Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Tuesday, August 31, 2004

Animals

Hamas supporters celebrate the twin suicide bombing that killed 16 Israeli's in Beersheba, during a Hamas rally in Gaza City, August 31,2004.

JEWISH CONSPIRACIES IN THE PENTAGON?

Somebody sold CBS News, NBC, and the Washington Post a grand conspiracy theory of sinister Zionist influence in the Pentagon based on … well on what really? The theory alleges that

a) Two years ago, some Pentagon planners wrote a draft memo suggesting that the US adopt a tougher policy toward Iran;

b) One of those planners then supposedly informed a friend at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee about the memo – who in turn informed the Israeli embassy.

Can we pause to consider what an amazing non-story all of this is?

The memo in question - a draft of a proposed presidential policy directive for Iran - was essentially rejected. The Bush administration has opted since 2001 for a policy of engagement and attempted compromise with Iran. For all practical purposes, the memo was an expression of something close to a purely personal opinion.

And even if the memo had been adopted, it involved no spycraft, no technical secrets. It simply offered a vision of what US policy toward Iran ought to be: a series of policy options.

Discussing policy options with knowledgeable people – and even with allied governments – is not “espionage.”

Which is why, after 18 months of investigation, the investigators were about to drop the matter. It looks as if whoever leaked the story of the investigation leaked it precisely because he or she was annoyed that the investigators were concluding that the whole thing was much ado about nothing.

But by cleverly shopping it to journalists who were eager to strike a blow at the Bush administration, a fizzle of a story was (at least temporarily) transformed into a one-day wonder.

Who shopped it? Presumably somebody at the FBI – an agency that has alas showed nothing like so much vigilance in cases in which life and limb were actually at risk. Along the way, however, the story got “sexed up,” to borrow a phrase.

Here are some steamy extracts from CBS’ report:

“CBS News has learned that the FBI has a full-fledged espionage investigation under way and is about to -- in FBI terminology – ‘roll up’ someone agents believe has been spying not for an enemy, but for Israel from within the office of the Secretary of Defense at the Pentagon. …

“This put the Israelis, according to one source, ‘inside the decision-making loop’ so they could ‘try to influence the outcome.’

“The case raises another concern among investigators: Did Israel also use the analyst to try to influence U.S. policy on the war in Iraq?

“With ties to top Pentagon officials Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, the analyst was assigned to a unit within the Defense Department tasked with helping develop the Pentagon's Iraq policy.”

Notice a couple of things in the CBS report: The story is written in such a way as to suggest that it was the FBI investigators who described the Israelis as “inside the loop.” And yet if you look carefully, you will see that this is not so. The allegation is attributed only to a “source” who might or might not even be a government employee – who is in fact very likely one of the small number of former government employees to whom journalists turn when they want some heavy breathing about the role of Israel.

Notice too the gratuitous and unsourced insinuation that Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith might somehow be implicated in the leak.

What seems to be going on here is this: People in the Pentagon broadly discussed proposed American policy toward one of America’s severest Middle Eastern problems – Iran, its terrorism and its nuclear ambitions. In the course of those discussions, they talked to knowledgeable people in many places. Possibly they talked as well to knowledgeable people in the governments of US allies, including Israel.

But there are figures inside the US government who want to see Israel treated, not as the ally it is by law and treaty (Israel like Japan, Australia, and New Zealand is designated a “major non-NATO ally” for intelligence- and technology-sharing purposes) but as the source of all the trouble in the Middle East and the world. They have injected their own hysterical agenda into the reporting of what would otherwise be a story of an FBI investigation that found nothing much.

Female bomber kills four Israelis at entrance to Gaza Strip

Hours after a Palestinian woman blew herself up early Wednesday at the Erez crossing terminal, killing four Israelis, Palestinian Foriegn Minister Nabil Sha'ath said that the Palestinian Authority was capable of stopping such terror attacks, but that Israel must first halt its attacks on the Palestinians, Israel Radio reported.

Speaking from Copenhagen, Sha'ath said that last August the Palestinians unilaterally halted attacks, but this collapsed because Israel failed to abide by this as well.

Can you imagine the chutzpah it takes tomake such a statement when have been daily attempts to kills Jews during this "unilateral cease fire"?

First Hamas female suicide bomber
Hamas and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, a militant group affiliated with Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, jointly claimed responsibility for the blast, which also wounded 12 people.

