Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, August 29, 2011

Syria attacks a Damascus mosque, imam

From BBC:

Syrian security forces have attacked protesters at a mosque in the capital, Damascus, activists say.

Security officials stormed the al-Rifai mosque in the Kafar Susseh district, the activists said, reportedly wounding the mosque's imam.

Unconfirmed reports say at least one person was killed in clashes with troops on Saturday.

The UN says more than 2,000 people have been killed since protests against Syria's president began in March.

A video shot at the mosque shows protesters chanting "the people demand an end to the regime", and calling for the execution of President Bashar al-Assad.

As security forces stormed the mosque, protesters tried to barricade themselves in with bookcases and shoe racks, reports say.

The imam, Osama al-Rifai, who is in his 80s, is said to have been beaten up.

Where are the mass protests in public squares of Arab countries?

Derfner fired from JPost, and pretends to be a martyr

And he remains clueless as to what he said that was wrong, instead lashing out at his seeming oppressors:

I got fired by The Jerusalem Post today. The paper got hundreds of notices of cancellations of subscription after my blog post (“The awful, necessary truth about Palestinian terror”) of Sunday last week; the reason being given for my firing, though, is the substance of the essay, despite the apology I published later. A page-one notice to this effect will be published in the Post tomorrow.

My apology was to have run in the Post yesterday, but a logistical mix-up prevented it. Today the paper ran a column by Isi Liebler titled “Justifying murder – an abomination,” which, like nearly all of the right-wing websites attacking my original essay (I took it down from my blog upon publishing the apology), it gives extremely short shrift to all the things I wrote that show my intent was not to encourage terror, but the opposite.

As I noted when he apologized, no one is saying that he supports or encourages terror. What he was doing, explicitly, was justifying it. And from what he has written, it seems that he truly believes that attacking civilians is a "right" even if he personally believes it is wrong.

That is what is offensive. His inability to realize that would be comical if it wasn't so sad.

Instead, he goes into martyr mode:

What bothers me most is not that I got fired, but that I’m not being given the opportunity to fill in the picture that’s been so distorted in today’s Post column and in right-wing Web commentaries. The parts of the picture being obscured or outright hidden would show that while I misspoke myself harmfully, my intent was not to support, endorse, advocate, encourage or call for terror against Israelis, but to end it. This intent was clear not only in my apology, but in my original essay. By skewing my words so badly, today’s Post column, the Web commentaries and Post publishes on page one tomorrow portray a writer announcing that he wants Israelis to get killed, instead of one who’s trying to stop that from happening.

I didn't read most of the other critiques of Derfner but I did not see any that claimed that Derfner personally wants Israelis to be killed. I am certain that my original denunciation of his essay was not predicated on the idea that he supports terror. And nothing he has written since disproves anything I wrote about his original essay - that he believes that Palestinian Arabs have a "right" to attack and kill Jews, and he cannot find a single ethical problem with Palestinian Arab terrorism, even if he personally doesn't approve of it.

(h/t CHA, Zach N)

Palestinian Arabs again rejoice at terror attack in name of Allah

Early this morning a Palestinian Arab man was stopped by Tel Aviv police from his plans to murder as many teenagers as he could find in a party at a nightclub. He still managed to stab eight people, one in serious condition.

It is clear that the terrorist, yelling "Allah hu Akbar," knew about the party and his intent was to kill as many of the youth there as he could find.

Which makes him a hero to Palestinian Arabs.

The Fatah-leaning Palestine Today has three comments on the story. Autotranslation of comments is often obscure, but the happiness is obvious:

Allah hu Akbar - Lord every day we hear news of Avatar Halnoa [?] be in the death of Jews and loyal to them

Victory for Men - God is great and the victory of Islam, here they are men of God lifting his registration and under Jmaaag captives, O Lord

You are handed your right hand and hit the collecting -Army man will not fail to see our mothers for giving birth to welding heroes

Notice how every comment uses religious imagery to justify an attack on Jews.

The PalDF message board is similarly filled with praise and happiness. The fact that the assailant yelled "Allah hu Akbar" is especially endearing to that crowd.

Once again, it is not possible to find a single dissenting opinion in the PalArabic media or comments about a terrorist attack aimed at innocent civilians. We are always told about how much Palestinian Arabs want peace and are against terrorism, yet apparently not a single one feels strongly enough about it to actually state that opinion online in reaction to attacks like these. (General Arab reaction is mostly positive but not quite as unanimous as Palestinian Arab reaction.)

Please, if you can find any counter examples, let me know - I will be happy to correct this post.

No doubt these Jihad lovers will be magically transformed into peace loving secular democrats by the establishment of a Palestinian Arab state.

