cease fire" on the part of Gaza terror groups.

It took many months of incessant rocket fire for Israel to start responding to these attacks again in a meaningful way - first targeting Qassam cells in late March, 2007. And even then Israel's responses remained limited.

Hamas, for example, accused Israel of violating the "cease fire" when it fired at people who even Hamas admitted were on a "jihad mission" in late April.

And Israel still remained committed to this sham "cease fire" as late as mid-May.

Essentially, it was over six months of Israel telling the terrorists that they had carte blanche to do whatever they wished while the world continued to blame Israel.

The problem wasn't so much that Hamas incessantly violated the last "cease fire" - everyone knew and expected that to happen - but the problem was that Israels' utterly incompetent Kadima government felt the need to unilaterally treat Hamas with kid gloves for over half a year afterwards, pretending that it was still in effect.

Nice shooting

Today Israel killed 7 members of the "Army of Islam" in Gaza in three separate strikes.

Yesterday, Israel killed four Islamic Jihad members in two separate strikes.

No civilians have been accidentally killed by Israel in any of these five attacks.

The most exaggerated "humanitarian crisis" in history

The definition of a "siege" and "blockade" are:

Siege, blockade are terms for prevention of free movement to or from a place during wartime. Siege implies surrounding a city and cutting off its communications, and usually includes direct assaults on its defenses. Blockade is applied more often to naval operations that block all commerce, especially to cut off food and other supplies from defenders.

Here is a list of what Israel allowed to be shipped to Gaza during the first half of June:

The Unit for Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories reports daily on the general humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip. The data for the supplies transferred via the Karni and Sufa crossings are based on the reports of Palestinian merchants.

Two-way traffic at the Erez Crossing of international organizations' staff, Gaza residents seeking medical treatment together with the people accompanying them ("medical evacuations"), and Palestinian civilians has been permitted for humanitarian and medical aid since 18 January 2007 and occurs almost daily.

Via the conveyor at the Karni Crossing, hundreds of tons of grain - wheat, barley, soy beans, corn and animal feed - are transferred from Israel to the Gaza Strip every week.

Via the Nahal Oz fuel depot, diesel fuel for transportation and the local Gaza power station, petrol, and gas for cooking and heating are transferred from Israel to the Gaza Strip, according to an assessment of civilian needs mandated by the Israeli court.

Via the Sufa Crossing, the following supplies are transferred by truck from Israel to the Gaza Strip: food, including: baby formula and food, rice and legumes, fruits and vegetables, meat, chicken and fish, dairy products, flour and yeast, oil, salt and sugar; hygiene products; raw materials for essential infrastructures; medicines and medical equipment; and a myriad of other items - ranging from school books to wheel chairs - needed by the civilian population.

The Kerem Shalom Crossing has been closed since 19 April 2008, due to terrorist attacks directed at it.

June 15, 2008
17 trucks delivered 456 tons of food to the Gaza Strip via Sufa crossing. At the Nahal Oz fuel depot, 212,000 liters of diesel fuel for the power station were transferred from Israel to the Gaza Strip.

In addition, 53 people (patients and their companions) crossed into Israel at the Erez crossing for medical treatment.

June 13, 2008
51 trucks carrying mostly food products were transferred from Israel to the Gaza Strip via the Sufa crossing. Via the Nahal Oz crossing, 510,000 liters of diesel fuel for the power station, 130,000 liters of diesel fuel for transportation, and 173 tons of gas were delivered.

In addition, 55 people (patients and their companions) crossed into Israel via Erez crossing for medical treatment.

June 11, 2008
38 trucks carrying fruit and vegetables and other food products as well as materials for humanitarian infrastructure were transferred from Israel to the Gaza Strip via the Sufa crossing.

In addition, 54 people (patients and their companions) crossed into Israel via Erez crossing for medical treatment.

June 10, 2008
59 trucks carrying food, materials needed for infrastructures, and medications were transferred from Israel to the Gaza Strip via the Sufa crossing. 24 trucks carrying 888 tons of grain were transferred via the Karni crossing. Via the Nahal Oz crossing, 280,000 liters of diesel fuel for the power station, 100,000 liters of diesel fuel for transportation, and 88 tons of gas were delivered.

In addition, 66 people (patients and their companions) crossed into Israel via Erez crossing for medical treatment.

June 8, 2008
521,800 liters of fuel and 84 tons of heating gas were transported via the Nahal Oz terminal.

In addition, 10 people (patients and companions) crossed into Israel from the Gaza Strip via the Erez crossing for medical treatment.

June 4, 2008
50 trucks carrying food and hygiene products were transferred from Israel to the Gaza Strip via Sufa crossing. 64 trucks carrying 2,409 tons of wheat, corn, soy beans and animal feed were transferred via the Karni crossing. Cooking gas was transferred via the Nahal Oz fuel depot.

In addition, 17 people (patients and companions) crossed into Israel from the Gaza Strip via the Erez crossing for medical treatment.

June 4, 2008
Medical evacuation: A Palestinian worker was critically wounded by a mortar bomb fired by Palestinian terrorists towards the Nahal Oz fuel depot. He was rushed to hospital in Gaza City. Due to the critical wounds the worker suffered and the deterioration of his condition, an urgent request was forwarded to the Israeli Coordination & Liaison Administration at the Erez crossing, to refer the wounded man for further treatment in Israel.

