Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, April 16, 2012

Interesting article on the international laws of war

At the Washington Post blog, Jennifer Rubin interviews Peter Berkowitz on his new book “Israel and the Struggle Over the International Laws of War.”

An excerpt:

You write that international laws are “a vital component of a freer, more peaceful and more prosperous world order.” But does Israel’s experience with Goldstone and the flotilla suggest otherwise?

Israel’s bitter experience with the Goldstone Report and, in the end, better experience with the Gaza flotilla controversy — both of which concerned Israel’s operations against Hamas, which is the ruling authority in Gaza and which is sworn to Israel’s destruction — involved the attempt by influential actors on the international stage to criminalize Israel’s inherent right of self-defense. All liberal democracies must combat this abuse and corruption of the international laws of war.

At their origins and properly conceived today, the international laws of war seek to balance the legitimate claims of military necessity and humanitarian responsibility. Liberal democracies such as Israel and the United States, which are engaged in a long struggle against transnational terrorism and depend on their armed forces on a daily basis to defend their ways of life, have a special interest in the struggle over the international laws of war. That’s in no small measure because soldiers and officers imbued with the principles of freedom and equality justly take pride in honoring laws of war rightly understood. The laws of war rightly understood take seriously both combatants’ obligation to defend their nation and their obligation to minimize harm to noncombatants.

Is the proper application of international law possible without a majority of liberal democracies in the international community?

Yes and no. It is certainly possible for the liberal democracies such as the United States and Israel to operate in accordance with the international laws of war, in part because the international laws of war accord states with competent judicial systems considerable responsibility for investigating and punishing war crimes. However, to the extent that the international laws of war are coopted by authoritarian states and transnational elites with their own political agendas, liberal democracies will be compelled to assume even greater responsibility for interpreting, upholding, and defending the international laws of war. The recognition of laws of war that are binding on all nations should not be confused with the obligation to vest in some mythical international community the authority for defining and punishing violations of the laws of war.

Nearly half the book can be read here.

(h/t Noah)

Follow-up on CJR's absurd article saying Israel jails more journalists "per capita"

Columbia Journalism Review has an article by Sohrab Ahmari that discusses the disgraceful manipulation and misuse of statistics that Justin Martin used at CJR two weeks ago to make it look like Israel treats journalists worse than almost every country on Earth. (I was the first to point out the falsehood of Martin's statistics.)

In recent years, the Columbia Journalism Review has devoted special attention to the use and misuse of statistics in American journalism, taking reporters to task when they have fallen for unreliable statistics or failed to seek the human stories behind data. The cover essay in the March/April 2011 issue, for example, harshly criticized the Los Angeles Times for publishing the names of thousands of public school teachers next to their “value-added” performance data without giving readers sufficient context to interpret these numbers. In its next issue, CJR lauded an alternative weekly reporter for exposing the faulty methodology behind wildly alarming sex trafficking statistics that were uncritically picked up by a number of regional broadsheets. Such instances of statistical credulity and probity on the part of journalists regularly earn “darts” and “laurels” in the pages of CJR.

Such efforts are admirable. But they also require CJR to be doubly cautious in its own use of statistics. On April 2, columnist Justin Martin posted an article on the CJR website purporting to spotlight the twelve countries with the most number of journalists jailed “per capita.” Save for the conspicuous absence of China, the resulting list of authoritarian and quasi-authoritarian states was mostly predictable. But one country stood out from the rest: Israel. The Jewish state, according to Mr. Martin, jails more journalists per capita than the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Ba’athist regime in Syria, and the Burmese junta, among others. Only Eritrea, Mr. Martin claimed, jails more reporters per capita.

....Mr. Martin’s findings soon sparked a firestorm of controversy, with supporters of Israel crying foul at the latest instance of Israel-bashing in the prestige press. ...The outrage was justified. Mr. Martin’s conclusion would not have passed professional muster under the standards CJR imposes on other outlets. Indeed, his methodology was a classic example of the sort of statistical recklessness that CJR scolds other journalists for.

To reach his per capita number, Mr. Martin merely divided the number of journalists detained—a number that, in the case of Israel, was debatable to begin with—by each country’s population in millions. As Commentary’s Omri Ceren pointed out, however, “If you want a ‘per capita’ number describing which countries disproportionately target journalists, you divide the jailed journalists in each country by the total number of journalists in each country, not by the total number of people.” Otherwise, tiny Israel—home to a huge press corps and where commentators in the Arab and leftist presses regularly question the state’s very right to exist—ends up appearing more repressive than, say, North Korea, where a totalitarian regime does not permit journalism as such to exist.

Allowing Mr. Martin to skewer the Jewish state using faulty statistics undermines CJR’s role as professional watchdog. But the harm done extends beyond journalistic standards. The ultimate impact of pieces like Mr. Martin’s is a softening of the reading public’s moral intuitions and sensitivities. By placing Israel on the same plane as the likes of Iran and Syria, Mr. Martin minimized the threats faced by journalists working under genuine authoritarianisms—not to mention the broader human rights catastrophes underway in these societies.

In Iran, where I was born and spent the first half of my life, journalists and writers are persecuted on a nearly industrial scale; dozens of outlets are shuttered every year. Just last month, the Committee to Protect Journalists reported, Nazanin Khosravani, a reformist writer, began serving a six-year sentence in Tehran’s nightmarish Evin prison for the crime of “propagating against the system”—a charge unheard of in Israel. But why should Western audiences care about these very real injustices when seemingly authoritative “statistics” show the West—including Israel and the U.S.—to be equally authoritarian? Mr. Martin thus challenged the common moral sense of his readers, distorting conclusions they would otherwise draw from straightforward reporting on the realities of practicing journalism in free and unfree societies. Will he earn a dart from CJR anytime soon?

Martin's response is more than lame:

I fully agree with this criticism. Unfortunately, we don’t yet have reliable data on national tallies for working reporters in many of the countries—Eritrea, Sudan, Ethiopia—that jail journalists. And even if such data were available, we would want counts of how many newsmakers in each country were working for regime-owned news sources versus private organizations. For now, although the data are a bit large and cumbersome, ratios of imprisoned reporters to countries’ population still deliver some meaning.

No, they don't. They obscure meaning. It is as worthwhile as comparing the number of jailed journalists to the number of registered dogs in the same country.

Martin then gets even more ridiculous, trying to take credit for spending 30 seconds to subtract the journalists jailed by Hamas in the original survey, and helping Israel look better. Wow - we should praise him for doing something that any high-school reporter would be expected to do?

Martin proved himself to be anything but a serious journalist with this episode. He has now proven that he has no credibility in criticizing other journalists, at all.

(h/t David G)

Hamas terrorists tweet about morality

All you need to know about Hamas - and, in many ways, mainstream Palestinian Arab thought - can be seen in this tweet from the Al Qassam Brigades, their terrorist wing:

They are claiming that the IDF is inhumane, presumably because of the incident yesterday where an IDF soldier whose fingers were broken during a "peaceful protest" hit a protester with his rifle. Obviously, to the Qassam Brigades, use of force by an army against protesters is a terrible thing.