The PA's water lies debunked (JPost)

A very important article in JPost exposes the depth of the PA's lies to the international community regarding their oft-stated claim the Israel "steals" their water:

On June 15, 2011 The Jerusalem Post published an article about the Palestinian water crisis, written by the head of the Palestinian Water Authority, Dr. Shaddad Atilli.

In his article, Atilli wrote that Israel’s ‘discriminatory policies’ are to blame for the lack of water in Palestinian society. He claimed that Israel uses the Joint Israeli Palestinian Water Committee (JWC) to veto and delay Palestinian water projects. He also wrote that Israel illegally exploits 90% of the shared water sources.

Furthermore, he claimed that because of the Israeli theft of water and the destruction of water wells and treatment plants, people realize that the two-state solution is rapidly fading.

His libelous article, full of distortions, outright lies and false accusations, was yet another proof of the PA’s intransigence.

Recently our organization, Missing Peace, obtained authentic papers documenting meetings of the Joint Israeli Palestinian Water Committee (JWC), and correspondence between Colonel Avi Shalev, head of the International relations branch of COGAT, and Dr.Atilli. These documents paint an entirely different picture.

Contrary to Atilli’s outrageous accusations, the Palestinian Authority has been sabotaging the two-state solution by preventing the development of an independent water infrastructure for the future Palestinian state.

Since 2000 the PWA submitted 76 requests for permits to the office of the Civil Administration.

Subsequently 73 permits were issued by ICA and three denied because there was no master plan.

In a letter of June 8 2009, Shalev responded to Atilli’s complaint that ICA did not honor a PWA request to issue 12 of these permits. Shalev wrote that these permits had already been issued in 2001, and that ICA wondered why the PWA did not execute these projects.

Another 44 JWC-approved projects, the majority in Areas A and B, like the construction of a waste water treatment plant (WWTP) in Jenin that received approval in 2008 - have not been implemented. The German government even withdraw a plan to build a WWTP in Tulkarm when it concluded that the PWA could not handle the project.

When, back in November 2009, the PWA complained about a lack of funds, the Israeli government offered to finance water projects for Palestinian communities. The PA has yet to respond to this offer.

...The PWA did not implement projects in the Eastern aquifer that would have solved much of the Palestinian water crisis. More than half of the wells approved for exploitation of the Eastern aquifer have still not been drilled. The permits were issued in 2000.

In a letter written on April 4, 2001, the civil administration urged the PWA to execute these projects. A letter from June 8 2009 repeated that request.

Atilli also lied about Palestinian water consumption. In the JPost article he claimed that Palestinians are ‘limited to an average of just 60 liters.’ However, in 2009 his own PWA published a report that mentioned an average supply of 110 liters per capita per day.

Atilli’s level of chutzpa is best shown by his third claim, about Israel stealing water and destroying Palestinian water projects. In fact, Palestinians steal millions of cubic meters of water per year by drilling illegal holes into the water pipes of the Israeli water provider Mekorot. The Civil Authority fixes 600 of these illegal taps each year.

Furthermore, since 2008 Israel has asked the PA to re-establish the joint JSET water patrols that fought water theft before the El Aksa intifada.

The PA has refused.

Another reason for the loss of water is the poor maintenance of the Palestinian water infrastructure. A staggering 33% of the fresh water supply gets lost because of leaks, theft and poor maintenance.

Other documents provided solid evidence that the closing of 250 illegal wells was agreed upon in the JWC meetings. For example, minutes of the JWC meeting on November 13, 2007 show a consensus decision to destroy ‘illegal drillings and connections.’ Nevertheless, Atilli acted as if he never attended these meetings or co-signed the joint decisions.

He even had the gall to write urgent appeals to the international community as soon as ICA, after numerous appeals to the PWA to follow up on the agreed closure of illegal wells, finally closed those wells....

Read the whole thing.

The Dutch-language Missing Peace site is a fantastic resource for source materials that debunk Palestinian Arab claims and dig up the truth about the Middle East.

(h/t Yerushalimey)

Terrorists fired at the Erez Crossing last week. Did you hear anything?

From the MFA:

On Thursday night (August 25th), the terror organizations from the Gaza Strip continued launching rockets and mortar shells towards Israel.

During the attack several mortar shells hit the Erez Crossing, just as three Palestinian women and two infants were crossing back into the Gaza Strip after receiving medical treatment in Israel, causing damage to the crossing's infrastructure and an electrical shutdown. The power outage disabled gates at the crossing. Two of the women passed through safely but a third woman, along with her infant daughter, got caught between two disabled gates while rockets were falling.