Hamas, vowing to escalate attacks, said it used a woman suicide bomber for the first time, in order to counter Israeli security precautions.

"For the first time [Hamas] used a female fighter and not a male fighter and that was a new development in resistance against the enemy," Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin told Reuters. "Resistance will esclate against this enemy [Israel] until they leave our land and homeland."

Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia declined to condemn the attack, saying that continued Israeli attacks and restrictions on the Palestinians are leading "to more escalation on both sides."

The explosion ripped through a recently dedicated facility where laborers and foreigners cross over the boundary. There were few Palestinian workers in the area at the time, Israeli officials said. Most workers had crossed hours before the mid-morning explosion.

Hamas later identified the bomber as the 22-year-old mother of two children.

IDF soldiers catch would-be suicide bomber at Erez Crossing

Israel Defense Forces soldiers foiled a suicide attack Tuesday, when they prevented a Palestinian man carrying an explosive device in his trousers from passing through the Erez Crossing from the Gaza Strip into Israel.

The belt was different than any the IDF has dealt with before in that 'it was sewn to resemble a pair of underpants,' the spokeswoman said.

Is Iran planning an attack on th US?

On May 28, Al-Sharq Al-Awsat reported that an Iranian intelligence unit had established "The Brigades of the Shahids of the Global Islamic Awakening."
In a speech by Hassan Abbassi, a Revolutionary Guards intelligence theoretician who teaches at Al-Hussein University, he spoke of Teheran's secret plans, which include
"a strategy drawn up for the destruction of Anglo-Saxon civilization."
"There are 29 sensitive sites in the U.S. and in the West. We have already spied on these sites, and we know how we are going to attack them," Abbassi explained.
Over the past few months, Iranian leader Ali Khamenei has been vocal about the impending "destruction of the U.S." In May he told the Iranian paper Jomhouri-Ye Eslami that "the world will witness the annihilation of this arrogant regime."
Speaking on Iranian TV channel Jaam-E-Jam 2 on July 27, Iranian MP Hamid-Reza Katoziyan warned: "The whole group of people belonging to the Arab community and Muslims living in the U.S. are currently, in my opinion, in a special situation."
"Perhaps they do not walk the streets with weapons in their hands or attach bombs to themselves in order to carry out a suicide operation, but the thought is there."

Israel leads in missile protection

Israel Military Industries (IMI) has developed an invisible flare for use by its Flight Guard protection system for civilian aircraft. The Flight Guard system, developed jointly by IMI and Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI), will soon be installed on six El Al Israel Airlines passenger aircraft, making El Al the world's first airline to operate aircraft equipped with a defence system against shoulder-launched missiles.

Flight Guard is undergoing a series of flight tests, where the system is checked against the infrared seekers of several surface-to-air missiles. The tests will be concluded in August and the first system is scheduled to be installed in an El Al aircraft in September.

Since the use of Flight Guard has not been approved by US and European aviation authorities, it will first be installed on aircraft serving Africa and Asia, where the level of threat is considered higher. However, IMI and IAI are expecting the new invisible flare to improve the chances of Flight Guard receiving Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) licensing, as the flare is designed to reduce public fright when activated over an airport.

Flight Guard is adapted from a military system used by the Israel Air Force's fixed-wing and rotorcraft. It comprises a variant of IAI subsidiary Elta's EL/M-2160 pulse-Doppler radar, which detects surface-to-air shoulder-launched missiles. The radar activates IMI's countermeasures dispensing system (CMDS), which jams heat-seeking missiles and sends them off course by creating a signature close to that of the aircraft's engine. "

Palestinian cops report explosive device to IDF

In a rare example of anti-terrorist cooperation, Palestinian police reported to the IDF an explosive device found in Ramallah. The IDF exploded the device, which had been intended for a terror attack, under controlled conditions.

French official: Attacks on Jews tripled since start of year

The number of anti-Semitic incidents in France has soared by hundreds of percent since the beginning of the year and the law enforcement authorities are having difficulty coping with them.
Justice Minister Dominique Perben issued figures last Thursday showing a tripling of anti-Semitic attacks this year, with 298 so far, compared to 108 in all of 2003.

Perben's figures were broken down by their targets, showing there were 67 attacks on Jewish people, 162 on property and 69 cases of anti-Semitic writings.

