Report: Announcement on Shalit deal soon

If Israel gets the body of Gilad Shalit, are we obligated to end the blockade of Gaza and release prisoners?

Sources: Announcement on Prisoner Exchange Deal Close12/09/2009

By Abdul Sattar Hatita and Ihab Hussein

Cairo, Asharq Al-Awsat - Egyptian and Israeli sources stated Friday that Cairo and Tel Aviv are close to reaching agreements on developments in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, at the heart of which is the prisoner exchange deal between the two sides. The sources also stated that these agreements would be made public following a meeting between Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday.

In this regard, the sources also referred to important meetings between Egyptian Intelligence Chief Omar Suleiman, Israeli negotiator Haggai Hadas and head of the Hamas politburo Khaled Meshaal on the "prisoner exchange deal." They added that the fact that the Israeli Interior Minister will be accompanying Netanyahu on his visit to Cairo is a good indication, from the practical side, that a prisoner exchange deal will be reached soon.

The sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that Hadas' visit to Cairo lasted many hours and he met Omar Suleiman and a number of his senior aides in order to discuss the details of the release of Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the release of the captive Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.

The sources said "the Egyptian President will meet Netanyahu and his delegation over Iftar [the breaking of the fast in Ramadan] in Heliopolis, Cairo, in order to discuss developments in the Palestinian-Israeli peace process, the prisoner exchange and bilateral ties between Tel Aviv and Cairo."

On his part, North Sinai Governor Major General Mohammed Abdul Fadil Shousha said that Egyptian authorities opened the Rafah border crossing to Palestinian pilgrims trying to make their way to Saudi Arabia. An official at the Rafah border crossing said that Egyptian authorities will open the crossing again next Tuesday for three days so that hundreds of stranded Palestinians on both sides could cross and spend Eid al Fitr with their relatives in the Gaza Strip.

Continued (Permanent Link)

IDF refutes B'tselem claiims of Gaza Casualties caused by Israel

The rights group Betselem has published claims about the allegedly large number of casualties in Operation Cast Lead.

Refutations of earlier similar claims may be found here and here Evidence that police served as terrorists is given here.

Of particular relevance is this order issued by the Hamas during operation Cast Lead:

"" In accordance with the policy of the factions of the jihad resistance in Gaza …we inform you that it is completely forbidden to issue information about the numbers, names or pictures or any [other] detail about the shaheeds and wounded of the resistance . The order is in force until the end of the Zionist aggression which is clear to us and our nation, with the consent of Allah, may he be exalted. Any [report] which violates these rules will be deleted and a warning will be sent to whoever is responsible for the posting. Let us all be soldiers of the resistance, and if we cannot assist it, at least let us not assist the enemy [fighting] against it." "

A facsimile of the original Arabic is here.

The following is the published response of the IDF Spokesperson to B'telem allegations:

Approximately six months ago the IDF publicized official statistics, gathered and confirmed by the Research Division of the IDF Defense Intelligence, citing the number of casualties during Operation Cast Lead. According to these statistics, there were 1,166 Palestinian casualties in the Gaza Strip, the majority of which (709) were terror operatives affiliated with the Hamas terror organization, some of whom belonged to other terror groups.

The "B'Tselem" report is not based on facts or on accurate statistics. Furthermore, among its sources, B'Tselem officially states that it based its findings, on cross referencing statistics from investigations of Palestinian human rights groups and various websites and blogs, including those of the militant wings of terror organizations and that of the Palestinian Police.

The discrepancy in the numbers is based on the fact that B'Tselem's sources are organizations with a vested interest, and it does not have the tools, nor the intelligence capabilities with which it can within a necessary degree of confidence know the causes of death or the affiliations of these casualties.

The Hamas terror organization is hiding these statistics so that it can play on international public opinion so as to increase support in its violent acts of terror. For example, the way in which Hamas "police officers" are categorized in the report, where Hamas is presenting operatives in its military wing as police officers whose job is to enforce law and order. This is done in order to minimize the number of casualties amongst its forces, while inflating the number of civilian casualties.

By shifting public attention to the number of casualties, Hamas is diverting attention from the real issue, in which this terror organization specifically and deliberately endangered the lives of the residents in the Gaza Strip, where on the other hand, as much as was possible, the IDF sought to prevent the harm of uninvolved noncombatant civilians. It should be remembered, that the IDF engaged in Operation Cast Lead after a prolonged period of continuous rocket and mortar fire on hundreds of thousands of Israeli residents. The firing of these rockets was done from within population centers in the Gaza Strip, while using the local residents as a human shield from behind which it would launch its terror attacks.

OTR:

1. With regards to the categorization of the "police officers," information can be found that proves their terrorist activities on the website of the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center: www.terrorism-info.org.il.

2. An example of the double use of Hamas "police officers" in reports can be openly seen in a statements made on June 28, in which the Hamas Minister of the Interior, Hamad Fatahi, and also Haled Mashal himself, admitted that on the first day alone, 400 or 500 "Hamas warriors" had died. Furthermore, as Hamas has a policy of withholding information regarding sustained casualties during the operation, it is possible that the number of terror operatives who were killed is higher than the IDF's calculations.

3. It should also be stated the Manager of Emergency Services in the Palestinian Health and Emergency Services Ministry stated that there were approximately 1400 casualties during Operation Cast Lead. A possible explanation for this discrepancy is that a number alone was given unsupported by identifying names, as well as the addition of natural death cases, which stands at approximately 400 per month in the Gaza Strip, possibly caused by the confusion at Gaza Strip hospitals during the operation.

4. As was explained to the organization, the IDF is unable to disclose the methods in which it gathers such information, as it is classified.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Breaking the silence - Allah testifies that they are lying

What is important is not so much the common sense message, but the source of the message.

 

A Word of Truth

By Abdallah al–Hadlaq
Arabic: http://www.alwatan.com.kw/Default.aspx?tabid=164&article_id=523218

English:A word of truth: http://tundratabloid.blogspot.com/2009/07/kuwati-newspaper-runs-op-ed-supporting.html

Al-Watan, Kuwait
19 July 2009

"Allah testifies that they are lying"

A non-governmental Israeli organization claims that the IDF that attacked Gaza and the ostracized Hamas used local civilians as human shields and opened fire indiscriminately. The report by "Breaking the Silence" says the IDF destroyed buildings, mosques and private homes, and includes testimonies by 30 soldiers who participated in the attack on Gaza (2008/12/27–18/1/2009), but without revealing their names or unit affiliation.

However these allegations are to be rejected because the IDF has proved that its troops follow international law and obey orders despite the stress of battle. These testimonies lack sourcing or corroboration, thus preventing any conclusions from being drawn... Furthermore, it was the ostracized Hamas that caused much grief when it fired dozens of Qassam missiles at innocent civilians in the southern towns and villages of Israel. The IDF had no choice but to fight back causing the deaths of 1400 Palestinians, half of them civilians used as human shields by Hamas, in addition to the 5,000 wounded. Israel lost just 10 soldiers and 3 civilians.

The IDF defended innocent Israeli civilians against Hamas attacks and did all it could to prevent harming any civilians, targeting just the Hamas men, to disarm them by aerial bombing, shelling, and the use of heavy tractors, while maintaining the humane principles of the IDF that seeks to win with minimal human cost to either side.

The report by "Breaking the Silence" was unfair, unbalanced, and lacking in proof, so one wonders where it was when Hamas used schools and homes for weapons storage or for missile launchers. Israeli pilots reported many secondary explosions after they hit Hamas targets. Where was that organization when Hamas smuggled tons of illicit weapons through a network of tunnels from Egypt?

;

aalhadlaq@alwatan.com.kw

bsp;

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Palestinian suicide attack- against Palestinians!

It is only a matter of time, before an attack succeeds...

Last update - 12:56 09/06/2009       
Three Hamas women arrested for plotting suicide attack against Fatah
By The Associated Press

 

Palestinian Authority security forces have arrested three Palestinian women who were allegedly planning a suicide attack targeting
their own policemen in the West Bank.

 

Palestinian official Jamal Muheisen said Tuesday the women are members of Hamas, the Islamic group that has a long-running feud with the Western-backed Fatah government in the West Bank.

 

Muheisen said the women were arrested Sunday on their way to the town of Qalqiliya, where four police officers and four Hamas militants were been killed in recent clashes.

 

He added that one woman was carrying an explosive belt and confessed she intended to blow herself up in a police compound.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Hamas-Fateh war continues

While Barack Obama talks about a two state solution, meanwhile, back in reality, things look different. Perhaps there will be three states between the river and the sea.

 

Last update - 17:02 06/06/2009       
Fatah: Hamas carrying out mass arrests of our men in Gaza
By Reuters

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction accused Hamas Islamists on Saturday of arresting some 150 of its activists in Gaza, in apparent retaliation for raids that killed four Hamas men in the West Bank this week.

 

Fahmi al-Zarir, a spokesman for Fatah in the West Bank, said Hamas had made the arrests since Friday. He said some men were being held in schools and hotels in the Gaza Strip, territory the Islamists seized in a bloody 2007 coup from Fatah.

 

Hamas officials declined any comment, but a statement posted on Hamas's Interior Ministry website said "some" Palestinians loyal to Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, a Fatah-backed leader, were arrested as suspected informers for Israel.
 

 

The arrests came days after four Hamas men and a civilian died in deadly raids by Abbas' Western-backed security forces against Hamas Islamists in the West Bank town of Qalqilya.

 

These raids highlighted the tensions within Palestinian society over Abbas's efforts to fulfill commitments to rein in militants as part of a long-stalled, U.S.-backed "road map" peace plan.

 

Underlining the growing tension, Hamas had published a "hit list" for security leaders accused of cracking down on its members, and one of the group's preachers in Gaza called for an intifada, or uprising, in the West Bank against Abbas' men.

 

Last month, U.S. President Barack Obama urged Abbas to press on with his security campaign, which he credited with making "great progress" in the West Bank.

 

In an address in Cairo on Thursday, Obama urged Hamas to heal the Palestinian rift by putting "an end to violence" and recognizing Israel's right to exist. Hamas calls for Israel's destruction.

Prominent Palestinians have issued a joint plea to "end the bloodletting" and engage in reconciliation talks which were expected to resume in Cairo next month

Continued (Permanent Link)

Obama in Cairo - We've got plenty of nothing

The full text of US President Obama's speech in Cairo is here among other places. Below are the highlights. This is the first time that a U.S. President has used the word "legitimacy" about Israeli settlements, but regarding both the Israeli-Palestinian issue, as with the Iranian and other problems, Obama offered no plan - just finely balanced rhetoric that will either please everyone or make them angry. Each media outlet will choose to highlight whatever seems important to them: Here is the Israeli-Palestinian nugget:

Palestinians must abandon violence. Resistance through violence and killing is wrong and does not succeed. For centuries, black people in America suffered the lash of the whip as slaves and the humiliation of segregation. But it was not violence that won full and equal rights... That is not how moral authority is claimed; that is how it is surrendered.

Now is the time for Palestinians to focus on what they can build. The Palestinian Authority must develop its capacity to govern, with institutions that serve the needs of its people. Hamas does have support among some Palestinians, but they also have responsibilities. To play a role in fulfilling Palestinian aspirations, and to unify the Palestinian people, Hamas must put an end to violence, recognize past agreements, and recognize Israel's right to exist.

At the same time, Israelis must acknowledge that just as Israel's right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine's. The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop.

Israel must also live up to its obligations to ensure that Palestinians can live, and work, and develop their society. And just as it devastates Palestinian families, the continuing humanitarian crisis in Gaza does not serve Israel's security; neither does the continuing lack of opportunity in the West Bank. Progress in the daily lives of the Palestinian people must be part of a road to peace, and Israel must take concrete steps to enable such progress.

Finally, the Arab States must recognize that the Arab Peace Initiative was an important beginning, but not the end of their responsibilities. The Arab-Israeli conflict should no longer be used to distract the people of Arab nations from other problems. Instead, it must be a cause for action to help the Palestinian people develop the institutions that will sustain their state; to recognize Israel's legitimacy; and to choose progress over a self-defeating focus on the past.

America will align our policies with those who pursue peace, and say in public what we say in private to Israelis and Palestinians and Arabs. We cannot impose peace. But privately, many Muslims recognize that Israel will not go away. Likewise, many Israelis recognize the need for a Palestinian state. It is time for us to act on what everyone knows to be true

What does "continued Israeli settlements" mean? Is it a deliberate imprecision? Does he mean continued settlement, or the continued existence of settlements? Is Jerusalem a "settlement?" If he is referring to existing settlements, then Obama's speech directly contradicts the letter of Predident Bush given in 2004. It did take some courage to say, in Cairo, addressing the Arab world, that the bond between israel and the United States will never be broken. This was not a AIPAC meeting after all.

Ami Isseroff

Obama: I'll personally pursue two-state solution
By Haaretz Service

In his long-anticipated Cairo address to the Muslim world, U.S. President Barack Obama reaffirmed Washington's strong backing for a Palestinian state, highlighting his administration's commitment to follow through on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

While reaffirming Washington's "unbreakable bond" with Israel, Obama said that there can be no denying of the right of Palestine to exist, and that he would "personally pursue" the realization of a Palestinian state "with all the patience that the task requires."

"Israelis must acknowledge that just as Israel's right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine's," Obama said.

The president also issued a blunt repudiation of Israel's settlement enterprise in the West Bank, an issue that has strained Washington's ties with Jerusalem.

"The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements," Obama said. "This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop."

"The obligations that the parties have agreed to under the Road Map are clear," Obama said, referring to the multi-stage peace plan agreed to by Israel and the Palestinians during the Bush presidency. "For peace to come, it is time for them - and all of us - to live up to our responsibilities."

"If we see this conflict only from one side or the other, then we will be blind to the truth," Obama said. "The only resolution is for the aspirations of both sides to be met through two states, where Israelis and Palestinians each live in peace and security."

"That is in Israel's interest, Palestine's interest, America's interest, and the world's interest," the president said.

In addressing the Iranian nuclear program, Obama acknowledged longstanding Muslim accusations of Washington's double standard in objecting to Tehran's drive for nuclear weapons while tolerating Israel's alleged possession of atomic bombs.

The president reiterated his desire to see a world free of nuclear weapons.

"I understand those who protest that some countries have [nuclear] weapons that others do not," Obama said. "No single nation should pick and choose which nations hold nuclear weapons. That is why I strongly reaffirmed America's commitment to seek a world in which no nations hold nuclear weapons."

Obama conceded that Iran has rights to nuclear energy "if it complies with its responsibilities under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty."

Obama said his government will close the gap between public pronouncements and difficult truths that are often acknowledged behind closed doors in the halls of power throughout the Middle East.

"America will align our policies with those who pursue peace, and say in public what we say in private to Israelis and Palestinians and Arabs," Obama said.

Obama urged Muslims around the world to acknowledge Jewish suffering and to repudiate Holocaust denial. The Arab and Muslim world ought to reconcile with the existence of Israel, the president said.

"Threatening Israel with destruction - or repeating vile stereotypes about Jews - is deeply wrong, and only serves to evoke in the minds of Israelis this most painful of memories while preventing the peace that the people of this region deserve," Obama said.

The president also noted the plight of the Palestinians, who "have suffered in pursuit of a homeland" and who "endure daily humiliations ... that come with occupation."

"Many wait in refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza, and neighboring lands for a life of peace and security that they have never been able to lead," Obama said. "So let there be no doubt: the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable. America will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own."

The president urged the Palestinians to draw upon the example of African slaves in the United States, arguing that a "peaceful and determined insistence upon the ideals at the center of America's founding" had led to their gaining civil rights.

"Resistance through violence and killing is wrong and does not succeed," Obama said. "For centuries, black people in America suffered the lash of the whip as slaves and the humiliation of segregation. But it was not violence that won full and equal rights."

Obama said the Palestinians "must focus on what they can build." He urged Hamas to accept the Quartet's preconditions for international recognition - recognition of past signed agreements with Israel, recognition of Israel's right to exist, and a renunciation of violence.

"I have come here to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect," Obama said.

Obama offered the Arabic greeting of assalaamu alaykum, or "peace be unto you", in the early part of his speech. He also quoted a passage from the Koran and cited his father's Muslim background in a bid to highlight his sensitivity to Islamic grievances against the West.

"America is not and never will be at war with Islam," Obama said. "We will, however, relentlessly confront violent extremists who pose a grave threat to our security."

"The relationship between Islam and the West includes centuries of co-existence and cooperation, but also conflict and religious wars," Obama said. "Violent extremists have exploited these tensions in a small but potent minority of Muslims."

"Much has been made of the fact that an African-American with the name Barack Hussein Obama could be elected President," Obama said. "But my personal story is not so unique."

Obama is delivering his long-anticipated speech seeking to turn a new page in Washington's relations with the Arab and Muslim world.

Obama arrived in Egypt hours before giving long-promised speech in Cairo, the ancient seat of Islamic learning and culture.

The U.S. president is hoping to usher in a new era in the United States'
relationship with the world's 1.5 billion Muslims. Aides say Obama will blend hopeful words about mutual understanding with blunt talk about the need for Muslims to embrace democracy, women's rights and economic opportunity.

Obama met with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, a key American ally, at his palace in the capital.

"We discussed how to move forward in a constructive way to bring peace and prosperity to people in the region," Obama told reporters after talks with Mubarak, who has ruled Egypt since 1981 and kept a tight lid on opposition.

"I emphasized to him that the U.S. is committed to working in partnership with countries in the region so all people can meet their aspirations," he said before heading to a mosque in a quarter of Cairo that is full of Islamic architectural gems.

The mosque is a 600-year-old center of Islamic worship and study called the Sultan Hassan mosque. Obama will then tour the Great Pyramids of Giza on the capital's outskirts.

Obama arrived in Egypt from Saudi Arabia, where he stayed overnight at King Abdullah's horse farm in the desert outside Riyadh.

In his Cairo address Thursday, Obama called on Israel and the Arab states to change their approach to the Middle East peace process.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Portrait of an anti-Zionist presentation

"Israel is an abomination", say 'activists'

This afternoon I attended the "Free Gaza" presentation at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Fresno, the presentation that I wrote about last week ("Pro-Hamas activists to speak in Fresno"). About 50 people, mostly church members, attended.

I stood at the door before the event and handed out flyers, which read in part:

The speakers today will tell you that they are fighting for the Palestinian people. But their actual goal is to assist the genocidal Hamas organization.

The Gaza Strip is currently ruled by Hamas (The Islamic Resistance Movement) which took control of the area from the Palestinian Authority in a violent coup in 2007.

Hamas' reason for being is to destroy Israel and replace it with an Islamic state. Its methods are the most violent possible. Since 2000, Hamas has murdered hundreds of Israeli civilians by bombings, shootings and rocket and mortar attacks.

The 'occupation' they talk about is the 'occupation' that began with Israel's creation in 1948, not the 1967 war.

The so-called Free Gaza Movement is part of a propaganda apparatus which tries to portray the Iranian-financed proxy war being fought against Israel by Hamas and other extremist groups as a human rights issue. It is not – it is an asymmetric war in which the concept of human rights is cynically used by some of the world's most intolerant, hateful extremists to try to prevent Israel from defending herself.

What you will hear and see today will be a combination of exaggerations, lies, and – most importantly – partial facts presented without context.

I followed this with some excerpts from the Hamas Covenant, so everyone would know who Hamas is.

The presentation was strange, sort of a throwback to a 1950s anti-communist B-movie. The room was festooned with Palestinian flags, the lectern draped with a keffiya. Donna and Darlene were, if anything, more robotic and humorless than their picture suggests.

It began with two music videos, one sort of lyrical, praising the courage of the Palestinian people and predicting their ultimate triumph (in nonspecific terms), the other a hip-hop rant:

Israel is a terrorist state!

Free Palestine!

Free Palestine!

More: "Israel is an abomination", say 'activists'

Continued (Permanent Link)

When Shalit comes marching home again

19.03. 2009
http://www.zionism-israel.com/log/archives/00000668.html
Original content copyright by the author
Zionism & Israel Center http://zionism-israel.com

The Israeli ethos of "not leaving anyone" behind is embedded in our national psyche. In his 1956 Diary of the Sinai Campaign, Moshe Dayan expressed his admiration for troops who risked their lives to bring back wounded and dead comrades, and opined that this sometimes irrational devotion was nonetheless necessary to maintain the espirit de corps of the IDF. But after the Suez Campaign, Israeli POWs had to suffer patiently until honorable prisoner exchanges were arranged. And most regrettably, the prisoners of the Lavon affair were not released.