The commander of the Erez crossing and another security officer rescued the woman and her daughter. All of the Palestinian women were brought to a protected shelter at the crossing where they were given a meal for the end of the daily Ramadan fast.

Those horrible Israelis!

This attack is not an anomaly. In the past the Gaza terrorists have repeatedly attacked all the crossings between Israel and Gaza - the same crossings that the international community insists must be wide open for unlimited transit of goods and people. These attacks often result in suspension of the crossings and delays for those people and goods scheduled to go through.

The Erez crossing in particular allows hundreds of Gazans to travel to Israel for medical treatment, as well as for NGOs to enter Gaza to help people there.

How often do you hear anyone - including these same NGOs - condemning attacks on the crossings? The international media all but ignored it (exceptions: CNN in context of Israel's response and Shanghai Daily behind a paywall.)

I cannot recall a single statement of condemnation by any NGO ever for terror attacks on crossings. Shouldn't people whose supposed main concern is the welfare of the people of Gaza strongly condemn those who attack the very means needed to help them?

(h/t Ian)

Pro-Israel, pro-Shalit rally at Trafalgar Square (plus EoZ poster sighting!)

From Richard Millett's blog:

Israel’s supporters came out in Trafalgar Square today to show sympathy with Israel as rockets continue to rain down from Gaza and to wish a happy 25th birthday to Gilad Schalit who is in his sixth year in isolation in Gaza having been kidnapped by Hamas from Israeli soil when he was 19.

There were some tremendous speeches.

Hasan Afzal, of British Muslims for Israel, said he supports Israel because it is “the only country in the Middle East where Muslims have freedom and democracy”.

Jonathan Sacerdoti spoke movingly about Gilad Schalit spending his 25th birthday “in prison, in Gaza with no contact with the outside world, his family or even the International Red Cross to ensure that his health is adequate”.

Joy Wolfe urged the crowd to ignore media lies about Israel and described Israel as a home for people of all religions.

She went on to call for an end to the double standards of the United Nations and some British MPs and said that Gilad Schalit probably doesn’t even know that today is his birthday and probably feels as if he has been forgotten. But she said that no one will rest until the Red Cross gets access to him and every government in the world is calling for his release.

It was an excellent afternoon arranged at very short notice by the British Israel Coalition and supported by Stand With Us.

It made a change from the previous Sunday’s terror rally at Trafalgar Square where the rhetoric called for war with Israel and signs called for Death to Israel. It’s a shame there wasn’t a similar pro-Israel rally at that time.

Read the whole thing; he has videos too.

The demonstration had some 500 people. I received this photo of the rally which shows one of my posters (click to enlarge):

Here's the poster:

Photo credit goes to StandWithUs UK official photographer Adrian Korsner Photography. H/t CiFWatch for letting me know.

Even Hezbollah is accused of being Zionist

The Lebanese March 14th movement is accusing Hezbollah of acting like Israel and of serving Israel's interests:

Several March 14 leaders attacked Hezbollah on Saturday and condemned the speech of its Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah that he delivered via video link on Quds ( Jerusalem ) day last Friday night.

Phalange party MP Sami Gemayel compared Hezbollah to Israel in the way it has been expanding to take over Lebanon.

Gemayel said that Hezbollah is practicing “a unique policy of settlements” similar to Israel’s.
“Hezbollah depended on military power to control a certain area, and the Jews depended on the same thing to take over Palestine,” he told As-Sharq radio station.

March 14 MP Ahmad Fatfat said on Saturday that Hezbollah’s Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah is the one who serves Israel’s interests.

“Didn’t he assassinate leaders in the national resistance? Isn’t he the one who pointed his weapons at the Lebanese people? Doesn’t that serve Israel?,” Fatfat questioned.

Don't Strip! (updated)

Yisrael Medad suggested a poster series to me, and how could I resist?

UPDATE: Wow, controversy! I'm getting emails as well as comments from people who are offended by these as well as those who love them.

I don't view the posters as tremendously sexist, although I see many women do. From my perspective they are using images that are quite tame nowadays to allude to an earlier era (hence my choice of fonts - although I think that the top one is Jane Russell from the 1940s, and she wasn't a stripper.) Yisrael chose the images and text, I did the layout.

Controversy is good in general when you want to get a message out, and that is what the aim is; I prefer messages that are more direct but there is a place for this approach (as in PETA's campaigns.) I have my doubts as to the effectiveness of the message, to be honest, as it is not obvious how to draw the line from the photo to the message. Maybe putting a leftist's head on a photo instead:

PA accuses Israel of stealing organs from terrorists

Palestine Today reports that PA Minister of Prisoners' Affairs, Issa Qaraqe, said that Israel is the largest global hub for trafficking in human organs, and is harvesting organs of "martyrs."

