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)

Inspiration and ray of hope - Summer Camp for Palestinian and Israeli Youth

Danny Shapiro, a friend who has started working at the Peres Peace Center wrote the following account.

July 19 was the first day of a six day camp joining 32 Israeli kids, aged 12 – 14, from the poor southern towns of Yeruham and Sderot, and 28 Palestinian kids living in poverty and despair in the occupied territories.


The camp, held at Kibbutz Galon, is organized by the Peres Center's Sports Department. And as much as I read about this kind of program, no article I could read, or video I could watch, could in any possible way match the almost incredulous sense of wonder and inspiration aroused by seeing these sixty kids playing in Galon's pool together, and enjoying a multi-lingual "Darbuka" session with a Palestinian madrich (leader).


It was also fascinating and deeply impressive to speak at length with Issam, who works on a number of projects with the Peres Center. Issam grew up in Gaza and moved to Ramallah after Hamas came to power and he felt his life was in danger for his many years of reconciliation work. No doubt some of you know him.


His story is amazing. He sat in Israeli prison and had a life-changing experience with an Israeli officer that put him on the path of working towards conciliation and peace. If I have the time I will write the story down and pass it along.


Issam reminded me again and again that not only was this the first time most of the Palestinian children had met an Israeli who not either a soldier or a settler – but for the great majority of them, this was the first time in their lives outside of their town or certainly the territories; the first time they had eaten in a restaurant; the first time they experience what even the lowest social and economic classes in Israel take for granted.


I have no illusions that the experience of these 60 kids, and that of the additional several hundred who will be treated to similar camps this summer, will make any serious dent in overall public opinion or attitudes, and certainly will not make the leaders on both sides more peace loving and conciliatory. But then, that (the latter, at least) is not the goal of the Peres Peace Center.



But this type of program most certainly changes attitudes (this is based on professional evaluation following multiple years of experience), and, if nothing else, humanizes the conflict for those who are involved in it; and injects a few rays of hope into our battered and shattered hearts and minds

That is what Peres Peace Center does. That is what the "peace" group Alternative Information Center finds objectionable. They published an article insisting that Palestinians must boycott Peres Peace Center. The article states:

Shimon Peres is definitely an enemy of the Palestinian people, of human rights and of peace, and any kind of collaboration by a Palestinian organization with the Peres Center is scandalous.

Is the summer camp "scandalous?" You decide. The directors of the Peres Peace Center, in any case, are Uri Savir and Ron Pundak, though Peres founded the Peres Peace Center.

Ami Isseroff

Continued (Permanent Link)

Scoop: Israeli preparations for Attack on Iran Almost Complete

Regard if you please, the below confidential communication, which I, and a select group of maybe 20,000 other people have received. This is definitely "inside dope." I am about to share this precious secret with you, and expose yet another conspiracy of internal Jew Zionism. Here is what it is about. The virtuous and truth telling democratic Ismalic Republic of Iran is fresh from having conducted impeccable democratic elections in the best traditions and with total transparency. The glorious Basij warriors triumphed over the Mossad inspired plots of evil people like Neda Soltan, who wanted to introduce foreign and corrupting concepts into Iran such as women's rights, as well as degenerate and evil culture such as the Zionist Mickey Mouse. But Iran is a victim of a plot and a libel by the international Jew Zionism conspiracy that is operated from that den of iniquity, Tel-Aviv.

The Iranians, who have the second largest gas reserves and the sixth largest petroleum reserves in the world, as well as a puny industrial capacity, explain that they have an urgent need of nuclear power to generate electricity, as well to satisfy the intellectual curiosity of the forward looking Mullahs, who were commanded by Allah in the Quran to seek out the secrets of the world, hidden from all men and Jinn except for the wisest and most virtuous. That is the only explanation for why they are refining uranium, and for why they built secret centrifuge factories and a secret heavy water reactor, and why they are investing a huge part of the budget of their poor country in nuclear gadgetry and solid fuel intercontinental ballistic missiles. Perhaps the missiles will be used to solve the traffic jam problem in Tehran.

The Zionists, for reasons all their own, decided arbitrarily that Iran, which never harmed a hair on anyone's head, is trying to create nuclear weapons. If the Iranians do not stop their peaceful and innocent nuclear program, not to mention their peaceful and innocent crash solid state ICBM development program, also needed for peaceful purposes, the greedy and evil Zionists propose to attack the centrifuges and other development sites. At least that is what the letter below claims. As the astute author and analyst Sam Vaknin notes:

Late last year, Israel embarked on a coordinated campaign of leaks to the press regarding its determination to take out Iran's nuclear facilities if Obama's then-new administration fails to sway the Iranians diplomatically.

And Vaknin goes on to tell in detail of the pernicious Zionist plot, designed to torpedo the Obama program of engagement with the nice Iranians. He tells us that preparations are almost complete. To his excellent and imaginative report, which is based on information that is available only to a select group of about two billion people who have the rare qualification of being literate, we can add that the Zionist government has passed both submarines and warships through the Suez Canal, which analysts of about the same caliber of Vaknin have claimed is a sure signal to Iran by Israel. All this, as noted is supposedly meant to torpedo the Obama policy and launch an attack on Iran in a few short months. Only Vaknin forgot that Obama has said repeatedly that Iran must not be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons, and that Obama has vowed to get tough with Iran if it doesn't respond to diplomacy in a few months.

Vaknin has joined the honorable ranks of the Iran attack prognosticators. The most prominent of them are Sy Hersh of the New Yorker and Uzi Mahnaimi of the Sunday Times. Every few months these two earned their keep by predicted an Israeli or American attack on Iran in just a few weeks or months. No attack ever materialized, but the two clowns went on predicting, based on "leaked" "information" from "reliable" sources. Like the medieval Jewish prognosticators of the Ketz - the end of days - based on the false "science" of numerology, they were never deterred by the fact that the cataclysmic event did not occur. There was always a good excuse: their leaks had exposed the vicious Zionist-neoconservative conspiracy of Dick Cheney, the Likud and other malefactors.

Vaknin himself is the best judge of his own character and motivations. After all, as he tells us that he is author of a book called, "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited."

What is wrong with Vaknin's prediction that an Israeli attack is imminent? A few things. Firstly, in the surprise attacks it has carried out in the past, Israel never ever leaked any details of the planned operation beforehand. This was true of the attack on the Iraqi reactor, Operation Focus that began the Six day war, the attack on the reactor that was being built by North Korea in Syria, the attack on Tunis, and the sinking of Arafat's "refugee boat" in Cyprus, among others. Leaked "plans" are almost surely disinformation. A great analyst like Vaknin must know that. (Surely he is a great analyst, as he says so himelf). Second, the timing is wrong. Meir Dagan, head of the Mossad said that Iran will not have a bomb before 2014, so what is the hurry? Third, the timing of the attack is wrong. Israel hasn't got its missile defenses in place, and will not have an operation anti-missile system for all the relevant ranges for a while. Fourth, Israel and the US agreed to go for sanctions in the autumn if Iran doesn't negotiate seriously. An Israeli attack would make some Americans pretty angry, unless it is really part of the plan. Fifth, Vaknin claims that Israel will attack only two targets. This seems to be worthless, since any attack must strike at least the nuclear research center at Isfahan, the Arak reactor that can produce plutonium, and the Natanz facilities for manufacturing centrifuges. Probably there are other vital targets. Israel would have to hit a number of them in order to really set back Iran's "electricity generation" program.

But who am I to question Vaknin? Vaknin seems to be no amateur. He is an "analyst" - he tells people in Macedonia all about Israeli policy. He has Web sites about Global research etc. Nobody in Macedonia or Micronesia or anywhere else asks fools like me to explain Israeli policy. So how could this astute sleuth have missed all this signs that only a child could miss? As he notes, Israel has planted many leaks, and one could be quick to conclude that Vaknin himself is a devious agent of the sly Zionist conspiracy, trying to confuse and panic the ever virtuous and stout hearted Iranian government.

The truth may be simpler. By his own accounts, Vaknin (see samvak.tripod.com/cv.html) has a Phd from a third rate American university in philosophy and dabbled in computers and business administration. While he was in jail(!) (see healthyplace.com/personality-disorders/malignant-self-love/my-story/menu-id-1470/) for unspecified reasons, he wrote an amateur book about psychology, and then he evidently graduated to amateur geopolitical analysis. All this information is from his own CV and autobiographical summary. I could not find anywhere where he had studied or worked in anything related to international relations, security, military affairs etc.

Assuming that I didn't miss anything (you are invited to check) and that it is not a cover provided by a sinister intelligence agency (you know which one) the conclusion is that his ideas are no better and no worse than yours or mine. The difference is that we don't usually pretend to know with absolute certainty when or if Israel is going to attack anyone, or whom they will attack. If he can make a living from it, then good for him. We should not begrudge anyone a living, but it should not come at the expense of endangering the peace and spreading unfounded rumors about Israel.

The letter follows below.

Ami Isseroff.

---

Preparations for Attack on Iran Almost Complete

By: Sam Vaknin

July 10, 2009

Late last year, Israel embarked on a coordinated campaign of leaks to the press regarding its determination to take out Iran's nuclear facilities if Obama's then-new administration fails to sway the Iranians diplomatically. Israel is unwilling to accept a nuclear Iran: "It is not an option", say its senior intelligence and military leadership.

On January 20, 2009, I appeared as a guest in the most popular political affairs program in Macedonia ("Glasot na Narodot", or The Voice of the People). I warned that Israel is willing to wait 6 to 8 months for Obama's "diplomacy" with regards to Iran's nuclear capability to show some progress. If Iran remains recalcitrant, Israel plans to bomb two facilities in Iran as it did in Iraq in 1981, I said. Refueling won't be a problem, I assured the program's host, Slobodan Tomic: both Egypt and Saudi-Arabia offered to help.

Israel has decided to go ahead. Taking into account political, geopolitical, military preparedness, and climatic conditions, there are two windows: between July 21 and 24 and between August 6 and 8. Advance teams comprised of Mossad agents and military personnel are already on the ground in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Iraq (including in the Kurdish lands, adjacent to Turkey).

A mock has been erected not far from Eilat (near the Red Sea, opposite Aqaba). A defunct airbase in Biq'at Ha'Yareach (Moon Vale) has been resurrected to accommodate Air Wing 10. In a country as small and intimate as Israel, it is amazing that this has been kept a secret: hundreds of recruits and reservists - from mechanics and pilots to cooks and administrators - have been re-stationed there in the last few months.

A mysterious facility also sprouted up not far from Dimona's nuclear reactor, next to a university town called Sde Boker. It is not known what is its role, though speculation is that it is intended to shield the sensitive facility from an Iranian counter-attack. Several batteries of aged Patriot missiles have been recently replaced with brand new anti-missile rockets developed by Israel.

Citizens are reporting dry runs in the skies of the Negev, Israel's traditional air force training grounds and a desert with some resemblance to Iranian conditions. Piecing these scant testimonies together, it seems that the Israelis are concentrating their effort on midair refueling and surgical strikes on multiple targets.

Finally, HAGA (Hagana Ezrakhit), the Civilian Defense Force, a part of the Israeli Defense Force (IDF), has been instructed to begin preparations for a possible Iranian counter-strike with long-range conventional missiles. At this stage, Israel is not contemplating chemical or biological warfare (though the distribution of gas masks does seem to be part of the drill).

No one knows for sure where will Israel strike. Wiping off all the widely distributed and impregnable components of Iran's capability to enrich uranium is close to impossible. The after-effects of even a limited air attack may be devastating and not necessarily short-term, as the Israelis are convinced. The price of oil is likely to spike and radicals and extremists throughout the benighted region are bound to leverage the attack to smear and taunt Israel and its allies but, then, what else is new. The Arab countries are likely to breathe a sigh of relief that the Iranian bully has been humbled.

The big question mark is how will the Obama administration react to such a fait accompli that flies in the face of the new President's stated policies. Will Obama try to make an example out of Israel and harshly punish it - or will he merely verbally lash it and proceed with business as usual? Time will tell. Soon.

Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. (E-mail : vaksam@mt.net.mk, Mobile/Cell: +38970-565488)

Associate Editor, Global Politician and Founding Analyst, International Analyst Network

Continued (Permanent Link)

The truth about the settlement freeze

It seems that the US has broken yet another agreement or understanding with Israel. It is not the first time.

Hillary Is Wrong About the Settlements
The U.S. and Israel reached a clear understanding about natural growth.

By ELLIOTT ABRAMS

 

Despite fervent denials by Obama administration officials, there were indeed agreements between Israel and the United States regarding the growth of Israeli settlements on the West Bank. As the Obama administration has made the settlements issue a major bone of contention between Israel and the U.S., it is necessary that we review the recent history.

 

In the spring of 2003, U.S. officials (including me) held wide-ranging discussions with then Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in Jerusalem. The "Roadmap for Peace" between Israel and the Palestinians had been written. President George W. Bush had endorsed Palestinian statehood, but only if the Palestinians eliminated terror. He had broken with Yasser Arafat, but Arafat still ruled in the Palestinian territories. Israel had defeated the intifada, so what was next?
[Commentary] Getty Images

 

Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, President George W. Bush, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Jordan's King Abdullah, June 4, 2003.

 

We asked Mr. Sharon about freezing the West Bank settlements. I recall him asking, by way of reply, what did that mean for the settlers? They live there, he said, they serve in elite army units, and they marry. Should he tell them to have no more children, or move?

 

We discussed some approaches: Could he agree there would be no additional settlements? New construction only inside settlements, without expanding them physically? Could he agree there would be no additional land taken for settlements?

 

As we talked several principles emerged. The father of the settlements now agreed that limits must be placed on the settlements; more fundamentally, the old foe of the Palestinians could -- under certain conditions -- now agree to Palestinian statehood.

 

In June 2003, Mr. Sharon stood alongside Mr. Bush, King Abdullah II of Jordan, and Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas at Aqaba, Jordan, and endorsed Palestinian statehood publicly: "It is in Israel's interest not to govern the Palestinians but for the Palestinians to govern themselves in their own state. A democratic Palestinian state fully at peace with Israel will promote the long-term security and well-being of Israel as a Jewish state." At the end of that year he announced his intention to pull out of the Gaza Strip.

 

The U.S. government supported all this, but asked Mr. Sharon for two more things. First, that he remove some West Bank settlements; we wanted Israel to show that removing them was not impossible. Second, we wanted him to pull out of Gaza totally -- including every single settlement and the "Philadelphi Strip" separating Gaza from Egypt, even though holding on to this strip would have prevented the smuggling of weapons to Hamas that was feared and has now come to pass. Mr. Sharon agreed on both counts.

 

These decisions were political dynamite, as Mr. Sharon had long predicted to us. In May 2004, his Likud Party rejected his plan in a referendum, handing him a resounding political defeat. In June, the Cabinet approved the withdrawal from Gaza, but only after Mr. Sharon fired two ministers and allowed two others to resign. His majority in the Knesset was now shaky.

 

After completing the Gaza withdrawal in August 2005, he called in November for a dissolution of the Knesset and for early elections. He also said he would leave Likud to form a new centrist party. The political and personal strain was very great. Four weeks later he suffered the first of two strokes that have left him in a coma.

 

Throughout, the Bush administration gave Mr. Sharon full support for his actions against terror and on final status issues. On April 14, 2004, Mr. Bush handed Mr. Sharon a letter saying that there would be no "right of return" for Palestinian refugees. Instead, the president said, "a solution to the Palestinian refugee issue as part of any final status agreement will need to be found through the establishment of a Palestinian state, and the settling of Palestinian refugees there, rather than in Israel."

 

On the major settlement blocs, Mr. Bush said, "In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949." Several previous administrations had declared all Israeli settlements beyond the "1967 borders" to be illegal. Here Mr. Bush dropped such language, referring to the 1967 borders -- correctly -- as merely the lines where the fighting stopped in 1949, and saying that in any realistic peace agreement Israel would be able to negotiate keeping those major settlements.

 

On settlements we also agreed on principles that would permit some continuing growth. Mr. Sharon stated these clearly in a major policy speech in December 2003: "Israel will meet all its obligations with regard to construction in the settlements. There will be no construction beyond the existing construction line, no expropriation of land for construction, no special economic incentives and no construction of new settlements."

 

Ariel Sharon did not invent those four principles. They emerged from discussions with American officials and were discussed by Messrs. Sharon and Bush at their Aqaba meeting in June 2003.

 

They were not secret, either. Four days after the president's letter, Mr. Sharon's Chief of Staff Dov Weissglas wrote to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that "I wish to reconfirm the following understanding, which had been reached between us: 1. Restrictions on settlement growth: within the agreed principles of settlement activities, an effort will be made in the next few days to have a better definition of the construction line of settlements in Judea & Samaria."

 

Stories in the press also made it clear that there were indeed "agreed principles." On Aug. 21, 2004 the New York Times reported that "the Bush administration . . . now supports construction of new apartments in areas already built up in some settlements, as long as the expansion does not extend outward."

 

In recent weeks, American officials have denied that any agreement on settlements existed. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated on June 17 that "in looking at the history of the Bush administration, there were no informal or oral enforceable agreements. That has been verified by the official record of the administration and by the personnel in the positions of responsibility."

 

These statements are incorrect. Not only were there agreements, but the prime minister of Israel relied on them in undertaking a wrenching political reorientation -- the dissolution of his government, the removal of every single Israeli citizen, settlement and military position in Gaza, and the removal of four small settlements in the West Bank. This was the first time Israel had ever removed settlements outside the context of a peace treaty, and it was a major step.

 

It is true that there was no U.S.-Israel "memorandum of understanding," which is presumably what Mrs. Clinton means when she suggests that the "official record of the administration" contains none. But she would do well to consult documents like the Weissglas letter, or the notes of the Aqaba meeting, before suggesting that there was no meeting of the minds.

 

Mrs. Clinton also said there were no "enforceable" agreements. This is a strange phrase. How exactly would Israel enforce any agreement against an American decision to renege on it? Take it to the International Court in The Hague?