Continued - When Shalit comes marching home again

Continued (Permanent Link)

About "Bullets in box" - letter to Ethan Bronner

Mr. Ethan Bronner

c/o  N.Y. Times

620 Eighth Avenue

New York, N.Y. 10018

                                                       

                                                In re: "The Bullets in My Box,"  January 25, 2009

 

 

 

 

 

Dear Mr. Bronner,

 

Forgive me if this letter is not quite coherent. I'm still weeping over your sad plight. You want to be a good journalist by reporting "in a way both sides can accept as fair" and everyone is picking on you. No one's happy. What's a reporter to do? To paraphrase Herr Eichman, you are just doing your job, following your conscience. We all know (we all should know) that there is no such thing as absolute truth. There are only different perspectives, competing narratives. Had you been working for the Times during World War II, you would surely have been the one courageous enough to show the Nazi side (After all, there's always another side to the story): how traitorous Jews betrayed Germany's war effort causing it to lose World War I; how plutocratic Jews undermined the German economy; how Communist Jews were trying to take away the profits of hard-working German citizens; how degenerate Jews were leading to the general decline of culture and morality; how even American auto magnate, Henry Ford, and the inspirational Catholic priest, Father Coughlin, subscribed to Nazi views on the Jewish menace.  And, as the advertisers say, there's much, much more. Indeed, a very good case could be made for Hitler's cause. Morality is in the eye of the beholder. If you put a pound of gold on one side of the scales and a pound of baloney on the other, the scales will balance. A pound is a pound no matter what it's made of. If it balances, it's fair. No? A good journalist understands that everyone has his own truth. His job is to keep things even.

 

That is why you can write that "Among Israel's Jews . . .  Zionism . . . is bathed in a celestial glow," even though you know that there is an active peace movement in Israel for whom the word "Zionism" has become radically tainted. Israel's insular arrogance must be emphasized in order to balance your statement that "Zionism stands for theft, oppression, [and] racist exclusionism" throughout the Middle East. Jews may be well-meaning, but they're blind. Arabs may be overly hostile, but they have good reason to be. Each side overstates his case. What's not a good idea is to mention that while there are over a million Arab Muslims living as citizens in Israel, no Jew is allowed to live in Jordan or Saudi Arabia (although Jews once had a flourishing population in the Arabian Peninsula). Forget also that close to a million Jews were unceremoniously kicked out of practically every other Muslim state. And that even though the Arab world is, for all intents and purposes, Judenrein, somehow, it's Israel that's apartheid. But there are no villains, just a "cycle of violence" that goes on and on.

 

Because everyone's at fault in the "Greek Tragedy" that is the Middle East "crisis," it is important to blame both sides for the failure to bring about peace. Thus you write that "an understanding crystallized over a decade ago over the outline of an eventual solution," but you do not mention that the PLO never changed the clause in its charter that refused to accept the existence of a Jewish state, although acceptance was a core requirement of that understanding. Better to write that "the two sides' narratives have actually hardened." For it would certainly be hitting below the belt to call attention to the ways in which Arafat's P.A. broke all of its agreements within a day of the arrangement with vicious attacks and educational propaganda essentially erasing Israel from the map. And it would be snide for someone to point out that Israel "actually" softened her stance by choosing to ignore Palestinian violations. Even more troubling would be to mention that in 2000 and in 2001 Israel offered deals that "actually" sweetened the Oslo accords and that Arafat turned them down unequivocally (never pondered them, argued them, or came back with an alternative). Instead his response was the second Intifada--suicide bombings--the murder of school children in pizza parlors and buses, the murder of celebrants during a Passover Seder. So, the  P.A. has a terrorist wing. So, Israel has settlers. The Arabs make terror! The Jews make concessions! If you want to do business you have to have bargaining chips. Only the Mafia would recognize this deal as a form of extortion called "the protection racket." Besides, both sides accepted the agreement--didn't they? Both are responsible for its failure--aren't they? If Arafat was a bad guy, so was Ariel Sharon.

 

 

And if the "bad guys" are on both sides of the fence, there can be no aggressor, no defender. There can be no deterrence, only retaliation (a dirty word). Thus you can write that "opponents of Israel" believe her to be "a kind of Sparta that dehumanizes the Palestinians" as an excuse for her use of  "overwhelming force," but it would be tacky to even hint that overwhelming force (a dirty phrase) is the only way Israel has of stopping Hamas rockets. Because that would suggest that Israel's "excuse" for using overwhelming force might not be an excuse. And it would be just as tacky to suggest that Israel could, with minimal risk to her army, have carpet bombed Gaza and Hamas (as well as most Palestinians) would have been obliterated. But that would suggest that Israel's restraint showed she was interested in deterrence not retaliation (You know, that Jewish thing, an eye for an eye?). Nor is it in the best of taste to remind folks how Israel tolerated eight years of weapon smuggling and rocket attacks of an ever-increasing range on her innocent civilians--nursery schools and kindergartens; or that her civilian losses have been low because she has gone to the trouble and expense (cheated?) of building bomb shelters and early warning systems; or that the trauma for Israeli children undergoing years of close calls is comparable to the P.T.D.S of adult war veterans.  True! True! But, if a reporter has any decency at all, as you so obviously do, he must consider that the casualty count for operation Cast Lead was so lopsided, it would hardly be cricket to say anything that allows Israel to claim existential necessity. And, as an unfortunate corollary, gives the Palestinians the burden of responsibility.

 

In the same way (For obvious reasons Palestinians always seem to be getting the worst of things) it's perfectly legitimate to quote those who say that Israelis put "racist graffiti" on walls (I'd be curious to know how prevalent such graffiti are, or if the statement is even true). But it would be racist to bring out the fact that there has never been a national celebration of Palestinian deaths in Israel, whereas thousands turned out on the streets of Gaza and the West Bank to cheer and pass out candy whenever Jews were murdered in horrific explosions by devices filled with nails and poisons or, more recently, when eight Yeshiva students were shot in cold blood as they were studying torah. And it would certainly smack of bigotry to condemn the feisty Gazans who poured into the streets to mock in effigy a captured Israeli soldier who is being kept, against all international standards, incognito with never a single visit by the Red Cross. The barbaric pleasure Palestinians get from reveling in Jewish misery and Jewish blood must be downplayed, rationalized and justified lest charges of Islamophobia be brought to bear. That is why news of the omnipresence of anti-Semitic graffiti on Palestinian walls must be suppressed along with the broadcasts of anti-Semitic libels on Palestinian TV where even kiddie shows watched by three year olds feature a rabbit named Assud who kills and eats Jews. The scales must not tip. Palestinians must look at least as good as Jews. Better! Because to look at Palestinian blood lust squarely would be too appalling. True, anti-Semitism is a kind of entitlement for the poor, down-trodden Arabs, but it's wiser not to hit people over the head with it.

 

In this eternal war without cause, no reporter worth his salt would charge either side with evil intent. Palestinians may seem a little over-ardent in their struggle against "occupation," but then Israel is only too ready to demonize them in order to justify her "assault" (as one news report put it) on women and children. And you can write about "those who saw in this war an affirmation of their [Israeli's] beliefs--that Hamas . . . hides its fighters behind women and children," even though you know that this charge is not merely a belief but a fact corroborated by eye-witnesses and video tape; even though, in fact, Palestinians speaking among themselves on their own TV stations brag about their citizens' willing martyrdom and the delight it gives them; even though it is a well-known fact that Palestinians have, for years, been putting their families, their children, in harm's way as a PR gambit. But it is standard media fare that when Palestinians kill they are Hamas and when they get killed they are "innocent civilians." We mustn't blame the victim. Yes, Israel has every right to defend herself, but not to violate the rules of war. How an army can defend itself without returning enemy fire is not a question reporters need answer. Point-of-view determines fact.

 

That is why you can write that "one side says . . . the Jewish nation has returned to its rightful home" and the other side says "there is no Jewish nation," as if every argument were a simple matter of narrative disjunction. Although you know (you must know) that, despite Palestinian efforts to "prove" that there was never a Jewish nation in the Middle East, every archeological study, every legitimate history (including Muslim ones) documents the opposite. And you also know (you must know) that there is not and has never been a Palestinian state because the people who call themselves Palestinians have said to Israel "No negotiations. No recognition. No Peace." And you know (you must know) that before 1948 Palestine was a geo-political territory designated as such since 135 C.E., and that Palestinians were considered Jews (even by most Arabs) until the creation of the state of Israel; and that a unit called The Palestinian Brigade, comprised entirely of Jews, fought along side the British in World War I. And you know (you must know) that those who now call themselves Palestinians have never worked to build a state in the territories they lay claim to by creating viable institutions through government, commerce, and the arts or even by setting forth reasonable boundaries. Instead they turned the lushly developed area where Israel gave them total autonomy into a vast warren of weapons caches, a launching pad for deadlier and deadlier aerial attacks.  Why? Because they've based their nationhood on one overarching principle: the destruction of Israel and the Jewish people. No Jew may have a sovereign state in Arab/Muslim territory. No Jew may triumph over a Muslim. It says so in the Koran: "He made you masters of their [the Jewish tribe of Khayber]  lands, their houses, and their goods," Sura 33:23. Jews cannot be winners. (It would be too humiliating.) As one who's written about the Middle East for years, you have to know this because it's plainly stated in the charters of both Hamas and the PLO.

 

But admitting that "occupation" in the Palestinian lexicon means that Israel and the Jews must be wiped off the face of the earth would be to stack the deck against a proud and ancient people whose language, culture, and religion just happen to have originated in the Arabian Peninsula. You might have to acknowledge that the real Palestinians (Philistines) were a sea people from the European continent, invaders who disappeared some 2500 years ago, absorbed into the dominant population who happened to be (Hmm!) Jewish. Well, if there's no Palestine, only disputed territory; no Palestinian ethnicity, only one sample of Arab particularity, of what does the vaunted Palestinian identity consist? Is it a hoax? Could it be that it is made entirely of lies, hatred, bigotry and self-pity? Is this the glue that holds Palestinians together? Dear me, no. Such an ugly characterization must not be promulgated. That would be--mean-spirited

 

The Palestinians are too abject. The Israelis too successful. "Envy," "intolerance," they're only a "story line," a construct of the pro-Jewish lobby that has nothing to do with reality. Thus it is imperative that you write that "the other side tells a different story . . .;" that you repeat the canard that the Israeli Jews are colonialists who "stole and pillaged, throwing hundreds of thousands off their lands," that Israel was "born in sin" (an Israeli formulation, by the way); even though you know that Jews bought every inch of land they had, land which Arabs were happy to sell at exorbitant prices, until five Arab nations declared war on them.. You also know, I'm sure you do, that if any ethnic cleansing went on, it was done by Arabs whose pogroms pushed the Jews completely out of areas like Hebron where Jews had resided since biblical times. And this was before there was ever a Jewish State. You must also know, I'm sure, that since the middle of the 19^th century, Jerusalem was a predominately Jewish city until Jordan purged East Jerusalem of its Jews after the '48 war. Are you lying? Heaven forbid. Unless there's such a thing as the lie of omission. You're just telling what you've heard. What you choose to hear.

 

As you say, everything depends on who is telling the story. What does it matter if one side strains toward peace and the other is full of murderous violence? If the Israelis are always apologizing, they must be guilty of something. If the Palestinians are always defiant, they are obviously being oppressed. The Israelis have their tanks. The Palestinians their suffering. No back story is necessary. As long as balance is maintained, the reporter has fulfilled his obligations. A reporter cannot lie if he is quoting each side accurately. He is being objective. He is performing a great public service. No one's self-perception should be denied or discounted, even if it is false or falsely acquired. If one side looks bad (or good), the true reporter must make the other side look the same. No favoritism--for heaven's sake. Taking sides is for the Op-Ed pages. Everyone sees himself as victim anyways.

 

Truth, as you so diligently have reminded us, depends upon the light in which it's shown. Of course, it is the reporter's task to shed that light. Ultimately (the media's dirty little secret), it is the reporter who tells the story. That is why certain uncomfortable glitches must be smoothed out, covered over, or ignored like the emperor's new clothes. And that is why certain uncomfortable stories like the Mohammad Al-Dura hoax gets not one word of press from the New York Times. Again, I'm sure that you must have some knowledge of this affair which is prominent on the internet. It concerns a cynical fraud perpetrated by Palestinians that was instrumental in the death of thousands of people, including that of reporter Daniel Pearl and, if given appropriate attention by the mainstream media, might inspire more than a few pundits to call into question every explanation, every justification, every claim Palestinians make for themselves.

 

But righteousness (self-righteousness) must never give way to moral fatigue. Fair play demands that other side be given its due, especially when the "other" comes from an exotic culture that the reporter can never really comprehend. He must struggle against his "natural" biases in order to equalize the scales. He must neutralize (neuter?) the issues so that no one side can stake a claim to the moral high ground. He must make blanket pronouncements and all-purpose generalizations so that only noble ends are weighed, never despicable means, especially if those means belong to the underdog. Above all, justice, as well as his journalistic honor, demands that he work the text and shape the context, so that his piece will conform to some abstract model of public virtue. Thus the underdog (as he is perceived) must be raised up and the lucky dog (as he is perceived) must be put down. Deficiencies on one side need to be made up by subtractions on the other (besides, the pornography of violence sells). And, since the Palestinians are the needier, they are the ones who merit the handicap. If they come out slightly ahead, it's only because the Jews tend to win the battles (if not the war).  And when Jews are winners the reporter, especially if he himself is Jewish, must, often as not, look the other way. But then again, just as an Ahmedinejad can make homosexuals disappear by saying "There are no homosexuals in Iran," a reporter, particularly one working for as prestigious a vehicle as the New York Times, can always say, "If we don't print it, it doesn't exist." 
           

                                             Yours,

 

 

                                               Mitzi Alvin

Continued (Permanent Link)

Hamas confiscates Gaza aid - UN Protests

Who is depriving Gaza Palestinians of aid?

UNRWA
Press Release
East Jerusalem                            04 Feb 2009

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

UNRWA CONDEMNS CONFISCATION OF GAZA AID AND DEMANDS ITS IMMEDIATE RETURN

At 1430 on 3 February over 3,500 blankets and 406 food parcels were confiscated from a distribution store at Beach Camp in Gaza by police personnel. This took place after UNRWA staff had earlier refused to hand over the aid supplies to the Hamas-run Ministry of Social Affairs. The police subsequently broke into the warehouse and seized the aid by force. The aid was due to be distributed to five hundred families in the area.

UNRWA condemns in the strongest terms the confiscation of its aid supplies and has demanded that it is returned immediately. UNRWA has a strict system of monitoring aid delivery and ensuring that its assistance reaches only the intended beneficiaries. Our officials were on the ground overseeing the delivery of our aid and taking all possible steps to avoid its diversion.

For more information please contact:
Christopher Gunness
UNRWA Spokesperson
Mobile: +972-(0)54-240-2659
Office: +972-(0)2-589-0267
Sami Mshasha
UNRWA Arabic Spokesperson
Mobile: +972-(0)54-216-8295
Office: +972 (0)2-589-0724


-Ends-

Continued (Permanent Link)

Olmert threatens retaliation as four rockets hit Israel

Too much talk and not enough action?

 

Last update - 00:36 01/01/2009    

 

 Olmert: Israel will not return to old rules of engagement in Gaza 

 

 By Barak Ravid and Yuval Azoulay, Haaretz Correspondents, Haaretz Service and The Associated Press

Israel will not agree to return to the old rules of engagement in Gaza, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said at the beginning of the weekly cabinet meeting Sunday.

 

"We will act according to new rules that ensure we will not be dragged into an unceasing shootout that prevents us from living life as normal in the south," Olmert said.

 

Olmert warned that there would be a "fierce and disproportionate" Israeli response in the event that rockets continue to be fired from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel or directed Israel Defense Forces soldiers.

   
The prime minister said that the rocket fire has intensified in the last few days that leaves Israel with no choice but to react in a manner that makes its stance on the rocket fire clear.

 

"I asked the Defense Minister to instruct the IDF to prepare for the Israeli response that is required under these circumstances. The response will be given at the time, place and avenue that we choose."

 

Palestinian militants fired at least four Qassam rockets from the Gaza Strip into the western Negev on Sunday, with one landing in between two kindergartens.

 

Three rockets struck the Eshkol region, two of them landing in open fields and the third close to the kindergartens. A fourth rocket struck an open field in the Sdot Negev Regional Council area. No casualties or damage were reported in any of the strikes.

 

Later on Sunday morning, Israel Defense Forces soldiers exchanged fire with militants near the Kissufim crossing on the border with the Gaza Strip. No casualties were reported in the incident.

 

On Saturday morning one Grad rocket struck south of Ashkelon after a Color Red alert sounded in the city.

 

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said there is no need to wait for a response.

 

"The reaction must be strong and immediate as that is the only way that Hamas will understand the equation has changed," she said.

 

Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the security establishment had been instructed to formulate a response.

 

"Hamas received a heavy blow and if needed will receive another one," he said.

 

The rockets have demonstrated the fragility of a cease-fire that ended Israel's devastating Gaza offensive on January 18.

 

Israel halted the operation after saying its goals had been achieved. But Hamas declared victory and militants have kept up sporadic attacks.

 

Since the cease-fire, militants have fired rockets into Israel and killed one soldier in a border attack. Israel has conducted retaliatory strikes and pounded tunnels Hamas uses to smuggle in weapons from Egypt. Israeli forces have also killed three men Palestinians identified as farmers in violence along the Gaza-Israel border.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Blair: Hamas should be brought into the peace process

Either Mr. Blair is very smart, or very stupid. Hitler should have been bought into the peace process too, but he was also unwilling....

 

Last update - 00:24 01/01/2009       
Blair: Hamas should be part of peace process
By Haaretz Service and Reuters

Hamas should be part of the Middle East peace process, said Tony Blair, former British prime minister and envoy to the region of the international quartet of powers, in comments published on Friday.

 

"I do think it is important that we find a way of bringing Hamas into this process, but it can only be done if Hamas are prepared to do it on the right terms," Blair said in an interview with the Times of London newspaper, published on its Web site.

 

Blair is the Middle East envoy for the quartet of Middle East peace negotiators - the United States, the United Nations, Russia and the European Union.
 
Blair told the newspaper that that the strategy of "pushing Gaza aside" and trying to create a Palestinian state on the West Bank "was never going to work and will never work."

Continued (Permanent Link)

Hamas: Big surprises waiting for the occupation .. The resistance has used only 40% of capacity

Hamas Big surprises waiting for the occupation .. The resistance has used only 40% of capacity
2009-01-10 2009-01-10
Qassam agencies:

Source: alqassam.ps/arabic/news1.php?id=7456 (translated)

Palestinian sources familiar with the capabilities of the Palestinian resistance in Gaza stated: "The land battle has not started yet and the Palestinian resistance has used only 40% of its capacity in the battle on the edge of the Gaza Strip."

The sources said that "the Zionist tanks are still stationed in the open and agricultural areas and did not enter the Palestinian cities in the Gaza Strip", indicating that the tanks were in open areas in Rafah or Khan Younis camps, or central and northern Gaza.

The sources noted that the units of snipers and suicide bombers and booby-trapped houses and cars and thousands of fighters from the field units equipped with improvised explosive devices and rocket-launching persons and teams are not yet participating in the battle on the edge of the sector.

The sources pointed out that the artillery units assigned to the firing of mortar shells and rockets will operate out of thousands of cells of the resistance and deploy in the field and take their places in the streets and alleys, waiting for the battle between the alleys of refugee camps and neighborhoods.

The sources confirmed the fact that the war is expected to peak with the resistance meeting face to face with Israeli soldiers, noting that it was possible to increase the number of martyrs to more than ten thousand dead and thousands injured in the risk of heavy losses on the enemy. "

They revealed the existence of Palestinian resistance cells of about 40 people each, equipped with automatic weapons of various types, each equipped with ammunition and bombs.

The sources expected that all the combatants will join the people of the Gaza Strip in the battle against the Palestinian people, indicating that "a small number of fighters were involved in the battle on the edge of the sector now."

It stressed that "in the battle between the alleys of the camp, a proficient Palestinian fighter knows the streets and alleys of the camp and exits and entrances of homes in the Gaza Strip," they said, adding that the army of occupation in the Gaza Strip did not expect more than nominal resistance, and that Hamas benefited from the experience of battle in the Jenin refugee camp in 2002 and well as the experience of the July War on Lebanon in 2006.

