Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Saturday, June 18, 2011

US consulate rescinds invitation to anti-semitic PalArab cartoonist

A Palestinian Arab political cartoonist, Majed Badra, had been invited by the US Consulate to go to the US and participate in an international political cartoonist convention.

At the last minute, the US Consulate rescinded the invitation, when they became aware that some of his cartoons were, pretty explicitly, anti-semitic.

Badra objects to this, saying that he has nothing against Judaism and that his cartoons are only against Israel, not Jews. He is complaining that he had already cleared his schedule to go to the US.

Interestingly, in the past two weeks, he pulled all content from his website. Perhaps he is not as convinced that his work can stand up to scrutiny as being purely political.

Luckily, some of his cartoons can still be found elsewhere on the web.

A grab-bag of links

I have too many windows open and I'm not sure who recommended all these pages, plus I don't have time to do a normal linkdump, so....

http://www.israellycool.com/2011/06/13/pro-israel-blog-off-final/ Vote!

http://www.melaniephillips.com/unscrupulous-optimists-and-the-harm-they-cause-us

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/the-truth-should-be-taught-about-the-1948-war-1.368167

http://www.giyus.org/2011/06/these-are-the-faces-of-the-new-anti-semitism-please-report.html

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/egyptian-judge-denies-plans-to-charge-american-israeli-accused-of-spying-1.368134

http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/06/unrwa_protesting_too_much.html

Syrians getting shot today - last second shows two with legs blown off: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcVBfEohpRQ

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/269836/israel-palestine-and-brthe-peace-pieties-barbara-lerner?page=3

http://freeisraelnow.blogspot.com/2011/06/genocidal-racist-arab-leader-ahmad.html

How come "peace activists" only pressure one side for peace?

There is a new advertising campaign in various US cities on public transit:

This organization, the Committee for a Just Peace in Israel and Palestine (which carefully does not disclose the names of the people behind it and launders its charitable contributions through the Illinois Justice Foundation)

It claims that it is for "peace" and that the only way to get there is to stop US aid to Israel. This will, they say, force Israel to be more flexible in its approach to peace with Palestinian Arabs.

This is a recurring theme with so-called "peace" organizations. Their entire existence is only to pressure one side to make concessions.

If they are so interested in peace, shouldn't they be demanding that both sides make compromises?

Has Americans for Peace Now ever called to pressure Congress to reduce aid to the PA when Abbas walked away from negotiations?

But the problem is even worse than the bias that all these so-called "peace" organizations exhibit. The deeper problem is the absolute lack of pressure from any source demanding that Mahmoud Abbas and his cronies to make peace.

Where is the Palestinian Arab equivalent of Peace Now? Where are "Muslims for Peace" who are writing Arabic op-eds demanding "peace now"? Where's "A-Street" - the Arab equivalent of J-Street, an organization that claims that the US is coddling the PA with too much aid? Where are the leftist Arab newspapers slamming Saeb Erekat for yet more excuses to keep Palestinian Arabs in misery?

Why do European states fund so many "pro-peace" organizations whose entire purpose is so one-sided? Why aren't they searching out and encouraging peace-minded Arabs to do equivalent pressure on the PA and Hamas that so many dozens of organizations are dedicated to doing for Israel?

The sad fact is that Arab intransigence has paid off. The very idea of pressuring the Palestinian Arab leadership to make necessary compromises for peace is viewed as a non-starter. Years of sloganeering that "the settlements" are the "obstacle to peace" without acknowledging daily incitement, refusal to negotiate and all the other shortcomings of the PA position has resulted in a huge victory for the Arab side. Those who might try to call for pressuring the PA to negotiate with (as opposed to demand things from) Israel in Arab countries and the PA would be putting their very lives in their hands by even bringing up the topic.

Jews, on the other hand, are endlessly willing to give, and give more, and then give even more. So it is easier to demand that they be the only side to make substantive and concrete concessions.

This is not because Israel "holds all the cards," as the other side would claim. This exact same mindset of only pressuring one side was obvious before Israel was founded, as the British happily acceded to Arab demands about Jewish immigration and land purchasing, when the Jews held no cards whatsoever. The logic then was the same as it is now: Jews are reasonable and can compromise; Arabs are crazy and cannot be pressured without risking riots and bloodshed.

That is the real calculus of "peace." If we pressure Israel, maybe there will be peace. If we pressure Arabs, there might be bombs in our cities next month.

It is no contest.

So now anti-Israel organizations like this one can take advantage of this implicit Western mindset and cloak their hate in nice, liberal terms like "peace."

(The question of how reliable a local peace treaty might be when one party is widely but silently recognized as a threat to world peace is a question that no one dares to tackle.)

Palestinians attend Friday prayers at a new constructed mosque in the former Israeli settlement of Netzarim which was dismantled in 2005, close to Gaza city on Jun 17, 2011

Palestinian Prime Minister in Gaza Strip, Ismail Haniya delivers speech during Friday prayers at a new constructed mosque in the former Israeli settlement of Nate Sarim which was dismantled in 2005, close to Gaza city on Jun 17, 2011

There was once a beautiful synagogue in Netzarim:

Within minutes of Israel's evacuation, the Arabs burned it down and celebrated its destruction:

It looks like there is no problem finding building materials in Gaza, when the desire is there. And what greater purpose can be served in Gaza than building a brand new mosque in the place that hundreds of Jews lived a few years ago?

I haven't seen any new housing complexes built in the destroyed Jewish communities of Gaza. Mostly they have been used for terrorist training, some agriculture, and now this.

This new mosque was not built because of a pressing humanitarian need. It was built to insult Jews.

The "humanitarian aid" of "The Audacity of Hope": Letters!

Via a great article in The Telegraph, you can see a link to an interview with nutcase Alice Walker who will be on the US flotilla vessel called "The Audacity of Hope."

In the preface to that interview we find the exact contents of what the moonbat Americans and Canadians will be bringing with them to Gaza: letters from Americans to Gazans.

And from looking at the web page of US to Gaza, which is sponsoring the ship, we find out that the letters have already been emailed to Gaza for Gazans to make a public display out of them.

I'm sure that the starving Gazans will chew on the letters thoughtfully.

(h/t Israel Muse)

Palestinian Arabs celebrate even when Jews die in accidents

The horrific gas explosion in Netanya last night that claimed four lives is being covered by the Palestinian Arabic media - and the commenters are overjoyed.

From the pro-Fatah Palestine Press Agency we have "Allah is great" and "Prasie be to Allah."

At Firas Press Agency we see a person who wanted to repeat "Praise be to Allah" 9 times, plus someone who adds "Good news!" and another who called the victims "Jewish oppressors."

Egypt's Al Ahram obsessed with "spy" story

Egyptian newspaper Al Ahram, which is the most popular Egyptian daily, has been obsessed with the story of Ilan Grapel.

Every day there are multiple stories with new and more bizarre accusations.

Today we have:

An analyst who tries to prove that Grapel's actions could only be explained by his being a spy, as tourists would never act the way he did. (Of course, Arabists and adventurers would act exactly the way he did.)

Another article claims that a US embassy staffer told Grapel "You are in big trouble" and that Al Ahram obtained documents that Grapel filled out requesting a renewal of residence saying he was a Muslim.

A third is a lengthy interview with a security officer giving details on how the brilliant Egyptian security team managed to track down this spy who was using his own name and freely talking to everyone without trying to hide anything.

