Love of the Land: June 2016

Thursday, June 30, 2016

About the knives of the Palestinian Arabs (please pass this along) - Arnold Roth

If there were a way to have this video clip seen by everyone on all sides of the conflict who might benefit from it, the world would be a far, far better place - for us Israelis and our children, for the Palestinian Arabs and theirs, and for children everywhere.

Bedroom of a child: Kiryat Arba, Israel, today

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
30 June '16..
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qqyyM2R5Ms

Thank you, Lenny Ben David.

In respectful memory of a thirteen year old Jewish girl stabbed to death in her bed this morning at the hands of a jihad-minded assailant with a head full of the incitement depicted above. And in support of the heart-broken parents for whom an unwanted long journey starts today.

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work.

Some Thoughts Concerning the Palestinian ‘Refugee’ Dodge - by Evelyn Gordon

...As the journalist Amos Harel noted drily, “Such candid words are very rarely uttered by Arab statesmen.” Which is a pity, and not only because these fake Palestinian refugees divert desperately needed money and services away from real refugees

Evelyn Gordon..
Analysis from Israel..
30 June '16..
Link: http://evelyncgordon.com/the-palestinian-refugee-dodge/

One the most remarkable news items I’ve read lately is Haaretz’s report on a conversation between an Israeli and “a well-known Egyptian statesman…who held top positions in the past and still has great influence on the generals in Cairo.” The Israeli raised the issue of the Palestinian refugees, and the Egyptian exploded:

“What refugees are you talking about?” the Egyptian scolded his Israeli interlocutor. The region is flooded with millions of new refugees living under impossible conditions and desperately needing help. These people fled the terrors of war in Syria, Iraq and Yemen, rotting in the desert in the summer and freezing in the winter.

He went on. The tents they get from neighboring states and international relief agencies are insufficient. Giant tent cities have sprouted up everywhere in Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey…

There was more. Against this backdrop, the Palestinians’ insistence on portraying third-generation refugees, the grandchildren of those who fled or were expelled during the 1948 war, is groundless. Many of these refugees live in stone dwellings with proper infrastructure, continuing to benefit from handouts from the UN Relief and Works Agency. Their leaders use them to perpetuate the Palestinian problem.

As the journalist Amos Harel noted drily, “Such candid words are very rarely uttered by Arab statesmen.” Which is a pity, and not only because these fake Palestinian refugees divert desperately needed money and services away from real refugees–a point I’ve made here before. No less significant is what a candid discussion of the refugee issue would reveal about the Palestinian statehood project.

Earlier this month, the reporter Khaled Abu Toameh published an article on the growing unrest, which has already led to violence, in Palestinian refugee camps in the West Bank. “A quick chat with young Palestinians, including Fatah members, in any refugee camp in the West Bank will reveal a driving sense of betrayal,” he wrote. “They speak of the PA as a corrupt and incompetent body that is managed by ‘mafia leaders’… The feeling is that the PA leadership has done virtually nothing to improve their living conditions and that the real money is going to big cities such as Ramallah, Nablus, Bethlehem, and Hebron.”

Nor is this sense of betrayal unjustified. In the 22 years since its establishment, the Palestinian Authority has received billions of dollars of international aid each year, making it the biggest per capita aid recipient in the world, by a very large margin. But it hasn’t used any of this money either to move the refugees out of their squalid “camps”–which aren’t actually camps, but slum neighborhoods of nearby cities—or to improve conditions in these neighborhoods.

AJ+ Uses Classic Canard to Promote Jihad Against Jews - by Ricki Hollander

CAMERA has criticized some in the media for abandoning their journalistic duty to highlight the Palestinian canards employed to incite violence, but now AJ+, has taken it a step further by actively creating content to promote the false Temple Mount propaganda that incites anti-Jewish violence.

Ricki Hollander..
CAMERA Media Analyses..
29 June '16..

Nearly 80 years ago – decades before Israel was established as a Jewish state – then-Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin Al Husseini (who subsequently allied with Adolf Hitler) embarked on a campaign of incitement to foment a jihad against Jews.

His focal point? The area near the Temple Mount, Judaism's holiest site, and more specifically, the Western Wall — the last remnant of the Jewish Holy Temple compound. The canard upon which he based his campaign was that Jews were planning to destroy or take over Muslim holy sites. His battle cry? "Defend [Muslim] Holy Places." The result? Anti-Jewish pogroms carried out across Palestine, with massacres in Hebron and Safed that killed, mutilated or wounded hundreds of people. (For more details, see here.)

