Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, October 25, 2010

Boycott Saleys Bags and Gifts

Saleys Bags and Gifts is a South African company that specializes in luggage, bags and keychains.

Recently, they decided that they don't want any business from people who support Israel:

'Sorry, we cannot supply you any of our goods as we don't want or need your blood money!"

This scathing comment, written on an invoice returned to the South African Zionist Federation, has angered some members of the local Jewish community, who are now seeking legal opinion against a Muslim-owned Johannesburg company.

The SAZF had placed an order with Saley's Travel Goods in Ormonde, Johannesburg, for 249 conference bags, which it wanted to hand out at its 47th conference in March next year.

But after placing the order and confirming it telephonically, the SAZF had their invoice returned with the strongly worded comments, purportedly signed by "management" of Saley's.

The unknown person who wrote on the invoice started off by writing "Dear", but then scratched it out and launched into a series of harsh words.

It continued: "Please do not contact us anymore and remove all our contact details from your records and we will do likewise. We don't want to aid and abet organisations that are responsible for crimes against humanity!"

Two lines were also crossed over the invoice, worth R8841.59, with the words: "Please don't pay! Don't contaminate our account with your blood money!"

The SAZF - which describes itself as an organisation acting on behalf of the South African Jewish community in matters relating to Israel, and which is the local representative of the World Zionist Organisation - reacted angrily to the snub, with office bearer Ben Swartz saying they are seeking legal opinion.

"We believe it amounts to hate speech," Swartz told the Sunday Times on Friday.

He said the SAZF had previously placed numerous orders with Saley's over the years and "never experienced a problem like this with them before".

Note that this awful Zionist organization never had a problem buying products from this Muslim-owned company in the past.

Their feedback form is here. You might want to (politely) drop them a line.

(h/t CiFWatch for image)

Poll: Gaza and WB Arabs cannot express themselves without fear

We've seen numerous times how easily Palestinian Arab "eyewitnesses" lie to the media to make Israel look as bad as possible. Not nearly as often, we've seen journalists actually go a little beyond the sound bites and find Arabs who will go against the conventional wisdom and tell the truth - but almost invariably, they demand to remain anonymous.

There is a very simple reason that this occurs: fear.

The latest poll from the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research asks a very simple question:

In your view, can people in the Gaza Strip/West Bank today criticize the authority without fear?

The percentage of Gazans who answered "no" about their territory was 71.2%. This would not surprise most observers.

But the percentage of West Bank Arabs who answered "no" to the same question about their territory was nearly as high: 68.4% (or 71% of those who answered the question.)

More than two out of every three people who live in the West Bank feel fearful of simply criticizing their government. The same government that Western journalists and pundits are falling over themselves to praise as transparent and progressive has instilled a culture of fear that is nearly as pervasive as the one in Gaza! It might have improved in the past couple of years (as this poll seems to indicate) but it is nowhere near the paradise of progressiveness that the media has been breathlessly reporting.

Another question illustrates the fear that both Gazans and West Baners have of their governments:

To what extent are you worried or not worried that you or a member of your family could be hurt in your daily life by other Palestinians such as those affiliated with Fateh or Hamas?

The answers for West Bank and Gaza were again very similar - 48% of Gazans were worried or very worried about being hurt by other Palestinian Arabs, but 45% of West Bankers have that same fear.

There cannot be true freedom as long as people are afraid to publicly criticize their own leaders. Yet the world supports the establishment of yet another state without basic freedom of expression.

Isn't that a problem?

Reports: Israel behind blast at Iranian missile silo

Two weeks ago, an explosion at an Iranian military base killed some 18 people, including Revolutionary Guards.

Some details that emerged since then indicated that the base housed Iran's Shahab-3 missiles, which can reach Israel - and which can carry a nuclear payload. And those missiles are what exploded, not "ammunition," as Iran claimed.

Now, Le Figaro is reporting that this was a Mossad operation.

Who knows? Even if it wasn't, it can't hurt to make Iran think it was.

Illegal Arab buildings to be demolished. But this time, no one will protest.

