Tuesday, August 31, 2010

  • Tuesday, August 31, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
From the Jerusalem Post:
The Geneva Initiative unveiled a campaign partially funded by the USAID in which Palestinian leaders speak to the Israeli public in video clips, telling Israelis that there is a Palestinian partner for an agreement.

Thus far, Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat, secretary-general of the PLO Executive Committee Yasser Abed Rabbo and Fatah Central Committee member Jibril Rajoub have recorded short messages, all of which begin with a personal address to the Israeli public which includes the word “shalom” in Hebrew and conclude with “I am your partner. Are you my partner?”

Gadi Baltiansky, Geneva Initiative Israel director, explained that the campaign aims to counter the myth that there is no partner on the Palestinian side and to stir a debate as to whether the Netanyahu administration represents a partner for a two-state solution.

The Hebrew webpage for the ads is here.

As an op-ed in JTA says,
This political advocacy effort is aimed at convincing Israelis, in the words of Geneva Initiative head Gadi Baltiansky, “that there is a [Palestinian] partner -- that the problem is specifically with us.”

For the most part USAID, as its name suggests, has been involved primarily in projects related to Palestinian economic development, including parks and a sports facility in Tulkarem. An NGO-run advertising campaign marks a major shift in U.S. government policy. As in the case of NGO political campaigns funded by European governments, this process bypasses the elected Israeli leadership. Such direct interference in the internal affairs of other democracies is a blatant violation of international norms.

At the same time, the USAID funding is notable in that it is relatively transparent. While the USAID website makes no mention of this campaign, the Geneva Initiative released a statement about it: “The campaign is supported with the generous support of the American people through USAID.” News of the funding has been reported and criticized widely in the Israeli media.

...However, the transparency is partial, and the ads do not reference the U.S. government’s role and backing. Thus, Israelis hear Palestinian officials promoting peace without knowing that the message is brought to them courtesy of the U.S. administration, which has its own political interests. The absence of full public disclosure or congressional oversight for this unusual venture is problematic.
The US is funding an advertising campaign meant to make Israelis doubt the leadership abilities of the people they elected. The Geneva Initiative is far the the left of the mainstream Israeli public.

USAID is primarily meant to provide development and reconstruction assistance. To use it to fund a blatantly political program seems to go against its stated purpose.

It is notable that the Geneva Initiative claims:
The GI and our activities are designed to reinstill in the Israeli and Palestinian peoples the hope that it is possible to reach an agreement that will serve their respective national and personal interests and aspirations. We are committed to exposing each side's public to the message of the other – despite the technical and psychological barriers.
Yet I cannot find a single campaign they ever created or funded to convince the Palestinian Arabs to support a realistic peace with Israel. No public relations campaigns in the territories, no ads, nothing. Not a dollar is spent to influence Palestinian Arab public opinion.

It is even more interesting that the GI, as left-wing as they get, which is so keen to convince Israelis that Palestinian Arabs are such great peace partners, do not have a single Arab or Muslim organization listed as a "supporter" on their website. But trust us - they really are peace partners, even if they don't want to publicly be associated with the most dovish Israelis. That is probably only out of fear of being labeled "collaborators" and murdered in cold blood by their equally peaceful next door neighbors.

There is no problem with the GI coaching Saeb Erekat to lie about how peaceful he is. After all, lying is something he has a lot of experience in.  Only a month ago Erekat rejected the idea of talking with Israel. His intransigence is clear. And the GI may be hypocritical in its one-sided view of who is the intransigent party in the Middle East, but, again, that it their right.

If the Geneva Initiative wants to get Jibril Rajoub, who explicitly supports terror in Arabic, to make peaceful statements in English, they can pay him whatever they can afford.

However, US tax dollars are paying for political ads in Israel - and not just any political ads, but ads that are designed specifically to turn the Israeli public against their own government. That should be unacceptable from the point of view of  Americans as well as Israelis.

(h/t Jed for jogging my memory)
  • Tuesday, August 31, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
From the Tehran Times:
The Iranian vice president for parliamentary affairs said here on Monday that the list of firms related to the occupying Palestinian regime will be published by next week for further sanctions against these companies.