Colonel Nir Press, Head of Israel's Coordination and Liaison Administration at Erez Crossing, approved the evacuation to Barzilai Hospital in Ashkelon as per the request. Co. Press stated that evening: "The attack earlier today caused the casualty of one Palestinian, and ultimately forced the early cessation of pumping of fuel and gas. The Hamas campaign against the Gaza Strip crossings primarily inflicts suffering on the people of the Gaza Strip."

June 3, 2008
60 trucks carrying food, and raw materials for essential infrastructures were transferred to the Gaza Strip via Sufa crossing. At the Nahal Oz fuel depot, 261 tons of gas and 1.124 million liters of fuel for transportation and electricity were transferred.

In addition, 32 people (patients and companions) crossed into Israel for medical treatment.

June 2, 2008
64 trucks carrying rice, vegetables, meat/chicken/fish, dairy and other food products, and raw materials for essential infrastructures were transferred to the Gaza Strip via Sufa crossing. 71 trucks carrying 2,577 tons of wheat, soy beans, corn and animal feed were transferred via the Karni grain depot. At the Nahal Oz fuel depot, 260,410 liters of fuel for transportation and 732,400 liters of fuel for the power station, and 210 tons of heating and cooking gas were transferred to the Gaza Strip.

In addition, 13 people (patients and companions) crossed into Israel via the Erez crossing for medical treatment.

June 1, 2008
30 trucks carrying vegetables, meat/chicken/fish, dairy and other food products, medications and medical equipment, and raw materials for essential infrastructures were transferred to the Gaza Strip via Sufa crossing. 64 trucks carrying 2,500 tons of wheat, soy beans, corn and animal feed were transferred via the Karni grain depot. At the Nahal Oz fuel depot, 1.038 million liters of fuels and 262 tons of gas were transferred to the Gaza Strip.

In addition, 29 people (patients and companions) crossed into Israel via the Erez crossing for medical treatment.

Total (June 16, 2007 - June 15, 2008):
24,375 trucks; 579,491 tons

I still have not found a single case of someone starving to death in Gaza.

This has to be the most exaggerated "humanitarian crisis" in history.

Hamas stealing from kids' charity

Palestine Press Agency reports (autotranslated):

Hamas militiamen today stormed the Charitable Society for Development in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip, and seized at gunpoint on all its contents.

Eyewitnesses said that "dozens of Hamas gunmen stormed the headquarters and confiscated dozens of devices and equipment."

Local sources said that the militia confiscated food and juices and recreational materials were earmarked for summer camps serving 600 children.

Ho hum.

Aw, terror propaganda arm running out of money

The "International Middle East Media Center" is a propaganda organ of Palestinian terrorism masquerading as media outlet that "provides fair and comprehensive coverage of events and developments in Israel-Palestine."

A quick glance at this site shows that it is anything but fair, its journalistic standards are laughably poor, and it will always refer to Palestinian Arabs hurling stones at Israelis with slingshots as "peaceful protesters," and it consistently will blame Israel for "work accidents."

So imagine what a tragedy it is that this sick excuse for a "news" organization is now begging for donations to survive:

URGENT APPEAL FOR FUNDS!

The International Middle East Media Center is in danger of closing unless we raise needed funds immediately. YOU can help the IMEMC continue!

Since my readers are in such a giving move, may I suggest that money may be better spent here or here.

UN wants to pretend to be evenhanded so it can bash Israel more

The UN Human Rights Council's "Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967," Richard Falk, addressed the Council today.

The HRC has been incredibly anti-Israel and Falk recently compared Israeli actions to those of the Nazis. He descibed Israeli policies as having "genocidal tendencies." He replaced the equally execrable John Dugard in this post.

Naturally, many people have complained about the incredible one-sidedness of the Council and their clear anti-Israel agenda. This has made the HRC into a joke that is not being taken seriously even by Europeans as they see that it ignores essentially all human rights abuses by African or Islamic nations.

So, Falk proposed today that his role should be expanded to also investigate human rights abuses against Israelis by Palestinian Arabs in the territories, something that Israel has long demanded.

But he makes it very clear why he wants this to happen:

He respectfully asked the Council to consider expanding the mandate to also encompass inquiry into Palestinian violations of international humanitarian law, but not of alleged violations of human rights within the Palestinian territories. The mandate along these lines would enhance the credibility and effectiveness of the reports presented by the Special Rapporteur, and would respond in a constructive way to criticisms that had been made in the past, and yet maintain the focus of attention on core concerns of the Human Rights Council with the suffering inflicted on the Palestinian people as a result of the prolonged Israeli occupation. It was a delicate issue to be raised, but one that needed to be confronted as directly as possible, to both achieve the purpose of the mandate and to insulate the Human Rights Council from those who contended that its work was tainted by partisan politics.

This is an incredibly cynical ploy that Falk is openly advocating in the confines of his friendly audience at the HRC. He wants to make it clear that he wants to continue to slam Israel for every possible problem in the Middle East, but since the criticisms have hit close to home he wants to place a fig leaf on top of the HRC to make himself appear to be "even-handed" - something that he clearly is not. The fact that he does not want to include Palestinian Arab-on-Arab human rights abuses proves quite conclusively that all he wants is the ability to continue to insult Israel publicly and he cares nothing about real human rights.

As the UN at large does, he will then issue a perfunctory report condemning rocket attacks against Israel civilians for a sentence or two and then spend the next 200 pages railing about supposed Israeli crimes and abuses.

Although we have seen this methodology used before by traditionally anti-Israel but ostensibly even-handed NGOs in the past, rarely has the goal been stated so nakedly - saying that the goal was to insulate themselves from criticism even as they continue on their one-sided anti-Israel path.

Falk's continuing bias is made clear by another comment he made:

He said, however, he would not want to investigate abuses by Palestinians against their own people.