Continued (Permanent Link)

"Hamas:" Land battle with the enemy did not start .. The resistance is fully prepared

alqassam.ps/arabic/news1.php?id=7448
"Hamas:" Land battle with the enemy did not start .. The resistance is fully prepared
2009-01-10 2009-01-10
Qassam agencies:

According to the Islamic Resistance Movement "Hamas", the majority of the targets that had been shelled by Israel in the last days of the aggression are civilian targets, and did not deprive the resistance of its components. That was however, the easy part, and they were prepared for the ground battle ground that has  not yet begun.

The leader of the Islamic Resistance Movement "Hamas", Mushir al-Masri, told reporters that the resistance has only lost a few fightes, and the targeting of civilians by the entity is only evidence of military and political failure. He said: "We stress that the resistance has only lost a few now in its battle with the Zionist occupation, We emphasize that more than 1000 casuality goal of the Zionist enemy is achieved by hitting civilian targets from universities, schools, hospitals, mosques and homes, and targeting of civilians is proof of the failure and bankruptcy by the enemy who did not face resistance on the ground so far. "

Al-Masri pointed out that the land battle "has not yet begun, and that the Zionist forces are still in the frontier areas and in the open", and said: "The land battle has not started yet, the enemy is still on the edge of the regions, and preparations for resistance is great, and the dozens of people killed among the Zionists is evidence of the strength of the resistance; we are at the back of this enemy, we will not enable the invasion of Gaza and the resistance will cause them losses, and launch dozens of rockets on a daily basis towards the Zionist settlements, "as he put it.

Continued (Permanent Link)

PROUD OF TRINIDAD & TOBAGO AND HER SUPPORT FOR ISRAEL

PROUD OF TRINIDAD & TOBAGO AND HER SUPPORT FOR ISRAEL

Trinidad & Tobago is one of the most cosmopolitan countries in the world. Our population of 1.5 million is comprised of people of African, East Indian, Chinese, European, Mediterranean, Arab and Native American descent. We boast of the many churches, mosques and Hindu temples which dot the landscape of our tiny island. Racism, though ever so slightly present in politics, is not a true problem which plagues our society. Trinidad & Tobago a veritable paradise – a land of oil and money, Carnival and calypso, rum and calypso, beautiful beaches and sweeping skyscrapers, if only for one thing: Trinidad & Tobago seems to be under the "curious spell of anti-Semitism without Jews." For while our people adhere to the faiths of almost every major world religion, Jews and Judaism is largely unrepresented here. In total, the entire Trinidadian Jewish population accounts for only about 100 persons. Many of them are well-known figures, but their Jewishness is not something which they broadcast – and for good reason. Anti-Semitism is growing in Trinidad, in no small part thanks to the efforts of the approximately seventy thousand Muslims who call Trinidad & Tobago home.

Once there was a flourishing Jewish community in Trinidad – with over 5,000 Jews calling Trinidad home and terming themselves part of the "Calypso Shtetl". Unfortunately, the Black Power uprisings of the 1970's forced many of these Trinidadian Jews to migrate to Canada, Barbados and the United States. I was privileged to meet one of these Trinidadian Jews, a wonderful lady who, because of diplomatic reasons, returned to Trinidad to live for a few years. A true Trinidadian, born and bred on these very shores, this lady was the first to put into words the disturbing increase in anti-Semitism. She said in an e-mail to me: "In Trinidad, it is easily explained by 3 reasons: the Syrian population, the American black Nation of Islam influence, and the Muslim followers of Arabs. All of these groups are, by tradition, anti-Semitic." Truer words were never spoken, and it dismayed me to learn that anti-Semitism was rising in Trinidad.

On Sunday January 4th, 2009, the IBN (Islamic Broadcasting Network) Channel 8 in Trinidad & Tobago hosted a show discussing the current events unfolding between Israel and the terrorist group, Hamas, and it was here that I first learned of the anti-Semitism which exists in my country. Naturally, as was to be expected, many callers-in spouted venomous, hateful, anti-Israel sentiments - among which they called Israel "an aggressor", "prideful", "evil", and called for the boycott of Israeli products. Of course, since we live in a democratic state, they were most entitled to their opinion, but likewise, since it is a democratic state, I felt compelled to call in and offer my dissenting view.

While the other callers greeted the show hosts and the Trinidad & Tobago public with the proper Islamic greeting, I chose not to do so since I am not Muslim, and I simply said "Good night", before starting to say what I had to say. Perhaps that was my first mistake, for IBN is not known for being particularly open-minded with people whose views clash with their own. While they are greatly sympathetic to non-Muslims who call in to agree with their views, they aren't likely to be that understanding with non-Muslims who don't agree with them.

So I called in and said the following: "Good night, I'm calling in response to the last caller. Now we have to put things into perspective here: Israel has it's borders with the West Bank relatively open, because the West Bank isn't under the control of a terrorist group, and Hamas is a terrorist group in control of the Gaza Strip. Hamas quotes the hadith which speaks of Jews hiding behind trees and stones and those trees and stones calling for Muslims to kill the Jews. It's in their very charter which I've read, and -" at that point, my call was immediately disconnected and the show hosts went on a tirade to explain that the hadith I quoted didn't exist, and that Hamas was not a terrorist group, by any stretch of the imagination. I had obviously dreamed it up in my head that Hamas was a terrorist organization, because obviously I was deranged. Why would I think that? Hamas never called for an end to the state of Israel; Hamas' charter doesn't proclaim that all of "Palestine" is Islamic Waqf - land conquered exclusively for Muslim use, to be governed by Muslims; Hamas was not termed a terrorist organization by the EU, by the US, by Israel and many other countries; Hamas didn't say it would never negotiate with and/or recognize the Jewish state's right to exist, nor did Hamas ever say that it would rescind on all past agreements the PLO/PA made with Israel!

No sir-ee!

I was completely wrong on all these points!

What Hamas actually was, you see, was a peace-loving organization which was being treated unfairly by Western media and that aggressor country - ugh, Israel.

Doh! Get your facts straight, Mr. Jagdeo!

But just in case - in the mere chance that those presenters were wrong and I was right - I'd like them to know this: you can argue from now til thy kingdom come and you get your 72 virgins about why the sky is not blue - but that doesn't change the facts: the sky is blue, Hamas is a terrorist organization and the hadith does exist and it does say clearly that Muslims will get help from trees and stones in locating and killing those terrible, evil Jews. But if I'm wrong and Mr. Inshan Ishmael (the show's main presenter) is right - then slap me silly and call me Wakim, because I will head straight for the nearest mosque (I won't even bother to stop at "Go!" and collect my $200) and become a Muslim.

(Before we continue, may I stop here just to quote the hadith, which I was told did not exist. The hadith is as follows: "HADITH Sahih Bukhari [4:52:176] Narrated by Abdullah bin Umar: Allah's Apostle said, "You will indeed fight against the Jews and you will kill them to the point where the rock and the tree will say: 'O Muslim! O Abdullaah (slave of Allaah)! There is a Jew hiding behind me. Come and kill him.' Except for al-Gharqad for it is from the trees of the Jews.' " So there ya go. Either I am crazy, or Abdullah bin Umar was crazy, or maybe – just maybe – the shows presenters were the crazy ones. I'll leave it up to you to decide).

The point of my rambling here is not against IBN or against Islam. While I was very discomfited by the way I was treated that night, I didn't expect any better from that particular television station. After all, whenever they have a chance, they are ever-ready to make subtle anti-Israel and somewhat anti-Semitic remarks in their shows, and regularly broadcast subtle propaganda aimed against Jews and Israel. Subtle, because they are well-aware of the dangers of inciting people, and God knows they are somewhat wary of losing their broadcasting license in Trinidad & Tobago, so they resort to finding subtle means to dig at Israel, to dig at Jews and to further validate themselves (cause God forbid, Islam tries to exist without invalidating everyone else around it, especially Am Yisrael). For instance, they regularly broadcast a particular cartoon featuring a group of young Muslim-American scout-like boys who travel to Turkey and are caught up in the intrigue of fighting against "the Evil Star Organization" - a most devious, treacherous club, whose leader is pictured by a very pale, stooped-over gentleman, with a huge nose and the greediest, most money-grubbing personality you can imagine. You need not be any sort of Einstein to figure out what the Evil Star Organization represents and who the leader is a caricature of. And also, a couple weeks ago, on the weekly IBN show "Let the Quran Speak", the esteemed Islamic scholar Mr. Chote, was very clear in saying that the problems in the Middle East stem from not an Arab/Israeli conflict, but rather, a Muslim/Jewish one. Mr. Chote quoted the aforementioned hadith (which I was told, did not exist) to back up his argument and argue for a united Muslim front against Jews (though it must be said, Mr. Chote was very careful in choosing his words and did not exactly call for physical violence to be perpetrated against Jews or Jewish interests). Mr. Chote continued on to say that "Palestine" was a land belonging to all Muslims and not just Palestinians. Of course, I was mightily surprised by that statement. Apparently Mr. Chote seemed to think he had some sort of claim to the land of Israel as well, and only by the collective effort of the 1 billion Muslims in the world could the Jewish problem be solved. Oh well, just when I thought the only claimants to the land were the Jews and Palestinians, up comes Mr. Chote throwing his 2 cents in and staking his claim as well. Well, well - all I have to say is this: though the Moshiach may tarry - I believe in his coming. You just wait, Mr. Chote.

But as I was saying, I truly did not expect IBN to be open-minded, especially given its history of anti-Israel, anti-Jewish rhetoric. What really disturbed me was the level of hate of the callers. It wasn't simply a "we don't agree with Israel" - it was a constant, never-ending supply of "Assalam u alaykum", followed by "we hate Israel etc., etc., etc." I've a somewhat morbid sense of humor, so I could not help but find the irony that callers would greet the show hosts in the most syrupy-sweet voices wishing them "Peace unto you" (which is what "assalam u alaykum" literally means), and then go on to proclaim their hate for Israel, the funniest thing in the world. But that's beside the point - after all, everyone is entitled to their opinion. What really got to me was the unfairness of the situation. It upset me to my core. I was frustrated that I had not been given the time to talk about Hamas' constant barrage of Qassam and Katuysha rockets (one of the show presenters called it "Falusha" rockets, "or something like that". No my friend, Falashas are a derogatory term for Ethiopian Jews. Like I said, they know what they're talking about. I don't - so Falusha rockets it is) into southern Israel - over 10,600 rockets, to be exact. I wanted to yell out that Israel didn't have to do a ground invasion - Israel could've just attacked from the air, bombing their targets from the safety of their planes, and not risk the lives of their soldiers, but they chose to go in, putting the lives of their soldiers in jeopardy, in order to minimize Palestinian civilian casualties.

I wanted to yell out many things, but I didn't... because I'd been disconnected, most unceremoniously, from the show. After all, I didn't know anything: Hamas is not a terrorist organization; there is no hadith which says trees and stones will help Muslims locate and kill Jews; and Falusha rockets were what the Hamas was hitting Israel with.

Ah - you learn something new everyday.

The many callers - all of whom who declared their united hate for Israel and her aggression on those innocent, peace-loving Hamas members - sickened me. The abundance of ignorance on the issue among the Trinidadian public sickened me to my core. And it wasn't just the callers-in to the IBN show who sickened me. My growing sense of nausea had begun to grow earlier that very day. On that particular Sunday, before I tuned in to IBN, I'd read some articles in the newspapers by local columnists who were only too quick in their leftist views to denounce Israel as the poster country for all things evil. You know how it goes – Israel drops a bomb and the entire left begins their tirade against Israel and Zionism. Blah blah blah. It's the same story every time and everywhere. It's no different here in Trinidad.

So I felt sick - down to my very core. The leftists, the extremist Muslims, the uninformed – just too many haters… all springing from my country. I was ashamed – it was not what I expected, especially from a people who are famous for not being racist…

Now I'm the biggest Zionist ever - and perhaps, a little right-wing in my views: yeah, I'm a Jerusalem-should-not-be-divided, Bibi-loving, don't-give-land-unless-you're-getting-a-sustainable-durable-permanent-peace, don't-negotiate-with-terrorists kind of guy (oops, Hamas aren't terrorists! Didn't they teach me that on Sunday? Silly Nick!), but I am willing to listen to other points of view - if you would let me voice mine as well. But right then, it seemed that no one wanted to listen. At that point, it seemed to me that everyone in Trinidad & Tobago was as stubborn as the most hardened donkey out there, unwilling to look beyond the scope of the present and superficial, unwilling to dig down into the history and the deeper, ideological problems that simmer below the surface.

The whole thing hurt me awfully - because the truth is, I take things personally - and everyone dissing Israel and not giving me any space to stand up for her frustrated me, hurt me and really made me ashamed of Trinidad. I hadn't expected Trinidad to be so full of leftists, so full of anti-Israel sentiment, so full of hate and ignorance and a refusal to learn the history of the situation before they jump the bandwagon and start calling for death to Israel. It just seemed to me that everyone was too quick to just look at the here and now, presented to them by CNN and the ever-anti-Semitic BBC and judge Israel unfairly.

But two things happened which changed my dissatisfaction with my country; two things which made me proud of my people, and reassured me that they aren't all leftists, or extreme Muslims. Those loud voices are drowned out by the majority – and the majority came out and spoke and reassured me that my Trinidadian people are a most intelligent people who aren't all anti-Israel and aren't all unaware of the truth of the situation.

On Monday January 5th 2009, a friend of mine in Jerusalem sent me a link to a site where one can contribute to assist IDF soldiers in the war against Hamas. The site (http://www.stogether.org/gaza) asked for a simple contribution of US$18 to equip individual soldiers with little necessities which the army couldn't afford to give to them. Knowing my Zionist ideologies, my friend sent me this link cause she knew that I would want to help in any way I could, since I am currently so far away from Israel. Naturally, I immediately went onto the site and did what I had to do there, but I wondered, "Hmm? I wonder if there's anyone in Trinidad who'd want to help out as well?", so I clicked the forward button, and with the Zionist fervor bubbling in me, I forwarded that son-of-a-bitch e-mail to every Tom, Dick and Harry I could think of.

And boy was I surprised by what happened.

I'm no official representative of Israel, but people wrote back to me saying how they wanted to help, but didn't know how to - and this was a good idea of mine to send this to them. They SUPPORTED Israel! My e-mail, which had been forwarded to people I don't even know, made a bit of a ripple, and my humble GMail inbox was somewhat inundated with e-mails from a wide variety of folks: Christian evangelicals, everyday citizens who were well-educated about what's going on and in full support of Israel, and even an lady who "couldn't bear the thought of those poor soldiers not having any comforts, even though I don't know head or tail about the situation over there."

It warmed my heart - honestly it did.

And then, to further compound this warming in my previously hurt little heart, I clicked on the Facebook group I'd joined, "I support the Israel Defense Force in preventing terror attacks from Gaza", and checked the list of friends I had in it who I'd invited to join - and to my pleasant, most heart-warming surprise realized that from only 3 friends yesterday, this number had grown to 25 - including a hijab-wearing acquaintance! It was the the best feeling ever. And that's the point of this note - I know it's been long, I know I've rambled alot, but here's the long-awaited point: I forgot that while there is opposition to Israel – opposition to Israel's current war against terror, and possibly, opposition to Israel's very right to exist, there is also support for Israel, from varied, surprising and not-so-surprising sources in my country. There are Muslims who are fair and rational in my country, there is a huge evangelical Christian population in Trinidad (approximately two hundred and fifty thousand by some sources) who support Israel almost to the point of absurdity, and there are members of the intelligentsia who aren't leftist and biased against Israel. My very own Prime Minister, the Honorable Patrick Manning, while I don't always agree with him, was courageous and bold enough to say to hell with Caribbean's silly neutrality on the Israel/Palestinian conflict, and he established official ties with Israel and broke ground by being the first head of government of a Caribbean country to visit Israel in an official capacity in November of 2005.

So thank you, my wonderful country of Trinidad & Tobago.

Thank you for being open enough and intelligent enough and educated enough and caring enough to give your support to a country which is only trying to do the right thing, but whose name is being dragged through the mud because the world is a harsh, unfair place. Thank you for not feeding in to extremist Muslim and Arab propaganda; thank you for throwing yourselves behind Israel so firmly, so faithfully and so steadfastly.

Thank you, Trinidad & Tobago for making me proud of you and reinstating in me a pride in my country... you've thrown your support behind my other country, Israel, and I'm proud to be a part of you both.

--
Nick

Continued (Permanent Link)

Senior Jihad man, 14 others die in IDF strikes

Senior Jihad man, 14 others die in IDF strikes

 

Ziad Abu Tir, fourteen people killed in strikes on northern Gaza; terror organizations prepare for ground incursion, vow to send out 'hundreds of car bombs and suicide bombers'. Over 60 rockets fired at Israel

 

Ali Waked
Latest Update:  12.29.08, 17:56 / Israel News

 

Gaza under fire: Palestinian source in the strip reported Monday evening of several IAF strikes across the strip.

 

Israeli Air Force fighter jets struck two targets in northern Gaza, both near the home of one of Hamas'  senior military wing operatives. News agencies reported that at least 20 people were killed and dozens were injured.

 

 Another strike in the Northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahiya hit the home of a senior member of the group's recruiting branch; and a third took out a truck carrying Grad rockets in the northern Gaza neighborhood of Jabalya. According to the IDF, the truck was either headed towards a hiding place or to launching pads.

According to the Palestinian, none of the Hamas operatives were in their homes during the strikes.

Eelier Monday, Ziad Abu-Tir (35) a senior member of the Islamic Jihad's military wing was among five people killed in an IAF strike in the Khan Younis area. His brother, nephew and two other people died in the attack as well. Five people were injured and the area sustained heavy damage.

A spokesman for the Islamic Jihad's military wing said that "this is another massacre and crime" and that Israel must wait for the organization's response.

A source in one of the organizations warned that gunmen in Gaza were well prepared for a ground offensive. "We'll kidnap soldiers, and it will equal all of this destruction," he told Ynet.

 

Meanwhile, the rocket fire continued Monday, with more than 60 rockets landing in southern Israel since the morning hours and one person killed in a construction site in the city of Ashkelon.

One of the rockets hit a house in Sderot, which was fortunately empty. Neighbors reported of complete devastation, as security forces evacuated the area fearing a gas leak. Several people suffered shock and were treated by Magen David Adom emergency services' paramedics.

 

'We still have ace up our sleeve'

 

The armed Palestinian organizations reported that they were completing their preparations for Israel's expected ground offensive. A Palestinian source told Ynet that "the Israeli side must wait for a united Strip under the ground and for hundreds of car bombs and hundreds of suicide bombers."

 

Another senior source in the groups said that all of the organizations were preparing to abduct soldiers. "If the kidnapping plan proves successful it will compare to all the destruction Israel had caused."

 

A Hamas source rejected the reports suggesting that the rocket fire at Ashdod, as well as the reports of kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Shalit was hurt, are evident of the organization's distress. "We have sent messages that we can fire to longer distances that the Israelis are used to and that the Israeli soldier is held in the Strip," he said.

 

The source refused to elaborate on Shalit's condition.

 

According to Hamas, the rockets on Ashdod was fired from deep within the Strip and any launchings from its northern part would surely hit targets northerly in Israel, perhaps bringing them closer to central Israel.

 

"We have other aces up our sleeves and we will use them when the time and place are right," said the source; adding that while the number of Palestinian casualties' numbers in the hundreds, no more than 10 Hamas operatives have been killed.

 

Continued (Permanent Link)

US Prosecutors: Holy Land Foundation was Hamas in USA

The case against the USA Holy Land Foundation "charity" seems pretty clear. This group worked on behalf of Hamas. But they got off once before and shall probably do so again.

Last update - 11:05 12/11/2008

Prosecutor: U.S. Muslim charity glorified Jihad and killing Jews By The Associated Press

Defense attorneys and prosecutors battled over allegations that a U.S. Muslim charity broke the law by funneling money to Hamas institutions, speaking in closing arguments at the Holy Land Foundation's second trial for allegedly financing terrorism.

"Look at all those videos. It seems like every song was about support of Hamas, about martyrdom, about jihad, about killing Jews," said prosecutor Jim Jacks.

