Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, December 16, 2005

Today's Palestinian Police Phunnies XVIII

Israeli sources discovered on Thursday that Palestinian police stationed at the Karni crossing planned on assisting in the carrying-out of a terrorist attack at the crossing. Fortunately, the attack was thwarted by Israeli security sources.

The policemen reportedly meant to allow the terrorists detonate a large bomb at the crossing while it was being scanned. The assault also was intended to include opening fire and throwing grenades, according to Israel Radio.

The best defense against Iranian nukes

A great sentence in a great post from AbbaGav:

We'll be watching for the human shields too. Grass roots organizations should be starting about now if they want to get here in time to chain themselves to the best buildings.

Thoughts on compromise, influence, independence, peace

SoccerDad starts with this post of mine and runs with it , decrying the current US administration as now acting in ways indistinguishable from previous ones, vis a vis Israel.

He comments:

The failing of most administrations when it comes to Mideast peace is that they put a premium on its success. This makes the cost of peace more expensive. The Palestinians loving the attention make sure that their demands are sacrosanct and Israel thus must bend to those to those demands or be obstructionist.

His second sentence is very accurate, but it is also partially Israel's fault. If only the Jews would remember their Talmud!

If two persons hold a cloak, one says, "I found it," and the other says, I found it," one says, "All of it is mine," and the other says, "All of it is mine," the first one shall swear that not less than one half of it belongs to him, the other one shall swear that not less than one half of it belongs to him, and they shall divide it. If one says, "All of it is mine," and the other says, "Half of it is mine," the one who says "All of it is mine" shall swear that not less than three-quarters of it belongs to him, and the one who says "Half of it, is mine” shall swear that not less than one-quarter of it belongs to him; the former shall take three-quarters and the latter shall take one-quarter.

If one party claims the entire item in dispute, and the other one says that they share it, the only thing a third party judge can do (absent other evidence) is splitting the difference. Since Jews are always looking to compromise for peace, and the Arabs aren't, this gives the Arabs a much stronger claim. Israel should have long ago defined their "red lines" in this battle. Unfortunately, thanks to Barak, the Israeli "red line" is pretty much the Green Line. This was perhaps the worst legacy ever left by an Israeli leader.

Back to Soccer Dad's first sentence quoted above, though - I look at it a little differently. The reason that the US always ends up pressuring Israel and giving the Palestinians a relatively free ride is indeed because the US puts a premium on solving the problem - and the US only has influence over Israel because of the billions of dollars it gives annually.

This is not the entire problem - Egypt regularly thumbs its nose at the US and still gets billions every year as well. The problem is that Israel feels indebted to the US because of the money and feels she must bend over backwards to make her "good friend" happy. That's what friends do.

The Palestinians have no such pressures. The EU could play a role here but it usually refuses (although yesterday there was a hopeful sign.)

Let's step back. What things did Israel do over the past few years that reduced violence?

Taking the war to the terrorists.
Building the barrier.

These moves were successful in making Israel safer (and consequently making Palestinian Arabs safer.) Any "truce" only came about because Israel was successful in doing these things.

And the world community was against both of them.

World pressure (including US pressure) on Israel is almost always counterproductive to true peace.

The only way to reduce this pressure, specifically from the US, is for Israel to plan to wean itself from American dollars. Absurd agreements like Rafah should never have happened, and if it wasn't for US dollars to Israel, they wouldn't have.

Israel is no longer acting as an independent state; rather as an extension of the US. This is not only a tragedy for the Zionist dream, it is counterproductive to real peace.

The Perdana "Peace" Conference

Right now, another worthless anti-American, anti Israel conference is taking place in Kuala Lampur. It is called the Perdana Peace Conference, and it has attracted some corporate sponsors.

Speakers include:

Najwa Jalamneh, a 15-year old Arab girl who "disclosed continued atrocity and criminal acts of the Zionist regime citing the horror and crimes being perpetrated by occupiers in Palestine;"
Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed, who writes "Israel is racist" articles;
Antisemitic former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad;
George Galloway, who has said that Zionists control the media;
Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, who blames Christians for Muslim terror;
Mass murdering Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe;
and many more self-appointed "peace" activists.

Sponsors of this hatefest include Dell Asia and Nestle.

"Obstacles to Peace"

How many times have we heard that the Jewish settlers who live beyond the Green Line are obstacles to peace? A quick search finds here,
here, here, here, and literally hundreds of other times that this phrase was used in reference to Jewish settlements, often by the State Department and the White House.

Well, now these supposed obstacles are gone from Gaza, so we must be that much closer to peace now, right?

The Palestinian Authority, instead of housing citizens in the Gaza communities abandoned by Israel, has turned them into training camps for armed factions. N'vei Dekalim is used to launch rockets.

Many of the 21 communities emptied of their Jewish residents last summer have now been turned into full-fledged military training camps of the ruling Fatah group and of other Islamic terror groups. According to the groups, the communities also act as recruitment centers for the “people's army” being funded by Fatah.

Two Kassam rockets were fired from Gaza, mid-day Tuesday, toward Israeli towns in the western Negev. A Hamas official told the World Tribune that the rockets were fired from former Jewish towns that have been converted into launching sites for the war against the Jewish State.

Last month, the PA official in charge of interior affairs, Nassar Yusouf, toured the training camp erected on the remains of the community of N'vei Dekalim – which was the largest of the Jewish towns in Gush Katif. Yusouf planned to declare the area a closed military zone, but soon realized that armed hordes from his own Fatah faction had set up a military infrastructure in the place.

It must be an oversight by the major media outlets and our Department of State, but not once have I seen terror training camps in Gaza referred to as "obstacles to peace." Not once have I seen anyone in the mainstream press or officials from the US or EU utter the obvious truth that terror is far more an "obstacle to peace" than Jews who want to live on historically Jewish land.

It is mind-boggling that after the Gaza debacle, where the pseudo-statelet is well on its way to becoming Hamastan, that people think that peace is closer now than it was six months ago.

There is only one obstacle to peace - the fact that the Palestinian Arabs, and the Arab and Muslim world at large, cannot accept the idea of Jews living in the Middle East in positions of power, even if Israel was the size of a tablecloth.

Solving that problem will not bring peace, but it is a necessary precondition of peace. Making more concessions to people who ultimately want you dead or dhimmified is the worst sort of wishful thinking.

AFP resurrects the death scorecard

At the end of an article about Israel killing four terrorists, whose car was filled with bombs creating a huge explosion, AFP restarted the old MSM deathcount to make it appear that Israel is four times more monstrous than Palestinians:

GAZA CITY (AFP) - At least four people were killed and three others wounded in an Israeli air strike on their vehicle in the Gaza Strip.
[...]
The latest deaths raised to 4,911 the overall toll since the Palestinian intifada, or uprising, began in September 2000. More than three-quarters of the victims have been Palestinian.

Ah, numbers.

Did they count the Palestinians killed by other Palestinians as "corroborators"?
Did they count the Palestinians who blew themselves up killing Jews?
Did they count the Palestinians who blew themselves up in "work accidents"?
Did they count the Palestinians who were shooting at Jews?

There is only one reason why AFP would decide to use a number like that in an article, and it isn't for context.

Backgrounder on Muslim Holocaust Denial

Iran's president Ahmadinejad's claims that the Holocaust was a myth is hardly surprising, since the Arab and Muslim worlds have been peddling Holocaust denial for two decades now. The ADL has a well-researched paper on the phenomenon from 2001, including Mahmoud Abbas' book that denies the Holocaust - claims he never backed down from.

But Holocaust denial has taken place in the official media of Jordan, the PA, Syria and Egypt.