The Mehr News Agency quoted Hojjatoleslam Mohammad-Reza Mir-Tajeddini as saying that three years ago a plan was approved by the Majlis to intensify sanctions against the Zionist regime.

Following that, last week a list was prepared of multinational companies which are somehow related to this regime and sent to the foreign policy commission of the Majlis.

He said that after the Majlis and the administration check the list before publishing it.
I can save him some trouble. Here is a very partial list of Israeli companies listed by Wikipedia. There are lots more, of course:


Ahava
Aladdin Knowledge Systems Ltd.
Amdocs
Answers Corporation
Carmel Agrexco
Ceragon Networks
Cisco Systems Israel
Check Point Software Technologies
Coca Cola
Comverse Technology
D.B.S. Satellite Services (1998) Ltd.
dbMotion
ECI Telecom Ltd.
Elbit Systems Ltd.
Exanet Ltd.
Freescale Semiconductor
Google
Haaretz
Horizon Semiconductors
HP Scitex
HSBC Israel
IBM Haifa Labs
IDIT I.D.I. Technologies
IncrediMail Ltd
Intel Israel
Microsoft Israel
Mirabilis (company)
Mirs Communications Ltd.
M-Systems
Motorola Israel
NetManage
Newlog (a subsidiary of shipping magante Zim)
Nemesysco
NICE Systems Ltd.
Panorama Software
Paz Oil Company Ltd.
Precise Software
Rad Group
RAD Data Communications
Radcom
Radvision Ltd.
Radware
SAP Israel
SuperPharm
Tadiran
Tadiran Telecom Ltd.
Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.
Teva Naot
TNUVA Co-Op for Marketing of Agricultural Produce in Israel Ltd.
Tower Semiconductor
Trivnet
Verint Systems
Vigilant Technology
Visonic
VocalTec
Unilever Israel
Zend Technologies
Zenith Solar
Zim Integrated Shipping Services
Zoran Corporation

And while I cannot vouch for every one of these, this is the list from a Muslim anti-Israel website from 2008 of brands that must be boycotted because they are available in Israel:





Always glad to help the Islamic Republic! And make sure that your computers and nuclear plants have no hardware or software from Microsoft, IBM, Google, Intel, HP, Cisco or Motorola! (Or Linux, for that matter...)
  • Tuesday, August 31, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Not only are the PA and Hamas restricting which Gazans can leave, but Egypt is as well.

Hamas accused Egypt of stopping Hamas members from traveling through Rafah en route to Saudi Arabia for Ramadan. They accused Egypt of collaborating with the PA to restrict the movement of Hamas members and leaders. They also said that Egypt tried to blame Saudi Arabia for the rejection of Hamas members.

It should be recalled that in the past, Hamas stopped Fatah members from going on the Hajj pilgrimage. Also, in 2007, Hamas used Hajj as an excuse to send terrorists to Iran for training.
  • Tuesday, August 31, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
The Muslims really have to scour the news to find things to seethe about.

The World Jewish Congress is having a Governing Board meeting in Jerusalem over the next three days. It is not a huge convention; only about 200 people are in attendance. While there are some prominent speakers, like Shimon Peres and Elie Wiesel, it did not get any major press.

But the Muslims noticed.

From the Qassam website, as well as others:
-The Islamic-Christian Front for defending Jerusalem (ICF) says the 14th World Jewish Congress (WJC), which is set to be held on Wednesday in Jerusalem, is a blatant provocation to the Arab and Islamic nation as a whole.

Dr. Hassan Khater, Secretary General of the ICF said: “Not only does the [Israeli] occupation not at all care about the feelings of Muslims in Palestine and the world, but now deliberately shows direct prejudice to the religious sentiments of the Palestinians and Muslims in general, as evidenced by the conference deliberately held during the holy month of Ramadan.”

“In these heavy days of black memories against Islamic holy sites, beginning with the forty first anniversary of the arson attack of Al-Aqsa, the sixteenth anniversary of the Ibrahimi Mosque massacre, the outrageous attack on the Ain Silwan mosque, and preventing worshippers from reaching Al-Aqsa, even in the month of Ramadan, comes the brutal Zionist decision,” he added.

Brutal! How can Jews dare to meet in Jerusalem, when every day of the year is the anniversary of an outrage against Muslims! And Ramadan to boot!