Then, in the very next sentence, we are informed that "resistance" - which to the Qassam Brigades means suicide bombings at pizza shops, shooting rockets at civilians, and stealing bulldozers to run over people - is the "only way" for them.

The rules are simple. Anything Israel does, no matter how justified, is inherently immoral - and anything Hamas does, no matter how heinous, is justified.

If it was only Hamas that felt this way, it wouldn't be so bad. But there are tens of millions of Arabs, hundreds of millions of Muslims and tens of thousands of Westerners who believe the exact same thing. In this case, Hamas is not anomalous - it is mainstream.

Iranian arms ship to Syria intercepted

From Der Spiegel on Saturday:

A German-owned freighter loaded with weapons from Iran was stopped on Friday near the Syrian port of Tartus in the Mediterranean Sea, SPIEGEL has learned.

A few days prior, the Atlantic Cruiser, owned by the Emden carrier Bockstiegel, had allegedly picked up heavy military equipment and munitions meant for Syrian dictator Bashar Assad's regime from an Iranian freighter at the Djibouti port. The cargo, desperately needed reinforcements for Assad's crackdown on dissidents, was supposed to be unloaded on Friday.
But defectors from inside the Syrian government had learned of the delivery and warned the shipping company. On Friday the Atlantic Cruiser suddenly changed course, heading for the Turkish harbor of Iskenderun instead. Then the ship stopped some 80 kilometers (50 miles) southwest of Tartus, sailing in circles for the next few hours.

"We stopped the ship after getting information on the weapons cargo," shipping agent Torsten Lüddeke of Hamburg-based C.E.G. Bulk Chartering told SPIEGEL.

According to Lüddeke, the ship had been chartered by an Odessa, Ukraine-based company called White Whale Shipping. "They declared to us as cargo mainly pumps and similar things," he said. "We never would have allowed weapons on board." For now, the 6,200-ton ship will "stay where it is," he added.

Meanwhile, the Ukrainian shipping company has insisted that the Atlantic Cruiser is not carrying weapons and that it be allowed to dock in Tartus.

However, SPIEGEL has learned that the ship's crew had attempted to refuel in the Cypriot port of Limassol, but was turned away after reporting its cargo as "weapons and munitions."

The German Economics Ministry told the Associated Press on Saturday that it was looking into the matter, but provided no further details.

The route between Djibouti and Tartus is known as a path for transporting weapons, according to intelligence experts. In January another ship out of Russia was halted with munitions in Cyprus, but later continued its journey with the cargo to Syria after the captain declared he would head to a different port than initially planned.

And today:

Officials in Germany are still seeking information about a German-owned ship believed to be carrying a load of weapons and military equipment that had been destined for the despotic regime of Syrian leader Bashar Assad. Since the revelation on Friday, it appears that transponder used to broadcast the ship's whereabouts has been turned off repeatedly. On Monday, though, it appeared to be on again, with the 6,200 ton freighter ship apparently on a course towards Turkey.

...But many questions still persist about the ship -- and the shipping company's version of events has been filled with contradictions for some days now. On Sunday, officials with Bockstiegel would not comment to SPIEGEL ONLINE on the events. Initially, the German freighter was supposed to call at the Syrian port of Tartus at the end of last week. Earlier, the ship had reportedly loaded heavy military equipment and munitions from an Iranian cargo ship in Djibouti that had been intended for Assad's henchmen.

...The behavior of those in charge raises a number of questions. It remains a mystery why the shipping company didn't immediately order the ship to head to a port so that the cargo could be swiftly investigated. The shipping company also could have ordered the ship's captain to make a closer inspection of the freight it is carrying. A quick check of the freight could have quickly answered some of the most pressing questions and also might have exonerated all parties involved. But it appears they didn't want to do that.

Instead, it appears the captain was instead prompted to turn off the ship's transponder so that the Atlantic Cruiser's location could no longer be traced. For 24 hours, the ship could no longer be tracked as it traveled on the high seas. It will also be difficult to determine what happened on the ship during that time. The same applies to Sunday night, when the transponder was yet again turned off. What has been happening on the ship since then?

The shipping company has said off the record that it is normal for the transponder to shut down as soon as the freighter ship stops moving. But ship brokers claim the move is extremely unusual. Experts said that even when a freight ship is at port or in open seas, the transponder is usually in operation, making it possible to track the vessel's whereabouts.

(h/t Yoel)

Arabic media is reporting that a former leader of Hamas, Mustafa Leddawi, was kidnapped in Damascus by unknown assailants who took him to an unknown destination.

Sources told Al Hayat that Leddawi, who had held several leadership positions in Hamas including being its representative in Syria, Lebanon and Iran, was captured early Sunday morning while driving his own car.

Hamas leadership is in contact with Syrian authorities and received a promise that they will make efforts in order to know where he is.

Hmmmm.

UPDATE: He was released, and still doesnt know who kidnapped and tortured him. But he is implying - and his brother is saying - that he was kidnapped by Hamas, as he is now a critic of the organization.

Arabic book: "Zionists conspired with Iraqi government to expel Jews"

A new Arabic book attempts to prove that Iraqi Jews were forced out of the country by Israel working together with the Iraqi government.

Written by Egyptian Mohamed Ahmed Saleh Hussein, the book claims that Jews in Iraq lived a wonderful existence. It bases most of its conclusions based on an autobiography by Israel Prize winner Sasson Somekh, a secular Jew who lived in Iraq and whose family immigrated to Israel in 1951. He quotes Somekh, who was eighteen at the time, as saying that he felt not that he was immigrating to Israel but that he was being uprooted from his country, Iraq. This proves, according to Hussein, that Jews in Arab countries were unwilling to move to Israel.

Of course, if there hadn't been rampant anti-semitism and governmental discrimination against Jews in Iraq, the Jewish community would not have been entirely uprooted to begin with.

Hussein rehashes the old discredited claims that it was a Zionist campaign of terror that forced the Jews to leave. Beyond that, he says that Iraqi authorities colluded with "Zionists" to expel the Jews from the country. As the book reviewer summarizes it:

The authorities of that era conspired with Zionism, and began to put pressure on Iraqi Jews, forcing them to leave. Thus, they were forced to drop their Iraqi nationality, and [Iraqi authorities] showed deliberate discrimination against them is in the "sacking of dozens of Jewish civil servants, and limiting the number of students admitted to schools and universities, and forcing Jews to show trials that would usually end with their execution.". This gave the Zionist media rich material to serve their interests... This pushed the Jews of Iraq to immigration, especially after the Farhood [pogrom in Baghdad] that led to the process called "Ezra and Nehemia" [airlift to Israel.] From here, it is clear that the Iraqi Jewish community was the victim of a big conspiracy involving states and many systems, forcing themm to leave their country.