Al Ahram confidently publishes a disclaimer of sorts at the end of one of the articles:

Pending completion of investigations

Al-Ahram will continue to publish all information and documents about the Israeli spy case, as it has been doing in recent days. The days after the conclusion of the investigation and the start of the trial will determine whether the Al-Ahram has been truthful and accurate or otherwise.

Other Egyptian papers are allowing at least a small degree of skepticism. But in poker terms, Al Ahram is "all in" and will now ensure that the most bizarre rumors will be plastered all over its pages to make sure that any possible "trial" will support its yellow journalism.

I don't know what the US is doing to get Grapel out of there, but this is a case of life and death, with Arab pride on the line. Every day that is wasted can literally be a death sentence for him. It is time to mobilize and write to the State Department to insist that this is the highest priority.

Meanwhile, the Egyptian woman in this photo with Grapel was interviewed on Egyptian TV. She revealed that Grapel told her he fought in the Lebanon war, that he studied in Tel Aviv and in the US, that his Arabic accent was Lebanese, he invited her to Israel but warned that "there was racism there."

He once told her that they will be allies one day. She asked, "Against whom?" He said "Iran." She replied, "forget it, that's impossible."

UN Watch again blasts the UN's hypocrisy

From UN Watch:

UN Watch's Hillel Neuer's speech after the usual "human rights" advocates - including Egypt, Bahrain, Syria, Venezuela, and Iran - slammed Israel this week, as usual, at a UNHRC meeting in Geneva.

Mr. President,

History will record that the highest human rights body of the United Nations met today for no objective reason. Nothing in recent events, nothing in logic, nothing in human rights justifies today’s debate.

Our meeting is automatic—the consequence of a decision adopted four years ago, shortly after this council was created, to keep a permanent agenda item on one country only: Israel.

History will record that at a time when citizens across the Middle East were being attacked by their own government—by rifles, tanks, and helicopters—the UN focused its scarce time and attention on a country in that region where this is not happening; the only country in the region which, despite its flaws, respects the right to peaceful assembly, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion; the only country in the region with free elections, an independent judiciary, and the equal treatment of women; the only country where gays are not persecuted, arrested or stoned to death, but, on the contrary, march in their own annual parade, as they did in Tel Aviv three days ago.

Mr. President, that is why the logic of this agenda item represents the opposite of human rights, and why it embodies the pathologies that so discredited this council’s predecessor.

Indeed, this item is so unjust, so biased, so selective, so politicized, and so contradictory to this council’s own principles of equality and universality, that it was condemned by the Secretary-General himself, Mr. Ban Ki-moon, on 20 June 2007, the day after its adoption.

And so we ask: In its recent 5-year review, despite everything happening in the Middle East, why did the Council decide to perpetuate this item, an act that will be finalized this week by the General Assembly?

Mr. President,

History will record that when citizens were being persecuted or massacred by their own governments—in Syria, Iran, Yemen, Libya, Bahrain and elsewhere—the UN chose to turn a blind eye to the victims, and instead endorsed the cynicism, hypocrisy and scapegoating of the perpetrators.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Gazans protesting UNRWA, threaten to shut "Summer Games"

Protesters in Gaza are blocking people and vehicles from entering the UNRWA headquarters in Khan Younis.

They say that UNRWA has failed to rebuild their homes after Cast Lead.

Israel has been allowing building materials into Gaza for UNRWA and other approved projects since last year.

The protesters say that they might block UNRWA's "Summer Games," where hundreds of thousands of Gazan children attend free UNRWA-run summer camps.

As we mentioned before, it is a strange logic that Palestinian Arabs have - "if I don't get what I demand, then nobody gets anything."

That's a sure path to a successful state!

The Economics of Settlement (George Gilder)

A must read article at the American Spectator (thanks to all those who sent it in.) Excerpts:

The root cause of Middle Eastern turmoil, according to a broad consensus of the international media and the considered cerebrations of the deepest-thinking movie stars, is Israeli settlers in what are described as the "occupied territories" on the West Bank of the Jordan River. Even such celebrated and fervent supporters of Israel as Alan Dershowitz and Bernard-Henri Lévy put the settlers beyond the pale of their Zionist sympathies. Remove the settlers, according to these sage analyses of the scene, and the problems of the region become remediable at last.

Lester Brown of the Worldwatch Institute adds to these political concerns a coming environmental catastrophe, also presumably aggravated by the Israeli settlers and their hydrophilic irrigation projects. He sees the Middle East as severely threatened by the growth of population and the exhaustion of water resources. The Institute explains: "Since one ton of grain represents 1,000 tons of water, [importing grain] becomes the most efficient way to import water. Last year, Iran imported 7 million tons of wheat, eclipsing Japan to become the world's leading wheat importer. This year, Egypt is also projected to move ahead of Japan. The water required to produce the grain and other foodstuffs imported into [the region] last year was roughly equal to the annual flow of the Nile River."

Although these two concerns might seem unrelated, they converge in the history of Israel, created by several generations of settlers and constrained at every point by the dearth of water in a mostly desert land. In the mid-19th century, before the arrival of the first groups of Jewish settlers fleeing pogroms in Russia, Arabs living in what became the mandate territory of Palestine -- now Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza -- numbered between 200,000 and 300,000. Their population density and longevity resembled today's conditions in parched and depopulated Saharan Chad. Although Worldwatch might prefer to see the Middle East returned to these more earth-friendly, organic, and sustainable demographics, the fact that some 5.5 million Arabs now live in the former British Mandate, with a life expectancy of more than 70 years, is mainly attributable, for better or worse, to the work of those Jewish settlers.

...Many people imagine that the new and larger influx of Jewish settlers after World War II perpetrated an injustice on the Arabs. What they did, in fact, was to continue the heroic and ingenious pattern of development depicted by Lowdermilk in 1939. With the Arab population growing apace with the Jewish population in most neighborhoods, and indeed faster in some, there could not possibly have been any significant displacement. The demographic numbers discredit as simply mythological or mendacious all the literature of Palestinian grievance and eviction from the likes of Ilan Pappe, Avi Shlaim Rashid Khalidi, and the other divas of the naqba narrative.

By 1948, the Arab population in the Mandate area had grown to some 1.35 million, an increase of 60 percent since the 1930s, and up by a factor of seven since the arrival of the creative, far-seeing cohort of pioneering Jews from Russia in the 1880s. Mostly concentrated in neighborhoods abutting the Zionist settlements, this Arab population was the largest in the entire history of Palestine. Only the 1948 invasion by five Arab armies -- and a desperate and courageous Israeli self-defense -- drove out many of the Arabs, some 700,000. These Palestinian Arabs were evicted or urged to flee by Arab leaders in 1948 in a war that the Jews neither sought nor invited. But the creation of the State of Israel and its growing economy accelerated a renewed immigration into the area to today's level of some 5.5 million Arabs.

The only real Palestinian naqba came not in 1948 at the hands of Zionists, but rather in 1949, at the hands of foreign aid bureaucrats in the form of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA). In a desire to compensate the Palestinians for their alleged victimization by the creation of the State of Israel, the international bureaucracies perpetrated and created a genuine and permanent victimization among the 1.4 million refugees who live in UNRWA's 59 camps and the millions more who reside in the surrounding ghettoes.

...The spurious ideology of Palestinian victimization by Israel blinds nearly all observers to the actual facts of economic life in the region. No one reading the current literature could have any idea that throughout most of the three roughly 20-year economic eras following 1948, the Palestinians continued to benefit heavily from Israeli enterprise and prospered mightily compared to Arabs in other countries in the region.