 

Regardless of what Mrs. Clinton has said, there was a bargained-for exchange. Mr. Sharon was determined to break the deadlock, withdraw from Gaza, remove settlements -- and confront his former allies on Israel's right by abandoning the "Greater Israel" position to endorse Palestinian statehood and limits on settlement growth. He asked for our support and got it, including the agreement that we would not demand a total settlement freeze.

 

For reasons that remain unclear, the Obama administration has decided to abandon the understandings about settlements reached by the previous administration with the Israeli government. We may be abandoning the deal now, but we cannot rewrite history and make believe it did not exist.

 

Mr. Abrams, a senior fellow for Middle Eastern Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, handled Middle East affairs at the National Security Council from 2001 to 2009

Continued (Permanent Link)

Reports that Israel seized Catholic funds wrong

But reports that the Catholic church seized Jewish funds for centuries are regrettably correct.

 

Reports that Israel seized Catholic funds wrong

 

June 9, 2009

 

ROME (JTA) -- Israel will not seize funds of Catholic institutions in the country, as Italian and Catholic media previously reported.

 

A statement Tuesday by the Israeli embassy to the Holy See said that "the seizure of funds from the Ministry of Education destined for some educational institutions of the Catholic Church in Israel will not be made, and that the situation remains unchanged."

 

Reports that Israel would seize assets of some Catholic institutions to pressure the Vatican to pay disputed taxes were published by Catholic and Italian media on Monday.

 

Italian media Tuesday quoted Israeli sources as saying the reports were the result of "a technical error" and a "misunderstanding."

 

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)

Obama: Honesty with Israel is the best policy - Go for it!

President Obama has said that the 'U.S. Must Be More 'Honest' With Israel. He said there should be no equivocation. That's a really good idea. Let's start with an unequivocal statement that says the United States will honor its written commitments and past agreements, because without that, there isn't going to be any basis for going forward. It doesn't seem to be forthcoming.

Here's part of an interchange with State Department Spokesperson Robert Wood:

QUESTION: The United States, in the form of a letter that President Bush sent to then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in 2004, made certain commitments to the Israeli state. I have tried to ask whether or not the Obama Administration feels bound by the commitments that President Bush expressed in that letter, which the Israelis would certainly feel comprise obligations on the part of the United States that we have made. Does the United States regard itself as - right now, as being bound by those commitments that President Bush made?

MR. WOOD: Look, what we are trying to do, James, is to get both parties to implement their obligations, written obligations in the Roadmap. We're trying to get those implemented. Our vision for a two-state solution cannot happen if these obligations are not, you know, held to. And so what Senator Mitchell has been trying to do is to work with the two sides. Both sides have an interest in meeting these obligations. They both want peace. We have said we will be a partner in trying to help them implement them - implement their obligations.

QUESTION: What about the letter?

MR. WOOD: Well, I - look, I speak for this Administration. I've told you exactly what we are doing with regard to trying to get both parties to live up to their written obligations.

QUESTION: What about our written obligations? Do we live up to the ones that we set?

MR. WOOD: Look, we - the United States lives up to its obligations. Right now, we are focused on, as I said, trying to get both sides to adhere to the Roadmap so that we can move forward toward that two-state solution. And it's not going to be easy, as you know. We've spoken to that many times. And we're going to continue to try to do that.

QUESTION: Is the letter binding or not on this Administration?

MR. WOOD: Look, what I'm saying to you, James, is we have - there are a series of obligations that Israel and the Palestinians have undertaken.

QUESTION: I haven't asked about their obligations and what they've undertaken. I've asked about a letter that this country sent to Israel. I'd like you to address that letter.

MR. WOOD: Well --

QUESTION: Is it binding on this Administration?

MR. WOOD: Well, this Administration is - as I said, has laid out its proposals, its strategy for moving forward. And that's about the best I can help you with on that, James.

QUESTION: Does it entail that letter?

MR. WOOD: I've said what I can say on this right now.

QUESTION: Robert, do you realize that by not saying yes, indeed the U.S. Government continues to be bound by the letter that former President George W. Bush sent, you are leaving open in the air the possibility that it does not see itself as bound?

MR. WOOD: I don't believe I'm doing that at all. What I'm saying to you is we have had a series of discussions with our Israeli and Palestinian partners. We've had discussions about their obligations and what both sides need to do. Both sides are well aware of what they need to do, and they know that we are trying to help them meet their obligations. And we'll continue to do that.

And I'm just not going to get into the substance of what a previous administration may have agreed to. I'm focused on what this Administration is trying to do right now. And that's where we are.

Do you understand what U.S. policy is from the above? I don't. Is it unequivocal? If the Bush letter is to be honored, how can the U.S. ask for a complete settlement freeze? What happened to honesty and not equivocating?

Ami Isseroff

Continued (Permanent Link)

Big choice at York University Israel debate

One state or one state, take your pick at the York University debate on "paths to peace." This is a wide and fair choice, really. You can have a secular Palestinian democracy like Syria or an Islamic Republic like Iran. Yes, "peace" can be achieved by destroying your enemy. It would not be the first time that peace was achieved through genocide.

Good thing Jeff Halper is invited. No hate-Israel gathering could be complete without Jeff Halper, who has done a monumental job of discrediting the cause of peace and Palestinian rights and turning it into an insane mockery. Halper is a veteran of the hatemongering fake "peace" movement.

The worst aspect of these activities is that the bad, fake peace makers inevitably drive out the good ones and make it impossible for them to work by delegitimizing the cause of peace. If the Palestinians do not want self-determination, it is their business, but they needn't try to foist this idea on the Jews.

It is really sad that York university has succumbed to this sort of cheap racism and Stalinist debating style. The terror groupies already tried to hold an "Israel Apartheid Week" at York University. You'll be glad to know that one of their speakers was scheduled to be "Sahabphan Jesuthasan. York Student, President, Tamil Students Association." The problem of the Tamil Tigers terrorists, one of the most notorious suicide terror groups, was since settled in a most satisfactory manner, by eliminating the group and killing their head, proving that it is possible to win an assymmetric war. Terrorists are not invincible. Nobody counted the civilian casualties. Sri Lanka declared a national holiday. If you will, it is no legend. Yes, peace can be achieved by wiping out your enemy. However, those who wish for that kind of "peace" should take into account that it is probably their side that will get wiped out.

YORK UNIVERSITY VS. ISRAEL:

"ACADEMIC FREEDOM" OR ACADEMIC FARCE?

Gerald M. Steinberg

Chair, Political Science, Bar Ilan University

and Executive Director, NGO Monitor

The President of York University in Toronto has issued a statement attempting to defend his university's sponsorship of an event headlined "Israel/Palestine: Mapping Models of Statehood and Paths to Peace", scheduled for June 22 to 24. This response to intense criticism of the program attempts to portray serious criticism as an attack on academic freedom. However, in examining the details and the debate over this event, and in the context of vulgar anti-Israel activities and physical intimidation of Jewish students at York, these bland words are a diversion -- a straw man aimed at deflecting criticism, and blocking the important public debate over the role of university campuses as battlefields in the Arab-Israeli narrative wars that perpetuate the violent conflict.

York's defense seeks to answer the public statement issued by Hershell Ezrin, head of the Canadian Council for Israel and Jewish Advocacy (CIJA). This analysis was based on a careful examination of the speakers and their topics, which reveals that this conference "aims to explore a one-state, bi-national solution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, the imposition of which would spell the end of Israel as a Jewish state. The conference will include a number of speakers who are recognizable for their roles as organizers and outspoken proponents of 'apartheid week' and the Israel boycott movement."

Far from an attack on academic freedom, such criticism highlights the very absence of the free exchange in a marketplace of ideas which is the indispensible foundation for academic freedom. The extremely complex history of the Arab-Israeli conflict and multiple dimensions of peace efforts contrast starkly with the narrowly constricted ideologies reflected in the list of 44 speakers. This information is readily available using the internet, and had the eleven sponsors -- six from York, four from Queen's university and a government funded research framework -- exercised "due diligence", they would have found that many of the speakers are virulent anti-Israeli activists, and are far removed from academic work to understand complex issues through research and debate. In other words, it is the conference that constitutes a brutal attack on academic freedom, rather than the analysts and critics.

For example, the first speaker on the list is Ali Abunimah, who runs a propaganda internet site known as the "Electronic Intifada", specializing in demonization of Israel through articles such as "Why Israel won't survive".. Abunimah is also affiliated with a political organization (PCHR) based in Gaza that systematically distorts and exploits the language of human rights – also to attack Israel. Abunimah's groups frequently condone Palestinian terrorism using the euphemism of "resistance" and terms like "apartheid" and "racist" in reference to Israel – the exact opposite of promoting compromise and a two state solution. Attempts to feature speakers like Abunimah under the banner of peace research is dishonest, and rather than attempting to prevent this criticism by pretending that academic freedom is at stake, York university officials should welcome the analysis

While the ideological bios and activist records of all 44 speakers would fill dozens of pages (a task that the sponsors at York University should undertake as a public service), a few more illustrations are useful. Jeff Halper is another veteran pro-Palestinian campaigner, far removed from any academic pursuits. He runs a small organization that claims to oppose the demolition of Palestinian houses, but most of his activities are aimed at generating support for the Palestinian narrative. He recently participated in sailing a few small boats from Cyprus to Hamas-controlled Gaza, hoping to engage in publicity-generating confrontations with the Israeli Navy. Halper often appears in support of Naim Ateek, whose speeches include classical antisemitic references, such as accusing Israel of "crucifying Palestinians". The context of Palestinian mass terror attacks, the mangled bodies, and the hatred against Israelis that promotes this inhuman behavior, is entirely erased.

An Israeli columnist recently witnessed Halper urging "his Muslim listeners in an American university to reject the Arab Peace Initiative, because it serves the Muslim tyrants. He told his listeners that Israel is actually a force that serves world capitalism, in the framework of the attempt to make enormous populations in the world disappear. The antisemites could not have said it better." To label such activities as promoting peace or remotely connected to university discourse is an insult to intelligent people. Recently, Halper's main benefactor, the European Union, rejected his application for renewed funding, but YorkUniversity – for reasons yet to be explained – is giving him the façade of academic legitimacy.

Amidst the long list of speakers, there are also few genuine academics – whom critics might dismiss as fig leaves for the hard-core propagandists -- but even here, the ideological range runs from strongly critical of Israel (but accepting the legitimacy of Jewish sovereign equality) to extremely critical (one-state promoters, tantamount to "wiping Israel off the map".) Although there are many academics whose research goes beyond one-dimensional Israel bashing, and examines the failures of Arab, Palestinian, and Moslem leaders to contribute to peace making, these dimensions are conspicuously absent from the program. In this Orwellian twist, the use of "academic freedom" is a mask for the crude censorship at York.

With so many obvious distortions, the defense offered by the President of York University is a farce. Without a free market of ideas, academic freedom, and even the concept of a university, is meaningless. Given a conference which fails to even hint at the complexity of the issues, the result is not censorship, but the transformation of the university into a macabre circus that sells hatred, martyrdom and murder.

In a free society, the circus, like the university, is open to all – as P.T. Barnum observed, "There's a sucker born every minute". But in the Middle East, such farces will only serve to fuel the vicious warfare and mass terror which has taken the lives of tens of thousands of Israelis, Palestinians, and others, and is escalating into nuclear confrontation. And York University has become an accomplice in this crime.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Illegal racist Zionist colonialist settler - Ehav Ever

Here is the sort of Zionist that right thinking (or left thinking) progressive people everywhere will love to exhibit as a racist colonialist western Zionist settler from America intruding on the rights of the oppressed Palestinian people -- the kind of Settler who in media canards is supposed to put on his Kippah and say a blessing before killing an Arab.

As a good right - thinking progressive would see it, Ehav Ever lives in the illegal colonialist Zionist settlement of Maaleh Edumim in the illegally occupied West Bank, next to the illegally occupied Arab city of Arab Jerusalem, which is where Suleiman the Arab Muslim built his temple, right? He is a rich and elitist Electrical Engineering graduate who works for an Israeli hi-tech firm, and he came on Aliya from the United States. The typical Christian Peace Teams stereotype of a male Jew settler. This is clearly the sort of racist colonialist Zionist guy Ken Loach and his friends would love to boycott, especially as Ehav Ever is opposed to a two state solution, which he thinks is besides the point. Go for it!

You can see Ehav Ever's Web log here: Hochma Umusar and you can see his video on Real Zionism too. In the video he explains why Israel belongs to Jewish people.

But in case you are too lazy to check it out (your loss), here's a hint about one fact about Ehav Ever that should be totally irrelevant, but that you might want to know. Here's his picture. When you write your articles and Web logs about the racist Zionist colonialist illegal settlers, be sure to include the picture, so everyone understands your point about racism.

"Zionism is racism" - right?

Ami Isseroff

Continued (Permanent Link)

Who Hates Who?

Who Hates Who?

http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/2009/05/who-hates-who.html

I've posted on the blog stories about the crazed slanders regarding Israel that are circulated in the Middle East and in countries like the UK (that play, remember?) often focussing on how Israelis allegedly teach their children to kill Arabs, hate Muslims, etc.

So a little reality. My nine-year-old son comes home today from school and remarks that it is Jerusalem Day. So, ask I, what did you learn? He begins as follows: "Jerusalem is holy to three religions, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity...."

More - Who Hates Who?

Continued (Permanent Link)

Israel's aid to USA??

This is worth keeping in mind when you read about the burden that Israel places on US taxpayers. There are obviously other things happening now and happening all the time, that we will learn about only in ten years, if ever. An interesting survey by David Elazar.

Israel Aid to the USA

...

David Elazar

Israel receives, in addition to political and moral support, $3 billion annually in foreign aid from the United States. Besides having a strong, democratic ally, what does the USA receive in return? The following bibliography is an attempt to put into perspective how Israel aids the USA and its citizens.

* Understanding the U.S.-Israel Alliance: An Israeli Response to the Walt-Mearsheimer Claim by Dore Gold General George F. Keegan, a retired U.S. Air Force intelligence chief, disclosed in 1986 that he could not have obtained the same intelligence that he received from Israel if he had "five CIAs." During his interview, at which time the Cold War was still raging, he added: "The ability of the U.S. Air Force in particular, and the Army in general, to defend whatever position it has in NATO owes more to the Israeli intelligence input than it does to any single source of intelligence. Sept 2007"

* Two-way independence: In many ways, Israel is the giver and the U.S. is the receiver By Yoram Ettinger "...Israel is the largest American aircraft carrier...saved the U.S. billions of dollars...F-16-responsible for 600 improvements...upgraded Hawkeye spy plane and the MD-500 chopper...bombed the Iraqi nuclear reactor...innovative Israeli technologies effect on civilian and agricultural industries... 05 Dec 2005

* MIGs to Nevada "Area 51 was used to train Navy and Air Force fighter pilots to fight USSR MiGs. Israel captured many MiGs in 1967, and they gave us a bunch of them. led directly to the F-4 'Phantom' turning around it's losses in Vietnam to a 14 to 1 kill ratio. They found the MiG's weaknesses and exploited them.

* Strategic Alliance "The U.S. and Israel share an unparalleled strategic relationship. Since a landmark 1985 agreement established the two allies as strategic partners, military cooperation has expanded to include the development of cutting-edge weapons systems, sharing of real-time intelligence and joint training exercises." (2005)

* "Army Says Israeli Armor Has Saved "Many" U.S. Lives in Iraq. The U.S. Army has thanked Israel for supplying it with armor for armored personnel carriers (APCs) in Iraq, the Israel21c website reported. The Israeli armor has saved "many lives," according to a letter sent by the Army to Rafael, the Israel Armament Development Authority. Israel expedited delivery of the armor to the United States to help protect American APCs from roadside bombs, which have killed more than 150 U.S. servicemen in Iraq.(March 2005)

* Technology Helps Prevent Mid-Air Mishaps "Mid-air helicopter crashes may become a thing of the past. The Lahav division of Israel Aircraft Industries has developed a system that predicts collisions during tactical missions and formation flights." (Oct 2004)

* Ben Gurion University develops anti-missile laser "used to develop a new airborne missile interception system in the US." (12 Jan 2004)

* USAF to equip with IAI conformal fuel tanks "F-16s...increase fuel carrying capacity by 50%." (28 Nov 2002)

* Passenger aircraft - anti-missile interception and detection system. Israeli company to complete development of operational system, the Passive Approach Warning System (PAWS), for detecting and disabling missiles fired against passenger aircraft.

* Light concrete-piercing bomb two US companies to jointly produce a revolutionary light-weight bomb capable of penetrating several meters of concrete. The bomb was developed in Israel. (14 Nov 2002)

* Super-chip system is global hit Motorola (NYSE:MOT) recently presented its third generation processors of this type, the PowerQUICC III series,developed in Israel. (12 Nov 2002)

* Instant messaging program ICQ developed in Israel, brought about a breakthrough in US military communications, and made US forces inAfghanistan many times more efficient, (03 Nov 2002)

* Aridic Soils of the United States and Israel This website is the result of a demonstration project funded by the International Arid Lands Consortium to design and create a WWW site for information on soils of arid regions of the U.S. and Israel. It was designed to provide information to assist those who would manage their impact on the soils of arid regions for sustainability.

* Bekaa Valley War June 1982, Israeli ground forces pushed into Lebanon in an effort to putan end to cross-border terror attacks. [Israeli developed] RPVs went in first to get the Syrian SAMs to turn on their radars. Then the F-4s destroyed them with high-speed anti-radiation missiles critical turning point in the deadly duel of fighters and SAMs operation threw military men (in Moscow) into a kind of shock" made the Soviets understand that Western technology was superior to theirs, and in this Czech general's view,the blow to the Bekaa Valley SAMs was part of the cascade of events leading to the collapse of the Soviet Union. (June 2002)

* Litening II-pluspods United States has deployed an Israeli-manufactured airborne targeting pod in the war in Afghanistan installed on the F-16 multi-role fighters laser spot capability that an American rival does not possess. (January 2002)

* ARROW ANTI-MISSILE MISSILE. IT IS A JOINT PROJECT -- WHERE THE UNITED STATES PROVIDES MOST OF THE MONEY, THE ISRAELIS -- MOST OF THE HIGH-TECH EXPERTISE.

