Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, January 09, 2011

PalArabs pretend to have identified Arafat's "poison"

Firas Press reports that the former Special Adviser Yasser Arafat has, after months of painstaking research, determined the likely poison agent used to "assassinate" Arafat: Thallium.

According to the adviser, Bassam Abu Sharif, "British and European toxins experts are unfamiliar with this poison, but a specialist in criminal investigation on the murder by poison knows about it and and it is very effective, and there is no antidote to stop it after five hours of injection or being eaten."

Abu Sharif adds that "the expert who has done research confirmed that this poison works slowly to destroy the internal organs of the victim one after the other (liver - kidney - lung - and then the brain) and that the period of time to kill a man with this poison varies from person to person based on [various factors]. This period ranges from two to eight months, which gives an opportunity for offenders to escape from the crime scene."

The supposed "expert" looks like a scam artist who took money from Abu Sharif to pretend to unravel the mystery of how a man who died from AIDS can be credibly made to appear to have been poisoned by Israel. In fact, thallium poisoning usually is seen quite quickly and there is an antidote known to scientists since the 1960s - Prussian blue.

Oh well. Better luck next time!

(h/t Folderol)

Melanie Phillips: "Israeli hasbara is a joke"

A video where Phillips tells it like it is:

Facts and logic do not work on the ideologues

Ha'aretz this morning has another article that twists the facts of the Abu Rahma case. This one, by Gideon Levy, blames the IDF for what he thinks is clear evidence that Jawaher Abu Rahma's death, and he calls the IDF spokespeople liars.

Now there is no doubt that the IDF has not handled this as well as they should have. But what is even more clear is that there is no way that a healthy person with no other medical condition will be killed by a weak concentration of tear gas that hovered for a few seconds from between 150 and 500 meters away, depending on the version of the story.

So I commented on the story:

Never in history has anyone been documented of dying from CS tear gas inhalation outdoors - let alone from 150 meters away from the gas source. Never. It is essentially impossible to breathe in a lethal concentration of CS gas for the amount of time necessary for a healthy person to die in a ventilated area. Levy and Haaretz, by insisting otherwise, are the liars.

I received two responses. The first one was from Darwish:

Thank you for clearing that up. Now can you please list your credentials to lend support to your stated "facts."

So Ha'aretz has scientific credentials that I lack. I didn't know that.

The second one was:

How do you know all this? Researched intensively on tear gas use over the past 50 years have you? Doctorate in the subject? Even if this poor girl did have an underlying condition, it was evidently the gas which led to her death. Whether 99.9% of the population would not have died under the same circumstances is really not the issue. THe IDF should step up and take responsibility. Their constant evasion of responsibility is totally counterproductive.

So I answered:

Sources? Sure!
Physicians for Human Rights 1989 paper on tear gas
Archives of Toxicology vol 77 number 10 (misquoted by Haaretz on Friday)
BMJ June 2009
And, finally, Prof. Dr. Uwe Heinrich in his paper on CS at Waco said "There are no reports on human death related to CS exposure" in 2000.

Haaretz apparently doesn't let me put in URLs, but the reports are out there - IF you care about the truth and not simply finding fault with Israel.

(I had first tried putting in URLs to the blog, which Ha'aretz rejected.)

The funny thing is that my fact-based response, which anyone could Google, got seven "thumbs up" and five "thumbs down." (My original post also received a healthy number of "thumbs down.")

Now, why would anyone disapprove a post that gives the real research and unbiased information?

The only conclusion you can draw is that a lot of people are emotionally invested in the idea that the IDF is filed with murderers and liars, and any fact - no matter how tangential - that disturbs that meme is viewed somehow as a threat to their cherished viewpoint. Instead of shaking them up, it strengthens their resolve to fight.

In other words, logic and facts are useless. These people are following a religion, the religion of IDF-hatred, and convincing them otherwise is as useless as using logic against a Christian fundamentalist or an Apple Macintosh fan. One someone is emotionally invested, then - game over. This is why it is so difficult to find people who who publicly give out their opinions who are willing to admit to or correct their mistakes.

From a hasbara perspective, it is useless to try to convince the ideologues that they are wrong. Practically none of them can listen to facts that contradict their worldview without getting offended, and that very offense shuts down whatever little ability they may have had to listen to logic. It is a form of primitive flight or fight.

I am convinced, however, that most people do not have any strong opinions, and sort of go with the flow - whatever they glean from the headlines. These are the people that need to be targeted with facts - and with soundbites, posters, videos, and so on. When going into battle against the frothing haters like Levy and his fans, the important thing is to remember who the audience is.

It isn't the other side. It's the lurkers.

Chile's recognition of "Palestine": A partial victory for Israel?

Chile has joined other South American countries in recognizing "Palestine" - but this recognition is different than that of Brazil, Argentina, Ecuador and Uruguay. While those other countries mentioned the imaginary "1967 borders" as the boundaries of the state, Chile specifically didn't:

The State of Chile has always and consistently supported the right of the Palestinian people to establish itself as an independent state coexisting in peace with the State of Israel. It has also fully endorsed the right of Israel to exist within secure and internationally recognized borders.

It says nothing about the borders of the state.

Chile was heavily lobbied by its large Palestinian Christian community to recognize "Palestine" on the other side of the Green Line - and it evidently refused, instead echoing the wording of UN Security Council Resolution 242 which imply that the 1949 armistice lines are not going to be the final borders of Israel.

Morning links

Some stuff, new and not so new...

Melanie Phillip's excellent speech on how Israel must treat delegitimization (from last month)

The IDF is going on the record the Jawaher Abu Rahma did not die from tear gas. Not as many specifics as I would like, though.

The IDF also shows video from last Friday's Bil'in protest, showing that they wait for the stone throwing and fence-cutting before shooting tear gas.

The JCPA has a paper on Turkey's disappearing Jewish community.

The flying Mossad agent is being freed from Saudi Arabia!

And for those going to the counter-protest in New York today, please take pictures and video - especially if any of my posters are being used :)

Meanwhile, rockets continue from Gaza (Israeligirl)

From Israeligirl:

Rocket attacks on Israel have escalated over the weekend, as one IDF soldier was killed and several soldiers and civilians were injured in clashes with Palestinian terrorists.

The al-Quds Brigades, the militant arm of the Islamic Jihad group, took responsibility for the shootings. Hamas is looking the other way, allowing smaller terrorist groups to test how far Israel will go in its response.

Here is a summary of the events:

On Friday evening, An IDF force identified several Palestinian militants planting explosive devices near the fence in the Central Gaza Strip. The soldiers reacted by firing towards the Palestinian terrorists. For a reason that is still unclear, one of the shells deviated from its course and hurt IDF soldiers. Sgt. Nadav Rotenberg was killed and an other IDF officer was moderately injured. Three other IDF soldiers were lightly wounded during the incident.