One tiny example of how institutionalized Holocaust denial is in the PA:

Clue: Jewish center for eternalizing the Holocaust and the lies.
Answer: Yad Vashem (the official Israeli Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem)

From the February 18, 1999 crossword puzzle of PA newspaper Al-Hayat Al-Jadida.
(translated by USA Today, April 4, 2001)

"Palestinian Authority Must...."

Yesterday, the State Department emphasized that the PA must take steps to stop terror. To wit:

U.S. State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli says Palestinian authorities must do more to stop such attacks:

“The attack once again reminds us of the importance of all sides to do everything possible to contain violence and to tackle terror. The Palestinian Authority must take immediate steps to prevent these attacks, to end the violence, and to dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism.”

To achieve the goal of an independent Palestinian state, the Palestinian Authority must put a stop to terrorism.

Strong words!

Too bad they are watered down by the fact that they have been stated so many times before, and not only do the Palestinians ignore these statements; they are rewarded for ignoring these statements!

"Palestinians must recognize the right of Israel and its people to live safe and secure lives today, tomorrow and forever." Bill Clinton, December 14, 1998

"Chairman Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Authority must immediately find and arrest those responsible for these hideous murders. They must also act swiftly and decisively against the organizations that support them. Now more than ever, Chairman Arafat and the Palestinian Authority must demonstrate through their actions and not merely their words their commitment to fight terror." - George Bush, December 2, 2001
"The Palestinian Authority must do everything in its power to prevent the killing of innocents." - Terje Roed-Larsen at the UN, April, 2003
"Calling Hamas an "enemy of peace," U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said Friday that the Palestinian Authority must take decisive steps to disarm the Islamic militant group. " - June 20, 2003

"The Palestinian Authority should take immediate and specific action to prevent terrorist acts against Israel, and its leadership must do more to de-legitimize terrorism among the public." - Kofi Annan, July 17, 2002

"The Palestinian Authority must act now to dismantle terrorist networks that perpetuate such attacks, and to prevent future attacks." - White House, August 13, 2003

"Powell Says Palestinian Authority Must Stop Terrorism Now" - October 16, 2003

"Under the roadmap, Palestinians must undertake an immediate cessation of armed activity and all acts of violence against Israelis anywhere, and all official Palestinian institutions must end incitement against Israel. The Palestinian leadership must act decisively against terror, including sustained, targeted, and effective operations to stop terrorism and dismantle terrorist capabilities and infrastructure. Palestinians must undertake a comprehensive and fundamental political reform that includes a strong parliamentary democracy and an empowered prime minister." - George Bush, April 14, 2004

"The Palestinian Authority must in particular demonstrate its complete determination to combat terrorism." - European Council, June 16, 2005

"And the obligation of the Palestinians has to do with the dismantling of terrorist infrastructure and organizations and they're going to have to do it." - Condoleeza Rice, August, 2005

"The Palestinian Authority must earn the confidence of its neighbors by rejecting and fighting terrorism." - George Bush, October 20, 2005

When dealing with people for whom lives are disposable, words are hardly going to have an impact. It is unfortunate that those making these strong statements have no interest in penalizing those who repeatedly ignore their demands.

Weak Kofi: Annan delivers lame apology for map incident

An interesting followup to the story about the UN wiping Israel off the map:

The particular event in question was organized by the Palestinian delegation in the U.N. and the Palestinian Authority Foreign Minister Nasser al-Kidwa, and hosted all of the organization's high ranking officials.

During preparations for the event, the flags of the U.N. and Palestine were placed on the central stage, and a map depicting the territory of Israel was hung on the wall behind it.

However, the map was titled 'Palestine' instead of 'Israel', and all Israeli communities have been curiously erased from it.

Annan, who during the event sat on stage under the map and addressed the audience, apparently failed to notice its peculiarity.

The U.N. Spokesman Stephane Dujarric told Yedioth Ahronoth on Monday that 'the map that was displayed at the event is not an official U.N. map. Secretary General Annan believes it was regretful that the map was in the room during his speech. We have informed the event's organizers that such an incident should be prevented from repeating in the future.'

So, according to the UN, the problem is that Kofi Annan was embarrassed by an inaccurate map hung behind him.

The fact that the Palestinian leadership today explicitly denies Israel's right to exist, despite their lies at Oslo, is not worth mentioning.

What exactly is the difference between what Nasser al-Kidwa did and what Iran's lunatic president says? Both negate Israel's existence in no uncertain terms.

But Palestinians are still the world's darlings and therefore need to be rewarded for lying more and more about pretending to want a peaceful solution. Iran is a bit more of a pariah so the UN can afford to criticize its president (while refusing to do anything beyond words.)

HH #49 Anniversary Post

The next edition of Haveil Havalim (hosted next week at the fantastic SerandEz blog) will mark its first anniversary. The tireless Soccer Dad is asking that JBloggers submit a post from about a year ago, to show how our blogs have changed in the past year, or alternatively to write an article about why we started blogging and linking to that.

This blog started in August of 2004, but for many months it was meant to be a compilation of news concerning Israel, terrorism and anti-semitism with very little comment from me. It was still useful and I still often see people finding an old article I posted that is no longer available from the original link.

Other bloggers also started much more complete Israel-news blogs, like News for Members of the Tribe and the excellent Iris, so I started adding commentary and eventually original pieces.

Almost exactly one year ago, one of my earliest commentary posts was tearing apart Reuters' obvious anti-Israel bias in one of its articles.

Since then I have been trying to carve out my own niche in the J-Blogosphere (as SoccerDad put it in a recent comment) .

While I get most of the articles I comment on from Daily Alert and similar sources, I also now will do a regular Google News search on terms like "Zionist." Using this I can often discover interesting articles in the Muslim world, which even when translated into English shows incredible bigotry and hate. Iranian news sources are particularly likely to use the term "Zionist" as an epithet. (For example, now I know that Iran's foreign minister blames Zionists for the assassination of the anti-Syrian Lebanese journalist yesterday.) Much outrageous anti-semitism can also be found this way, helpfully masqueraded as "news" sources by Google.

I also spend time looking through old Palestine Post articles and finding parallels between what Israel went through during its birth and today. I spun off an entire separate blog just to re-post the articles based on that research, and, who knows? Maybe someone will offer me a book deal! For some reason I have blogged a lot from the Palestine Post recently, and even though it is only Monday I think I will nominate my latest article on the Arab League boycott of Jewish goods in 1946-47, which has relevance today.

Anyway, a big מזל טוב to Haveil Havalim on its anniversary, and to Soccer Dad for having created such a successful and important venue for the Jewish Blogosphere!

Since taking office in August, Ahmadinejad has spoken out frequently against Israel in terms which were almost unheard of under his reformist predecessor Mohammad Khatami.

European diplomats say his anti-Israel comments, which have included calling the Jewish state a 'tumor' that should be 'wiped off the map', may cause a delay in planned talks between the European Union and Iran over Tehran's nuclear program.

What a strong response! Delaying talks is sure to make Iran's insane president think twice about his nuclear program.

Good thing we have the EU to protect the world from nuclear proliferation.