ISRAEL IS SHARING RESEARCH LESSONS WITH THE UNITED STATES

See also a December 2002 article in the Christian Science Monitor

Continued (Permanent Link)

Peace initiative - Good for Israel?

Israel and the peace initiative

07.05. 2009
http://www.zionism-israel.com/log/archives/00000688.html
Original content copyright by the author
Zionism & Israel Center http://zionism-israel.com

The American sponsored peace initiative seems to have little rational thinking behind it and little chance of success. But while the President of the United States may not be right, he is certainly the President of the United States. Israel cannot afford to forget that. Nonetheless, Israel's first responsibility must be to ensure that it has a viable defense.

A great peace initiative is being undertaken by the United States. The general idea seems to bundle a remodeled Arab Peace Initiative for regional peace, Palestinian-Israeli peace based on a two state solution and a solution to the problem of Iranian nuclear weapons development. Lately, a fourth element was apparently added - general nuclear disarmament and arms control, including hints that the U.S. expects Israel to become a signatory of the Nuclear Non-proliferation treaty. All this will somehow, so the theory goes, make it easier for the United States to secure its withdrawal from Iraq, and prevent a disaster in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Continued here: Israel and the peace initiative

Continued (Permanent Link)

Netanyahu: Israel prepared to resume negotiations without preconditions - Iran is the common danger

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Speech at AIPAC

It's very good to be with all of you, and I want to thank all of you. I want to thank first the members of Congress who are assembled there, the leaders of , you David, Howard Friedman, Lee Rosenberg and Howard Kohr, all the delegates of AIPAC and the hundreds of students that are in the room, all the friends of Israel. I want to thank all of you for your unwavering support for Israel and for strengthening the great friendship between Israel and the United States.

As you said, I have met President Obama, I respect him and I look forward to seeing him in Washington in a couple of weeks. We plan to continue our common quest for security, for prosperity and for peace.

Friends, there is something significant that is happening today in the Middle East, and I can say that for the first time in my lifetime, I believe for the first time in a century, that Arabs and Jews see a common danger. This wasn't always the case. In the '30's and '40's, many in the Arab world supported another country believing that that was their hope. In the '60's, '70' and '80's, they supported another country that was at odds with the Jewish state. But this is no longer the case.

There is a great challenge afoot. But that challenge also presents great opportunities. The common danger is echoed by Arab leaders throughout the Middle East; it is echoed by Israel repeatedly; it is echoed by Europeans, by many responsible governments around the world. And if I had to sum it up in one sentence, it is this: Iran must not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons. If I had to sum up the opportunity in one word, it would be cooperation – cooperation between Israel and the Arab world and cooperation between Israel and the Palestinians.

Next week I'll be visiting Egypt with President Mubarak, and I plan to discuss both matters with him. We seek expanded relations with the Arab world. We want normalization of economic ties and diplomatic ties. We want peace with the Arab world. But we also want peace with the Palestinians. That peace has eluded us for more than 13 years. Six successive prime ministers of Israel and two American presidents have not succeeded in achieving this final peace settlement. I believe it is possible to achieve it, but I think it requires a fresh approach, and the fresh approach that I suggest is pursuing a triple track towards peace between Israel and the Palestinians – a political track, a security track, an economic track.

The political track means that we are prepared to resume peace negotiations without any delay and without any preconditions – the sooner the better. The security track means that we want to continue the cooperation with the program led by General Dayton, in cooperation with the Jordanians and with the Palestinian Authority to strengthen the security apparatus of the Palestinians. This is something we believe in and something that I think we can advance in a joint effort. The economic track means that we are prepared to work together to remove as many obstacles as we can to the advancement of the Palestinian economy. We want to work with the Palestinian Authority on this track, not as a substitute for political negotiations, but as a boost to them. I want to see Palestinian youngsters knowing that they have a future. I want them not to be hostage to a cult of death and despair and hate. I want them to have jobs. I want them to have career paths. I want them to know that they can provide for their families. This means that we can give them a future of hope, a future that means that there is prosperity for all. And this has proved to be successful in advancing a political peace in many parts of the world.

I believe that this triple track towards peace is the realistic path to peace, and I believe that with the cooperation of President Obama and President Abbas, we can defy the skeptics. We can surprise the world. But there are two provisos that I think have to be said at this point. First, peace will not come without security. If we abandon security, we'll have neither security nor peace. So I want to be very clear – we shall never compromise on Israel's security. Second, for a final peace settlement to be achieved, the Palestinians must recognize Israel as the Jewish state. They must recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

A few hours ago, I spoke at the Knesset. We marked the birthday of Theodore Herzl, the founding father of Zionism. Herzl revolutionized the history of the Jewish people, a people that was scattered and defenseless throughout the nations. He revolutionized Jewish history when he published a slim pamphlet called, "The Jewish State". This was our salvation and this is our foundation – the foundation of our future and the foundation of peace.

Good night from Jerusalem. God bless America. God bless Israel. Thank you all

Continued (Permanent Link)

Historian and author Michael Oren to be Israel's US Ambassador

Michael Oren is possibly the best man for the job of Israel ambassador to the United States, though he has no diplomatic experience. Media reports variously portray Oren variously as a "neocon" or a peacenik. Obviously, both assessments could not be correct, and either one is an oversimplification of a complex three-dimensional personality. Oren is a good speaker as well as being an accomplished historian. He has written "Six Days of War" about the Yom Kippur war and  "Power, Faith and Fantasy: America in the Middle East." The first book demonstrated a familiarity with how Israel "works" as well as an understanding of how to present it to a foreign audience. The second demonstrated an understanding of how American diplomacy "works" and of evolving American understanding of the Middle East. In other words, Oren speaks both Israeli and American. In the possibly difficult days ahead with the Obama administration, Oren might be best qualified to win American public support for Israeli positions and to put them in langauge that American officials can understand and identify with, as well as being able to read and translate the United States for the Netanyahu government.

 

However, promise is one thing and fullfilment is another. It would no doubt have been better if Oren had served in some lesser diplomatic post before being tapped for the most critical diplomatic posting for Israel, at a most critical time.

 

Last update - 19:37 02/05/2009       
Netanyahu candidate Michael Oren tapped as U.S. envoy
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent

 

Dr. Michael Oren is set to be appointed Israeli ambassador to Washington after Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman added his endorsement over the weekend.

 

Oren, who was Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's candidate for the position, received the endorsement following separate meetings with Netanyahu and Lieberman on Thursday.

 

The cabinet must now approve the appointment at its weekly meeting Sunday to set the decision in stone. Oren would then take up the position before Netanyahu's expected meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama in Washington on May 18 or 19.
 
Oren, a visiting Georgetown University professor, said in a lecture there last month, "The only alternative for Israel to save itself as a Jewish state is by unilaterally withdrawing from the West Bank and evacuating most of the settlements."

 

He beat several high-profile candidates for the position, including ex-Likud MK Zalman Shoval, who served twice before as ambassador to the United States, Dr. Dore Gold, who served as Israel's ambassador to the United Nations from 1997 to 1999, and Alon Pinkas, who served as Consul General in New York from 2000 to 2004

Continued (Permanent Link)

Barry Rubin: Two state dissolution?

Barry Rubin knows better than this. To a great extent, "Two state solution" is a slogan that is necessary for the sake of U.S. diplomacy, regardless of its utility as an actual policy.

Dissolving in the Two-State Solution

By Barry Rubin*

April 25, 2009

Ring! Ring! The Israeli prime minister's alarm clock went off. He quickly sat up in bed and immediately shouted out: "Yes! I'm for a two-state solution!"

At breakfast, lunch, and dinner, during his talks and all his meetings, in greeting his staff as he walked down the corridor to the office, endless he repeated that phrase.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what the world seems to want from Israeli policy.

But the fact is that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accepted the two-state solution back in 1997 when he took over in the midst of the Oslo agreement peace process and committed himself to all preceding agreements.

This is not the real issue. The real issue is this: much of the world wants Israel to agree in advance to give the Palestinian Authority (PA) what they think it wants without any concessions or demonstration of serious intent on its part.

Continued here: Dissolving in the Two-State Solution

Continued (Permanent Link)

Surprise: 'Lieberman says two states the only way'

The ultranationalist right wing, war monger expansionist neocon, racist, right wing (did I mention that?) Israeli FM of the right wing (did I mention that?) expansionist Zionist war criminal Israel government is reported to have said that a two state solution was the only way to achieve peace and security.

Go figure.

'Lieberman says two states the only way'

Apr. 25, 2009
JPost.com Staff , THE JERUSALEM POST

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman was "very moderate" during his meeting with Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman last week, and told him that a two-state solution with the Palestinians was the only way to achieve peace and security in the region, according to a report in the London-based Arab paper Al-Hayat Saturday.

The paper was quoting an unnamed Egyptian official who it described as "reliable." Lieberman, the official said, also told Suleiman that economical development of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip was of utmost importance to the peace process. The official said that the meeting between the two was successful and achieved its objective.

The Jerusalem Post could not confirm the report.

Regarding Gaza, the source said that the Israeli position on the subject was that any renewed cease-fire with Hamas was conditional to the release of Gilad Schalit, But, he added, any possible prisoner exchange for the abducted soldier has been put on hold as the new Israeli government studies the issue. The source said Suleiman had made it clear to Israeli officials that the current quiet on the Gaza front was due to understandings between Egypt and Hamas.

Israeli leaders told Suleiman that the strengthening of Israeli-Egyptian relations was at the top of their agenda, the official said. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, he added, was expected to visit Egypt following his upcoming visit to Washington.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Proactive foreign policy: Israel meeting the Obama challenge

..."Moderate" Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas has refused to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. From the beginning, that should have been the cornerstone of Israeli policy - Arabs, Palestinians included, must recognize the validity of the League of Nations British Mandate for Palestine and of UN General Assembly Resolution 181, both of which explicitly recognize the right of the Jewish people to self determination. After all, that is what the whole conflict is about. Once the Palestinians are will willing to accept international law, we can quibble about borders, refugees and other issues. President Obama's off-the-cuff remarks must be converted into a commitment by the United States to support the existence of Israel and its recognition by its Arab neighbors as the homeland of the Jewish people. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has already made a statement demanding that Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state. Too bad that demand was not part of Avigdor Lieberman's speech. It will be remembered, also, that Ehud Olmert made a similar effort and then mysteriously dropped it. This issue has to be a centerpiece of Israeli policy, raised at every opportunity. not just a sound bite to be used when the occasion seems to call for it.

Similarly, though it is not a prior condition for negotiations, everyone should be made to understand that Israel will assert the historic rights of the Jewish people in "East Jerusalem." The Palestinians have been allowed to establish a historical "fact on the ground" by dint of repetition: They have convinced at least themselves, and perhaps much of the world, that they have a "right" to a capital in East Jerusalem, even though Jerusalem was never the capital of any Arab state, and was not even included in the Palestinian area in the 1947 partition plan. Jerusalem was always known as the ancient capital of Jewish people, and the old city had a large Jewish community until it was ethnically cleansed in pogroms beginning in 1920 and culminating in the expulsion of the remaining Jews by force by the Jordanian Legion in 1948. Absurdly, a sizeable part of world opinion now believes that somehow "East Jerusalem" ought to be the capital of an Arab state and that Israel and the Jews have no rights there.

On these bases, when it is clear what is is being negotiated and what the end of the process will be for Israel, and it is clear that the agreements will be kept at least by the Fatah lead Palestinian Authority, it makes sense to continue negotiations. If they have any intellectual honesty, even the most enthusiastic proponents of "Annapolis" in the USA and in the EU would have a hard time explaining why Israel has to negotiate and what is to be negotiated with a partner that declares that its constituent groups - containing the same personnel who do the negotiating - are not bound by any agreements, and that the end goal of the negotiations is to destroy Israel as a Jewish state. But we can hardly expect others to agree with this point of view if the Israel Foreign Ministry itself has not advanced it at every opportunity.

Read the whole article here:

Proactive foreign policy: Israel meeting the Obama challenge

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Guardian's Gaza war crimes goof

When ludicrousness stops being funny, the Guardian Gaza report

I thought there is little more to add on the Guardian videos accusing the IDF of war crimes during the Gaza operation, given what has already been written in ZioNation, in the Jerusalem Post by the indispensable Melanie Philips and more, and more. And more as these lines are been written, but apparently, there is more to add.

In the first video I was struck by the Guardian reporter's decision to go to the Israeli website 'Shavuz' for technical information about Israel's unmanned drones capabilities. Shavuz is Hebrew slang for 'worn-out' or over worked. The site serves primarily as a service for soldiers before enlisting and before rejoining civilian lives. It gives advices on jobs, and academic courses along with social interactions in forums, exchange of war stories, and other army life experiences. IT IS NOT a supplier of professional information on Israel's technological capabilities; there are plenty of other sites and publication for that, many of them in English. Using 'Shavuz' for information on technology is the equivalent of using the 'London Employment Help Center' for information on the electronics of the London Tube. It is simply ludicrous; unfortunately there is nothing here to laugh at.

This link from 'Shavuz' would have given the Guardian part of the answer to their repeated question as to why so many civilians were hurt. In it Israeli pilots recall how Hamas operatives were dressed as women so the Israeli forces won't fire on them. More: When ludicrousness stops being funny, the Guardian Gaza report

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IDF Investigation Refutes the Testimonies About Gaza Killings.

IDF Investigation Refutes the Testimonies About Gaza Killings.

Maariv in (Hebrew)

22.3.09

[Complete translation by Israel News ]

Today, Sunday, an IDF officer whose troops fought in Gaza will present the conclusions of his personal investigation in the wake of testimony of soldiers in his brigade about incidents of killing of Palestinian civilians during Operation Cast Lead. The investigation reveals that in at least two of the incidents mentioned in the testimony, which raised a storm of public controversy, no Palestinian women were killed as had been claimed.

Two central incidents that were brought to light in the testimony, which Danny Zamir, the head of the Rabin pre-military academy presented to Chief of Staff Gaby Ashkenazi, focus on one infantry brigade. Today the brigade's commander will present the findings of his personal investigation about the matter which he undertook in the last few day to Brigadier General Eyal Eisenberg, commander of the Gaza division,, and after approval, he will present his findings to the head of the Southern Command, Major General Yoav Gallant.

Light Finger on the trigger

Regarding the incident in which it was claimed that a sniper fired at a Palestinian woman and her two daughters, the brigade commander's investigation cites the sniper: "I saw the woman and her daughters and I shot warning shots. The section commander came up to the roof and shouted at me, ?Why did you shoot at them.' I explained that I did not shoot at them, but I fired warning shots."

Officers from the brigade suspect that fighters who remained in the lower story of the Palestinian house thought that he hit the the women, and from there the rumor that a sniper killed a mother and her two daughters spread.

Regarding the second incident, in which it was claimed that soldiers went up to the roof to entertain themselves with firing and killed an elderly Palestinian woman, the brigade commander investigation found that there was no such incident.

According to one of the officers, "The number of terrorists killed and the extent of arrests in "Operation Cast Lead" varied from brigade to brigade because the troops fought in different areas, and as part of the tradition there is always competition to show that your brigade is more combat ready. Nonetheless, the official evaluation has not yet begun and among field commanders there is a fear that troops will bring to light additional incidents that took place during the fighting.

An officer of an elite unit that fought deep in Palestinian territory in Operation Cast Lead told NRG Maariv, "There was a light trigger finger during operation Cast Lead without a doubt, and non-combatant ("uninvolved") civilians were killed without doubt. But there was no deliberate harm done to innocent civilians. I am fully convinced that there was no soldier who shot for no reason out of a desire for revenge. I don't know of any such cases.

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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

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'Durban II' draft resolution drops Israel criticism

If this is factual, it is good news. The question remains, whether the meeting itself will be turned into a circus.

Draft for 'Durban II' meeting drops Israel criticism
Mar. 17, 2009
Associated Press , THE JERUSALEM POST

Muslim-backed references to 'defamation of religion' and Israel have been dropped from a draft being prepared for next month's world racism meeting, United Nations officials said on Tuesday.

The draft now speaks only of concern about the "negative stereotyping of religions" and does not single out Israel for criticism.

Muslim countries had demanded free speech be limited to prevent criticism of Islam and other faiths. They also wanted to take Israel to task for its treatment of Palestinians.

Israel and Canada have said that they will boycott the April 20-25 meeting in Geneva. The United States and Italy said that they would not attend unless countries committed to a balanced declaration. The European Union warned it may stay away unless Muslim countries back down.

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Amos Oz: ISRAEL MUST DEFEND ITS CITIZENS

(Evidently a translation of remarks made to "Bild" -- no original Web provenance can be found. This comment by Dovish Israeli author Amos Oz appears to have been penned just before Operation "Cast Lead")

ISRAEL MUST DEFEND ITS CITIZENS

Amos Oz

"The systematic bombing of the citizens in Israel's towns and cities is a war crime and a crime against humanity. The State of Israel must defend its citizens. It is obvious to everyone that the Israeli government does not wish to enter Gaza; the government would rather continue the ceasefire that Hamas violated and finally revoked. But the suffering of the citizens surrounding Gaza cannot go on.

The reluctance to enter Gaza stems not from indecisiveness but from well knowing that Hamas is actually eager to cause Israel to embark on a military operation: If dozens or even hundreds of Palestinian civilians, women and children are killed in an Israeli action, radicalism would gain strength in Gaza, Abu Mazen's rule in the West Bank might collapse, and Hamas extremists could replace him.

The Arab world will rally together around the atrocious sights that Al-Jazeera will air from Gaza, and the world court of public opinion will rush to accuse Israel of war crimes. This is the same court of public opinion that remains unmoved by the systematic bombing of population centers in Israel.