Hussein seems to admit that there was state-sponsored discrimination against Jews - but he bizarrely blames "Zionists" for it. Not only that, he mentions the Farhud massacre, but seems to imply that this was no big deal and not a factor.

The author also notes that Iraqis Jews started an "Anti-Zionist" committee in 1945, which he uses as proof that they were not interested in moving to Israel. The fact that this committee was meant to distance the Jews from the coming anti-semitism that they could anticipate coming down the pike doesn't seem to occur to Hussein.

Based on this review, it appears that the book ends up proving what it is meant to disprove. Of course most people will not willingly uproot their homes and communities where they lived for millennia - it takes a big push to get people to want to do that. Iraq provided that push with its increased anti-semitism of the 1940s and 1950s, official state-sanctioned Jew hatred that Hussein seems to admit. But he is forced to create a convoluted conspiracy theory - based, as always, on the evil Zionist entity - to explain the rampant anti-semitism that is well-documented throughout the entire Arab world in those days.

Tunisian president tries to reassure Jews

From Tunisia Live April 11:

Tunisian President Moncef Marzouki marked the ten year anniversary of the 2002 Al-Qaeda truck bombing attack on the El Ghriba synagogue with a visit to the Djerba landmark today.

In a solemn ceremony commemorating the 21 victims who were killed in the attack, President Marzouki reiterated that Tunisian Jews were equal citizens under the law to all other Tunisians and that the Tunisian government was committed to the security of the small 2,600 year-old community. Marzouki called the attacks “cowardly,” and expressed deep sympathy for the families of the victims who died.

Victims’ families came from France and Germany to meet with the new Tunisian President and share their grief for the loss of their their loved ones. In his speech, Marzouki said, “Tunisia is a peaceful country and the Tunisian people refuse all forms of violence against civilians.”

Marzouki also declared that, “any vandalism or violence against the Tunisian Jewish people, their property or their holy sites is totally unacceptable.” He also condemned the recent attack which killed four Jewish children in Toulouse, France.

The Tunisian president also announced that he has invited a group of Jewish school children to visit his Carthage Presidential Palace office. Marzouki has recently brought school groups to visit his office as a way of opening the Tunisian Presidency to the public after the revolution.

Recent demonstrations by ultra-conservative Islamist groups have seen public chants calling for Muslims to kill or wage war against Jews on three occasions in the past three months in Tunisia. Individual Tunisian followers of the Salafist movement have been known to have had ties to Al-Qaeda in the past.

Local Jewish community leaders expressed great pleasure with the visit of Marzouki and optimism for the future of the Jewish community.

“It is a blessing to live together, as Tunisians: Muslims and Jews, our bonds challenge the hatred of the Salafists,” said Perez Trabelsi, president of the El Ghriba Synagogue and the Jewish community of Hara Segira, Djerba.

“The day-to-day living situation for Jews has not changed since the revolution, and we hope it will never change; we don’t live in fear,” Perez Trabelsi added.

Perez Trabelsi’s son, Rene, owns a Kosher hotel and resort in nearby Sidi Mansour, Djerba as well as a Paris-based travel agency that organizes Jewish religious tours of Tunisia. “I am sure the government will put an end to these hateful speeches that we have seen in videos,” said Rene Trabelsi. “The tourism season is coming soon and many Jews are interested in visiting Tunisia,” he added.

The Jewish students visited the presidential palace yesterday, although they did not meet with Marzouki.

Last month, thousands of Islamists at a rally in Tunisia called to "fight the Jews" in order to "enter Paradise."

Egypt, Hamas to establish free trade zone?

The Hamas-based Palestine Times newspaper is reporting that Egypt and Hamas are close to agreeing to create a free-trade zone on the border in Rafah.

The article makes it sound like the Gaza and Egyptian chambers of commerce agreed to the deal, which would set aside areas of Rafah in both Gaza and Egypt for the zone. It also says that eventually Gaza businessmen would be able to import and export goods through the Egyptian port at El Arish.

What the article was thin on was any sense that the agreement was approved by the Egyptian government. It sounds more than a bit nebulous right now, but it is worth following.

At the moment, there is no mechanism for Gaza manufacturers to export goods through Egypt, and no such initiative had been discussed. The Rafah crossing is meant only for people, not goods, and Egypt has shown no desire to rebuild it. Hamas tried to pressure Egypt to retool Rafah to allow fuel imports and Egyptian authorities adamantly refused, insisting that any fuel from Egypt go through the Kerem Shalom crossing near the Egyptian/Israeli/Gaza border.

Hamas wins, gets free fuel for two months from Qatar

The fake fuel crisis has paid off in spades for Hamas.

25,000 tons of free fuel for the power plant is expected to arrive in Egypt in the next couple of days from Qatar. Egypt will ship it to Gaza through Israel's Kerem Shalom crossing.

Hamas is also extracting promises from other Arab countries like Algeria to provide it with fuel, presumably for free as well, to help alleviate the artificial crisis.

Remember how Hamas refused to accept fuel from the Kerem Shalom crossing for over a year, causing the crisis when Egypt cracked down on illegal smuggling. But now that the fuel is free, and Hamas can freely tax it, it has lost all its objections to receiving the fuel via Israel.

I reported about the Qatar fuel being shipped two weeks ago.

Syrians still fleeing by the thousands; Palestinians pose a special problem

From Jordan Times:

A lull in violence in Syria has failed to slow the ongoing exodus of Syrians to Jordan, with over 3,000 refugees entering the Kingdom since the implementation of a UN-brokered ceasefire on Thursday, security sources and relief agencies say.

Meanwhile, Agence France-Presse reported that France said on Friday it was considering sending aid for Syrian refugees in Jordan.

Reuters reported from Istanbul that Jordan and Turkey discussed accepting international aid to help share the cost of caring for the displaced Syrians.

According to a security source stationed in the border region, over 2,500 Syrians crossed into the Kingdom illegally between early Thursday and late Friday, marking one of the largest influxes of refugees into the Kingdom since Damascus’ launch of a military crackdown on peaceful protesters in March 2011.

Local charitable societies say they have witnessed a spike in new arrivals since the start of a fragile ceasefire on Thursday, with Al Kitab and Sunna Society reporting the arrival of 1,000 refugees on Saturday alone, which places an increased burden on relief agencies and security forces.

“Thousands of Syrians entered the country illegally over the last three days, and we only expect this number to increase,” Ziad Hamad, director of Al Kitab and Sunna Society, told The Jordan Times.

“We thought the ceasefire would lead to a drop in the number of refugees but we are seeing the opposite.”

According to Syrian activists, some 400 additional families are currently camped out in the border region, holding out hope that the drop in violence will encourage Damascus to reverse a month-old ban on civilians travelling to Jordan.

The majority of new arrivals hail from Homs and Daraa, which activists claim continue to be under military siege despite Damascus’ pledges to withdraw military forces from residential areas.