Fatah is a reverse acronym from the complete Arabic name: HArakat al-TAhrir al-Watani al-Filastini, becoming "HATAF", which, since it means "death" in Arabic, was reversed to become "FATAH" meaning "conquest" in Arabic.
The Fatah official emblem shows two fists holding rifles and a hand grenade superimposed on a map of the land they claim as Palestine: present-day Israel, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Fatah joined and began to dominate the PLO in 1969.
The "Palestinian National Authority" is formally delegated its power by the PLO. In other words, the PA is officially run by a terrorist organization.
While there is some controversy about whether the PLO ever modified its charter to recognize Israel (a modified charter has never been published, to my knowledge), Fatah's "constitution" still explicitly calls for Israel's destruction by "armed struggle."
It appears that every major member of the PA is a member of Fatah (including such "moderates" as Saeb Erekat), and not one is known to have said that they do not subscribe to the Fatah "constitution."
Mahmoud Abbas and Farouk Qaddoumi have been in a power struggle over leadership of Fatah and the PLO. Qaddumi, who lives in Tunisia and is adamantly against any compromise with Israel, is the head of the PLO Central Committee and as such, the PA reports to him. Abbas disputes this, and some call him the President of Fatah. Some ugly incidents have occurred as a result.
Either way, it appears that Abbas holds the purse-strings for Fatah in "Palestine" and the Al Aqsa Martyr's Brigade terror group gets its funding from Fatah.
Qaddoumi wants to move to Gaza.

1946-1947 Arab boycott of Jewish goods hurts Pal Arabs much more than Jews

One of the recurring themes in the history of Palestinian Arabs is the incredible number of times they've been screwed - by their fellow Arabs. From at least the 1940's, the Palestinian Arab leadership and especially the leaders of other Arab countries have not hesitated to use Palestinian Arabs as pawns in their maniacal desire to rid the Middle East of Jews in non-dhimmi roles.

The earliest example of this that I have found occured in late 1945. The Arab League, alarmed at the acceleration of the movement towards Zionist statehood, hit upon a formula that they have repeated many times since then - the boycott of Jewish products (sometimes called "Zionist" products, but as can be seen below, the word "Jewish" was used interchangably with "Zionist" at the time.)

Ain't Arab solidarity grand?

Almost immediately, there were concerns among Palestinian Arabs about the impending boycott and how it would affect their livelihoods:

Notice the outspokeness of the real Arab street about how this would hurt them. "Those in the Arab League who decided on a strike don't worry about us."

Of course, this doesn't stop the Arab leaders, who always know best. On January 1, 1946, the boycott starts as planned. Immediately, there are problems with compliance.

So, the wise Arab leaders decided to extend the boycott to not only Jewish goods but also to Jewish services. No longer could Palestinian Arabs go to Jewish doctors or Jewish-owned movie theaters! That will teach those uppity Jews! (Notice that here is one case where the boycott is explicitly called against "Jews", not "Zionists." The almost inescapable conclusion is that the Arabs were reading from the Nazi playbook, where boycotts of Jewish goods preceded the Holocaust.)

It is also interesting to note that the non-compliance by Palestinian Arabs here in late January is becoming more of a concern to the leaders of the boycott. Not that they were consulted or anything.

The months flew by and the boycott became less and less relevant. Palestinian Arab leaders passed yet another of their many anti-Jewish resolutions at yet another meaningless meeting in August, and called again for their people to abide by the boycott that was still being roundly ignored.

Meanwhile, the Jewish economy was booming as never before! As this October article shows, the Zionists adjusted their economic models to sell more to non-Arab countries. Any effect that the boycott may have had was more than offset by their business in new markets.

As 1946 became 1947, and as Israel became closer to becoming a reality, the Arab leaders refused to believe that the boycott was an abysmal failure. Someone had to be at fault - and that someone was, of course, the Palestinian Arab businessman who refused to go along.

The solution was simple. Bomb the Palestinian Arab businessmen!

Just bombing them in Jerusalem was not enough. This had to become a national event.

It appears that dozens of bombs were set off in Arab businesses by other Arabs as 1947 wore on, putting Palestinian Arabs in the position of either losing their businesses by adhering to a bizarre failure of a boycott, or losing their businesses to the bombs of their leaders who couldn't possibly be at fault themselves.

One at least one occasion, the targeted businessmen had had enough of this.

A "cycle of violence" was now established! But even with the thuggish tactics of the terrorist Arab "leaders," the boycott was still ignored and Jewish businesses were not hurt at all.

The only ones hurt were the ones that the boycott was officially supposed to benefit.

I don't know if this is the first time that Palestinian Arabs were treated like dirt by the people who pretend to champion their cause, but it was certainly far from the last.

Crossposted to Palestine Post-ings.

Hey-hey, Haveil Havalim #48 is out

A Whispering Soul does an outstanding job of finding a ton of cool links in the J-Blogosphere in this week's Haveil Havalim. It appears that the number of links hits triple digits. There is a lot of quality out there in the Jewish blog world and it is nice to see it all in one spot. (Finding the time to check all these links out is a whole 'nother story.)

Yours truly was mentioned as well, and it was for the post I was most proud of this week. So many thanks to whoever nominated me!

(I am working on another major Palestine Post-ings article this week as well, so far I have about 5 articles on a theme and a few more coming. We'll see how much time I get to put it together. )
(UPDATE: I finished it. )

Doctor, I need help. I just can't self-nominate!

I admit I like to be mentioned in the weekly Haveil Havalim, and I admit I like getting the extra hits that mentions like that generate. But I can't nominate myself for these things!

I thought I had a lot of good posts this week, especially the Palestine Post-ings articles on Kiryat Gat/Intel, December 9 1947, and the aborted Palestinian Arab state of 1948. Beyond those, my article on the Palestinian Arab "peace" soccer game got picked up by the Cuanas blog, people seemed to like the Saeb Erekat morality post, and many read the UN map post. And SoccerDad thought I should nominate my post on Paradise Now.

Not to mention that the second annual JIB awards are coming and I also can't bring myself to nominate this blog. It just feels wrong - if people like a blog, it seems to me that they should nominate what they like, not the bloggers themselves. Not that I look down at those who do. It just doesn't feel right to me.

I actually started trying to compose a self-nomination to A Whispering Soul, who is compiling HH this week. I simply couldn't do it.

I think I may need an on-line shrink to help me work through these issues!

The Intellectual Corruption of Academia

Usually, Nobel Prizes for economics aren't controversial. But if one of the winners has the chutzpah to actually think that Jews have the right to live beyond the 1967 borders, well, he becomes a "warmonger" and his theories become "controversial."

Prof. Israel Aumann received the Nobel Prize for economics in Stockholm Saturday evening. Several hundred academics, charging that his theory supports Yesha communities, want the prize revoked.

Prof. Aumann, of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, received the honor jointly, shortly after the end of the Sabbath, with American Prof. Thomas Schelling, for their work on understanding conflict through game theory. Aumann brought his entire extended family to the ceremony, where Sweden's King Carl XVI Gustaf presented the prize.

The Israeli scholar, the eighth Israeli to win a Nobel prize, moved to Israel from Germany in 1956 and is chairman of Hebrew University's Center for Rationality. Prof. Aumann said that war is not irrational and must be studied 'like cancer' in order to defeat it.

Almost 1,000 intellectuals and academics submitted to the Royal Swedish Academy of Science a petition to protest the 'monstrous' act of awarding Prof. Aumann. They charged that he is using game theory to 'justify the Israeli occupation and the oppression of the Palestinians.' They also want the award to be taken back from Prof. Schelling, whom they blamed for inspiring American military strategy that includes bombing civilians.

The British newspaper The Guardian stated that Prof. Aumann, in an interview with an American website, said that Israel made a mistake in expelling Jewish residents from the Gaza and northern Samaria regions.

'From a game theory point of view it was a very bad move. But if I didn't study game theory, I would also say the same thing,' according to the professor.

"It was a bad move because it sends a signal to the other side that if you apply enough pressure, then we will respond in a way that you are applying pressure. It's a bad move theoretically. It sends the wrong signal," he said. In another interview, he said the Arab-Israeli conflict has been "been going on for at least 80 years and as far as I can see it is going to go on for at least another 80 years. I don't see any end to this one, I'm sorry to say."