During the era of Israeli "occupation" that ran from after the war of 1967 to 1993, for example, the number of Arabs in the territories tripled to some 3 million, with the creation of some 261 new towns, a tripling of Arab per capita incomes, and a rise in life expectancy from 52 to 73 years. Meanwhile, the number of Israeli settlers in this area stripped of Jews by Jordan rose only to 250,000. Again, far from effecting any displacement of Arabs, the Jewish settlements enabled a huge increase in both the number and wealth of the Palestinian Arabs.

IHH is out of the flotilla (updated)

From YNet:

The Turkey-based IHH group, considered the driving force behind the Gaza flotilla announced Friday its ship the Mavi Marmara will not be taking part in the Strip-bound sail.

IHH Chairman Bolant Yilderim called a press conference and told reporters that "due to technical problems, the Mavi Marmara will not sail this time and we are deeply sorry for that."

The international vessel convoy, which currently consists of 10 ships, will sail to Gaza nonetheless, he added, saying that the fact that the sail will be devoid of the Marmara would negate the notion that the flotilla was an "Islamist idea by Turkey."

The planned flotilla has been hit by setbacks as organizers have been finding it hard to meet their goal in regards to the number of ships participating in the sail; as well as calls from the UN and the Turkish government to cancel or postpone the planned sail.

The IHH, which organized the first Gaza flotilla, is heavily involved in the second sail, alongside the "Free Gaza" Movement" and the "European Campaign." These three are joined by several smaller groups, which are trying to stage a united international front.

No doubt, the flotilla organizers can make up for it because they claim to have 500,000 volunteers who applied to be on the ships.

UPDATE: The flotilla organizers insist that IHH is still in the flotilla, even if the Mavi Marmara is not. (h/t israelinfo)

Palestinian Arab prisoners using Facebook

From Ma'an:

Trying to show that Palestinian prisoners in Israel’s custody enjoy VIP treatment, the Israeli daily Ma'ariv published Wednesday a report by Amit Cohen who monitored the Facebook accounts of some prisoners.

Ma'ariv says that a Hamas-affiliated prisoner, Haytham Battat, uploaded on his Facebook page three weeks ago a short YouTube film he entitled "Take me to Jihad." The film, according to Ma'ariv, included a song in Arabic dedicated to the Chechen rebels. A few minutes after the film was uploaded, his mother wrote a comment saying, “Oh my beloved son. This is a great song. I hope you and all prisoners will be released tomorrow morning."

The strange part of the story is that Battat updates his Facebook page from his prison cell. Battat is 27 and he is serving three consecutive life sentences after he was convicted of masterminding a bombing in Beersheba. He posted on his page photos shot inside the prison in one of which he is sitting with Sa’id Shalalda, who was convicted of abducting and killing an Israeli man, Sasson Nuriel, in 2005 near Ramallah.

Ma'ariv highlighted that Shalalda was on the list of Palestinian prisoners Israel approved to be released if a prisoner swap deal for captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit is to be agreed on.

Battat is not the only Palestinian prisoner who updates his Facebook page from his prison cell. Ma'ariv’s report says many prisoners have state-of-the-art cell phones which help them access the Internet easily and even make video calls.

Another Palestinian prisoner, Saed Omar, posted on his Facebook page several photos of the lavish meals he and other prisoners are served, the paper reported. Omar is from the Nablus district, and he is affiliated to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. He is serving a 19-year sentence. He was said to have posted photos of prisoners preparing stuffed chickens before they gathered around a luxurious table to eat their meal.

"I would rather die with my weapon in my hand than the stay alive with my weapon in my enemy’s hand," Omar was quoted as saying on Facebook.

After Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit was detained in Gaza, the issue of living conditions of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails surfaced as an issue, with hardliners advocating the abolition of prisoners rights. There were attempts to toughen prison conditions.

Ma'ariv's article also mentions the prisoners doing on-line shopping (picking out clothing and having their families deliver it).

This was originally written about in Al Arabiya a couple of weeks ago. I cannot find the article now but the price for smuggled cellphones was pretty high - if I recall, about 20,000 shekels. Ma'ariv reports that the prisoners say that prison administrators turn a blind eye to the cell phone use as long as the prisoners are behaving and not using the phones to violate security. The Israel Prisons Service denied that.

(h/t Joel)

Arab Facebook group: kidnap Israeli girl "to marry Shalit"

From YNet:

For five years now, Hamas has been holding Gilad Shalit but failed to secure the release of Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the abducted IDF soldier. As it turns out, Gaza radicals are fed up with this failure, yet instead of making do with a more minor release of detainees they prefer to boost the "loot" in their possession.

Accordingly, a new Palestinian Facebook group has been launched in recent days titled "The people want a bride for Shalit."

The intention behind the slogan is clear: A call for the abduction of an Israeli female solider who will serve as yet another Hamas bargaining chip in a future prisoner swap with the Jewish state.

Yet beyond the disturbing message, group organizers resorted to particularly sickening "humor" to further their cause, posting a doctored photograph showing a chained Israeli soldier held by an armed Palestinian woman belonging to Hamas' military wing, Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades.

By the way, from reading terrorist websites, it is clear that Hamas is more proud of the Shalit kidnapping than anything else. They know that Cast Lead was not a victory, but they happily point out that Shalit has been held for five years without Israel figuring out where he is.

(h/t Folderol)

Gazans shoot rocket into Israel, ending lull

From YNet:

A Qassam rocket exploded Thursday evening in an open field in the Eshkol Regional Council.

No injuries or damage were reported in the strike, the first of its kind in southern Israel in recent weeks.

Shortly before 9:30 pm, the Color Red rocket alert system was activated in region. A few moments later, an explosion was heard in the area.

"From the eve of Passover until today we had a calm period that we are not familiar with by any standard," Eshkol Regional Council head Haim Yalin told Ynet. "We are not surprised that the lull ended, we're surprised by a month an a half of quiet. Qassam fire is not an unusual thing, because we know who's living on the other side,"

While it was an unprecedented period of calm, it is not true that no Palestinian Arabs fired rockets to Israel - just that they didn't succeed.

Between May 22 and June 4, one mortar and three rockets were fired. The mortar and one of the rockets fell short, and two other rockets were shot into the sea as experiments.

On May 19th, another rocket fell short.

Again, this is much better than in any previous "lull." Even during the supposed Hamas cease fire in the months before Cast Lead - the one that Israel bashers never fail to say that Israel broke in November 2008 - there were rockets every month.

"Birthright" criticized in The Nation

Kiera Feldman writes an article criticizing Birthright Israel in The Nation. Excerpts:

The seekers are young, just beginning to face the disappointments of adulthood. Their journey is often marked by tears. They may weep while praying at the Western Wall, their heads pressed against the weathered stone, or at the Holocaust Museum, as they pass the piles of shoes of the dead. Others tear up in Jerusalem’s Mount Herzl military cemetery, while embracing a handsome IDF soldier in the late afternoon light. But at some point during their all-expenses-paid ten-day trip to a land where, as they are constantly reminded, every mountain and valley is inscribed with 5,000 years of their people’s history, the moment almost always comes.

When Julie Feldman (no relation), then 26 and a Reform Jew from New York City, arrived at Ben Gurion Airport in December 2008, she called herself “a blank slate.” She returned as the attack on Gaza was under way, armed with a new “pro-Israel” outlook. “Israel really changed me,” she said. “I truly felt when I came back that I was a different person.”