Massive pressure will be exerted on Israel to restrain itself. No such pressure will be placed on Hamas because there is no one to pressure them, and there is almost nothing left with which to pressure them. Israel is a country; Hamas is a gang.

What remains for us to do? The best thing for Israel is to achieve a total ceasefire in exchange for alleviating the blockade of Gaza. If Hamas insists on refusing the ceasefire and continues bombing Israeli citizens, we must take care lest the military action play into Hamas' hands. Hamas' calculation is simple, cynical and evil: If innocent Israelis are killed – good. If innocent Palestinians are killed – even better."

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Abbas: Olmert agreed that East Jerusalem should be Palestinian-ruled

Abbas: Olmert agreed that East Jerusalem should be Palestinian-ruled
Date: 26 / 11 / 2008  Time:  16:45    

 

Ramallah – Ma'an Exclusive – Outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has accepted that East Jerusalem should be placed under Palestian control, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Wednesday.

 

In addition, Israel has recognized the existence of only 200,000 Palestinian refugees from the violence at its creation in 1948, Abbas said.

 

Abbas said this recognition took place in secret final-status negotiations with Israeli negotiators. Israel's acknowledgment of these refugees falls short of the list of 950,000 refugees the Palestinian Authority says were expelled in 1948, along with five million total refugees and their descendants, the Palestinian president claimed.

 

Abbas revealed this and other information about the negotiations with Israel and with his Palestinian rival, the Hamas movement, during a two-hour meeting with senior Fatah officials in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

 

Abbas said the Palestinian leadership takes the negotiations seriously: "Those who think that we sit with Israelis for sake of publicity; they are wrong."

 

"We armed ourselves with documents, maps, data and statistics ahead of each session and we have a fortified, professional expert negotiating team. We get prepared each time as if studying before class at school," he said.

 

Abbas said that he had rejected an Israeli offer of a Palestinian state that would include 92% of the land of the West Bank, saying that he would not accept any deal that left out even 1% of the land.

 

Abbas also explained that Israel had hesitated to make a firm commitment to the pre-1967 borders during the negotiations. However, in recent meetings, Israeli leaders had finally accepted that occupied East Jerusalem ought to be a part of the Palestinian State.

 

He said: "Whenever we asked them about the borders they had usually responded that they are not so sure. Only in the last two sessions they recognized those borders including East Jerusalem, as Olmert explained that a two-state solution is the best choice and Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem should be ruled by PA."

 

The president also recounted an anecdote about his first meeting with United States President George W. Bush. After presenting the US leader with a map of the West Bank showing the route of the separation wall and other Israeli installments, Bush became angry, throwing the maps in the face of an assistant.

 

"This way there won't be a Palestinian state and Israel is cutting off the road to a solution," Abbas reported Bush as saying.

 

Abbas said that when he went to Switzerland he was asked why he rejected Hamas' suggestion of a Palestinian state with temporary borders. He said he replied that he advised Hamas leader Isma'il Haniyeh at the time to stop making such suggestions, as he sees them as harmful to the negotiations with Israel.

 

He said Hamas's suggestion of a long-term truce with Israel would actually stabilize the current situation, with Palestinians controlling less than 60% of the West Bank and Gaza, and the Israeli wall remaining in place.

 

Abbas said that Hamas is damaging the Palestinian national cause out of anger of their exclusion from politics, "destroying the game because they are not allowed to play."

 

Blaming Hamas for the collapse of Palestinian internal talks, Abbas also criticized Israel for refusing to allow Palestinian political leaders from the West Bank representing Fatah, the PFLP, and the DFLP, to travel to the talks in Cairo.

 

Abbas said that three points must be accepted in order for the dialogue with Hamas to proceed: The presence of Arab forces to support Palestinian security forces, reform of the Palestinian government and simultaneous presidential and legislative elections.

 

Abbas also said that that the Palestinian prisoners slated for release by Israel before the upcoming Eid Al-Adha holiday include lawmakers and prisoners serving long sentences. 

 

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Settler Rabbi Arrested for Incitement

Yeshiva head arrested for 'incitement'

 

Yaakov Katz

The Jerusalem Post

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1226404841467&pagename=JPost%2FJPArti...

Rabbi Yigal Shandrapi, the head of Yeshuat Mordechai Yeshiva, is expected to be brought before the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court on Wednesday for a remand hearing, after police from the Judea and Samaria Division arrested him on Tuesday on suspicion of inciting Jewish youth to riot.

According to the allegations, Shandrapi incited the teenagers two separate cases, the most recent of which occurred two months ago at the Yad Yair outpost, in the West Bank. During that incident, soldiers described being attacked and said that their vehicles were damaged.

Meanwhile, nearly 40 Jewish youth reportedly rampaged through the streets of a Palestinian neighborhood in Hebron overnight Tuesday, puncturing car tires and shattering windows in Arab homes.

The youths were also suspected of spray-painting a Star of David on one of the houses in the area.

While no arrests had been made, police were investigating the incident.

Responding to the latest developments, the chairman of the Knesset Interior Committee, MK Ophir Paz-Pines (Labor), called on Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Public Security Minister Avi Dichter to clamp down on the offenders.

"This is an additional crossing of a red line by organized, dangerous thugs, and it must be responded to with the utmost seriousness and gravity," Paz-Pines said. "The police must immediately initiate a thorough investigation and start a series of arrests in order to put an end to the 'Wild West' in Hebron, and to establish, without hesitation, the rule of law."

Meanwhile, Barak warned on Wednesday that if settlers do not voluntarily evacuate the dispute four-story building in Hebron, known as Beit Hashalom, the defense ministry will evacuate them by force.

Speaking during a tour of the IDF's Hebron brigade, Barak stressed that the evacuation would be carried out by police and that the IDF would provide surrounding support.

Barak also harshly criticized the recent violence and said that any harm inflicted on a soldier or policeman or anyone who represented the state of Israel was a "grave incident which expands the rift which is already harming the gentle fabric of democracy in Israel."

Barak said Israel must "arrest these attackers, punish them with all the severity of the law, since their actions are aimed at undermining the authority of the State."

The defense minister, toured the area with IDF Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi and OC Central Command Maj.-Gen. Gadi Shamni.

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Obama: Silly Season continues

Optimist that I am, I thought that with the end of the USA election campaign, the flood of silly season emails would dry up. (See Get with it: Obama hopes and fears. It has not dried up. It has in fact, gotten sillier if anything.

Mr. Obama is not yet president. He has done nothing at all about the Middle East. There is no real evidence on which to base any opinion of his Middle East policies, and yet these "Zionists" are going full speed ahead, pillorying Obama and his administration as allies of the Hamas.

Over the past few days I am sorry to say that the level of accusations made against Barack Obama has deteriorated. I have gotten mail claiming that Obama uses hypnosis to convince people, and there is a "story" out there in "Zionist" publications claiming that Obama is the son of Malcolm X.

Barack Obama has announced one appointment. It was not Louis Farakhan or Robert Malley or Rashid Khalidi or Jesse Jackson. It was a Palestinian though, just as the doomsayers have been predicting. A Jewish Palestinian, though. He appointed Rahm Emanuel to be the White House Chief of Staff. This is not a policy position, but as the presidential gatekeeper Emanuel will have a certain amount of power. In some administrations, this post is more important than others. Emanuel's family has an interesting history. Their uncle, Emanuel Auerbach, was killed by Arabs in Jerusalem in 1933, and the family took the name "Emanuel" in his honor. Emanuel's father was a messenger for the Irgun. As can be expected, this was not pleasing to Electronic Intifada editor and supposed Obama friend Ali Abunimah.
Continued here:

Obama and Israel - first signs

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Livni: I oppose Olmert's peace plan

Livni says what everyone knows: Neither Israel nor the Palestinians are ready to make a deal.

Last update - 01:50 06/10/2008
Livni tells France's Kouchner: I oppose Olmert's peace plan
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent and News Agencies

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told her French counterpart Bernard Kouchner that she opposes the agreement in principle that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has offered Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

"I do not believe in far-reaching proposals and an attempt to expedite matters, especially in light of the political situation," Livni, the prime minister-designate, told Kouchner on Sunday.

In the morning, Kouchner met with Olmert, who said he was frustrated that Abbas had not accepted his proposal. "You've read what I said in the interview," Olmert told Kouchner, referring to his statements in Yedioth Ahronoth favoring concessions. "Still, the Palestinians do not want to sign."

Kouchner raised the matter later when he met with Livni and asked why she objects to Olmert's proposal. Olmert's plan proposes a comprehensive solution on borders and refugees and postpones a decision on Jerusalem.

Livni's explanation was a criticism of Olmert. "Abu Mazen [Abbas] in his present political situation cannot accept such an agreement," she said. "The political situation in Israel also does not allow it to be signed."

Livni also argued that blaming the Palestinians for refusing to accept Olmert's offer does no good. "We can say this is their fault - but what will that do?" she said. "We had the same thing after Camp David in 2000 and look where that got us."

Livni: Annapolis will continue, regardless of political upheaval
Earlier Sunday, in her first foreign policy address since winning the Kadima party primary, Livni voiced her commitment to continue peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

"Annapolis will continue," Livni said, referring to a U.S.-sponsored peace conference last November that restarted negotiations on a Palestinian state.

"Let us not allow dates or political changes to stand in our way," she said, in her address to Foreign Ministry conference on policy and strategy in Jerusalem.

"The point is to understand the required concessions in order to conduct a correct process," Livni said.

Sunday's conference marked the first of what is to be annual assessments of Israel's foreign policy, and was also attended by Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Malki.

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Christians & Jews eat dinner with Ahmadinejad

Well meaning Christians and Jews decided to have Iftar dinner (part of the Ramadan holiday) with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Or maybe they were not so well meaning, since nobody can ignore who Ahmadinejad is and what he stands for.

Dinner with Ahmadinejad reminds me of an old joke about poor Pedro the Mexican peasant. One day little weak old Pedro was going along the road with his oxcart. A famous Mexican bandit, the Sonora Hombre, and his men came down the road at a gallop. They could not pass the laden oxcart.

"You," shouted the Hombre waving his gun and firing in the air, "get down off your cart."

Pedro got off the cart.

The Hombre pointed his gun at Pedro's temple and said, "You see the horse crap there? Eat it!"

Pedro reluctantly ate.

The Hombre and his men pushed the cart off the cliff, mounted their horses and went on their way.

A few weeks later, Pedro was in saloon in a small town.

Someone came in and yelled, "Vamenos Muchachos - the Sonora Hombre is coming! Vamenos!"

Pedro sat still.

The bartender said, "Aren't you afraid of the Sonora Hombre?"

"No, I know the Sonora Hombre. I am not afraid."

"You, Pedro, you know the Sonora Hombre?"

"Si, I know him. We had lunch together."

All this by way of introduction...

Ami Isseroff

Breaking Fast With a Hate-Monger
Opinion

By Bruce Chilton
Thu. Oct 02, 2008

Iftar is a beautiful custom within the liturgical practice of Islam. During Ramadan, the month of fasting, sunset marks the time when food may be taken again. Families and communities offer meals for friends and neighbors, often inviting those who are not practicing Muslims to join with them in sharing special dishes. This can be a relaxed and congenial setting for interfaith dialogue, especially among those who have inherited the biblical tradition, those whom the Quran calls "the people of the book." The same chapter of the Quran that deals with how and when the fast should be broken also speaks of "the people of the book," and hospitality is deeply rooted in Islamic theology.

Iran's mission to the United Nations recently co-sponsored an Iftar at New York's Grand Hyatt hotel, with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as the featured guest. The meeting was co-hosted by Christian groups, most notably by the Mennonites, the Quakers and the World Council of Churches. The event had an ennobling theme, "Has not one God created us? The significance of religious contributions to peace."

The result, however, was anything but ennobling.

Many organizations — both Christian and non-Christian — had criticized the September 25 event in advance. Documented policies of religious oppression within Iran and the Islamic Republic's nuclear program provoked deep concern about the Iftar and engendered anger at its Christian co-sponsors.

The Mennonites and the Quakers survived the persecution of their leaders during the 16th and 17th centuries. Their response was to articulate clear theologies of pacifism, which remain influential to this day among all those who ponder the relationship between violence and morality. So what purpose did they believe they served in co-sponsoring Ahmadinejad's evening breakfast?

The event's Christian co-sponsors made it plain that they by no means wished to signal agreement with all of Ahmadinejad's policies and statements. Their intent was to treat him, not as a pariah, but rather as a leader with whom dialogue is necessary. Part of their agenda, as explained by the American Friends Service Committee, a prominent Quaker organization that co-hosted the Iftar, was to rebuke the Bush administration for what they regard as its confrontational posture toward Iran. And yet, Ahmadinejad, in his speech to the General Assembly two days earlier, was himself nothing if not confrontational toward the United States. "American empire in the world is reaching the end of its road," he said. The Christian co-hosts of the Iftar dinner may or may not agree with this sort of rhetoric, but that was far from the only inflammatory passage in his speech.

Ahmadinejad has long been embroiled in controversy over his statements regarding the State of Israel. Some have argued that he has not exactly called for Israel to be wiped off the map, but merely wished for it to collapse, as the Soviet Union did. Either way, his feelings toward the Jewish state are undeniably ugly, and he made his hostility unmistakably clear in his General Assembly speech. "In Palestine, 60 years of carnage and invasion is still ongoing at the hands of some criminal and occupying Zionists," he said. His proposed solution was for a "free referendum" to set up a new state in order to replace the regime that, in his words, has "no way for it to get out of the cesspool created by itself and its supporters."

This is what Ahmadinejad had to say the day before his Iftar for peace. His remarks are consistent with his previous statements, but the juxtaposition of his speech and the Iftar only highlighted the irresponsibility of the event's Christian co-sponsors.

Christians can and do differ over the degree of support that Israel should be accorded, over how to respond to Iran's nuclear ambitions and over how the Islamic Republic of Iran should be treated. But in his speech to the United Nations the day before the Iftar, Ahmadinejad staked out a position that no theologically aware Christian can condone.

In terms reminiscent of "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," the antisemitic tract that poisoned Europe at the beginning of the 20th century, Ahmadinejad spoke out against what he called a "Zionist network," complaining that "they have been dominating an important portion of the financial and monetary centers as well as the political decision-making centers of some European countries and the U.S. in a deceitful, complex and furtive manner." This incitement to hatred complements Ahmadinejad's well-known proclivity to deny the reality of the Holocaust.

Moments come to Christians, as to other people of conscience, when they need to recognize that a person or a movement has set itself in direct opposition to their principles. Ahmadinejad has deliberately resorted to a tradition of hate speech whose intended consequence — proven repeatedly by hard experience — is violence against Jews. The pogroms of the Middle Ages, abetted by corrupt church leaders and a theology that endorsed murder, formed the background of Hitler's genocide.

No one can claim ignorance in regard to the consequences of the kind of antisemitism that Ahmadinejad has expressed. Christians of conscience need unequivocally to reject his position, and to cease supporting events that are little more than photo opportunities for an erratic politician who faces waning legitimacy abroad and dwindling support at home.

The Rev. Bruce Chilton is director of the Institute of Advanced Theology at Bard College and chairs the Episcopal-Jewish Relations Committee for the Episcopal Diocese of New York. He is the author, most recently, of "Abraham's Curse: The Roots of Violence in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam" (Doubleday).

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U.S. to sell 25 F-35 fighter aircraft to Israel

U.S. approves sale of 25 F-35 fighter planes to Israel

By Haaretz Correspondents and Agencies , By Amos Harel, Yuval Azoulay and Natasha Mozgovaya

 

The United States government said Tuesday it had approved the sale to Israel of 25 F-35 Joint Strike Fighter aircraft and an option for 50 more in coming years, for a deal valued at up to $15.2 billion.

 

The Pentagon's Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said the deal is vital to U.S. national security interests to assist Israel as it develops and to maintain "a strong and ready self-defense capability."
 

Israel needs the aircraft built by the Lockheed Martin Corp to enhance its air-to-air and air-to-ground defense, the agency said.

 

The DSCA notified Congress about the proposed sale before lawmakers head back to their districts for the November election. Lawmakers now have 30 days to block the sales, but such action is rare, since the agreements are usually carefully vetted beforehand.

 

The Israeli embassy in Washington made a concerted effort to have the deal approved by the current Congress, and a critical development in the legislation was achieved this weekend.

 

The next stage would be Israeli and American defense officials signing the agreement, enabling the provision of the aircraft by 2014.

 

The Pentagon agency said Israel wants to buy an initial 25 F-35s in the Conventional Take-Off and Landing (CTOL) configuration, with an option to buy an additional 50 F-35 CTOL or Short Take-Off and Vertical Landing (STOVL) aircraft.

 

All aircraft would be equipped with either the F-135 engine built by Pratt and Whitney, a unit of United Technologies, or the F-136 engine being developed by General Electric Co. and Britain's Rolls-Royce.

 

Lockheed Martin said it welcomes the decision. "As the first potential foreign military sale of the F-35, this would be an important first step in expanding interest in the Joint Strike Fighter beyond the U.S. government and eight international F-35 partner nations," said Lockheed spokesman Tom Jurkowsky.

 

Earlier in September the Pentagon approved up to $330 million in three separate arms deals for Israel.

 

Top Israeli and U.S. officials met in Washington last month for the most senior bilateral high-tech talks between the two allies. Discussions focused in part on ensuring that sensitive technologies were not passed to third parties.

 

An Israeli embassy spokesman called the latest deal further proof of the countries' special relationship, as Israel is the first country outside NATO to receive the aircraft, each of which cost about $50 million.

 

The Israel Air Force is expected to send pilots to the U.S. to train on the planes once the sale is complete. Israel's military industry will also be involved in the aircraft's operation, providing various electronic support systems.

 

Acquisition of the plane represents a significant boost to Israel's security capabilities, as it can be used both for bombing missions and in aerial combat, possessing advanced stealth capabilities.