Notice that the "academics and intellectuals" aren't protesting that his science or math is wrong - but that they believe (undoubtedly most of them are not familiar with game theory) that these theories are being used to justify wars they don't like.

In other words, math and science and true intellectual pursuits are far less important to these self-appointed guardians of knowledge than doing what they feel is politically correct. These so-called "intellectuals" are against true research and acquiring knowledge, which is beyond ironic.

It is ironic that "academics" are so clueless as to how they are damaging their own reputations as thinkers and seekers of knowledge. It is funny how hysterical these supposedly dispassionate observers become when they disagree with someone's politics. It is sad that many Israeli professors seem to have joined in this farce.

The awarding of Nobel Peace prizes is often controversial, but it is rare for the scientific laureates to generate significant opposition. However, a petition to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences signed by about 1 000 intellectuals and academics from Israel, Europe and America describes the awarding of this year's prize to the two professors as "monstrous".

The critics accuse Aumann -- a member of the hawkish think tank Professors for a Strong Israel, which believes the Jewish state should retain the occupied territories -- of using his mathematical theories to promote his political views.

"Aumann uses his analysis to justify the Israeli occupation and the oppression of the Palestinians," the petition says.

It describes Schelling's theories as directly inspiring the United States military strategy in Vietnam, including the indiscriminate bombing of civilians.

"This strategy resulted in two million civilian deaths and was a complete failure in realising its objectives," the petition says. "Neither of these individuals has contributed anything that improves the human condition; rather, they have contributed to the misery of millions."

The petition is signed by Israeli peace campaigners, economists, academics, Holocaust survivors and left-wing politicians. Signatories from about 50 other countries, including the US and several Arab states, have also supported it. Those from Britain include academics at several universities, members of groups such as Jews against Zionism, and activists in the Respect party.

Shraga Elam, an Israeli writer among those behind the petition, concedes that his objection is to Aumann's political views and not to the quality of the analysis on game theory.

"Every person, including a Nobel Prize laureate, is entitled to his political views," he said. "But ... it is not enough to say that politics does not enter in to it.

"Can a racist or a Holocaust denier receive the Nobel Prize even if he is very talented in his scientific field? Political views are relevant."

There you have it - a self-proclaimed "intellectual" who likes to compare Jews who believe that Gaza shouldn't be Judenrein with neo-Nazis.

What an intelligent, academic argument!

And the sad thing is, these so-called intellectuals have no reason to fear that they will not get tenure or prestigious positions at other universities because of their profoundly censorious views. The left-leaning academic world is an entire culture built on self-congratulatory closemindedness that is the exact opposite of what true knowledge seekers should be.

The war already began: Palestine Post, December 9, 1947

Here is a snapshot of the first page of the December 9, 1947 Palestine Post:

Israel's friends like to say that the combined Arab nations all attacked Israel as soon as she declared her independence. But it is not quite true: they attacked much earlier than that, and the between the time of the UN Partition decision and May, 1948, the Arabs already started attacking Jews all the while gearing up for the much larger war to come. And the British pretty much gave up on any pretense of protecting the Jewish citizens of Palestine.

Iraq wanted to position it's troops in Transjordan:

Arabs attacked and burned Jewish homes, murdering women and kidnapping babies:

Jews lived together with the enemy - no wall, no security, and no interest by the British to keep the peace. At any moment there could be sniper fire, and many Jews were killed just doing their normal day-to-day activities.

The Arab countries continued to criticize the Partition plan but were confident of their ability to kill the Jews who actually thought they had a right to live in peace in the land of Israel - making it a religious obligation to join the war against the Jews: (page 2)

So the time period between Partition and independence was hardly peaceful. The war already started, and it was by no means clear (within a few years of the Holocaust) that any Jews would survive, let alone that Israel would win.

Bush ignoring Israel in "war on terror" speeches

A disturbing op-ed from Sidney Zion. I believe his conclusions are spot-on - the genteel anti-semites and Israel-haters have managed to separate Israel's war against Islamic terror from that of the rest of the world, giving rise to the thought process that somehow the Palestinian terror is more acceptable and legitimate than the Islamic terror in the rest of the world.

The President's omission of Israel as a country affected by Islamic terror strengthens the positions of the fundamentalist Hamas and Islamic Jihad immensely - any distancing between Israel and America is a huge victory for the Islamofascist propaganda machine. And there is no doubt that this omission is noted and celebrated in Ramallah and Gaza City.

Repeat a lie enough times and people will start to believe it. This has certainly worked here.

Bush's radar skips Israel

President Bush, in back-to-back speeches defending the Iraq war, has crossed Israel off the list of countries hit by Islamic terrorists.

In his address yesterday to the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, Bush said: "The terrorists in Iraq share the same ideology as the terrorists who struck the United States on Sept. 11, blew up commuters in London and Madrid, murdered tourists in Bali, killed workers in Riyadh and slaughtered guests at a wedding in Amman, Jordan."

In Annapolis last week, he listed the same countries, adding the massacre of Iraqi children and their parents, who had just been hit outside an Iraqi hospital.

How could Israel fail to make the President's cut? Especially yesterday, after a suicide bomber killed five and wounded 60 in Netanya on Monday. Not to mention that Israel has been the prime target of terror forever.

Is this an oversight by Israel's greatest friend in the White House? Or could it be an effort to appease the Arab world?

Certainly no oversight. In 11 speeches over the past three months in which Bush has talked about terror, he only mentioned Israel three times - once before Jewish Republicans. Yesterday, he left them out again. "The enemy must be defeated on every battle front, from the streets of Western cities to the mountains of Afghanistan to the tribal regions of Pakistan to the islands of Southeast Asia and the Horn of Africa."

If he forgot them last week, he was reminded by the Zionist Organization of America, in a tough press release that was cited by a reporter in the White House briefing the day after the Annapolis speech.

Q. "Why did the President do this, given 1,700 Israel citizens murdered by Islamo-fascists, and 10,000 more maimed by them since 1993?"

Scott McClellan, Bush's spokesman: "There's no stronger friend and supporter of Israel."

Q. "Why did he not mention that with all those other countries?"

McClellan: "I don't think that's the way to look at it."

I think Bush put a blue pencil through Israel, and I think he did it because he's in big trouble with the war and all he can think about is appeasing the Arabs.

He likes to compare himself to Winston Churchill. The President should keep these words of his in mind: "If you feed the crocodiles, you'll be his last meal."

UN wipes Israel off the map

Arutz Sheva reports:

The United Nations held a "Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People" last week. A large map of “Palestine,” with Israel literally wiped off the map, featured prominently in the festivities.

The ceremony was held at the UN headquarters in New York and was attended by Secretary General Kofi Annan and the Presidents of the UN Security Council and the General Assembly.

Map of "Palestine" from the Jordan River to the sea, with no mention of the Jewish State.

During the festivities, a map labeled a "map of Palestine” was displayed prominently between UN and PLO flags. The map, with “Palestine” written in Arabic atop it, does not include Israel, a member of the UN for 56 years. The map does not even demarcate the partition lines of November 29, 1947, marking a Jewish state alongside an Arab state. The partition was dictated by the UN General Assembly itself.

Map surrounded by the flags of the UN and PLO.

With the map hanging behind him, Secretary-General Annan addressed the public meeting at UN Headquarters.

Kofi Annan sits at the dais with the map negating the Jewish State's existence in the background (lower left side of photo)

I have yet to hear about any world outrage, or even protest from Israel.

Oy! I've been tagged!

The J-Blogosphere has been buzzing with the "meme" asking people to write what random songs show up on their iPod. WHen I saw it, I didn't expect to be tagged (no one has ever tagged me for anything anyway) but I had it in the back of my mind, wondering if I would embarrass myself by revealing what songs would come up on my iPod Nano that I got as a gift from work and have been playing with for a month or so.