It was mission accomplished for Birthright Israel, the American Zionist organization that has, since its founding in 1999, spent almost $600 million to send more than 260,000 young diaspora Jews on free vacations to the Holy Land.

Barry Chazan, a Hebrew University professor emeritus and the architect of Birthright’s curriculum, explains in a celebratory 2008 book, Ten Days of Birthright Israel, that the trip is designed so travelers “are bombarded with information.” The goal is to produce “an emotionally overwhelming experience” that “helps participants open themselves to learning.” On my own Birthright trip last year, I experienced the Chazan Effect. Chronically underslept, hurled through a mind-numbing itinerary, I experienced, despite my best efforts to maintain a reportorial stance, a return to the intensity of feeling of childhood.

“This is not a vacation,” a Birthright employee pronounced the first evening, before shooing us to the hotel bar. “You are embarking on a journey.” Just four nights later, my steel trap of a heart was overcome by emotion upon seeing my new Birthright crush dancing with another girl. I fled to my room and cried.

To apply for a Birthright trip, participants need just one Jewish grandparent—and to pass a screening interview. (Practicing a religion other than Judaism is an automatic disqualifier.) After their ten days on Birthright, participants may postpone their return by up to three months to travel in the region, and it is not unheard of for progressives to “birth left” in the West Bank afterward (as I did)—though Birthright policy is that anyone discovered to have a “hidden agenda” of “exploiting” the free trip “to get access to the territories” to promote “non-Israeli” causes can lose her spot. Birthrighters planning anti-occupation activism with the International Solidarity Movement have been dismissed.

“Welcome home” is a predominant message, a reference to the promise of instant Israeli citizenship for diaspora Jews under the 1950 Law of Return. (About 17,000 Birthright alumni now live in Israel, according to the Jerusalem Post.) It serves as a pointed riposte to the right of return claimed under international law by the 700,000 Palestinians expelled in 1948 upon the creation of the Jewish state, and their descendants.

Birthright’s boosters seem strangely unaware of the tribe’s more visible woes, the forty-four-year illegal occupation of Palestinian lands and the racism and legal discrimination that underpins Israel’s ethnocracy.

Birthright tour providers are allowed to take tourists anywhere between the Dead Sea and the Mediterranean. Mark, the CEO, explained that “as an apolitical organization,” Birthright does not concern itself with the Green Line, the internationally recognized border separating Israel proper from the illegally occupied West Bank. “If security allows it, we allow for our participants to see the beginnings of where the nation started.” Theoretically, a visit to a Palestinian town in the West Bank would be within the boundaries of acceptability—but Chazan said no trip provider has done it. Birthright funders and officials see Palestinians as best avoided, for “security” reasons. On my trip, we were given maps of Israel that referred to the West Bank as “Judea and Samaria”—biblical terminology typically favored by settlers and their sympathizers.

“I trust that they’re doing the right thing,” Jewish Federations president Jerry Silverman told me, when asked about Birthright’s support of settlements. Such was the predominant sentiment of the funders on this matter, and on the overt racism expressed on some trips: Birthright, like Israel itself, can do no wrong.

It’s pleasure as a medium for Jewish nationalism. In Birthright, dissent is for fun-suckers. “Just enjoy the experience,” a tour mate told me when I denounced the remarks of one Birthright employee, Gia Arnstein, who had said, apropos Palestinian suicide bombers, “If I impose a holocaust on them, what can I do?” In American discourse, the logic of Jewish victimhood and Israeli militarism is rarely articulated so clearly.

This article goes to the very heart of the matter of hasbara - and anti-Israel propaganda.

Logic rarely makes people change their minds about something. It is emotions that win.

This has been a winning strategy for the anti-Israel crowd for decades. The fake "checkpoints' they set up on college campuses, "die-ins," BDS song and dance routines - they are not trying to give reasoned arguments, but to appeal to emotions.

I recently pointed out that there are thousands of people who visit Israel every year who are on tours specifically designed to push an anti-Israel narrative, where they sleep over at Palestinian Arab houses and stay away from all Zionists except for a token "settler" who gets an hour with them after they have already been force fed anti-Israel propaganda for a week.

Are there any exposes in The Nation about these trips? Is anyone infiltrating them to find out what lies are being said and what subconscious or conscious bigotry is propagated there? Are there any teary articles from participants who felt that they were being brainwashed?

Of course not! Emotions are OK when they are done for the right reasons, not when they are done for "Right" reasons. When Jews try to strengthen their connection to their homeland, it must be exposed and ridiculed. When Arabs and anti-Zionists try to create an impression of Arab attachment for Palestine, however, it is fine and dandy - they are just showing their love.

Now, if Birthright trips do push a bigoted or false narrative - it is hard to know how much of this piece to believe - then they should be fixed. There is no reason to lie when showing the Jewish connection to Israel, or even of the historic Arab apathy towards Palestine. But in the end, this is a battle of emotions, of getting to young people before they make up their minds, and the way to get to them is through the heart and then with the truth.

On that same theme, I recently made this poster for an organization that is doing Zionist education for teens:

Teaching Jewish kids Jewish history and Zionist songs should not be considered subversive: it should be normal.

The fact is that it is sad that Birthright is necessary to begin with. It proves that the majority of today's Jewish kids are ignorant about Israel, don't understand the basic issues, and couldn't put together a cohesive pro-Israel argument if they tried. The week-long experience is meant to make up for the terrible ignorance about Israel that they suffered from for their first twenty years. How much will they get out of three hours a week of Hebrew school oriented to teaching them to barely mumble blessings for their Bar and Bat Mitzvahs? How much do their parents know about Israel to begin with?

Birthright is a success because Jewish and Zionist education has been an abject failure. It shows that Jewish kids are hungering for meaning that they are not receiving from home or Hebrew school. It is a wonderful band-aid, but it is still only a band-aid that needs to be reinforced and strengthened (something that Birthright is doing, thankfully.)

Propaganda? Perhaps. But in a world where your television and web browser and mobile phone are filled with advertisements that are meant to change your mindset about various causes and products by playing on your emotions, why is it illegitimate for Zionists to use the same tools? As long as the facts can back it up, then emotions are a legitimate means to get people to the truth.

Guess the date this happened

When was this story published?

Sheikh Ibrahim al Dawi recently issued a fatwa in Baghdad declaring that it was a duty incumbent upon all Muslims to participate in or to support a jihad (holy war) in defence of the Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem and other Muslim sacred places in Palestine alleged by him to be threatened by Jewish imperialism.

Answer:.

Mufti "supports" Palestinian Arabs - because he despises them

From The Daily Star - Lebanon, June 4:

Lebanon’s grand mufti said Friday that resistance was “the only means to liberate Palestine and guarantee the return of Palestinian refugees.”

Ending this tyranny starts by standing by the side of our besieged people in Gaza and Palestine and supporting them through all possible means and not leaving them alone in confronting the enemy,” Sheikh Mohammad Rashid Qabbani said in a statement to commemorate the 44th anniversary of the Naksa, or the fall of East Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Syria’s Golan Heights and the Egyptian Sinai desert under Israel’s control in the 1967 war, which is observed on June 5.

Qabbani said boosting Palestinian national unity, in line with the Palestinian reconciliation inked last month, would enhance the steadfastness of the Palestinians and help them restore their right to an independent state, with East Jerusalem as its capital along with their right of return.

