Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, June 22, 2012

There is no Zionism without Jerusalem (video)

This was a nice video by Im Tirtzu; I made the subtitles using an excellent translation done by Nevet Basker of BroaderView.org.

Another fake BDS "victory," Forward falls for it

Earlier today, the Forward reported:

Pension Giant Dumps Caterpillar Over Israel Ties

TIAA-CREF Boots Company From Responsible Investing Fund
By Blair Thornburgh
Published June 21, 2012.

Retirement giant TIAA-CREF has dumped Caterpillar from a socially responsible investment fund after over two years of pressure from human-rights groups that say the company bolsters Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands.

The pension fund had held $72 million in Caterpillar shares in its Social Choice Funds portfolio.

The Illinois-based construction company sold bulldozers to the Israeli government, which critics say are used in the destruction of Palestinian homes and buildings.

The move comes after campaigning against TIAA-CREF spearheaded by the We Divest Campaign in 2010 and a high-profile call to action by Archbishop Desmond Tutu last July.

The U.S. group Jewish Voice for Peace initiated the We Divest movement and gained support from the Palestinian BDS National Campaign and over 30 other organizations worldwide with petitions and grassroots activism.

It turns out that the truth is quite different.

As Divest This! reports:

Once more, a hoax tale seems to be centered on TIAA-CREF. If you recall, the boycotters were caught red-handed several years ago trying to pass off a generic business decision by the retirement giant as a response to their request to get the organization to divest from Israel.

Rather than simply act as though the whole incident never happened, the BDSers took the unusual step of launching a multi-year campaign to get TIAA-CREF to actually do what they had simply pretended they did the year before.

The response to date from CREF has been a series of polite “please piss off” messages. Which is why this recent announcement that their divestment campaign has borne fruit seems mighty suspicious indeed.

To begin with, the story is not accompanied by any statement from TIAA-CREF itself that it has taken any action that could be described as political in nature. Which makes sense once you realize that CREF is still heavily invested in the company the boycotters are claiming as a divestment win (the long suffering Caterpillar Corporation).

In fact, if you dig a little deeper it looks like CREF did not make any politically related investment or divestment decision at all, but rather that one of its funds (one targeting social investors) was following the lead of an independent research firm (MSCI) which generates an index which many “Social Responsibility” investment funds use to determine what will and will not be included in their portfolios.

Now earlier this year, MSCI downgraded and eventually removed Caterpillar from their index, which means that CREF was just following along with a decision made by an independent researcher, not making a judgment regarding Caterpillar on its own (as reflected by the fact that other funds managed by CREF still hold millions in Caterpillar stock).

Indeed, we can see that TIAA-CREF still has tens of millions invested in Caterpillar in other funds: $21 million in their Growth and Income Fund, a similar amount in their Large Cap Growth Fund, and $10 million more in their Enhanced Large Cap Growth Fund.

Doesn't sound like divestment, does it?

In fact, TIAA-CREF has explicitly said why they won't divest from Caterpillar:

While TIAA-CREF acknowledges participants’ varying views on Israeli and Palestinian policies and the Gaza Strip and West Bank, we are unable to alter our investment policy in accordance with those views. Our responsibility to earn a competitive financial return on the retirement savings entrusted to us by 3.7 million participants obliges us to invest in a diverse line-up of companies across all sectors of the global economy.

The Forward simply believed the false press release of the "Jewish Voice for Peace," complete with lots of quotes from the usual suspects praising this "victory": the Corries, Omar Barghouti and others.

As soon as The Forward was told that they were duped, they silently removed the article, although at the moment you can still see that they index it in their search page.