3 foreign workers were injured when a mortar fired from the Gaza Strip exploded in the Sha'ar Hanegev region. One of the foreign workers was in moderate-serious condition from shrapnel injuries to his chest. A second foreign worker was moderately wounded by shrapnel in his leg and a third was lightly wounded in the incident.

At least three Qassam rockets were fired at southern Israel Saturday evening, wounding a truck driver lightly. The truck driver was hurt by glass shreds after driving near the rocket landing site.

It's been slightly more than 2 years since Israel launched operation "Cast Lead" and Hamas is increasing the fire slowly but surely.

For those who like to use Ma'an as a reliable source...

Today's Ma'an (English) says:

The Palestinians will achieve a historic triumph in any future confrontation with Israel, but the toll will be heavy on the Palestinian side, senior Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahhar said Saturday.

"We are only a few steps away from achieving a historic triumph which might cost us a large number of our children. However, in the coming confrontation with the Zionist entity, we will realize our ancestors' dream and return history to the right track," Zahhar said

The Hamas official made the comments at a ceremony held to commemorate the second anniversary of a massacre at the UN-controlled Al-Fakhoura school in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip.

The school which was bombarded by Israeli forces during Operation Cast Lead, a three-week offensive that began in December 2008.

Even the UNRWA admitted that no shells hit the school:

...[T]he Situation Report of 7 January referred to ‘the shelling of the UNRWA school in Jabalia.’ The Humanitarian Coordinator would like to clarify that the shelling, and all of the fatalities, took place outside rather than inside the school.

In fact, the shells hit a street outside the school, from which there had been mortar fire according to witnesses, and at least three and possibly as many as 10 militants were killed in the IDF response.

Western media will often quote Ma'an as if it is a real news source. They should think twice.

Is Ha'aretz just making stuff up? UPDATE: Not this time, at least.

Ha'aretz, Friday, had an article headlined: 2004 IDF study: High concentrations of tear gas could be lethal

Here's what it said:

Seven years ago, the IDF Medical Corps published a study on CS gas in both the Israeli medical journal “Refuah” and the overseas journal “Archives of Toxicology.”

That study, based on animal experiments, concluded that to kill a person, you would need a dose 800 to 5,600 times larger than the quantities used to disperse demonstrations.

Nevertheless, it added, a high concentration of the gas in a given location could cause serious or even lethal harm, and therefore, the gas cannot be considered innocuous.

Over the last year the IDF has begun using a tear gas grenade launcher in Bil’in, the Ringo, that allows them to shoot six canisters at once into the same place, creating a thick cloud of gas. The Palestinians say Abu Rahmah was caught in such a cloud.

When Haaretz contacted some of the doctors involved in the Medical Corps study, they declined to comment, saying the study was not necessarily relevant to today’s conditions.

The study “approved the way the IDF used tear gas then and determined that it was not life-threatening,” one explained. “If the way the gas is used has changed, and especially in a manner that creates much higher concentrations, it’s necessary to do a new study.”

I have this weird tendency to be skeptical of everything I read and to seek corroboration. And it just so happens that the Archives of Toxicology has its abstracts online, so I could look for any articles about CS over the past forty years or so.

The journal has published exactly five articles on the topic of CS, or to be precise, o-chlorobenzylidene malononitrile, since only one of those articles was written in the past ten years, it has to be the article Ha'aretz is referring to because it was written by Israelis (published in 2003):

Report of accidental CS ingestion among seven patients in central Israel and review of the current literature
I. Solomon, I. Kochba, E. Eizenkraft and N. Maharshak

Abstract
A report of seven people who accidentally drank a juice contaminated with CS (o-chlorobenzylidene malononitrile) is given. Due to its mucosal irritating properties, CS (also known as "tear gas") is commonly used by policemen and soldiers in riot control. However, only a few reports of its ingestion by humans exist. Ingestion of CS may cause immediate irritation of the oral mucosa and gastrointestinal symptoms later on. Damage of internal organs, which has been shown in animals but only rarely in humans, is probably related to the dose ingested. The extensive use of CS gas merits recognition of the signs and symptoms of its exposure in order to reduce anxiety in both patients and medical staff and to facilitate fast and efficient management.

And the paper does survey the literature about CS, although it only studies the specific case of the seven who accidentally drank juice laced with CS.

There is only one problem: the paper doesn't say what Ha'aretz says is written there.

Here are the relevant parts (h/t Zach who got a full copy for me):

The irritant effects of CS are of rapid onset even in low concentrations and are short lived (15–30 min) if individuals are moved into fresh air (Worthington and Nee 1999), though the time for complete recovery has been questioned (Editorial 1998). Irritant symptoms are produced at concentrations at least 2600 times lower than the lethal dose (Danto 1987). The systems and organs most commonly involved are the eyes, respiratory tract, skin and gastrointestinal tract.

...At high concentrations, enclosed spaces, or prolonged exposures, severe side effects may occur and human deaths from lacrimating agents have been reported (Danto 1987; Ferslew et al. 1986; Thorburn 1982).

CS is just one lacrimating agent, and the Thorburn paper, at least, was entitled "Injuries after use of the lacrimatory agent chloroacetophenone in a confined space" - and chloroacetophenone is not CS (it is the agent used in Mace.)

Unless there is some other article in the Archives of Toxicology that I am missing, then Ha'aretz appears to be making things up. They go on imply that current IDF methods of shooting tear gas are much more toxic than in the past, and further imply that this makes CS as deadly outdoors at it potentially is in an enclosed space for a full minute.

The entire article is trying incredibly hard to implicate the IDF, and it hangs on a study that simply doesn't say what Ha'aretz claims it says.

So where did Ha'aretz get this from? Did they read the paper and ignore it? Did they take the information from someone else and that person made it up? Or, is there a chance that the Archives of Toxicology had another article on CS, by members of the IDF, within a year of the article I found?

I've been looking hard, and I cannot find a single case of someone dying from CS outdoors, ever. And even indoor cases are very hard to find. Ha'aretz, however, seems to want people to believe otherwise. Why is that?

UPDATE: I have been emailed a link to the Hebrew paper (in the Refu'ah journal) that Ha'aretz was referring to and it is not at all the one that was published in the Archives of Toxicology. It was written by different people than the paper I referred to above and appears to be a general overview of CS gas. (My Hebrew is not good enough to actually understand most of it.)

At any rate, Ha'aretz' assertion that the paper was published in the Archives of Toxicology is not true. I cannot find the paper in English anywhere, although here is the abstract.

Mrs. Ginsburg gets a visit from the Human Rights Police

SCENE: Mrs. Ginsburg is in the kitchen of her home in Israel, preparing a meal.

The door bursts open and three men in suits enter.

MAN 1: Drop the knife!

MRS. GINSBURG [dropping knife] : What's wrong? Who are you?

MAN 1: I'm Richard Johnson - Human Rights Police. Step away from the counter!