When Israel demolishes Arab buildings in East Jerusalem that are illegally built - for example in al-Bustan, which was zoned to be a green open space and now has over a hundred illegal buildings - there is no shortage of self-proclaimed "human rights" workers willing to vigorously protest for the rights of the people to build these structures.

Somehow, I don't think they are going to be as concerned in this case:

The Gaza government announced Monday that it has given directives to its interior ministry to raze what it has termed illegal structures on public lands and enforce previous orders to arrest those trading the land.

Head of the ministry's land department Ibrahim Radwan said those in violation of the order had been given a deadline which has now expired and that officers would maintain permanent checkpoints, supported by police, on public lands to prevent "any violation."

Radwan said in the coming days, the ministry will begin enforcing a "wide-scale campaign" to remove structures erected or built on public lands without permission.

Iranian universities to stop teaching "Western science"

From Reuters:

Iran will not allow its universities to begin teaching certain disciplines it deems too "Western," and existing courses will be revised, a senior Education Ministry was quoted as saying Sunday.

"Expansion of 12 disciplines in the social sciences like law, women's studies, human rights, management, sociology, philosophy....psychology and political sciences will be reviewed," Abolfazl Hassani was quoted as saying in the Arman newspaper.

"These sciences' contents are based on Western culture. The review will be the intention of making them compatible with Islamic teachings."

Hassani said Iranian universities will not be allowed to open new departments in these disciplines and the curricula for existing departments would be revised.

Iran's hard-line rulers accuse the West of trying to harm the Islamic state by influencing the country's young generation with "decadent" culture.

Pointing to the enrollment of some 2 million out of a total of 3.5 million university students in the humanities, in August Iran's most powerful figure Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called for modification of these studies.

"Many disciplines in the humanities are based on principles founded on materialism disbelieving the divine Islamic teachings," Khamenei said in a speech reported by state media.

"Thus such teachings...will lead to the dissemination of doubt in the foundations of religious teachings."

I'm afraid that I need to inform Iran that nuclear physics is also a decadent, Western science - and a Zionist one to boot.

Hints of corruption under Fayyad

Palestine Today reported last week that PA prime minister Salam Fayyad, who is supposed to be untouched by corruption, has arranged for the head of the Office of Financial Supervision and Management to be fired.

Dr. Mahmoud Abu Rub's job was to audit the financial dealings of other PA ministries and institutions. According to the article, he did his job too well, and was uncovering a little too much.

Quoting Al Quds al Arabi, the newspaper says that al-Rub "went past red lines in researching the financial files and expenses of the government."

A month ago, al-Rub decided to look at the files of the Ministry of Finance, a ministry that Fayyad had led. This investigation evidently upset Fayyad.

Fayyad does not have the authority to fire the head of that office, so he appealed to Mahmoud Abbas to sack him, and he did.

(h/t Ali for help with translation)

Khaled and Hala, ages 5 and 3, are engaged

From MSN:

Hala and her fiancee Khalid have exchanged rings and plan to marry in 10 years when she is 12 and he is 15.

Their story has become a national talking point in Syria after the girl's father relayed the story of their engagement to the Akes Alser website.

The families of both children have won plaudits over the union — although they insist the children are in love and want to marry.

Khalid's father, Juma, said the boy was his only child from a 25-year marriage.

"I vowed to have my child engaged at the age of five if he was a boy and to marry him to a woman of his choice at the age of 15," he told Gulf News.

Juma said Khalid, from the town of Horns, 180km north of Damascus, fell in love with Hala within days of meeting her during a family trip to the port city of Latakia.

He claimed Khalid was so love-sick after parting from his young girlfriend that he refused to go back to his nursery unless little Hala came too.

"We did not know what to do till my wife called Hala's mother and asked her opinion about the case," Juma was quoted saying.

"She said her daughter had developed similar symptoms of loneliness and the family would be happy to see them engaged."

Juma bought rings for the young ones and both families held a celebration in Latakia.

The father has even vowed to cover the education expenses of both children until they graduate from school.

"We know that Khalid or Hala might change their mind in the future, but what we do know at this stage is that they are very happy and talk to each other everyday," Juma told Gulf News.