(h/t DK, CHA)

Friday Links

From Ian:

The least surprising story of the day.
David Duke endorses anti-Israel candidate from Brooklyn

Ex-KKK leader and Louisiana congressman backs Charles Barron’s Democratic primary bid, citing shared hostility to ‘Zionist control’

Another dog bites man story - Berkley Pol Sci Professor thinks Iran should have nukes.
Kenneth Waltz Thinks Iranian Acquisition of Nukes is a Good Thing
More at Commentary:
Iranian Nukes? Don’t Worry, Says Prof

Turkey's Defense Minister: Israel will not be given access to NATO data designed to protect against missile attack from rogue nation

'When there is quiet in the south, there will be quiet in Gaza'

"Israel's Ambassador to the U.N. Ron Prosor sends letter of complaint to U.N. Security Council following recent barrages of rockets fired from Gaza into Israel • "The only thing that Hamas is 'reforming' in the area are the capabilities of its rockets to reach further and further into Israel," Prosor says."

The West's embrace of the Muslim Brotherhood – Dore Gold

From Yoel:

"Arab Spring" like protests in Sudan

Egypt border terrorist fought alongside rebels in Libya

Peres on CNN says "time is running out" on Iran sanctions

Sexual assaults in Tahrir Square keep getting worse

From Bikya Masr:

The month of June has seen numerous reports of sexual violence in Egypt’s iconic square, highlighting that women’s rights and ending harassment continue to be on the outside looking in as political tension in the country amps up.

Last Friday was the worst day, with women, both foreigners and Egyptians, reporting that they had been sexually assaulted in the square take place following the disbanding of Parliament on Thursday evening.

“I was walking in the square and was hoping to be part of the calls for the SCAF to leave power when a man behind me grabbed by butt and started saying disgusting things to me,” one woman told Bikyamasr.com on Friday afternoon, asking that their identity remain anonymous.

“He asked if I was a slut and then swore at me when I yelled at him,” she added.

Others also reported being harassed on social media networks, highlighting the growing concern facing women in the country and specifically in Tahrir Square, where masses are gathering.

One foreign correspondent, a female, said she would not head down to Tahrir when it gets dark for fear of being attacked and groped. She said on the side streets of the square, she was grabbed numerous times this past week.

If women cannot walk their streets freely, without fear of being assaulted, harassed and raped, how can the country move forward on a revolution that has been stalled by the military power in control of the country?

While there are a number of activists who have apologized for sexual violence against women, these apologies and anger toward sexual assaults against women in Egypt are usually forgotten within 24 hours, with many activists claiming there “are more important issues” to be discussed.

This misses the point facing more than half the country. As Nawal Saadawi, the prominent Egyptian feminist, told us recently in her Cairo house, “women are the revolution and without women you cannot have a future.”

...This is the current, modern Egypt that exists. And one where women are silenced from public. The use of violence and harassment against all women in this country is the main social problem that is barring any real and viable change from occurring.

If Egypt is to see the success of the revolution then women, and violence against them, must be battled at every step.

A constitution and election are important. But a country where women live in fear of walking down their streets, anywhere, is not a country that has a bright future.

Syria round-up: 170 killed yesterday; Russia admits sending helicopters; new defections

From Al Arabiya:

Clashes in Syria on Thursday killed nearly 170 people, mainly civilians, on the deadliest day since a ceasefire came into force, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, as Russia acknowledged that it was trying to send repaired combat helicopters to Syria.

“It’s the bloodiest day since the start of the ceasefire (on April 12) and one of the bloodiest since the start of the revolt against the Syrian regime,” Observatory director Rami Abdul Rahman told AFP.

The day’s violence had killed at least 104 civilians, 54 soldiers and 10 rebel fighters, according to the toll compiled by the London-based organization, based on the reports of activists inside the country.

Aid workers hoping to evacuate trapped civilians and the wounded were unable to enter hard-hit areas of the Syrian city of Homs on Thursday due to shooting and an “unclear” security situation, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said.

Government forces and rebels had both agreed on Wednesday to an ICRC request for a truce for humanitarian reasons after more than 10 days of intense fighting.

Meanwhile, Russia acknowledged on Thursday that it was trying to send repaired combat helicopters to Syria and said it would continue to carry out arms contracts with President Assad’s government despite Western and Arab criticism.