Haj Amin al Husseini's battle cry was so successful in igniting a jihad that it became the go-to slogan and theme to promote anti-Jewish violence in the Middle East. During Jordan's 19-year, illegal occupation of Jerusalem, Jews were barred from visiting their holy sites and the theme became a non-issue, but since Israel's recapture of the area in 1967, it has been used successfully by consecutive Palestinian leaders and has become part and parcel of the campaign to separate Jewish people from their holiest site. (For more details, see here.)

Journalists are under tremendous pressure from the Palestinian Authority and Abbas to adopt words that reject the history of the area to promote Arab/Muslim supremacy there. For example, a "media advisory" put out in November 2014 by the PLO Negotiation Affairs Department warned journalists not to refer to the site as "disputed" and to reject any non-Muslim terminology in regard to the site as invalid.

(Continue to Full Post and Video Links)

Wednesday, June 29, 2016

Why Palestinians Throw Rocks - by Jonathan Tobin

...The century-old war on Zionism has always had at its core a degree of intolerance for the Jewish presence and a desire on the part of Arabs to erase Jewish history. The rocks being thrown on the Temple Mount are a product of hate, not a misunderstanding about where the borders between two states should be drawn. They are a symbol of a conflict that can only be resolved when the Palestinians give up their dreams about a return to an era of discrimination against Jews.

AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary Magazine..
29 June '16..
Link: https://www.commentarymagazine.com/foreign-policy/middle-east/why-palestinians-throw-rocks-temple-mount/

When advocates of Middle East peace proposals speak of the future of Jerusalem, the discussion always centers on guarantees of freedom of worship for all faiths at the holy places. The assumption is that peace and presumably a re-partition of the city will ensure that these sites are open to all and that the end of the “occupation” will mean that Muslims, Jews, and Arabs will share the city in harmony. But while peace processors are always telling us that the real obstacles to coexistence are Jewish settlements or the failure of the leaders of the two peoples to take risks, the problem is actually much more simple. One side of this conflict has consistently demonstrated their willingness to compromise and share; the other has not.

Another illustration of this conundrum was on display this week as Palestinians rioted on the Temple Mount. The police were subjected to barrages of rocks, as were Jewish worshippers below the sacred plateau at the Western Wall. The result of these violent demonstrations was that Muslim extremists got their wish. The Temple Mount, the most sacred place in Judaism as well as important to Christians, was closed to non-Muslims who wished to visit.
Eventually, Israeli authorities in cooperation with the Jordanian government (which has attempted to exercise some influence over the Muslim Wakf that administers the Temple Mount) will eventually re-open the site. But it’s important to understand that this is far from an unusual event and that the violence reflects the long-term goals of both the rioters and the Palestinian Authority.

After Jerusalem was unified during the 1967 Six Day War, the Israeli government sought to send a message to Muslims that their holy sites would not be threatened by the change. They let the Temple Mount, home to the Al Aksa Mosque, the third holiest Muslim shrine, remain under the rule of the Wakf. Israeli governance over the united city was the first time in history when freedom of worship for all faiths at the holy sites was guaranteed. But the one exception was that a ban on Jewish prayer on the Mount — the site of the ancient holy temples of Jerusalem — was instituted and strictly enforced by Israeli police.

A small minority of Jews would like to see that ban lifted, but it remains in force. Yet not content with that restriction, Muslims on the Temple Mount have begun a campaign of intimidation directed at non-Muslims tourists who are permitted to walk around the plateau under escort. That harassment has now escalated to rock throwing. Far from acting on their own, the thugs use the mosques on the Mount, which are generally off-limits to police, as staging areas for their assaults. As has sometimes happened in the past, when they were able to gain control of the plateau, rocks have been thrown down on the Western Wall Plaza, resulting in injuries to worshippers there.

What’s the point of this violence?

Herzog’s naive and intolerable deceit - by Isi Liebler

...It was surely utterly naïve and politically counterproductive to extend such unilateral concessions before obtaining a single indication of reciprocity from the Palestinians. But the worst travesty was the unprecedented initiative of an opposition leader to furtively engage in foreign affairs initiatives that conflict with the policies determined by a democratically elected government. When this is applied toward hostile forces that promote and endorse terrorism, it could even be considered seditious.

Isi Liebler..
Candidly Speaking from Jerusalem..
29 June '16..
Link: http://wordfromjerusalem.com/herzogs-intolerable-deceit/

Zionist Union Chairman MK Isaac Herzog is the scion of one of Israel’s most distinguished families. His late father Chaim served with distinction as president, and his grandfather, whose name he carries, was one of Israel’s most respected and beloved chief rabbis.

I have been lauding Herzog over the past year, relating to him as a Labor Zionist of the old school who had the ability to revive the party and rid it of the delusional leftists who alienated many of its former supporters and weakened it – almost to the point of destruction.