He sounds like a strong supporter of Palestinian Arabs, doesn't he?

Last Saturday, Qabbani spoke to a delegation of PLO representatives, and his words were a bit more interesting. From Al-Arab:

Palestinian sources reported that Lebanese Mufti Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Qabbani was visited by a Palestinian delegation that visited on Saturday to discuss a gathering of Palestinian refugees in Beirut. The delegation was surprised when the Mufti shouted in their faces and called them obscene and vulgar names. He told them, "You are spies and usurpers and we no longer want you guests." The Mufti also said: "You are garbage and will not win for your cause; I'm against you" and continued to repeat these words over the quarter of an hour.

It appears that some of the vaunted Arab "support" for the "Palestinian cause" is really because they want to get the Palestinian Arabs the hell out of their countries.

After I wrote this I see that Khaled Abu Toameh covered the incident in more detail in the JPost. (h/t DK)

A damning indictment of Obama's Syria policy

From Now Lebanon, by Tony Badran:

This past week, the Obama administration was once again questioned over the status of the US ambassador to Damascus, Robert Ford, as the reasoning behind keeping him there has become less tenable than ever. The Obama administration’s ever-shifting rationale, dubious to begin with, is now all but indefensible. In fact, by refusing to recall the ambassador, President Obama only continues to bestow legitimacy on the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

In late March, shortly after the uprising against Assad began, anonymous administration officials told the New York Times that Ford “has been quietly reaching out to Mr. Assad to urge him to stop firing on his people.”Ford’s task was not only an obvious failure, but even the description of it struck a dissonant note. The administration had been insisting that it needed an ambassador to send “tough messages” to Assad. “Quietly reaching out” in order to “urge” Assad gave the impression of feeble reticence rather than forceful outrage.That the message that Ford was delivering was hardly “tough” was evident in an interview he gave to Al-Arabiya in early May. Nothing in the substance of what Ford said could be characterized as “tough.” In fact, it was the embassy’s staff that was on the receiving end of the Syrian regime’s brand of “tough messages.”

In late April, the Wall Street Journal reported that an “American diplomat based in Damascus” was “hooded by Syrian security agents and ‘roughed up’ before being released.” The State Department reacted by “formally protesting” the incident to the Syrian ambassador to Washington.

But that aside, there are questions as to when was the last time that Ford actually met with high-ranking Syrian officials, let alone Assad (whom he reportedly only met once). In late April, Jacob Sullivan, head of Policy Planning at the State Department, told reporters that Ford had met with “senior Syrian officials” whose actual rank he could not specify, and it was unclear whether that was before one of the major assaults on the city of Daraa or afterward. Since then, Ford’s meetings seem to have been rather limited. The State Department’s spokesman, Mark Toner, has repeatedly told the press that Ford’s requests for meetings continue to be denied. In fact, a senior US official told the Washington correspondent for the Lebanese daily An-Nahar, Hisham Melhem, that the ambassador has not met with the Syrian Foreign Minister or his deputy “for some time,” and whatever meetings he’s had have been with “intermediaries.” As such, it’s difficult to make sense of Toner’s claim on Tuesday that having Ford in Damascus “sends a clear message” that the US is “going to continue to press the Assad regime to end its human rights abuses.”

That Ford hasn’t even been allowed to meet with Syrian officials has not been the only problem. The State Department also concedes that the ambassador’s movement is equally restricted, apparently confined to Damascus. This constraint calls into question the administration’s alternate argument that Ford’s continued presence is necessary in order to relay an accurate picture of what’s going on in Syria, given that international media is barred from entering the country. In addition, Ford and other officials have expressed reservations about relying solely on the videos streaming out of Syria by activists and dissidents.

However, at the time the Syrians “roughed up” the embassy’s diplomat, the State Department itself noted that such measures “have made it difficult for embassy personnel to adequately assess the current risks or the potential for continuing violence.” With all these constraints, one has to wonder what picture, exactly, the ambassador is relaying back to Washington.

Leaving aside why such a task requires an ambassador to begin with, there are more troubling questions surrounding Ford’s continued presence in Syria. Sources close to the Syrian opposition are claiming that the US ambassador has asked some dissidents (who, incidentally, are not even central players in the protest movement) what their conditions would be to lower the ceiling of demands to accept “reforms” rather than Assad’s toppling.

The administration’s argument for keeping an ambassador was always problematic, but if this story is true, then all of its claims about Ford's role are exposed as utterly hollow. This posture – the logical outcome of President Obama’s call on Assad to “lead the transition” – only legitimates the murderous Assad regime at a time when the US should be publicly declaring it illegitimate.

President Obama already lent American prestige to Assad when he decided to recess appoint Ambassador Ford. Awarding normal diplomatic relations with a superpower to a rogue regime is a legitimating act on its own. If the Obama administration is serious about ratcheting up the pressure against Assad, it should first state publicly that it is done dealing with the Syrian dictator, then follow that with a declaration that it is withdrawing the US ambassador from Damascus.

Hamas member electrocutes himself

From Ma'an:

The militant wing of Hamas, the Al-Qassam Brigades, issued a statement Thursday saying one of its fighters had died in hospital after sustaining a life-threatening electric shock two days earlier.

The group identified the man as Muhammad Al-Mahmoum, 20. He sustained an electric shock while he was working with the brigades in the southern Gaza Strip city of Rafah.

In a statement, the brigades said "Al-Mahmoum dedicated his life to jihad."

Tunnel workers often suffer electric shocks from faulty wiring in the underground passages leading between Egypt and the Gaza Strip.

While it is likely that he was killed in a smuggling tunnel, the Qassam Brigades page says

The brigades confirmed that the Mujahed was died of an electric shock while performing a Jihad duty in the Rafah refugee camp, adding that he was martyred after a long bright path of Jihad, hard work, struggle and sacrifice.

May all those who embark on the long bright path of Jihad have the opportunity to join al-Mahmoum in Paradise after being equally successful with their tasks.

Egypt in a frenzy over "spy"

Popular Egyptian newspaper Rose al-Youssef is claiming that alleged Israeli spy Ilan Grapel is a member of "Unit 101," an IDF special forces unit that was accused of massacres of Arabs, including at Qibya. The newspaper says that "Unit 101" is part of Israeli intelligence.

Unit 101 hasn't existed since 1954. (He actually was part of the IDF Paratroopers 101st Battalion.)

While many Egyptians are doubting the story, the news media is convinced that Grapel is a spy.

Egypt's al-Ahram weekly reported Thursday that that Cairo's prosecution is looking into ways to expedite the legal proceedings against Ilan Grapel, an Israeli detained there on alleged espionage charges.

Should such a move be successful, Grapel may face trial within a few weeks.

The newspaper continues to claim that Grapel is a Mossad agent, who was caught "trying to recruit locals and inflame the conflict between the Egyptian people and the armed forces."

The paper also alleged that Grapel's visa application – filed with the Egyptian Embassy in Tel Aviv – stated that he was Muslim; adding that he was caught sending "several emails from Internet Cafés to the Mossad."

According to the report, Egyptian Foreign Minister Nabil al-Arabi refused to meet with the Israeli consul to Cairo on the matter.

Meanwhile, another Egyptian publication, "al-Masri al-Youm," reported that since Grapel's arrest, "dozens of young 'revolutionists' have come forward with information regarding the Israeli agent, reporting to the Attorney General."