Today, the rebels struck back:

Twenty six men believed to be pro-government "Shabbiha" militiamen have been killed in Syria's northern Aleppo province, an activist monitoring group said on Friday.

A video link sent by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights showed several men covered in blood and piled on top of each other on the side of a road. Many wore army fatigues but some were just wearing t-shirts.

And there may have been some high-level defections:

A Syrian activist group says four senior army officers have defected and joined the opposition.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights provided a video Friday purporting to show two brigadier generals and two colonels. They declared they were defecting.

The group said the defections came Thursday — the same day a Syria fighter pilot flew his MiG-21 warplane to neighboring Jordan, where he was given asylum.

Speaking of defections:

Members of Bashar al-Assad’s inner circle are secretly making plans to defect to the opposition should the Syrian regime become critically threatened by the rebellion, US officials have told The Daily Telegraph.

Senior military figures are understood to be laying down “exit strategies” and establishing lines of communication with the rebels to discuss how they would be received if they deserted.

And the Golan Druze leaders, who normally can discern the political winds, have abandoned a long-standing ban for their people to become citizens of Israel. Up until now they excommunicated any people who became Israeli citizens, but they no longer feel that they have any loyalty to the Assad regime.

(h/t Yoel)

The other "price tags" that the media ignore

From Arutz-7:

Residents of the small agricultural community of Maor, east of Hadera, went to their synagogue Friday for morning prayers and were appalled to find that it had been vandalized overnight.

The vandals sprayed the walls of the building with the words of Muslim prayers, written in Arabic, and with praise for Mohammed, who Muslims believe was a prophet.

Last month:

Israelis who went to pray at an ancient synagogue near Jericho were appalled to find that the building had been vandalized. Swastikas and pro-Palestinian Authority slogans had been painted on the gate of the building and on an ancient mural.

The synagogue, in Naarin, has been desecrated in the past. However, residents of the region said, the latest incident shows that vandals have “crossed a red line.”

“The historic mural that was desecrated is an important testimony to our people’s history,” said heads of the Jewish community in the Jericho region. “A people that does not protect its past has no future.”

And deliberate arson attacks, seemingly by Arabs in the Jerusalem area have mushroomed:

A rash of suspected arson attacks in open areas around southeast Jerusalem has firefighters scrambling to find a way to stop the fires, believed to have been set by area youths.

In the month of May, firefighters dealt with 1,759 blazes in open areas around that part of the capital, according to Jerusalem Fire and Rescue Services spokesman Asaf Abras. Considering that the Jerusalem district usually deals with about 8,000 such events during the entire year, the number is staggering.

Abras said firefighters had opened 200 investigations into suspected cases of arson since May, and in half of the cases were able to positively identify the source of the fire as having been arson. Sometimes multiple fires are considered part of the same investigation.

Most of the blazes are around the Arnona, Armon Hanatziv, Jebl Mukaber and Sur Bahir neighborhoods. Abras said the fires were so frequent that firefighters often were called back to the same area less than 15 minutes later to deal with another outbreak.

But desecrating synagogues and setting fires aren't newsworthy when they are done by Arabs.

Links. Here.

From Ian:

Israeli Prime Minister meets with Google Executive

“(Google Chairman) Schmidt noted that an Israeli engineer created the database for organizing artefacts is now used by museums worldwide. He described how Israelis have a unique blend of discipline, motivation and creative thinking. Together these form a competitive advantage that is unlike any society in the world. Schmidt said, “The decision to invest in Israel was one of the best that Google has ever made.”

Brian Lilley Interviews Glenn Beck –Video, he talks about Israel at 14min

Media bias in Australia Danby tackles the ABC over its Israel coverage
Michael Danby has written twice to the ABC complaining about two separate reports, one on an Australian man jailed in Israel for assisting Hamas and the second on a Four Corners Program in which Robert Fisk was invited on as an and made his usual crass, ill-informed attacks on Israel falsely claiming ( without host Kerry O’Brien demurring ) that Israel supported the massacres in Syria.