“The regime is not upholding its end of the ceasefire and more and more people are left with no option but to flee,” said Ahmed, a Syrian opposition activist residing in Amman who did not wish to use his real name.

Several army defectors and officers were among this weekend’s influx of Syrians, who, according to a security source, were transferred to a military-guarded compound outside Mafraq dedicated to former members of the Syrian armed forces.

The Jordan Times is not talking about the Palestinian Syrians, though. Jordan is considering treating their Palestinian Syrian refugees differently from the others, as I reported last week.

Arab News reports the situation in a beautiful example of doublethink:

The brutal Syrian regime’s bloody crackdown on the protesters, who have been taking to street to get rid of the autocratic regime, has not only inflicted unacceptable toll on the Syrian people but has also triggered a new wave of Palestinian refugees.

It is the destiny of those refugees to live in a permanent state of refuge. Palestinian refugees in Syrian are estimated to be 480,000.

With the continued influx of refugees from Syria, Jordan was alerted that the many refugees entering the country from Syria were in fact Palestinians.

It is worth mentioning that Jordan hosts some two millions Palestinians refugees and several hundred displaced. Therefore, receiving a new wave of refugees is a source of concerns in Amman.

But given the delicate demographic balance in Jordan, Jordanians are sensitive toward having new Palestinians refugees. There is a strong political current in Jordan that oppose resettling the Palestinians in Jordan calling for them to be given the opportunity to practice their right of return.

Against this, Amman cannot afford to be seen as encouraging the settlement of Palestinian refugees outside Palestine. For Jordan, the problem of dealing with Syrian refugees is complex as a considerable percentage of the refugees are Palestinians.

Sources from the Jordanian Ministry of Interior say that Jordan is considering establishing a buffer zone to place Palestinians refugees.

It seems logical for those Palestinian refugees to seek shelter and protection in sympathizing countries next door. Therefore, Jordan, Turkey, and Lebanon seem ideal destinations for refugees.

Notice how the Arab News is pretending that the institutionalized discrimination that Palestinian Arabs receive at the hand of every Arab government is natural and even praiseworthy, when in fact it is nothing less than the cynical use of Palestinian Arabs as political pawns against Israel.

No moonbats are making weepy folk songs about their plight. Alas, that job is up to me to tell the truth about how Arabs treat their Palestinian brethren.

Hamas, "the bearded traitor"

From a blog called Road2Tahrir:

I am Palestinian. Just because I happened to be born in America, due to my family who decided to flee their homeland following the 6 day war with Israel, I am sitting here. Waiting. Stuck in Al-Arish, 20 kilometers from the Rafah/Gaza border, for 10 days now waiting to get permission to enter Gaza.

Their rules for entry are unclear and confusing and with no reason given – I have been denied permission to enter Gaza. I have been denied entry NOT by the Israelis. NOT by the US government. NOT by the relentless Egyptian military who has refused to loosen the Rafah border one bit, since the great Egyptian revolution. I have been denied entry by the Gaza gov’t, Hamas – who has slowly and steadily been tightening their grip on the strip, and increasing in power and repression Daily – while under international blockade!

With such overwhelming odds such as an international blockade making it extremely difficult to rule, I felt it was important to give the Hamas government a chance to prove themselves. But not only has the “Palestinian parliament, which has a large Hamas majority, not convened” their “term effectively ended in January 2010, so it currently lacks constitutional legitimacy”1. Repeatedly, they reveal their true intention in one thing and one thing only – getting and keeping power and control over their lil fiefdom.

In providing some hope, their are those daring to speak out, such as Gaza Youth Break Out (GYBO) who wrote the Gaza Manifesto. But many of the youth have been targeted and imprisoned by the Gaza authorities, for doing so. It’s fine for those in solidarity to blame Israel and US to a certain point, then it is up to Palestine activists everywhere to draw attention and highlight this fact. We can no longer remain silent, the youth of Gaza need our support for opposing such oppression!
...
It seems clear that Hamas is the next link in the chain of the victim becoming the oppressor. When will activists, rise up and start calling out the abuse of power, control and oppression from WITHIN Gaza?! It is up to us to FIRST stop building our own chains, that snakes and binds itself around our communities, and those who should be our most natural allies. And, if it is not stopped now – their grip on power will only grow stronger and more cemented in place making it much more difficult in the future.

As usual, this call will be drowned out by those who obsessively want to blame Israel for everything, because the very idea of a Jewish state in the Middle East causes them to froth at the mouth.

In other words, it is old fashioned anti-semitism that is hurting ordinary Palestinian Arabs more than anything else. It is the visceral and absurd hate of Israel that makes Arab governments reject naturalization of Palestinian Arabs as citizens; it is the irrational hate of Jews in power that ensures that Arabs cannot support true compromise with Israel and move on; it is the Arab inability to accept that the historic dhimmis have power and aren't going away that forces them to keep trying to make every battle an all-or-nothing, zero-sum game where the Jewish state is used an an excuse to keep millions of people in perpetual limbo - purportedly for their own good. Creating generation after generation filled with venom has been the Arab strategy of dealing with Israel, if not in this century then in the next.

And as much as I sympathize with this writer, my guess is that he is still part of the problem. The people who are against Hamas and who created the Gaza Manifesto don't seem to accept Israel's existence any more than they are thrilled with Hamas' duplicity. And until a new group rises up that understands that the all-or-nothing option is never going to happen, and moreover that there are plenty of Israelis who would be happy to extend their own hands in friendship towards Arabs who don't want to see them all dead, then I am afraid that Gaza's youth will remain forever angry.

Ten years since something that never happened

A must-read at Harry's Place:

This is a guest post by Myrrh

[I submitted this to the Guardian as a commentary piece on April 4.  On April 12 they confirmed that they will not be running it.  Both Brian Whitaker, former Middle East Editor current CiF editor, and Harriet Sherwood, currently the Jerusalem correspondent, have informed me that there are no plans to revisit the Jenin issue or theGuardian’s coverage of it ten years ago.  The readers editor also wrote me that he has no plan on revisiting the issue.]

For two full weeks in April of 2002, the Guardian ran wild with lurid tales of an Israeli massacre in the Palestinian city of Jenin on the West Bank — a massacre that never happened.  The misrepresentations and outright fabrications have never been properly addressed in the ten ensuing years, as though the Guardian’s editors believe nothing more than some hasty reporting and bad sourcing happened.  But the reportorial failings were far too systematic to be so dismissed, and until the Guardian conducts a thorough investigation of its own errors and publishes a detailed account to its readers, its integrity on Israel-Palestine will continue to be called into question.

First the facts: On the heels of a thirty-day Palestinian suicide bombing campaign in Israeli cities which included thirteen deadly attacks (imagine thirteen 7/7’s in one month), Israel embarked on a military offensive in the West Bank.  The fiercest fighting in this offensive occurred in the refugee camp just outside the West Bank town of Jenin, the launching point for 30 Palestinian suicide bombers in the year and half previous (seven were caught before they could blow themselves up; the other 23 succeeded in carrying out their attacks).  In this battle, which lasted less than a week, 23 Israeli soldiers were killed as well as 52 Palestinians, of whom at most 14 were civilians (there is some marginal dispute about that last figure).