Yet more outrageous statements from The Yentas

According to the leader of the Palestinian National Initiative, Mustafa Barghouti, Jimmy Carter not only supports the idea of "Palestine" unilaterally declaring itself to be a state, but he said that he would "work in the international arena" to gain traction for that idea.

Jordan's Addustour reports that Carter also told him that he supports international sanctions against Israel for its policy of allowing Jews to live in Judea and Samaria.

I guess if unilateral moves are OK for Jimmy, then maybe it is time for Israel to act unilaterally concerning the the disputed territories as well.

Might be time to change the name of Carter's group of old busybodies trying to remain relevant...

Spokesman defends Hamas from critics - hilariously

Ahmed Youssef, Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs for Hamas in Gaza and widely regarded as one of Hamas' more moderate voices, was interviewed by Jordan's Addustour newspaper (reported in PalPress.) In the interview, he describes why Hamas has not been keen on suicide terror lately: "Martyrdom operations bring us problems with the international community, and are exploited by the Israeli media to distort our image, and accuse us of terrorism and incitement to violence."

That stupid international community, thinking that heroically blowing yourself up among women and children is a form of terrorism!

He also said that the current relative calm in Gaza was partially in order to take advantage of the negative political views of Israel worldwide, because a new barrage of rockets would cloud the impression from the Goldstone Report that only Israel was an aggressor. (His words were that the calm was "an investment for the international reaction, which criticized Israel following the Goldstone report.")

He claimed that the timing of the attack that killed four Jewish civilians in late August was not meant to derail the peace talks or embarrass Abbas, saying that it was "only a coincidence" that the attacks occurred right before the negotiations were to resume.

Perhaps the best part of the interview was his insistence that Hamas is not trying to turn Gaza into an Islamist statelet. Specifically dealing with the law that makes it illegal for women to smoke a hookah in public, he responded:

"There is no place in the world does not prohibit smoking in public places, and in Western countries there are strict laws (restricting smoking), while in Gaza, we have more freedom, and the law is limited to women to maintain public morality."

There you have it - Hamas is more liberal than Western states because it allows men to smoke in public!

(Not to mention...if it is immoral to have women seen smoking in public, using their mouths to inhale the fragrant tobacco from the long tube, wouldn't men smoking in public be....gay?)

More details of what happened on the Mavi Marmara

In his testimony before the Turkel committee, IDF Chief of Staff Lieutenant-General Gabi Ashkenazi revealed a few new details of the Mavi Marmara incident.

He said that one of the soldiers, who was being strangled by the peaceful protesters, used a stun grenade on his own body to save his life.

One soldier who was beaten on the ship still suffers memory loss.

And the second soldier to be shot was definitely hit with a gun that was not IDF-issue, meaning a gun that the Mavi Marmara militants had brought on board themselves.

(h/t Jed, Islamonazism blog who has an update from Haaretz)

Fatah newspaper op-ed complains about Hamas leader hugging Carter

The West generally regards Fatah as moderate political party, especially in comparison with Hamas. This meme permeates American and European coverage of the Middle East, as it is an easy shorthand way to explain things.

However, in Arabic, Fatah members and the pro-Fatah media often attack Hamas for being too accommodating with Israel!

We've documented this many times, with both Fatah leaders and others complaining about Hamas' supposed moderation.

Today we see another example, in the pages of the adamantly anti-Hamas and pro-Fatah news site Palestine Press Agency.

Op-ed writer Ahmad Dahglas is disgusted by Khaled Meshal hugging Jimmy Carter in Damascus last week, saying that it shows that Hamas supports the idea of a Jewish state.

He blames Carter, as architect of Camp David, of supporting a Jewish state in Palestine, something that is obviously unacceptable to any self-respecting Arab. He calls Carter "the head of the snake that has poisoned the region" and his desire to see Israel exist makes him as bad as Herzl.

For Hamas leader Meshal to embrace Carter is akin to him hugging Menachem Begin or Theodor Herzl, according to this op-ed.

How moderate Fatah is!

(h/t JSS for the more complete Carter picture, and a nod to Meshal's right hand)

Arabs prune olive trees, claim "settlers" cut them down

From Ma'an:

On Saturday morning, Salima Ewes, 73, and her family found 40 olive trees had been cut down in their field in the northern West Bank village of Al-Lubban Ash-Sharqiya, southwest of Nablus city.