MRS. G: Oh, dear, what's wrong?

JOHNSON: Your chemical weapons killed an Arab woman in the next village.

MRS. G, surprised: What did you say?

JOHNSON: Oh, don't act coy, ma'am. You know what you did.

MRS. G: To be honest, I'm at a loss. I'm just preparing dinner for my family.

JOHNSON: Oh, sure. Dinner. And I suppose that all of your dinners include - onions? [pointing to her chopping board]

MRS. G: Well, some of them do.

MAN 2: Onions contain chemicals. At high concentrations the chemicals can kill someone. And that's exactly what happened to Mrs. Khalawar.

MAN 3: Propanol S-oxide.

MRS. G: I'm so sorry! I didn't know!

JOHNSON: Oh, yes you did. Your eyes tear when you chop onions - you know, and so does everyone else. Don't pretend and lie. You Israelis make me sick.

MRS. G: But if onions are so dangerous,then we have to warn the people in the nursing home down the block!

JOHNSON: Really? [Speaking into walkie talkie] - Whitson, new information about an old age home - check it out for fatalities. [Back to Mrs. Ginsburg] What's the name of the facility?

MRS. G: Ummm...the Gloria Cohen center, I think.

JOHNSON makes a disgusted face. [back to walkie talkie] Cancel that order, Whitson. [To Mrs. Ginsburg] Stop playing with us, the fumes only kill Arabs. Everyone knows that.

MRS G: I don't want to hurt anyone, but how can I cook without onions? I always use onions! Onion soup, chopped liver, and tonight I was making pepper steak...

JOHNSON: [Shocked] Did you say pepper?

MRS. G: Yes, pepper steak...

JOHNSON [to walkie talkie] Get the Hazmat suits, stat! We have a full blown case of chemical warfare here!

MRS. G: [sputtering] But...but...

MAN 2: Two lachrymatory agents in one dish! The horror!

MAN 3: Who knows how the S-oxide would combine with the capsaicin in the peppers? It could start World War 3!

JOHNSON: [to walkie talkie] Find out every Arab woman and child who has died in the past six months within a five kilometer radius. [eyeing Mrs. Ginsburg] We think we found the cause. Over. [back to Mrs. Ginsburg] Do you know nothing about human rights of Arabs? Now we have to shut you down.

[Men arrive in hazmat suits, start ripping apart Mrs. Ginsburg's kitchen.]

[Tight shot of a confused Mrs. Ginsburg. Fade out.]

An interesting school name in Rafah

Hamas concluded a week-long commemoration of the Gaza was with an assembly at a secondary school in Rafah on Thursday.

The name of the school is "Beersheba." ( بئر السبع )

Just another tiny proof among the thousands of others that many Arabs will not rest until Israel is destroyed.

The day in tear gas

In the past day or so, tear gas was deployed in:

Algeria
Telangana, India
Jordan
Greece
Turkey
and Tanzania.

Let's see how many of these incidents capture the imagination of the human rights community.

Son of an imam who is a critic of Islam gets death threats

From Translating Jihad:

Hamad 'Abd-al-Samad: I Consider Islam Part of the Problem in the Islamic World

masrawy.com, 6 Jan 2011, (link to Arabic)

What would the world lose if the Islamic nations disappeared from the map? Almost nothing, says Hamad 'Abd-al-Samad, and he adds that the Islamic world has stopped innovating, and become a burden on the civilized nations. Indeed it has become a breeding ground for intolerance and violence. The researcher at the University of Munich says in his book, which was published in German and Arabic under the title "The Fall of the Islamic World," that the Muslims are fixed on the past, and are unable to answer the difficult questions of the future. Therefore they flee to the successes of a glorious past."

The book has caused serious controversy since its release in Germany, between those who accuse 'Abd-al-Samad of disseminating and establishing stereotypes, and those who consider him a "brave writer" who has placed his finger on the problem for many people, calling on Muslims to take charge of the reform of their own societies. In this book, 'Abd-al-Samad considers Islam a part of the problem in the Islamic world, and he looks at the Qur'an as a stumbling block in the way of Muslim development, due to the enormous influence the text of the Qur'an has over Muslims. The author has received a number of death threats, and also received accusations that he--the son of an imam of a mosque in the Egyptian countryside--is swimming in the current of hostility to Islam and Muslims. [...]

In another article, possibly based on the same interview which seems to have been done by Deutsche Welle, he says "that the Islamic world will collapse, and is expected to fall during the decades after the oil runs out and the desertification of parts of it occur due to climate change."

Enough links to last the weekend

Hamas leader Mahmoud al Zahar told a rally in Gaza that the Holocaust was a Zionist lie. Surprised?

The Economist has a good article about Israel's economic promise, and potential problems. (h/t Yaakov Lozowick)

Israellycool, inspired by my series, makes his own poster.

Speaking of, a Polish site put my posters together in a narrative!

Zach at Facebook notices that a couple of people were killed in a protest in Tanzania, a story that will disappear immediately without a trace because no one can blame the Jews.

Yesterday the PA released a number of prisoners who were involved in major terror attacks - including the massacre of four people near Hebron in August. Palestine Today has smiling photos of them. (Israel arrested them, accidentally killing a man during the search.)

Palestine Today also reports that Israel is looking for a type of gum to keep soldiers alert and awake. I figure, if Israelis are so good at making sex gum, how hard can it be?

Swiss bank UBS has banned money transfers to certain anti-Israel (called "pro-Palestinian") organizations. The major one is Collectif Urgence Palestine, whose webpage says that their objectives are to end occupation, release prisoners and allow the right to return as a first step. Hmm..wonder what Step 2 might be? (It is possible the UBS made the decision after lawsuits from Israeli victims of terror claiming that UBS money transfers funded the attacks.)

Folderol sent a link to some new information indicating that Jews used Greek translations of the Torah in synagogues much later than had been thought. Some of the Greek is written in Hebrew characters.

Richard Millett notices an advertisement for tourism to "Palestine" that seems to imply that Israel doesn't exist. Will the UK advertising board ASA object?

Alan Dershowitz and Yaacov Lozowick respond to the ridiculous Letty Cottin Pogrebin column in the Forward that I skewered last week.

Yaacov also has a nice perspective on Abu Rahma.

I had missed this great story from last month: BDS protesters tried to intimidate a Montreal shoe store owner into dropping a brand of high-end Israeli women's shoes called BeautiFeel. He refused, and the Montreal Jewish community has more than made up for any losses from the weekly protests. (One woman bought $3000 worth of shoes to distribute to the homeless!) (from Gil Troy blog)

The dog who drove Nazis crazy

From JPost:

Germany's Nazi government was so angry about a dog trained to imitate Hitler that it started an obsessive campaign against its Finnish owner, according to newly discovered documents.