Then Ze'ev from Israel Perspectives raised the stakes and changed the meme into 15 books people have read recently, are currently reading or really like. And then he tagged me, as if I was a literate person!

If he would have asked for 5 books, maybe I could have scraped something together quickly. But, here goes, in no particular order:

Contemporary Halakhic Problems, volumes 1-3, J. David Bleich - I love the subject of halacha in today's society, moral and ethical perspectives. This was the series that started it all. Other similar books by Basil Herring and Fred Rosner are good. I have not yet read the more recent volumes, though.
Six Days of War, Michael Oren - the definitive history of the 1967 Six Day War, with a very good overview of 1948-67 as well in the first chapter.
Bringing Down the House, Ben Mezrich - a fun true story of some MIT kids who beat the system in Las Vegas playing blackjack.
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, JK Rowling - My review was here. The entire series really is great.
Year's Best SF 10, Hartwell and Cramer - I don't have the patience for long SF stories but I love anthologies, and this is one of many I have read, usually on planes during business trips. But if I recall correctly, it included the novella "Sergeant Chip" which was a fantastic story, one of the best SF stories I ever read.
New Voices in Science Fiction, Resnick - Similar to the other SF anthologies but much more variety, and at least two Jewish themed stories including a very cool ba'al teshuva/vampire story called "Lifeblood" by Michael Burstein.
Artscroll Eruvin volumes 1 and 2 - I am trying to make time to at least do the English of the Daf Yomi this cycle, and so far (bli ayin hora" I've been mostly successful. Eruvin is hard though and needs more time than I am giving it. (I know Ze'ev wasn't including sifrei kodesh, but, he didn't explicitly exclude them.)
Bodyguard of Lies, Anthony Cave Brown - an exhaustive yet mostly entertaining description of the British use of deception in World War II, climaxing in the amazing story of how they fooled Hitler into misplacing his troops for D-Day.
Secrets and Lies, Bruce Schneier - a good book to place the problems of computer security in context, with applications beyond the digital world.

This is all I have time for right now, and I am not going to burden anyone else with this meme (since Ze'ev already tagged many others.) I can also claim that if you add the many volumes of books I mentioned it is way more than 15.

Perhaps I'll try to add more later.

Palestinian soccer players to be punished for heinous crime

This article is telling not only for how it shows that Palestinian Arabs have no interest in peace, but also in how Israelis do.

The situation hasn't changed for a hundred years and it will not change in the next hundred, without a significant change in the mindset of the Palestinian Arab leaders.

The naivete of the Peres Center is also interesting.

Sports and politics are two sides of the same coin.

The Palestinian FA plans to punish players under its jurisdiction for participating alongside Israelis in a 'Peace Match' in Barcelona, an official said on Wednesday.

A 'Peace Team' of Israeli and Palestinian players lost 2-1 to Barcelona at the Nou Camp last week in front of 31,820 spectators, including many dignitaries.

'The Palestinian FA will form a committee to investigate the players who participated in the match ... everyone involved will be punished,' senior FA official Jamal Zaqout told Reuters.

'We act in accordance with the attitude of our people who are against normalisation (of relations with Israel) before the end of the occupation,' Zaqout said, referring to Israel's hold over lands captured in the 1967 Middle East war. (And Reuters of course can read his mind that he was only referring to the '67 borders. - EoZ)

Fifteen Israelis, including many internationals and 12 Palestinians from the occupied West Bank joined up for the match sponsored by Israeli statesman Shimon Peres's Centre for Peace foundation.

A Peres Centre spokeswoman said the Palestinian FA's reaction was 'irresponsible and annoying'.

'The Peres Centre together with its Palestinian partner, the Abu Sukar Centre, received the blessing of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and (his senior security adviser) Jibril Rajoub for the match,' spokeswoman Michal Eldar said.

'The match in Barcelona was an unprecedented event in which we managed to convey to the world the message of peace and cooperation between Israelis and Palestinians,' she said.

A spokesman for the Israel FA (IFA) said it had approved the participation of its players.

Israel's FA has been generally supportive of its Palestinian counterpart, which became a full FIFA member in 1998.

The IFA helped Palestinian players receive permits to leave Gaza for overseas matches when Israel controlled the coastal territory before pulling out last September.

Pro terror "art" in Berkeley

I missed this classic photo essay from Zombie last month about this art exhibition in the city-funded Berkeley Art Center. It still runs through next week, though. A small sample:

The first painting to catch my eye was this one of what is apparently a young suicide bomber wearing a mask made out of a kaffiyeh. The Arabic words behind him say, over and over, "I will not accept a little" or "I will not accept a pittance," apparently referring to the desire for a Palestinian state that occupies all of modern-day Israel, and not just the West Bank and Gaza. In other words, it is a call for the elimination of Israel, seemingly with suicide bombing as the means for achieving this. (Thanks to evariste for the translation.)

Here's a close-up of the central figure, with the bomb attached to his waist more clearly visible (which is reminiscent of this photograph of a young Palestinian being groomed to become a suicide bomber).

Next up was this photograph of two mannequin-hands holding a "blood"-soaked globe. You might wonder: what does this have to do with Palestine or Israel? The answer: everything. Because the image of greedy hands grasping a (frequently bloody) globe is one of the most notorious anti-Semitic illustrative themes of the last century. This motif was (and is) often used as an illustration for covers of the anti-Semitic tract The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion.

(Click on the image to enlarge.)
Here is a classic example from a 1930s-era French-language edition (provided here as a comparison -- it was not part of the exhibit). In most reditions, the hands grasping the bloody globe belong to a greedy Jew who wants to take over the world. I suppose this is the message -- which is widely believed among Palestinian militants -- that the artist who took the photograph wanted to communicate. (Notice also how the position of the continents is identical in both images. Coincidence?)

Read the whole thing.

Iranian president: Islam seeks peace for humanity

This is one of the more unintentionally hilarious news stories around (Hat tip: Judeopundit)

TEHRAN, Dec. 6 (MNA) -- President Mahmud Ahmadinejad said here on Tuesday that Islam seeks peace, calm and justice for humanity.

Speaking to reporters before leaving for Saudi Arabia to attend an extraordinary summit of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) in Mecca, Ahmadinejad stressed that leaders of Islamic states are tasked with envisaging a hopeful future for the current world which suffers from injustice and tension, development of chemical and biological arsenals and aggression. (He didn't mention nuclear weapons. Must have been an oversight. -EoZ)

He said that the OIC could play a significant role in world developments, expressing hope that the upcoming meeting would have positive results for the Islamic and the entire world.

Ahmadinejad added that studying challenges and problems encountered by Muslims worldwide will be high on the agenda of talks.

He noted that the talks should also focus on the decisive role the Islamic world can play in the international community.

Ah yes, a world divided into Muslims with nukes, dhimmis and infidels. How peaceful it would be!

Today's Palestinian Police Phunnies XVII

A heroic effort to arrest terrorists, unfortunately thwarted by the fact that the terrorists didn't want to be arrested. Better luck next time!

Hours after the attack, PA security forces tried unsuccessfully to detain a Jihad terrorist in Jenin. The man, who was not identified, was shot in the shoulder during the attempt to detain him.
Eyewitnesses said scores of Fatah and Islamic Jihad gunmen, backed by many civilians, foiled the attempt to apprehend the terrorist and take him to a prison in Jericho.
Local members of the Aksa Martyrs Brigades, Fatah's armed wing, voiced support for the suicide attack, pledging to use force to thwart any attempt by the PA to detain Islamic Jihad officials. The group's commander, Zakariya Zubeidi, was among those who welcomed the attack, saying it was "a natural response to Israeli violations of the truce."
Another attempt to detain Jihad activists in the Balata and Askar refugee camps near Nablus also failed after dozens of gunmen drove back the PA security forces after pelting them with stones.