Akram Jamil Uweis said his family headed to their field to harvest olives, and found their trees destroyed. He said the family believed residents of the nearby illegal settlements of Eli and Ma’ale Levona were responsible for the attack.

As is often the case, the Arabs are claiming that religious Jews cut down their trees during the Jewish Sabbath - something very unlikely.

But beyond that, look at the pictures of the supposedly chopped down trees Ma'an show us:

Olive trees have much larger trunks than what is shown here. And for olives to grow best, trees have to be pruned relatively often - sometimes down to the trunk.

By any measure, these pictures show neither that the olive trees were "cut down" nor "destroyed." And in the past we have seen Palestinian Arabs claim that their normal prunings were actually "settlers" destroying the trees - or that they pay Arab kids to cut the trees - and they get compensation from Israel when they make those claims.

And while there may indeed be incidents where hotheaded West Bank Jews do damage trees, it is hardly a one-way street. Arabs have destroyed the trees belonging to Jews, something that gets next to no coverage in the media.

And Arabs have destroyed Jewish-owned trees and crops for a long, long time.

Lauren Booth converts to Islam

She's on spiritual morphine!

Tony Blair’s sister-in-law has converted to Islam after having a ‘holy experience’ in Iran.
Broadcaster and journalist Lauren Booth, 43 – Cherie Blair’s half-sister – said she now wears a hijab head covering whenever she leaves her home, prays five times a day and visits her local mosque ‘when I can’.

She decided to become a Muslim six weeks ago after visiting the shrine of Fatima al-Masumeh in the city of Qom.

‘It was a Tuesday evening and I sat down and felt this shot of spiritual morphine, just absolute bliss and joy,’ she told The Mail on Sunday.

When she returned to Britain, she decided to convert immediately.

Ya gotta love someone who converts to Islam before reading the Koran.

Then again, Booth has never been someone who thinks much about anything before declaring her fantasies to be true.

How long before her already brainwashed children follow? From the end of this video, it looks like it's already started....

(h/t Jacoby, Silke. See also Israellycool.)

Hamas sprinkles Mavi Marmara dead's ashes on terrorist graves

From Ha'aretz:

Members of the Islamic Hamas movement Saturday scattered ashes from the nine Turkish activists killed by Israeli naval forces during the interception of their Gaza-bound flotilla on the graves of Hamas militants killed in Gaza.

The dust of the Turkish activists was brought to Gaza by campaigners form the aid convoy Lifeline 5 - which arrived in the coastal enclave on Thursday, Hamas officials said.

Mahmoud Zahar, a senior Hamas leader who scattered the ashes on Hamas militants' graves, told reporters that "this action reiterates the strong ties between the Turkish people and the Palestinians in confronting Israel."

He added "those campaigners of the freedom flotilla, had sacrificed themselves and their blood for breaking the siege imposed on Gaza. Today the dusts are mixed upon the request of the families of the Turkish victims."

But I thought it was a non-violent flotilla! Surely those people who were killed while wielding their metal bars and chains - people deeply committed to peaceful resistance - would be aghast at the idea of their remains being sprinkled on the graves of Hamas terrorists and fighters!

I'm sure that Free Gaza and Viva Palestina and the ISM, all deeply committed to peace and peaceful resistance, will protest the symbolism shown here immediately and loudly.

Any hour now.

"Elders" attend anti-Israel protest

I could not find this story in any Western media:

Former American President Jimmy Carter was among a group that attended an East Jerusalem demonstration protesting the removal of Palestinians from their homes in the area. Carter praised the work of the Palestinian and left-wing Israeli activists present, who hold weekly demonstrations, and emphasized the importance of peaceful protest in their struggle.

Al Masry al-Youm says that Mary Robinson attended the rally as well, and that Carter addressed the crowd.

It should be emphasized that the Arabs who were evicted from the neighborhood hadn't paid their rent to the Jewish owners of the homes, and that the evictions have been upheld by Israel's Supreme Court. Which means that Carter and Robinson are effectively accusing Israel's legal system of being corrupt.

What honest brokers they are!