He was reminding jurors of videos from the 1980s and early 1990s of Palestinian festivals where speakers and musicians openly praised Hamas and Holy Land raised money. Jacks made the comments in the government rebuttal Tuesday - the final word before deliberations begin.

"Can there be any doubt that these men were the leaders of Hamas in the United States, and that they were the fundraising mechanism?"

Last year's trial of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development ended in no convictions and a mistrial on most charges in the government's biggest terror-financing trial since Sept. 11, 2001.

Prosecutors say Holy Land funneled more than $12 million to Palestinian schools and charities controlled by the militant group Hamas after the U.S. government declared Hamas a terrorist group in 1995, which made supporting it illegal.

Holy Land was the largest Muslim charity in the U.S. before it was shut down in December 2001.

Defense attorneys, for their part, argued that the charity did not break the law by casting politics aside and aiding Palestinians under brutal Israeli occupation.

Elashi and former Holy Land chief executive Shukri Abu Baker are each charged with conspiracy, supporting a foreign terrorist organization, money laundering and filing false tax returns.

Tightening their case from the initial trial, prosecutors dropped most of nearly 30 counts against Mufid Abdulqader and Abdulrahman Odeh. The men still face three conspiracy counts.

Mohammed El-Mezain, a former Holy Land chairman acquitted on most charges in the first trial, is charged with one conspiracy count.

Linda Moreno, attorney for former Holy Land co-founder Ghassan Elashi, stressed the former Richardson, Texas-based charity's humanitarian work Tuesday and lambasted government evidence as old and irrelevant.

"For those who have been impoverished by politics and history and failed leadership, for all those generations of refugees that he helped feed and clothe and educate, Ghassan Elashi does not apologize for serving them, she told jurors," The Dallas Morning News reported online. "He knew the work of the Holy Land Foundation attracted enemies."

Continued (Permanent Link)

Israelis support "calm" but think it won't last.

The latest poll shows that a plurality of Israelis support the "calm" with Hamas but think it won't last. Interestingly, Kadima voters support the "calm", but are pretty certain it won't last. Knesset polls show a significant relative advantage for the Kadima party if Tzippi Livni is its candidate for Prime Minister, and a drop in the popularity of Labor and the Likud relative to other scenarios and previous polls. Still, the Likud is the party that gets the largest number of mandates in all scenarios.

Polls: 40.6%:32.9% support calm agreement with Hamas, 74.8% expect to last
days
Dr. Aaron Lerner Date: 19 June 2008

Telephone poll of a representative sample of 497 adult Israelis (including Arab Israelis) carried out by Shvakim Panorama for Israel Radio's Hakol Diburim (It's All Talk) the afternoon and evening of 18 June 2008 after the announcement of the "calm" in the Gaza Strip.

If elections were held today how would you vote (expressed in mandates - based on the 81.2% who indicated what party they would vote for)

Four scenarios:
[A] Kadima headed by Livni
[B] Kadima headed by Mofaz
[C] Kadima headed by Dichter
[D] Kadima headed by Shetreet

Actual Knesset today in [brackets]
[A][B][C][D]
22 18 09 08 [29] Kadima
14 17 19 19 [19] Labor
25 22 29 30 [12] Likud
11 11 11 11 [12] Shas
11 12 11 12 [11] Yisrael Beteinu
07 08 08 07 [09] Nat'l Union/NRP
06 06 06 06 [06] Yahadut Hatorah
06 07 07 07 [05] Meretz
04 05 06 06 [00] Green Party
03 03 03 03 [00] Social Justice (Gaydamak Party)
** ** ** ** [07] Retirees Party
11 11 11 11 [10] Arab parties
** does not get minimum votes for Knesset representation

Do you support or oppose the calm agreement with Hamas?
Total: Support 40.6% Oppose 32.9% No position 26.5%
Kadima voters: Support 38.1% Oppose 31.8% No position 30.1%
Likud voters: Support 22.3% Oppose 60.4% No position 17.3%
Labor voters: Support 69.2% Oppose 10.1% No position 20.7%

You think that the calm will continue for a short time (days) or a long time (months)?
Total: Short 74.8% Long 17.1% Don't know 8.1%
Kadima voters: Short 81.5% Long 5.3% DK 13.2%
Likud voters:: Short 91.4% Long 2.2% DK 6.4%
Labor voters: Short 59.6% Long 12.8% DK 27.6%

Dr. Aaron Lerner, Director IMRA (Independent Media Review & Analysis)
(mail POB 982 Kfar Sava)
Tel 972-9-7604719/Fax 972-3-7255730
INTERNET ADDRESS: imra@netvision.net.il
Website: http://www.imra.org.il

Continued (Permanent Link)

IDF video clears Israel of blame for Gaza family deaths

Here are two stories about the death of the Gaza family and the video taken by the drone. Neither quite captures the flavor of the incident. Unfortunately, the video is apparently not yet available on the Web, but it was shown on Israeli TV. Clearly, the IDF was chasing an armed group and had fired missiles at it. In each case, a small detonation was followed by a larger one, indicating that the missile hit ignited explosives. One of the group reached an area in front of the courtyard of the family in Beit Hanoun. The family was in the courtyard, which was concealed from the drone cameras by hedges. A small missile fired at the terrorist touched off a much larger explosion, killing the family.

 

In the film, the terrorists are clearly seen to be running as IDF pursues them, but a Swiss volunteer in Gaza claimed that the Palestinians had invented the fable that the Islamic Jihad man had come to distribute sweets to the family, celebrating killing or wounding of two Israeli soldiers. Amon the "sweets" it seems were several RPG rockets.

 

Moral of the story - beware of Islamic Jihad terrorists bearing sweets.

 

Ami Isseroff

 

 

Last update - 18:34 02/05/2008

IDF releases clip clearing itself of blame for Gaza family deaths

By Haaertz Service and News Agencies

The Israel Defense Forces on Friday released a video exonerating itself of responsibility for the deaths of Palestinian woman and her four children in Beit Hanun on Monday, which the clip shows were caused by the detonation of explosives carried by a Gaza militant hit in an Israel Air Force strike.

Israel and Hamas have exchanged accusations since the incident over blame for the civilians' deaths in the northern Gaza Strip town.


According to the IDF panel investigating the deaths, the target of the IAF strike on Monday was a group of four Palestinian gunmen which had been identified.

IDF Spokesperson's Office said the panel concluded that, "one gunman was targeted and hit from the air. As a result a strong secondary explosion occurred" when ammunition and weaponry he was carrying in a back pack was detonated.

This "secondary" blast was what killed the mother and her four small children, according to the Spokesperson's Office statement, which continued: "The second gunman was targeted and hit as well, causing an even bigger explosion ... Both explosions were significantly stronger than those caused by the IDF attacks against them."

Four militants, armed with weapons, are clearly seen walking near the home in the clip.

The video formed the principal evidence for the panel, which was appointed by GOC Southern Command Major General Yoav Galant.

Army spokeswoman Maj. Avital Leibovitz, said the militants were going out to battle in the middle of residential neighborhood.

An Israeli human rights group had called for a criminal probe, saying the military appeared to have violated international law by firing close to the family's home.

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert voiced "deep remorse" for the victims, but said Hamas militants operating in civilian areas had exposed non-combatants to danger and turned them "into an inseparable part of the war."

*****

Israel issues drone video of disputed Gaza deaths

 

Fri May 2, 2008 11:11am EDT

By Dan Williams

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel's military released video footage on Friday which it said showed that accidentally detonated Palestinian munitions, rather than direct Israeli fire, killed a Gazan woman and four of her children this week.

Residents of Beit Hanoun, a town in the northern Gaza Strip, insisted that the April 28 deaths were caused by an Israeli tank shell or air force missile fired at Myassar Abu Meateq's home.

An unrelated Palestinian described by hospital officials as a 17-year-old student was killed outdoors in the same incident. Another Palestinian of about the same age was wounded.

Publishing the conclusions of an internal investigation along with black-and-white footage from a surveillance drone, the Israel Defense Force (IDF) spokesman said that during fighting in Beit Hanoun the air force twice fired missiles at Palestinian gunmen "carrying backpacks loaded with ammunition" near the home.

"One gunman was targeted and hit from the air. As a result a strong secondary explosion occurred," the spokesman said in a statement.

"The second gunman was targeted and hit as well, causing an even bigger explosion ... Both explosions were significantly stronger than those caused by the IDF attacks against them."

The first clip of high-angle footage tracks two figures walking on a road. A caption describes them as gunmen, though weapons cannot clearly be seen. An explosion envelopes the two, followed by a second, slightly bigger blast moments later.

The second clip shows a figure lying outside a building that a caption marks as the Abu Meateq home. A big and sustained explosion takes place, its flames reaching into the building.

A caption says that this "larger explosion" was "most likely caused by the setting off of weaponry carried by the terrorist". Another caption says that the Israeli missile that set off the blast was aimed at the centre of the street.

"The possibility that the family was hit by other IDF fire was eliminated since this was the only incident recorded that day in which attacks were carried out in the area," the spokesman's statement said.

Hamas and Abu Meateq's neighbors denied that Palestinian gunmen were operating near the home during the Israeli attacks.

The Palestinian faction Islamic Jihad said one of its gunmen was killed by Israeli forces elsewhere in northern Gaza. Another Palestinian militant was shot dead later in the day.

The killing of Abu Meateq and the four siblings -- whose ages ranged from 1-1/2 to 5 years old -- dealt a blow to Egyptian bids to broker a Gaza truce between Hamas and Israel.

Hamas deplored the deaths as a "war crime" and fired short-range rockets across the border in retaliation. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said he was "deeply sorry" about the deaths but blamed Hamas fighters for operating among civilians.

Ibrahim Abu Meateq, a half-brother of the four slain children, dismissed the Israeli military's findings as a lie.

"We knew they were not going to treat us fairly. Other families have been eliminated before and they didn't take responsibility," he told Reuters, referring to the high civilian toll from past Israeli raids on Gaza.

(Additional reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza and Avida Landau in Jerusalem, Editing by Giles Elgood)

Continued (Permanent Link)

US rebuffs Hamas "truce" offer to Carter.

Carter got the same old same old - "We agree to take a state and give you nothing except 10 years of quiet - during which time we gather the means to destroy you."

 

What is strange about this report is this:

 

"Mashaal said he made the offer to Carter during talks between the two men on Friday and Saturday in the Syrian capital."

 

But reports on Saturday said that on Sunday Meshal was to have responded to Carter's offer! So who offered what?

 

Ami Isseroff

 

 

US: Mashaal's truce offer to Carter is meaningless
TOVAH LAZAROFF and HERB KEINON , THE JERUSALEM POST  Apr. 21, 2008

 

Former US president Jimmy Carter ended his nine-day trip to the region with a promise from Hamas to offer Israel tacit recognition and a 10-year truce if Israel in turn withdrew to the pre-1967 borders.

 

Khaled Mashaal, whose group has sworn to destroy Israel, told reporters in Damascus on Monday that Hamas would accept a Palestinian state in the West Bank with Israel as its neighbor, but stressed that his group would not formally recognize it, a move immediately dismissed by the USas meaningless.

 

"We agree to a (Palestinian) state on pre-67 borders, with Jerusalem as its capital with genuine sovereignty without settlements, but without recognizing

 

Israel," Mashaal said."We have offered a truce if Israel withdraws to the 1967 borders, a truce of 10 years as a proof of recognition."

 

Mashaal said he made the offer to Carter during talks between the two men on Friday and Saturday in the Syrian capital.

 

Mashaal used the Arabic word "hudna," meaning truce, which is more concrete than "tahadiyeh" - a period of calm - which Hamas often uses to describe a simple cease-fire. Hudna implies a recognition of the other party's existence.

 

In Washington, deputy State Department spokesman Tom Casey brushed aside Hamas's offer, saying the group's past rhetoric contained "all this language about truces and other kinds of issues. But the bottom line is, Hamas still believes in the destruction of the state of Israel; they don't believe Israel has a right to exist," adding it was clear "that nothing has changed" in Hamas's attitude - including that the group still refuses to explicitly recognize Israel and denounce terrorism.

 

The statements by Hamas followed Carter's visit to the region, during which he spent time in Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Syria.

 

Carter angered both Israel and his own government by meeting with Hamas, which is considered by both countries to be a terrorist organization. It has carried out terror attacks in Israel, and has launched rockets against the country's southern border. It has also held Cpl. Gilad Schalit captive since June 2006.

 

Top Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, refused to meet with Carter during his stay. But Carter, who ended his visit to the region on Monday, said that it was critical to talk to Hamas.

 

The former president, who brokered a peace deal between Egypt and Israel in 1979, said repeatedly that in those meetings, as well as in others he held, he was simply on a fact-finding mission for the Carter Center, which he runs in the United States.

 

But he did more then just receive information. He tried and failed to broker deals regarding a cease-fire with Hamas and the release of Schalit.

 

He did, however, wrangle a promise from Hamas that it would send a letter from the young man to his parents.

 

The gesture was acknowledged by Mashaal on Monday, who told reporters in Damascus that he had agreed to this "humanitarian" gesture out of respect for Carter.

 

Schalit's father, Noam, who, along with his wife, spoke with Carter both before and after his strip to Damascus, said he would wait until receiving the letter before commenting on the gesture.

 

Speaking to the Israel Council on Foreign Relations, Carter said that Hamas had rejected his proposal for a rapid prisoner exchange that would allow Schalit to be moved to Egypt in exchange for the release of people held by Israel not guilty of violent crimes, including politicians, women and children.

 

"Hamas considered its negotiations through Egypt to be well advanced," and it had already made promises to the families of prisoners who are on the prisoner list that is already under discussion with Israel, Carter said.

 

But, he added, Hamas would be willing to move Schalit to Egypt after the first part of that deal brokered with Egypt had been concluded.

 

Israel has agreed to release 1,000 prisoners in exchange for Schalit, but the hold-up has been the identity of the prisoners on the list.

 

Ofer Dekel, the official charged by Olmert with dealing with the kidnapped soldiers issue, was reported as saying Monday that he had not received a briefing about Carter's activities in Damascus and his talks with Mashaal, government sources said.

 

They added it was clear that Industry and Trade Minister Eli Yishai would brief the government - and Dekel - on what he heard from Carter regarding Schalit.

 

The two men met both before and after Carter's talks with Mashaal.

 

Far from knocking Carter's efforts, Yishai had asked Carter to help arrange a meeting between him and Hamas to work on releasing Schalit.

 

Carter told Yishai that Hamas was interested in such a meeting, but did not want to talk to him at this time, out of fear it would complicate already existing negotiations.

 

But Carter said he would help Yishai arrange a meeting in Egypt with intelligence chief Omar Sullieman. Yishai also spoke with Carter about his involvement in a conference of Islamic and Jewish religious leaders.

 

But, while Yishai wanted to work with Carter, one government official said the former US president had done more harm than good, even with the promise of a new letter. The Schalit family had previously received a letter from their son last June.

 

According to this official, Hamas is dissatisfied that, despite holding Schalit for almost two years, they have not gotten what they want from the Israeli government - the release of high-profile terrorists - for his return.

 

In an attempt to pressure the Israeli public to pressure the government, Hamas is interested in opening up another negotiating track which bypasses Dekel and the government, and goes directly to the public.

 

Carter, the official said, serves this purpose, because the impression that things could move much faster if only another channel of communications were tapped is exactly the message Hamas wanted the Israeli public to hear.

 

The official said it was clear that Hamas was using Carter for its purposes, and that Mashaal, who knew far in advance that Carter was coming to Damascus to meet him, could very well have had a letter to give the former president from Schalit. It's all about shaping Israeli public opinion, the official said.

 

The official said that Hamas also used Carter to give it legitimization.

 

The US and European Union position is that Hamas should not be engaged until it accepts three preconditions: recognizing Israel, disavowing terrorism and accepting previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements.

 

In comes Carter, the official said, and he meets Hamas without its having to pay any price, which is exactly what the organization wants to have happen with the rest of the world.

 

But, during his Jerusalem speech, Carter defended his actions.

 

"It was a small step forward to reassure Cpl. Schalit's parents that he is alive and well and will be writing them a letter soon," said Carter.

 

He also reported that Hamas would accept any deal negotiated by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, even one they disagreed with, as long as it was approved by the Palestinian people through a referendum.

 

"Let me underscore the significance of the statement. It means that Hamas will not undermine Abbas's efforts to negotiate the agreement," said Carter.

 

More to the point, if the Palestinian people, through a referendum, agreed to recognize Israel, then Hamas, in effect, would do so as well, he said.

 

But Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri in Gaza said Hamas's readiness to put a peace deal to a referendum "does not mean that Hamas is going to accept the result of the referendum."

 

Such a referendum, he said, would have to be voted on by Palestinians living all over the world. They number about 9.3 million, including some 4 million living in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem.

 

A spokesman for Carter said the former president had already left the country and had no response to the comment.

 

But during his speech, Carter acknowledged that he had failed in some respects during his talks with Hamas.

 

The group had rejected his suggestion for a 30-day unilateral cease-fire, he said.

 

"They met all day yesterday to consider this proposal. They finally decided that they were dependent on Egypt as an intermediary, and that progress which had been made already with Egypt should prevail. They couldn't terminate unilaterally, because they didn't trust Israel to follow up by lessening their attacks on Gaza and the West Bank," said Carter.

 

Separately, Carter said that Hamas wants to negotiate an agreement with Abbas to create a government of national consensus with a unified professional security force for the West Bank and Gaza. The cabinet would be composed of technocrats, until another election was held.

 

Hamas has also proposed that the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza be reopened with the help of EU monitors, as it was in the past, except that this time, Egypt, not Israel, would control it.

 

With respect to Syria, where Carter met with President Bashar al-Assad and senior officials, Carter said that Syria wants to conclude a peace agreement with Israel as soon as possible.

 

"I was impressed with their eagerness to complete an agreement on the Golan Heights. He [Assad] said that the only major difference in starting good faith talks was that Israel insisted that there be no public acknowledgement that the talks are going on, whereas Syria insisted that the talks being conducted would not be a secret."

 

Carter said that 85 percent of the differences had been resolved, including borders, water rights, security zones and the presence of international forces. He chastised the US for opposing talks between Syria and Israel.

 

Syria wants the US to play strong role, and "I hope that it will be done," said Carter.

 

He said that he asked the Syrians about the fate of Israeli soldier Guy Hever, who went missing in 1997, while in the area of the Golan Heights. There are those who believe he is being held by Syria.

 

Carter said the Syrians had no evidence of his whereabouts. They also said they knew nothing about the fate of kidnapped soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, both of whom were abducted by Hizbullah in July 2006.

 

AP contributed to this report.

 

This article can also be read at

Continued (Permanent Link)

Obama against meeting Hamas; criticizes Carter

 Last update - 23:38 16/04/2008       
Obama slams Carter for meeting Hamas, tries to reassure Jewish voters
By The Associated Press

 

PHILADELPHIA - U.S. Senator Barack Obama on Wednesday criticized former U.S. President Jimmy Carter for meeting with leaders of the Islamic terrorist group Hamas as he tried to reassure Jewish voters that his presidential candidacy is not a threat to them or U.S. support for Israel.

 

The Democratic presidential candidate's comments, made to a group of Jewish leaders in Philadelphia, were his first on Carter's controversial meeting scheduled this week in Egypt.

 

Republican presidential nominee-in-waiting John McCain called on Obama to repudiate Carter in a speech Monday.
 
Obama told the Jewish group he had a fundamental disagreement with Carter, who was rebuffed by Israeli leaders during a peace mission to the Middle East this week.

 

"We must not negotiate with a terrorist group intent on Israel's destruction," Obama said.

 

"We should only sit down with Hamas if they renounce terrorism, recognize Israel's right to exist, and abide by past agreements," he added.

 

Obama has been working to reassure Jewish voters nervous about his candidacy in the wake of publicity about anti-Israel sentiments expressed by his pastor, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

 

Obama's rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton, also criticized him during a February debate, saying he did not immediately rejected an endorsement from black Muslim leader Louis Farrakhan. Obama responded that he already denounced Farrakhan, but would reject his support as well.

 

Obama told the group that he had not been aware of Wright's more incendiary speeches before launching his presidential campaign last year, even though he had been a member of Wright's congregation for nearly 20 years. Obama said he had spoken to Wright and privately conveyed his concerns about some of his sermons once he learned of their content. But he acknowledged that he had declined to be more public in his criticism until recently, since Wright was preparing to retire from ministry at Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ.