"I think the (U.N.'s) special attention to the occupation has to include resistance to the occupation," he said. "That is why I favor expanding the mandate, but not expanding it to include what Palestinians do to each other."

Without shame, Falk has fully accepted the terrorist newspeak of "resistance to the occupation" when in fact Gaza rocket attacks are terror, not resistance, and Gaza is not legally occupied.

To think that extending his mandate will make any difference whatsoever in the HRC's hateful bias would be the height of delusion.

(By the way, Reuters wrote a surprisingly good article about this, so we have to give credit where credit is due.)

UPDATE: Smooth Stone has video, and shows UN Watch asking Falk about his denial of Arabs attacking the US on 9/11.

Biggest threat to Hebron peace? "Peace activists"

YNet reports:

"The activity of some leftist organizations in Hebron is more dangerous that which is being conducted by their right-wing counterparts," a senior Shai District Police official told Ynet Monday.

"Organizations such as Bnei Avraham (which is committed to 'disturbing the occupation, disrupting the segregation and apartheid regime') and Breaking the Silence are wolves in sheep's' clothing", the official said in light of the growing tensions between left and right-wing activists in the West Bank city.

The head of the Israel Police's Hebron district, Commander Avshalom Peled told Ynet that "from my experience in the Hebron and Gush Etzion area, the activity on the part of the militant left can be severe and dangerous."

Hebron police have recorded a drop in disturbances involving Jewish settlers over the past year and noted an improvement in the dialogue between the settler community and police.

"The leftists antagonize the settlers in the hope that the settlers will attack them," a police official said.

"The left-wing organizations have become an even greater threat than the anarchists."

Bnei Avraham callas themselves "peace activists" on their Google Groups page, and "Breaking the Silence" only mentions that they provide "tours" to Hebron without saying that the purpose of the tours is to cause the types of trouble that they pretend to be against.

Perhaps it is time for right-wing organizations to call themselves "peace" organizations as well, since the word has clearly no meaning to the Left.

Who says PalArabs have no culture?

Palestinian Arabs are just as likely to appreciate poetry as anyone else.

But they are somewhat more likely to appreciate the poetry of Libyan dictator and all-around nutcase Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.

From Palestine News Network (autotranslated):

Qalqiliya / PNN - amid attend the rally and conclude a distinguished academic in the town of Qalqilya Palestinian literary conference on the first literary works (the stories) by Colonel Muammar Gaddafi "Commander of the Revolution September," the Libyan Jamahiriya, has participated in the first conference of its kind in the Palestinian territories selected Palestinian academics from universities and national success Quds Open, Hebron and Palestine is the eligibility of cultural events inside the Green Line.

The conference was opened by General Coordinator of the Movement of revolutionary committees Palestinian speech welcoming the audience and thanked them for their concern and their interaction with the conference theme and also transfer them greetings from the brother of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi and warm appreciation for their efforts in this area and then head of the conference Prof. Dr. Yahya Jabr, who assumed management of hearings and debate After.
This conference was held in two acts occur in the first Professor Dr. Adel Al-Osta professor of modern Arab literature Najah University and Dr. Isa Abdul Khaliq Chief Arabic-Najah University and Dr. Zaher Hanani professor of modern Arab literature Quds Open University and then Dr. Zeidan paper from inside the Green Line and Dr. Raid Abdul Rahim from the Arabic Language Department Najah University.
The House debate on the statement in papers researchers At the second meeting spoke of Dr. Hassan Abu Lord and Dr. Adnan Ayyash of Al-Quds Open University and Dr. Yahya Jabr.
Then read papers Professors Dr. Said Coahnh of Hebron University and Dr. Sadik Dabbas Chief of the Arabic language at the University of Palestine civil ensuing discussion on the papers presented. Papers and conference centered around several axes was highlighted by the irony in the work of Colonel Gaddafi literary and artistic techniques and Lamia title at the stories It also addressed the religious dimensions and leftist there.
At the conclusion of the conference participants recommended the need to hold more conferences and seminars aimed at introducing thinking Muammar Gaddafi and Dubai truly away from what prevailed in some quarters of negative attitudes towards Colonel Gaddafi and his ideas and projects It is worth mentioning that the movement of Palestinian revolutionary committees in the near future is planning to hold a conference On the draft peace: perspectives and dimensions.

Le Figaro: Over 350 tunnels between Egypt and Gaza

France's Le Figaro reports that there are over 350 tunnels between Gaza and Rafah - and goes on to swallow Hamas propaganda that they are only used for food and fuel: (autotranslated)

One year after the seizure of power by the fundamentalists, over 350 have been dug underground to escape the blockade of Israel and import food from Egypt.

At the surface, the facades of buildings in Rafah aligned along the border with Egypt were turned into Swiss cheese by five years of Israeli mitraille. Until the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza in September 2005, the frontline here ran along the 'axis Philadelphia "controlled by the IDF.

The dreams of opening, which had preceded the departure of Israeli troops are no longer a distant mirage. Within a year of power of Hamas in Gaza, the basement has been transformed into a real mouse. At the foot of buildings, tents sheltering the entrance of spinning smuggling tunnels to Egypt have grown like mushrooms.

...The Islamists took control traffic tunnel have industrialized. Rafah, a town of outlaws, became the capital of "import-export" version gaziote.