Also, the Mufti of Jerusalem denounced the meeting, calling it "dangerous."

You can see the live video feed of the nefarious Jews plotting to take over the world. President Peres' speech is here.
  • Tuesday, August 31, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
While the number of Palestinian Arab murders has gone significantly down this year compared to the past two years, the past five days have seen four murders (and one person killed in a tunnel collapse.)

On Friday, a man's body was found in an abandoned tunnel in Rafah.

On Saturday, a man was found stabbed to death in Gaza City.

On Sunday, a 15-year old boy was stabbed to death near Jenin.

And on Monday, a man was killed in the al-Bureij camp during a "clan clash."

Also during Ramadan a 12-year old girl was murdered, and a 62-year old woman was killed because she was thought to be a witch.

Nevertheless, the pace of violent deaths this year in the territories is a little less than half that of last year at this time.
  • Tuesday, August 31, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
From YNet:

Hamas has completed a series of experiments on its advanced Fajar rocket, which has a range of almost 80 kilometers (roughly 50 miles) and can as far Kfar Saba, northeast of Tel Aviv, experts say.

In a few months, Hamas will be able to begin manufacturing the rockets, Yedioth Ahronoth reported Tuesday.

The progress made by the Gaza group on the rocket front is huge, considering that Hamas' original Qassam rockets had a range of around 1.5 km (roughly 1 mile.)

The long-range rockets acquired by Hamas are of the Fajar-5 type, and it is believed that they arrived in the Strip via the Sinai peninsula.

Israel believes that the rockets were developed by scientists working for the organization and for research institutes located in Arab countries in the region that have been working non-stop to arm Hamas in Gaza.
Hezbollah had used Fajr-5 rockets in the 2006 Lebanon war.
  • Tuesday, August 31, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Here is a video where Honest Reporting re-visits the event that helped start that organization - the mis-captioning of a September 2000 newspaper photo to make it look like an Israeli border policeman was beating up an Arab, rather than saving the life of a Jew.

Since then, Honest Reporting and its blog Media Backspin has exposed countless cases of media bias and outright lies against Israel, always with meticulous research and transparency. HR, along with other media-aware organizations like Just Journalism and CAMERA, have certainly helped improve the fairness of coverage of the Middle East.

Monday, August 30, 2010

  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
I thought that this was interesting, part of a much longer two-part article, from Life, April 1, 1957. Click to enlarge.

Juan Cole writes in his blog:

The spiritual leader of the ultra-Orthodox Shas Party, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, made waves this week when he included in his blessing for Rosh Ha-Shana, the Jewish New Year, a prayer that a plague should strike the Palestinians and wipe them out, including Mahmoud Abbas. He said, “Let Abu Mazen [Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority] and all these evil folk perish from this world. May God smite them with plague, them and these Palestinians.”

I wrote a comment - we'll see if he publishes it:

It is amusing that Juan Cole, who famously defended Ahmadinejad by claiming that his statement to wipe Israel from the face of the earth was a mistranslation, relies on Yahoo to translate the words of Rabbi Yosef. YNet today gave a more accurate translation: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3945840,00.html

Yosef did not wish a plague on all Palestinians, only the ones who “persecute Israel.”

Since Cole cares so much about accurate translations, I trust that he will correct this and apologize.
This picture was taken in Iran in 2008. I guess the podium designer doesn't know Farsi as well as Cole does.


(h/t Dan)
  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Over the weekend, Elder Brother of Ziyon requested that I get rid of Spongebob Squarepants on the bottom of my blog logo.


His reasoning was that he often refers other people to the site, or he quotes it in message forums for various newspapers, and he thinks that it should look more serious in order to be taken more seriously. At this point in time, he says, EoZ has content and analysis that is as impressive as most major media sites and the picture of Spongebob detracts from what this site should be.

When I originally requested that the beautiful and talented Daughter of Ziyon design the logo, I specifically asked for Spongebob because I wanted to always remind myself as well as my readers that this is still a blog, and that I shouldn't take myself too seriously. (If I ever get to the point that I tell people that I am right because of what an expert I am and without giving any real proof, please shoot me.)