 

Senior security officials and the Israel Defense Forces General Staff expressed broad support for the sale, but some senior IDF officers expressed dissatisfaction with its timing. They said the sale should have been postponed by a year and the funds used to buy tank defense systems and armored personnel carriers, two elements they said are currently lacking among ground forces.

 

The F-35 can flying large distances without refueling and can cover the distance between Israel and Iran. It is designed to carry a variety of advanced weapons and radar devices.

 

The F-35 is considered the "last manned aircraft," as aviation experts believe aerial combat will be conducted largely by unmanned aircraft in the coming years. Its maiden flight was in December 2006.

 

Israel had expressed interest in acquiring the F-22, considered the only "fifth-generation" combat aircraft in the world, but was prevented from doing so by a U.S. Congress bill prohibiting its sale to any other countries in order to preserve the combat superiority of the U.S. Air Force.

 

While the F-22 uses a twin engine, the F-35 runs on a high-powered single engine designed by Pratt & Whitney.

 

Meanwhile, Lockheed Martin is expected to complete its sale of 102 F-16 aircraft to Israel by the end of the year.

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Barak: Arab areas in Jerusalem could be Palestinian capital

Israel Defense Minister Ehud Barak has said some Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem could become the capital of a future Palestinian state as part of a final peace agreement. This is no different from the formula he offered in 2000. Palestinians continue to insist that Israel has no national rights whatever in East Jerusalem. The late Yasser Arafat amazed American politicians by claiming repeatedly that there had been no Jewish presence in Jerusalem in antiquity. Archeological finds give evidence of the Jewish monarchy as early as King Hezekiah in 700 BC and ancient writers commonly referred to Jerusalem as the former Jewish capital, but Palestinian leaders pretend this evidence does not exist. Arafat's views were frequently seconded by the former Mufti of Jerusalem, Ikremah Sabri.

Prior to 1948, about 5,000 Jews lived in the Jewish quarter of the Old City. The community underwent attrition due to Arab riots in 1929 and 1936. In 1948, the entire community was ethnically cleansed by the Transjordan Legion under the supervision of British officers. East Jerusalem was also the site of the original campus of the Hebrew University, which was reconstituted after 1967. Arab media however, ignore the Jewish connection to East Jerusalem in modern times as well as ancient, and commonly refer to it as "Arab East Jerusalem" on the basis of the 19 year illegal Jordanian occupation.

East Jerusalem is also the site of Masjid Al Aqsa and the Dome of the Rock, important Muslim holy places.

Fatah leaders have been promising a Palestinian state with its capital in Jerusalem since the signing of the Oslo accords, though Israel never undertook to cede all of Jerusalem or any of it as part of a peace setltement.

"We can find a formula under which certain neighborhoods, heavily-populated Arab neighborhoods, could become, in a peace agreement, part of the Palestinian capital that, of course, will include also the neighboring villages around Jerusalem," Barak told Al-Jazeera television.

"I'm not sure whether the gaps are close enough," Barak said when asked if a deal was possible this year.

Officially, Israel is not discussing Jerusalem with the Palestinians at all, since the non-Zionist ultraorthodox Shas party insisted they would leave the coalition if any concessions were offered in Jerusalem. Orthodox and ultraorthodox Jews in the United States and Israel, rather than Zionists, are the chief opposition to Israeli compromise on the issue. As long as the Palestinians remain intent on excluding Israel entirely from East Jerusalem, the issue of Israeli compromise is a moot point.

Ami Isseroff

Continued (Permanent Link)

Mahmoud Abbas insists on ROR, urges Lebanese discrimination against Palestinians

 

Everyone knows that a dog in Israel has more rights than a Palestinian refugee in Lebanon. It is natural for Mahmoud Abbas to try to ingratiate himself with the Lebanese and calm their fears that, horror of horrors, Palestinians might want to settle in Lebanon. But Abbas went on to insist that the Palestinians are seeking "Right of Return" to Israel, a solution that he knows Israel has to reject.

 

Ami Isseroff

 

Abbas: Don't resettle Palestinians in Lebanon

Published: 08/28/2008

[JTA] Mahmoud Abbas said he objects to the permanent resettlement of Palestinians in Lebanon. 

"The Palestinians have the right of return and this is an issue we are discussing with the Israelis," the Palestinian Authority president, meeting in Beirut on Thursday with Lebanese President Michel Suleiman, told reporters.

About 400,000 Palestinians live in 12 refugee camps in Lebanon. Most of them arrived in Lebanon in 1948 or are descendants of those refugees. The camps are a hotbed of ferment, with occasional outbursts of violence.

Abbas also called for a "comprehensive" solution to the Israeli-Arab conflict, including returning the Golan Heights to Syria and resolving the dispute between Israel and Lebanon over the border-area Shebaa Farms.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Israelis abroad make excuses

Roi Ben Yehuda is an Israeli, or ex-Israeli, who lives in Spain and writes frequently for Ha'aretz. He previously (see 'Epiphany in a Spanish neo-Nazi bookstore,' Haaretz June 15, 2008) alleged that a Neo-Nazi Book shop is selling anti-Semitic materials in Barcelona. He further alleged that "just about everywhere he looked" he saw swastikas and anti-Nazi graffit. These claims were made by no-one else to my knowledge. They made Barcelona sound like a description of Berlin in 1932. This assertion could not be verified by a friend living in Spain. She notes that the sale of such materials is forbidden by Spanish law and that she did not see much graffiti in or posters of the type described in Barcelona. Perhaps others can enlighten us. Roi's story about Nazi bookstores and graffiti in Spain is therefore dubious, to say the least.

Roi's latest article tells us that many people, including apparently himself, believe that you can be an Israeli living in Spain or the United States or some other country. (See "Why Jews can have more than one home," Haaretz August 26, 2008). As Roi notes, there are as many as 600,000 such "Israelis" living in the United States.

This concept of "Israeli Lite" is shared by many Israelis living abroad. But the truth is that most people can have only one home and are not happy with split identities. You can be an Israeli with Spanish or American citizenship or an American with ties to Israel, but you cannot really be both an American and an Israeli at the same time.

If you live and work in the United States or Spain, your children will learn Spanish or English, and not Hebrew, and they will be Spanish or American. It is not likely they will be Israeli. Sooner or later, they or their children or their grandchildren are going to decide they are not Israelis. Roi is going to find himself less and less Israeli the longer he lives in Spain.

Everyone must make their own choices, but I am fascinated by the phenomenon of Jews who insist on living in various European countries: Spain, Poland, Germany, and also insist on complaining about anti-Semitism in those countries. All those countries have a history of anti-Semitism of course. If you live in France, expect good wine. If you live in Spain or Poland, expect the characteristic specialties of those countries.

In my view, living in Spain and complaining about anti-Semitism is like eating ripe Camembert and complaining about the taste. Often, these claims are clearly exaggerated, as happened in a hoax letter circulated about French anti-Semitism. Is anti-Semitic persecution a part of the "Jewishness" of these folks?

Roi is entitled to his opinion. The question is, why Ha'aretz wants to publish it.

More interesting is the question of why Sara Miller of Ha'aretz, as well as Roi Ben Yehuda himself sent me letters trying to tell me what I can and cannot write about Roi Ben Yehuda and claiming that what I wrote was 'libelous.' Of course, Ha'aretz would be justifiably upset if someone tried to censor them. What I wrote can scarcely be libelous unless there is indeed a major Nazi revival in Barcelona, which no other journalist has reported. Nor did anyone else report that everywhere they looked in Barcelona there are Swastikas. And if it is "libelous," what are we to make of the writings of Gideon Levi, Amira Hass and Yitzhak Laor about Israelis and Zionists? Is Ha'aretz prepared to guarantee that every accusation they make is absolutely grounded in fact and provable in a court of law?

As I have no desire for legal problems with Ha'aretz, the article is duly altered, but the message is the same.
Ami Isseroff

Continued (Permanent Link)

Are there limits to Stupidity?

Snoopy T. Goon at Simply Jews has a friendly dispute with Norman Geras of Normblog. The question at issue is whether there are limits to stupidity. Geras asserted that there are limits to stupidity. His own contribution however, was not encouraging for his theory. He found a stupid quote by George Bush, but promptly found an even stupider distortion of the quote by a Guardian writer.  Presumably one could find a stupider (according to that definition of "stupid") discussion of the stupid distortion of the stupid Bush quote, and then someone would misunderstand the discussion and write up their misunderstanding and so on in infinite progression.   

Indeed, in Beg pardon, Norm 2, Snoopy insists there are no limits to stupidity,  He gives the example of Richard Silverstein equating all of the following: Palestinian Poet Mahmoud Darwish, Israeli dovish leftist poet Yehuda Amichai, Robert Frost and Ezra Pound. Amichai and Pound??? Darwish or Amichai as great as Robert Frost?  Give us a break.

 

But I have the temerity to differ with both learned gentleman. The examples they give are not examples of stupidity, but of arrogance, perversity, hypocrisy, bad taste or intentional and malicious distortion. All of these are unlimited. Stupidity must be limited, at least in Web logs.  If a person is sufficiently stupid they would be unable to write a Web log, so we are generally spared the worst examples of stupidity. Of course, one can alway argue about whether stupidiy exists independent of an observer, like the question of the tree that may nor may not exist if nobody is looking. If a stupid Web log is not written, is it still stupid?  But that is a question for metaphysicians.

 

Likewise ignorance, an element whose natural abundance should never be underestimated, must be limited. A theoretically totally ignorant person would know nothing at all - there is a finite bound to this quality. 

 

These are each different qualities. I will illustrate some of the differences. 

 

1. Arrogance - In a private e-group, someone, an American,  insisted that knew all about the The Balfour Declaration and proceeded to "explain" it to me. That was arrogance. I often get lectured by such persons on the history of my country and my people.  I don't presume to lecture Chinese people on the history of the long march or the Ming Dynasty, but everyone seems to think they know more about Israeli history than I do, and they are always willing to impart their "knowledge." I have 'learned" some very strange things from such people.

 

2. Perversity - The first point made by our would-be instructor was that contrary to Zionist propaganda, the purpose of the Balfour declaration was equally to protect the rights of the Palestinian Arabs as well as to grant a state to the Jews in Palestine. Since the declaration was quite soon rejected by the Arabs and immediately hailed by the Jews, and since everyone including Balfour himself as well as the League of Nations understood it as granting a national home to the Jews, it is perverse to claim that the declaration had, as a major purpose, equal to the promise to grant the Jews a state, the defense of Palestinian Arab rights. If it was so wonderful for the Arabs, why did they oppose it?

 

3. Ignorance - At this point I asked our would-be mentor what he thought the Balfour declaration was. He averred that it was a letter from Lord Balfour to a British colonial officials in Palestine. When the Balfour declaration was issued as a letter to Lord Rothschild, head of the Zionist organization, there were no British colonial officials in Palestine. There wasn't even a Palestine. The Turks did not call it that. General Allenby would not reach Jerusalem until over a month later. Of course, had our lecturer known that the declaration was a letter granted as a favor to Lord Rothschild and the Zionists, he could hardly have believed that it was about protecting the rights of Arabs in Palestine.

 

4. Stupidity - After admitting that he had no idea what the Balfour declaration was, the man nonetheless continued to insist that he knew more about the Balfour declaration than the rest of us, me included, and that his interpretation had to be correct! This also illustrates the quality of Chutzpa, which is not lacking either.

 

5. Hypocrisy - This element is probably present is super-abundance, and in limitless quality as well. Consider that many of the very same people who insisted that Israel's reaction to the Hezbollah was "disproportionate" in the Second Lebanon War, now insist that Russia was perfectly justified in invading Georgia, inflicting massive casualities and commting war crimes because Georgia invaded South Ossetia. Where are all the shocking photos of dead Georgian civilians? Where are the protests and condemnations of rights groups? The silence is defining.

 

There is also a lot of bullshit of course. Intellectual bullshit has always been available in limitless quantities and in any desired quality.

 

Ami Isseroff

 

  

Continued (Permanent Link)

Moderate Palestinian Leader Abbas congratulates Kuntar's family for killer's release

Is any comment really needed here? It speaks for itself.

Ami Isseroff

Abbas congratulates Kuntar's family for killer's release By News Agencies

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday congratulated the family of notorious Lebanese terrorist Samir Kuntar , who was freed on Wednesday with four Hezbollah guerillas as part of a prisoner exchange with Israel.

Abbas welcomed the swap between Israel and the Lebanon-based militant group, and in a statement congratulated the families of the "liberated prisoners," issued during a visit to Malta.

Kuntar has been imprisoned in Israel since 1979. He was convicted of one of the grisliest attacks in Israeli history - killing three people including, a man in front of his 4-year-old daughter, and then killing the girl herself by crushing her skull.
In Gaza, meanwhile, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh on Wednesday hailed Kuntar as "a great hero" and said Israel's decision to release him and four Hezbollah fighters had undermined Israel's policy of not freeing "prisoners with blood on their hands."

Haniyeh also branded the exchange of prisoners as "a victory" for Hezbollah and armed resistance against Israel.

"The Israelis should pay the price for the release of Gilad Shalit," Haniya said in a statement in central Gaza, referring to the Israel Defense Forces soldier kidnapped by Gaza militants in June, 2006 cross-border raid.

"It is hard to see thousands of prisoners still held in Israeli jails," He added.

People celebrated in the streets of the Hamas-controlled coastal territory, and handed out sweets in support of Hezbollah.

"Today is a great victory for the resistance movements and to Hezbollah, said Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri. "It shows that the only successful way to free the prisoners is by kidnapping soldiers."

Continued (Permanent Link)

British media bias: Israel at 60

British media bias: Israel at 60


Following is a summary of the main points of this important analysis (Israel at 60 in the UK media – an analysis). Not surprisingly, it shows that BBC and journals such as the Guardian and Independent were consistently biased against Israel, and included gratuitous conclusions that indicate an active anti- Israel slant rather than opinions based on fact: Israel doesn't want peace, Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians... This is a good study, but we always want more. We would like to see (wouldn't we?):

1. An analysis of television broadcasts. Television and radio are more difficult to analyze for many reasons - images and tone are hard to quantify.

2. A comparison of the coverage of Israel at 60 to the coverage of Israel at 50. Is anti-Israel bias getting worse or is it receding?

3. A tabulation of specific factual errors and omissions in op-ed articles. Opinion pieces are "allowed" to get the facts wrong. When they are always wrong in a specific direction they point to bias.

4. Did accounts of 1948 mention that it was the Arabs that attacked Israel?

5. How much of this British coverage included criticism of Britain's own role in creating the conflict, in reneging on its role as the British mandatory, and in attempting itself to ignore or violate
UN Resolution 181, which called for partition? A mass of evidence indicates that the British wanted to ensure that the Negev would be part of Jordan. British failed to cooperate with UN officials and allowed Arab infiltrators to enter Palestine. It would be interesting to find out if any of this was mentioned in British commentary.

Ami Isseroff

Israel at 60 in the UK media – an analysis

http://www.justjournalism.com/plugins/p1999_media_special_articles/pdf/1504_Israel60Booklet_05.pdf


Just Journalism

contact@justjournalism.com

INTRODUCTION

In May 2008, Israel celebrated 60 years of independence since its inception in 1948. Just Journalism carried out a thematic and statistical analysis of coverage of this event in the UK media, during April and May 2008.

Scope of coverage

Our monitoring covered nine national daily newspapers, eight Sunday newspapers, one London daily and three weekly current affairs magazines. We also monitored the BBC News Website and six BBC Radio 4 programmes as well as a BBC2 documentary. (See Appendix A for a complete list of outlets and programmes monitored.)

Methodology

Our report has three objectives:

1 To summarise and evaluate the volume and depth of the coverage devoted to this event.

2 To identify the key messages that came through from the coverage as a whole.

3 To conclude at a macro level whether the coverage was broadly favourable, unfavourable or neutral.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Scope:

Israel's 60th anniversary was an event which received wide coverage in the UK media.

Seventy articles appeared in the print media, BBC Radio 4 aired 12 segments in the programmes we monitored, while the BBC News website featured over 40 articles related to this event. The Guardian carried the most coverage, followed by The Independent.

Themes:

A number of themes emerged from the coverage:

A key theme to emerge from the UK media coverage was that Israel does not seek peace. Eighty-three per cent of all press coverage which took a position on the issue contained the message that Israel does not seek peace.

Seventeen per cent of all press coverage which took a position on Israel's stance on peace contained the message that Israel seeks peace.

Only 16% of articles conveyed that Israel is a homeland for the Jews.

Just Journalism found that across all the coverage as a whole, the strongest theme to emerge was that Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians. While Israel's anniversary celebrations received extensive coverage, this was generally offset by reporting on what the Palestinians call the "Nakba" or catastrophe.

A snapshot of the overall newspaper coverage indicates that 44 % of articles contained the message that Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians, and this rises to 54% when looking at the broadsheets.

This message is particularly prominent in The Guardian and The Independent. Sixty-seven per cent of articles in The Guardian contained this message.

There was a noticeable lack of coverage of domestic issues in Israel, of concessions Israel has made for peace and of the existential threat to Israel posed by Iran.

Nevertheless, there were divergences in messages across media outlets:

Eighty per cent of the coverage in the Daily Telegraph, for instance, contained the message that Israel faces existential threats.

On BBC Radio 4, the strongest message was that Israel is a homeland for the Jews – a message appearing in 42% of items.

By contrast, the strongest message on the BBC News website was that Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians – a message appearing in 45% of web articles

....

The purpose of extracting the key messages from each item of coverage was specifically to focus on the main

impression that was being conveyed to the reader or listener. We extracted the key messages from each individual

news item or article and then aggregated all the individual messages into common categories.

The messages we identified fall into eleven main categories, described below. Each article may contain one or more

of the following messages:

1. Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians

This message came through from pieces that implied that Israel's 60th anniversary should necessarily be seen alongside Palestinian displacement and dispossession in 1948. These pieces usually refer to what is often described as the "Nakba" or "catastrophe".