In the middle of World War II, the Foreign Office in Berlin commanded its diplomats in the Nazi-friendly Nordic country to gather evidence on the dog, and even came up with plans to destroy the pharmaceutical wholesale company of the dog's owner.

The dog, Jackie, was a mutt owned by Tor Borg, a businessman from the Finnish city of Tampere. Borg's wife Josefine, a German citizen known for her anti-Nazi sentiments, dubbed the dog Hitler because of the strange way it raised its paw high in the air like Germans greeting the Fuehrer with a cry of "Heil Hitler!"

On January 29, 1941, German Vice Consul Willy Erkelenz in Helsinki wrote that "a witness, who does not want to be named, said ... he saw and heard how Borg's dog reacted to the command 'Hitler' by raising its paw."

Borg was ordered to the German embassy in Helsinki and questioned about his dog's unusual greeting habits.

He denied ever calling the dog by the German dictator's name, but admitted that his wife called the dog Hitler. He tried to play down the accusations, saying the paw-raising had only happened a few times in 1933 — shortly after Hitler came to power.

The Finnish merchant ensured the Nazi diplomats that he never did anything "that could be seen as an insult against the German Reich."

The zealous diplomats in Helsinki did not believe him and wrote back to Berlin that "Borg, even though he claims otherwise, is not telling the truth."

The different ministries that were involved in the dog scandal — the Foreign Office, the Economy Ministry and even Hitler's Chancellory — meticulously reported all their findings about the canine.

The economy ministry announced that the German chemical conglomerate IG Farben, which had supplied Borg's wholesale trade with pharmaceuticals, offered to eliminate his company by ending their cooperation with him.

Based on all this support, the Foreign Office was already looking for ways to bring Borg to trial for insulting Hitler, but in the end, none of the potential witnesses were willing to repeat their accusations in front of a judge.

Although the episode is funny, there is a very important lesson to be learned:

Totalitarians have no sense of humor, and hate being made fun of.

Satire, humor and put-downs are important weapons against Islamists, Islamic terrorists and Islamist dictators. The entire purpose of terror, after all, is to feel important and relevant, to feel that you can make superpowers quake with fear. Every statement coming out of Iran is designed to make that state look like a superpower whose decisions must be taken seriously. If the reaction is instead belittling and humorous scorn that shows that they are like mere mosquitoes who need to be slapped down, they lose much of their incentive and power.

The Islamic terror supporters are good at insults but they are awful at being the butts of jokes. A few well-placed YouTube videos can make even other Arabs laugh at them. And it is something that anyone can do.

IDF: new information proves Abu Rahma died of other causes

YNet reports:

Israel Defense Forces officials said Friday that the army was about to reach an agreement with official Palestinian sources that the death of Jawaher Abu-Rahma in the West Bank village of Bilin last week was not caused by tear gas fired during an anti-fence rally in the area.

"Our assumptions were verified this week after we received additional documents from the Palestinians," said Judea and Samaria Division Commander Brigadier-General Nitzan Alon.

He added that "the documents and data we received strengthened the understanding that her death was caused by the method of the medical treatment and other medical aspects."

The division commander said some details remained to be examined on the matter, but that further talks would be held with the Palestinians in a bid to reach a final understanding.

"We now understand that she herself was not at the protest, but in a more distant place, where remains of the tear gas may have reached her. But this was not the cause of her death. She died from other illnesses and medical care."

This is on the record, so chances are that the IDF has some specific new information that will show the truth about Abu Rahma's death. My sources say that we will be learning more on Sunday.

"Completely Peaceful" - New EoZ video

An email correspondent suggested this idea...

Wikileaks: "PA money going to Hamas"

From Aftenposten's Wikileaks collection, a cable dated December 4, 2008:

Econoff called Udi Levi, Counterterrorism Finance Bureau Director at the [Israeli] National Security Council (NSC) and a senior intelligence officer on December 2 to press for release of NIS 250 million to the Gaza banking system, as requested by the Palestinian Monetary Authority. Levi said continued rocket and mortar attacks from Gaza, stalemate in negotions on release of Hamas-held Israeli Defense Force soldier Gilad Shalit, and new information on Hamas access to the Palestinian Authority salary payments funded by the requested transfer all made it unlikely that the GOI would honor the request.

Levi did say that the GOI is considering a policy to permit about NIS 40 million in new liquidity to enter the Gaza Strip banks on a monthly basis. The exact amount is still under discussion, said Levi, but the Israeli security services have agreed that monthly transfers of some amount of shekels to Gaza are necessary to avoid collapse of the banking system there.

However, Levi noted GOI intelligence has indications that Gaza banks are being forced by Hamas to underreport their true reserve holdings, so it is difficult for the GOI to assess the current state of the banking system in Gaza. He said that the banks have had no choice but to follow Hamas instructions and conduct business as if they were operating on insufficient reserves. He posited that the present pre-Eid crisis might be an attempt by Hamas to further consolidate its power in Gaza though he was vague on how the crisis would forward the Hamas agenda. Regarding the PA,s payroll, Levi told econoff that it included Hamas members and many other questionable individuals that the GOI did not believe to be working as civil servants for the Fatah-controlled PA. He offered to share all GOI information on the topicin a meeting with relevant USG officials at their earliest convenience. We will take him up on that offer and report septel.

A cable from November gives some background:

The PA contends that Hamas, ability to pay its workers, salaries each month combined with the inability of the PA to do so causes further deterioration in support for PA/Fatah relative to Hamas (reftel &I8). The GOI, on the other hand, believes that many of the estimated 77,000 wage earners on the PAs payroll may actually be Hamas members or affiliates. Israeli security analysts argue that a considerable portion of the civil service salaries that the PA attempts to pay each month to its Gazan employees actually find their way to Hamas or Hamas supporters (see reftel "D"). They have therefore determined that full coverage of the payroll is contrary to Israel,s security interests, even if Hamas gains some political advantage from being able to pay its salaries in full.

Furthermore, GOI officials, while often praising the credentials of PA technocrats, doubt the effectiveness and authority of the Palestinian Monetary Authority (PMA) to regulate and police Palestinian, and especially Gazan banks.

A new congressman who gets it

Great speech by Florida's new congressman Allen West:

(h/t Barry Rubin via email)

Islamic leader who is anti-semitic? No way!

Prominent Sunni Islamic sheikh Yusuf Al Qaradawi, who has millions of foillowers, has written the introduction to a biography of Yahya Ayyash, Hamas' chief bomb-maker known as "the Englineer," who was killed by Israel in 1996.

Qaradawi, who is an enthusiastic supporter of terrorism, wrote in the introduction that Ayyash "infuriated the Jews in his life and his blood will remain a curse on them after his death."

Ayyash himself was not reluctant to say that his hatred was against the Jews. He is quoted in the Al Qassam site on the anniversary of his death as saying "the war against the Zionist entity will not be over until there are no Jews in the land of Palestine" as well as other sayings.