I bemoaned the fact that a unity government was not formed, insisting that Herzog, like the head of all Zionist parties, would basically be implementing the same policies as the current government. In this context, I believed that he would make an excellent foreign minister and enable Israel to display unity in the face of the concerted diplomatic pressures being exerted against us.

In January after the elections, while as leader of the opposition, Herzog continued castigating Netanyahu, he nevertheless publicly endorsed the consensus policy toward the Palestinians adopted by Professor Shlomo Avineri, Labor Zionism’s foremost intellectual.

Although he emphasized that he remained committed to a separation from the Palestinians, Avineri maintained that the Oslo Accords were no longer relevant as the Palestinian leadership refused to accept Israel’s right to exist and considered Israel’s destruction a higher priority than achieving their own statehood. Avineri concluded that under such circumstances, efforts to implement a two-state solution were delusionary.

Despite bitter protests and condemnations from the radical ranks of Labor, Herzog publicly identified with this approach, explicitly stating that there is “no chance of peace in this era.” Furthermore, he declared that the Israel Defense Forces must remain in the West Bank and in the Jordan Valley. He told French President François Hollande that “hatred and incitement among the Palestinians” are currently too intense to contemplate implementing a two-state solution.

Thus, it was a shocking revelation when it was disclosed last week that, prior to last year’s election, at the height of Palestinian incitement and frenzied calls to “save Al-Aqsa,” Herzog was secretly negotiating terms for a final settlement with the corrupt and degenerate Palestinian Authority. Through former Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh, Herzog outlined the following surrealistic principles which were summarized in a secret letter of understanding with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and scheduled to be implemented following the elections.

- Israel would withdraw to the 1949 armistice lines, i.e., from all of Judea and Samaria, with the exception of 4% territory swaps enabling Israel to retain portions of the settlement blocs. Those resident outside these areas would either be repatriated to Israel or obliged to accept Palestinian rule. Israel would retain a “symbolic” presence in the Jordan Valley in conjunction with Palestinian forces.
- East Jerusalem would become the capital of a Palestinian state with a single municipality acting under the jurisdiction of both Israel and the Palestinian State.
- The Temple Mount would be administered by an international force with an Israeli presence at the Western Wall.
- The Palestinian refugee issue would be resolved on the basis of U.N. Resolution 194 with a “joint decision” to accept those wishing to return or accept financial compensation. The Arabs claim that currently over 5 million people – the original refugees and their descendants are awaiting repatriation.

This is simply an extension of the Olmert formula – which was not approved by the cabinet or the Knesset and rejected by Abbas.

It was surely utterly naïve and politically counterproductive to extend such unilateral concessions before obtaining a single indication of reciprocity from the Palestinians. But the worst travesty was the unprecedented initiative of an opposition leader to furtively engage in foreign affairs initiatives that conflict with the policies determined by a democratically elected government. When this is applied toward hostile forces that promote and endorse terrorism, it could even be considered seditious.

BBC News shuts its eyes to latest Temple Mount rioting - by Hadar Sela

...Notably, the BBC has not found it necessary to report on this latest round of organised violence intended to prevent non-Muslims from visiting a site of importance to three religions. Meanwhile, Israel continues to facilitate Ramadan visits to the site by Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and PA controlled areas.

Hadar Sela..
BBC Watch..
29 June '16..

Those getting their news from the BBC News website will not be aware of the fact that Palestinians recently engaged in pre-planned rioting on Temple Mount over a period of three consecutive days.

The violence began on the morning of June 26th.

“Mayhem ensued on the Temple Mount Sunday morning, when a group of masked Arab assailants threw rocks, shoes, metal objects, and chairs at a group of Jewish visitors at the contested compound during the first of the last 10 days of Ramadan.

According to police, who provided video of the disturbance, the group of 11 observant Jews were targeted shortly after entering the compound at approximately 9 a.m. in what appeared to be a premeditated attack.”

The rioting continued the next day.

(Continue to Full Post)

Isolated? Israel to Head UN Committee for the First Time - by Elliott Abrams

There was a tough diplomatic fight over this, so it is worth handing out kudos.

Elliott Abrams..
Pressure Points..
28 June '16..
Link: http://blogs.cfr.org/abrams/2016/06/28/israel-to-head-un-committee-for-the-first-time-so-much-for-isolation/

The argument that Israel is becoming increasingly isolated in the world took another blow this month when–for the first time in the history of the United Nations and of Israel–the Israeli ambassador was elected to head one of the UN’s permanent committees. This the Legal Committee, also called the “Sixth Committee,” and its covers the United Nations’ international law operations–which include matters related to terrorism and to the Geneva Conventions.