Arabic media has even accused Grapel of planning to blow up the gas pipeline between Egypt and Israel in order to embarrass Egypt.

Commenter Mitchell writes:

Aside from being an acquaintance of Ilan Grapel, his being a spy (specifically for the Mossad) does NOT hold water because a) Grapel always used his real name b) whenever Israel wants to send someone to spy on an Arab country, they will send a NATIVE Arabic speaker, not someone with an American accent who sticks out like a sore tongue c) it takes 2.5 years of intensive training ONLY after finishing service in an IDF combat unit before the Mossad will even send you out on a mission; Grapel has been studying at Emory University (in Atlanta, Georgia) for the past two years and only got released from the IDF September, 2007, so do the math....

It is starting to look like the cirrent Egyptian regime does not want to look foolish so it is going to push the lie that Grapel is a spy and fabricate evidence.

There is even a Facebook group that seems to call for Grapel to be executed. And a demonstration is planned in front of the Israeli embassy in Cairo on Friday to protest Israeli "spying" on Egypt.

The US needs to pressure Egypt to release Grapel (and American citizen) now, because time is not on his side.

Are these Israeli weapons? (updated)

Yesterday I mentioned that Egyptian authorities claimed to have busted a Palestinian Arab arms smuggling ring, and that they captured a quantity of Israeli and American weapons.

Here's a video of the event, from Al Masry al Youm, and the weapons can be found starting at 0:47. Could someone identify the types of weapons here?

UPDATE: The consensus is represented by this comment by Jonathan:

This *is* too funny. You couldn't identify most of these firearms as most of those were self-manufactured by the swell lads here, using parts from other firearms. For example, Uzi was never manufactured with front-mounted grip, yet you could see a [weird] one on the Uzi located at the far right on the table. The third from the left seems to be based on a shortened version of Beretta M12. The fact that the rear grip is made of wood and is clearly out of place there suggests that the M12 was shortened by the Palestinians themselves.

This is not a major weapons cache and Egypt is exaggerating the importance of this find. Hamas gets much better weapons than this, and in much higher quantity.

My response to a piece in Foreign Policy

Ahmad Samih Khalidi, writing in Foreign Policy, writes:

The official PA/PLO position is that how Israel defines itself is not a Palestinian concern, and that the Palestinians cannot accede to this demand on two basic grounds: First, because it prejudices the political and civic rights of Israel's Arab citizens comprising 20 percent of the population whose second-class status would be consolidated by dint of recognition of the "Jewishness " of the state; and second, because acknowledgement of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people would compromise the Palestinian refugees' right of return as there would be no moral or political grounds for them to return to a universally recognized Jewish state.

But this is neither a complete nor totally convincing riposte. The Palestinians cannot be indifferent as to how Israel defines itself, or how others are ready to define it. In the context of the struggle over the shape and future of the Holy Land, one side's appropriation of a certain definition affects not only the rights of those who reside in this territory, but their very history and identity, their relation to the land, and by extension their rights, future and fate as well. There are, in fact, several deeper layers to this issue that warrant further examination and debate.

First, and perhaps most importantly, if Israel is the homeland of the Jewish people, then the lands that it occupies today -- and perhaps more as there are as yet no borders to this homeland -- belong to this people by way of right. But if these lands rightfully comprise the Jewish homeland then the Arab presence there becomes historically aberrant and contingent; the Palestinians effectively become historic interlopers and trespassers -- a transient presence on someone else's national soil.

This is not a moot or exaggerated point. It touches on the very core of the conflict and its genesis. Indeed, it is the heart of the Zionist claim to Palestine: Palestine belongs to the Jews and their right to the land is antecedent and superior to that of the Arabs -- this is what Zionism is about and what justifies both the Jewish return to the land and the dispossession of its Arab inhabitants.

But this is not the Palestinian Arab narrative, nor can it be. We do not believe that the historical Jewish presence and connection to the land entail a superior claim to it. This we believe is our homeland established over one-and-half thousand years of continuous Arab-Muslim presence, and that we were eventually only dispossessed of it by superior force and colonial machination. For us to adopt the Zionist narrative would mean that the homes that our forefathers built, the land that they tilled for centuries, and the sanctuaries they built and prayed at were not really ours at all and that our defense of them was morally flawed and wrongful: we had no right to any of these to begin with.

...What [the Palestinians] cannot be expected to do is to renege on their past, deny their identity, take on the moral burden of transgressor, and give up on what they believe is their history. They cannot be expected to become Zionists.

As usual in a venue like FP, this is a sophisticated argument that uses a false framework. I responded there:

But the Palestinians also deny Jewish history!

Khalidi purposefully downplays the extent of the Palestinian Arabs' historical revisionism. It is not merely competing narratives; they deny basic history that there is such a thing as a Jewish people, that the Temples existed in Jerusalem, and so forth. These positions have been in official PA media and PLO statements.

Even worse, they co-opt indisputably Jewish shrines as their own - the "Bilal Mosque" that is supposedly at Rachels' Tomb simply did not exist fifteen years ago.

Real peace cannot occur if it is based on lies, and while it may be that Palestinian Arabs will not accept Zionism, they do need to face the facts that the Land of Israel has been the center of Jewish longing since before anyone ever heard of "Palestinians" - or Islam, for that matter. Their denial of those facts is not because of competing narratives - it is from an indoctrination of lies that must stop.

No Jew denies that thousands of Arabs lived in Palestine before 1948. Why can the Palestinian Arabs not accept that Israel, and Jerusalem in particular, has been the object of dreams and tears for the Jewish people since 70 CE?

Joke of the day: "Flotilla activists putting their lives on the line"

From the Australian Associated Press:

Three Australians will be putting their lives on the line when they board a boat hoping to stop the Israeli naval blockade of Gaza, the NSW Greens say.

"(They) are putting their welfare on the line to take part in a peaceful humanitarian mission to bring aid to the people of Gaza," said the party's leader David Shoebridge.

Last year nine activists were killed when Israeli marines stormed the flagship of an international aid flotilla bound for Gaza.

One of the Australians taking part, former Greens MP Sylvia Hale, said she hoped for a "more moderate" response when she takes part in the Freedom Flotilla 2.

"The Israeli government has shown by its past actions that it's prepared to shoot first and ask questions later," she said.

"We don't expect gentle handling."

The threat of violence, however, has only encouraged activists with over 500,000 applying to be part of the flotilla.

"Violence encourages further acts of resistance, the flotilla last time was comprised of six ships this time I understand there are 12," Ms Hale said.

The trio, which also includes youth worker Michael Coleman and Vivienne Porzsolt of Jews Against Occupation, has called on the Australian government to protect them.

Mr Coleman said the passengers on board the boat would be acting "completely lawfully".

"We will give Israeli forces no pretext for any assault."

Putting their lives on the line? Please. If they were interested in danger, they'd be volunteering to work in Afghanistan. Or Syria.

Everyone knows that the only people putting themselves in danger on this latest exercise in political theatre are the ones stupid enough to attack trained, armed soldiers who are doing their jobs. The reporter knows it, the Israelis know it and the flotilla fools know it quite well. After all, the people on last year's ships that were not on the "Mavi Marmara" - and didn't have jihadist, martyrdom seeking Turks wildly waving metal bars and knives* on deck - seem to have somehow made it home in one piece. How is that possible when everyone knows the IDF "shoots first and ask questions later"?