There was nothing extraordinary in this battle or in these numbers.  Looking back, what is extraordinary is that Ariel Sharon’s Israel sat through 18 months of Palestinian suicide terror before embarking on even this military offensive.  Seamus Milne assured readers on April 10 of the ‘futility’ of this military response, though with the benefit of hindsight we can clearly see this battle as the turning point in the struggle to end suicide terror on Israel’s streets.  Milne referred to ‘hundreds’ killed, ‘evidence of atrocities,’ and ‘state terror.’  Not to be outdone, Suzanne Goldenberg reported from Jenin’s ‘lunar landscape’ of ‘a silent wasteland, permeated with the stench of rotting corpses and cordite.’  She found ‘convincing accounts’ of summary executions, though let’s be honest and concede that it’s not generally difficult to convince Goldenberg of Israeli villainy.  In the next day’s report from Jenin, a frustrated Goldenberg reported that the morgue in Jenin had ‘just 16 bodies’ after ‘only two bodies [were] plucked from the wreckage.’  This didn’t cause her to doubt for a moment that there were hundreds more buried beneath or to hesitate in reporting from a Palestinian source that bodies may have been transported ‘to a special zone in Israel.’  Brian Whitaker and Chris McGreal weighed in with their own equally tendentious and equally flawed reporting the following week.

Only on the tenth consecutive day of breathless Jenin Massacre reporting did Peter Beaumont report on detailed Israeli accounts refuting the massacre accusations, though predictably this was presented as part of an Israeli PR campaign rather than as conclusive proof.  Two days later, Beaumont conceded that there hadn’t after all technically really actually been a massacre but then proceeded to repeat a handful of falsities as fact all over again.  Without a doubt, though, the most memorable article the Guardian published on Jenin was its April 17 leader ‘The Battle for the Truth.’  The high dudgeon prose included the following sentences: ‘Jenin camp looks like the scene of a crime’; ‘Jenin smells like a crime’; ‘Jenin feels like a crime’; ‘Jenin already has that aura of infamy that attaches to a crime of especial notoriety’; and, unforgettably, the assertion that Israel’s actions in Jenin were ‘every bit as repellent’ as the 9/11 attacks in New York only seven months earlier.

No correction or retraction has ever been printed for this infamous editorial.  On the contrary, though mounting evidence emerged that the whole massacre calumny was a fabrication (never adequately reported by the Guardian), twice over the following year this leader article was obliquely cited — once incondemning another Israeli action by comparing it to the ‘repellent demolition of lives and homes in Jenin’ and most outrageously under the headline ‘Israel still wanted for questioning.’  The latter headline ran on top of the only leader that mentioned the UN report clearing Israel of the massacre charge.  Rather than humbly acknowledging their own role in the libelous crescendo of that spring, the editors reminded readers, ‘As we said last April, the destruction wrought in Jenin looked and smelled like a crime’ and assured them that this was still the case.  Someone who gets all their information about the world from the Guardian, a sizable phylum in the common rooms of my present university, would have no idea just how much of a lie the Jenin massacre was.

Read the whole thing.

Official Moroccan delegation visits Israel, first time since 2000

From Al Resalah:

An official Moroccan delegation arrived in Israel two days ago for the first time ever since the diplomat relations were first cut in 2000, Ynetnews reported.

The delegation arrived in Israel last Thursday, as being invited by Sam Bin Shatreat, the head of the Jewish Federation of Morocco to participate in the Passover.

The 4-member delegation, including the legal advisor of the Moroccan King, will meet today Danny Ayalon, the Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs , upon their request, Ynetnews briefed.

According to the stories as told in Arabic media, they are taking part in the annual post-Passover Mimouna festival, and the trip was authorized by the King of Morocco.

It is notable that for all the vitriol that Israel's Foreign Ministry receives from the "progressive" crowd, especially under Avigodor Lieberman, it seems to be doing a better job in forging friendships than any of the more centrist Israeli governments have done.

How's that Syrian "cease fire" doing?

From Al Arabiya:

Syrian government forces shelled the city of Homs on Sunday, resident opposition activists and a rights activist said, as a six-person advance party of U.N. observers is due to arrive in Syria to monitor a ceasefire meant to start four days ago.

“The bombardment of Khaldiyeh intensified this morning with an average of three shells a minute,” the head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdel Rahman, told AFP.

The rebel district of Bayada was also shelled, Abdel Rahman said, adding that it was the fiercest shelling of Homs since a U.N.-backed ceasefire went into force at dawn on Thursday.

CNN adds:

Government helicopters pounded the besieged city of Homs from the sky, opposition activists said Sunday, three days after a so-called cease-fire in Syria.

In addition, "one bomb is being shelled every 10 minutes from the military academy, aiming at al-Wair neighborhood in Homs," said the Local Coordination Committees of Syria, a network of opposition activists.

At least nine people died across Syria on Sunday, including six in Homs, said the opposition Syrian Network for Human Rights. Two died in Aleppo a day after they were injured when regime forces opened fire at a funeral procession, the group said.

Ooh, maybe the UN will upgrade their "condemnations" to "deplorings."

Palestinian Arab media still blames Israel for Vittorio Arrigoni's death

It has been a year since Vittorio Arrigoni, Israel-hater and terror supporter, was murdered by an Islamic group in Gaza.

At the time, the usual anti-Israel crowd was quick to blame Israel for the kidnapping and murder. However, Hamas identified members of a Salafist group that took credit for the kidnapping and killed a number of them in a shootout.

Yet today, Palestinian Arab media is still blaming Israel for the murder - and this includes the "moderate" media.

Both the Fatah-leaning Palestine Press Agency and the independent Ma'an News Agency are reporting today that the group that killed Arrigoni was "working for the occupation."

Any resemblance between Palestinian Arabic media reporting and the truth is purely coincidental.

Welcome to Palestine!

Today, a bunch of anti-Israel activists are attempting to embarrass Israel by flying in to the country to hold protests. They call this stunt "Welcome to Palestine." So far, it looks like a spectacular failure.

It wasn't that long ago that there was a concerted effort to get people to visit Palestine, and the Palestinians at the time were actively seeking these visitors. But those Palestinians were Jews.

A few years ago I collected a series of posters created by the Jewish Palestinians of the 1930s meant to encourage tourism to Palestine. Here are some others that are most interesting, especially for those who think that Palestinians are identical to Palestinian Arabs.

There were a series of Levant Fairs held in Tel Aviv in the 1920s and 1930s, and the 1934 fair was considered a "World's Fair." Exhibitors came from many countries worldwide - including Arab countries like Egypt and Syria. Here is one poster from the 1936 Levant Fair that shows how things could be today if Arab nations accepted Israel:

And here is the Lebanese Pavilion in Tel Aviv:

Incidentally, the logo for the later Levant Fairs was a flying camel, because (the legend goes) the mayor of Jaffa told Mayor Dizengoff of Tel Aviv that a Levant Fair would only happen "when camels fly."