Now, more than 350 tunnels connecting Rafah to Egypt. The din of drills and engines running pulleys to trace the goods now accompanies the buzz of Israeli surveillance drones. The houses are filled with border sandbags and it does even bother to hide the freshly turned earth. "The Hamas government allows us to dig tunnels to break the siege imposed by Israel, said Abu Jendal, co-owner of two tunnels. "The key is not to put us kneel facing the Israelis. "

Two teams of ten men take turns day and night for him spawn a new underpass. They share a salary of 100 dollars for every metre widened to death drills and trowels. They will have four months to travel the 800 meters to win the opening in Egypt."Some diggers, very famous, earn more," said Mahmoud 22 years, which has already drilled a dozen galleries. That is a pittance compared to the risks involved. I lost four comrades in landslides since I do this work. But in Rafah, work in tunnels is the only one that relates. Thousands of people are employees and everyone lives g hanks to the tunnels. But because Israel, we are forced to live like earthworms. "

The intercom from the tunnel rings. A delivery arrives. The pulleys busy to go up in the pit 25 meters deep cans of petrol and diesel, which are badly in Gaza. In Rafah, just Egypt: chocolate, coca, medicines, computers, engines, spare parts, oil, sugar, houmos, canned food, cigarettes… As long as demand is strong enough, the cost of transport (350 dollars per bag goods) is profitable. The importer shall telephone number of his contact the Egyptian owner of the tunnel and it is responsible to deliver the goods. A guard of Hamas monitors everything that passes through tunnels.

"The importation of drugs, alcohol, weapons and people is prohibited," says the bearded supervisor, equipped with a walkie-talkie to call for reinforcements or to be alerted in case of attack Israeli. The Islamist movement, which draws in passing a tax ranging from 20 to 30% depending on the goods, and found in such trafficking as a source of funding comfortable.

However, these goods represent only a drop of water in relation to the needs of the Gaza Strip. "Since Hamas is in power, we lack everything: food, gasoline, drinking water, medicines," said Samir, a trader. The products are sold in Egypt to triple their prices, while 70% of the population lives below the poverty line. The survival has become our daily concern. The most important rule is to never get sick. Due to lack of medicines and medical care effective, any disease can prevail. "

The role of Hamas is reduced to manage shortages. Thus, the Islamist government distributes the past two months ration tickets, which are essential to get a few litres of fuel at the pump. The only success on the assets of Hamas is to have foiled forecasts in bringing order and security in Gaza, where armed gangs were mafia law.

The order has a price. The associations defending human rights denounce a dark years in Gaza, for individual freedoms.

The last paragraph of skepticism doesn't make up for the reporter's unbelievable parroting of the lie that no weapons or people go through the tunnels - Egypt has been discovering plenty of large weapons caches near the tunnels.

Unfortunately, it appears that Israel's blockade has not hurt Hamas at all. While Israel is not obligated to provide food and fuel to its neighboring enemy territory, the stated goals of the blockade (to force a popular uprising against Hamas) have not materialized and on the contrary, Hamas has managed to profit from it.

Weeds - the video

This is an experiment to see how many more people will watch a video on YouTube than read an entry on my blog.

Earlier this year I had two popular posts called "Weeds." This is a video version of those posts.

Funeral shooting and clan clash!

From Ma'an:

A Palestinian child was killed on Friday afternoon after he was hit by a bullet fired in the air during a funeral procession in the Shuja'iyya neighbourhood in eastern Gaza City.

Palestinian medical sources told Ma'an that 5-year-old 'Ubeida Habib died from head injuries sustained during the funeral procession of one of the Hamas fighters killed in an Israeli air strike on the Jabalia refugee camp earlier on Friday.

There was also a clan clash south of Hebron, killing one, so the 2008 PalArab self-death count is now at 95.

Followup on yesterday's "work accident"

YNet reports:

Hamas’ Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades confirmed Friday that the operatives who died in Thursday's explosion in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahiya were making last-minute preparations for a “special mission”, a Hamas codename for a “high-quality” attack.

According to the statement, the dead were operatives of a special Hamas unit. The organization promised that its people will “continue following in the path of those killed.”

A Hamas gunman who was wounded in Thursday's died Friday morning. Hamas’ announcement does not refer to the blast's circumstances even though the group's media has begun using the term “explosion” and not just “attack,” the term repeatedly used on Thursday.

Hamas was quick to blame Israel and reacted with a heavy rocket fire on the western Negev. Recent statements, however, have omitted placing the blame on Israel.

On Thursday, Hamas spokesman Abu Obeida said that as a result of the IDF denying it's involvement, the military wing will conduct an investigation into the blast and make its results public immediately.

Hamas’ announcement confirmed Ynet reports saying that Ahmed Randur, commander of the Izz el-Din al-Qassam Brigades in north Gaza was present at the time of the explosion and lightly injured as a result.

Additional senior Hamas officials were present at the scene including Beit Lahiya Hamas Area Commander Ahmed Hamouda, whose house is the one which exploded. His daughter was killed in the blast. Hassan Abu Shakfa and Ashraf Mushtaha, both senior officials in Hamas’ military wing were killed as well.

A neighbor who lives adjacent to the exploded house said that the presence of Hamas’ senior officials at the scene of the incident and at the hospital immediately after it occurred, proves that those present at the blast were very high-ranking. “The fast arrival of the civilian leadership and of the firefighters proves that extreme pressure was felt due to the identity of those injured.”

Hamas identified 6 of its members who died in the explosion.

Keep in mind that this apparent bomb factory was built in a residential house in a crowded neighborhood, and if Israel would have attacked it the world community would have been unanimous in its condemnation.

Also, in this case as with others, there were "eyewitnesses" that Israel had done this (the Saudi-based Arab News all but blames Israel completely,) proving yet again that Palestinian Arabs simply lie, repeatedly and consistently.

