The posts will be labeled BTFA.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
archaeology
The Arabs would use this, of course, to delegitimize any Jewish claim on Israel.
Debunking this is easy, if only from a single archaeological find that was announced yesterday:
The Israel Antiquities Authority on Monday announced the discovery of a large building dating to the time of the First and Second Temples during an excavation in the village of Umm Tuba in southern Jerusalem.Biblical characters from the First Temple period hanging around in Jerusalem in the 8th century BCE writing in Hebrew sort of demolishes Kamal Salibi's theory.
The excavation was conducted by Zubair Adawi on behalf of the antiquities authority, prior to the start of construction there by a private contractor.
The archaeological remains include several rooms arranged around a courtyard, in which researchers found a potter's kiln and pottery vessels. The pottery remains seem to date from the eighth century B.C.E. (First Temple period).
The excavators also found royal seal impressions on some of the pottery fragments that date to the era of Hezekiah, King of Judah (end of the eighth century B.C.E.).
Four "LMLK" impressions (which indicate the items belonged to the king) were discovered on handles of large jars used to store wine and oil. Seals of two high-ranking officials named Ahimelekh ben Amadyahu and Yehokhil ben Shahar, who served in the government, were also found.
The Yehokhil seal was stamped on one of the LMLK impressions before the jar was fired in a kiln and this is a rare example of two such impressions appearing together on a single handle.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
The day after the rally, Marty decided it was time for me to do some real work, and he handed me a long list of people to interview.Find out their self-interest, he said. That’s why people become involved in organizing -because they think they’ll get something out of it. Once I found an issue enough people cared about, I could take them into action. With enough actions, I could start to build power.I know that these words are out of context, but it was still a little bit of a shock to see that they were written by Barack Obama in his Dreams From My Father autobiography.
Issues, action, power, self-interest. I liked these concepts.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
Achinoam Nini, a singer and peace activist, has long stirred controversy here. Known abroad by her stage name, Noa, she has recorded with Arab artists, refused to perform in the occupied West Bank, condemned Israeli settlements there and had concerts canceled because of bomb threats from the extreme right.Notice that the Times cannot find a single voice on the Right that is upset at the idea of an Arab co-representing Israel in the Eurovision contest. Even though the article gratuitously refers to Avigdor Lieberman as being "ultranationalist" there are no smug labels for the pro-Hamas, anti-co-existence "left." Yet once one takes out that adjective, one would see that the Israeli Left is far more extreme than the Right that always gets tagged with that label.
But lately it is the left that has been angry with Ms. Nini. Chosen by Israel to represent the country at the Eurovision Song Contest — this year being held in Moscow in May with an expected television audience of 100 million — Ms. Nini asked if she could bring along her current artistic collaborator, an Israeli Arab singer, Mira Awad.
The selection committee liked the idea of having both Arab and Jewish citizens in the contest for the first time. But coinciding as it did with Israel’s Gaza war and the rise of Avigdor Lieberman, the ultranationalist politician who threatens Israeli Arabs with a loyalty oath, the committee’s choice was labeled by many on the left and in the Arab community as an effort to prettify an ugly situation.
A petition went around demanding that the duo withdraw, saying they were giving the false impression of coexistence in Israel and trying to shield the nation from the criticism it deserved. It added, “Every brick in the wall of this phony image allows the Israeli Army to throw 10 more tons of explosives and more phosphorus bombs.”
Neither Ms. Nini, 39, nor Ms. Awad, 33, has been deterred. But since they consider themselves peace advocates, they are a bit surprised. The antiwar movement, they say, seems to have turned into a Hamas apology force. That, together with the political turn rightward in Israel, means that while the two are being sent to represent this mixed and complex society, they also feel a bit orphaned by it.
Later in the article we find out
The common-sense left is being drowned out by the pro-terror pretend-left, even in Israel.But recent politics have also clearly taken their toll. During the war, Ms. Nini sent out a letter on her blog condemning the Islamists of Hamas, and calling on her “Palestinian brothers” to join together to eliminate what she called the ugly monster of Hamas. It was widely interpreted as an endorsement of Israel’s war in Gaza, although she said it was not.
“What I wrote was based on what my Palestinian friends in Gaza told me, that they are threatened by Hamas,” she said.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
During a recent live broadcast of a popular children' show on Iranian television, one young girl surprised viewers when she related how her father called her stuffed monkey 'Ahmadinejad', the name of the Islamic Republic's president.Well, the resemblance is pretty uncanny.
An Iranian news agency reported on Tuesday that, during a telephone call that took place on the show 'Uncle Fornaj', the show's host asked a young female caller whether she was good girl who obeyed her parents.
"I'm a good girl and my father bought me a doll," the girl responded, adding that the doll was stuffed monkey. "My father calls it Ahmadinejad," she said in response to the host's follow-up question.
'Uncle Fornaj' is one of the most highly-watched shows in Iran, broadcast on the country's premier state-run channel and hosted by a local children's celebrity.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
Yesterday, the Islamic Jihad terror movement held a large meeting to praise the behavior of Palestinian Arab "journalists" in Gaza during the Israeli operation.As usual in meetings like these, all pretense of objectivite news gathering goes out the window - the speeches make clear that the purpose of the media in Gaza is to further the "resistance" and to "expose Zionist crimes." Certainly the so-called journalists are not expected to report on Hamas stealing aid, on people killed in Islamic Jihad crossfire, or on Hamas kneecapping Fatah members in public.