There was a tough diplomatic fight over this, so it is worth handing out kudos.

First, Israel’s ambassador Danny Danon, who was mocked by many on the Israeli Left and in the Israeli media (and yes, there is a large overlap) when Prime Minister Netanyahu appointed him, showed that he is a very competent diplomat. He was a member of the Knesset and a minister when appointed, but had had no diplomatic experience. He has obviously learned the job, and fast.

Second, kudos to the United States Mission to the UN, which fought very hard to get votes for Israel.

Third, kudos to those members of the “Non-Aligned Movement” who refused to go along with Palestinian, Arab League, and Iranian pressure to stop the Israelis. Three countries in particular stopped the anti-Israel effort: Singapore, Rwanda, and India. That last is noteworthy, because India’s new friendship for Israel is a great departure from its decades of hostility and because India has considerable weight at UN headquarters in New York. It has been stated in the Arab press, though impossible to prove because there was a secret ballot, that several Arab countries actually voted for Israel. This entire episode is a humiliation for the Palestinian delegation in New York.

Tuesday, June 28, 2016

Abbas’s satisfied customers - by Caroline Glick

...Abbas’s most recent anti-Jewish diatribe, and the warm reception it received from the Europeans who paid for it bear an important lesson for the many Israelis who search endlessly for ways to build friendlier relations with Europe. The hard truth is that we cannot do anything to influence them. They operate in a closed intellectual circle. They pay for blood libels. They receive them with standing ovations. They disseminate them at the UN and their media. And then they organize “peace” conferences, where Israel is expected to accept as fact or spend its entire time dispelling the lies they create through their Israeli and Palestinian employees and disseminate through their media.

Caroline Glick..
Our World/JPost..
27 June '16..
Link: http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Our-World-Abbass-satisfied-customers-457899

One of the more remarkable aspects of the blood libel sounded by Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas in his address before the European Parliament in Brussels last week is the claim that he ad-libbed the part about rabbis poisoning Palestinian wells.

After refusing to meet President Reuven Rivlin who was also in Brussels last week, Abbas ascended the podium in Brussels and began his custom of demonizing Jewish and Israel. Clearing his throat, the man whose incitement is most responsible for the fact that the Palestinians are the most anti-Semitic people in the world, began his speech by saying, “We are against incitement.”

Then, as is his wont, Abbas proceeded to incite mass murder of Jews by accusing rabbis of ordering the poisoning of Palestinian wells.

In his words, “Just a week ago, a week, a group of rabbis in Israel announced, in a clear announcement, demanding their government, to poison, to poison, the water of the Palestinians.”

“Is this not incitement? Is this not clear incitement, to the mass murder of the Palestinian people?” It’s not quite clear what it was that he was ad-libbing but a reasonable bet is that he was embellishing what was already in his planned speech. In the days preceding his speech, the Abbas-controlled PLO media put out stories claiming that a non-existent rabbi, who heads a non-existent rabbinical council issued an opinion that Jews in Judea and Samaria should poison Palestinian wells.

As the IsraellyCool website pointed out, by Abbas’s telling, it wasn’t just one non-existent rabbi, who heads a non-existent rabbinical council that told Jews in general to poison wells. In Abbas’s ad-libbed version, the entire non-existent council, led by the non-existent rabbi ordered the government to poison Palestinian water.

At any rate, whether Abbas winged the blood libel or just embellished a less powerful one, far from being a mitigating factor for judging the significance of his statement, the claim that he was speaking on the fly makes it all the worse.

Abbas simply couldn’t help himself.

The War Of A Million Cuts - Review by Sheri Oz

"...It is the responsibility of Israel’s government to defend its citizens from all types of attacks. This should be true for the propaganda war – also called “political war” – as well.

Sheri Oz..
Israel Diaries..
28 June '16..

One small paper-cut on a finger is painful and distracting; a million of them inflicted onto one’s entire body surface would be unbearable. And that is what the Jewish People face today — with growing virulence.

Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld has a singular ability to tackle this topic in a way not many others could. He has academic degrees in chemistry, economics, environmental studies and Jewish Studies. With such a broad interdisciplinary background, he brings to the examination of any topic both scientific method and goal-oriented processing of presenting problems. His experience as an economic analyst and consultant for large international and Israeli concerns rested upon and further cemented a holistic approach to problem-solving and most likely a way of thinking that can best be characterized as being “outside the box”.

Gerstenfeld Defines the Problem

The first step in solving a problem is defining it. Is the problem growing antisemitism? Is it reawakening of antisemitism that has lain dormant, in at least part of the world, for a few decades after World War II? Is it the metamorphosis of antisemitism into anti-Israelism? Or are these just facts of life whereby the problem should be defined as the lack of an effective approach to combating antisemitism/anti-Israelism?