He said Israel is holding the bodies of the terrorists to "avenge" them and their families, as well as to hide the "crimes" Israel did to their bodies.

It is unlikely that anyone will denounce these outrageous and libelous claims.

In June, Israel refused to hand over the bodies of some 84 terrorists after initial reports to the contrary, instead keeping them as a bargaining chip in helping to get Gilad Shalit released.

The PA news agency scrubs a lie

From Ma'an on Friday:

Honduras has recognized the State of Palestine, the official Palestinian Authority news agency reported Friday.

The announcement came in a letter to President Mahmoud Abbas that Honduras recognized the State of Palestine on the 1967 borders and would back efforts to seek membership in the UN, WAFA reported.

The original WAFA announcement on Friday did say that Honduras recognized the mythical "1967 borders."

Here's the image of the autotranslated Arabic announcement:

However, the actual announcement from the Honduras did not mention any borders.

And WAFA has since removed that reference from its website. Here's the scrubbed version, again from the Arabic - with the exact same timestamp of 18:53:

It is a little unusual that WAFA scrubbed its original announcement, which may indicate some displeasure from the Honduran government on that point. It is more interesting that they tried to hide the change, which is not something that any legitimate news agency should do.

(h/t George Hale for helping find the cached Arabic announcement.)

Fatah/Hamas "unity" update: They can't agree on what time it is

From Ma'an:

For the first time in history, Palestinians in the West Bank and in Gaza will live in different time zones.

Clocks were pushed back an hour at the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan on August 1 in the West Bank and Gaza.

The Palestinian Authority cabinet decided Tuesday to revert to summer time (+3 hours GMT) at the end of Ramadan. The cabinet announced that the Eid Al-Fitr holiday which marks the end of Ramadan would begin Tuesday.

But the Hamas government's civil services bureau in Gaza announced Saturday that the government would continue to work on winter time (+2 hours GMT) after Eid Al-Fitr.

Unity!

BDS Fail in Brisbane

From Menzie's House:

Danielle Keys reports on the counter-protest against the Socialist Alliance anti-Semites:

On Saturday the 27th of August at 1pm, the Socialist Alliance and "Justice for Palestine" met at Merivale Street, Brisbane to march down to Southbank to bully and intimidate the customers and staff of popular chocolatier 'Max Brenner'.

I, Danielle Keys, organised the counter-protest movement a month ago after seeing the Socialist Alternative at UQ handing out flyers about their protest. The flyers said to boycott Max Brenner as an agent of apartheid Israel. I thought it was so disgusting that I organised a facebook event just to see if some friends were interested in counter-protesting.

Little did I know that in a matter of weeks I would have many different groups approaching me to help support the cause, over 90 facebook friends attending and be in contact with the corporate management of Max Brenner. Little did I truly foresee that I would be speaking to almost every single newspaper I can think of as well as television and radio opportunities. I would have been happy to stand alone but I am really glad I didn't have to! The reason that people stand behind counter-protest movements I think is because as just individual people we get bullied by the disgraceful agendas of the loudest most empty vessels of humanity - the Socialist Alliance. They are the unwashed aggressors who exist off the fringes of society prepared to violently demonise anyone who disagrees with them. I really had enough of it and I'm glad to see I was not the only one!

I guess the only way to properly describe the events of yesterday is like this...

THE COUNTER-PROTEST WAS AWESOME!!!

When the Socialist Alliance marched down to Southbank they were not counting on being outnumbered by ordinary Australians telling them to go home and that their intolerance was not welcome. They quite seriously didn't bank on it and were very upset about it (ha-ha!)....

Anyone who was there would have seen how much fun it was. Everyone there was laughing, chanting, getting stuck into the SA, drinking hot chocolates and dancing around. The Socialist Alliance eventually walked away. Shamed into oblivion. They went and stood in a park somewhere continuing their little rant, where no one could hear them and no one could call them to account. This is unsurprising and indicative of their cowardice.

All fun and exciting times aside, there was a really powerful and beautiful element to this counter-protest movement. I was really humbled and overwhelmed by people from the Jewish community voicing their thanks for the support. It sounds insane but I never really thought of the Brisbane Jewish community when it came to organising this. I was so busy thinking of the political and ideological principles that I didn't properly see how personally vilified and offended the Jewish community felt over this. They came out in force to stand up for Max Brenner and say no to Socialist Alliance abuses. I met so many wonderful Jewish people and I felt so touched when they said how surprised and happy they were to see non-Jewish people standing by them in an event like this.

Here's one video of the protest/counter protest.