And I thought that stones were not harmful. Silly me.

Was Netanya a terrorist act? PA not sure

Mahmoud Abbas' pretend "condemnation" of the suicide bombing in Netanya included something unusual - an apparent description of the attack as a terror attack. (The fact that this is unusual speaks volumes by itself.)

From AFP:

Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas condemned the attack as an act of "terrorism" and vowed to bring the perpetrators to justice.

"We severely condemn this terrorist operation in Netanya," a statement from his office said.

"President Abbas has ordered all the security services to catch whoever is responsible for this attack and bring them to justice."

From AMIN, where we see exactly why Abbas is condemning the attack (and it isn't because innocent Jews got murdered:)

Palestinian presidency spokesman said in a statement that President Abbas “has strongly condemned the terrorist operation which took place in Hasharon shopping mall in Netanya”.

The President issued strict instructions to arrest those involved in and responsible for the operation and bring them to justice.

"These operations against civilians cause the greatest damage to our commitment to the peace process, and the Palestinian National Authority will not show indulgence towards anyone who is found responsible for this operation," the statement said.

(As Soccer Dad noted, Abbas is quite capable of condemning a terror attack on moral grounds when he wants to. However, it is too much to ask him to actually pretend to be upset when Jews get killed.)

At any rate, he was careful to use the word "terror" this time.

But apparently the PA's International Press Center didn't get the memo, because they consistently put the word "terror" in scare quotes:

Israeli security sources said that the "Israel defense Forces" along with the secret services have started a campaign of multifarious activities to undermine the infrastructure of what they designated as "terrorism". And they added that the attention will be focused on the leaders of the Islamic Jihad.

The sources added they saw every prospect of long-lasting activities of such a kind.

Shaul Mofaz came out from the consultation session with all his recommendations ratified by the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon.

The most important recommendations implied: a large-scale military operation in the north of the West Bank; placing Gaza Strip and the West Bank under a watertight curfew; and resuming the extra-judicial assassination against the Palestinian Factions' operatives.

Talks around operating the safe passage were frozen until further notice. In addition the VIP cards of the PNA senior officials were canceled.

Sharon said that these procedures will remain in effect until the Palestinian side proves a serious crack-down on the "terrorism".

He also, arrogantly, held Abbas responsible for the attack, arguing that he was engrossed by the elections instead of fighting "terrorism".

In its comment on the Islamic Jihad operation, Hamas said that the responsibility of the operation rest squarely at the Israeli shoulders, for the Israeli breaches of the truce and escalations were, as it is always, the reason behind the Palestinian retaliation.

Notice the complete absence of quotes when relaying the Hamas statement.

It sure seems as if the Palestinian Authority agrees with Hamas!

It appears that international pressure can make the PA pretend to act like they are a part of the human race, but in the end, they will choose blowing up Jews over accepting Jews having their own country any day of the week.

There really was once a Palestinian Arab state - sort of

A little-known footnote in history that could be an accurate indicator of how any future Palestinian Arab state would be:

In 1948, the Arab League was upset at King Abdullah of Trans-Jordan for his territorial designs on the West Bank. Under their prodding, the notoriously anti-semitic ex-Mufti of Jerusalem set up his own "government" in Gaza in September 1948.

Abdullah was adamantly opposed to this "Gaza Government" and the issue caused a major rift between Transjordan and the rest of the Arab world.

The actual wishes of Palestinian Arabs do not seem to have entered the equation for either party! (click all pictures to enlarge)

The democratic nature of the nascent nation was soon apparent...

Also look at King Abdullah's objection - that creating a Palestinian state was like accepting Partition! (Note also the article in the middle!)

And what is a country without a flag?

Tensions mounted between Transjordan and Iraq over this issue:

Alas, as soon as Israel launched an counter-offensive against Egypt later in 1948, the Gaza government ministers (who no doubt had a great love of the land) fled bravely to Cairo. And then their ministers started quitting, one by one. By March, the "government" was in tatters:

The New York Post published an interesting analysis on the situation back in October 1948:

Rift in the Arab Front

Abdullah and the British Are Isolated
in the Middle East

By OBSERVER

Behind the Arab front there is a rift. The Arab League has set up a government in Gaza comprised of the followers of the ex-Mufti of Jerusalem. Abdullah of Transjordan has not recognized this government. Hilmi Pasha, who commanded the Arab forces on the Jerusalem front, was elected head of the Gaza government. Abdullah then stripped Hilmi Pasha of his authority as commander on the Jerusalem front and placed the Old City of Jerusalem under a new commander. The Gaza government is on the territory occupied by the Egyptian army.

Abdullah’s legion has done more fighting than the forces of any other Arab state on Palestinian soil. Abdullah hoped to have the entire country for himself, but since Israel successfully defended its territory, he now counts on the annexation of at least the Arab part of the country to Transjordan. His rival is the ex-Mufti of Jerusalem. They are carrying on an old feud.

* * *

The British planned that Abdullah’s legion—their own creation—should conquer all of Palestine for Abdullah, which means for them. So they supplied him with officers, money, ammunition and even spies.

The ex-Mufti planned that Abdullah should conquer the country for him. His own “Army of Liberation” under Kaukaji proved to be good only on the run.

Egypt is not at all interested in increasing the British sphere on its border; for many years the entire policy of Egypt has been directed toward getting rid of the British, in Egypt proper, in the Sudan, in the Suez Canal zone. The Egyptians think that if the British should dominate Egypt from the Negev, they would never leave the Suez Canal zone or the Sudan.

Egypt would therefore like to have southern Palestine for itself. Opposition to Zionism is artificially intensified; the Egyptians make war against Israel but they regard the British as their real enemy and Abdullah as a British stooge. Said one of the Egyptian delegates at the Paris Conference, quoted by the United Press correspondent in his dispatch of October 2: “Britain is now considered the Arabs’ number one enemy.”

The entire enterprise fell apart, without ever having governed anybody (but that didn't stop many Arab countries from recognizing it.) The cynical nature of the effort was emphasized in 1950, when the Arab League tried to resurrect the Gaza Government again for purely political gain, as is mentioned in this good overview from the Palestine Post then:

A few notes of interest:

The entire episode was so embarrassingly inept, no Palestinian Arab advocate today ever mentions this as an example of historical Palestinian sovereignty. They prefer the myth of a nation called Palestine to the reality of a short-lived aborted vanity enterprise.
Not once can I find that any of the parties showed the slightest interest in what is best for the Palestinian Arabs that they were pretending to help.
The "government" ran away and abandoned its supposed subjects at the earliest sign of fighting.
Should such a state have succeeded, it would have been just another Arab dictatorship - in this case a theocracy under the Mufti.

Arab pressure on Intel based on another lie

Intel is opening up a state-of-the-art chip manufacturing plant in Kiryat Gat, and the Arabs are mad.

No, Kiryat Gat is not in "occupied" territory. But the Arabs are claiming that it was built on the ruins of a town called Iraq al-Manshieh. They demand:

* Intel abandon its investments in Israel. The company’s proposed expansion site is located on land confiscated from the Palestinian village of Iraq Al-Manshiya.
* Israel forced out the original inhabitants of Iraq Al-Manshiya and the nearby village of Al-Faluja after the 1948 war ended contrary to international law and an armistice agreement sponsored by the UN and which Israel signed.