Freedom of the press, PalArab style (XII)

The Palestinian Arab WAFA news agency reports:

A person who claimed to be speaking on behalf of Hamas, this evening, threatened the news agency 'Wafa', if it does not stop the dissemination of news about the practices of Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

The person said in a telephone conversation with the Agency's headquarters in central Ramallah that he speaks on behalf of Hamas movement and gave the Agency until next Saturday to stop the reporting of news about Hamas in Gaza.
.
He added : 'You know that Hamas is capable of implementing its threat'.

Ironically, West Bank-based Palestinian Arab news sources are more accurate in their reporting about Hamas than any of the wire services.

But I thought that Hamas was pro-democracy....

Hamas apologists never fail to say that Hamas should be the legitimate rulers of the PA because they were democratically elected. What they don't like to mention is exactly how democratic Hamas remains once it gets itself in power.

From PCHR:

The Palestinian centre for Human Rights (PCHR) renews its opposition to the anti-democratic policy of local government council members being privately appointed in the Gaza Strip. The Centre views these appointments as a continuation of nepotism, at the expense of democratic local council elections that have been conducted in most Gaza Strip communities during the last few years.

The Ministry of Local Government (of the Hamas Gaza Government) announced a decision last week to dismiss the appointed municipality council in Khan Yunis, headed by Dr. Fayez Abu Shammala. The appointment of a new council, headed by Mohammad Abd El-Khaliq El-Farra and comprising of twelve others, all of them Hamas members, was announced. The new council began operating on 7 June 2008, after an official inauguration ceremony organized by the municipality.

A "mysterious explosion" occurred this morning in the house of the Hamouda family in Beit Hanoun, killing at least 4 (Ma'an breaking news) and injuring dozens.

Hamouda is a member of Hamas.

Most Palestinian Arab news sites reported it as an ambiguous explosion initially; Palestine Today has started blaming an Israeli airstrike, but Israel denies any actions in the area of the explosion today. Hamas is now blaming Israel as well.

Our 2008 PalArab self-death count climbs to 89.

Meanwhile, Hamas raided a wedding last night, beating celebrants, because they were playing Fatah tunes.

Hamas also arrested many Fatah members commemorating the first anniversary of Hamas' execution of the late, lamented Jamal Abu Billygoats and his brother Majid.

UPDATE: Ma'an has backed off to three "martyrs", one an infant girl. 88.
UPDATE 2: Ma'an has raised it back to 4. 89.
UPDATE 3: We are now up to 7, according to both Ma'an and Palestine Press Agency. 92.
UPDATE 4: Palestine Press Agency is reporting that an eighth body was found underneath the rubble. 93.

Mordechai Keidar on Al-Jazeera

The video we've been waiting for (h/t Soccer Dad and Daled Amos):

Rumor: Khaled Meshaal dead?

Firas Press is reporting a rumor that no one knows the whereabouts of Hamas "political leader" Khaled Meshaal, that there is a "news blackout" about the topic and the possibility that he was aboard the Sudanese airplane that crashed yesterday.

If this turns out to be true, how many milliseconds until Israel is blamed for the crash?

UPDATE: If true, how long before Israel is blamed for the crash by Meshaal's pal Jimmy Carter?

UPDATE 2: Alas, it is apparently not true, as Jameel mentions in the comments.

Iranian TV: "Chicken Run" a Zionist plot

This is too good:

Following are excerpts from an Iranian documentary on Hollywood cinema, focusing on the movie "Chicken Run." The documentary aired on IRINN on May 29, 2008:

"Traces of Zionism in World Cinema"

Presenter: Movies into which huge amounts of money are poured, in an effort to turn Zionist themes into entertainment, include movies created for children and youth. Animation films produced since the 1990's joined other film genres in becoming a tool for Zionist propaganda. Sometimes this is achieved by using falsified biblical narratives, like in the case of "The Prince of Egypt." Other times, it is achieved in a very subtly, crafty, and indirect manner, like in the film "Chicken Run."

[...]

Dr. Majid Shah-Hosseini, an Iranian film critic: Many films from the 1960's and the 1970's indirectly convey the notion that the Jews were oppressed. This is conveyed through the themes of distance from the motherland, and the search for one's mother, who symbolizes the motherland. These messages were gradually introduced into animation and children's films.

[...]

Sayyid Abu-Alhassan Allawi Tabatabai, an Iranian film critic: These people never make a film without a premeditated motive.

[...]

Two emotional themes can be identified in children's films, especially animations. One is the lost mother, and the other is the lost land. There is also the lost dog... These three themes frequently appear in animations produced since the 1970's.

[...]

Presenter: Even though "Chicken Run" is a sort of fantasy about an animal farm, on a deeper level it depicts the Zionists' favorite themes, which appear in many of the visual dramas of the 20th century. The recreation of a kind of genocide, using visual elements reminiscent of Nazi Germany death camps – an idea linked to the religious themes of a savior and immigration to a promised land – serves a propaganda machine, whose goal it is to depict itself as a symbol for the oppressed and for those who suffer.

[...]

Dr. Majid Shah-Hosseini: In "Chicken Run," for example, you find allusions to the Holocaust, to concentration camps, and to the concept of awaiting a hero or a savior. It portrays efforts to escape a predetermined fate – the death of all those who lived in that camp, who are depicted as chickens. Eventually, a kind of Noah's Ark is built – in this case, it is a flying ship – which is used for their escape.

[...]