Why does this make a difference?

(Read Full Review)

Targeting Israel, because they have Rebecca Vilkomerson’s Jewish approval?

...Vilkomerson believes that BDS is the best tool to pressure Israel to change its policies. She is misguided. BDS may demonize and delegitimize Israel, but the truth is on Israel’s side, and Israel will not base national security decisions on pressure resulting from misleading op-eds and BDS lies.

Zahava Raymond..
Honest Reporting..
27 June '16..

In contrast to its innocent-sounding name, Jewish Voice for Peace actually shares the most dangerous and radical positions of the BDS movement; it supports a Palestinian claim to a “right of return” for refugees, which would mean the end of Israel as a Jewish state, has promoted the lie that the Al-Aqsa mosque is under threat, and praised increased Palestinian violence over the last 8 months as “resistance.” Their pinned Tweet is from October 2015 praising MSNBC for its “courage” in airing a series of maps that claim to show Palestinian land loss – which MSNBC later apologized for, admitting the map was “completely wrong.”

JVP deliberately exploits its Jewish character to attempt to shield the BDS movement from accusations of anti-Semitism, which explains the headline of its director Rebecca Vilkomerson’s piece for the Washington Post: “I’m Jewish, and I want people to boycott Israel.”

The implication is that anyone who might be uncomfortable with the idea of singling out the world’s only Jewish state for boycotts and demonization now has the go-ahead to target Israel, because they have Rebecca Vilkomerson’s Jewish approval. But a closer look at her article shows that her arguments supporting BDS are so weak, her religion might be the only card she has left to play.

(Continue to Full Post)

When Will the NY Times Ask Abbas About His Other Lies?

...The refusal to ask hard questions shows the bias that journalists have. Deep down, they want to see a peace deal, and they believe that exposing Abbas’ lies will make that deal more difficult. Only Israel must be pressured, in their minds. So Abbas can lie with impunity until Israel makes the lies into a story that cannot be ignored. And that is why Abbas feels he can get away with it.

Elder of Ziyon..
algemeiner.com..
27 June '16..

From the New York Times:

A little more than a day after President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority accused rabbis in Israel of calling for their government to poison the water used by Palestinians, he retracted the allegation in a statement on Saturday, saying it had become “evident” that it was “baseless.”

Mr. Abbas made the unsubstantiated allegation during an address to the European Parliament on Thursday. The remarks echoed anti-Semitic claims that led to the mass killings of European Jews in medieval times.

The Palestine Liberation Organization had initially published the allegation on a website run by one of its offices, and it spread through some regional news media outlets.

Mr. Abbas’s retraction was sent to reporters early Saturday morning, issued by the P.L.O., of which Mr. Abbas is the chairman. It said that Mr. Abbas “rejected all claims that accuse him and the Palestinian people of offending the Jewish religion.” It added that he “also condemned all accusations of anti-Semitism.”

“After it has become evident that the alleged statements by a rabbi on poisoning Palestinian wells, which were reported by various media outlets, are baseless, President Mahmoud Abbas has affirmed that he didn’t intend to do harm to Judaism or to offend Jewish people around the world,” the statement continued.

It’s very nice that Abbas has admitted his lie, after he felt the pressure from the news media.

But what about the other lies that Abbas made in that speech alone?

(Continue to Full Article)

Monday, June 27, 2016

Turkey, Israel and the Value of Saying No - by Evelyn Gordon

...Turkey could have gotten these same terms six years ago, but it thought it could force Israel into conceding more. Had Israel’s chattering classes had their way, Ankara would have been right. But all the warnings of dire consequences if Israel refused to capitulate proved false.

Evelyn Gordon..
Commentary Magazine..
27 June '16..
Link: https://www.commentarymagazine.com/foreign-policy/middle-east/turkey-value-saying-no/

The Israel-Turkey reconciliation agreement announced this week is an object lesson in the importance of being willing to walk away from negotiations. For six years, the Israeli chattering classes and the international community urged Israel to simply accept Turkey’s terms, arguing that Ankara wasn’t going to soften its demands and that Israel desperately needed good relations with Turkey, whatever the price. But it turns out neither part of that argument was true: Turkey proved to need Israel far more than Israel needed it, and consequently, it eventually reduced its demands significantly. The current deal is thus much better than what Israel would have gotten had it caved in and signed earlier.