 

"You make a decision about how are you going to handle it," Obama said. "Do you publicly denounce his comments? Do you privately express concern but recognize you are still part of a broader church community that is going to be transitioning? I chose the latter."

 

Obama has stepped up his outreach to the Jewish community in recent weeks after videos of Wright's speeches surfaced where he criticized Israel and expressed sympathy for the Palestinian cause.

 

Among other things, Wright has denounced Israel as racist and suggested tension between Israel and the Palestinians had contributed to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

 

Obama also met privately with about 100 Jewish leaders in Ohio before that state's primary March 4.

 

Obama has been the subject of persistent Internet rumors suggesting he is a Muslim who was educated at a Madrassah in Indonesia and took the oath of office with his hand on a Koran. Obama did spend part of his childhood in Indonesia but attended Catholic and public schools there. He took the oath of office on a Bible.

 

Obama delivered a well-received speech last month addressing the Wright controversy, in which he criticized many of his former pastor's views. But the issue has continued to dog him.

 

Obama told Jewish leader he would work as president to diminish tensions between the black and Jewish communities, noting that both groups shared the experience of suffering discrimination.

 

Obama also said at the meeting that he is willing to make diplomatic overtures to Iran even though it has funded Hamas and other militant groups.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Three Israeli soldiers killed in clashes near Gaza border

Last update - 15:34 16/04/2008    

 

 Three Israeli soldiers killed in clashes near Gaza border 

 

By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent 
 
Three Israel Defense Forces soldiers from the elite Givati Brigade were killed on Wednesday in an exchange of heavy gunfire with Palestinian militants next to the Gaza Strip security fence.

 

A preliminary IDF investigation suggests that an operational mishap occurred during the soldiers' raid, a senior officer in the Southern Command told Haaretz.

 

The officer said that the army was investigating why reinforcements were not sent to back up the Givati troops and whether the soldiers were sent on the correct path.

 

  
The IDF said that the clashes occurred near Kibbutz Be'eri, in the western Negev, as troops entered the Strip to arrest a band of suspicious looking figures.

 

The soldiers were killed after troops spotted two Hamas militants planting a bomb near the Israeli border. Troops pursued the militants, only to fall into an ambush by another Hamas force lying in wait, Israeli defense officials said.

 

Three other soldiers were wounded in the clashes, two of them moderately, and were taken to the Soroka Medical Center in Be'er Sheva for treatment.

 

The army named one of the slain soldiers as Corporal Matan Ovadati, 19, of Moshav Patish. The names of the other fatalities have not yet been released.

 

An IDF spokeswoman said soldiers had shot several Palestinian gunmen during the fighting, though there were no reports of injuries among the militants.

 

The six Israeli casualties were struck in the first few minutes of the clashes. Two were killed instantly, another was critically wounded, and the other four sustained various levels of injuries.

 

Palestinian medical workers and Hamas reported that IDF troops killed four Hamas gunmen in a separate battle in Gaza near a terminal used to supply fuel to the coastal territory.

 

Hamas said soldiers, backed by helicopters, killed the four militants during fighting east of Gaza City, a few hundred metres from the Nahal Oz border terminal. The terminal was the site of a terrorist attack last week, in which two Israeli civilian workers were shot dead by Gaza gunmen.

 

An IDF spokeswoman said soldiers clashed with Palestinian gunmen in the area and identified hitting them. An Israel Air Force air craft also fired at a group of gunmen, the army said.

 

At least five Palestinians were injured in the clashes at several points in the Gaza Strip, Hamas and medics said.

 

Two Palestinian civilians were wounded when their house was hit by a tank
shell, medics said. The army did not immediately comment on that incidents.

 

In one of the areas east of Gaza City, IDF armored vehicles hit and damaged a mosque, local residents said. Orange and olive trees were also
uprooted, the witnesses said. The IDF did not immediately comment on the damage to the mosque and trees.

 

Throughout the fighting, militants fired 10 Qassam rockets and a number of mortar shells at the western Negev on Wednesday morning. There was no word of casualties in any of the incidents.

 

Hamas claimed responsibility for both the Qassam fire as well as the slaying of the IDF soldiers.

 

Meanwhile, an IDF soldier was moderately wounded late Tuesday when shot by a Palestinian sniper in the central Gaza Strip.

 

Earlier Tuesday evening, the Israel Air Force attacked two Palestinian militants as they rode a motorcycle through the northern Gaza Strip, killing one and wounding the other, Hamas police officials said.

 

They identified the casualties from the missile attack in Jabalya refugee camp as members of Islamic Jihad, one of several Palestinian militant factions.

 

The dead man was named as Mohammed Ghausain, Islamic Jihad's commander in northern Gaza. He was hit while riding his motorcycle in the Jabalya refugee camp, Palestinians said.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Rice: "Hamas is the main impediment to peace"

Good Ole Jimmy Carter is going to visit with Hamas, to learn more about the evil Zionists for his next book. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice notes:

"I find it hard to understand what is going to be gained by having discussions with Hamas about peace when Hamas is, in fact, the impediment to peace," Rice said at a press event with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

The same question, "What is to be gained by having discussions with Hamas?" should be directed at those Israelis who favor talking to Hamas.

Ami Isseroff

---

Last update - 13:09 12/04/2008
Rice criticizes Carter over planned meeting with Meshal
By Haaretz Service and News Agencies

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice criticized former President Jimmy Carter on Friday for his reported plans to meet Hamas' political leader Khaled Meshal during a visit to Syria.

Carter has not confirmed the plans to meet Meshal but the Palestinian militant group has said the former Democratic president sent an envoy to Damascus, where the Hamas leader resides, requesting a meeting with the militant group's officials.

"I find it hard to understand what is going to be gained by having discussions with Hamas about peace when Hamas is, in fact, the impediment to peace," Rice said at a press event with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

Rice was responding to a question about Carter's plans but did not mention him by name.

"Hamas is a terrorist organization," she said, repeating the Bush administration's explanation for why it will not meet with members of the group.

The State Department says it twice advised Carter against meeting any representative of Hamas. A Carter-Mashal meeting would be the first public contact in two years between a prominent American figure and Hamas officials.

A press release from the Carter Center said the former president was to lead a study mission to Israel, the West Bank, Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Jordan as part of his ongoing effort to support peace, democracy and human rights in the region.

Carter was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for his decades of work in mediating conflicts and his humanitarian travels for the Carter Center since he was in office. One of his mediations was the 1978 Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel, for which Egypt's Anwar Sadat and Israel's Menachem Begin were awarded the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize.

Earlier Friday, Rice said the U.S. will consider fresh incentives and sanctions to persuade Iran to rein in its nuclear program but major changes in either are unlikely now.

"We will always continue to consider refreshing both tracks but this is not the time, I think, to expect major changes,"

Rice told reporters. "We have just passed a (UN) Security Council resolution (imposing additional sanctions) and we will see how Iran responds."

Report: Secret Iranian missile site revealed in new spy photos
A series of recently released spy photos have uncovered the secret location where Iran has allegedly been developing long-range ballistic missiles capable of striking Europe, The Times reported on Friday.

The satellite pictures pinpoint the facility where Iran launched its Kavoshgar 1 "research" rocket in February, according to the report. Iran has claimed that rocket was tested as part of its space program.

Analysis of the Digital Globe QuickBird satellite taken just days after the launch show details indicating that the site of the research rocket is the same location where Iran is preparing a ballistic missile with a range of 6,000 kilometers, the report said.

The site is located about 230 kilometers southeast of Tehran. The connection between the research rocket and Iran's long-range program was exposed by Jane's Intelligence Review following an analysis of the photos by a former Iraqi weapons inspector, said The Times.

Analysis of the photos suggest that Iran is pursuing a space program similar to that being developed in North Korea, with a focus on long-range missile technology, according to the report.

An analyst at the Institute of Technology, Geoffrey Forden, said that a structure on the Iranian site - roughly 40 meters in length - closely resembled a Taepodong long-range missile assembly facility in North Korea, The Times reported.

The editor of Janes's Proliferation has said that based on examination of the Iranian site, Tehran may be just five years away from developing the long-range missile, according to the report.

Source

Continued (Permanent Link)

Khaled Mesh'al orders Hamas to deny role in Jerusalem terror attack

Mash'al To Hamas: Don't Take Responsibility For Jerusalem Seminary Attack

A senior Palestinian official close to Hamas said that Hamas political bureau head Khaled Mash'al had ordered the movements' leaders not to take responsibility for last week's Jerusalem seminary attack for fear of a harsh response by Israel.

Mash'al also ordered Hamas leaders to take maximum cautionary measures so as not to permit a retaliatory attack by Israel.

Source: Al-Jarida, Kuwait, March 10, 2008

Posted at: 2008-03-10

 

Continued (Permanent Link)

To the people of Sderot and Ashkelon: Grim Restraint and Fierce determination

In these days, it is important to remember: Arab terror attacks are not new, and casualties are not new. We have seen much worse times in this country. This personal account of the Ben Yehuda Street Bombing of1948 reminds us of the essentials. In the bombing, over fifty people were buried in the wreckage and destruction wreaked by Arab terror.

The letter was not written by a spinmaster, a blowhard politico or a Zionist "Hasbara" master. It was written by an American young lady, a student in Jerusalem in 1948, who had joined the Haganah. She arrived on the scene of the bombing and set up a first aid station.

Zipporah Porath wrote:

I am becoming like the Jews who live here: every shock and sorrow nurtures you to grim restraint and fierce dedication.

That is something to think about for the frenzied op-ed writers, who tell us every day that the sky is falling. A 60 year old lesson in being an Israeli, 101, from a young student and new immigrant. This is what we do when the sky really does fall!

Ami Isseroff

Continued (Permanent Link)

Qassam rockets kill Israeli civilian; IDF kills Hamas terrorists

Qassam rockets kill, again. See Qassam rockets kill for background.

 

Israeli killed in massive Qassam barrage on Negev

By News Agencies

At least one person was killed, several were wounded and many were treated for shock Wednesday as least 30 Qassam rockets slammed into the western Negev town of Sderot and surrounding communities.

The 30-year-old student killed in the strike was apparently in a car, parked next to Sapir College on the outskirts of Sderot, which was hit by a Qassam. He suffered lethal shrapnel wounds to the chest.

The rocket barrage occurred hours after an Israel Air Force strike killed five Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip who were apparently planning a large scale terrorist attack against Israel after having been trained in Iran. The Shin Bet security service ventured a guess that the severity of the rocket attack against Israel Wednesday afternoon reflected the central role the dead Hamas men had played in the organization.

 

Palestinian officials said two more people, including a civilian, were killed in a second IAF airstrike carried out immediately after the Qassam attack against Sderot.

One of the Qassam rockets directly hit a home in Sderot, while another exploded in a factory mess hall shortly after the workers had exited.

Several people suffered shrapnel wounds in the attack, and seven people suffering light injuries and shock were evacuated to Barzilai Hospital in Ashkelon.

Later, a Qassam rocket exploded near the Ashkelon hospital and several more people suffered from shock. Four rockets struck various sites in Ashkelon.

Hamas' military wing claimed responsiblity for firing the Qassams.

Israel frequently carries out airstrikes and brief ground incursions in Gaza to halt the rocket attacks, and it appeared likely that the deadly rocket barrage would draw a new Israeli reprisal.

Earlier Wednesday, at least six Palestinian militants, most from the extremist Hamas movement, were killed in operations by the Israel Defense Forces in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

In southern Gaza, an Israel Air Force air strike destroyed a minivan carrying Hamas members, killing five. Hamas said that the dead included a senior engineer involved in the production of the Qassam rockets fired at southern Israel from Gaza on a daily basis, as well the commander of a local rocket-launching squad.

Two other Hamas members were wounded in the airstrike, according to Hamas and Dr. Moaiya Hassanain of the Gaza Health Ministry.

Minutes after the first explosion, an IAF missile struck another car nearby. Witnesses said the militants in the car had abandoned the vehicle for the white minivan shortly before the strike. There were no casualties in the second attack.

The IDF confirmed the strikes, which it said targeted vehicles transporting militants. Israel is targeting Palestinians responsible for the daily Qassam barrages.

Local residents who knew the men said some of them had undergone training in Syria or Iran and returned home after Hamas breached the Gaza Strip's border with Egypt in defiance of an Israeli blockade of the territory of 1.5 million people.

Abu Ubaida, spokesman of Hamas's Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, denied they had traveled outside the Gaza Strip.

Also Wednesday, IDF elite troops operating in the center of the West Bank city of Nablus killed one Palestinian and wounded three others.

The IDF said that the commando patrol spotted a group of five men, one carrying a pistol. The group fled after they were asked to stop by the troops, who then opened fire. Four of the men were wounded, including the man who later died in an Israeli hospital. Another of the group was said to be in critical condition.

In the early hours of Wednesday, a gunman from Islamic Jihad was killed during clashes with IDF troops in central Gaza, the militant organization said. The man's body was taken to hospital in Gaza on Wednesday morning.

The IDF said a militant approached the Gaza-Israel border fence late Tuesday and that soldiers had seen an explosion, likely caused by explosives the militant was carrying.

Continued (Permanent Link)

You don't say: Open Gaza border is not good for Israel

Well OK, we knew this was bad news...

Jerusalem Issue Brief

Institute for Contemporary Affairs

founded jointly with the Wechsler Family Foundation


Vol. 7, No. 30 5 February 2008


Strategic Implications for Israel of the Gaza-Egypt Border Opening

Maj.-Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror and Dan Diker

Some had hoped that pressuring Hamas in Gaza via sanctions, while helping to create a stable and prosperous Palestinian society in the West Bank under Mahmoud Abbas, would trigger support for Abbas' leadership in Gaza. However, Hamas, via Gaza's new-found access to Egyptian materials, goods, and services, can now ease Gaza's depressed condition and diminish the differences between Gaza and the more prosperous West Bank.
For the first time in the history of the modern Middle East, Hamas - the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood and the ideological cousin of al-Qaeda - has gained full control over contiguous territory and population, and has now effectively become a state government without real opponents.
In sharp contrast to Fatah's yet unfulfilled promises, the Palestinian public sees Hamas' dramatic opening of the Gaza-Egypt border as the latest in a series of successful actions. Others include Hamas' surprise January 2006 electoral victory over Fatah, its kidnapping of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, the sustained rocketing of southern Israel, and Hamas' expulsion of Fatah forces from Gaza and the establishment of its control over the government there in June 2007.
Terrorist operatives and groups such as al-Qaeda, that have already used Egyptian Sinai as a rear base, can now reach Gaza without interference. Gaza has transformed from its prior status as part of the Palestinian Authority to its new role as a mini-state that is now an integral part of the Arab world. Hamas will now be able to obtain weapons, ammunition, explosives, and training more freely via Egyptian Sinai. Since the border opening, weapons have flowed unimpeded into Gaza, enabling the transfer of higher-grade weapons such as anti-aircraft missiles.
Al-Qaeda operatives already infiltrated the Gaza Strip from Egypt, Sudan, and Yemen back in 2006. After the breach of the Egyptian-Gaza border, many Palestinians trained in Syria and Iran easily returned to Gaza. With the open flow of Palestinians into Sinai, there are also increased prospects for attacks against Israeli targets by terrorists infiltrating across Israel's long border with Sinai. If Egypt is forced to take responsibility for Gaza, Israel will have to more carefully weigh its military responses to Hamas terror actions originating from the Strip.

The Recognized Government of the State of Gaza
Hamas' breaching of the 12-kilometer security fence separating Gaza from Egyptian Sinai on January 23, 2008, with the acquiescence of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, has triggered major shifts in the triangular relationship between Israel, Gaza, and Egypt.

Hamas' opening of Gaza's southern border to Egypt was a well-planned strategic move that has effectively knighted Hamas as the recognized government of a new state of Gaza. Previously, the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and some Israelis had hoped that pressuring Hamas in Gaza via sanctions, while helping to create a stable and prosperous Palestinian society in the West Bank under Fatah leader and PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, would trigger support for Abbas' leadership in Gaza.

However, recent events in Gaza have buried this possibility for the foreseeable future. Hamas, via Gaza's new-found access to Egyptian materials, goods, and services, can now ease Gaza's depressed economic condition, and thereby diminish the differences between Gaza and the more prosperous West Bank. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians flooded the northeastern corner of the Sinai Peninsula after January 23, spending approximately $130 million in local Egyptian markets.1

The opening of the state of Gaza to Egypt reinforces Hamas control that no external pressure will be able to reverse at this juncture. The prospects of Mahmoud Abbas regaining control in Gaza are remote at best. Despite reports of an agreement with Egypt to include Abbas' Palestinian Presidential Guard at Gaza's Rafah border crossing, Hamas will not give up its achievement and allow forces loyal to Abbas to control the border, despite Egypt's preference for such an arrangement.2

The radical Hamas government, which is financed, trained, and armed by Iran, has proven itself as an effective military and political force. Hamas has upgraded its strategic posture by opening its southern border and forcing its Egyptian neighbor to allow free and largely unimpeded access for nearly two weeks for hundreds of thousands of Gazans who crossed Egypt's sovereign borders and returned to Gaza at will. Hamas' success in forcing Egypt to negotiate over the crisis has established Hamas' upgraded status.3 Hamas has agreed to cooperate with Egypt to close the breached border. However, the gesture is temporary and must also be considered in the context of stated intention to disengage completely from Israel, abandon the Israeli shekel and adopt an Arab currency, and seek fuel, utilities, trade, and a new open border regime with Egypt.4


A Territory Under Islamist Control
This crisis may also be seen in a much broader and far-reaching political and ideological context. For the first time in the history of the modern Middle East (other than the limited case of Hassan Turabi's Sudan5), Hamas - the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood and the ideological precursor to al-Qaeda6 - has gained full control over contiguous territory and population, and has now effectively become a state government without real opponents or internal challenges for power.

Gaza's new open border with Egypt represents the fulfillment of a long-held dream by the Muslim Brotherhood across the region, and suggests far-reaching ramifications for neighboring Arab countries including Jordan, Syria, and Egypt. In fact, on January 27, 2008, a senior Muslim Brotherhood delegation from the Egyptian parliament paid an official visit to Hamas' government compound in Gaza.7A senior Hamas delegation headed by its political leader, Khaled Mashal, has also been invited to Saudi Arabia to discuss "developments" since the border was opened.8


The Sunset of Fatah
In the Palestinian-Israeli context, Hamas' success enhances its political power among Palestinians and further weakens Mahmoud Abbas' image as the leader of the Palestinian people. While Abbas is eager to return Fatah control to Gaza, recent events have ratcheted up Hamas' control.

In sharp contrast to Fatah's failed and corrupt government, the Palestinian public sees Hamas' dramatic opening of the Gaza-Egypt border as the latest in a series of successful actions. Others include Hamas' surprise January 2006 electoral victory over Fatah, its kidnapping of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, the sustained rocketing of southern Israel, and Hamas' expulsion of Fatah forces from Gaza and the establishment of its control over the government there in June 2007. Hamas' border breach has also been a signal to Egypt of the Gaza government's strength.9

The events in Gaza may signal an historic change: the end of Fatah as the ruling political power in Palestinian society. Fatah's continued control in Palestinian areas of the West Bank today is the direct result of the Israel Defense Forces' control of the territory. Only the continuing IDF operations in the West Bank have prevented Hamas from staging a takeover similar to its military coup against Fatah in Gaza in 2007.


An Enemy State with an Open Door
Another strategic shift is reflected in Gaza's new status as an enemy state entity with open borders. Gaza has transformed from its prior status as part of the Palestinian Authority to its new role as a mini-state that is now an integral part of the Arab world. Hamas will now be able to more freely obtain weapons, ammunition, explosives, and training via Egyptian Sinai. Since the border opening, advanced weapons have flowed unimpeded into Gaza across the Egyptian border, enabling the transfer of higher-grade weapons than can be smuggled via underground tunnels.

The Israel Security Agency has confirmed that Hamas smuggled large amounts of long-range rockets, anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles into Gaza since the border was breached.10 This new weaponry will enable the continued upgrade of Hamas' highly disciplined army that is largely financed and trained by Iran and is modeled after the Iranian-backed Hizbullah in Lebanon.