Some 80 percent of this year's cases have not yet been solved, Perben said after meeting with France's Chief Rabbi Joseph Sitruk to discuss government efforts to fight anti-Semitism.

French Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin said the number of violent incidents against Jews and Jewish property this year reached 160, marking a 113 percent rise compared to the equivalent period last year, in which only 75 incidents were reported.

In an interview with Le Monde on Friday, de Villepin said the reasons for 80 percent of the incidents were unclear and the perpetrators have not been found. Only 11 attacks were committed by extreme right-wingers and 50 were committed by people of Arab or Muslim origin."

Bombs & Weapons Uncovered in Bethlehem

(IsraelNN.com) Three pipe bombs, six magazines and a number of Kalashnikov AK-47 assault rifles were uncovered by IDF troops operating in PA-controlled Bethlehem. The bombs were neutralized without incident.

"Skunk bomb" will keep back Palestinian protestors

The IDF has developed a pungent new weapon to be used to keep Palestinian protestors at bay, media sources reported. The so-called 'skunk bomb' contains a synthetic version of the odor skunks release to deter predators and will be used to break up stone-throwing confrontations without causing casualties, security officials said yesterday.

According to the reports, the new weapon was developed to replace controversial rubber bullets, which have caused numerous injuries and killed many Palestinians during the course of the Intifada. Security officials said the army, which has come under international criticism for allegedly using excessive force, has been seeking out new non-lethal weapons to deal with violent Palestinian protests.

The 'skunk bomb,' which is not yet operational, releases a cloud so pungent that according to initial tests it permeates clothes for five years, the officials said, according to a Reuters report.

The 'stinky' weapon could be particularly unpleasant for devout Muslims since they cannot pray with clothes that smell and would have to throw them away, the report said.

Soldiers rescue trapped Israeli truckers from Palestinian lynch mob

Israel Defense Forces soldiers rescued three Israeli truck drivers when they came under attack by a mob of Palestinians after taking a wrong turn near Jerusalem, and ending up in Ramallah near the Kalandia refugee camp.

The Jewish truckers were in two vehicles when they were surrounded by hundreds of Arabs who had just emerged from a gathering in support of Palestinian security prisoners conducting a hunger strike in Israel prisons. Many of the mob pelted the truckers with stones and other objects, pulled them from their vehicles and beat them severely until the soldiers arrived. They suffered light to moderate injuries.

The dog that didn't bark

“The dog that didn’t bark” is an expression from a Sherlock Holmes mystery. It was an important clue that led to identifying the criminal. It seems that the killer entered and left the estate grounds one night but without the guard dog barking an alarm at the intruder’s presence as expected. From this non-event Holmes reasoned that the dog must have known the killer and that clue led to solving the case.

There is an analogy to U.S. Mid-East policy where U.S. silence, i.e. our failure to “bark” when we should, in the face of outrageous events is also a clue to U.S. attitudes. We can contrast the significance of when the U.S. “barks” and when it is silent.

We observe that when Israel defends itself the Administration is very capable of promptly barking its disapproval. For example when Israeli forces entered Judea and Samaria to root out terrorist murderers, Colin Powell had no trouble barking at Israel in a nasty manner for them to get out and be quick about it, and such outbursts also carry an implied threat. When Israel began construction of its security fence this Administration was quick to criticize and, for a time, to punish Israel by reducing loan guarantees by some 300 million dollars. When Israel assassinated terrorist leaders, who had so much blood on their hands, the Administration was also quick to warn Israel to consider the consequences of its actions.

All this establishes that the Administration watches every detail of Israeli actions and is quick to issue public criticisms and warnings to distance itself from our only true ally. This serves to accentuate the contrast between criticism of Israel vs. its noticeable silence in the face of Arab crimes and pronouncements.

On the other hand when the U.S. fails to respond to Arab outrages against Israel, that silence is significant. For the record it is true that when Arafat’s killers slaughter innocent Jews in especially large numbers the Administration will serve up a perfunctory condemnation of the act, a growl, so to speak. But there is no holding the killers responsible nor any withholding of funds to the PA as was done for a while with Israel. The U.S. message is clear. No bark, no bite. The Arabs can safely disregard those pronouncements because it is only an empty public relations gesture in return for which Israel is expected to show gratitude, practice more restraint, and the killers again go unpunished.