Presenter: Unfortunately, Zionist notions can be detected in children's movies, from the days of Walt Disney and to TV animation films. The Zionists' exclusive investments in group specializing in children's films, such as DreamWorks in the 1990's, and the appearance of various works like "Chicken Run," which employed magnificent techniques, were part of their premeditated plan to cover the blood stains soiling the clothes of the occupiers of the lands of Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.

Produced by the IRINN Science, Culture, and Arts Group

Video clip here.

For those who haven't seen "Chicken Run", it is spoofing the many American films about Nazi POW camps, specifically The Great Escape.

But perhaps Mel Gibson would disagree....

Reuters' painting Hamas as moderate

This Reuters story is ostensibly about the growing influence that Qaeda-style groups are gaining in Gaza, but the subtext is loud and clear: Hamas isn't really so bad, after all. Here's part of the article, highlighting the clearly pro-Hamas parts:

Abu Hafss is not happy.

A year after Hamas Islamists seized control of the Gaza Strip, Abu Hafss is waiting impatiently to see a sword remove the hand of a thief or a woman stoned to death for adultery.

"Hamas does not implement the rule of God," the Palestinian ally of al Qaeda said. "We have seen no one have his hand cut off for stealing. We have seen no one stoned as an adulterer."

Yet for all Abu Hafss' disappointment with the approach Hamas has adopted since it routed secular rivals in Gaza a year ago, some analysts believe smaller, more radical groups like Abu Hafss' secretive Jaysh al-Ummah (Army of the Nation) have benefited from the Hamas takeover to expand their membership.

Despite an official Hamas policy of respecting the rights of Gaza's small Christian minority, there has been an increase in attacks on Christians in the past year, apparently by Islamists not content with the extent of Hamas's "Islamisation" of Gaza.

Among the outward signs of that have been a proliferation of beards on men and headscarves on some women, along with the virtual disappearance of alcohol and a ban on pornographic websites -- though Hamas officials reject accusations that they are embarked on a programme to impose Islamic law on daily life.

If Gazans are more observant of Islamic practice -- and not all in the enclave agree that this so -- that is the result of persuasion, Hamas says.

...A week of fighting with the Fatah forces of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas saw Hamas take control of Gaza and its 1.5 million people on June 14 last year -- and saw Abbas dismiss a Hamas-led government that had been hit by Western sanctions over Hamas's refusal to renounce violence against Israel.

Within three weeks of seizing power, Hamas was quick to trumpet its success in securing the freedom of the hostage reporter, the BBC's Alan Johnston. Its spokesmen say it continues to oppose violent Islamist factions.

"Anyone who harms the public order will certainly be hunted down," Hamas spokesman Abu Zuhri said, while also saying Hamas was ready to accept the aid of such groups in its fight against Israel.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad control the majority of mosques in Gaza and both groups restrict the activity of other extremist factions who tend to meet at smaller mosques or in homes where they preach their fanatic brand of Islam.

Market stalls do brisk business in selling recordings of speeches of al Qaeda leaders Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahri and the late Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as well as videos of beheadings of U.S. and foreign soldiers and personnel in Iraq.

In an environment where a tightened Israeli blockade against Hamas has increased hardships for people in the enclave, more radical forms of Islam appear to some analysts to be exercising a growing influence over some Palestinians.

A Gaza political analyst, who spoke anonymously for fear of retribution, said Hamas's influence on fostering more Islamic social behaviour in Gaza had been mixed. He argued that the fact Hamas had taken control but then did not impose more severe Islamic ways may have boosted those groups which favoured that.

The al Qassam website couldn't have done a better job in propaganda for Hamas. And the last paragraph implies that perhaps Hamas is being too moderate!

Latest YES commercial

Ahmadinejad announces that Israel will be destroyed on Monday, but the Iranians don't want to miss their favorite Israeli TV shows, in this latest ad from Israel's YES cable network.

Partial translation (and hat tip) here.

Hamas leaders in hiding

Firas Press reports (autotranslated):

Sources in the Hamas movement say that the movement expects Israel to make a number of assassinations of prominent leaders of the movement at the last minute that precedes approval of the "calming" proposal from Egypt.

The Al-Hayat of London newspaper quoted sources as revealing that "a number of Hamas leaders finally vanished from sight for fear that Israel carried out its threats of military action in the sector before accepting the calm", in a reference to the statements of Minister Ehud Barak, the Israeli army, which threatened to implement a military operation in the sector before the truce.

Another way that Israel is making the lives of Gazan terrorists miserable.

Book review: The Truth About Syria

The Truth About Syria, by Barry Rubin, effectively illuminates the inner machinations of the Syrian leadership and how the West should act towards that state.

The newly-released paperback edition was forwarded to me by Professor Rubin to review.

Syria is unique in that it is a weak country that has managed to make itself critically important at minimal risk to itself. Using a combination of publicly available articles and MEMRI translations, Dr. Rubin shows many examples to describe the Syrian leaders' mindset and strategy.

Briefly, the overriding concern of the late Hafiz Assad and later his son Bashar is to stay in power, no matter what. At this, they have been remarkably successful.

From the 1940s to 1970 Syria went through many coups and regime changes. Much like Iraq, Syria is a multi-ethnic nation and is always in danger of serious internal conflict. Hafiz al-Assad's takeover of the then-ruling Baath Party in 1970 ushered in a long period of stability, and Rubin examines how he succeeded.

Modern Syria has consciously styled itself in the Soviet mold. As the USSR collapsed, Assad made sure that he would not make the same mistakes, and he and his son remain steadfastly against any internal reforms that they could not keep under control. Through an ingenious combination of rewarding supporters and punishing detractors, Syria has made internal dissent simply not worth it.