Terrorist operatives and groups such as al-Qaeda, that have already used Egyptian Sinai as a rear base, are now able to reach Gaza more easily. Several al-Qaeda-affiliated operatives, some of whom infiltrated from Egypt, Sudan, and Yemen, have been active in Gaza since 2006. Over time, al-Qaeda-affiliated organizations have also emerged in Gaza, including Jaish al-Islam (Army of Islam) that was responsible for the kidnapping of BBC journalist Alan Johnston. Other groups were also formed like Jaish al-Umma (Army of the Nation), Al-Qaeda in Palestine, and Mujahidin Beit al-Makdes (Holy Warriors of Jerusalem), which attacked the American International School in Gaza in January 2008.11

Global jihadi leaders, such as Abu Abd al-Rahman al-Ansari of the Lebanese-based Fatah al-Islam, called for jihadi fighters around the world to exploit the breached Rafah crossing and enter Gaza.12 With the open flow of Palestinians into Sinai, there are also increased prospects for attacks against Israeli targets by terrorists infiltrating across Israel's long border with Sinai.

It must be understood that Hamas is no longer merely a well-trained guerilla terror force. Rather, Hamas must be confronted as a state army that uses guerilla tactics and terrorism while, simultaneously, it prepares for all-out war against Israel. With each passing day that Israel does not mobilize for a major ground operation in Gaza, it will be more difficult for the IDF to enter Gaza and destroy Hamas, whose growing Katyusha rocket arsenal has already reached Ashkelon and can strike major Israeli urban centers 20 kilometers north of Gaza, like Kiryat Gat and Ashdod.

At the same time, Hamas and other terror groups continue to fire shorter-range Kassam rockets at Sderot and other Israeli localities. Since January 1, 2008, alone, more than 420 rockets have been fired into southern Israel from Gaza.13


Completing Israel's Disengagement from Gaza

Following the opening of the Gaza-Sinai border, Israel can now complete the disengagement it undertook in September 2005 and seal its border with Gaza, prohibiting the entry or exit of persons and commercial goods, or, as has occurred recently, explosives disguised as commercial materials.14

Israel and Egypt had negotiated the administration of Gaza in the framework of the 1978 Camp David Accords. However, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat refused to take responsibility for the Strip. Instead, Sadat insisted only on establishing an Egyptian liaison office in Gaza. However, Prime Minister Menachem Begin rejected the Egyptian demand.15

Today, however, a newly-sealed Israel-Gaza border would force Egypt into the role of state custodian for the Gaza Strip. The opening of the Egypt-Gaza border has demonstrated that Egypt can play a key role as a supplier of goods and services to Gazans. Egypt can also supply utilities such as gas, electricity, and water, and raw materials such as cement.

Egypt sees itself as the Arab world's leading power, and will not stand idly by and allow Palestinians in Gaza to suffer shortages if Israel closes its border with Gaza. Egypt's humanitarian role has been the basis of Mubarak's justification for allowing the border to remain open and it is unlikely that Egypt will suddenly reverse this policy in the future.

While certain benefits may accrue to Israel as a result of a shift in Egypt-Gaza relations, there are also possible dangers for Israel-Egypt relations, which are a vital strategic asset for both Jerusalem and Cairo. If Egypt is forced to take responsibility for Gaza, Israel will have to more carefully weigh its military responses to Hamas terror actions originating from the Strip. Israel's strategic flexibility could be reduced due to any direct Egyptian role in Gaza. Israel may benefit if it is no longer the responsible party for the welfare of Gaza's citizens. But at the same time, Israel loses its ability to monitor what enters and exits over Gaza's border with Egypt.




The Iranian Role

The Iranian role is another troubling aspect of the new situation in Gaza. Iran's direct and robust backing of its Hamas proxy, via Khaled Mashal and the Damascus-based Hamas leadership, has essentially created a reinforced Gaza base to export Iranian terror and expand Iranian political control in the region. It is no small irony that now, Egyptian-assisted Gaza has become a second Iranian gateway to the Arab world, in addition to Syria, from which to subvert and assert control over Arab countries and territories, as part of Iran's grand strategy to achieve regional hegemony under a nuclear umbrella.


* * *
Notes


1. Ehud Yaari, "Egypt Working to Contain Gaza," Policy Watch #1337, Washington Institute for Near East Policy, February 1, 2008.
2. "Egypt Agrees to Abbas Control over Gaza Border, Palestinian Officials Say," Ynet News, January 27, 2008.
3. Khaled Abu Toameh, "Cairo Invites Hamas Representatives for Talks on Rafah Border Situation, Jerusalem Post, January 28, 2008.
4. "Egypt to Close Rafah Sunday; Hamas Says It Will Cooperate," Jerusalem Post, February 2, 2008. Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniya was quoted as saying, "We have said from the days of our election campaign that we want to move toward economic disengagement from the Israeli occupation. Egypt has a greater ability to meet the needs of Gaza." Haniya's senior advisor, Ahmad Youssef, added that "Hamas has already generated plans and proposals to unite economically with Egypt instead of Israel." According to Hamas, Egypt can serve as "Gaza's gateway" to the Arab and Muslim world and as its in-depth strategic partner. Roee Nahmias, "Hamas Considering Economic Disengagement from Israel," YNET News, February 2, 2008,

5. Lt.-Col. (res.) Jonathan Dahoah-Halevi, "The Muslim Brotherhood: A Moderate Islamic Alternative to al-Qaeda or a Partner in Global Jihad?" Jerusalem Viewpoints #558, Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, November 1, 2007. "The links between the Muslim Brotherhood and global terrorism were also made evident by the reception Hassan al-Turabi, a high-ranking Muslim Brother and at that time one of the heads of Sudan, provided for al-Qaeda in the early 1990s. In 1991, accepting al-Turabi's personal invitation, Osama bin Laden moved from Saudi Arabia to Sudan and established a terrorist network there. In addition, al-Turabi founded the Popular Arab and Islamic Conference, some of whose members were the PLO, Hamas, Hizbullah, al-Qaeda, and the Egyptian Jihad. The Conference met in April 1991, December 1993, and March 1995. In August 1993, in the wake of the attack on the World Tra de Center, the United States included Sudan in its designated list of terrorism-sponsoring states." -Qaeda_or_a_Partner_in_Global_Jihad?
6. Dore Gold, "Ties between al-Qaeda and Hamas in Mideast Are Long and Frequent," San Francisco Chronicle, March 5, 2006,
7. Israeli Channel Two television news, January 27, 2008.
8. Avi Issacharoff and Barak Ravid, "Officials: Israel Won't Let Gaza Border Breach Threaten Security," Ha'aretz, January 28, 2008.
9. Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, January 29, 2008,
10. See terrorism Center brief here. See also "Diskin: Gaza Breach Allowed Influx of Advanced Armament," Jerusalem Post, February 3, 2008.
11. Lt.-Col. (res.) Jonathan Dahoah-Halevi, "The Growing Hamas/Al-Qaeda Connection, Jerusalem Issue Brief, v. 7, no. 1, Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, May 17, 2007. See also "Leaflets of Al-Qaeda-Affiliate Found in Looted American School in Gaza," Ha'aretz, January 15, 2008.
12. See here
13. "Gaza: Why and What to Do About It," Jewish Institute for National Security Studies, Report #740, January 24, 2008.
14. An IDF force checking a truck carrying humanitarian aid (flour, sugar, etc.) about to go through the Kerem Shalom crossing into the Gaza Strip found two tons of dual-purpose fertilizer, also used in the manufacture of explosives for rockets and bombs. It was not the first time that the terrorist organizations had tried to smuggle explosives into the Gaza Strip by disguising them as humanitarian aid. See "News of the Israeli-Palestinian Confrontation," January 9-15, 2008, Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center,
15. According to Dr. Meir Rosenne, former Israeli Ambassador to the United States, who was part of the Israeli negotiating team at the 1978 Camp David Accords, in a phone interview, February 4, 2008.
* * *

Maj.-Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror, Chairman of the Institute for Contemporary Affairs, is former commander of the IDF's National Defense College and the IDF Staff and Command College. He is also former head of the IDF's Research and Assessment Division, with special responsibility for preparing the National Intelligence Assessment. Dan Diker is Director of the Institute for Contemporary Affairs and foreign policy analyst of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.



This Jerusalem Issue Brief is available online at:

http://www.jcpa.org



Dore Gold, Publisher; Yaacov Amidror, ICA Chairman; Dan Diker, ICA Director; Mark Ami-El, Managing Editor. Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (Registered Amuta), 13 Tel-Hai St., Jerusalem, Israel; Tel. 972-2-561-9281, Fax. 972-2-561-9112, Email: jcpa@netvision.net.il. In U.S.A.: Center for Jewish Community Studies, 5800 Park Heights Ave., Baltimore, MD 21215; Tel. 410-664-5222; Fax 410-664-1228. Website: www.jcpa.org. © Copyright. The opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of the Board of Fellows of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.



The Institute for Contemporary Affairs (ICA) is dedicated

to providing a forum for Israeli policy discussion and debate.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Real reason for "breaking the siege" in Gaza?

Hamas worked for months to break open the Rafah border. Are we sure they did it for humanitarian reasons?

Egypt arrests 12 Hamas planning Sinai attack

Published: 02/01/2008
Egyptian authorities arrested 12 Hamas terrorists planning an attack on Israelis in the Sinai Desert.

Israeli reports quoted Egyptian media as saying on Friday that the men, from two separate terrorist cells, were arrested with weapons and explosives near Egypt's breached border with the Gaza Strip.

They were planning attacks on Israelis who flock to the Sinai's Red Sea shore.

Hamas gunmen blew open the border last week to allow Palestinians in the blockaded Gaza Strip to leave. Israel has blockaded Gaza in a bid to stop rocket attacks on Israel's south.

Soon after the breach, Israel issued its citizens a travel warning advising against Sinai travel.

Source

Continued (Permanent Link)

Flour power claim: Each Palestinian eats half a ton of flour each day

No wonder those Palestinians were so anxious to buy flour in Egypt. It seems each and every Palestinian in Gaza consumes half a ton of flour every day!! At least, that is what the Boston Globe claims. Martin Kramer points this out. Apparently, their various activities result in a need to consume huge quantities of carbohydrates.

See also: Amazing fact about Gazans

Sahten!!

Ami Isseroff

Gaza buried in flour

posted Monday, 28 January 2008

The Boston Globe has just run an op-ed under the headline "Ending the Stranglehold on Gaza." The authors are Eyad al-Sarraj, identified as founder of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program, and Sara Roy, identified as senior research scholar at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. The bias of the op-ed speaks for itself, and I won't even dwell on it. But I do want to call attention to this sentence:

Although Gaza daily requires 680,000 tons of flour to feed its population, Israel had cut this to 90 tons per day by November 2007, a reduction of 99 percent.

You don't need to be a math genius to figure out that if Gaza has a population of 1.5 million, as the authors also note, then 680,000 tons of flour a day come out to almost half a ton of flour per Gazan, per day.

A typographical error at the Boston Globe? Hardly. The two authors used the same "statistic" in an earlier piece. They copied it from an article published in the Ahram Weekly last November, which reported that "the price of a bag of flour has risen 80 per cent, because of the 680,000 tonnes the Gaza Strip needs daily, only 90 tonnes are permitted to enter." Sarraj and Roy added the bit about this being "a reduction of 99 percent."

Note how an absurd and impossible "statistic" has made its way up the media feeding chain. It begins in an Egyptian newspaper, is cycled through a Palestinian activist, is submitted under the shared byline of a Harvard "research scholar," and finally appears in the Boston Globe, whose editors apparently can't do basic math. Now, in a viral contagion, this spreads across the Internet, where that "reduction of 99 percent" becomes a well-attested fact.

What's the truth? I see from a 2007 UN document that Gaza consumes 450 tons of flour daily. The Palestinian Ministry of Economy, according to another source, puts daily consumption at 350 tons. So the figure for total consumption retailed by Sarraj and Roy is off by more than three orders of magnitude, i.e. a factor of 1,000. No doubt, there's less flour shipped from Israel into Gaza--maybe it's those rocket barrages from Gaza into Israel?--but even if it's only the 90 tons claimed by Sarraj and Roy, it isn't anything near a "reduction of 99 percent." Unfortunately, if readers are going to remember one dramatic "statistic" from this op-ed, this one is it--and it's a lie.

Sarraj is a psychiatrist, but his co-author, Sara Roy, bills herself in her bio as a "political economist." Her research, the bio reports, is "primarily on the economic, social and political development of the Gaza Strip." You would think someone with this claim to expertise would know better than to copy some impossible pseudo-statistic on the consumption of the most basic foodstuff in Gaza. Indeed, in a piece she wrote a decade ago, she herself put Gaza's daily consumption of flour at 275 tons. Did she even read her own op-ed before she sent it off to Boston's leading paper? If she did, what we have here is a textbook example of the difference between a "political economist" and an economist.

Continued (Permanent Link)

BESA: The Middle East Axis of Destabilization

BESA: The Mideast Axis of Destabilization

Ely Karmon

Perspectives Paper No. 36, December 26, 2007

"[T]he only vital and effective axis in the region is that between Tehran and Damascus. They are the two capitals which enjoy a degree of strength and a measure of independence that allows them to remain unaffected by direct political pressure." Hizballah Voice of the Oppressed (radio station), 27 April 1991.

The "Axis of Destabilization" in the Middle East

The Iran-Syria-Hizballah-Hamas alliance has acted during the last 15 years as an "axis of destabilization" in the Middle East, achieving major strategic victories at the expense of moderate Arab states, and US, European, and Israeli interests.

The Damascus regime, weakened by the withdrawal of its army from Lebanon and international pressure after the assassination of Rafik Hariri, still maintains a firm grip on the Sunni majority population at home, plays a strong hand in Lebanon, and supports radical Palestinian groups.

With Syrian support, Hizballah (Tehran's closest ally) has become a state-within-a-state potentially able to become Lebanon's arbiter if not actual ruler. Syria is actively involved in the destabilization of the Palestinian arena and has a growing role in supporting the Shi'a anti-American forces in Iraq. Iran also flexes its muscle in the Iraq arena, as most of Iraq's territory and major oil resources are controlled by Shi'a movements with historic and ideological links to the Tehran regime.

The "Axis" significantly influences Israel's relations with its neighbors. The inconclusive results of the Second Lebanon War of July-August 2006 and the continuous bombing of Israeli cities and villages from Gaza have diminished Israel's deterrence versus Hizballah, Hamas, Iran and Syria. Similarly, the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians, despite the Annapolis gathering, is essentially paralyzed. Hamas is in control of the Gaza Strip, threatens the Fatah-controlled West Bank, and is able to derail any negotiation in the peace process by terrorist attacks.

An Unnatural Alliance: What Makes it Work?

The alliance should hardly function due to Sunni-Shi'a historical rivalries:

1. Iran's Shi'a theocratic regime allied with Syria's Baathist secular "socialist" regime, a country where some 80 percent of the population is Sunni.
2. Syria's Baathist secular regime cooperated with a Shi'a radical Islamist movement, Hizballah, while the natural ally of Syria in Lebanon is the Shi'a Amal secular organization.
3. The Palestinian Hamas, a branch of the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood (MB) is allied with Iran's Shi'a theocratic regime.
4. The Palestinian Hamas is allied with Syria's Baathist secular regime, which killed some 20,000 Syrian MB members in 1982.
5. The Sunni Palestinian Hamas cooperated with the Shi'a Hizballah (in the Palestinian Authority and in Lebanon, where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians live) while in Iraq the Sunni and Shi'a radicals fight each other ferociously.

This alliance works because of the strong religious ideologies that shape the strategy of three of the actors: Iran, Hizballah and Hamas. The Tehran regime, based on the revolutionary doctrine of Ayatollah Khomeini, has implemented its creed through an aggressive strategy after silencing all internal dissent. The apocalyptical overtone of Mahdism in its leadership circles makes this ideology even more dangerous. Hizballah, as proven by its covenant and the open declarations and deeds of its leaders, closely follows the religious ideology and the strategy of export of the Khomeini revolution. Hamas, as a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, the oldest Sunni Islamist movement, sees jihad as a general duty of all Muslims and is the only MB group involved in systematic warfare against Israel and "world Zionism." Different from the other three, Syria is still driven by Pan-Arabism and the concept of Greater Syria.

The alliance has a strong determined leader: Iran. The country serves as the conductor of the "quartet." Iran, a major regional power, has a leadership with a regional hegemonic vision, a huge oil resource, a large army, and an advanced military industry. Most importantly, Iran is to acquire a nuclear arsenal.

The alliance has succeeded in obtaining most of its objectives because its members have no moral constraints in using terrorism and subversion against their adversaries, challenging the same major enemies: the United States as a global and regional power but also as epitome of Western liberal values; Europe as a democratic bloc; Israel; and Iraq until Saddam Hussein's removal from power. At the same time they have displayed tactical pragmatism and skills of manipulating leaders of great powers and heads of international organizations.

The US, Europe and Israel Didn't Challenge the Alliance

However, the victories of this alliance are not only the result of the robust and durable cooperation between its four members, but also in great measure the consequence of the US, European and Israeli leaderships' lack of strategic vision and political courage.

The United States and France (the major European country challenged by the axis) did not inflict any serious damage on Iran and its operational arm Hizballah, for the long series of terrorist attacks against their citizens, soldiers and interests. Nor has Syria paid a real price for the direct and indirect support to Iranian and Hizballah anti-Western terrorism. Not only has Iran not suffered any consequences for 20 years of lying about its nuclear program, but the West is still willing to offer ever-greater incentives, strengthening Iran's leaders' sense of self-confidence that they can achieve nuclear military capability.

The West has forced Bashar al-Asad to withdraw the Syrian army from Lebanon, but it has stopped short of endangering his regime at home or curtailing his influence in Lebanon. The continuous political killings there are designed to intimidate those working courageously to end Syria's interference in Lebanon's internal affairs.

Since 1982, Israel has permitted Syria to support Hizballah attacks and Palestinian proxy against its territory. Israeli leaders did not have the courage to challenge Damascus. Even during the July-August 2006 War, when Hamas leader Khaled Mashal was running the kidnapping of the Israeli soldier from Damascus and Syria continued to provide heavy military hardware and ammunition to Hizballah, the Israeli government sent the message that it had no intention to bother Syria.

By giving Hizballah the credit for the Israeli disgraceful withdrawal from southern Lebanon in 2000, by permitting its consolidation as a state-within-a-state and the building of a small modern guerrilla-army, the various Israeli governments have preferred tactical political gains at home to real strategic long-term interests. In the 2006 war in Lebanon, Israel paid a high price not only in human lives and material damage, but also in its regional standing and its deterrent power versus its enemies.

The Israeli leadership also failed to recognize the real long-term goals of Yasser Arafat when signing the Oslo agreements and did not challenge his double game, which led to the violent Second Intifada.

Moreover, the United States and the West permitted Hamas, a terrorist organization committed to the destruction of the Jewish state, to take over the government in the Palestinian Authority through democratic elections.

The Threat of a Nuclear Iran

The dangerous destabilizing effect of the Iran-Syria-Hizballah-Hamas alliance on the Middle East and beyond and the leadership role of the Tehran regime in this coalition place the prevention of the Iranian nuclear military program as first priority for the international community.

The US, the international community and Israel face a daunting challenge: how to prevent a nuclear Iran. After 20 years of futile diplomatic dialogue and a year of mild international sanctions, three options remain: severe economic sanctions, military operation against the Iranian nuclear facilities, or laissez faire tactics that allow the Iranians to achieve their goal and devise a deterrent strategy for the future.

As a global power, the Bush Administration needs to find a grand strategic compromise with Russia to display a common front against Iran and thus considerably enhance the success of the sanctions. Russia could have a crucial role in convincing the ayatollahs of the seriousness of their situation. Russia has redefined the limits of its nuclear cooperation with Iran: it has halted Russian work on the construction of the Bushehr nuclear reactor and is procrastinating in transferring the nuclear fuel required for its activation. However, in light of the growing tension between the US and Russia on important strategic issues, such as the building of the missile defense system in Poland and the radar station in the Czech Republic or the expansion of NATO into the old Eastern Bloc on Russia's western border, President Putin is less willing to cooperate on the Iranian file.

There is the possibility to isolate Tehran by breaking the alliance with Syria, which is key in isolating and disarming Hizballah and reducing the influence of radical Palestinians on the peace process with Israel. Israel cannot defeat Hizballah if it does not occupy most of Lebanon, which it is reluctant to do. Therefore, the best way to change the equation in Lebanon is to challenge Syria. The carrots the European leaders proposed President Bashar al-Asad have not convinced him to join the moderate Arab camp. These incentives should perhaps be improved, but the stick should be waved higher. Currently, there is no reasonable hope that negotiations or economic sanctions can turn Tehran's rulers away from the dream of great-power status and Islamic revolution.