Thanks to the Palestine Poster Project for these images. (They have posters from both sides, including some of my own.)

Egyptian TV host spouts about the Protocols. And he's hardly alone.

From MEMRI:

Following are excerpts from an address by Egyptian TV host Hussam 'Aql, which aired on Al-Nas TV on March 23, 2012 :

Hussam 'Aql : The Zionist entity and the Zionist movement are constantly "playing" with revolutions. What does that mean? After the revolutions, the situation is very fluid – the state is on its knees, and its institutions are shaky. This is the perfect opportunity for the Zionist entity to deal its blow and to play its little game.

Whoever does not believe me can look at The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. This is no book of poetry or stories. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is a matter of undisputable science.

There was a meeting of the Freemasons in France, and a French woman managed to smuggle out some dangerous documents, which circulated in the meeting.

Between 1897 and 1951, the secret Zionist groups held nearly 23 meetings, one of which was a large gathering, which included over 50 Zionist groups. They issued several documents: How can we gain control over the world's minds? How can we gain control of the media? How can we turn the mighty national armies into cantons, which will fight one another? How can we gain control over the flow of capital? How can we gain control over the presidents and state leaders, and turn them into collaborators?

A French woman managed to smuggle out these documents, which serve as the backbone of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

When the world read these documents… A Russian scholar called Sergei Nilos was the first to read these documents. He looked at the documents in front of him, and then examined the political situation around him, and realized how the leaders of the Zionist entity were playing with the money, and with the means of pressure, and how they were trying to take over regimes and governments, as well as the nascent regional forces.

Look how Tel Aviv cannot keep its mouth shut when it sees Egypt on its way to become a regional power, and to restore the momentum of its activity and to lead the region. Tel Aviv cannot possibly keep its mouth shut. We do not want to be stupid or naïve.

Sergei Nilos issued a warning and wrote research. Then in the early 20th century, along came Victor Marsden and translated The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. We have read The Protocols, and we have detected the despicable, hellish, and Satanic plan to dominate the world and to humiliate the peoples and the nations.

Just like I am humiliating Mr. 'Aql right now by showing him to be an idiot! Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!

And if you think that this is somehow anomalous and that most Arabs know that the "Protocols" are a forgery, check out Al Wafd from two weeks ago with a long article on the topic that accepts the veracity of the work unquestioningly.

Or this recent article from pan-Arab newspaper Moheet. Or this even more recent article from a Jordanian newspaper As Sabeel.

All of which accept the Protocols as absolute truth.

All written by supposedly educated Arab journalists.

Iran offers a "friendly" threat to UAE

Last week, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited islands that are in dispute between Iran and the UAE, and the UAE was not happy:

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) recalled its ambassador to Tehran Thursday, state news agency WAM reported, after having protested over a visit by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to a disputed island.

“The foreign ministry has recalled its ambassador to the Republic of Iran, Saif Mohammed Abid Al-Zaabi, for consultations,” it said.

Emirati Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah Bin Zayed Al-Nahayan Wednesday slammed the visit to the island of Abu Musa as a “’flagrant violation of UAE sovereignty over its territories.”

This is a “setback to all efforts and attempts the UAE is making to find a peaceful settlement to Iran’s occupation of the three UAE islands,” the foreign minister said.

“This visit will not change the legal status of these islands which are part... of the UAE national soil,” the English-language statement said.

Sheikh Abdullah, who visited Iran in February, said Ahmadinejad’s move and “provocative rhetoric... expose Iran’s false allegations regarding its keenness to establish good relations... with the UAE and countries of the region.”

Iran's response is about as threatening as possible while pretending to be "friendly":

Secretary of Iran's Expediency Council advises the officials of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) against singing the same tune as Zionist regime of Israel and to avoid hasty measures.

Mohsen Rezaei made the remarks on Saturday in reaction to the UAE protesting President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s recent visit to Iranian island of Abu Musa.

“The President’s trip to the Iranian island of Abu Musa to visit Iranian citizens was the right thing to do,” Fars News Agency quoted him as saying.

Rezaei stated that UAE officials appear to be abusing Iran's friendship and brotherhood, adding, “If they think Iran has become weak, [they] are mistaken. Today, Iran is very strong and will crush any [act of] aggression.”

“Emirati officials had better apologize to Iran and not be dragged onto the same path as the Zionists because the region needs tranquility, peace and cooperation. If they have any objections, they can politely convey their objection to the Iranian government via diplomatic channels,” Rezaei said.

He went on to say that the UAE has been issuing statements on three Iranian islands - Greater Tunb and Lesser Tunb and Abu Musa - for years.

“The UAE government sometimes uses a fake name for the Persian Gulf, but Iran continues its friendship and collaboration with the UAE with patience and by ignoring such wrong behavior,” he added.

Rezaei said the UAE government has apparently misunderstood Iran's friendship or is trying to appease foreign parties due to pressures.

“It would better for the UAE government to maintain honest and friendly relations with Iran and not repeat its [earlier] mistake of cooperating with [Iraq's former dictator] Saddam Hussein,” he concluded.

It looks like the smile of a wolf as he circles his sheep neighbors.

Most Arab states have denounced Iran over this latest provocation.

Israelis saving the world, yet again

From Forbes India:

[E]mergency care is at a nascent stage in India. Demand outstrips the supply of ambulances and the crowded roads invariably delay their arrival. Often death strikes during this window. About 30 percent of deaths in accident spots are estimated to be on account of lack of pre-hospitalisation care. What happens between an event—it could be a road accident, a fall or severe chest pain—and the arrival of the ambulance is critical. Across the world, emergency care experts have been struggling to find a way to send expert help more quickly.

An Israeli organisation, United Hatzalah, might have just cracked the code. The idea is simple; it depends on a network of volunteers and smart use of technology. The organisation recruits volunteers, gives them 100 hours of training, equips them with a kit containing medicines and devices that fit on a two wheeler, and lets them get on with their normal lives. When an emergency strikes, it locates the volunteer closest to the scene and alerts him. The volunteer rushes to the scene and provides first aid. There are 1,700 volunteers across Israel and they arrive at the scene in a matter of minutes. Eli Beer, who founded United Hatzalah, says he is aiming to crunch this number to 90 seconds.

United Hatzalah has not only saved hundreds of lives, it has also had a positive impact on the social fabric. Recently, Al Jazeera aired a documentary on how the organisation brought Arabs and Jews together in a region that’s defined by extreme hatred. Mark Gerson, co-founder of Gerson Lehrman Group and chairman of United Hatzalah, says right now they have an oversupply of people wanting to volunteer in Israel. Beer and Gerson hope to replicate the model across the world, including India.