Media bias against a Palestinian hunger striker.........in Norway!
Palestinian woman on hunger strike for 3 weeks. She’s not in Israel, so the Guardian yawns
Palestinians on hunger strike in Israel attract world’s attention; in Norway we just let them die

Alice Walker reactions:
Alice Walker's Bigotry by Alan M. Dershowitz
Pulitzer winning writer Alice Walker sets shocking new low for anti-Israel boycotters Boycotting a whole language

From Peter Beinart’s ~~Death to Israel~~ Open Zion page at The Daily Beast.
Some Context For The Rockets From Gaza

“But there are other facts to this story, facts that are no less important but which tend not to be discussed when rockets start flying out of Gaza. To wit: On Monday evening, the IDF carried out strikes in several locations in Gaza, and Palestinian[s] reported that five people were wounded. Shortly afterward, the IDF carried out two more strikes and killed four Palestinians.”

In other words Israeli victims of terror like Saeed Fashafshe don’t count.

Muslim couple planned to bomb Jews in al Qaeda inspired plot

"A Muslim couple were assembling components of a home-made bomb to attack Jewish neighbourhoods after becoming radicalised by al Qaeda propaganda on the internet, a court heard."

Belgium calls for Olympic ceremony to commemorate Munich massacre

"Flemish sports minister joins officials from Israel, US, Canada and Australia in supporting moment of silence"

Editor of pro-Israel Kurdish magazine vanishes in Iraq
Mawlud Afand’s co-workers suspect he was kidnapped by Iran

Syrian fighter jet lands in Jordan, pilot requests asylum

Website Of Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood: The Days Of The Zionist Entity Are Numbered

Also, Michael Totten: Winter in Cairo

Assad using cyber warfare against rebels

Pro-Israel Kurd goes missing in Iraq, may have been kidnapped by Iran

Israeli help when you need it!

(h/t Missing Peace, Yoel, O.)

The Gaza tunnels that are nowhere near Egypt

From IMEMC:

Palestinian medical sources reported that twelve residents were wounded, on Thursday before noon, after a siege-busting tunnel collapsed, east of the Sheikh Zayed area, in the northern part of the Gaza Strip.

I'm not sure if it is the same one, but the tunnel collapse that killed 2 Hamas members earlier today was also in northern Gaza.

Which means that these were not tunnels to smuggle weapons from Egypt.

So what are they?

Hamas builds tunnels outside of Rafah for one of three reasons.

One is that they are used to travel between buildings in a town without going outside and being seen by the IDF.

Another is that they build underground bunkers with weapons, which makes their claim of the Hamas members being killed by "poisonous gas" most interesting.

And the third reason is that they build tunnels under the border to Israel in order to kidnap Israelis and hold them hostage.

Either way, they are legitimate military targets, and they aren't "siege busting" tunnels as the ridiculous IMEMC says.

(h/t YM and Elliott.)

An incomplete list of rockets that fell short in Gaza

From the Gaza NGO Safety Office's SMS alerts, an unfortunately incomplete list, but representative:

20 JUN, 0805hrs: Pal. ops fired 3 HMRs from Deir El Balah, MA. 1 of the rockets dropped short.

20 JUN, 0840hrs: Pal. ops fired 4 HMRs from Deir El Balah, MA. 1 of the rockets exploded prematurely. 1 Pal. injury reported.

20 JUN, 1550hrs: Pal. ops. fired 1 HMR from Nuseirat, MA. The rocket dropped short near Salah Ad Din St.

21 JUN, 1615hrs: Pal. ops. fired 1 HMR from N-E of Nuseirat, MA, toward the Green Line. The rocket exploded at the launching site.

Life magazine argues against a Jewish state, 1946

This is an earnest editorial published in Life in August, 1946, urging that Jewish refugees not be settled in Palestine (mostly because it would upset the Arabs.)