Iran and the Alliances' Retaliation Capabilities

In the case of a US or Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear facilities, Iran and the alliance can retaliate in force. Iran could stage an immediate missile counterattack on Israel and on US bases in the Persian Gulf with its 500 Shihab ballistic missiles, with ranges varying from 300 to 2,000 kilometers and capable of carrying warheads of up to 1,000 kg.

Iran can also retaliate against energy targets in the Gulf and the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz. Ayatollah Khamenei warned the US that "if the Americans make a wrong move toward Iran, the shipment of energy will definitely be in danger, and the Americans will not be able to protect energy supplies in the region." Consequently, oil prices would increase dramatically.

One of the strongest cards against the United States is Iran's capacity for wreaking havoc in Iraq and provoking a confrontation between US troops and the Shi'a majority. Tehran has already activated this option; currently it is on a low burner. The regime is also preparing an army of suicide bombers to be sent to Iraq, on the model of the Basij suicide soldiers used in the Iraq-Iran war.

Hizballah will be the main tool to attack Israeli territory with rockets and guerrilla commandos. Iran and Syria have rearmed the organization and Nasrallah boasted that Hizballah has 20,000 rockets. Iran can target Israeli and Jewish targets abroad, as it did in 1992 and 1994 in Buenos Aires. As for the Palestinians, Khaled Mashal declared that "if Israel attacks Iran, then Hamas will widen and increase its confrontation of Israelis inside Palestine."

A US or Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear sites could enhance the appeal of extremism in the Muslim world, at the expense of the moderates. It would be perceived by Muslims worldwide as another assault on Islam, as was the case in Iraq and in Lebanon. The promised retaliation by Iran must be taken very seriously.

A Nuclear Iran?

There is also no doubt that a nuclear Iran would provoke nuclear proliferation throughout the Middle East, as already hinted at by Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey.

A recent collective study by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy investigating the challenges posed by deterring a nuclear Iran in the case diplomacy might not succeed suggests that deterring Iran might prove much more difficult than deterring Russia during the Cold War, because of the nature of the regime in Tehran, the regional security environment, and the challenges of coalition formation. Moreover, Iran's nuclear weapons could be controlled by some of the most radical elements in the regime and some of these weapons might find their way into the hands of terrorists.

A nuclear Iran will strengthen the radicalization/Islamization process. In Iraq, at least in Shi'a-controlled areas, the potential for radicalization/Islamization could quickly materialize and result in a more bloody sectarian war involving neighboring Sunni countries. This could be a major step in the formation of the dreaded Shi'a Crescent. In Lebanon, Hizballah would have an influence on accelerating a more radical population. The process of radicalization/Islamization in Palestine, which begun by the takeover of Gaza by Hamas, would also be accelerated, with immediate influence on the Muslim Brotherhood and other radical Islamist groups in Egypt and Jordan and even the Islamist movement in Israel.

A nuclear Iran, with Hizballah and Iraqi Shi'a radicals' support, could open a new front in the Gulf countries by inciting the Shi'as who live in the oil rich provinces in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, the UAE and Yemen, to revolt against their governments.

Similarly, a nuclear Tehran would be tempted to spread its revolutionary message towards the Muslim republics in Central Asia and in Turkey.

There is No Happy End in Sight!

President Bush said that the international community must keep pressuring Iran to give up its nuclear weapons program. To this end, the US is working with allies to send a consistent message to the Iranians. Bush has not ruled out the possible use of force against Iran, but believes it is still possible to resolve the dispute diplomatically. This is true even after the release of the recent US National Intelligence Estimate.

Israel's air raid on Syria on September 6, 2007 has broken the immunity of the Damascus regime without provoking a European or Arab outcry. Israel should decide on a more forceful Syrian strategy, based on the Turkish example of 1998 (and 2007), and seek US and European support for it. Israel's air raid also proved that if a country does act against a clear and present danger, the Muslim world will not erupt. Moreover, Iranian aspirations should be viewed in proper proportion. Iran is not an international superpower and it has its own domestic, economic and military vulnerabilities.

If the military option is the last resort, it is imperative to dissuade the Tehran regime from retaliation. Ex-French President Jacques Chirac gave the example when he said that France was prepared to launch a nuclear strike against any country that sponsors a terrorist attack against French interests. "The leaders of states who would use terrorist means against us, as well as those who would envision using . . . weapons of mass destruction, must understand that they would lay themselves open to a firm and fitting response on our part."

The US, the European Union and Israel have the duty to protect their citizens and interests, as well as those of their allies in the Middle East. They must stand firm against the "axis of destabilization" and the apocalyptic plans of the radicals in Tehran.

Dr. Ely Karmon is a Senior Research Scholar at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) in Herzliya, Israel, and a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Policy and Strategy at IDC. He lectures at the Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya and at the National Security Seminar of the Galilee College. This article is a summary of a monograph under the title "Iran - Syria - Hizballah - Hamas: A Coalition against Nature. Why does it Work?" forthcoming in the Proteus Monograph Series Fellows Program, US War Academy, Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

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Will Fatah and Hamas reunite?

Note- Fatah in Gaza is not necessarily controlled by Fatah in West Bank any more.

 

Ami Isseroff

 

Exclusive: 'Fatah, Hamas may join ranks'
Khaled Abu Toameh , THE JERUSALEM POST Nov. 29, 2007

Fatah will fight alongside Hamas if and when the IDF launches a military operation in the Gaza Strip, a senior Fatah official in Gaza City said Thursday.

"Fatah won't remain idle in the face of an Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip," the official said. "We will definitely fight together with Hamas against the Israeli army. It's our duty to defend our people against the occupiers."

The Fatah official said his faction would place political differences aside and form a joint front against Israel if the IDF enters the Gaza Strip. "The homeland is more important than all our differences," he said.

The statements came amid reports that some Arab countries were planning to resume mediation efforts between Fatah and Hamas to avoid further deterioration in the aftermath of the Annapolis peace conference.

According to the reports, Saudi Arabia and Egypt have decided to invite representatives of Fatah and Hamas for talks on ways of ending their power struggle.

A senior Palestinian official who visited Cairo this week said the Egyptians and Saudis have reached the conclusion that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas won't be able to move forward with the peace talks with Israel without solving his problems with Hamas.

The official said Abbas had given his blessing to Cairo and Riyadh to resume their efforts to end the crisis with Hamas.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak phoned Abbas Thursday and discussed with him the results of the Annapolis conference and the possibility of resuming negotiations between Fatah and Hamas. Abbas is currently on a visit to Tunisia, where he is expected to brief veteran PLO officials on the outcome of the conference.

Earlier this week, the Egyptian government gave permission to several pro-Palestinian organizations in Egypt to send truckloads of food and medicine to the Gaza Strip. The trucks are scheduled to arrive in the Gaza Strip on Friday through the Rafah border crossing, which remains closed to travelers.

Hamas, meanwhile, is bracing for a massive IDF operation to halt the firing of rockets from the Gaza Strip.

Sources in the Gaza Strip said Hamas's security forces have been placed on full alert and most of the movement's senior leaders have gone into hiding for fear of being targeted by Israel. In addition, Hamas has evacuated many of its security and civil institutions.

Hamas leaders on Thursday tried to establish a link between the Annapolis conference and a potential IDF attack on the Gaza Strip. They said the latest escalation, which claimed the lives of some 20 Hamas members over the past week, was directly linked to the conference.

Hamas spokesman Ismail Radwan said Israel was stepping up its military operations in the Gaza Strip to cover up for the "failure" of the Annapolis conference. He said the thousands of Palestinians who demonstrated against the conference over the past few days in the West Bank indicated that a majority of the public were opposed to Annapolis.

Hamas legislator Mushir al-Masri said the killing of six Hamas activists over the past 48 hours was one of the direct results of the Annapolis conference.

"The Annapolis conference has failed," he said. "This conference was nothing but an attempt to impose the American and Israeli agenda on the Palestinians. The conference also gave a green light to Israel to launch a big military operation in the Gaza Strip."

 

Source

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Hamas in the peace process

We can't say the Hamas isn't participating in the peace process, right?

 

Militants increase attempts to stab Hebron Border Police in run-up to summit

By Haaretz Staff and Channel 10 

 

Haaretz.com/Channel 10 daily feature for November 22, 2007.

 
Hebron Border Police have reported a sharp rise in incidents of attempted, and successful, stabbing attacks by Palestinians on its forces in the last two weeks.

 

The security establishment believes the increased number of terror bids in Hebron, a city holy to both Jews and Muslims, comes from a desire to foil next week's Middle East peace summit at Annapolis

 

Video here

Continued (Permanent Link)

Palestinian Christian 'activist' killed - by Palestinians

Headline:

 

Palestinian Christian activist found dead in Gaza City

An "activist" is generally someone who plants bombs in Middle East newsspeak, but this activist was director of the Teacher's Bookshop, Gaza's only Christian bookstore, which is run by the Bible Society of Gaza Baptist church. Health Ministry officials confirmed his death.

 

Ayyad had been missing since Saturday evening. Over the years he had received repeated death threats from unidentified people displeased with his missionary work. He was found stabbed to death in a street in Gaza City early Sunday.

 

The associated press article adds gratuitously and incorrectly, that Muslim-Christian relations have not deteriorated since the Hamas takeover in June. Apparently, this means that the Muslims burn churches and murder "activists," and the Christians smile and say "I can't complain."

 

Ami Isseroff 
 

Continued (Permanent Link)

Life in Gaza - a paradise for liberals and women

Those who support the Hamas as the "democratically elected" government of the Palestinians, will surely be glad to read how life is improving there, especially in the direction of discipline and modesty for women.

Gaza's deadly guardians

Marie Colvin (The Times [UK])

A radical Islamist state has emerged from the smoking ruins of Gaza, threatening a new war with nearby Israel. Marie Colvin ventures into the lair of the Hamas extremists imposing their hardline doctrine on Palestinians trapped there.

Hamas wants you to believe it has created a benevolent sanctuary where once chaos reigned. At the beginning of the journey into Gaza it's easy to believe that things are better.

There is no longer a Palestinian immigration desk after the long walk from the air-conditioned Erez terminal on the Israeli side, past concrete blast walls, and down a dusty track in the furnace heat.

But further down the road, Hamas gunmen have taken over the checkpoints. They are polite and well turned out in blue camouflage trousers, clean black T-shirts, shiny black boots.

Once hostile, they now smile at returning foreigners who fled after the kidnapping of Alan Johnston, the BBC reporter, and the savage bloodletting between the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) forces and Hamas in June that left the fundamentalist party in absolute power.

So does everyone else in Gaza. It's like hearing the first songbird of spring. The welcome starts in the taxi. "Gaza is safe now. We have security, praise be to God," says Munir, my driver for years, who always in the past shook his head and

moaned about how terrible everything was.

It's the same at the Al Deira hotel, mostly empty, where once aid workers, diplomats, journalists and sophisticated Gazans mixed on the terrace overlooking the Mediterranean. "Everything is safe now. You are welcome," says Amir at the front desk.

For the first time on a trip to Gaza, I was stopped going the wrong way down a one-way street, by one of the young Hamas volunteers in yellow vests now standing up to drivers in a culture that considers a red light to be a mere suggestion to slow down.

The rubbish still smells, but now it is piled neatly in the streets. Families stroll late at night. Gone is the gunfire that used to punctuate days and nights and often escalated into street battles that left innocents dead on the pavements.

Then you start talking to people - in private.

Young men show you bruised limbs and welts on their feet; every girl wears a hijab head covering and, for the first time, women wear niqab - Saudi-style face coverings that reveal only the eyes. And people whisper.

Welcome to Hamastan.

Ahmed Al-Naba'at, 24, sits in his courtyard in an oversized Barcelona shirt. He looks too young to be the father of the three young children who toddle barefoot round the tiny dirt courtyard.
His feet still hurt. Hamas came for him at 2am.

About 30 armed men, their faces masked but wearing the black uniforms and badges of the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigade, the military wing of Hamas, had surrounded the house. They covered his eyes and took him away in a car.

"They took me somewhere, I don't know, a room," Naba'at says. He has high cheekbones and the near-black skin of his Sudanese ancestry. "They were screaming and beating me, punching me, slapping me on the face," he says. "Then they tied my legs together and started falaka" - a traditional Arabic torture where the soles of the feet are beaten with sticks. "I relaxed."

He sees the surprise in my face. "I thought they were going to kill me," he explains.
"When I realised it's just falaka, I thought, okay, it's just torture."

Qassam dumped him near his home, hours later. It took him half an hour to walk what usually takes two minutes. "You were lucky," interjects his unsympathetic father, who is sitting against a courtyard wall. "Most of the people they beat, they throw them unconscious in the street and they are not found until the morning."

His crime? Earlier that night at a party for a friend's wedding, Naba'at had danced and played a song popular in Gaza - an over-romanticised ballad to Samih al-Madhoun, a Fatah commander executed by Hamas during the fighting. Hamas cameramen had filmed as Madhoun was dragged down the street amid spitting crowds, shot in the stomach, beaten and shot some more. It was shown on Hamas television that night.

The overblown ballad of his death - "Your blood is not for free Samih/You left behind an earthquake/We will not forget you Samih" - is such a Gazan hit that many young people have it on their mobile phones. Hamas, predictably, is furious. Three of Al-Naba'at's friends who had danced at the wedding were also beaten.

Al-Naba'at, who left school at 14 and worked as a farm labourer and painter, has little recourse. He is too afraid to sleep at home any more. His father is clearly exasperated - like many of the older generation, he thinks his sons should shut up. He points to another son, 17-year-old Mustafa. Hamas came after him when he burnt a Hamas flag: they arrested his father and twin brother until he gave himself up.

Hamas is not just going after the poor. Azil Akhras is a sophisticated 24-year-old woman with heavily kohled eyes, thick, flowing black hair and rouged lips, comfortable in her jeans and tight red shirt. Life used to be shopping, going out - maybe to Roots, a popular Gaza nightclub even though it now serves only soft drinks - and going to the beach. Her life changed dramatically three months ago when Hamas took over Gaza.

"Now, I cover my head when I go in a car. Hamas is at the checkpoints. Last week, they stopped a girl who was not covered and they beat her brother when he tried to protect her."

She and her sister must be careful; they are alone. Their father, a former government health minister, has fled Gaza to escape Hamas. He has holed up in Ramallah, the West Bank capital, and is unable to return.

It's not just shopping trips she misses. A university graduate, Akhras had wanted to sit her master's degree; she wanted to travel. "I had an idea, I wanted to be famous in history. Maybe a journalist," she says. "Now, there's no chance, I can't even go outside." She resents Hamas's repression. "If I decide to cover [my head], it will be for my God, not some Qassam soldier."

Gazans are living in a climate of fear. The place is eerily serene, not only because of the presence of disciplined Hamas security forces on the streets but, as in all successful police states, because everyone has started policing themselves, afraid of the consequences of stepping over a line not defined in formal law.

Hamas took power after five days of vicious, internecine fighting with the security forces of the PNA, who mostly belong to the rival Fatah organisation co-founded by Yasser Arafat, the late president.

Tension had escalated into clashes between the secular Fatah, who governed for a decade and whose members stack the civil service and security forces, and Hamas, after the religious party won national elections in March 2006.

The differences were exacerbated by Gaza's isolation. The international community cut funds to the Palestinian government after the Hamas election victory. Israel blocked the millions in tax revenue it was supposed to pass on for imports, and closed the borders intermittently. The economy went into freefall.

A national unity government formed in February failed to end the confrontation. But the speed of the coup in Gaza was shocking.

Hamas fielded only about 7,000 members of the Executive Force, its police force, which was backed by the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigade, the military wing of the party, against the 70,000-strong government forces loyal to Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president.

There are many reasons for the swift collapse: the government security forces hadn't been paid for 18 months and were demoralised by the corruption of their own leaders. Their commanders fled, and many foot soldiers found that their guns were locked in storage. Hamas was better armed, better trained, and fought with the single-mindedness of those with a cause.

It was the worst ever clash among Palestinians: 110 died, and the population is still shocked by the brother-on-brother nature of the battle. Today there is a deadlock, and essentially two Palestinian governments. Abbas fired the Hamas-led coalition government and named a new emergency cabinet, but its powers run only in the West Bank. Hamas ministers refused to step down.

By Palestinian law, the government must be renewed by the parliament, but Hamas dominates the legislature and, anyway, it lacks a quorum: about one-third of its members are in Israeli jails for belonging to Hamas.

The evidence of the ferocity of the fighting can be seen across Gaza City. The headquarters of the Preventive Security Service, the PNA's main security force, was the last stronghold. Now occupied by the Executive Force, there are gaping holes in the walls from bullets and rockets.

Abbas's presidential house is guarded by Hamas police who brew tea under new posters of Hamas members killed in the fighting. They shake their heads at the marble floors and luxurious furnishings, contrasting it with the home of Ismail Haniya, the Hamas prime minister, who lives in the al-Shati refugee camp.

At the Muntada, the Palestinian version of the White House, Hamas fighters stroll the corridors, and dust gathers on Abbas's rosewood desk, where Arafat once sat.

Hamas is extending its control. Nobody is safe if the example of Ashraf Juma, one of their more articulate opponents, is anything to go by. Juma is a senior member of Fatah, who refused to leave his home or office in Rafah, Gaza's southernmost city on Egypt's border. He is one of the most popular politicians in Gaza: when Hamas won the election, sweeping Gaza, he was one of the few elected from the Fatah list.

He was leader of the al-Aqsa hawks during the first intifada (uprising), and hands out money from his own pocket to the needy of both Fatah and Hamas (these days it's from his brother's, a wealthy businessman). His latest project is to find £5,000 for school uniforms for poor children.

None of it was any protection from Hamas. It began on the internet. Juma was criticised on the official Hamas website for supposedly sending Abbas the names of people whose salaries should be cut because they were Hamas members.

Then critical leaflets were distributed in the local mosque. "Someone called from Hamas and said, 'Leave your office. This is a preparation for an attack on you,' " he says, sitting at home in a white short-sleeved shirt, dark trousers and sandals.

The next day, as he and his office staff finished evening prayers, blue police cars pulled up, disgorging men in the uniform of the Executive Force. They also wore black masks.

As he opened the door, he saw his secretary, Osama, trying to fend them off with a table. The gunmen began screaming and shot Osama in the thigh. They started beating him in the hallway before running off . "You were my sons. I served you," he shouted after them.

Juma shakes his balding head, and describes how the situation turned almost farcical. As word spread that he had been attacked, hundreds of people poured into Shifa hospital and packed the emergency room and courtyard.

"There were so many people, the doctors couldn't work properly. Look, they put stitches in wrong," he says, ducking his head to show newly healed scars. The crowds carried him out of the hospital before the doctors had finished, afraid that Hamas would return, and grabbed Osama from the operating room before his broken hand and gunshot wound were treated.

They almost killed their hero. Juma fell unconscious, Osama writhed in pain. Hundreds poured into the streets, denouncing the Executive Force. A doctor finally came and treated both of them at home.

It was a night of terror for many. Ismael, 29, an English teacher for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, sits in the front room of the house he had just painted for a marriage that now will never happen.

"My last hours before they came were happy," recalls Ismael, who doesn't want his last name used because Hamas threatened to kill him if he told the story.

"I had just gotten engaged and I spent from 7.30pm to 11pm talking with my friends about what we would do for the celebrations," he says.

Suddenly, his house was surrounded by armed men in black with Qassam Brigade emblems. "One tried to hit me with a stick, and I said, 'What are you doing? I have done nothing.' "

They took him first to the Sayed Sayel Executive Force post. "They put me against a wall and started shouting, 'Have you been to a demonstration?' he says. "They became hysterical, shouting, 'You have been making riots here,' beating me with sticks, metal bars, stones."

His ordeal had just begun. "They said, 'What about the orphans?' " Ismael supports two orphans, Allah, who is nine and needs an eye operation, and Dina, who is 11, while trying to get them medical help through an American charity. Hamas said he should have no contact with foreigners.

They beat Ismael for an hour and a half, moving him at one point during the night to Idara Madaneh, the civil administration building in Jabaliya camp. He was blindfolded, but two young teenagers who had been taken in ran to him, screaming "Teacher! Teacher!", probably recognising him from school.