The blog has had the current layout for many years already; probably since 2007 or so. Since then my readership has increased dramatically, while the blog itself is a bit outdated in its design as well as slow to load. I've been wanting to do a major overhaul for a while; perhaps something like this test site I've been playing with off and on.

Yesterday I replaced the E with something more generic, and a couple of people noticed and requested that Spongebob, with any attendant copyright issues, return.

EBoZ's larger point is a good one, although with the name of the site as it is, I am not sure how seriously anyone could ever take it anyway unless they actually deign to read it.

Anyway, I decided to ask my readers whether  I should return to the old logo, keep the newer one, or forget about both of them and re-do the site already (not that the test site is what a new site would look like.)

The poll is on the right hand sidebar.

Let the great debate begin!
  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
On August 2, 2008, I quoted a Jordanian paper:
Well known sources informed Albawaba that General Mohammed Suleiman, an adviser to Syrian president Bashar al Assad, was assassinated on Friday. Suleiman also served as Syria's liaison officer to Lebanon's Hizbullah movement.

According to the sources, Suleiman was shot dead by a sniper in the Syrian port city of Tartous. They added the funeral service will be held on Sunday in Suleiman's home-town of Driekesh which is located less than 20 kilometers away from Tartous.

The sources told Albawaba the Syrian authorities have been making huge efforts to prevent the publication of the news regarding Suleiman's killing. It should be mentioned that on February 13, 2008 Imad Moughniyeh, the military commander of Hizbullah, was assassinated in Damascus.
I commented then:
Syria's formerly airtight grip on internal security seems to be unraveling.
My assumption that it was an internal Syrian hit was wrong.

From YNet, in a fascinating article that you really need to read about Israel's bombing of the Syrian nuclear reactor:

On the evening of August 2, 2008, 11 months after the bombing of the reactor, a festive dinner was held on the terrace of a summer house in Rimal al-Zahabiya, north of the Syrian city of Tartous. The summer house was adjacent to the shore and had a magnificent view. The terrace overlooked the sea and served as a refuge from the summer's high humidity. The guests were close friends of the house's owner, General Mohammed Suleiman, who had traveled there for a weekend break.

Suleiman was President Assad's top aide on military and security matters. He was in charge of the reactor's construction and its security. Government circles in Damascus referred to him Assad's shadow. His office was located in the presidential palace, next to Assad's, and few knew him in Syria and abroad. While Suleiman's name was not mentioned in the media, Mossad and Western intelligence agencies knew him and his actions well. The 47-year-old Syrian was an engineering graduate of Damascus University. During his studies he befriended Basil Assad, then-President Hafez Assad's firstborn son and Bashar Assad's older brother. After Basil's death in a road accident, his father was sure to bring Suleiman close to himself and his heir. In 2000, Hafez Assad died and his son Bashar was elected president. With his rise to power, the young president made Suleiman his confidant and close advisor.

Suleiman played a unique role: He was a member of the Syrian research board, which dealt with the development of missiles, chemical and biological weapons and nuclear research and development. As part of his job, he was Syria's contact with North Korea. He coordinated the transfer of the reactor's parts to Syria and was in charge of security arrangements for the North Korean scientists and technicians involved in its construction. The reactor's bombing was a serious blow for Suleiman, but not a lethal one. After overcoming the initial shock, he began to plan the construction of an alternate reactor, for which a location had yet to be determined. Suleiman's new mission was much more complex and difficult than before, since he was now aware that he was on the Israeli and American intelligence agencies' radars.

Ahead of the next phase of his secret mission, Suleiman took a few days off and traveled to his summer home. A vacation and dinner with his friends was the best medicine for the pressure he was under. From his seat by the table he watched the waves lazily crawling up the shore. But what he didn't see, at a distance of some 150 meters (165 yards) from the terrace, was two figures waiting, motionless in the dark water. They reached this point from a far off distance in a ship that dropped them off some two 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) from Suleiman's house. From there they dived until they neared his home. The two were professional snipers, possessing a wealth of experience and nerves of steel. They carried their weapons in water-proof covers. When they reached the shore they immediately spotted Suleiman's house. The information they received from their country's intelligence agency was accurate. They identified the building and the terrace, scanned the people seated at the table and focused on their target: The general sitting opposite them, among his guests.