However, India might turn out to be different, given its size and background. Israel is a small country, and its population—7.6 million—is smaller than that of Hyderabad. What works in Israel might not work in India. But the size of the countries shouldn’t matter, says Gerson. The ideal way to go about it would be to take one city at a time, get the fundamentals right, put the system in place, and scale up over time.

In fact, in Brazil, they have started with Sao Paulo. The experience has been good—the volunteers were easy to come by and the technology works as well as it did in Israel. “We are looking to assist the Sao Paulo group to expand in Rio de Janeiro. Operational plans are already underway. United Hatzalah is assisting in a similar programme in Panama as well,” says Beer.

A bigger challenge in India will be in recruiting volunteers. Israel has a long culture of volunteerism, strengthened by mandatory military service. In Brazil, they were approached by members of the Jewish community who were impressed with the organisation’s operations and wished to replicate it. The community leaders made speeches and distributed flyers, says Beer. Word of mouth, however, was the most effective outreach tool. “There were more volunteers than [we] were able to initially accept,” he says.

But India is different from both Brazil and Israel. However, Beer doesn’t think that will matter at all. In fact, the two wheeler and mobile penetration in the country make the model adaptable. “The groundswell of good-hearted people wanting to help their communities is universal,” he says. “Given a chance to save a life, who will say no?”

Well, I don't think that Jordan, Egypt or the UAE is jumping to work with Hatzalah any time soon...

Of course, this is just another case of first-aid-washing.

(h/t Guest)

Major Egyptian presidential candidates reportedly disqualified

Interesting developments, reported by Egypt Independent:

The Presidential Elections Commission announced on Saturday that 10 presidential candidates are disqualified from the race. The commission said it would release the full list of qualified candidates at a later time.

State-run Al-Ahram newspaper reported that conservative candidate Hazem Salah Abu Ismail, former vice president and intelligence chief Omar Suleiman, and official Muslim Brotherhood candidate Khairat al-Shater, Ghad al-Thawra Party head Ayman Nour had all been disqualified. Also out of the running, it reported, were Ahmed Saidi, Mamdouh Qutb, Ashraf Baroma, and Ibrahim al-Ghareeb.

"The commission has disqualified candidates because they do not fill one or more of the required conditions," the electoral body said in a statement, AFP reported.

Meanwhile, Al-Masry Al-Youm quoted judicial sources as saying, “The most prominent names that have been excluded are Sheikh Hazem Salah Abu Ismail, General Omar Suleiman, former vice president," in addition to Shater.

Suleiman was reportedly excluded on the basis of the geographical distribution of his signatures of support, according to Al-Masry Al-Youm. A candidate must have 1000 signatures from 15 separate governorates to qualify.

Shater, who was released from prison in March last year, has been barred because of a law that states that candidates can only run in elections six years after being released or pardonned, Tarek Abul Atta, a PEC official, told AFP news agency.

Abu Ismail is out of the race because his mother holds another nationality, violating election rules, he said.

Others who have been disqualified include Ayman Nour, who caught the world's attention when he challenged ousted president Hosni Mubarak in 2005 presidential elections.

Nour was imprisoned shortly after those elections and released on health grounds in 2009. He was banned under the same rule as the Muslim Brotherhood's Shater.

The disqualified candidates have 48 hours to appeal the decision.

If the commission's decision stands, the remaining frontrunners will be former Arab League head Amr Moussa and former Muslim Brotherhood member Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh.

Meanwhile, there was a rally against Suleiman's candidacy. Naturally, the protesters claimed he was Zionist:

Anti-semitic T-shirts sold at Polish soccer stadium (UPDATE)

From JTA:

T-shirts featuring anti-Semitic slogans were discovered being sold outside a soccer stadium in the Polish city of Lodz.

The T-shirts were being sold outside the stadium of Widzew Lodz, which plays in Poland’s premier league, according to an April 12 article on the website of Polskie Radio.

The shirts featured slogans such as “This is Widzew territory, entry to Jews is forbidden” and “Curl hunters,” referring to Orthodox Jews’ payos.

A woman who works in the shop that sold the T-shirts told the Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza that the shirts are popular. The shop is adjacent to the team’s official shop.

A third of Lodz’s population was Jewish before World War II.

Here is a sign outside the store:

And this graffitum saying "You will meet death:"

UPDATE: Lodz police arrested two workers at the shop, a salesman and a manager, for selling anti-semitic material (h/t Malgorzata)

Early weekend links

I will not be posting anything until Saturday night or Sunday, so have a great weekend/chag sameach!

To tide you over, here are some links:

Another British group supporting Habima playing at the Globe.

While there are a lot of Israel-haters in USC, it didn't stop a delegation from the school from visiting Israel in February.

Sarah Honig on the bigger picture around Gunter Grass.

Obligatory NYT piece about supposed "Islamophobia" following the Merah murders.

Time for the eight-state solution?

Good morning Tehran! Israeli radio station broadcasts in Farsi, and a lot of Iranians tune in.

The most profane bar mitzvah ever filmed.

The Titanic had a kosher kitchen!

(h/t DKrieger, Norman, Zvi, Ronald)

The birth of an new Muslim lie

From Al Resalah:

The Jewish settlers are desecrating the Ibrahimi Mosque in Passover this year through burning parts of it, resulted from the candles left behind by the extremist settlers.

"Thousands of Zionists broke into the Ibrahimi Mosque to celebrate the Passover," said Hassan Alrejoub, a Palestinian journalist. "Muslims were thoroughly denied access to the Mosque," added he, " and the Islamic section of the Mosque was burnt because of the candles the Zionists left behind".

Yet Palestine News Network even reported that the fire was accidental and caused no (or little) damage.

Israeli sources show that the fire occurred during early morning prayers on Monday, and from the photos is appears that it was apparently on the Jewish side of the building, inside a structure meant for candles. It was put out by Israeli police using sand and water. There was slight smoke damage. During the incident, Jews were not allowed to enter the building.

Al Resalah also doesn't mention that for ten days a year Jews are denied access to the entire building so Muslims can perform their "Koranic rituals." Nor does it mention that some 81% of the building is used by Muslims during the year.

Kuwait MPs approve death penalty for "cursing God"

Moderation!

From AFP:

Kuwait’s parliament on Thursday provisionally passed amendments to the Gulf state’s penal code stipulating the death penalty for those who curse God, Islam’s Prophet or his wives.

Forty-six MPs, including cabinet ministers, voted for the key amendments that will come into effect only after another round of voting and government approval. The second and final vote will take place in two weeks.

Four Shiite MPs voted against the law, a pro-Shiite Sunni lawmaker abstained, while two MPs refused to vote.

Shiite MPs have demanded that the new amendments also enforce the death penalty for anyone who curses their sect’s 12 revered Imams, but the Sunni- dominated parliament rejected their requests.

The move to stiffen penalties for religious crimes came after authorities last month arrested a Shiite tweeter for allegedly cursing the Prophet Mohammed, his wife and some companions.