2. Israel does not seek peace

Coverage in this category conveyed the sense that Israel is not seeking peace.

3. Israel is an entirely negative phenomenon

Coverage in this message category portrayed Israel in a fundamentally negative way, occasionally questioning the legitimacy of the Jewish State.

4. The Palestinian refugee problem is the fault of Israel

Coverage in this category referred exclusively to the events of 1948, but suggested that Israel is chiefly to blame for the Palestinian problem.

5. Israel has lost its ideals

This message was derived from coverage relating to an erosion of Israel's founding ideals and values.

6. Israel's future is uncertain

This message came through from pieces raising questions over Israel's future existence as a result of demographic trends, regional conditions or its policies.

7. Israel faces existential threats

Coverage in this message category highlighted the existential threats facing Israel, most commonly the threat from Iran.

8. Israel is a homeland for the Jews

This included pieces conveying the sense that Israel is a focal point for Jewish identity or that Israel is a haven for Jews around the world.

9. Israel is a successful country

Coverage containing this message conveyed admiration for Israel's accomplishments or recognised that Israel has excelled in key areas such as democracy, economy, social diversity and the high-tech industry.

10. Israel seeks peace

Coverage in this category conveyed the sense that Israel is seeking peace.

11. The Palestinian refugee problem is the fault of the Arab world

This covered pieces that referred exclusively to the events of 1948, and suggested that the Arab world is chiefly to blame for the Palestinian problem.

MESSAGING IN NEWSPAPERS

The section below summarises the key messages within the printed publications. A full discussion of the messaging in individual newspapers and magazines can be found in Part 5 – Analysis of Individual Media Outlets.

The broadsheets and tabloids are addressed separately.

Key messages across all newspapers

Eighty-three per cent of articles which took a position on Israel's stance on peace contained the message that

Israel did not seek peace.

Sixty-two per cent of articles which blamed one party for the creation of the Palestinian refugee problem

blamed Israel.

Forty-four per cent of articles contained the message that Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians.

Twenty-seven per cent of articles contained the message that Israel is a successful country.

Twenty-four per cent of articles contained the message that Israel faces existential threats.

Sixteen per cent of articles contained the message that Israel is a homeland for the Jews.

Sixteen per cent of articles contained the message that Israel has lost its ideals.

Fourteen per cent of articles carried the message that Israel's future is uncertain.

Ten per cent of coverage contained the message that Israel is an entirely negative phenomenon.

...

Key messages in broadsheets

Fifty-four per cent of articles contained the message that Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians.

Eighty-eight per cent of articles which took a position on Israel's stance on peace contained the message that

Israel does not seek peace.

Ninety per cent of articles which blamed one party for the creation of the Palestinian refugee problem

blamed Israel.

Twelve per cent of articles contained the message that Israel is an entirely negative phenomenon.

Twenty-two per cent of articles contained the message that Israel faces existential threats.

Twenty-six per cent of articles contained the message that Israel is a successful country.

Sixteen per cent of articles contained the message that Israel is a homeland for the Jews.

ISRAEL WAS CREATED AT THE EXPENSE OF THE PALESTINIANS

[Figure omitted]

.... For instance, out of 15 articles on Israel's 60th anniversary published in The Guardian, 10 (67%) contained the message that Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians, whereas neither of the two articles in The Independent on Sunday contained that message.

Overall, 54% of articles in the broadsheets carried the message that Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians.

All the daily broadsheets published at least one article containing the message.

Two out of four Sunday broadsheets published articles with the same message.

An example of this message:

"That is why today – the anniversary of the end of the British mandate in Palestine and the declaration of Israeli statehood – is also a day of mourning for 10 million Palestinians and their supporters: the commemoration of the nakba, or catastrophe, that led to the destruction of their society and expulsion from their homeland."

(Seamus Milne, Expulsion and dispossession can't be cause for celebration, The Guardian, May 15, 2008)

ISRAEL IS AN ENTIRELY NEGATIVE PHENOMENON

[Figure omitted - only the Guardian and the Independent carried this message]

Overall, 12% of articles in the broadsheets carried the message that Israel is an entirely negative phenomenon.

This message was only carried in The Guardian and The Independent.

An example of this message:

"Sixty years after the creation of Israel, there could not be a wider gap between the cruel reality of Israel today and Herzl's dream." (Jacqueline Rose, Israeli fiction – the nation's conscience, The Guardian, May 10, 2008)

ISRAEL DOES NOT SEEK PEACE

[Figure omitted]

Forty per cent of articles carried the message that Israel does not seek peace. All the daily broadsheets published articles containing the message.

Of the Sunday broadsheets, only The Observer published an article with this message.

An example of this message is the following:

"there has always been a strain of Israeli society that preferred violently setting its own borders, on its own terms, to talk and compromise. This weekend, the elected Hamas government offered a six-month truce that could have led to talks. The Israeli government responded within hours by blowing up a senior Hamas leader and killing a 14-year-old girl." (Johann Hari, Israel is suppressing a secret it must face, The Independent, April 28, 2008).

ISRAEL HAS LOST ITS IDEALS

[Figure omitted]

Overall, 14% of articles in the broadsheets carried the message that Israel has lost its ideals. Of the daily broadsheets, The Guardian, Financial Times and The Times carried the message. Of the Sunday broadsheets, only The Observer published an article with this message.

An example of this message is the following: "Today, with the 60th anniversary of independence fast approaching, there are a significant number of Israelis on both left and right asking whether in the intervening period the Israel declared by its founding fathers as a largely secular, communitarian project has not somehow lost the plot.." (Sam Kiley, Israel: 60 years of hope and despair,

The Observer, April 20, 2008)

ISRAEL IS A SUCCESSFUL COUNTRY

[Figure omitted]

Overall, only 26% of articles in the broadsheets carried the message that Israel is a successful country. All the daily broadsheets published at least one article containing the message.

Three out of four of the Sunday broadsheets published articles with the same message.

An example of this message:

"…60 years after its creation the very existence of the state of Israel remains nothing short of a miracle: a miracle of human will, determination and ultimately of hope. In less than three generations and in spite of extremely difficult conditions, Israelis have managed not only to survive but also to create a rich and original culture; to achieve spectacular results in science and medicine; and to create a technological hub in the region." (Dominique Moisi,

Israel's Pride and Prejudice at 60, Financial Times, April 30, 2008)

ISRAEL IS A HOMELAND FOR THE JEWS

Overall, 16% of articles in the broadsheets carried the message that Israel is a homeland for the Jews.All the daily broadsheets except The Times published at least one article containing this message. Three out of four of the Sunday broadsheets published articles with the same message.

An example of this message:

" …This Zionist anthem articulates something very deep in Israelis' sense of themselves: they are a nation formed by those who had no other place to live. The Holocaust, inevitably, looms large in this: the establishment of a Jewish state just three years after the liberation of Auschwitz was no coincidence. After 2,000 years, the world was finally persuaded that the Jews deserved what every other people regarded as a basic right: a place of their own." (Jonathan Freedland, As it turns 60, the fear is Israel has decided it can get by without peace,

The Guardian, May 7, 2008)

ISRAEL SEEKS PEACE

[Figure omitted]

Overall, only 6% of articles carried the message that Israel seeks peace. This message was only contained in three articles in The Daily Telegraph, The Independent and The Sunday Telegraph. An example of this message:

"Mr Rabin, who won the Nobel peace prize for negotiating the Oslo Accords with the Palestinian leader Yasser

Arafat in 1993, showed that the Jewish state could also make painful concessions in the interests of peaceful

coexistence with its Arab neighbours". (Con Coughlin, As Israel remembers horrors of the past, the future

looms dark, The Daily Telegraph, May 2, 2008)

ISRAEL'S FUTURE IS UNCERTAIN

[Figure omitted]

Overall, 18% of articles carried the message that Israel's future is uncertain.

The Guardian, The Independent, Financial Times and The Observer published articles carrying this message.

An example of this message:

"..Hopefully I will not live to see the day when it becomes possible that the State of Israel might no longer exist" (Daniel Barenboim, Israel and me, The Guardian, May 14, 2008)

ISRAEL FACES EXISTENTIAL THREATS

[Figure omitted]

Overall, 22% of articles carried the message that Israel faces existential threats. This message featured particularly strongly in The Daily Telegraph. The message was not carried in The Guardian, The Observer, The Times, and The Sunday Times.

An example of this message:

"For a long time Israel has been accused of crying wolf over surrounding countries that want to "drive it into the sea". Now it has a neighbour whose president has not only made that threat explicit, but who intends to develop the capacity to do it." (Martin Bright, New Statesman, The Great Betrayal, May 19, 2008)

21

BBC Radio

Key messages in BBC Radio coverage

Forty-two per cent of coverage contained the message that Israel is a homeland for the Jews.

Thirty-three per cent of coverage contained the message that Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians.

Twenty-five per cent of coverage contained the message that Israel faces existential threats.

Twenty-five per cent of coverage contained the message that Israel's future is uncertain.

BBC News Website

Key messages on BBC News website

Forty-five per cent of web coverage contained the message that Israel was created at the expense ofthe Palestinians.

Thirty-one per cent of coverage contained the message that Israel is a homeland for the Jews.

Twenty-six per cent of coverage contained the message that Israel is not seeking peace.

Twenty-one per cent of coverage contained the message that Israel is a successful country.

PART 3: POSITIONING ANALYSIS

In addition to categorising key messages, we also observed how Israel was presented in broad terms, by noting whether each piece of coverage was positive, negative, or neutral, as defined below:

Positive

Israel was cast in a largely favourable light.

Negative

Israel was cast in a largely unfavourable light.

Neutral

Israel was cast neither in a favourable nor unfavourable light.

Overall Statistics For All Newspapers

Just Journalism found 70 articles across all the newspapers with relevant coverage.

Thirty-six per cent of coverage was negative.

Forty-three per cent of coverage was neutral.

Twenty-one per cent was positive.

[Figure omitted]

23

Broadsheets

Just Journalism found 50 articles across the broadsheets with relevant coverage.

Thirty-eight per cent of coverage was negative.

Forty-two per cent of coverage was neutral.

Twenty per cent of coverage was positive.

Therefore nearly twice as many broadsheet articles were negative than positive.

[Figure omitted]

... The Guardian and The Independent contained the most negative coverage while the

Telegraph titles carried the most positive coverage. None of the Sunday broadsheets carried negative articles.

BBC Radio

Just Journalism monitored 42 broadcasts on BBC Radio 4, including Sunday, Today and The World Tonight, finding 12 pieces of relevant coverage.

Seventeen per cent of the coverage was negative.

Sixty-six per cent of the coverage was neutral.

Seventeen per cent of the coverage was positive.

BBC News Website

Just Journalism found 42 web items on the BBC News website.

Forty-three per cent of the coverage was negative.

Fifty-two per cent of the coverage was neutral.

Five per cent of the coverage was positive.

Therefore negative coverage outweighed positive coverage by almost nine to one.

Of the 42 items published, 20 were authored pieces. Interestingly, a separate study of the authored pieces

revealed the following:

Sixty per cent of the coverage was negative.

Forty per cent of the coverage was neutral.

[The detailed analysis of journals is omitted]

CONCLUSION

The 60th anniversary of Israel's creation was an event that received extensive coverage in the UK media. This coverage varied across the media outlets, but the strongest theme overall was that Israel was created at the expense of the Palestinians. The focus on this theme suggests a shift in the British media towards the Palestinian narrative on 1948.

A second theme that emerged from the UK media was that Israel does not seek peace, characterised by the focus on the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and its policy towards Gaza. In contrast, there were few references to the concessions that Israeli governments have made over recent years in order to advance peace with the Palestinians– from Oslo in 1993 through to the Camp David talks in 2000 and the Disengagement from Gaza in 2005.

Arguably, the most noticeable omission in the coverage was the lack of focus on Israel's domestic issues, such as the hi-tech industry, the impact of immigration on Israeli society or relations between the religious and secular populations. Israel's 60th anniversary provided a rare opportunity for the UK media to explore and scrutinize the diverse challenges facing the Jewish State and its society. Yet, with a few exceptions, such as the Economist, the Financial Times and BBC Radio 4, the British media missed this opportunity.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Censored: A tourist's view of Israelis practicing the art of normalcy

Believe it or not, the writers of mighty Ha'aretz are reaching out to try to censor little old me. Here is one of two instances. I will report the other one elsewhere if time permits.

Brigitta Moll from Cologne Germany visited Israel as a tourist for a few weeks. Evidently that made her into an expert, as all such tourists are. So Haaretz published her article: First impressions of a European in Israel to tell people of the world what Israel is like. She seems to have come with the idea that she is entering a war zone, and so she diligently gathered material in support of her views. If Israelis act like almost anyone else, it must be because we are pretending and hiding the truth.

The truth is, that even in the worst days of the Intifada, Israelis were far more likely to die of traffic accidents (or coronary occlusion) than of suicide bombings or other terror attacks, as Brigitta notes. At the time, and during the Second Lebanon War, nobody pretended that things were "normal" here. But the truth is also that generally Israelis, like everyone else, go about their business most of the time and do not even think of the conflict. We are busy here with other things as well. The conflict is one aspect of life, but not an all-consuming one. If anything, the accusation of Palestinian Arabs is that for Israelis they are invisible. It is not entirely an unfair accusation.

Israelis have also developed, to some extent, a certain familiarity with and contempt for danger. The sight of soldiers in the streets has not been familiar in Europe for a long time. Israelis are used to seeing soldiers in the streets, in their own homes (our kids) and in the mirror for that matter. It has been that way for 60 years now. That is "normal" for us. It must strike visitors as odd. But objectively it is really not especially dangerous here. This normality is somewhat maddening to those who think we are all "bad guys" who should be suffering, though tourists will find it reassuring.

If Ha'aretz editors really think Israel is under such immediate danger, it is difficult to understand why they publish so many articles that are critical of Israel. When the guns are shooting, the pen of criticism is generally silent.

But the stereotype of Israel as a target of suicide bombers, as a country of fearful Jews anticipating a second Holocuast persists. It is exploited for different purposes by the right and the left in this country, and Brigitta's article must've filled the editorial bill for such articles.

Israel has many things to offer tourists - holy places for religious people, topless beaches for those who want sun and sex, bauhaus architecture in Tel Aviv, nightlife, quaint corners of life preserved from other periods of Middle Eastern history. But Brigitta came to write about the conflict it seems, so none of these attractions are evident in her article. But if she wanted to write about that, why didn't she come to Sderot when the Qassam rockets were falling, rather than writing about Tel Aviv? Isn't it strange to come to a peaceful city and write only about the conflict?

Air travel and fast boats have made the world a small place. It is very strange to read such a "travelogue" article, appropriate to the days of Richard Burton or perhaps Marco Polo, when today any interested European can come to Israel and see what is here for themselves, rather than seeing it through the peculiar lens of Brigitta Moll.

After telling her readers that Israel looks normal on the surface, Brigitta Moll felt the compulsion nonetheless to show that Israel is really only about the conflict. She wrote that the normal animation surprises her. She wonders how people can cope with conflict ridden reality.

Brigitta evidently interprets everything she hears and sees to support her view. A graffiti about a "Secret Nuke Cellar" must certainly be a sign of conflict tension according to her, since Europeans never joke about war, Brigitta tells us. Really? During the Cold War there were many jokes in USA about nuclear war, and I remember that Danish and Italian tourist guides joke about the activities of their neighbors in World War II. Everyone has war jokes. Perhaps it is tactless to tell Brigitta this, but the German war jokes are quite famous, though often not very funny to others.

Brigitta finds a soldier who took a trip to India. This too must be all about the conflict, because the soldier says that sometimes you just have to get out of here. What, European young people don't take trips around the world? We find them in Israel and Jordan and Egypt and America and India. Are all these backpackers escaping some conflict in Europe we do not know about? It doesn't occur to Brigitta that it might be possible that young people want to see the world before settling down, and not be confined to our little, wonderful country. The wanderlust of Israeli youth must be due to the conflict.

Imagine that someone from the Middle East visits the USA as a tourist. They are convinced that Americans must think only of the war in Iraq. But all they see around them are people going to work, shopping or relaxing. So they seek out someone who says they went for a trip abroad to get some "space," and present that as proof that all Americans are obsessed about the war in Iraq.

Of course, most people will see what they are prepared to see and use it to justify whatever they believe. Such people can never learn anything new. They know all about it already. It is their privilege to write what they want, and it is up to the reader to beware, to come and see with their own eyes when they can, and judge for themselves.

If a travelogue still has any value today, it is to try to capture what a people really think about their country and their life, rather than perpetuating what others think about them. Brigitta did not have to come here at all to write her prejudiced opinions. All over the world there are such people, who think in terms of stereotypes: Spain is only about bull fights, Germans are only engaged in drinking beer, French people are always in bed and British have no sense of humor. These are OK for ethnic jokes, but they can't be the basis of reasonable journalism. Travel is supposed to broaden one's vistas and change the stereotypes, and travelogues should pass on realistic information, not more stereotypes.

That is hardly the end of the story. Brigitta has written to me that I must delete this Web log article because she does not agree with the way her text is being used in the blog. She protests that her article was intended to be "balanced." She came to a peaceful city and reported only conflict, and she thought that was "balanced." It does not not occur to her that I have the same license to see things through my eyes, as she has to see things through her eyes. Only Brigitta's opinion can be heard.

But Brigitta of course, did not ask the graffiti writer if that is how the graffiti was intended, and did not get permission to use it in the article. She did not ask me or anyone else if we agree with the way she portrayed our country, which she thinks is sensitive and balanced.

If I have somehow misinterpreted Brigitta's message, if she has not portrayed Israel as a place full of people obsessed with the conflict, then she failed to communicate very well in her article. If she has written about the theater and the concerts in the Mann auditorium and the beaches and the nightclubs, then maybe I have a reading deficiency because I couldn't find anything abut those things. It is not that Brigitta should not have been critical. There are bad things here. If she wrote about the nice or ill mannered people she met here, I missed that too. To visit Israel and not meet one rude person is really exceptional! If she noticed the disorder and regrettable uncleanliness of Tel Aviv streets, which must be striking to European eyes, I must've missed it. I could see only one thing in that article: conflict, conflict, conflict. It is not a problem of unfair criticism, but of a peculiar monomania.