The ruling Alawites, Rubin notes, are not even considered Muslims by most other Muslims. Nevertheless, the Assad family has not only styled themselves as Shia Muslims but they have come up with a way to use the new religious fervor throughout the Muslim world to their advantage. While the regime started off as deliberately secular, it has co-opted religious institutions in Syria while carefully limiting their power.

The major way that the Assad father and son have kept internal problems at bay has been to represent Syria as the vanguard of the pan-Arab nation and to externalize all threats to Syria as threats to the Arab world. The regime thrives on crises that are outside Syrian borders, as it uses them as excuses to avoid reform and preach Arab unity to bring together Syria's disparate communities.

As a result, Syria has a great interest in fomenting instability in the region around it. As long as there are external problems, Syria can avoid dealing with internal ones. This appears to be a deliberate policy, and Westerners who try to argue that Syria would be better off it it would reform itself miss the point entirely - Syria's leadership is not interested in improving the lives of its citizens but only in self-preservation.

More than any other nation, Syria excels at exporting terror. Between Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, Iraqi terrorists and others, Syria has managed to fight its enemies entirely by proxy - in others' lands - since the 1973 war with Israel. Syria maintains deniability as to its own part in these battles, and the West is eager to believe it. At little cost to itself it can maintain a battlefront against Israel, basking in "victories" while paying nothing in terms of damages. The 2006 Lebanese war is a perfect example of this - even though Syria was not necessarily behind the specific fuse that lit that particular event, it set up the atmosphere for it to happen at any time.

Syria's effective takeover of Lebanon is Syria's way to improve its economy. Friends of the regime - specifically Sunni Muslim middle class merchants - profit from the captive Lebanese market, and this has become such an important part of the Syrian economy (as well as Syria's traditional worldview that Lebanon, as well as Palestine, are really a part of Syria proper) that any Western incentives for Syria to abandon Lebanon are foolhardy.

More recently, Syria has managed to co-opt the the pan-Islamism of its internal Muslim Brotherhood into traditional Syrian pan-Arabism.

All the while, Syria manages to manipulate the West into offering more and more concessions at little cost. Syria's tiny contribution to the Gulf War gave it a bonanza of Western benefits, and more than once Syria gained praise from gullible Americans - including the State Department - by simply lying about closing terrorist offices in Damascus. The baldfaced lies about their involvement with Hezbollah and their control of their borders multiply, yet Westerners stricken with terminal wishful-thinking are ready to believe them.

Bashar, who was given plenty of slack by the West as being a Western-educated reformer, has done nothing of the sort, and his rhetoric often surpasses that of his father. He has made some major mistakes, though, in subsuming Syria's self-image as the pre-eminent Arab leader by showing an immature enthusiasm towards Hezbollahs' Nasrallah as well as turning Syria into a client state of Iran.

Rubin shows that Syria does have the ability to act more responsibly, but only when it feels that the alternative is much worse - namely, the threat of an invasion on its own soil. Although he doesn't say it, if Israel would have made clear that it considers Hezbollah to be a part of Syria and that any attack from Lebanon will result in retaliation against Damascus, then the Second Lebanon War would probably never have occurred.

The book itself, I am sorry to say, is not as well organized nor as easy to read as it should have been. There is a large amount of repetition; the same speeches and examples are cited multiple times throughout the book, as are the conclusions. Dr. Rubin is at a disadvantage as there really isn't that much source material available in the West, and the Assads do not make that many public speeches, but this should mean a shorter book. Also, even though the book itself was written from the perspective of late 2006, I was disappointed that the Iranian/Syrian relationship was not expanded nearly as much as those of Lebanon, Israel and even Turkey.

Even so, it is an important book and worth having for reference. I wish I would have read it before my brief conversation with a member of Congress on this topic last month.

Tunnel collapses!

From Ma'an:

A Palestinian man was killed on Monday evening when an underground tunnel collapsed in the city of Rafah, underneath the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip.

Palestinian medical sources identified the victim as 20-year-old Fadi Khalifa. His body was taken to Abu Yousif An-Najjar Hospital in Rafah.

Earlier on Monday, Palestinian sources said that 27-year-old Majdi Khdair was killed in a similar tunnel collapse in the Salam neighborhood of Rafah.

Our 2008 PalArab self-death count is at 85.

Have a good Yom Tov

I won't be blogging until (at least) Tuesday night.

For those who celebrate Shavuos, have a great yom tov!

Carnival!

A post of mine made it into Dr. Sanity's weekly "Carnival of the Insanities."

The same post also made it into the weekly Haveil Havalim #168.

Check them out!

Popular lies

Ma'an reports, with little fear of contradiction:

Israeli forces violently broke up a peaceful demonstration against the construction of the Israeli separation wall in the West Bank village of Nil'in, near Ramallah, on Sunday, shooting a foreign cameraman with a rubber-coated metal bullet.

Three protesters were injured. The coordinator of Ni'lin's popular committee against the wall, Salah Al-Khawaja identified the arrestees as 'Ahid Al-Khawaja, Ibrahim 'Amira and an unnamed foreign solidarity activist.

Al-Khawaja explained that his committee organized the rally in attempt to stop work on the wall. Farmers from the town lied on the ground in their fields to stop Israeli bulldozers from digging up the fields and erecting the wall. According to Al-Khawaja, the farmers succeeded to stop the work for one hour. He said bulldozers have uprooted 90 trees in the village in just three days.