Other notable parts of the editorial are the perfect belief in the conventional wisdom of the day:

There is no way that Palestine can absorb so many people;
The Jewish lobby is pushing Truman to do things thatare against American interests;
The Middle East is not an American interest anyway;
The reasons the Arabs hated the Jews of Palestine is because of their higher standards of living;
Nationalism, at least in the case of Jewish nationalism, is wrong.

The most amazing part is the conclusion, where the editors of Life say that rather than create a Jewish homeland where Jews can live in safety, we should instead push for a utopian world where there is no discrimination, so Jews can feel free to live anywhere.

Except Palestine!

When you read reasonable-sounding editorials today spouting what passes for conventional wisdom and coming to conclusions based on them, keep in mind how wrong the accepted facts can be to begin with.

In a World unutterably wearied of seeing people pushed around, there is an understandable, though wishful, tendency to believe in some easy solution for the problem of Europe’s homeless Jews. The notion is being broadcast that the solution is merely to let 100,000 more Jews into Palestine where they can be cared for by their own people. Thus they would be lifted from the world conscience. lt is also suggested that in a true, independent Jewish state, not just a "Home,” the Children of Israel would continue to build out of arid wastes a land of hydroelectric milk and industrial honey so rich and so charming as to attract and provide for all unwanted Jews.

The Zionists are superb organizers; they are also religious idealists, with all the virtues - and_°someof the blind spots—-of zealots through-out history. It could only he wished they had the right answers. But they haven’t.

lt is hard to say this, not only because of the immense humanitarian efforts of the Zionists but also because the situation is so tense and so full of domestic and international emotions and bitterness that it has almost become impossible to express an honest, dispassionate opinion. Yet the time has plainly come for some blunt
American speaking. The U.S. must adopt a Palestine policy and hold to it.

...The difficulty the Jews face, both as to immediate immigration and as to the long-range dream of a homeland, is primarily with the Arabs. Specifically it is with the l,000,000 Arabs in Palestine, hut generally it is with the 50,000,000 Arab population of the Middle East, now banded together in the Arab League and threatening that if they fail to obtain justiee in London they will turn to Moscow.

The differences between the Jews and the Arabs are such they can scarcely be understood unless one is an Arab or a Jew. The present obvious nub of friction is simply that the Jews in Palestine have come to enjoy a much higher standard of living than their Arab neighbors.

This View of the matter was reaffirmed only last spring hy the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry as a part of its long report on Palestine. This report also urged that l00,000 of the Jews currently in assembly camps in Germany and Austria—and most of them in or trying to get into the American zones-—should be immediately and humanely transported to Palestine.

The Arabs’ response was such that Britain’s Foreign Minister Ernest Bevin estimated that it would require dispatch of a British division and expenditure of $800,000,000 to effect the immigration. So he rejected the proposal.

When President Truman insists, in the face of British objections, that the 100.000 Jews be let in at once, he may have a nervous eye on the Jewish vote. But the President should approach it with the same bipartisan strategy he employed when the United Nations was organized at San Francisco. Otherwise the Palestine question, by becoming the price of a Zionist-led Jewish vote, could enter our politics in such a way that an entire national election might turn on how a few New Yorkers feel about an entirely extraneous issue. That wouldn't go down so well in Oklahoma.

...Britain and Zion are virtually at war today. Yet the Zionists must realize that the British, through the years, have been their truest friends and that removal of the Tommies now would probably tesult in the Arabs quickly pushing the Jews into the sea. This is what spoils the analogy between modern Palesttine and the Ireland of 25 years ago.

...It is clear that the immigration of the 100,000 Jews still in camp cannot really be decided until the central problem of Palestine's future is answered. To admit 100.000 more Jews - almost one fifth of the total Jews already there- without provision for land and industrial expansion to take care of them would only tend
to ghetto-ize the Jewish community. So, what of a Jewish state’? The Arabs regard it as an "exotic movement. internationally financed, artiﬁcially stimulated, holding no hope of ultimale or permanent sueeess.” Unfortunately there is something to this point of view. Palestine is not self-supporting. Perhaps given land expansion. great power and irrigation projects and, above all, internal peace, the Jewish community might become self-supporting in a generation or two. That is a moot point and almost irrelevant, because prospects for such expansion, projects and even peace are slight.