The biggest change is that Turkey capitulated completely on its longstanding demand for an end to the Gaza blockade, which would have badly undermined Israel’s security. Under the current deal, all restrictions meant to prevent Hamas-run Gaza from importing arms and exporting terror remain in place: The naval blockade will continue; imports to Gaza will still enter through Israel and undergo Israeli security checks, and movement restrictions aimed at preventing Gazan terrorists from entering either Israel or the West Bank will remain in force. Instead, Turkey will bolster its self-image as Gaza’s champion by building a power plant, hospital, and desalination facility–all badly needed humanitarian projects that Israel has long wished someone would undertake. It will also be allowed to send unlimited humanitarian aid through Israel’s Ashdod Port–a meaningless concession since Israel never restricted humanitarian aid shipments.

Another important change relates to Hamas operations in Turkey, where Hamas’s West Bank command–responsible for planning anti-Israel attacks from the West Bank–has long been headquartered. Ankara insisted for years that the reconciliation deal should include no provisions affecting its relations with Hamas. But the current deal requires it to end all Hamas military activity on its territory.

This falls short of Israel’s demand that it expel Hamas entirely; the Islamist organization will still be able to engage in diplomacy and fund-raising in Turkey. But if Israel refused to have relations with any country that let terrorist groups engage in diplomacy and fund-raising on its territory, it would also have to sever ties with the European Union, where the political wing of Hezbollah–a far more dangerous group than Hamas–is allowed to operate freely in all but a handful of countries. In other words, this is an acceptable compromise that genuinely improves the existing situation.

‘Poisoning’ Accusations: A Lengthy and Colorful Palestinian Tradition - by Rafael Medoff

...The list of Palestinian “poisoning” claims in recent years is lengthy and colorful. The director of the PA’s Committee for Consumer Protection, for example, has accused Israel of supplying Palestinian markets with chocolates that cause mad cow disease. The PA’s website has charged that Israeli planes drop bags of poisoned candy into Palestinian neighborhoods.

Rafael Medoff..
algemeiner.com..
27 June '16..

JNS.org – Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas must be surprised at the international outcry over his accusation this week that Israeli rabbis are plotting to poison Arab wells. After all, Abbas and his colleagues have been making similar allegations for more than 30 years, yet the international community has hardly said a word.

The best-known allegation was the declaration by Yasser Arafat’s wife, Suha, at a 1999 press conference that Israel was engaged in the “daily and intensive use of poisonous gas” against Palestinians, as part of a plan that was causing “an increase in cancer cases among women and children.” The Israelis had also contaminated 80 percent of the PA’s water sources with “chemical materials,” she said.

The episode sparked controversy because then-first lady Hillary Clinton was sitting next to Suha Arafat at the time and did not respond. Clinton later said she was unaware of Mrs. Arafat’s statement because her headphones were not working at that moment.

The list of Palestinian “poisoning” claims in recent years is lengthy and colorful. The director of the PA’s Committee for Consumer Protection, for example, has accused Israel of supplying Palestinian markets with chocolates that cause mad cow disease. The PA’s website has charged that Israeli planes drop bags of poisoned candy into Palestinian neighborhoods. The Palestinian representative to the United Nations in Geneva has claimed that “the Israeli authorities infected by injection 300 Palestinian children with the HIV virus.”

(Continue Full Article)

How US actions emboldened and empower the terrorists of Hezbollah - by Arnold Roth

If you're not deeply concerned about what this means and how it happened, you might not understand what terrorism does to civilized societies. And if you think it's a problem that impacts only Israel, you might not understand the Iranian game-plan. Here's a little suggested homework.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
26 June '16..

In a public speech broadcast on Friday and reported the following day, ["In first, Hezbollah confirms all financial support comes from Iran", Al Arabiya, June 25, 2016], the supreme head of the Lebanon-based terror organization Hezbollah made several revelations that ought to have an impact on how the world views the Iranian menace.

Figuring out who the terrorists are and what to do about them is, as we keep saying here, not such a straightforward thing.

Hezbollah illustrates the point: it is formally classified as a terrorist organization by the Arab League, all the monarchic Gulf states (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates), United States, France, Australia, Canada, Netherlands, and Israel.

On the other hand, the European Union, New Zealand and the United Kingdom have decided they view only its so-called military wing as terrorist; the rest of they are presumably OK with. Russia says Hezbollah is legitimate and China "remains neutral" [source; Wikipedia].

It's hard not to be deeply cynical about how diplomats and politicians, aware and informed of what the terrorists are doing with their improbably vast arsenal - currently estimated at an astounding 150,000 rockets and ramping up - play games with people's lives.

(Continue to Full Post)

Sunday, June 26, 2016

(PMW) Abbas repeats water-poisoning libel to EU, then retracts

The Palestinian Authority and Mahmoud Abbas have a history of spreading horrific libels whose purpose is to create hatred and fear among Palestinians and demonize Israel in the international community.