A minor correction on a previous tear gas posting

In my update to my posting about Physicians for Human Rights and tear gas, I wrote:

Some blogs are saying "The U.S. Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine warns that at a concentration of 2mg per cubic meter, CS gas 'is immediately dangerous to life [and health]…'

The document does say that - and it is a typo.

It turns out it was not a typo - but it doesn't mean what it sounds like.

The phrase "immediately dangerous to life and health," IDLH, is a specific technical term that is defined by OSHA as "an atmosphere that poses an immediate threat to life, would cause irreversible adverse health effects, or would impair an individual's ability to escape from a dangerous atmosphere." The word "impair" is the key word here, meaning it makes it more difficult to leave but does not prevent the individual from doing so.

For those keeping score, there are three important acronyms when dealing with tear gas: IDLH, as defined above, ICt50, which is the concentration that is intolerable to 50% of the exposed population for 1 minute, and LCt50, which is the concentration that is lethal to 50% of the exposed population for one minute.

For CS tear gas, the numbers are

Odor threshold value - 0.004 mg/m3 (concentration that can be smelled)
IDLH - 2 mg/m3
ICt50 - 3.6 mg/m3 (depending on which study; some humans can learn to tolerate up to 6.6 mg/m3)
LCt50 - 61,000 mg/m3

So while it seems counterintuitive that IDLH would be lower than ICt50, the OSHA definition makes it make sense.

The huge difference between ICt50 and LCt50 is what makes CS such a perfect tool for crowd control. The amount needed to get someone to run away is far, far less than the amount necessary to kill someone.

Lying about tear gas deaths: Lisa Goldman and Joseph Dana (updated)

I stumbled across a tweet from self-described journalist Lisa Goldman, where she says "Amnesty Int'l documented 40 deaths in one year from the tear gas that killed Jawaher Abu Rahmah."

Her source? The rabidly anti-Israel lobby group, Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. In 1992 they wrote:

Amnesty International has reported 40 deaths from CS tear gas inhalation alone from December 1987 to June 1988.

Notice this: Lisa did not try to look for the original Amnesty International report that supposedly says this. She linked to WRMEA; uncritically believing that they were quoting Amnesty. This is not how a journalist is supposed to act.

This piece of information of the supposed 40 deaths in seven months has now been rocketing around the Twittersphere and blogosphere and even some left wing websites. But no one has tried to find the actual report. Except for one person: Joseph Dana, of the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee - who may have started this rumor - says that Amnesty wrote it in their report "Israel and the Occupied Territories: Amnesty International’s concerns in 1988."

Amnesty's 1988 report is not online. But their response to Israel's criticisms regarding that report is. And here is how they defend their methodology:

The manufacturers of CS tear-gas used by Israeli forces stress that such agent can be lethal if misused -- for example, by using it in confined spaces from which vulnerable individuals cannot readily exit. It is particularly dangerous when used in massive quantities in heavily built-up and populated areas, as has been the case with the refugee camps in the Occupied Territories, or when launched directly into homes or other buildings. Infants and elderly people or others who cannot rapidly move away, as well as people with respiratory problems, are particularly vulnerable.

Amnesty International finds such background sufficient to warrant the reporting of deaths following alleged misuse of tear-gas, and to call for adequate investigation of this issue, even in the absence of conclusive medical evidence to prove or disprove the extent to which these deaths were caused by tear-gas inhalation. In June 1988 it issued a report outlining its concerns on the matter.

These paragraphs prove that Amnesty either didn't explicitly charge that the deaths came from tear gas in the 1988 report, or they backtracked from that assertion. It also proves that Amnesty was only talking about misuse of tear gas in confined areas - which the IDF admits had happened on occasion during the first intifada. And Amnesty notes that Israel has changed its guidelines for tear gas use in 1988 to stop using it in confined spaces.

In other words, the Amnesty report repeating assertions from Arabs in 1988 - admittedly without proof - that 40 of them were killed by misuse of tear gas has absolutely no relevance to the death of a single supposedly healthy person in 2010 who died, outdoors, quite a distance from any tear gas.

To compare the two is similar to saying that Jawaher Abu Rahma had died of an overdose of saccharine because she had two packets of artificial sweetener earlier that day. After all, there are scientific studies that a huge quantity of saccharine can kill humans if ingested very quickly!

The facts are clear. No one can find a single documented case in scientific literature of anyone dying from CS tear gas outdoors, ever. (I've been looking.)There are very, very few documented cases of CS tear gas killing people even indoors, at concentrations and over time periods that are hundreds of times more potent than any possible outdoor scenario.

Anyone bringing studies of isolated tear gas-related deaths of people were stuck indoors with high concentrations for long time periods as some type of proof that Abu Rahma was killed by tear gas in fresh air is, knowingly, lying.

UPDATE: Balfour St. finds that Goldman makes mistakes in her article on the subject, misreading a BMJ article on tear gas to falsely claim that CS is more dangerous than CN (it is less dangerous) and mistakenly claiming that CS is banned in the UK (it isn't.) The BMJ article also does not mention any cases of CS killing anyone outdoors. Even its mentioning that CS might have killed some of the Branch Davidians in Waco in 1993 is far from definitive: this report on the matter says that the only way they could have died is if they were unable to leave the rooms with the CS.

This is what is called "news" in Gaza

I mentioned earlier today that Western news agencies are ignoring Hamas' daily abuses against Arabs in Gaza.

So what are all of those reporters, photographers and stringers doing there?

Here's a clue:

Cameramen and photographers surround two Palestinians participating in a reenactment of an Israeli strike during a performance organized by Hamas, marking the second anniversary of theIsrael-Gaza war, in Jebaliya, northern Gaza strip, Thursday, Jan. 6, 2010.

Snapped Shot counted 21 photographers in this photo that is literally staged by Hamas.

There is no doubt that a great number of so-called "journalists" in Gaza are simply shills for Hamas, ready to jump and photograph anything Hamas asks and happy to avoid all areas that Hamas tells them to stay away from (a very common occurrence, especially after "unexplained" explosions.)

The web infrastructure of the PA government is a joke

Even though PA prime minister Salam Fayyad has been telling every Western reporter that he is building the infrastructure for a state in the Palestinian Authority, a look at the websites of the PA government shows a mess that might reflect the reality more than any official statements.

The sites are filled with broken links, incomplete pages, and many have not been updated in years. The quality of the websites looks more like how the web looked in 1996 than 2011.

Here is a survey of the PA web pages I could find:

The State Information Service page, which is supposed to be the main portal, is not even up. This made it a bit difficult to find the other pages.

The Ministry of Planning homepage returns an error code.

The Ministry of Education site is a bit better, last updated in May of 2010. It includes, of course, a section on how "occupation" is affecting education.

The Prime Minister's Office site isn't terrible and is reasonably up to date, although it points to a webmail page that does not have a trusted certificate for its encryption.

The Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs site has not been updated since 2001.

The Ministry of Finance page is only a couple of weeks out of date. For some reason it includes a collection of "Nakba" photos, as well as photos of places like Haifa.

The Ministry of the National Economy (English) is a horrendous site , barely updated ever (some news items from 2004 and 2009), filled with broken links. Its Arabic site is a little better, and has been updated more recently, but has the same broken links.

The National Plan of Action for Palestinian Children still refers to President Yasir Arafat. It is pretty much a shell of a site, set up once a long time ago and long forgotten.

The Palestinian Legislative Council's homepage is filled with photos of their meetings - in the same conference room, around the same table, from the same camera angle. Wow.

The Commission of Human Rights page has not been updated since 2004.

The Ministry of Environmental Affairs starts with an awful Flash animation, and then shows pretty much nothing. It does not appear to have been updated since 2001. Not surprisingly, two of its three publications blame Israel for every environmental issue.

Perhaps the most symbolic of the broken pages is the government website dedicated to a European/Mediterranean Information Society initiative, to connect the PA to other countries in a large network. That page has not been updated since 2001.

This entire mess seems to be the responsibility of the Government Computer Center, which sets up websites for other government organizations.

It may not be a coincidence that the most up-to-date sites - the Prime Minister, Economy and Finance - are all sites that are of special interest to Prime Minister Fayyad. While this is hardly evidence, it gives the impression that the entire PA infrastructure is a shell, intended to fool the West into thinking that there is something solid there when it is completely rotten underneath. What journalist is going to bother to spend the half hour it takes to find this mess?

Keep in mind that there are literally billions of dollars being poured into building an infrastructure for the PA. Most Palestinian Arabs do have connections to the Internet so there is a possibility for a lot of value - and money savings - in an effective Web presence. There is no evidence that any effort is being put into the cyber-infrastructure of the PA.

If the state-building that is supposedly being done in the Palestinian Authority is being reflected in their websites, then there won't be a Palestinian Arab state for a very, very long time.

Some child abuse, discovered by Palestinian Media Watch:

A glimpse of the world of education in Sur Baher in East Jerusalem was recently made available by Hamas TV. A broadcast showed how the Jerusalem children in the Islamic Riyad (Gardens of) Al-Aqsa School were taught to sing about desiring death: "May our blood be shed."

They also sang the following in front of the cameras:
"How strong is the army of Al-Aqsa.
I am a soldier, defending its protected area.
How precious is the land of Al-Aqsa.
I shall give up my life for its sake."

"Zionists broadcast pornography to child prisoners"

Palestinian Arabs are accusing Israel of showing pornography to its Arab prisoners under the age of 18.

Palestine Today reports that Mohammed Khalaf was recently released from the children's section of the Megiddo prison. He is quoted as saying that "the prison administration is running several channels of pornography in the section for those who are under 18 years old."

This is an outrage! My cable company charges extra for adult films, and Israel's prisons provide several channels for free?

This ridiculous story is already spreading quickly throughout the online Arabic media sites.

Pro-Israel Blog-Off contest (updated)

Israellycool is sponsoring the first annual Pro Israel Blog-off Contest. The details are:

Bloggers are invited to submit one ”pro-Israel” entry, whether it be a blog post, podcast, or video no older than 1 month. Then each week, I will pit submissions against each other. The winner, decided by a combination of reader votes and panel-determined score, moves to the next round, where they will submit a new entry to compete against another first round winner.

The process continues until we get to two finalists competing for an Apple iPad.

I have around 300 blog posts in the last month, and if I want to enter, I have to choose one.

I have no idea.

One of my posters? One of my ElderToons? Or simply one of my regular posts?

I'm thinking perhaps my "Enemies" poster, my Christmas poster, my Abbas intransigence ElderToon, my Apartheid ElderToon, or my Abu Rahma ElderToon. Or my video version of Nothing's Changed. Or my post on How to Defame Israel, NPR Edition. Or

Any suggestions or votes would be appreciated!

UPDATE: I made an executive decision, to submit my Apartheid ElderToon. I figure that Yaakov Kirschen, the cartoonist behind Dry Bones and one of the judges, might lean towards that, and no one else is likely to submit a cartoon so it makes my entry stand out.

Morning links

Elliot Abrams now has a blog that might be interesting.

Excellent Michael Young post on Syria: " What we see is Syria simultaneously being an arsonist and a fireman." (h/t Silke)

Rob Miller on why Israel is losing the information war, and Israel Matzav's comments.

Michael Totten on Arab conspiracy theories. (h/t Silke)

On a related note, the Heplev blog brings us this:

UPDATE: One more, from last month, on Jordanian oppression of Palestinian Arabs.

You need Arab media to find out the truth in Gaza

It is ironic that the Western media is not as critical of Hamas as some of the Arabic media are.

The latest example is an article in Dar Al Hayat (London), quoted in Palestine Press Agency and many other places in Arabic.

On Saturday, a Beit Lahiya resident named Ghassan Abu Nasr asked Hamas police why they were arresting his neighbor, Shadi Diab.

Because of that, the police took Abu Nasr and his neighbor, drove them to an empty area, beat them with a baton, then brought them to Hamas police station where they continued to beat them with rifle butts and batons.

Abu Nasr's knee and right hand were broken. Abu Diab fell into a coma and is now being hospitalized.

Al Hayat goes on to report that Gaza citizens are afraid of the endemic abuses of Gaza police. Even though Hamas claims that they are working to improve the situation, with training police on how to act and punishing those who abuse people, it is not working and Gazans still live in fear. There are many similar stories, including against journalists.

This article has been reproduced widely in the Arab media. Yet Western media remains silent.

Why are Arabs more critical of Hamas than the media of the free world?

Poster for counterprotests - 10

I think I'm addicted to doing these....

(Photo h/t CiFWatch via Jed)

Spoofing the pro-Hamas rally poster (9th in the series)

The anti-Israel rally that is scheduled to take place in New York on Sunday is being co-sponsored by Al Awda, an organization that is rather explicit in its support of terror and desire to destroy Israel.

Here is their flyer:

So I spent a good 15 minutes to come up with this:

If anyone in New York wants to attend the counter-protest this Sunday where you can have fun plastering my posters all over Herald Square, let me know and I'll hook you up with the organizer.

UPDATE: Information on the Stand With Us counter-protest here. But it appears they are only going to be at the destination of the march, not dealing with the march itself.

A little wordy for my tastes, but the quote is so great...

Iran buying land from Lebanese Christians

From Al Arabiya:

The recent rise in Iranian purchases of property owned by Christians stirred controversy in Lebanon as the Islamic republic is accused of dividing the country along sectarian lines and embarking on a Shiite infiltration scheme.