(h/t Ian)

Syria "news" agency caught lying with photos again

Sometimes, you can't trust your own eyes.

From Syria's SANA agency:

SANA reporters on Saturday denied existence of any gatherings or demonstrations at al-Abbasiyyin, Umayyad and Kefr Souseh Squares contrary to what some provocative satellite channels have aired this morning.

Notice the photo they use to prove that things were normal at that town square on Saturday morning?

Here's that same photo - in a SANA article from April:

In fact, that photo is all over the Internet.

Now, why did they use an old photo to prove that things were normal in the square today?

Gilad Shalit's Birthday Wish (video)

Sunday is Gilad Shalit's birthday.

The Hurricane Irene open thread

Don't know if I'll be able to blog at all during the hurricane and possible power outages, as I'm pretty much in the path of the storm.

Meanwhile, here's an open thread!

Now I have to sue Hezbollah

First Hamas rips me off, and now this!

Lebanon's Hezbollah scouts parade as they carry a Star of David symbol with a spider on it during a rally marking "Quds (Jerusalem) Day'' in Nabatieh town, southern Lebanon, August 25, 2011.

This looks suspiciously like the logo of the International Zionist Web, my nefarious organization created in 2006!

I gotta find a Lebanese lawyer.

At least Iranians admit their "Qods Day" rallies are anti-Israel

It is refreshing to see that Iran makes it very clear that their annual Qods Day demonstrations are not meant to show support for Jerusalem or support for Palestinian Arabs nearly as much as they are to show unbridled hate towards Israel. Such a difference from Western "pro-Palestinian" rallies that are anti-Israel hatefests.

Here's the description of the Iranian rally from FARS News Agency:

Iranians across the country alongside other people around the world held massive anti-Israel rallies on the last Friday of Ramadan in opposition to the continued occupation of Palestinian land by Israel.

In Tehran, millions of people gathered for the march, chanting 'Death to Israel' and holding anti-Israeli and anti-American signs.

The International Quds Day was started by the late Founder of the Islamic Republic, Imam Khomeini, in 1979 as a way of expressing solidarity with the Palestinians and underscoring importance of the holy Quds to Muslims.

International Quds Day is an annual event opposing Israel's occupation of Beitul-Muqaddas. Anti-Zionist rallies and demonstrations are held on the last Friday of Ramadan in Muslim and Arab countries around the world, and especially in Iran.

Protesters unanimously condemned Zionists' crimes in the Palestinian occupied lands.

The fasting people carrying placards chanted 'Down with the US' and 'Down with the Israel' and other anti-Zionist slogans.

But in one way the Iranian and Western haters of Israel do have one thing in common in their fake love for Palstinian Arabs:

Many demonstrators were also wearing Palestinian keffiyehs, a symbol of Palestinian nationalism, to show their solidarity with the people of Palestine.

Erekat: "Palestine" would still be subsidiary to the PLO

PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat says that a declaration of a Palestinian Arab state would not affect the status of the PLO as "the sole legitimate representative for the Palestinian people."

He says that the PLO is the only party that can negotiate for "Palestine" - even after "Palestine" is established.

According to Erekat, the statehood demand next month will be submitted by Mahmoud Abbas to the Security Council in his capacity as Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization as well as President of the State of Palestine, but the PLO will remain the mandate-holder in the final negotiations, including all final-status issues like "refugees," water, land and Jerusalem.

It is far from clear that he is saying that the PLO would be dissolved after negotiations.

So any Palestinian Arab state that would be declared next month would be perhaps the first state ever recognized that was run by a private organization.

Clueless anti-Israel protesters exposed (video)

Someone with a camera challenges anti-Israel protesters, including some Jews, in Harvard Square earlier this week.

The first person being asked questions is Nancy Murray who is a Director of Education at ACLU-Massachusetts.

(h/t Anna)

Report that Hamas is more serious about this truce. Rocket fired anyway.

From Palestine Press Agency:

Palestinian sources revealed on Friday instructions issued by the political echelon in the Hamas movement which controls the Gaza Strip to prevent other factions from firing rockets at Israel in response to the military escalation in the Gaza Strip.

The sources said that Hamas had given strict instructions to prevent any resistive elements from trying to launch rockets at Israel.

The sources noted that the forces of Hamas have begun to spread in the streets of the Gaza Strip, especially in the border areas, to prevent resistance fighters from firing rockets, saying that the orders issued by both the political and the military was to prevent rocket fire by force.

I did not see any reports of Hamas actively enforcing the Sunday night truce, which never really took effect.

This truce was announced for 1 AM. It held for about 14 hours, before a Grad was fired south of Ashkelon.