Around 9 pm the snipers returned to test their aim and range. They watched Suleiman, sitting on a chair at the center of the table surrounded by his friends. It was crowded around the table, which forced the snipers to reset their focus and aim at the host's head. They continued to hide in the water. Then the signal was given. The two emerged from the water to the shore, moved closer to the house, aimed their rifles and shot Suleiman simultaneously. The hit was lethal. His head was first jolted back and then collapsed forward on the table. Those present did not understand what had happened, because they didn't hear a sound – the rifles were equipped with silencers. Only after they noticed the blood flowing from Suleiman's head did they realize he had been shot. A commotion broke out on the terrace, which enabled the snipers to flee via a pre-planned escape route. The Sunday Times reported a slightly different version, saying the snipers were IDF Flotilla 13 commandoes who arrived in Tartous on a luxury yacht belonging to an Israeli businessman, carried out their mission, and vanished.
Sometimes, it really is the Mossad that assassinates major Arab figures.
  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
The initial reports over the weekend claimed that former Sephardic Chief Rabbi Ovadia Yosef called for a genocide against all Palestinian Arabs, wishing the plague on Mahmoud Abbas and all other Palestinians.

The New York Times said
he described the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, as “evil” and called on God to strike “these Ishmaelites and Palestinians with a plague; these evil haters of Israel.”

YNet originally reported and translated the sermon this way:
Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef Saturday night wished death on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and his people, who he called "evil enemies of Israel."

During his weekly lesson, held at the synagogue near his house in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Har-Nof, the rabbi mentioned the blessing said at the Rosh Hashana feast that says, "May our enemies and adversaries be destroyed", and applied it to the current situation. "Abu Mazen (Abbas) and all those evil men – may they perish from this world. May God Almighty strike them and these Palestinians."

Today, however, YNet has changed the translation - after the entire world has already been convinced that Rabbi Yosef is a genocidal maniac.

Today's story says:
Ovadia, who heads the Shas religious party in Israel's ruling coalition, expressed hope in his weekly sermon Saturday that "all the evil people who hate Israel, like Abu Mazen (Abbas), perish from our world."

"May God strike them down with the plague along with all the evil Palestinians who persecute Israel," he said.
This is much different from what was originally reported. This is not a call for genocide; it is a call for God to strike down Israel's enemies - a much different story and very much in line with daily prayers.

Is this another case of an overzealous media mistranslating (or, in the case of Israel's anti-religious media, misreporting) the words of the religious?

I cannot find the text of the sermon online, so I can't say for sure, but it sure looks like the media again placed their own preconceived notions of Jewish "extremism" ahead of an accurate story.

UPDATE: My readers come through again! Ruchie via email sends a link to the video and the money quote:

אבו-מאזן וכל הרשעים האלה, שיאבדו מן העולם. יכה בהם הקדוש ברוך הוא מכת דבר, בהם ובפלסטינים האלה, רשעים צוררי ישראל

Her translation is:
Abu Mazen and all those villains, may they perish. May the Almighty strike them with the plague, them and those Palestinians, evil enemies of Israel.


With all due respect, I think that YNet's newer translation of  צוררי ישראל as "persecutors of Israel" is more accurate.

To engage in a little pilpul, if he meant all Palestinian Arabs he would have not used the word "those", in Hebrew האלה. I think that he was referring only to those who are the "enemies" in the sense that they are actively against Israel. It is hard to know without hearing the entire context.

UPDATE 2: Yeranen Yaakov looks at the context as well.
  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Palestinian Media Watch shows a children's TV show, shown last week, that refers to a series of Israeli cities as "occupied."



TV host to girl: "You live in Jerusalem. Do you visit the 1948 occupied cities (Israeli cities)?"
Girl (Lujayn): "I’ve been to Hebron."
TV host: "No, Hebron is a city [in the Palestinian Authority] that we all can enter. The occupied cities – such as Lod, Ramle, Haifa, Jaffa, Acre (all Israeli cities) – have you visited them?"
Girl: “I’ve been to Haifa and Jaffa.”
TV host: "Tell us, are they beautiful?"
Girl: "Yes…"
TV host: "We hope all children of Palestine will be able to go to the occupied territories, which we don't know and have never been able to see. Personally, I have never been there."
Isn't it interesting that they do not refer to Hebron as "occupied," but Haifa is?
  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
For nearly a week, Lebanese politicians have been reacting to the fatal firefight between Hamas and al-Abbash in Beirut by calling for the elimination of arms in Beirut altogether.