Latest Latma (10/22/10)

"It's the occupation, stupid" - Robert Pape's stupid argument

Robert Pape, writing in Foreign Policy, says:

New research provides strong evidence that suicide terrorism such as that of 9/11 is particularly sensitive to foreign military occupation, and not Islamic fundamentalism or any ideology independent of this crucial circumstance. Although this pattern began to emerge in the 1980s and 1990s, a wealth of new data presents a powerful picture.

More than 95 percent of all suicide attacks are in response to foreign occupation, according to extensive research that we conducted at the University of Chicago's Project on Security and Terrorism, where we examined every one of the over 2,200 suicide attacks across the world from 1980 to the present day. As the United States has occupied Afghanistan and Iraq, which have a combined population of about 60 million, total suicide attacks worldwide have risen dramatically -- from about 300 from 1980 to 2003, to 1,800 from 2004 to 2009. Further, over 90 percent of suicide attacks worldwide are now anti-American.

He then goes on to his recommendation - stop "occupying" other countries and the problem goes away!

Pape then makes up some very subjective criteria to explain why most occupations do not result in suicide bombings -one that there is a "social distance" between "occupier and occupied," and the other is "prior rebellion."

There is a lot that is absurd about this obviously biased research meant to reach a foregone conclusion. Joshuapundit covered a few.

I looked up the raw data for his research supposedly showing no correlation between Islamic fundamentalism and suicide bombing, the Suicide Attack Database at the University of Chicago. It allows you to search for all attacks by country, year, group claiming responsibility and other factors.

Here is the full list of all groups that engaged in suicide attacks since 1981, according to the research that Pape relied on for his conclusion:

1920 Revolution Brigade
Abu-Dajanah al-Ansari Martyrdom Brigade
Aden-Abyan Army
Al Madina Regiment
Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade
Al-Fatah
Al-haramayn Brigades
Al-Jaysh al-Islami li Tahrir al Amaken al Muqaddasa
Al-Mourabito un Group
Al-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda in Iraq
Al-Qaeda in Islamic North Africa
Al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia
Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb
Al-Shabaab
AMAL
Amjad Farooqi group
Ansar al-Islam
Arab Egyptian League
Arab Resistance Movement - Al-Rashid Brigades
Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party
Armed Islamic Group
Assirat al-Moustaqim
Babbar Khalsa International
Chechen Separatists
Egyptian Islamic Jihad
Fatah al-Islam
Great Eastern Raiders Front
HAMAS
Harakat ul-Mujahidin
Hezbollah
Hizb-I Islami
Hizbul Mujahedin
Islamic Holy War
Islamic Jihad
Islamic Resistance
Islamic Revolutionary Movement
Islamic State of Iraq
Jaish Ansar al-Sunnah
Jaish-e-Muhammad
Jama'at Al-Tawhid Wa'al-Jihad
Jemaah Islamiya
Jund al-Sham
Kurdistan Workers Party
Lashkar-e-Islam
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi
Lashkar-e-Taiba
Lebanese Ba'ath Party
Lebanese Communist Party
Lebanese National Resistance Front
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
Mujahideen Shura Council in Iraq
Mujahideen Youth Movement
Mujahidin Shura Council
Mujahidin Shura Council
Partisans of the Sunni
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
Popular Resistance Committees
Revolutionary People's Liberation Party/Front
Riyadus Salikhiin
Soldiers of the Prophet's Companions Group
Syrian Social Nationalist Party
Taliban
Tanzim
Tehrik Taliban-e-Pakistan
Unknown Group
Vanguard of Arab Christians

Now, when you look at this list, do you see a pattern?

Now, it is true. many of these groups are not Islamist - some are secular and some are Christian - but practically all are Arab or Muslim, pointing to a much clearer correlation between suicide bombings and Arab/Muslim culture than a strained theory of "occupation."

Also, his biased research is apparent when he defines Pakistani suicide bombings against Pakistan - over 2000 deaths that do not fit any of his "occupation" criteria - as an example of US occupation, since Pakistan is a US ally!