The Shiite purchase of Christian land in Lebanon drove Lebanese Labor Minister Botros Harb to submit to the cabinet a draft law that prohibits the sale of land across religions.
Harb’s proposal mirror Lebanese fears of a scheme that enables Iran of exercising growing economic influence in Lebanon through Shiite businessmen who buy lands and houses owned by Christians and take advantage of Lebanon’s free market economy.

According to the draft [law], those who violate this law whether by sale, purchase, or mediation will face five to 10 years in jail and fined double the price of the sold property.

The main purpose of the draft law is sounding alarm bells over an organized scheme of appropriating Christian land, said Labor Minister Botros Harb.

“These purchases aim at undermining Lebanon’s religious diversity and national unity,” he told AlArabiya.net.

Although Iran is reportedly the “foreign party” behind those purchases, Harb refused to name the parties or countries involved.

According to Lebanese economic expert Dr. Ghazi Wazni,..."“The possibility of approving this law or putting it on the cabinet’s agenda is zero percent.”

Isn't that interesting?

Reaching out to Arabs in Hebron. But where's the other side?

From Israel21C:

I cannot bring myself to be as ecstatic about these sorts of initiatives as the well-meaning organizers are. All I can think is - where are the people creating similar initiatives on the Arab side? Why are all of these types of programs created by Israeli Jews?

A few other things bother me about this video.

For the past 10 years, it has been officially forbidden for Israeli citizens to visit the Palestinian West Bank city of Hebron.

Really? I saw the houses of a few hundred Israeli citizens in Hebron, and their friends in Kiryat Arba visit them all the time!

You can refer to it as a "majority Arab city" or whatever, but calling it a "Palestinian city" is an insult to those who believe that Hebron is Jewish, and it was Jewish way before any Arabs were around.

Also, note that even the organizer himself is afraid to walk around the Arab section of Hebron with a yarmulka on his head. Are Arabs afraid to walk around Israel with keffiyehs?

Moreover, note that Jew cannot visit the Muslim part of the Tomb of the Patriarchs. However, I witnessed Arabs visiting the Jewish side when I was there.

And mentioning only that it is the burial ground for Abraham, while ignoring the five or more prominent Biblical figures who are there as well, plays to the Muslim narrative of the second-holiest place in Judaism.

Altogether, I like Israel21C, but their desire to be politically correct in this case ends up insulting Jews more than they intended.

Abu Rahma Lawfare

Palestine Today says that the Abu Rahma family is planning to sue the IDF for the death of Jawaher, which they claim was caused by tear gas.

Her brother Ahmed narrates a tale of her death that seems at odds with what her cousins told Ha'aretz. He describes what happened when she collapsed as if he was there, but her cousins say that he came later with the ambulance.

He also said that she had attended many protests and had never been affected by the tear gas before.

The entire family seems to be heavily involved in the weekly Bil'in riots. Besides her brother Samir who is the ringleader, we see that Ahmed also protests, and three weeks ago the IDF released a Bil'in rioter from prison named Adeeb Abu Rahma, possibly a cousin. And who provided the photos to the ISM in that article? Hamde Abu Rahma, the same person who claimed on Facebook that she was at her home.

So when the family of agitators, rioters and liars (remember, Samir went on TV saying that the soldiers shot "phosphorus") says they want to sue, it is not for justice - it is for politics.

And in the end, they won't, because that would reveal facts about the case that they would rather not have publicized.

According to rioters, Abu Rahma was 150-180 meters away

Ha'aretz published a map of the (one of many) Palestinian Arab version of events in Bil'in. I received a horrible fax copy of it (click to enlarge - h/t Joel for color Hebrew version)

According to this version, Jawaher Abu Rahma was standing 150-180 meters away from the kids throwing stones who were hit with tear gas.

This is nearly two football fields away.

As we saw yesterday from the Physicians for Human Rights paper on tear gas, the immediate cloud produced is some 6-9 meters in diameter and even in the center of the cloud the concentrations of the agent are 3%-10% of the amount usually needed to be breathed in for a full minute to kill the average healthy person.

I can't find any studies on dissipation of CS gas outdoors but simple watching of videos of these demonstrations shows that the gas cloud dissipates within seconds (although the canister emits gas for maybe 10 seconds so if one was right next to the canister one could be exposed at the highest outdoor levels for perhaps 15 seconds.)

While I have no doubt that someone can smell tear gas from a greater distance and even that their eyes can tear from a whiff, the idea that tear gas is toxic from 150 meters is absurd. The entire town of Bil'in would have been wiped out years ago.

(h/t Yisrael Medad and SoccerDad)

Poster for counterprotests - 7

Continuing the series....

Morning links

Some stuff to tide you over (not sure how much I'll be able to post today):

Jeffrey Goldberg on the plight of Middle East Christians (except for Israel, of course.)

Globalising Hatred: The New Antisemitism - book review at JCPA.

Roots of Muslim anti-semitism at CJN

Why isn't Obama pressuring the Palestinians? at FP

Free Jonathan Pollard (video)

(h/t V)

Islamist "cookbook" for Alexandria church bombing - plus a prophecy

From MSNBC:

In the weeks before the New Year's Day suicide bombing of an Egyptian church, al-Qaida-linked websites carried a how-to manual on "destroying the cross," complete with videos on how to build a bomb and the locations of churches to target — including the one that was attacked.

They may have found a receptive audience in Alexandria, where increasingly radicalized Islamic hard-liners have been holding weekly anti-Christian demonstrations, filled with venomous slogans against the minority community.

Only two or three days before Saturday's bombing, police arrested several Salafis spreading fliers in Alexandria calling for violence against Christians, a security official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.

According to authorities, the strong belief among investigators is that local extremists who knew the area and the nature of their target were behind the blast. The Egyptian weekly Al-Youm Al-Saba said police were examining photos of the Salafis' weekly protests for suspects.

In the weeks before the attack, al-Qaida militants on the Web spewing calls for "jihad," or holy war, on Egypt's Christians laid out everything anyone would need to carry out a bombing.

One widely circulated posting includes a so-called "Jihadi Encyclopedia for the Destruction of the Cross," with a series of 10 videos describing how to build a bomb.

In the videos, an unidentified militant in a white lab coat and a black mask is shown listing the ingredients to make TNT and mixing up the chemicals in beakers.

The site lists Coptic Christian churches in Egypt, along with phone numbers and addresses — including Alexandria's Saints Church. "Blow up the churches while they are celebrating Christmas or any other time when the churches are packed," it says.

But I thought that "it goes without saying that no Muslim, whatever their political leanings may be, will ever commit such an inhumane act."

I'm shocked. Shocked!

(h/t Callie)
------------------
After I wrote this, I saw an amazing letter by a Christian who essentially predicted the fatal attack on Egyptian Copts on December 24th:

Egypt is another place in the Middle East where Christians are in peril. They are more numerous in Egypt than they are in Iraq, but they are targets of a similar strain of hostility. In January of 2010, six Christians were murdered outside the church where they were celebrating Christmas mass. (Christians in Egypt are Coptic Orthodox Christians who celebrate Christmas in January.)