What really happened is that in the 1949 Armistice Agreement between Egypt and Israel, the Arab residents of Iraq al-Manshiyah and Al-Falujja were given a choice - either stay or evacuate. The pro-Palestinian site Cactus48 has the text of the agreement, although they seem to be incorrect as to whether the agreement was actually part of the Armistice or an adjunct.

At any rate, the implication from the terrorist sympathizers is that Israel forced the residents of Iraq al-Manshiyah to leave. But as is clear from the articles at the time in the Palestine Post, the Arab residents of the area all wanted to leave, the world was quite aware of their situation, the Arab League didn't want to take them in, and in fact the evacuees complained that the evacuations were too slow!

Not only that, but the Jewish community of Gath which Kiryat Gat was named after was not built on top of anything, but was under siege itself during 1948, and was evacuated under Egyptian fire - three months before the state of Israel was declared.

So you may want to email to Intel, the way that Al Oufok wants you to, but to thank them on their smart business decision to continue to create world-class technology in Israel.

As Al Oufok says:

Call and write to :

Craig R Barret, Chairman of the Board
Email : Craig.R.barrett@intel.com
Phone : 480-554-5977

Paul Otelline, President and CEO
Email : Paul.Otellini@intel.com
Phone : 408-765-5551

Please cc your correspondence to alerts@al-awda.org . I'm sure they'll be happy to read your emails!

Iran now embraces negotiation

Amazing how cooperative Iran can be when it is only months away from making the "negotiations" pointless.

TEHRAN, Dec. 5 (MNA) -- Supreme National Security Council Secretary Ali Larijani said here on Monday that Iran has called for unconditional talks with the European Union.

“Setting conditions for talks will disrupt the process, and I don’t think either of the two sides would want to do that,” he told reporters.

He noted that the preliminary talks would be about the agenda and method of negotiations, in other words, formulating a model for talks.

The nuclear issue is not a complicated matter, he said, adding, “If we all try to reach a logical solution, an appropriate conclusion can be reached over the next few months.[Any guesses as to what that "appropriate conclusion might be? Anyone? - EoZ]

He said, “We are pleased that European states, Russia, China, and member countries of the Non-Aligned Movement have announced their readiness for talks,” adding that Iran regards Europe’s step to resume talks as positive.

“We will try to hold constructive as well as serious talks with the three EU countries (Britain, Germany, and France), and negotiations will continue in order to reach a logical and accessible solution.”

Larijani stressed that the talks would focus on the main points of contention, i.e., assurances that Iran’s nuclear fuel program would not be diverted toward weapons development and Iran’s right to master the complete nuclear fuel cycle on its soil.

“Iran views the future talks as a win-win game,” he said.

“We certainly have a positive view of the talks, otherwise we would never have wasted so much time on them."

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Riza Asefi responded to recent Israeli comments that Iran's nuclear program was an unacceptable threat to its security, saying that 'Zionist authorities are well aware that if they make a foolish mistake against Iran, Iran's harsh response will be destructive and determined.'

But, hey, I'm sure that diplomacy will work wonders in defusing the crisis.

Jonathan D. Halevi (News First Class-Hebrew)
On the very day of a suicide bombing in Netanya, it has been reported that the chairman of the Palestinian Authority gave budgetary approval to assistance for the families of suicide bombers.

Each martyr's family will receive a monthly stipend of at least $250 from the PA.

The budget for families of martyrs, prisoners, and the wounded could reach $100 million a year out of an annual budget of over $1 billion.

Your tax dollars at work.

"I believe that this harms Palestinian interests and is another act to sabotage efforts to revive the peace process and to sabotage the Palestinian elections," Erekat said.

Once again, Palestinians say they "condemn" a murderous terror attack - but only in context of how it is counterproductive for their cause, not because it kills innocent people. (As if the most efficient way for Islamic Jihad to sabotage an Arab election is by killing Jews!)

In other words, if killing many innocent Jews would help the Palestinian Arab cause in any way, Erekat would be all for it.

Yesterday I posted how the director of the film "Paradise Now" strenuously tries to distinguish between suicide bombings in Israel and those in Bali, London, Madrid, Iraq, New York, Afghanistan and anywhere else in the world. He said, "Palestine is a different conflict. The Palestinians are being physically oppressed. We face 60 years of occupation. Maybe they use the same methods elsewhere, but to understand anything, you must understand the conflict, not just look to the action."

This is not a unique perspective. The fact that the film has gotten so many awards shows that much of the left, and much of Europe, also subscribes to the notion that Palestinian terror attacks are somehow more justified - and the inescapable conclusion is that they feel that when the victims are Jews, it is somehow more moral. The Palestinian Arab leaders themselves are often quick to condemn attacks such as 9/11 on moral grounds.

Which begs the question - according to the smug genteel Jew-hating intelligentsia of Europe, what could the Palestinians do that would be considered immoral? In other words, once blowing up shoppers in a mall can be justified because of "occupation," what cannot be?

Let's do a thought experiment. Let's say that a Palestinian terrorist decides to murder a baby girl, gut out her insides and replace it with explosives, sew her back up and throw the baby bomb in the middle of a Jewish kindergarten.

Or let's say that the Palestinian terror leadership decides that while bombing Jews is an effective method of terrorizing Jews, mass raping teenage Jewish girls and boys would also cause Jews to be scared and consider ceding land.

Once the "occupation" justifies terrorism, what does it not justify? There are no red lines anymore, as long as the "greater good" of Jews giving up land to Arabs is the potential result.

Or to put it another way, anyone who considers Palestinian suicide bombings at all justified in any way, shape or form is a completely and thoroughly immoral person, and any moral justifications that they find for their cause is the worst sort of hypocrisy.

And Saeb Erekat is one such person.

Calm down - Iran still months away from nuclear bomb!

Let's see how much further in the sand El-Baradei can stick his head.

IAEA chairman Muhammad ElBaradei on Monday confirmed Israel's assessment that Iran is only a few months away from creating an atomic bomb.

If Teheran indeed resumed its uranium enrichment in other plants, as threatened, it will take it only 'a few months' to produce a nuclear bomb, El-Baradei told The Independent.

On the other hand, he warned, any attempt to resolve the crisis by non-diplomatic means would 'open a Pandora's box. There would be efforts to isolate Iran; Iran would retaliate; and at the end of the day you have to go back to the negotiating table to find the solution.'

And we all know that a diplomatic Pandora's box would be much worse than hundreds of thousands of dead Jews.

Much better to continue with the effective negotiations that the West has pursued with Iran over the years. There will be a breakthrough, any decade now.

What passes for scholarship in the Arab world

I came across an amusing piece in Asharq Alawsat just now. The author is described this way:

Ghida Fakhry is New York Bureau Chief of Asharq Al Awsat and a weekly columnist for the newspaper. From 2002 to 2004, she was Anchor of Al-Hayat/LBC’s main evening news broadcast live from London. During the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, she reported on location from Kabul and Baghdad, and interviewed numerous senior US officials, including Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. During her journalistic career, she covered extensively the United Nations as New York Bureau Chief of Al Jazeera and for Abu Dhabi Television. She traveled on special assignments with Kofi Annan to the Middle East and conducted several in-depth interviews with the Secretary-General of the UN. She appears as a guest analyst on CNN, ABC News, NBC and MSNBC. Ghida Fakhry holds an M.A in Near and Middle Eastern Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, and an M.A. in International Relations from Boston University.

One would think that with such credentials she would have at least a passing familiarity with Middle Eastern history.

One would be wrong.