"Then Hamas started beating me on the arm I was using to try to protect the children," he says.
He was finally released at 4am with a warning not to talk, and not to go to a hospital. A doctor friend came round and treated him secretly.

Photographs from the June beating show welts on his back, ferocious bruises on his left arm, and a swollen right arm and elbow. He won't show me his legs out of modesty, but says they were black, and his knees are still not right.

But that was not the worst. His fiancée's family heard of the incident and believed he was a political activist against Hamas, which would endanger her future. Her father revoked his permission to marry and he has not spoken to his fiancée, a fellow teacher, since then. "My sister tells me she is crying and crying," Ismael says. Can't they marry when things calm down? "No chance. This is our tradition." For the first time in a long story, he brushes away a tear.

"Most of the educated people here feel they are living in a country that doesn't belong to them," he says when he recovers.

Hamas is not triumphalist in its takeover, as was the first prophet of militant Islam, Ayatollah Khomeini, who immediately set himself up against the West and all who didn't want to follow his unforgiving brand of Islam.

But then he had oil, 50m people, an army, air force and navy, and control of his own borders. Hamas is isolated and depends on international aid, with little but farming, fishing and a hostile neighbour that controls its borders, sea and skies.

This heavily armed statelet is squeezed between Israel's southern border and Egypt's northern border, separated by a chunk of Israel from the West Bank, the bigger, richer other half of the Palestinian "state".

The West Bank is still occupied by Israeli soldiers and Jewish settlers: they withdrew from Gaza two years ago, but still control the borders and ban all air and sea traffic, except for tiny wooden fishing boats allowed to go out six miles.

Since the Hamas takeover in June, Israel has not opened the main crossing points for even a day, and the economy has collapsed. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) estimates unemployment at 80% among the 1.4m inhabitants. There are no exports; a trickle of food bought by private Palestinian merchants from their Israeli counterparts is allowed across at the tiny Sufa crossing. It must be one of the strangest commercial dealings in the world. The Israeli army moves in pallets from about 100 trucks a day, shooting at anyone who approaches before they withdraw behind the fence; then there is a bizarre Mad Max-style race by forklifts to get the merchandise left in the no-man's-land.

In three months, an estimated 70,000 jobs have been lost in the construction industry alone. UNRWA has had to stop £47m in projects funded by donors - apartments for those whose homes were destroyed by Israeli fire, oxidation projects for Gaza's overflowing sewage-treatment plants. Everyone is desperate. "This place is a powder keg waiting to explode," said John Ging, UNRWA's Gaza director.

Instead of the open defiance of Khomeini's Iran, Hamas has developed a parallel system: show a reasonable face to the world in the hope of ending Gaza's isolation, while enforcing the unforgiving law of the state of Hamastan at home.

Ismail Haniya, the silver-haired Hamas prime minister, could be a poster boy for moderate Islam. When I see him, he is sitting with Arab journalists, and gently lecturing them like the professor he once was. Aware he stands little chance with the West, he is seeking Arab support.

He tells them that negotiations are possible under certain conditions with Mahmoud Abbas, who is welcome to come back to Gaza. No women will be forced to wear the hijab - that is a personal choice. Well, of course there can be no negotiations with Israel, although that could happen if they recognise Palestinian rights.

There is duplicity even in the detail, however: Haniya may say that women are free not to cover their heads, but before I go to his office an aide calls to tell me to be sure to wear a headscarf.

And recognising Palestinian rights is Hamas-speak for "We want all of the land of mandate Palestine, from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River," a maximalist position that ignores the fact that most Palestinians have moved on from 1948 to accept the existence of Israel, and would settle for a two-state solution. Negotiations are moribund, but Fatah-led governments have signed agreements with Israel recognising the reality that two states is the only solution.

Haniya may be the smooth-talking Hamas frontman but he lacks real power. A former professor of religion, he was a compromise choice fielded by Khaled Mesha'al, the exiled Hamas leader based in Damascus. "When we were negotiating, whenever a difficult point came up, Haniya had to leave the room to call Mesha'al," one of Abbas's top lieutenants said.

The real power lies with Mahmoud Zahar, who is in the strange position of being a foreign minister who can't travel from Gaza (Israel has closed the borders even to government officials).

A militant once expelled by Israel, he was expected to be prime minister after the Hamas victory, but Mesha'al apparently considered him too radical, and more of a threat than Haniya.

Sitting on a couch in the foreign ministry damaged in an Israeli bombing, he is scathing about Abbas. "[He] committed big crimes against the law, against human interest." Zahar is dressed in a light-grey safari suit, his beard neatly trimmed, his shoes polished. He exudes confidence and scorns any need for Hamas to reach out for a compromise. "Abbas is acting as an agent of America and Israel."

The power that stretches beyond his title peeps out. "We have information that Fatah are organising themselves into cells," he says. "We will find them and we will crush them."

There is no sense of urgency in finding a solution to the desperate need of the average Gazan with a large family and no work.

"We are not in a hurry. Palestinians are used to being under siege. I believe sooner or later the West will change its mind," he says calmly.

Again, during the interview, his power beyond that of the average diplomat is revealed when he takes a phone call about the siege of the powerful Dagmoush clan, the kidnappers of Alan Johnston, the BBC journalist. Earlier in the week the clan killed two Hamas policemen.

"Tell them that by 10pm we will go in if they have not agreed. We will enter their houses one by one."

Across town that very siege is under way. Hamas has again surrounded the Dagmoush neighbourhood as they did to get Johnston back. They have cut off the water and electricity.

Few in Gaza have any sympathy for the Dagmoushes. One of the leaders of the clan and Johnston's main kidnapper, Mumtaz Dagmoush spouts extremist Al-Qaeda rhetoric, but his so-called Army of Islam has about 20 members and is better known for theft, gun smuggling and kidnapping. Fatah let Gaza's powerful families run wild, sometimes using them against Hamas.

Hamas has taken them on. Breaking the Dagmoushes is crucial to consolidating power.
The discipline of Hamas on the front line of the siege of the concrete-block houses in the neighbourhood is in contrast to Fatah's members who won't talk until they get word from a commander over the walkie-talkie. Once allowed to talk, Abu Yehia, the local commander, doesn't have much to say. "We are imposing law and order. This is our duty. Islam tells us that."

Hamas is demanding that the Dagmoushes surrender the guilty members of the family, and give back stolen weapons.

That night, the family does surrender, led by Mumtaz Dagmoush. He is double the size of the average Gazan, tall, broad-shouldered, with a shaggy dark beard and wild hair. He and his entourage screech their pick-up trucks into the Preventive Security compound, jump out waving guns and, seeing me, starts waving his M16, shouting: "Get this journalist out of here!" With both sides jostling and shoving, for moments it seems there will be a shoot-out.

Dagmoush finally hands over bags of guns, then marches with his bodyguard into the darkened police headquarters and starts pounding on the commander's door, shouting: "I gave you my weapons, let me in there."

The M16 is in the air again, 50 men all shoving with guns and elbows, and shouting.
Eventually, he calms down and half an hour later is talking to Abu Dahab, the Hamas commander.
Dagmoush tells me, "We've just had an English guest staying with us for a while," referring to Alan Johnston, the kidnapped journalist. I asked him why he kidnaps, and if his activities other than kidnapping will be affected under Hamas. He shrugs: "Business is business," he says.

Now that Hamas has solidified power, they are putting in place their system of keeping it. One part of this is a new "ladies unit", reminiscent of the one in Iran where fierce, make-up-free women drag other women out of cars and away for re-education. Ominously, Hamas have failed so far to set up a court system, so cases are being heard by an Islamic judge.

The one thriving industry is the arms industry. I visit a Qassam area leader in Yibne camp in southern Gaza who has been "cooking" for three days - making the explosive mixture that goes in the rockets they fire into Israel.

He takes me to one of the many armouries they have and shows me the extraordinary range of weapons they manufacture locally, mostly in underground factories. What they can't make, they smuggle through tunnels from Egypt.

The armoury is in a small, concrete block house, indistinguishable from its neighbours in the squalid maze of the camp. The home-made weapons I see include foot-wide land mines, tank-busting missiles, guns, rocket-propelled grenades, all stored amid the clutter of a bedroom with flowers on the shelf above the bed and a teddy bear lying belly-up on the floor.

He is nervous while we are there - the Israelis target such places if they get information from collaborators, but he opens up when we go to another house for tea, although he won't give his name. He is unconcerned about his outside image, and this is the true voice of Hamas.

"Of course we will create an Islamic state. This is called for in the Holy Koran," he says. What would that mean, I ask him.

Well, for one, sharia law. "For a murder, death, not this life sentence there is now. A thief should have his hand cut off. An adulteress must be stoned," he says, in a chillingly nonchalant voice.
"There is no possibility of recognising Israel," he says. "All the land is ours. We are taught this by our leaders and they will never compromise."

His certitude comes from how Hamas recruits. It gets them young; my informant started at 14. Only when he proved himself "mentally and spiritually" was he allowed to join Qassam and receive military training.

And not all girls are like Azil Akhras. Gehad Nehan, 19, is studying law at the Hamas-dominated Islamic University in Gaza. She wears glasses, a hijab, and is covered in a navy-blue robe down to her thick black shoes. "Hamas has taken over the police stations and now the life is good."

She insists women are equal, but as she talks, a different reality is revealed. At the university, she says, "the boys say woman is weak, her work must be in the home. I say this is wrong".

Even getting to study was a struggle. "My father hits me and he punishes me and says I should not go to the university. It's difficult."

But despite having described Hamastan as virtually a perfect state, she has the yearning of all here to leave. "I want to travel all over the world and see people and how they live."

Those who have already travelled are the most angry at Hamas.

One restaurant owner begins by extolling Hamas for improving security. He sits at a banquette in his eatery in a yellow polo shirt. Christmas streamers still hang from the ceiling, and Whitney Houston is on the soundtrack.

"And they cancelled all family connections," he adds. "Before, if someone was connected to the government, they could eat and just not pay.

"But they are not the future for the Palestinian people," he insists. "We need a government that can deal with the international community." Despite growing dissatisfaction such as his, there is little sign that the green flags of Hamastan will be coming down any time soon.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Christian persecution in Gaza

Those freedom loving Hamas are at it again. Next time Sabeel visits your church and tries to badmouth Israel, ask them if their secular democratic state won't look like this.

Gaza: Christian-Muslim tensions heat up

Khaled Abu Toameh , THE JERUSALEM POST
Sep. 25, 2007

An attack on an 80-year-old Christian woman in Gaza City has triggered renewed fears among the 2,500-strong Christian community in the aftermath of the Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip.

Claire Farah Tarazi was the latest victim of anti-Christian attacks that have increased in the Gaza Strip since Hamas took full control of the area last June. Leaders of the Christian community strongly condemned the assault and appealed to Hamas to make an effort to protect Christians.

Tarazi said a masked man dressed in black clothes knocked on her door late at night and demanded all her money.

"He was carrying a club and a sharp tool," she said. "As soon as I opened the door, he pushed me inside and shouted: 'Where is the money, you infidel?' I shouted back: 'I'm not an infidel - I'm a proud Palestinian Arab.'"

Tarzai said the assailant beat her on her hands with the club, demanding that she hand over all her money and jewelry. "I was so terrified that I gave him two golden bracelets, a mobile phone and a few hundred shekels," she added. "But the man said that this was not enough and he hit me hard on the head with a tool he was carrying until I started bleeding."

The attacker then locked her in her bedroom and started searching the house for money and valuable items. "After he left the house, I managed to open another door into the bedroom which he hadn't noticed," she said. "Then I went to the neighbors and asked for help."

Tarzi's relatives told The Jerusalem Post that it was evident that she had been targeted because of her faith. "The fact that the attacker called her an infidel speaks for itself," said one of them. "He clearly knew that this was a Christian woman living alone. He would not have dared to do the same thing to a Muslim woman."

Representatives of various women's groups in the Gaza Strip who visited Tarazi expressed deep shock over the attack and called on the Hamas government to halt attacks on Christians. The women expressed concern over increased attacks on Christians in light of the absence of law and order in the Gaza Strip.

The assault on the elderly Christian woman is the latest in a series of attacks against Christians over the past few months. Since the Hamas takeover, Muslims have targeted a Christian school and church.

Father Manuel Musalam, leader of the small Latin community in the Gaza Strip, said masked gunmen torched and looted the Rosary Sisters School and the Latin Church.

"The masked gunmen used rocket-propelled grenades to storm the main entrances of the school and church," he said. "Then they destroyed almost everything inside, including the Cross, the Holy Book, computers and other equipment." Musalam expressed outrage over the burning of copies of the Bible, noting that the gunmen destroyed all the Crosses inside the church and school. "Those who did these awful things have no respect for Christian-Muslim relations," he said.

He estimated damages at more than $500,000. "Those who see the destruction will realize how bad this attack was," he said. "Christians have been living in peace and security with Muslims for many years, but those who attacked us are trying to sabotage this relationship."

Continued (Permanent Link)

Palestinian resistance... To Hamas

The Gaza story bears watching. The fighting between the "democratically elected" Hamas and the Fatah is gradually intensifying, or at least, Hamas repression is intensifying. according to the story below, Fatah Calls It Third Intifada. While the story says that at lease 35 Palestinians were wounded, other sources put the numbers at "at least 70."

 

The problem for Israel is that Israeli attacks on Gaza, to stop the accumulation of arms and to hinder Qassam rocket fire, would probably serve to unify the Palestinians and allow Hamas to consolidate their rule under the rubric of "uniting against the Zionist enemy."

 

Ami Isseroff

 

Fatah Calls It Third Intifada

Hisham Abu Taha, Arab News
 

 

GAZA CITY, 8 September 2007 — At least 35 Palestinians were wounded yesterday when Hamas security forces clubbed Fatah supporters who tried to hold street prayers to protest Hamas rule in the Gaza Strip.

 

Some of the injured had gunshot wounds. "They were chasing and beating and arresting us as if they were occupation soldiers," said one young Fatah supporter in Gaza's Maghazi refugee camp, likening Hamas forces to Israelis.

 

Palestinian Information Minister Reyad Al-Maliki called it the beginning of a third intifada. He told reporters in the West Bank city of Ramallah: "What we saw in Gaza today was the beginning of a third Intifada, against the Hamas occupation. We bless this uprising." The earlier two were against Israel in 1987 and 2000.

 

The street showdowns, which erupted three months after Hamas took control of the Gaza Strip violently, had been widely expected after Hamas said it would not allow Fatah to conduct "political prayers" outdoors on Fridays.

 

The Friday gatherings have become focal points for clashes between the Executive Force that polices the territory and members of Fatah.

 

The Executive Force briefly detained three Palestinian journalists and assaulted five other reporters.

 

President Mahmoud Abbas appealed for calm. "We ask our worshippers to avoid any friction or confrontation with the coup-makers and their armed militia," said a statement from Abbas.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Hamas tells it like it is, but lies

Hamas speaks. What part is a lie and what part is true? Consider this:

 

No, there were no Palestinian Jews. When the British Mandate began in 1917, there was only one settlement on Palestinian land, which included several dozen Jews, who were living there in violation of the law at the time. I would like to mention that under the Ottoman state – regardless of the many reservations we have about it – there was a law that prohibited the Jews from staying in Palestine for over a month. Their passports and personal documents were taken away from them, and they were given an Ottoman permit at the border, which allowed them to stay for a month on Palestinian land. The only group that can be called Jewish was the one in Nablus. They still live there to this day.

This guy has to be kidding. There are no Jews in Nablus, though there once were. But about four decades before the Balfour declaration, my grandmothers were born in Jerusalem. Five years before the Balfour declaration, my mother was born in Hebron. As for my aunt, her family had lived in Tiberias for over 300 years by the time of Lord Balfour and his declaration. One of my grandfathers was a soldier in the Ottoman army, not a transient with an Ottoman permit. The other grandfather was excused from service because he sold charcoal to the Ottoman army to run their trains.

 

The rest of what he has to say is equally fictitious. He has been smoking too much Lebanese blond, or too many Lebanese blondes.

 

There is one part I believe though:

 

...the final goal of the resistance is to wipe this entity off the face of the earth. This goal necessitates the development of the capabilities of the resistance, until this entity is wiped out.

So much for peace deals with the Hamas.

 

Ami Isseroff

 

 

Special Dispatch-Hamas/Jihad & Terrorism Studies Project
August 16, 2007
No. 1682
 
Hamas Representative in Lebanon Osama Hamdan Justifies Suicide Bombings in Buses: Israeli Soldiers Ride Those Buses
 
 
The following are excerpts from an interview with Hamas representative in Lebanon Osama Hamdan, which aired on Al-Kawthar TV on August 6, 2007.
 
August 06, 2007

Hamas representative in Lebanon Osama Hamdan Justifies Suicide Bombings in Buses: Israeli Soldiers Ride Those Buses

Following are excerpts from an interview with Hamas representative in Lebanon Osama Hamdan, which aired on Al-Kawthar TV on August 6, 2007:

Interviewer: Islamic law has forbidden aggression during Jihad – by forbidding the killing of women, children, the elderly, clerics who devote themselves to the worship of God, and other non-combatant civilians who do not serve in the enemy's army. Do you consider all the Jews in Palestine to be combatants who have plundered the land? We've witnessed martyrdom operations that targeted buses and restaurants.

Osama Hamdan: First of all, let me clarify something very important. What is the ruling regarding those who live in Palestine, in the co-called Israel, and who are aggressors and plunderers of the land? The way we see it, they all came to Palestine from abroad, whether before the declaration of the Zionist entity or after it. If you were to conduct statistics within the Zionist entity, you would find that all these people have their origins in other countries – they came from Europe, Eastern Europe, from American, South America, or other places.

Interviewer: In other words, there were no Palestinian Jews?

Osama Hamdan: No, there were no Palestinian Jews. When the British Mandate began in 1917, there was only one settlement on Palestinian land, which included several dozen Jews, who were living there in violation of the law at the time. I would like to mention that under the Ottoman state – regardless of the many reservations we have about it – there was a law that prohibited the Jews from staying in Palestine for over a month. Their passports and personal documents were taken away from them, and they were given an Ottoman permit at the border, which allowed them to stay for a month on Palestinian land. The only group that can be called Jewish was the one in Nablus. They still live there to this day. The Palestinians regard them as part of the makeup of Palestinian society, and they number no more than several hundred. As for those who immigrated from various countries – they are not Jews. Anyone who comes to live in a war zone is a combatant, regardless of whether he wears a uniform. That's one thing. Secondly, neither Hamas nor the Palestinian resistance force intentionally killed civilians. You mentioned the buses. What's an easier target – a bus, which is protected by various security measures, or a school, a theater, or a stadium, for example? These civilian targets – in which the killing of women and children is intentional – were not targeted by the resistance. Why were buses targeted? Because they are the means of transport used by the soldiers as well. The Zionist soldiers, who go from their homes to their bases and back, use public transport, because it is free or almost free. In my opinion, the occupation soldiers also have a security motive in using public transport: They shield themselves behind the so-called "civilians" within the Zionist entity. Therefore, the way I see it, they need to stop using public transport, or else society should prevent them from using it, because it is the soldiers who are targeted. Just to prove it, in the dozens of operations that were carried out, the Zionists never announced, for example, that 20 children were killed, or that 50 women were killed. On the contrary, if you were to examine who was killed in martyrdom operations that targeted buses, you would find that 70% were occupation soldiers, and they may even have been in uniform at the time of the operation.

[...]

We are making the preparations for a confrontation. This is not because we need to be prepared for an Israeli act of aggression – after all, aggression is intrinsic to this entity – but because the final goal of the resistance is to wipe this entity off the face of the earth. This goal necessitates the development of the capabilities of the resistance, until this entity is wiped out.

Interviewer: Do you think that Mahmoud Abbas, who has found himself in the crisis of the confrontation with Hamas, plays the role of a policeman, who thwarts the Intifada, the resistance, and the Jihad against the Zionist occupation in the Palestinian lands?

Osama Hamdan: He plays a role that is even worse than that. Mahmoud Abbas is doing this out of ideological conviction. He has been calling for a settlement ever since 1973. It was Mahmoud Abbas who created the Oslo Accords, and who was brought in by the Americans to serve as prime minister in order to confront Arafat. In my opinion, he plays this role willingly and out of conviction, which is worse than if he were doing so due to commitments to the occupation.

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