Two groups disagree: Hezbollah and their allies in Amal.

Hezbollah first rejected the idea, saying that Beirut needs to be protected from that constant Israeli threat. Then they said that the only weapons that should be allowed in Beirut are "resistance weapons."

And guess who owns all the "resistance weapons"?

Those who still think that Hezbollah is acting for the good of all of Lebanon are delusional.
  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
From The National (UAE):

Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, faces a crisis of credibility among his own people as he heads into direct talks with Israel in Washington this week.

Perhaps nothing better illustrates this than a rather awkward security crackdown Thursday in Ramallah, when leftist factions convened a meeting to protest against Mr Abbas’s decision to accept the US invitation to the talks. Security officials justified the actions of dozens of plainclothes security officers, who disrupted the meeting and prevented a press conference from being held, as a legal measure against an “illegal rally”.

But privately, Palestinian Authority officials expressed their dismay at what looked to most like an effort by security services to stifle dissent.

And dissent there is.

All Palestinian political factions, bar one, have denounced the direct talks, some in harsher language than others.

Only Fatah, Mr Abbas’s own group, supports direct talks. Even among its members, though, there are plenty of disapproving voices.

Ordinary Palestinians, as well as the political factions, feel they have little influence on the Palestinian leadership’s decisions. The Palestinian polity is broken. There is no functioning parliament. The Gaza Strip and the West Bank are divided under the leaderships of rival factions. The PA government under Salam Fayyad was appointed by presidential decree and elections – presidential, parliamentary and municipal – have all been postponed indefinitely.

Even the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), which is chaired by Mr Abbas and represents Palestinian interests in international forums, including negotiations with Israel, was not properly consulted about the decision to go to direct talks. The US invitation to the talks was accepted, without a quorum as normally required by the PLO’s rules, at an emergency meeting of its executive committee.

The Palestinian leadership’s subsequent attempts to justify their decision to go to talks have also been clumsy.

“There is a real leadership crisis in the Palestinian arena,” said Diana Buttu, a Palestinian analyst and a former legal adviser to the PLO, adding that it “is not responsive to the people it represents or even the factions it represents”.

“The direct talks will lead to direct failure,” Ms Buttu said. “Failure could lead to another intifada, but not necessarily one against Israel. This one might well be directed against the Palestinian Authority.
And the Quartet, including the US, is willfully blind to all of these issues that are not very far beneath the surface.
  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Al Ahram has a sensationalist article that claims that in recent days, Palestinian Authority prime minister Salam Fayyad has been "crying" and begging Arab countries to help prop up the finances of the PA.

As opposed to Fayyad's public speech last week where he confidently predicted the PA's full financial independence by the end of 2013, in private he has been intensely lobbying and begging members of the Arab League to pay up on their pledges, saying that the PA coffers are empty. The article says that he is writing letters to the Arab leaders with "blood and tears" in his desperation for cash.

The Arab League had pledged some $55 million monthly to the PA and has largely not paid up on those pledges.

Al Ahram also says that of the $500 million pledged in March to strengthen Arab and Muslim institutions in Jerusalem, not a dollar has ever materialized.

According to the article, the US and the EU have "closed off the taps" a few weeks ago in order to pressure the PA to agree to direct negotiations with Israel. I have not seen confirmation of that anywhere else.
  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Over the weekend, Egyptian security forces discovered five separate caches of weapons, explosives and ammunition that were on their way to Gaza.

110 anti-aircraft missiles were found in one area, and 60 more in another. A third contained 100 kg of explosives. The others had ammunition, more explosives and weapons.
  • Monday, August 30, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
A little late to the game, but at least the word is getting out:
The rival Palestinian governments in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have clamped down harder on opponents and critics in recent months — deepening a nasty split that could prevent Palestinian statehood even if peace talks with Israel kicking off this week succeed against long odds.