Notice how hungry these Islamic Jihad members and their propagandists appear to be, after years of the Zionist siege that they keep talking about.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
Today, we have further confirmation, from Palestine Today:
Private sources confirmed that the Palestinian resistance obtained the Israeli missiles which did not explode during the aggression on Gaza, saying that resistance experts were able to dismantle the missiles and extract the the explosive material inside.The last sentence is interesting, because it seems to confirm that some Hamas collaborators are in Egypt, scouring the Sinai for old mines to smuggle to Gaza.
The same sources pointed out that they will be able to manufacture hundreds of improvised explosive anti-tank devices, after the dismantling of dozens of huge rockets that did not explode during the Israeli war.
The sources added that the experts were able to extract the detonators of the missiles as well.
The sources said the explosive article by Israeli missiles, located in one of the finest and most powerful species in bringing about breakthroughs in the explosions and the place where he received meant that the Palestinian resistance and put her hand on the precious treasure of the Israeli explosives.
Palestinian factions would use quantities of explosive materials from remnants of the wars that took place in Egypt's Sinai for the manufacture of missiles against the Israeli occupation forces, but they were of poor quality.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
Hamas' challenge to the PLO (elaborating on a story I broke over three weeks ago)
In a Palestinian Arab unity government, Hamas wins (JPost)
The Path of Realism or the Path of Failure (Elliot Abrams)
Backspin's Responding to Amnesty
Treppenwitz: Why am I nervous?
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
My first strike was my Rachel Corrie video, which someone complained about but which clearly did not violate any of the Community Guidelines.
The second one was for my "Just Like Us" video, which indeed showed some violence - but whose footage I took directly from another YouTube video. That got me banned from YouTube for two weeks.
The third was from my copy of the MEMRI video showing the death of Assud the Jew-Eating Bunny. MEMRI contacted me asking me to remove it, and I told them I would be happy to, but I was suspended from YouTube and wouldn't be able to edit my channel until February 26th. MEMRI couldn't wait and complained to YouTube, and now my video channel - and all my YouTube videos - are gone.
I am trying to find an acceptable place to move the videos I can recover (I fear I have lost some early ones.) I spent much of last night trying to place some of them on NMA-TV, a "conservative" alternative to YouTube that allows me to create my own group, but it seems very buggy and my group video page has been going into an infinite loop. I don't know if that site has staying power, wither, as it begs for money and hasn't yet reached anything close to critical mass.
I don't like LiveLeak too much because for some reason not all my videos show up consistently on my page there. I also looked at QubeTV, another conservative video site, but they are having technical problems, so they are flaky as well.
So for now, I'm done with YouTube. I am still looking for an alternative where I can create and preferably customize my own channel that will not disappear in a few months.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Monday, February 23, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
Monday, February 23, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
unrwa
Let's put aside the fact that this money will allow Hamas to spend 100% of their Iranian funding directly on weapons and terror, and it will give them a position of strength as they negotiate with the PA take over the Palestinian Arab cause, and let's not think about the fact that the large percentage that will go to UNRWA is going to an organization that has little oversight and known ties to terror.
Besides all of that, here we have a significant chunk of change being paid by the US - in a struggling economy - to Gaza. And so far we have not heard a single complaint from the crowd that claims that US aid to Israel is a huge burden on the US taxpayer!
If you add up the aid that Arabs get from the US this year, your total will be just about the same as what Israel is getting in foreign aid. Yet the WRMEA and "If Americans Knew" and similar organizations that gleefully add up real and imagined aid to Israel are strangely silent about billions going towards entities that, to be frank, hate and despise the US.
Perhaps they don't care about your tax dollars as much as they pretend to?
Monday, February 23, 2009
Elder of Ziyon
bahrain
It starts off as one would expect - with the prince, Sheikh Salman Bin Hamad Bin Isa Al-Khalifa, trying to pressure Great Britain to be even more pro-Arab than it already is:
The crown prince of Bahrain said on Monday Britain was too pro-Israel in its outlook, but its contribution to the Middle East peace process was still needed.Isn't it funny that third-party Arab nations are not expected to be "impartial," but they complain if the West isn't (in their estimation?)"If we are to solve the Arab-Israeli issue then you cannot approach it as a friend of one side at the expense of another," Sheikh Salman Bin Hamad Bin Isa Al-Khalifa told Sky television.
When asked if he felt Britain had been too pro-Israeli he replied: "I think we all feel that."
"But that doesn't mean we don't want Britain's involvement, we need Britain's involvement and we need Britain to be more impartial, sure."
But the interesting part comes later:
To settle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, "you give up land for peace," he said. "Land that you haven't already built on. It can't be simpler."Does this mean that Bahrain believes that Israel can hold onto the settlements that have already been "built on?" How about Greater Jerusalem?
I have a feeling that we will see some backtracking real fast.
Elder of Ziyon