And note how this "news" article swallows the absurd statistic that 500,000 people volunteered for the flotilla. Oh, really? Where is the list? Who even made such a claim? Where are the Facebook groups of people who were denied access, and what was the reason given? Can we see the form letter of denial?

This isn't a news article; it is a press release for the Free Gaza idiots.

*I noticed today that the UN report on the flotilla claimed, in footnote 69: "The Mission has found no evidence of knives being taken on board by passengers except for one traditional ceremonial knife."

The report was published over three months after Hurriyet published photos showing "peace activists" with hunting knives - knives that Reuters cropped out of the photos initially and then republished after there was an outcry.

How could the crack investigators at the UN miss that when hundreds of thousands of people saw the photos? A real mystery, I tell ya.

Completing the seasons open thread

I had posted photos taken at a small nearby last autumn and winter for open threads. I have now completed the series:

So here is an open thread to celebrate.

And to remind you to vote in the Pro-Israel Blog-Off - I'm way, way behind in the voting. (My pleas are likely to get more pathetic as the week goes by. What can I say; I want to win. There, I admit it!)

Links!

CifWatch - Harriet Sherwood feels Hamas' pain

Colonel Richard Kemp:

...After the terrorist attacks in London on July the 7th, 2005...we in the UK were left deeply shaken by the attacks, and I remember that the first ones to call to offer help – for some time, in fact, they were the only ones to call – was the IDF. It was then that we knew who our real friends are.

Hamas on how the Jews gained from the Holocaust.

Latest issue of Military and Strategic Affairs. Looks good.

PC Magazine: Why Google Earth pixilates Israel

Israel vulnerable to cyber attack

Israel holds an olive branch towards Lebanon's new Hezbollah-dominated government!

Sheikh Raed Salah warns, for the millionth time, that Israel is preparing to ethnically cleanse all Palestinian Arabs.

"The machinations of the Israeli and Palestinian negotiators are immaterial. The Arab reform process is the peace process."

Ever see Arabs drape themselves with an Israeli flag and say "Allah Akbar"?

(h/t Israel Muse, Akiva, Yisrael M., Joel)

More exposure of UNRWA lies (Zach N)

Received via email:

From the UNHRC's Handbook on Procedures and Criteria for Determining Refugee Status under the 1951 Convention and the 1967 Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees

184. If the head of a family meets the criteria of the definition, his dependants are normally granted refugee status according to the principle of family unity.

In other words, it is not automatic, like the case of Palestinians (and there is actually a further exception in 188 which states, "If the dependant of a refugee falls within the terms of one of the exclusion clauses, refugee status should be denied to him)! Many Palestinians would fall within the exception clause, which I discuss at the bottom.

Another clause:

187. Where the unity of a refugee's family is destroyed by divorce, separation or death, dependants who have been granted refugee status on the basis of family unity will retain such refugee status unless they fall within the terms of a cessation clause; or if they do not have reasons other than those of personal convenience for wishing to retain refugee status; or if they themselves no longer wish to be considered as refugees."

Cessation Clause (which EoZ mentioned):

113. Article 1 C of the 1951 Convention provides that:
“This Convention shall cease to apply to any person falling under the terms of section A if:
(1) He has voluntarily re-availed himself of the protection of the country of his nationality; or
(2) Having lost his nationality, he has voluntarily re-acquired it; or
(3) He has acquired a new nationality, and enjoys the protection of the country of his new nationality; or
(4) He has voluntarily re-established himself in the country which he left or outside which he remained owing to fear of persecution; or
(5) He can no longer, because the circumstances in connexion with which he has been recognized as a refugee have ceased to exist, continue to refuse to avail himself of the protection of the country of his nationality;
Provided that this paragraph shall not apply to a refugee falling under Section A (1) of this Article who is able to invoke compelling reasons arising out of previous persecution for refusing to avail himself of the protection of the country of nationality;
(6) Being a person who has no nationality he is, because the circumstances in connexion with which he has been recognized as a refugee have ceased to exist, able to return to the country of his former habitual residence

This is particularly interesting:

(3) Persons considered not to be deserving of international protection

Article 1 F of the 1951 Convention:

“The provisions of this Convention shall not apply to any person with respect to whom there are serious reasons for considering that:
(a) he has committed a crime against peace, a war crime, or a crime against humanity, as defined in the international instruments drawn up to make provision in respect of such crimes;
(b) he has committed a serious non-political crime outside the country of refuge prior to his admission to that country as a refugee;
(c) he has been guilty of acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.”

And now for the kicker:

A. War refugees
164. Persons compelled to leave their country of origin as a result of international or national armed conflicts are not normally considered refugees under the 1951 Convention or 1967 Protocol.22 They do, however, have the protection provided for in other international instruments, e.g. the Geneva Conventions of 1949 on the Protection of War Victims and the 1977 Protocol additional to the Geneva Conventions of 1949 relating to the protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts.23

165. However, foreign invasion or occupation of all or part of a country can result--and occasionally has resulted--in persecution for one or more of the reasons enumerated in the 1951 Convention. In such cases, refugee status will depend upon whether the applicant is able to show that he has a “well-founded fear of being persecuted” in the occupied territory and, in addition, upon whether or not he is able to avail himself of the protection of his government, or of a protecting power whose duty it is to safeguard the interests of his country during the armed conflict, and whether such protection can be considered to be effective.

166. Protection may not be available if there are no diplomatic relations between the applicant's host country and his country of origin. If the applicant's government is itself in exile, the effectiveness of the protection that it is able to extend may be open to question. Thus, every case has to be judged on its merits, both in respect of well-founded fear of persecution and of the availability of effective protection on the part of the government of the country of origin.

For some additional points, I include some quotes from James Lindsay

"That is, UNRWA already grants refugee status to the children of refugees in Jordan, even though almost all of them are Jordanian citizens—this fact complicates any argument that matrilineal descendants in other areas should remain unregistered because they have citizenship through their nonrefugee fathers," pg. 25.

"Even UNRWA sometimes finds it difficult to remain coherent on the subject of citizens who are refugees. In a May 17, 2007, interview with Riz Khan of al-Jazeera, the commissioner-general stated, “Any group of refugees, until they can go home or until they are resettled or until they decide to integrate or take another nationality, they are, they remain refugees; their descendants remain refugees.” Yet, in the same interview, she noted that “the Jordanian government has given citizenship [to most of its Palestinian refugees], but that doesn’t take away the refugeehood; the refugee status remains.” Video of the interview available online " pg. 37.

"The roughly 414,000 UNRWA-registered Palestinian refugees in Lebanon have a significantly different status from their nonrefugee neighbors, but even there, some of UNRWA’s registered beneficiaries are likely citizens (given that Beirut granted citizenship to some 70,000 Palestinian Christian refugees in past years)," pg. 53.

"Nonetheless, with the increasing attention paid to women’s rights and gender equality (made a UN value by the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women adopted in 1979)—and particularly since the May 1994 publication of Christine Cervenak’s influential article accusing UNRWA of “gender-based discrimination”—the agency has been embarrassed by its different treatment of the children of male and female refugees. In response, UNRWA began making a number of ad hoc adaptations, softening the effects of its discrimination against women married to nonrefugee men and the children of such marriages. With the adoption of the 2006 Consolidated Eligibility and Registration Instructions, nonrefugee husbands and descendants of registered refugee women are now entitled to apply for UNRWA services. Nevertheless, because matrilineal descendants still are not registered as refugees, the supposedly unequal treatment remains in a formal sense. Therefore, the pressure to categorize descendents of all registered refugees as refugees in their own right, adding tens of thousands of new “refugees” to the rolls, will likely continue," pg. 25.