U.S. silence is highly significant when Israel’s enemies make direct threats and issue inflammatory lies. When Saddam Hussein earlier threatened to “burn half of Israel” there was no American comment. Iran has repeatedly threatened Israel with annihilation once they acquire nuclear weapons and regardless of any Israeli peace with the Palestinians. No public denunciation from the administration. When Arafat, in Arabic, incites his people to continue to slaughter Jews - again silence. When Arafat displays his map of the Middle East with NO Israel - more silence. Arafat indoctrinates Palestinian children with murderous hatred of Jews along with layer upon layer of lies. Not only is there no U.S. criticism but Arafat’s PA continues to receive hundreds of millions of U.S. taxpayer dollars. When Egypt trains for its next war against Israel with U.S.-supplied weapons and incites its people with raw anti-Semitism - again more silence. When Saudi Arabia pours forth Nazi-type invective against Israel and Jews - continued silence.

Going beyond the above, the State Department conducts an even more active policy of a double standard against Israel. It not only ignores evidence of flagrant Arab crimes against Israel, but it demands that Israel accept these crimes without protest. Mr. David Bedein of the Israel Resource News Agency has published a list of 20 such actions by the State Department in his Aug. 4, 2003 article titled, Is the State Department on the Saudi Payroll? .

These are only a few of the many egregious actions that are constantly going on. And yet successive administrations, and the State Department, continue to behave like the dog that didn’t bark. Israel’s Arab enemies certainly observe all this and they may draw conclusions about the real attitudes of the U.S. administration.

The Administration’s cynical excuse is that they want to be “even handed” in their Mid East policy. One cannot be “even handed” between aggressors and the aggressor’s victims. The hard reality is that the administration is actually practicing a consistent double standard against Israel which is even worse than being unfairly “even handed.”

The question is what kind of game is being played here? In truth this policy has been in place from the birth of Israel. It is not hard to guess that the State Department, which leads our foreign policy, is maneuvering between two conflicting forces. One force is the pro-Israel sentiment among the American people and the U.S. Congress to support a loyal and democratic ally. The other force is pressure from the numerous Arab and Islamic governments, combined with our need for their oil. That would be bad enough but the gratuitous nastiness that often accompanies State Department actions towards Israel suggests that there is also an additional element of domestic anti-Semitism that exists independently of balancing conflicting geopolitical interests and independently of America’s national interest.

The Arabs are adept at this type of politics. Their posture is always that of pretending to be aggrieved victims of what they call “Israeli aggression” and their endless complaining that America uncritically supports Israel. And behind this is their perpetual threat of the Arab and Moslem masses rising up in outrage against American interests. As long as U.S. policy makers succumb to these threats, they will continue to be made and we will remain hostage to them.

But as with a cancerous growth, our failure to respond early and morally is leading to a metastasis of hatred from being directed mainly against Israel to now targeting other countries, including the U.S. We see it in Saudi Arabia which long supported terrorism against Israel but which recently has come under internal terrorist attack. The Saudis are now very strong to fight terrorism, but only inside their own kingdom. And the U.S. has long ignored anti-Israeli terrorism as long as it was mainly Israelis who were killed. Even in the early 1970’s when Arafat’s thugs kidnapped and murdered American diplomats Cleo Noel and George C. Moore in Khartoum, Sudan, U.S. policy even then was to play down the threat in the expectation that it would remain very contained and limited. Today we find ourselves becoming as much of a target as Israel.

Nevertheless our policy of selective silence remains largely unchanged. We still ignore the existential danger to Israel, our most loyal and most supportive ally. But we also deliver another unintended lesson to our enemies and to our few remaining friends. The lesson is that the U.S. will betray a loyal friend in order to appease an enemy in the hope that it will somehow work to our benefit. Egypt, Arabia, France, China, Russia and others all betray us and yet we call them friends and there is no price for them to pay. And then we wonder why so may nations feel entirely free to turn against us.

It would also be unfair to place all the blame on the morally corrupt U.S. officials and especially the State Department. Much of the blame must also be shared by the defective, and insufficiently assertive American Jewish leadership. They also resemble “The dog that didn’t bark” when they should have boldly spoken truth to power. The Jewish left in America makes matters even worse by masquerading as supporting peace even while they loudly “bark” their support for Israel’s enemies. Israel is our most loyal and most supportive ally; therefore those who betray Israel also betray America’s national interest.

Rachel Neuwirth