Itamar Marcus/Nan Jacques Zilberdik..
Palestinian Media Watch..
26 June '16..

Among these libels, PA leaders have accused Israel of doing medical experiments on Palestinian prisoners, stealing body parts from killed Palestinian terrorists, intentionally spreading drugs among Palestinian youth, and many more.

The latest Palestinian Authority libel, which Palestinian Media Watch described in detail last week which accused Israel of poisoning Palestinian water sources in order to kill Palestinians and force them to emigrate, was repeated by Mahmoud Abbas when speaking at the European Union on Friday. Because this was said at the EU and televised, the condemnation was widespread and Abbas was forced to issue a retraction. The retraction was not televised but was a press statement issued by his office.

(Read Full Bulletin)

Israel Recycles Water, and Amira Hass, of Course, Recycles False Water Charges

Amira Hass must really like false charges that Israel is stealing Palestinian water, since she keeps on repeating those false charges, requiring us to repeat their refutation.

Alex Safian, PhD..
CAMERA Media Analyses..
23 June '16..

Amira Hass must really like false Palestinian charges that Israel is stealing their water, since she keeps on repeating those false Palestinian charges, requiring us to repeat the refutation.

Whereas previously Hass charged that profligate Israelis "use three times more water a day in their households as West Bank Palestinians do," in her latest effort she charges that:

On average, the Palestinians consume 73 liters per person per day. Below the recommended minimum. Israelis consume a daily 180 liters on average, and there are those who say even more.

She also charges that "Israel sells the Palestinians water that it first stole from them," and:

With the Oslo Accords, Israel imposed an outrageous, racist, arrogant and brutal division of water sources in the West Bank: 80 percent for Israelis (on both sides of the Green Line), and 20 percent for the Palestinians ...

Hass is dead wrong about the relative usage of water by Israelis and Palestinians, and about her other charges too, but before getting into details and numbers, it's important to illustrate a deeper distortion in her claims.

(Continue Reading)

Fire and brimstone rhetoric from the shortest term in Israel's history - by Martin Sherman

...I could go on and repudiate almost every line of invective in this inappropriate and infuriating speech by one of the worst political leaders in the nation's history. But there are just so many mean-spirited falsehoods one can rebut in a single opinion column. All that remains now is to hope that the Israeli public is savvy and sane enough not to be led astray by the ridiculous rants of a man who has demonstrated time and time again that, well, he couldn't.

Martin Sherman..
Israel Hayom..
24 June '16..
Link: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=16495

Former Prime Minister Ehud Barak recently launched into a derogatory diatribe, viciously vilifying the current government, which was (inexplicably?) voted into power in the (annoyingly?) free and fair elections just over a year ago.

As such, it was less an indictment of the ruling coalition, and far more a harsh condemnation of the Israeli electorate for its (infuriatingly?) stubborn refusal to disregard past experience and vote for parties, whose political credos, presumably similar to those that Barak professes to hold, have been proved -- repeatedly and tragically -- misguided.

With a torrent of fire and brimstone rhetoric, Barak warned ominously of what lay in store in the incumbent government if it was not replaced, or at least, if it was not coerced by popular pressure, to adopt the policies of its ideological adversaries, defeated not long ago at the polls.

In his tirade, he managed to invoke virtually every pejorative adjective in the Hebrew language to brutally berate Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government, which he characterized as "weak, flaccid, raucous, devious, and extremist, that has failed again and again, to ensure security. … It has undermined the fabric of Israeli democracy, failed in managing relations with the U.S. and in shaping Israel's image in the world; it repeatedly misses diplomatic opportunities, suffers from paralysis in effectively managing the conflict, even in the absence of any 'partner.'"

Full disclosure: I am not an uncritical advocate for either Netanyahu or his government. Quite the opposite. In the past I have expressed deep concern over many of his decisions, and grave misgivings as to his approach to numerous issues. But against the backdrop of Barak's harsh words of censure, the spectacle of him presuming to don the mantle of some redeeming and sagacious oracle has a distinctly distasteful and disingenuous ring to it -- falling somewhere between the delusional and the detestable.

The shortest term in history

Ironically -- and for the purposes of this analysis, significantly -- Barak's tenure as prime minister, a mere year and 245 days, was in fact the shortest in Israel's history, following which he was forced to resign and suffered a stinging defeat in the ensuing election, forced on him because of his dismal performance in almost every sphere, but particularly in security -- his purported field of expertise.

Rather than invoke any sense of humility, this dubious "honor" did nothing to deter Barak from preaching, presumptuously, pretentiously and pompously, to the very person, who, in stark contrast to himself, has held the post of PM longer than any of his predecessors -- apart from Israel's first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion.