Friday afternoon links

Hezbollah's Boy Scouts in FP

Joshua Hammer in TNR - good until the last paragraph

Israeli ties with Greece improving in wake of Turkish fallout

ZAKA adding Christian, Muslim, Druze units

CiFWatch on Israel - and Luxembourg

Alaska Airlines and Operation Magic Carpet

Abuse of temporary marriages in Iraq (NPR)

UN Watch on the bias of "Goldstone II"

(h/t to many commenters, Jawa Report, Daily Alert)

Israeli flag in Morocco causes consternation

Last week I mentioned that there were a number of protests over the participation of Israeli singer Yael Naim in the "Concert for Tolerance" in Agadir, Morocco.

Well, the vigilant Arabs have sniffed out other Israelis visiting that city,and they are not happy.

The Hespress Moroccan newspaper mentions that the Seventh International Congress on Cactus Pear and Cochineal was also held in Agadir this week, and it included an Israeli scientist who spoke on Tuesday (Noemi Tel-Zur on the scintillating topic of "Pitahayas: introduction, agrotechniques and breeding.")

Last June, the paper notes, an Israeli delegation participated in a conference on whaling, also in Agadir.

All of these events went off without a hitch, and it is to Morocco's credit that the complaints - while noisy - were contained. But it is harder for them to forgive what happened next.

Earlier this week, also in Agadir, one could see the scene in the picture on the right.

The occasion is the 16th World Junior Judo Championships, being held in Agadir - and Israel is participating.

Municipal officials were stunned at the Israeli flag being displayed publicly. They felt blindsided by the display, not even knowing that Israel was participating. Some prominent officials said that they would not attend the opening ceremony if the flag continued to be shown.

So the judo officials took the flag down a half hour before the ceremony, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

Jimmy visits Jerusalem and exposes more hypocrisy

London's Al Quds quotes Jimmy Carter as calling for Israel to withdraw from "East Jerusalem", saying it must become the capital of a Palestinian Arab state.

AFP quotes him as saying, "We will continue to work on a peaceful solution where the Israelis will withdraw from east Jerusalem and let this be the capital of a Palestinian state."

Since 1948, the entire world has demanded that Israel not establish its capital in even the western part of Jerusalem. Israelis have been told that the eternal Jewish capital and the center of Jewish hopes and dreams for some 3000 years cannot be the capital of the Jewish state, rather it must be in the new city of Tel Aviv. The Green Line, which everyone now remembers as an "internationally recognized border," was not considered a legal boundary by anyone, and as a result Israel's declaring Jerusalem as its capital was considered somehow illegitimate.

Even today, practically no country recognizes even the western part of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Instead, the world is demanding that Jerusalem become the capital of a Palestinian Arab state.

Arab interest in Jerusalem was practically nil before the anti-semitic Mufti in the 1920s started politicizing the issue, and then it faded from Muslim and Arab consciousness for the 19 years of Jordanian rule when the Palestinian Arab national cause was all but mute.

Arab interest in Jerusalem is directly proportional to Jewish political rule over the city. It is not inherent; it is derivative. It was never set up as a positive goal but rather a negative one - they didn't want to establish Jerusalem as an Arab capital, but to deprive Jews of establishing it as theirs.

Nowhere was this clearer than in 1949, when almost the entire Arab world appealed to the UN to make Jerusalem an international city - and expel all Jews who moved there since 1947:

Yes, Arabs wanted to give away the entire city, including Muslim holy places, holy places to the UN in 1949 - for the sole purpose of depriving Jews of controlling even the western part of the city!

Is this how a nation acts towards their capital?

Fast forward back to today. Idiots like Carter insist that a Palestinian Arab state cannot possibly exist without Jerusalem as their capital.

The simple question is - why?

If Tel Aviv must be Israel's capital according to the entire world, why can Ramallah not be the Palestinian Arab capital?

The fact is that the only reason that people say that Jerusalem must be the Palestinian Arab capital is because the Palestinian Arabs insist upon it, despite the absence of any historical ties to the city as a political or cultural center for the Arab world. Their insistence - wholly predicated on taking away Jewish sovereignty - is regarded as somehow more valuable and authentic than the rich Jewish historical, religious and cultural ties to the city.

The question of Jerusalem exposes the hypocrisy of the world.