I know that many people often misunderstand what I write as well. It is their privilege - the article has to stand on its own. It never occurred to me to try to silence them.

This is not the first time that Ha'aretz writers have attempted to censor my opinion of them. They have been given a great forum for their ideas, but they begrudge me this little one. More about that another time.

I have removed the text of the article, which you can find at Ha'aretz and judge for yourselves unless Ha'aretz has archived it.

I have not asked Brigitta to remove her article from Ha'aretz, on the grounds that I do not agree with the way she has used my country. But Brigitta should not be able to dictate to me what I can and cannot write. "Die Gedanken Sind Frei."

Ami Isseroff

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)

Settlers beating Palestinians and Israeli response

Crime and punishment! The people who carried out these attacks on innocent Arabs should be hunted mercilessly and treated as traitors and enemies of the Jewish people. They have done more harm to the Israeli cause than suicide bombers. Indeed, some suspected that the beatings were provocations by Palestinians dressed as Israelis.

 

The story of the beatings of the Nawaja family near Sussiya, and a video are posted here.

 

How many Palestinians have been arrested by Palestinians for murdering Israeli civilians?

 

Ami Isseroff

---

 

 

Jerusalem Post / Jun 17, 2008 10:10
2 settlers arrested in assault case
By YAAKOV LAPPIN AND JPOST.COM STAFF


Several days after police have opened an undercover investigation to identify the masked men who were videotaped beating three members of a Palestinian family with sticks a week ago, two settlers from the southern Mount Hebron area were arrested, Tuesday.

One of those arrested on Tuesday is a minor, and police estimated more arrests will be made.

The two settlers who were held Tuesday did not try to resist arrest. They were caught after police acted under cover.

The assault took place near Sussiya in the southern Hebron Hills. In the video, shot by a teenage Palestinian girl, four individuals who appear to be young men march toward the family while holding sticks, with one
man wielding a stick at a Palestinian farmer. The film then ends, as the camera girl fled to summon help.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Lessons of the Jenin "Massacre" for today

In 2002, following a month of massive and brutal suicide bombings, the Israeli government reacted to defend its citizens by launching operation Defensive Shield. Palestinian propagandists fabricated a story about a "massacre" perpetrated by the Israel Defense Forces in which 500 Palestinians were killed in Jenin refugee camp. The lie was broadcast around the world. It was carried to the UN where there were demands for action against Israel. This angry chorus of anti-Israel recriminations for non-existent "crimes" was in marked contrast to the silence that had greeted the Palestinian campaign of actual suicide bombings that was orchestrated and financed by the Palestinian Authority.

There was no massacre. Israel warned people repeatedly to leave the camp, and most had left. UN and HRW investigations as well as those of the IDF determined that about 56 Palestinains had been killed in all. Of these, over half were armed terrorists killed in batte. The rest were civilians, most of whom had chosen of their own volition to stay with the terrorists. Some supposedly could not move. How could it be that there was nobody available to help old or infirm people leave the camp. How could people run away and leave family members there?

A large number of Israeli soldiers were killed as well. It would have been easier to simply bomb the compound where the terrorists had holed up with civilians as willing or unwilling hostages. That is what any other country would have done, and it is what the US has done repeatedly in Iraq and Afghanistan. Instead, Israel used ground troops to spare Palestinian lives.

The lie of the Jenin Massacre was also made into a film, "Jenin, Jenin." which perpetuates the lie. Though both Human Rights Watch (HRW) and the UN admitted that there had not been a massacre - many months after the fact, Human Rights Watch still alleged Israeli "war crimes" based on the same fake "eye witness" testimony that had earlier been offered as "proof" of the non-existent massacre.

The "Jenin Massacre" is not just history. The same pattern of fabrications has been carried forward and is repeated today in almost every story you read about Israeli actions in Gaza and the West Bank and in Lebanon.

Media and rights groups again cited such fabricated evidence in 2006 during the Second Lebanon War, to complain of Israeli rights violations, indiscriminate killing of civilians and other "crimes" that never happened.

Today, the same campaign is being conducted regarding Gaza. An electricity shortage was fabricated by the Hamas, complete with pictures of people gathering by candle-light - with electric signs clearly lit and visible. Nothwithstanding the obvious fakery, media, rights groups and the UN cooperated in disseminating the lie.
UN rights workers and NGOs complain of a "humanitarian crisis" in Gaza, but Israel has been trucking huge quantities of humanitarian supplies there on a regular basis. Fuel supplies were interrupted when a Hamas terror squad shot up the fuel depot.

Physicians for Human Rights announced that a Palestinian had died because Israel did not allow him to get medical attention in Israel. A few days later, the dead man appeared, alive and well (see Palestinian Miracle: Fatality "victim" of occupation resurrected) . The Hamas falsely claimed, again with "eye witnesses" that Israel had bombed a house, killing seven "civilians." In retaliation for the imaginary "crime," Hamas carried out a real bombardment of targets in Israel (see Hamas Palestinians manufacture atrocity and 'retaliation').

Below is one of the first detailed reports from the Jenin, published in the National Post in 2002, that provided fairly detailed evidence that there had been no massacre. Parts of this article are quoted elsewhere on the Web, but the original appears to be missing, and the entire text is apparently not posted anywhere else. Pay attention to the "eye witness reports" which were all fabrications. Especially - the report of Israel soldiers loading bodies into a truck. In fact, the truck contained only food.

How long will the lies go on? When will the media, the NGOs and the UN learn the lesson of Jenin?

Ami Isseroff

What happened at Jenin?
National Post
Monday, April 15, 2002
Page: A1 / FRONT
Section: News
Byline: Stewart Bell
Column: Mideast: Analysis
Dateline: RAMANEH, West Bank
Source: National Post, with files Reuters
National Post reporter Stewart Bell interviewed Palestinians fleeing the Jenin refugee camp and Israeli military officials in an attempt to sort out the two sides' widely disparate claims about the conduct and human cost of the battles in the camp.

- - -

RAMANEH, West Bank - Ramaneh Elementary and Preparatory School normally echoes with the squeals of children. Yesterday it served a more sombre function as a refuge for hundreds of war-weary Palestinians displaced by the fighting in nearby Jenin.

There was a woman who had fled her home in such a panic she grabbed the wrong child, realizing too late that she was running away from the battle with her nephew rather than her son. She still does not know what happened to her boy.

There were young men who told of being rounded up en masse by Israeli troops, detained and released with orders to carry crude army-issue photo identity cards. And there were those who said missiles had struck their homes, all but destroying them.

During a stop at the Ramaneh school, Ahmed Tibi, an Arab member of the Israeli Knesset, said he had met hundreds of Palestinians displaced by what he termed the "massacre" in Jenin, where 23 Israeli troops and at least 100 Palestinians were killed last week.

"Everyone has a story," he said. "Everyone has a tragedy, about executions they saw, about their whole family that was killed, about the most tangible concern -- where is my family?"

While the people of Jenin had vivid accounts of the fighting and destruction of homes, few seemed to have first-hand knowledge of the massacres said to have taken place. The lack of solid information has fuelled the rumour mill.

A grocery store owner near Jenin spoke in a hushed voice about seeing Israeli troops loading the bodies of massacred Palestinians into a refrigerated truck which he said was still parked on a nearby hill.

Asked to elaborate, he declined. "The people that are sitting there are collaborators," he said.

The refrigerated truck was parked on a grassy hill, where Israeli troops were resting with their tanks and armoured vehicles listening to Alanis Morissette on a stereo.

When a National Post reporter inspected the truck, it contained not bodies but apples and other food and supplies for the troops.

Yesterday was a day of diplomacy in the Middle East, but it was also a day of all-out public relations, as the Palestinians tried to portray Jenin as a cold-blooded massacre -- their version of Srebrenica or Racak -- and the Israelis did their best to prove such accusations unfounded.

The Jenin refugee camp, a hotbed of Palestinian militancy, was the scene of the heaviest fighting of the current Israeli counter-terrorism offensive. Although the house-to-house street battles ended four days ago, the camp remains off-limits (still, the Israeli army took a hand-picked group of reporters on a guided tour yesterday).

The Israelis say the camp has not been opened up because it was extensively booby-trapped by Palestinian militants. But that has only fuelled speculation that the Israelis are buying time to cover up a massacre. A few reporters who snuck past security lines or broke away from the official tour overseen by Israeli officials found bodies, frightened civilians and heavy damage to buildings.

The contorted bodies of four Palestinian men, blackened by decomposition, were found in a living room apparently hit by a missile. Andeera Harb, 34, a child psychologist whose relatives owned the house, said the four men had been eating dinner.

However, there was a helmet on the head of one body. What appeared to be pipe bombs were partially hidden under a coat.

In a room of a house 100 metres away, the bloated body of a middle-aged man, arms and one leg suspended in rigor mortis, lay on its side next to a bookcase.

Only a few dozen residents were seen, all women, children and older men. They said the army had killed or detained all men of fighting age, whether they were militants or not.

Many homes, including some untouched by fighting, seemed to have been ransacked. Residents claimed money, jewellery and other valuables had been stolen, and that larders were raided.

In Jerusalem, Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, the Israeli Defence Minister, told the Cabinet around 70 militants were killed in the camp, fewer than earlier army estimates, political sources said.

Jacob Dallal, an army spokesman, said 26 bodies lay unretrieved around the once-teeming concrete camp, home to Palestinian refugees since 1948, and more could be under the wreckage. Another nine Palestinian bodies were turned over to two hospitals for burial and two more had been buried by relatives.

All but three were members of the estimated 200-strong, hard-core Palestinian militant force in the camp, Mr. Dallal said. The others were two women and a child.

Jenin has exacted the highest Israeli toll -- 23 soldiers dead and scores wounded -- in the 16-day incursion into West Bank cities, billed as a drive against suicide bombers. The army says most of its dead were killed by booby traps fitted to cars, assault rifles, garbage cans, doors, closets, chairs, drawers, fridges, sports balls and uniforms.

Mr. Dallal cited these as one reason why 26 bodies had yet to be retrieved. "Some of the bodies themselves may be booby-trapped."

Army officers said the Palestinian Red Crescent had been reluctant to collect bodies for safety reasons. However, Palestinian medics say the army has barred them from entering the camp and some Palestinians said the army was secretly burying corpses in mass graves to cover up a massacre.

Standing before eight-metre mounds of rubble and earth in the square, army officers said most of the camp's 15,000 residents had been evicted by militants who placed booby traps in their homes, before the army arrived.

Camp residents said the army drove them out by threatening to destroy their homes, and then kept them out.

"Most of the houses we approached on entering the camp were empty [of civilians]. The camp was ready for war," said Israeli platoon commander Yoni Wolff.

"People are living in agony because of these massacres," Mr. Tibi said. "No one has any numbers but people here are talking about hundreds of Palestinians murdered. People are talking about a missile attack by helicopter, by tank."

Major Natan Golan, spokesman for the Israel Defence Forces, countered that what the Palestinians are calling a massacre was really an extremely heavy battle between government troops and armed militants who set bombs throughout the village.

Jenin was "littered with explosives and [defended by] very certified terrorists," he said. He acknowledged there was heavy damage to the camp but said it was a result of booby-trap bombs that were either set off by Palestinians or blown up by Israeli forces.

He also said the Israeli army had dispatched rescue teams to Jenin yesterday to help rescue 19 Palestinians trapped in two collapsed buildings.

Tanks were not used in the operation because the streets are too narrow and helicopters were only used on one day, when a group of Israeli troops were ambushed. "There was no massacre in the Jenin refugee camp," Maj. Golan said.

He blamed the Palestinian propaganda machine for the massacre story. "They are doing their job well," he said.

About 800 uprooted Jenin residents are now living in Ramaneh and the nearby villages of Zbouba and Taiiba. Most are staying at the school but hundreds more have been taken in by local families.

The towns lie within the Israeli security perimeter, so locals have set up an underground smuggling operation to bring in clothes and food. The goods are stashed at a house in a nearby village and then carried after dark across the defence lines.

Yesterday, a tractor ferried the supplies to the Ramaneh school -- onions, potatoes, apples and old clothes.

As he lay in the shade of the school, one young man described how he had been arrested by troops and taken by bus to a makeshift prison in Salem. The troops held him for hours and then took his photo with a Polaroid camera and released him, telling him not to return to Jenin.

"Most of the men have pictures like this," said another man, holding an identity card. "This picture shows that they were captured."

Rashid Mansour described how he left after 11 shells hit his house and an adjoining home. "I don't know if my house is destroyed, gone, bulldozed."

Kiffah Moustapha said, on the second day of the fighting, her children were terrified so she made a run for it and the Israeli troops let her go. She walked roughly 10 kilometres to Ramaneh.

She said she saw no bodies, only damaged homes. But if the Israelis were only trying to capture Palestinian militants, she said, why were they bombing homes? She said she suspected the troops were seeking revenge rather than simply trying to catch terrorists.

Almost everyone at the Ramaneh school seemed convinced there had been a massacre. They said the Israelis had taken away scores of bodies because they wanted to hide the evidence.

One Jenin man accused Israeli troops of planting ammunition beside the bodies of civilians to make it look like those killed were fighters.

The debate over the body count might have been settled yesterday by Israel's Supreme Court, which ruled that the army had to let Palestinians identify those killed in Jenin before they could be buried.

The Israeli army planned to escort the Red Cross to Jenin today to begin dealing with the bodies.

Stewart Bell

Idnumber: 200204150160
Edition: National
Story Type: News; Analysis

Length: 1590 words
Keywords: TERRORISM; VIOLENCE; ARMED FORCES; SUICIDE; BOMBINGS; TERRITORIAL ISSUES; REFUGEES; FOREIGN RELATIONS; SOCIAL CONDITIONS; ISRAEL; PALESTINE; JENIN

PRODUCTION FIELDS
BASNUM: 3698516
NDATE: 20020415
NUPDATE: 20020417
DOB: 20020415

Cross posted: Israel News Middle East Analysis

Continued (Permanent Link)

Everyone should be a political party, right?

Under the Israeli system, everyone can be a political party. Didn't like the job you got? Start a party. Didn't get a seat in the cabinet? Start a party. Sneh, by the way means Bush. Sneh should remember that a Bush in the Knesset is worth two in the bush. So now we will have the Sneh party, perhaps with a fancy name like "Party of progress and renewal of the pioneering spirit and Zionist ideals of the workers of Israel" or just "Tafnit" ("turning point") or "From the foundations." Behind the fancy name, the content will be, "Party of Sneh and his cronies."  Ben Gurion initiated showed the way when he quit Labor and formed "Min Hayesod," which was really "Party of Ben Gurion and his cronies."

 

If Kadima had any future, no doubt Sneh would have joined Kadima, along with other discards and renegades from Likud and Labor. Someone should explain to Sneh that he is not Ben Gurion.

 

Ami Isseroff  

 

MK Sneh to announce split from Labor to form new party

 

Labor MK Ephraim Sneh is to announce Sunday his intent to break from the Labor party and set up a new political party, Israel Radio reported on Saturday.

Labor sources said that Sneh's decision was made after party chairman Ehud Barak dismissed him from the position of deputy defense minister when he was appointed minister, and failed to assign him to a new function in cabinet.

Continued (Permanent Link)

Is Israel a democracy?

Dr. Eugene J. Fisher Responds to America Magazine Editorial, "Israel at 60"

While I can sympathize with much of the America editorial, which quite rightly reminds readers
of the needs, plight, and rights of Palestinians, I can only say that the statement that Israel
is not a democracy in the Western sense is ill conceived and very misleading.  It seems to
presume that all Western democracies have never had any problems with minorities,
unlike Israel.  Say again?  The USA has not, ever (according to this editorial) ever in any sense
mistreated its native American or Black American or, currently its Hispanic American citizens? 
And the French and British and Germans are not, right now, having problems dealing with their
Arab/Muslim minorities, and none have ever, ever persecuted their minorities?

I'm sorry.  Israel may not be a better Western democracy than the USA, England, France, Germany,
Denmark, etc., but to say it is not one of us is to entirely miss the point of what defines Western
democracies, which for all our faults I will defend and, therefore, perforce, defend our friend Israel.

Dr. Eugene J. Fisher
Great Falls, VA. 22066

(Dr. Fisher is the Former Associate Director of the Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB))

 ----------
www.christianfairwitness.com

Continued (Permanent Link)

Ahmadinejad predicts: Israel will disappear again - but Ha'aretz got it wrong

Ha'aretz's story Ahmadinejad predicts Israel will be 'swept away' by Palestinians is wrong. It states:

 

It is the second time within less than three years that the Iranian president predicted the eradication of Israel.

The first time was in 2005 when Ahmadinejad hoped that Israel would be eradicated from the Middle East map.

 In the first place, Ahmadinejad didn't say in 2005 that he hoped Israel would be eradicated from the Middle East map (or "wiped off"). What he said was that Imam Khomeini said there would be a world without Zionism and America, and Ahmadinejad believes this goal is feasible. This can be checked easily, though there is not really much difference between what he did say, and what he was widely reported as saying.

 

Secondly, Ahmadinejad has predicted the demise of Israel several times since then:

 

Jerusalem Post, Dec 2, 2006:

 

 

Ahmadinejad went on to say that, "Today scores of Western politicians are in doubt as to the future of this illegitimate regime and its existence has come under question.

 

"There is no doubt the Palestinian nation and Muslims as a whole will emerge victorious," the Iranian president told Haniyeh.

"The continued commission of crimes by the Zionist regime will speed up the collapse of this fictitious regime," said Ahmadinejad.

And Ynet, November 13, 2006:

 

 

Ahmadinejad: Israel's destruction near

Published:  11.13.06, 08:53 / Israel News

According to the Iranian media Monday, Iranian President Mahoud Ahmadinejad declared that Israel was destined to 'disappearance and destruction' at a council meeting with Iranian ministers.