He added that the foreign and Israeli solidarity activists participated in the rally along with local residents using mirrors to reflect sunlight at the Israeli soldiers who in return fired rubber-coated metal bullets and tear gas canisters at the protestors.

This vision of heartless Israelis building an "apartheid wall" and uprooting hundreds of olive trees while Palestinian Arabs protest peacefully has turned into a news cliche, a meme that has entered the world's consciousness as accepted fact.

Yet if one digs a little, one can see that things in Nilin are not quite as reported.

Here is a photo from today's demonstration:

A Palestinian demonstrator uses a sling shot to hurl stones as tear gas fired by Israeli troops can be seen during a protest against Israel's separation barrier in the West Bank village of Nilin, near Modin, Sunday, June 8, 2008

So much for the "peaceful demonstrator" part.

As far as the "bulldozing olive trees" part, guess what the IDF is doing in Nilin?

The Israel Defense Forces and the Civil Administration have decided to relocate some 440 olive trees belonging to Naalin residents to a nearby area, due to the construction of the separation fence in the area.
The Palestinians have protested this decision, claiming that it would badly harm their livelihood.

The IDF plans to relocate the olive trees under the supervision of a Civil Administration officer, but Naalin's residents do not intend to cooperate with the move, as they reject any act related to the construction of the fence.

Security sources told Ynet that the separation fence was being built according to law and that the State was doing all it could to minimize the damage caused to the Palestinian life fabric. The defense establishment is coordinating the entire construction process with the local population, they stated.

"There are always those who will not approve of the State's decisions, including Israeli citizens, and will do all in their power to break the law and stop the fence construction," a security official said.

"The handling of the olive trees, for example, shows how things could be done differently," the source added. "The proof is that the defense establishment, on all levels, knows how to collect all the trees in a professional manner and move them somewhere else, in a way that will not harm the Palestinian farmers."

Israel is spending untold amounts of time and money in order to minimize any damage done to the tree and Palestinian Arabs' livelihoods while still maintaining security. This is hardly what one would expect from the brutal IDF than is being portrayed day in and day out by both the Arabs and the major media who are only too happy to echo the lies.

Israeli Arabs claim to have built their own rockets

This video from Ma'an shows what is supposed to be a rocket built by an Israeli Arab terror organization, the Ahrar Al-Jalil Brigades, who have claimed a number of attacks internally in Israel - some of which seem to have never occurred, others are dubious.

The video could easily be of a painted cardboard tube, but it is still something to be aware of.

The brigades said in a statement that accompanied the video that is "the first time in the history of the 1948 Arabs that they have produced a homemade projectile which is now set up in the Al-Jalil hills (Galilee) and is ready to be launched."

In the statement the brigades sent a message to the Israeli leadership that if the Al-Aqsa mosque is attacked, the brigades will attack the Israeli defense ministry in Tel Aviv.

Arabs accuse Jews of poisoning the wells

Blood libels never get old in the Ummah!

The Iranian Alalam "news" states:

The Popular Committee to Oppose the Siege on Thursday warned against the Israeli regime's plans to spread lethal diseases in the Gaza Strip.

The Committee said with closure of Gaza City's Treatment Plant, the region was the target of environmental crisis.

The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) in its latest report has accused the Israel of dumping wastes and sewage into Gaza Sea.

Director of Water Resources in the Gaza Strip, Monther Shoblak, told Alalam Thursday that Israel dumps 70 percent of its wastes into Gaza Sea, affecting tourism industry and the marine lives in the region.

I didn't know there even was a "Gaza Sea."

How dare Israel do anything to harm the thriving Gaza tourism industry. All those poor tourists, sunbathing on the beaches of the Gaza Sea, being forced to stay out of the water because of Zionist fecal matter. I can see why they'd be upset.

Four dead in Gaza "drug raid"

Ma'an reports:

A member of the de facto government's police force was killed and eight others were injured when the drug squad stormed a suspected drug den in the Ash-Shuja’iyya neighborhood of eastern Gaza City on Friday morning.

Spokesperson of the de-facto affiliated police Islam Shahwan told Ma’an that Captain Jamal Abu Al-Qumsan was killed when the force stormed the den and clashed with the gang they suspect have been dealing drugs.

Shahwan announced that two of the alleged drug dealers were killed in the clashes. He named the dead man as Nawwaf and Marwan Hassanein. Six others were arrested and large quantities of drugs were confiscated.

Palestine Today updates the number of dead to 4.

Given Hamas' control of the press in Gaza, it is entirely possible that these killings had nothing to do with drugs. Either way, by my definition, these are still self-deaths so the 2008 count of Palestinian Arabs violently killed by each other is now at 83.

Egyptian man murders his bride

Firas Press reports on a horrific crime in Egypt, but its reporting indicates something even worse in Arab society.

In December, an Egyptian man from Zagazig named Hassan Mustafa Mohamed Hussein murdered his new bride, Abdullah Ahmad Bahgat, on their wedding night.

The reason? Because he thought that she wasn't a virgin.

He was just sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder.

Up until now, the story might be considered to be just another criminal story, similar to murders that happen daily throughout the world and reported as "strange but true" by wire services all the time.

The more sickening part is that the prosecutor waited for 45 days before charging Mr. Hussein in order to gather more relevant information.

The first important thing that he needed to determine was whether the groom was insane.

But the second part was to see if the bride was really a virgin. And, indeed, the forensics team determined that she was.

Clearly, if she had been found to have been a non-virgin, his sentence would have been much reduced.

Obviously no judge in Egypt would blame the murderer nearly as much in that case. Neither would the prosecutor.