The United Nations marked last Tuesday the "International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People" held every year on 29 November. Paradoxically, this is the day the General Assembly adopted in 1947 Resolution 181 on the "Future Government of Palestine" –a landmark if forgotten resolution that set forth the "Plan of Partition with Economic Union" that was to establish an "Arab State" in 43.5 percent of then British-occupied Palestine, a "Jewish State" in 56.5 percent of that territory, and an international enclave to include Jerusalem and its surroundings. In adopting the Partition Plan, the United Nations committed two sins. The first one, by paving the way towards the establishment of two States, the United Nations legislated a fundamentally artificial political segregation between "Arabs" and "Jews", as if an Arab could not belong to the Jewish faith and a Jew to the Arab world. It laid a barrier between communities that more often than not intersected, had more to unite than divide them. It was a conceptual distinction that pitted communities against each other that had coexisted peacefully for centuries and, aided by the migratory influx of European Jews into Palestine, fuelled hatred and deepened the sense of injustice. The second sin of the United Nations was to adopt a Plan and not ensure its implementation. To say the least, this is undoubtedly the international organization’s biggest blunder.

As the author well knows, there is no paradox to the date that the UN chose to annually condemn Israel and pretend to care about Palestinian Arabs. It was chosen on purpose.

As I have documented many times in the Palestine Postings blog, the life of Jews in Palestine was hardly peaceful (the 1929 massacres would seem to prove that), and to blame the UN for the Arabs' terroristic intransigence against allowing Jews to control any land in the entire Middle East is pretty funny. The separation between Jews and Arabs were wholly the fault of the Arabs who just couldn't stomach Jews in power.

But the funniest part of this poorly-written paragraph is that she is blaming the UN for not making sure that Resolution 181 was not implemented! The Jews accepted 181 wholeheartedly, it was the Arabs who rejected it unanimously - and tried to destroy the Jewish state that resulted.

There is no doubt in my mind that Ms. Fakhry knows these facts as well as anyone.

So the only conclusion that can be drawn is that this esteemed Arab journalist and scholar is simply a liar.

Which begs the question - why do CNN, ABC and NBC use easily provable liars as analysts?

Classic Jewish joke

Q: What did the 'Yekke' say to his wife before going to shul to daven on the night of December 4th?
A: "I'm going to be home a little late tonight, honey. "

(Indirect hat tip to JudeoPundit.)

Reuters' crocodile tears

AbbaGav points out some Reuters' photography bias.

An Israeli soldier (L) inspects a Palestinian man at a checkpoint in the West Bank city of Hebron on December 4, 2005. REUTERS/Nayef Hashlamoun

He notes:

You might think I'm just an oppressing Zionist with no empathy or sympathy. But believe me, I think I -- and indeed most Israelis -- can understand a little bit of the Palestinian's position, and then some. We go through the same checks countless times in our daily lives as well, just to get into the supermarket, the library, the swimming pool or our kids' schools. Nor do our spouses and kids just stand by watching the checks, they get checked too. And once we pass the security check we don't breathe a sigh of relief and hope the next guy gets off easier. No, we pray the security guard is as inconveniently intrusive with everyone else who follows, if not more so.

Haveil Havalim #47 released - another twofer!

I am really thankful that SoccerDad likes my blog, because whenever he hosts Haveil Havalim he always mentions me!

This time, as with #45, I am mentioned twice - for this news roundup from last Friday (which I considered pretty much a throwaway post myself) and for this post where the BBC blames Israel for the internal problems that the Palestinian "security forces" are having. (My "Palestinian Police Phunnies" series is a small sample of documentation that the Palestinian police problems are a little deeper than how the august BBC describes them.)

As I always say whenever I'm mentioned, it is an excellent roundup of the best of this week's JBlogosphere. (Although in the section entitled "Palestinian Democracy" I am at a loss as to why he didn't use scare quotes around the word "democracy.")

"Paradise Now" director shows his true colors

As the world heaps praise on the film "Paradise Now" as an even-handed and honest look at Palestinian terrorists as being just ordinary human beings who are pushed into blowing up Jews because they are forced to by Israel, it is interesting to read the articles where the reviewers are bending over backwards to say that the director, Abu Assad, is not making any judgments on the subject.

But as this article in the Toronto Globe and Mail shows, the director is hardly unbiased (and, frankly, his grasp of the politics is puerile.) A reporter destroyed everything the director claimed about the conflict, leaving only the idea that he just hates Israel's very existence:

By MICHAEL POSNER

I had intended to question director Hany Abu-Assad about his film Paradise Now, the story of two Palestinians, auto mechanics from the West Bank, who decide to become suicide bombers. It didn't work out that way.

When we met during the Toronto International Film Festival last fall, I began by telling Abu-Assad -- a tall, elegant, 43-year-old Palestinian who spends much of his time these days in Amsterdam -- that I considered the film provocative.

"Why provocative?" he asked.

Because it attempts to explain, and thus implicitly justify, the taking of innocent lives, I replied. And because suicide bombing is no longer a tactic that occurs only in Israel or even Iraq. In the current geopolitical climate, it could happen anywhere.

Abu-Assad disagreed. "Palestine is a different conflict," he insisted. "The Palestinians are being physically oppressed. We face 60 years of occupation. Maybe they use the same methods elsewhere, but to understand anything, you must understand the conflict, not just look to the action."

According to Abu-Assad, the despair that turns ordinary car mechanics and teenage girls into suicide bombers is the result of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank (and until recently, the Gaza Strip).

But there was Palestinian militancy, even terrorism, long before the Six-Day War in 1967. Moreover, I countered, suicide bombing is not something generally organized by moderate Palestinians committed to finding a peaceful modus vivendi with Israel. It's the work of Hamas, which regards not just the West Bank, but all of Israel as occupied territory. In the film, the two bombers are trained and monitored by just such a shadowy, unnamed group. So where do you stand, I asked him.

Abu-Assad deflected the question. "It's not about where is Palestine and where is Israel. It's about denying the rights of Palestinians in their land. It's about the principle that both have to have equal rights, as individuals and as a nation. Hamas is no different than most of Israel. Most of Israel thinks it's all Jewish land. Hamas wants an Islamic state and Israel wants a Jewish state. So the same, yes?"

Well, no, actually. First of all, the vast majority of Israelis have renounced any claim to so-called Greater Israel. Indeed, the man who was once the chief proponent of that idea, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, has become the grand architect of disengagement, handing back the Gaza Strip and a handful of West Bank settlements this summer.

"They have just made Gaza a bigger jail," Abu-Assad maintained.

But the logic of that argument leads to the Hamas position. Whatever land Israel returns, it will always be simply "a bigger jail" until the Zionist cause is finally abandoned.

Look, he said, "the issue is equal rights. Unless they are equals, you will have conflict. There is no other solution." But true peace, Abu-Assad added, can only be achieved if Israel severs its ties with the United States. "How can you survive in a place where you are protecting the interests of someone else?" he asked.

But why would Israel do that, "surrounded by 22 Arab nations, many of which are committed to its dissolution?"

Very simply, Abu-Assad said, "To survive. To be part of the Middle East." Besides, he added, "Washington's interests will diminish when the oil is gone, and what will Israel do then?"

Moronic nonsense, in black and white. He doesn't even try to maintain a consistent position, except that he hates the Jewish state - everything else is a smokescreen to make him sound more reasonable that gets shredded at the slightest questioning.

Which, come to think of it, is pretty much the Arab and leftist position regarding Israel to begin with.

Good news/bad news

Good news

Bad news

Israel Successfully Tests Arrow Anti-Missile System

Bolton proving his worth as UN ambassador

Muslims Defend Israel at Asian Conference

Economist: Israel Growing Faster Than Expected

Iran laughing at EU on nukes

Gaza: Newly Formed al-Qaeda Cell

Rice Envoy to "Monitor" Terrorists crossing into Gaza (and pressure Israel more)

Kill a Jew - Go to Heaven