This was only one of several attacks that took place in Egypt during the past year and given the level of hostility, it's likely more acts of violence will take place in the next few weeks. Imams have appeared on television accusing Coptic Christians in Egypt of storing weapons in their churches and of being in league with Zionist Jews from Israel. In Muslim majority Egypt, these are lethal charges. When prominent religious and political leaders make accusations like this, it's a signal to others that personal attacks on Christians will be tolerated and condoned.

Female terrorists in Gaza (video and poster)

From CNN:

With faces covered and guns loaded, Palestinian militants are training among the sand dunes of Gaza.

Shouts of "Allahu Akbar" -- God is great -- are followed by intense target practice. These militants are preparing to fight their sworn enemy, the state of Israel. But there is a difference -- they are women.

Training alongside men, they say they are ready to go into battle and are calling on more Palestinian women to join what they call the resistance against Israel.

CNN was given rare access to some of these women inside Gaza. The militant group insisted the location was kept secret, so we were blindfolded in the back of a car and driven to a house.

Five women are sitting in the back garden, all from the Salah ad-Din Brigades -- one of several militant groups in Gaza -- all veiled and armed. Only their eyes are uncovered.

Sitting beside a table of guns, rocket-propelled grenades and land mines, the scene is carefully choreographed for our camera and the message is clear.

One woman tells me: "I am trained and ready to be a suicide bomber against Israeli soldiers."

Which inspired me to make a new poster:

(h/t Clark)

PA GDP proportional to percentage working for Israelis

From Ma'an:

Of every 100 Palestinian workers, 11 work in Israel and the settlements compared to 10 in 2009, a new survey from the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics found.

The increase helped push up the Palestinian GDP per capita, in what was counted as a year of growth across the region.

Palestine's Gross Domestic Product increased by about 9 percent during the first three quarters of 2010 compared with the same period of 2009.

Released on Monday, the survey said growth was concentrated in economic activities with largest share in construction with a growth rate of 36 percent, followed by agriculture and fishing, wholesale and retail trade, transport, storage and communications, services, and public administration.

GDP per capita for Palestinian areas increased by 5 percent during the third quarter of 2010 compared with the same quarter of 2009, spurred mostly by an increase of three percent in the number of workers in construction, industry and the service sector.

Which means that since the settlement freeze ended, with Arabs working to build houses in Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, the Palestinian Arab GDP for the fourth quarter should go even higher.

So once again the people who say they want "peace" also want to hurt ordinary Palestinian Arabs trying to raise their families in dignity.

It is also interesting to see that the GDP increase is almost directly proportional - 9-10% - to the increase of workers in Israel and the Israeli towns across the green line. Foreign aid might not be so much a factor - jobs and cooperation with Israel is.

By the way, these statistics include Gaza, where no one works for Israelis, so that means that the percentage of West Bank Arabs who work for Israelis is probably closer to 15%. Boycotting Israel would throw the Palestinian Arab economy into a tailspin, and it would raise the West Bank unemployment rate to about the same as Gaza's is now - from around 17% to around 32%.

Posters for counterprotests - 5 and 6

Continuing the series...

I couldn't think of a sarcastic tagline that would be better than just showing the photos straight (with URLs so people can see for themselves.)

"Jews are Judaizing the Samuel's Tomb!"

The Al Aqsa Foundation (the same one that just freaked out over the iKotel iPhone app) is upset that Israel is spending "millions of dollars" to Judaize the site of Samuel's Tomb which, they say, is a mosque.

Just FYI: Samuel is not mentioned once in the Quran (although he is implied in 2:247-8.)

Long-time readers may remember my visit to the site four years ago - right after it was vandalized, and holy objects stolen, by Arabs. So let's hope that part of this money will go towards security.

But I suppose they weren't trying to vandalize it - just to "de-Judaize" it.

Qaradawi attacks the PLO

Prominent sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, one of the most popular religious figures in Sunni Islam, has issued a scathing attack the PLO for not being radical enough.

He criticized them for cooperating with the Zionist entity, and demanded that they return to "resistance" (i.e., terrorism, since they already claim to be doing non-violent resistance.)

He stressed that security coordination with Israel implies that Jews have a right to at least some of Palestine, which is completely unacceptable.

Qaradawi, who has some 40 million people viewing his al Jazeera TV show, also said these words that show in yet another way why the peace process could never work:

"Palestine does not belong to the Palestinians to do as they like but for [it belongs to] the entire Arab and Islamic nation."

Which means that even if Abbas and his henchmen manage to compromise and come to terms with Israel, the Arab world has effective veto power - certainly those who follow Qaradawi.

Poster for counterprotests - 4

4th in a series....

Physicians for Human Rights can't figure how tear gas could kill people outdoors

Physicians for Human Rights wrote a paper in 1989 to try to make tear gas sound as dangerous as possible. Here's the main point of the paper concerning CS, which is the type used by the IDF and Israeli police.

After discussing how CS could be potentially lethal if used indoors, the paper says:

The respiratory concentration of CS that would be lethal for 50% of healthy adults has been estimated to be 25,000 to 150,000 mg/m 3 per minute, based on animal studies (15). When detonated outside, a CS grenade generates a cloud 6 to 9 m in diameter, at the center of which a concentration of 2,000 to 5,000 mg/m 3 can be produced, with concentrations rapidly tapering off at the periphery. (16)

So for it to be lethal for a normal adult, there would have to be exposure for a full minute at concentrations that are ten to thirty times higher than is physically possible outdoors. I don't know how long CS takes to disperse, but certainly the highest concentrations of up to 5000 mg/m3 would not last for more than a few seconds.

The studies done of people who have been seriously injured from CS all show that they were indoors at the time, and had prolonged exposure - far more than a few seconds - and they could not leave the room.

I cannot find any case of someone succumbing quickly (within a day) to any level of exposure to CS.

In 1989, some human rights groups charged that Israeli use of tear gas - the more dangerous CN gas at the time - was responsible for increases in miscarriages and even 400 deaths. A US government GAO study found the claims to be baseless.

So this is nothing new.

UPDATE: Some blogs are saying "The U.S. Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine warns that at a concentration of 2mg per cubic meter, CS gas “is immediately dangerous to life…”

The document does say that - and it is a typo.

The document cached here says that for CS,

LCt50 = 61,000 mg-min/m3

which means that the median lethal dose of CS is 61,000 mg per cubic meter for a full minute - well within the range described by PHR and way, way higher than is possible outdoors. There is simply no way that it is dangerous to life at 1/30,500 of the median lethal dose, if the words "median lethal dose" have any meaning.

Not to mention that if the dose of 2 mg/m3 is immediately dangerous to life, then Bil'in protesters would all have been dead for years. A minor point.