So either Gunness is ignorant of the laws that govern his institution and the UNHCR or he's a liar. Maybe he's both.

Thru Jerusalem: Great music video

Details about the video and the artist:

Thru-Jerusalem, Kutiman's latest work, is the result of a musical journey that lasted a number of weeks and included visits to a number of different musicians in the city. Kutiman stopped off in apartments, ventured out into the open air (in the backdrop of the stunning Jerusalem landscape) and visited the rehearsal rooms of local creative artists to record their work.

Among other artists appearing on the resultant video piece are musicians such as blues artist Lazer Lloyd (who after a short visit to a rabbi changed his life completely despite being signed by Atlantic Records), Guy Mar from HaDag Nahash, Safi Suede - one of the most important Kanun players in the world; the ultimate marching band - Marsh Donderma, Emanuel Wizthum on the viola and a few dozen musicians of different ages, different ethnic backgrounds and who play different instruments-but all of which derive from the city.

Kutiman worked his magic and produced an amazing 5-minute long work which documents the emotional journey he took in the city. He alternates between optimism and despair, between the future and the past, between the new and the ancient and ends the video with a mantra of harmonious and emotional prayer. The work itself is made up of a collection of unique footage of the city and in essence this is, in fact, represent the unique "sound" of the city.

(h/t The David Project)

Israeli Arabs killing each other. So guess who's to blame?

Al Arabiya reports that violence and crime is increasing among Israeli Arabs.

A recent report shows that although Arabs are 20% of the population, some 79% of all shooting incidents in Israel are among Arabs, and 60% of the fatalities.

The article quotes an Arab MK that says that while it is true that Arabs do not always want to cooperate with Israeli police to investigate these crimes, the police aren't pushing hard enough. He also accused Israel of freely allowing weapons to proliferate among Arab communities so that they kill each other. (He said they do the same with drugs.)

Yeah, Israeli Jews want to arm Arabs. Makes perfect sense.

And since the Arabs have such easy access to weapons, they are likely to use them for things like family disputes, the MK continues.

Sheikh Marwan Jabara says that while some of the responsibility does rest with the Arabs themselves, most of the responsibility is the Israelis' (meaning, of course, Jews) because it is their policies that make Arab lives so miserable that they find themselves wanting to kill each other.

A monkey causes panic in Gaza

From Firas Press:

A monkey running in one of the main streets in Gaza City caused a state of panic and fear among citizens, amid strenuous efforts by many people to apprehend the fugitive monkey.

Witnesses said the monkey escaped from a street traders tunnel, and managed to hide in one of the produce shops at the beginning of the street. Plans are underway to get him out of his place.

I'm itching to add monkeys to the Zionist Attack Zoo, so we just need someone to blame Israel....

Interesting logic behind Lebanon UNRWA protest

Palestine Press Agency reports that Palestinian arabs in the Ein al-Helwa camp in Lebanon are engaging in a series of protests against UNRWA.

They seem to have a couple of problems with UNRWA. One is that UNRWA, supposedly, changed its name from "United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East" to only "United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees." For some reason, they interpret this as meaning that UNRWA will start to resettle Palestinian Arabs outside Israel. (If the name change is true, to me it sounds like UNRWA wants to take responsibility for so-called "refugees" in other countries.)

But the main reason for the protest is more interesting: it is to protest UNRWA's failure in adequately providing social and health services for residents of the camp.

So what do they do to protest the lack of services? They shut it down altogether!

They burned tires, closed entrances to the camp, and prevented all UNRWA employees from doing their jobs.

Meaning that the protest reduced services from "less than 100% of what we demand" to "zero."

Way to go! That will teach those UNRWA guys, forced to take a free vacation day as they close schools and stop distributing food and medicines!

(As usual, UNRWA does not acknowledge any problems. Since it is so transparent.)

Egypt arrests Palestinian Arab arms dealers in the Sinai

Ma'an Arabic reports that Egypt arrested some top Gaza arms dealers.

Egyptian police in northern Sinai said they were able to bust the cell of the top Palestinian arms dealers in the Gaza Strip that infiltrated into Egypt through the tunnels. They had possession of large quantities of Israeli and American weapons as well as ammunition.

Four were arrested in the early-morning raid in El Arish.

Iranian Revolutionary Guards anticipates first Iranian nuclear bomb test

From MEMRI:

An article posted April 24, 2011 on Gerdab, the website of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), envisions the day after Iran's first nuclear test. The article states that Iran's first controlled nuclear explosion will not disrupt the daily lives of Iranians, but will only boost their national pride. However, it says, in the Arab world, in the West and in Israel, it will sow a sense of fear mingled with respect for Iran's achievement.

The article makes satirical comments on Iran's charged relations with the Arabs and with the West.

The following are excerpts from the article:[1]

"The day after Iran's first nuclear test will be an ordinary day for us Iranians. But many of us will have a new gleam in our eyes.

"It's a fine day. The hour is 7:00 AM. The sun is not yet fully up, but everything is already clear. Many countries in the northern hemisphere are starting their day. It's the first dawn after Iran's nuclear test. It's an ordinary day.

"Yesterday, an underground nuclear explosion took place, probably [somewhere] in the deserts of central Iran, where the Americans and some of the [other] Western countries once wanted to bury their nuclear waste. The blast was not so powerful as to cause much damage to the region, but not so weak as to cause the Iranian nuclear scientists any problem in their experiment.

"It's an ordinary day, and just like on any [other] day when there is news from Iran – which is 90% of year – we see reports on the foreign news websites, and they read as follows:

"Reuters: 'Iran Detonates Its Nuclear Bomb.'

"CNN: 'Iran Detonates Nuclear Bomb.'

"Al-Jazeera: 'Iran Has Tested Its Second Nuclear Bomb.'

"Al-'Arabia: 'A Shi'ite Nuclear Bomb Has Gone Off.'

"Yahoo News: "Nuclear Explosion in Iran."

"The Jerusalem Post: 'The Mullahs Have Obtained Nuclear Weapons.'

"The Washington Post: 'Nuclear Explosion in Iran; Shock and Anxiety in Tel Aviv.'

The local [Iranian press] will also shower this achievement by the Hidden Imam and the Leader [Khamenei] with words of praise, as follows:

"Kayhan: 'Iran Has Tested Its First Nuclear Bomb.'

"Jomhouri-ye Eslami: 'Iran Carries Out Successful Nuclear Test.'

"Iran [a popular pro-Ahmadinejad daily]: 'On President's Orders, Iran Tests All-Iranian Nuclear Bomb.'

"Ettelaat: 'Iran Detonates Long-Awaited Nuclear Bomb'...

"It will be a news storm, but it will not disrupt normal [daily] life in Iran. Employees will come to work and punch the clock on time, or [at most] a little late. Bakers will not bake unsubsidized bread. Broadband Internet will function as usual, and even this storm will not make it any cheaper, nor will it cause [Iranian] TV to rethink its policy on the airing of foreign programs.

"The day after Iran's first nuclear test will be an ordinary day for us Iranians, but many of us will have a new gleam in our eyes – a gleam of national pride and might.

"[Koran 8:60:] 'And prepare against them what force you can and horses tied at the frontier, to frighten thereby the enemy of Allah and your enemy'"