This might get me in trouble:

Sinai Bedouin hijack a fuel tanker (photos)

Palestine Today has photos of how Bedouin in the Sinai yesterday hijacked a fuel truck that was meant to go to the international forces military base.

They siphoned out the fuel, they said, to distribute them to citizens who suffer from fuel shortages, saying they don't want the fuel to go to their "enemies."

Muslims continue to freak over Jews peacefully visiting Temple Mount

Every day this week, Jews visited the Temple Mount - and every day this week there were angry articles about those visits in the Arab media.

Today, the last day of Chol HaMoed Pesach, Muslims called for thousands of their people to go there are prevent Jews from doing any "Talmudic rituals." Specifically they called for "an extensive and significant presence to counter any attempt of desecration by Jewish extremist groups that have continued to storm the mosque today....They called upon the citizens who have access to the city of Jerusalem to be present early in the mosque to deal with the settlers and thwart their plans."

Here is one of their photos of those terrible Jewish "settlers" desecrating their holy spot. Simply because they are Jewish.

Their press releases go on to charge that Israel is planning to divide the Temple Mount, either into Jewish and Muslim areas or by banning Muslims to be there altogether at certain times of the day or year.

Because this week showed a strengthening of the Jewish presence on the holiest Jewish site, here's a video that is appropriate for the occasion.

Chorus:

Rejoice with Jerusalem, be glad about her,

be glad all you that love her,

all who love her.

On your walls, Oh city of David

I have stationed watchmen,

all day and night.

(repeat)

Chorus

Do not fear, my servant Jacob,

for your enemies shall be scattered before you.

(repeat)

Chorus

Look about you and behold; see all

as they are all gathering and coming unto you.

(repeat)

Chorus

And your people

are all holy

and forever shall inherit the land.

Chorus

Nablus governor bans Israeli potatoes, PA violating Oslo

From Ma'an:

The governor of Nablus on Wednesday prevented Israeli potatoes from being introduced to the Palestinian market, in line with an agriculture ministry decision issued this month.

Maj.-Gen. Jibrin al-Bakri said the decision aimed to protect national products and farmers' livelihoods.

The ministry decided this month to remove foreign produce from Palestinian markets, and the governor was implementing that decision, he told Ma'an.

The PA is trying to skirt around existing agreements that prohibit the PA from boycotting Israeli goods by pretending that they want to stop all imported produce.

But a glance at the speech by the PA Agriculture Minister shows beyond any doubt that this is meant to be a boycott to hurt Israel and to stop supporting "Zionist farms."

Up until now the PA was careful to say that they were only against "settler goods" and not Israeli products altogether because they did not want to violate signed agreements. It looks as if they are now no longer concerned about such public violations of Oslo.

When the economic agreement was forged between Israel and the PA, Israel let it be known that if the Palestinian Arabs wanted to implement boycotts or similar measures against Israel, then Israel would reserve the right to stop Palestinian Arabs from working in Israel - and a huge part of the Palestinian Arab economy is dependent on people working in Israel and for Israelis.

Saudi youth call for end of religious rule

On April 2 AFP Arabic reported on a new Saudi youth movement to get rid of the role of religious authorities in Saudi Arabia and to move towards democratic ideals.

The letter they wrote complained about the "bullying" that the Saudi religious authorities do to citizens.

2,100 people, mostly academics, including a large proportion of young women, signed the letter, which called for a rejection of "patriarchal" control exercised by the religious groups in Saudi society.

The letter talks about the inability of publicly speaking about ideas that run contrary to the official Saudi-approved groupthink.

It said, "We are young Muslims who reject this patriarchal muzzle which hinders our exercise of the right of free thought and research (...) We do not accept anyone that questions our patriotism or our Islamic identities."

It went on to "renounce all forms of incitement and bullying meant to remove the other [ideas] and we seek to build institutions of civil society to accommodate everyone," adding that they cannot accept anyone who "claims the monopoly of truth and righteousness on behalf of the law."

While the article was widely reported in Arabic media, so far it has not been reported anywhere in English.

BDS fail in Minnesota

From the Minnesota Post:

Ramsey County Judge Margaret Marrinan has dismissed a lawsuit that called for the state of Minnesota to sell the $18 million in Israeli bonds held in the state's portfolio.

Four groups and 23 individuals filed the lawsuit in 2011, claiming that the bonds were supporting settlements in Palestine and other activities in the West Bank that had been deemed illegal under international law.

They also claimed that Minnesota law does not allow investments in foreign countries other than Canada.

Marrinan threw out the suit, ruling that the plaintiffs do not have standing to file the lawsuit, and said that "the authority to make social, political and economic policy decisions of the kind Plaintiffs complain about in this case resides with the Legislature and the SBI [State Board of Investment], not this Court."

Even if the plaintiffs did have standing, the judge said Minnesota law does allow the State Board of Investment to purchase international securities.

Someone should really do a survey to see what percentage of BDS initiatives get anywhere. It appears to be in the low single-digits.

Unfortunately, the webpage of the Minnesota BDSers who devoted so many futile hours on publicizing their hate of the Jewish state has not yet been updated with the news of their latest failure.

(h/t The Jewish Press)

Mel Gibson calls Jews "oven dodgers," says Torah mandates killing Christian babies

From The Wrap:

Hollywood screenwriter Joe Eszterhas is accusing Mel Gibson, his recent collaborator on a movie about Jewish revolt, of “hating Jews” and using him to deflect his anti-Semitic reputation.

In an explosive nine-page letter to Gibson obtained by TheWrap, the screenwriter wrote that the director of “The Passion of the Christ” never intended to make the movie about Jewish heroism, called “The Maccabees.”

Instead, Eszterhas said, Gibson announced the project “in an attempt to deflect continuing charges of anti-Semitism which have dogged you, charges which have crippled your career.”

He added: “I’ve come to the conclusion that the reason you won’t make ‘The Maccabees’ is the ugliest possible one. You hate Jews.”

Eszterhas’ letter reveals a more complex dynamic, a disturbing picture of Gibson as a man yet again out of control, inflicting frequent rages on those around him, in the grip of an anti-Semitic obsession, and possibly dangerous to those around him.

Gibson’s anti-Semitic obsession was a leitmotif of working on the film together at Gibson’s homes in Malibu and Costa Rica, Eszterhas said.

"You continually called Jews 'Hebes' and 'oven-dodgers' and 'Jewboys.' It seemed that most times when we discussed someone, you asked 'He’s a Hebe, isn’t he?' You said most 'gatekeepers' of American companies were 'Hebes' who 'controlled their bosses.'"

The slurs continued, through their work:

“You said the Holocaust was 'mostly a lot of horseshit.' You said the Torah made reference to the sacrifice of Christian babies and infants. When I told you that you were confusing the Torah with The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, ... you insisted 'it's in the Torah -- it's in there!' (It isn't)."

And he said Gibson told him that his intention in making “The Maccabees” was “to convert the Jews to Christianity.”