Aside, however, from the physical limitations, there is the higher moral question that divides the Jews themselves: namely, is religious nationalism any more the answer to the over-all Jewish problem than is any other sort of nationalism the answer to any part of the world problem?

What the Jews really need is not a national state but the right sort of world. Probably there will always be a certain number of Jews who prefer segregation in the Holy land, but we hazard the opinion that it the nations carried out that provision in the United Nations Charter, presumably not lightly adopted, for "universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion,” it would do far more to solve the Jewish problem than any multiplication of the Jewish population in Palestine.

Among other things this would mean the re-establishment of the 100,000 Jews in the assembly camps on the same basis, and with the same regard, as the resettlement of all of Europe's millions of displaced persons. If the remnants of Hitler's evil anti-Semitic brew precludes this in Eastern and Central Europe. then, assuredly, humanitarian gates must he opened. but not only in Palestine. The whole world must share the task. including the US.

This makes a bipartisan approach to the problem all the more desirable.
All this—a humane world and one in which a Jew ean live and prosper equally with all—is an easy solution, surely. It is only as hard as the human heart.

Jordanian rapist marries 15-year old victim to avoid jail

Ammon News has the sickening story.

The owner of a mobile phone store befriended a 15-year old girl who hung out at his store and he promised to marry her. Then he asked her to come to his shop to discuss their marriage plans. He then drugged her, drove her to another location and raped her while she was unconscious. She woke up outdoors, naked.

She filed a complaint with the police and they went to arrest the store owner. He freely admitted the rape, but he said that he would marry her - so they let him go.

According to Jordan's penal code article 308, a rapist can go free if he agrees to marry his victim.

There is a disgusting catch: he must remain married to her for at least five years, thus further victimizing the girl.

There are no words.

I imagine it will only be a few months before The Guardian also starts to put "militants" in scare quotes when referring to people who purposefully fire rockets at Israeli civilians.

Hamas buries 2 year old girl it killed as a "martyr"

Two days ago, a 2-year old girl was killed in Gaza from a Hamas rocket that misfired. Ma'an gave the details and a Hamas official privately admitted that this is what happened to a BBC reporter.

Publicly, however, Hamas insists that the girl was killed by an Israeli airstrike. So Hamas staged a funeral for a girl they killed as a "martyr," wrapping her body in a Hamas flag.

And the locals ate it all up:

Sick, depraved people.

Nice shooting (and intelligence) (update)

The IDF struck a smuggling tunnel, killing two Hamas members and reportedly injuring 21 others.

Which means that it was a tunnel for smuggling weapons.

Of course, being the liars they are, the Gazans are accusing Israel of somehow injecting poison gas in the tunnels as they were bombing them.

UPDATE: Ma'an reports that Hamas is claiming not that Israel bombed the tunnel today, but that Hamas members went to inspect a damaged tunnel and died from inhaling poisonous gas. (h/ t Tam)

Palestine Press Agency reports that on Wednesday, Israel shipped 268 trucks filled with goods through the Kerem Shalom crossing, including 9 trucks of aid, 152 trucks for the commercial sector, including 11 trucks of wheat and 20 trucks of feed, 30 trucks for the agricultural sector, 5 trucks for the transportation sector, including, 30 vehicles, 9 trucks loaded with cement and iron for construction and 61 truckfuls of gravel for UNRWA projects, and also been pumping 159,510 kilos of cooking gas and 240,097 liters of diesel from Qatar, as well as 38,000 liters of diesel for transportation.

Gaza responded by"exporting" dozens of rockets towards Israeli civilians.

Today, after eight more rockets were fired overnight, Israel is sending another 310 trucks of aid through the crossing, including supplies to help upgrade the electric grid of Gaza.