"The western powers created the Zionist regime in order to expand their control of the area. This regime massacres Palestinians everyday, but since this regime is against nature, we will soon witness its disappearance and destruction," Ahmadinejad said. (AFP)

 

On June 3, 2007, Foxnews reported:

 

"God willing, in the near future we will witness the destruction of the corrupt occupier regime," Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying during a speech to foreign guests who attended ceremonies marking the 18th anniversary of the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who is known as the father of Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution.

 

 

Compare the above with the current story:  

 

"This terrorist and criminal state is backed by foreign powers, but this regime would soon be swept away by the Palestinians," Ahmadinejad said in a press conference in Tehran.

 

Ami Isseroff

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)

Remember that Olmert said this: Iran will not have nuclear capabiliy

 

PM Olmert said:

 

"I want to tell the citizens of Israel: Iran will not have nuclear capability," said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in a pre-Passover interview.

Forgive me if I am a bit skeptical about that promise. I remember when Olmert promised to wipe out Hassan Nasrallah and the Hezbollah, and before that, when he promised that Israel would be a "fun place to live."

 

Ami Isseroff

---

Last update - 09:03 17/04/2008    

 

 PM: Iran will not be nuclear 

 

By David Landau and Yossi Verter, Haaretz Correspondents 
 
"I want to tell the citizens of Israel: Iran will not have nuclear capability," said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in a pre-Passover interview. According to Olmert, the international community is making an enormous effort, in which Israel has a part, to prevent Iran from attaining nonconventional weapons capabilities. "And I believe, and also know, that the bottom line of these efforts is that Iran will not be nuclear," Olmert said.

 

In his holiday interview, his first to the print media in a year, Olmert declared that since the Annapolis summit in November, the possibility of reaching an understanding between Israel and the Palestinians during 2008 has grown. The prime minister said that the issue of Jerusalem has not yet been discussed at all, neither in his talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas nor as part of the talks headed by Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni with Ahmed Qureia.

 

As to Syria, Olmert said: "I know exactly what the Syrians want and I think the Syrians know what the State of Israel and I expect from the peace process."
 
Olmert said he intented to run again for the leadership of Kadima and to lead the party in the next elections. He did not rule out the possibility of a merger between Kadima and the Labor Party prior to elections.

 

Likud chairman Benjamin Netanyahu is not suitable for the post of prime minister, Olmert said, because of his positions. "We remember what happened here when he was prime minister."

 

Olmert also voiced unequivocal, public backing for Justice Minister Daniel Friedmann, calling him devoted to the rule of law. Olmert revealed that a few months ago he asked former Supreme Court president Aharon Barak to head up a committee that would be charged with drafting a law aimed at guaranteeing the independence of the Supreme Court, with Friedman's agreement. According to Olmert, Barak agreed, but later changed his mind.

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)

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)

Extending sympathy to the parents of Rachel Corrie

Send your sympathy to the parents of Rachel Corrie, one of many thousands of victims of the Israeli-Arab conflict, who was killed in 2003 by accident. Ask them please not to allow anyone to use her death in order to spread hatred and cause more and more deaths.

 

Condolences for Rachel Corrie

02.04. 2008
http://www.zionism-israel.com/log/archives/00000523.html
Original content copyright by the author
Zionism & Israel Center http://zionism-israel.com

To the parents of Rachel Corrie,
I am sorry for your loss. In 2003, your daughter Rachel became one of the many victims of the struggle between Jews and Arabs in the land of Israel, AKA (between 1917 and 1947) as "Palestine." I am sure that you love your daughter as much as every one of the bereaved parents and relatives of victims of the conflict loved their children. Your daughter was killed, apparently by accident, by a civilian bulldozer driver. I wish that Israel would open a full investigation of the matter and issue an apology, even if the death was purely accidental. As an Israeli, I apologize, but I can only do so as an individual.

But the other victims of the conflict are as dear to their parents and loved ones as Rachel was to you. Here for example, are Rachel Thaler (left) age 15, killed in a suicide attack on a pizzeria, and by her side is Rachel is Rachel Levi, age 19, killed in a suicide attack while waiting for a bus.

There is also Carlos Chavez. I call him "the other Rachel Corrie." He is the Rachel Corrie nobody will remember. He was a volunteer, like Rachel. He was harming nobody. He was working on a kibbutz near the Gaza border. He came all the way from his home in Ecuador to do that. He was murdered intentionally by Palestinian Arab terrorists, not accidentally.

Continued here: Condolences for Rachel Corrie

Continued (Permanent Link)

Are there Israeli secret talks with Syria?

Are Israel and Syria talking?

Published: 03/27/2008

Israel hinted at secret talks with Syria.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Wednesday that he wants to resume peace talks with Syria that stalled in 2000, though Jerusalem has balked at preconditions by Damascus such as the complete return of the Golan Heights.

"I hope that the Syrians are prepared to make peace with Israel, and I hope that the circumstances will allow us to sit together," Olmert told foreign reporters on Wednesday. "That doesn't mean that when we sit together you have to see us."

The suggestion that secret contacts already are under way followed media reports that Turkey has been trying to bring together senior Israeli and Syrian officials for discreet and preliminary exchanges of ideas.

Olmert's comments were echoed Thursday by Israeli National Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, who told Army Radio: "I know that the Israeli government, and he who is empowered by it, are doing everything possible to create a dialogue with Syria."

Expanding on the unidentified emissary, Ben-Eliezer said that "anyone who meets him, and there are such people, is told in spoken Hebrew that the State of Israel is prepared to sit down tomorrow and talk."

Source

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)

Israel should prepare for change in US Relations

This observation is undoubtedly astute and valid:

 

The preference for a prolonged strategic relationship with the U.S. should not extend to an exclusive reliance on that relationship or preclude placing some eggs in other baskets - in Europe, in Asia, and yes, also in the Arab and Muslim worlds.

 

The problem neglected by Daniel Levy, is that it is not easy for Israel to develop a strategic defensive alliance with say, Libya or Saudi Arabia, and therefore Israel is not likely to develop deep ties with those countries. Likewise, Libya and Saudi Arabia, or even China, do not manufacture anything equivalent to the F-16. These are minor problems that do not interest great minds, I suppose.

 

However, India is a promissing partner for business and security ties, but even there, there is domestic opposition. There is also a good opportunity to pursue deeper ties with Russia. Playing hard to get never hurt. A really novel idea is independence, which has not really been tried in a while.

 

Ami Isseroff

 

 

 Hope for the best, prepare for the worst
By Daniel Levy
 

 

Here's something else to add to an Israeli's menu of worries: The United States presidential elections may produce change in 2009. Or so fear people like Malcolm Hoenlein, the professional head of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, who said on a recent visit to Israel that all the talk of "change" is an "opening for mischief," and not good for Israel.

Apparently the status quo is so idyllic for Israel that one should wish for nothing more than that it be perpetuated eternally.

Of course not all change is good, but the Israeli-American relationship could benefit greatly from a dose of new thinking - in terms of both the nature and the exclusivity of that alliance.

There are already two storm clouds looming over the blissful American-Israeli landscape, but they are the product of current, not possible future, policies. The first is that reality is forcing more Americans to take a closer look at the Middle East. They see the scorched earth left behind by their government's recent policies, and the investment of U.S. lives and lucre. As they begin to ask questions, the role of the bilateral partnership is inevitably placed under increasing scrutiny. Sometimes the scrutiny is unfair: Israel, for example, did not get the U.S. into Iraq. And sometimes it's more justified: Complicity in Israeli settlements and occupation carry a heavy toll for America's standing in the region and beyond.

The candidacy of Ron Paul, on the Republican side, has been a lightning rod for that sentiment. His campaign broke party records, raising $4.2 million in contributions in one day, mainly in online donations. Paul will not be the Republican candidate for president, but the tendency for people to ask, "What is going on with the U.S. in the Middle East, and why does our ally Israel make things more difficult?" should give cause to reflect. The business-as-usual approach of many of Israel's supporters is not sustainable over time.

Four or eight more years of aggressive, divisive, costly and failed American policies in the region - especially if supported by the so-called pro-Israel camp - will exacerbate this tension, perhaps exponentially.

The second cloud is that Israel is today hitched to an America that is weakened economically, stretched militarily, deeply divided at home and decidedly unpopular abroad. To the extent that the next president continues the policies that have contributed to those trends, Israel too will pay a price. When Israel is so dependent on the U.S., and the U.S. is wounded, we feel it.

The warm rhetoric continues to emanate from Washington, and that feels comforting. The problem is that its utility is diminished, and nice words are no substitute for the smart plans that would actually make the U.S. and Israel more, not less, secure. Israel should hope for and encourage a change that lifts America out of its current morass, while at the same time diversifying its ally portfolio.

Haaretz's "Israel Factor" notwithstanding (and most members of that panel look like the Israeli equivalent of the aging WASPs one tends to find on a platform alongside John McCain), it is Barack Obama who has best positioned himself to reverse these trends and thereby guarantee the U.S.-Israel relationship. An Obama presidency is more likely to be the antidote to further tensions than their source.

The response so far in Israel to the Obama candidacy has split between gevald and hatikva. The former has more to do with email slur campaigns and our own prejudices than with hard policy positions espoused by the Illinois senator. The latter is easily understood when set against the prospect in 2009 of a 1999 election redux, of Bibi (Netanyahu) vs. Barak (Ehud), yawn. Perhaps Obama's ability to mobilize young people and to transcend political indifference, and his audacity to hope, will be infectious here in the 51st state of the U.S.A.

But Israel should be looking beyond the election. Yes, an Obama presidency is more likely to reverse America's decline - internally and externally - and to correct the hubris, incompetence and adventurism of the Bush years. The same might also be true of Clinton and McCain, though it seems less likely. It is what Obama could do to reenergize America that is first and foremost the good news for Israel. And when he talks of "changing the mindset" that got America into the Iraq war, Obama implies a policy of realism and engagement that stands to stabilize the region and even advance genuine peace. Israel could well be a main beneficiary of such a change.

But what if the next president is all about more of the same or something very similar? Israel must plan for the possibility of an America that continues in its decline, that can deliver less, and remains militarily bogged down in Iraq and perhaps elsewhere in the region. Under this scenario, the special relationship with Israel will become an ever-more contentious issue. America itself might increasingly turn its gaze toward Asia.

So while following American developments closely, and hoping for change, Israel should also be more active out there on the dating circuit. Though efforts have been made to strengthen other alliances, results have been mixed so far, and our options will remain limited so long as the Palestinian issue remains unresolved.

The preference for a prolonged strategic relationship with the U.S. should not extend to an exclusive reliance on that relationship or preclude placing some eggs in other baskets - in Europe, in Asia, and yes, also in the Arab and Muslim worlds.

Daniel Levy, a senior fellow at the New America and Century Foundations, is a former adviser in the Israeli Prime Minister's Office and was lead Israeli drafter of the Geneva Initiative

Source

Continued (Permanent Link)

The Silver Platter - a Memoir of 1948

A memoir of Palestine 1948 - immigration and defense

This is a memoir of Aliya Bet Ha'apala (illegal immigration) and fighting in Israel's War of Independence. It is one man's story. Together with other such stories (Memoirs of a Palmach volunteer, 1948, Was there Ethnic Cleansing in Palestine in 1948? it tends to disprove the claims of Israeli superiority in the war, and other myths that were circulated about unwilling immigrants who were forced to come to Israel from the DP camps of Europe. It also counteracts the fabricated notion that the war was initiated by "Zionists" for the purpose of "ethnic cleansing" of Palestine. The author fought to defend a kibbutz that was attacked by the Egyptian army.

Israelis, like everyone else, were not perfect, and some of the mistakes and frictions of the early years are evident in this story. It might be much "nicer" to provide a prettified version of events, but we want to relate history, not to reinvent it, as some others are doing.

The title, The Silver Platter, is a reference to the famous poem, "The Silver Platter," written by Natan Alterman soon after the United Nations Partition decision in 1947, an advance tribute to the youth who would fall in the coming war.

Ami Isseroff

---

The Silver Platter

Shlomo Ramon

....

Where we came from

We were born 1928 and 1929, as Wenzelberg and Glaser, respectively. Greta`s family lived in the Polish city of Bielsko in Polish Silesia, but she was born in Vienna, so that her mother would get proper care after a fist stillborn child. I was born in the ski town of Zakopane in the Polish Tatra mountains.

We lived in our towns until the outbreak of WW2, when our parents had the sense to escape the invading Nazis by going to the east of Poland – each unaware of the existence of the other. This saved our lives, but it meant being exiled by the Soviets to the Urals or Siberia. We were forced to stay out there, in the frozen wastes, until almost the end of WW2.

The Soviets then restored our Polish citizenship, and we were allowed to go "where we pleased" within the Soviet Union. By some chance both our families selected a town placed on a major rail line, named Chu in central Kazakhstan By that time Greta was already a full orphan and I had lost my father. She had to work for survival. I went to school and worked part time. We became acquainted while I was working as cinema projector operator and could get her in to see a movie for free.

Back to "homeland"

By the end of 1945 we were allowed to return to our homeland –Poland. The trip was in a cargo train and lasted 5 weeks, as train had a very slow priority on the system. The cargo cars were equipped with large shelves for sleeping and even had a cooking stove- to heat up whatever food could be scavenged in the railway stops. Greta travelled as a part of a group organized to join a kibbutz in Palestine, and I was with a mother and young brother.

When the train crossed the border, it became very clear that the "homeland" did not want us back. People were yelling: " What? the Soviets take our coal in a train and use the same train to send us Jews! " Some people were pulled off the train and murdered. When we got back to Krakow, my mother decided to stay for a while – to try to sell some family real estate. I joined a "kibbutz group" intended to join kibbutz Neveh Eitan in Palestine.

I understood the hard way that I have no fatherland and had better look for a new one. Prior to that time, we were not a Zionist family and I had no idea that Jews are a nation and should have a state of their own too.

Long way to Palestine

After passing through Slovakia our group arrived at a temporary DP (Displaced Persons) camp in Salzburg. We registered as DPS under false names so as to receive the DP benefits: food and lodging. Our instructor (Madrich) who came from Neveh Eitan to prepare our group for kibbutz life, organized all aspects of our daily life. There were other temporary camps in Austria: Vienna, Innsbruck, and other places.

There were also permanent DP camps, mostly in Germany, where people grouped waiting for their immigration visas to other countries.

From Austria our group went (illegally of course) to Italy to wait for our clandestine ship. First we went to a very nice place called Bogliasco, on the Genoa seashore. It turned out that the British knew all about us and no ship would be allowed near the place by the British Navy. So we went to the south, to place called Metaponto near to Bari to wait for our Aliya Bet (illegal immigration) ship.

Eventually we did board the Hayim Arlozorov (ULUA - See SS Ulua -- the story of underground Aliyah, by Arie (Lova) Eliav, am Oved, 1977;
In Hebrew: Hasfina Ulua, Sipuro shel Arthur, Hotza`at Am Oved, Tel Aviv, 1977. (dedicated to Tanya)

Most of illegal immigrant ships were barely floating wooden vessels. Hayim Arlozorov was the first very solid steel ship, originally built as naval escort during WW1. Our group of immigrants to be ("maapilim") first boarded the Rosa, renamed "Shabtai Losinki" on 2/47 from the bay of Taranto in South of Italy. The ship had no luck. A couple of days after sailing, there was a hole in ship`s bottom and it barely returned to Taranto in danger of sinking. All the maapilim descended and began to wait on the shores of Matponto for another ship. Meanwhile, the Rosa was repaired and eventually discharged several hundred ma`apilim in Palestine, next to Nitzanim. One of the members of the Jewish crew was Moti Fein (later Hod) my future CO in the IAF.

The ship Uloa arrived a couple of weeks later and anchored a couple of miles from the shore. The water was shallow there –the only way to board was by sailing from the shore to the ship in rubber boats, which we did. The ship had come all the way from Sweden , where it took on 700 ma`apilim, mostly women survivors of Bergen Belsen who were allowed to enter Sweden after liberation.

The Uloa was in bad shape. It had survived a heavy storm in the Atlantic and had very little food and drinking water, not much room either. The crew commanded by Lyova Eliav (Arthur) loaded most of us plus some food and water. Lyova met his future wife Tanya among the ma`apilim.

In addition to the 700 or so and people from Sweden there were about 700 more boarded in Metaponto. The"Swedish" passengers threw most of their suitcases and belongings over the board to make some room for the "Italians". The ship had no passenger facilities at all, except for the crew, all maapilim were loaded into ship cargo holds. Holds were outfitted with 5 or six layers of wooden floors, separated by about 50 cm in height and leaving only a few passages. On the planks they put mattresses. We were told to get on a mattress, stay there and not move around except for going to toilet. Using toilets was another exercise in torture,, There was no flushing water and very long wait – queue arranged by special detail. We were fed, rarely, sandwiches that were brought to our mattresses. No one was allowed on the topside to prevent the Brits seeing us, but in retrospect it only prevented us from getting some fresh air and forced people to vomit on the mattresses or in passages – adding another horror. Women were separated from men.

The ship was jam packed and sailed east, towards Crete. It was soon intercepted by Royal Navy ships – five destroyers. The Brits were never able to board because of our active resistance. They forced the ship to sail in the direction of Haifa harbor, but the captain Arazi steered her toward Bat Galim and beached her on the ground rocks there. The crew tried to scuttle the ship by opening the scuttlecocks, but the Brits boarded and prevented the scuttling.

I shall never forget my first view of Mount Carmel and the beach crowded with locals from Bat Galim who tried to help us get down. Some people tried to swim ashore but were fished out by the Brits.

The ship was there for many years, part of the Bat Galim view, until dismantled for salvage.

The Brits took all us forciblu to their deportation ships to Cyprus anchored in Haifa harbor, such as Empire Rival.

Continued here

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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

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