New reports by Palestinian rights groups highlight a surprising symmetry in the abuse that the U.S.-backed government of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank and his Iranian-supported rivals Hamas in Gaza inflict on each other.

Both governments carry out arbitrary arrests, ban rivals from travel, exclude them from civil service jobs and suppress opposition media, the rights groups say. Torture in both West Bank and Gaza lockups includes beatings and tying up detainees in painful positions.

Hamas and Abbas' Fatah organization have harassed each other ever since the Islamic militant Hamas seized Gaza in 2007. However, the crackdowns have become more sweeping in recent months as each aims to strengthen its grip on its respective territory.

The talks aim to create a Palestinian state, but it appears unlikely any deal could be implemented as long as the split persists, particularly if Hamas — shunned by Israel and the West as a terror organization — remains in charge in Gaza.
I've published lists of the "elephants in the room" - issues that make peace impossible yet are not being addressed by the sacred "peace process."

Number one has always been the fact that Hamas controls Gaza, representing nearly 40% of the Palestinian Arab population. The Hamas/Fatah split has only solidified over the years, and the formerly constant Arab headlines of an imminent agreement have all but disappeared. Yet no agreement can ignore Gaza, even the most anti-Hamas member of Fatah would not support a state without Gaza. The PA continues to pour more than half its budget into the Gaza black hole where their money indirectly supports Hamas but where they can pretend that they still have influence there.  (Some Israeli right-wingers base their new support of a one-state solution on the idea that Jews have a semi-comfortable majority in Israel and the West Bank, excluding Gaza.)

Furthermore, it is ironic that the enlightened, moderate, democratic PA employs methods against Hamas that would enrage the world if Israel would employ those exact same methods. As far as I can tell, no nation has threatened to withhold PA cash on the condition that it starts to treat its potential terrorists with more respect for human rights.Just another double-standard to add to the ever-growing list.

(h/t Backspin, which has another angle as well.)

Sunday, August 29, 2010

  • Sunday, August 29, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Mahmoud Abbas made a speech on the eve of negotiations with Israel.

He said that the only reason he agreed to negotiations is because the Quartet publicly confirmed their statement from last March that Israel must withdraw to the 1967 lines, including East Jerusalem. In his words:
The statement confirmed all previous statements of the Quartet ... the statement underlined the need to end the occupation that took place in 1967, including East Jerusalem, and not to recognize the Israeli annexation [of any territory.]
The only problem is, that is not what the Quartet said. The statement did request that Israel not expand settlements and stop demolitions in "East Jerusalem," but it also emphasized:
[T]he status of Jerusalem is a permanent status issue that must be resolved through negotiations between the parties...
And nowhere did they say that the final settlement must be based on the 1967 (really 1949) armistice lines.

In short, Abbas is lying.


He also fails to mention the failure of the PA to hold on to its end of what the Quartet demanded from them - "make every effort to improve law and order, to fight violent extremism and to end incitement."

The PA court system remains in a shambles, and incitement has not gone down at all. Just this month we have seen a PA square named after a terrorist, a state funeral for another terrorists, a summer camp named after a third, publicly claim that Israel poisoned Arafat, and lots more listed at the Palestinian Media Watch site.

Beyond that, he also telegraphed exactly how the negotiations will go, with another probable lie:
I would like to point out here that our attitudes toward the settlements and their legitimacy and to the settlement expansion has not changed. I must say that today, frankly and clearly that we were informed by all parties, including the American sponsor of the negotiations before we agree to participate, that the Government of Israel alone will have to bear responsibility for these negotiations, and the possibility of total collapse and failure, in the event of continued settlement expansion in all its forms and manifestations in other parts of the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967.
I find it very hard to believe that the US agreed that Israel would be held responsible if the PA walks away when the settlement freeze expires and Israel resumes building. Yet Abbas is saying, very plainly, that this is what he plans to do, and he is blaming Israel in advance.

If Abbas has no compunction making these lies on the eve of negotiations, why should anyone trust him during the negotiations themselves?
  • Sunday, August 29, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Saudi customs officials are bragging that they have confiscated over 5000 books that were being smuggled into the Kingdom this year.

Most of them were religiously offensive, although some were merely politically offensive.

Good work!

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