We are thus compelled to believe that Barak must be counting on severe memory loss on the part of the Israeli public, which, hopefully, will have erased all recollection in the minds of the populace of what transpired under his administration--when debacle followed hard on the heels of disaster.

What word will be missing from BBC report on sentencing of Hamas terrorists? by Hadar Sela

...Once again we see that while the BBC rightly uses the word terror when it reports on that topic in Europe, the same word is censored from its reporting from Israel, even an article about terrorists already convicted in court.

Hadar Sela..
BBC Watch..
24 June '16..

As has been mentioned here on prior occasions, it is extremely rare to see any follow-up reporting by the BBC after Palestinian terrorists have been arrested and put on trial but just such a report did appear on the BBC News website’s Middle East page on June 22nd under the headline “Palestinians jailed for life for killing Israeli couple“.

However, despite this being a story about the sentencing of convicted terrorists belonging to the Hamas terrorist organisation who murdered two Israelis in a pre-planned terror attack, the words terror, terrorist or terrorism do not appear even once in this report.

“An Israeli military court has sentenced four Palestinians to life in prison for the murder of an Israeli couple in the occupied West Bank, the military says.

Eitam and Naama Henkin were killed in front of their four young children in a drive-by shooting on 1 October.

The military said the assailants, members of the Islamist movement Hamas, opened fire at the Henkins’ car after an attempt to abduct them failed.”

(Read Full Post)

Saturday, June 25, 2016

Surprise? The European Parliament Rewards Hate - by Evelyn Gordon

...By granting financial and diplomatic rewards to Palestinian rejectionism and hate education, the EU has encouraged Palestinian terror and distanced peace. No self-respecting country should want to be associated with such sorry behavior. Britain is well out of it.

Evelyn Gordon..
Analysis from Israel..
24 June '16..
Link: http://evelyncgordon.com/the-european-parliament-rewards-hate/

Hats off to the British. Aside from all the other reasons to applaud Britain’s decision to leave the European Union (i.e. democracy, national sovereignty), it has voted to secede from an enabler of Palestinian terror and hate education. And if that accusation sounds harsh, consider what transpired in the EU Parliament on the very day of the Brexit referendum.

While the British were voting, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was addressing the EU Parliament in Brussels. By any objective standard, the visit didn’t start off well: Upon arriving, Abbas immediately rejected a personal plea by the parliament’s president, Martin Schulz, to meet with Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, who happened to be in Brussels at the same time. But things quickly got worse when Abbas started speaking.

Abbas’s speeches are always full of anti-Israel slander, and this one was no exception. He accused Israel of “massacring” Palestinians’ “history, heritage, identity and geopolitical entity.” He termed the Israeli “occupation” the longest in history and deemed it uniquely evil, “unlike anything that has happened to any other people anywhere in the world,” to quote one reporter’s live tweeting of the speech (I haven’t managed to find a transcript); in reality, of course, not only have there been many longer occupations, but few conflicts have ever entailed so little bloodshed. He accused Israel of being “fascist” and “racist,” of committing extrajudicial killings, and of turning “our country into an open-air prison.” All this is pretty standard, as was the conclusion, in which he paid lip service to his willingness to make peace with the monstrously evil country he just described.

But even by Abbas’s standards, this speech was exceptionally vile in two respects. First, he accused Israel of responsibility for all terrorism worldwide, ludicrously asserting that “Once the occupation ends, terrorism will disappear, there will be no more terrorism in the Middle East, or anywhere else in the world.” After all, Israel is clearly the reason why Muslims are killing fellow Muslims by bombing mosques, schools, and hospitals in Muslim countries like Syria, Iraq, and Pakistan, right?

Then, he resurrected a medieval blood libel, accusing Israel of poisoning Palestinian wells. Granted, he was speaking in Arabic, and this accusation wasn’t in his prepared English translation; but the simultaneous translator rendered it into English, and Israeli reporters had no trouble hearing it; thus one has to assume it was audible to EU parliamentarians, as well.

So how did those parliamentarians respond? By giving him a standing ovation. In other words, they told him that hurling blood libels at Israel and refusing to meet with its president and would not be penalized, but rewarded.

For the case of Jews exercising their rights a heckler's veto is sufficiently fierce

...In other words, the "international laws" that are so often pompously invoked can be set aside when, as is for the case of Jews exercising their rights under Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, a heckler's veto is sufficiently fierce. By that standard, Brown v. Board of Education should have been overturned due to white opposition throughout the South.

Sar Shalom..
Israel Thrives..
23 June '16..
Link: http://israel-thrives.blogspot.co.il/2016/06/where-analogies-are-useful.html

A week ago, Abu Yehuda posted about how analogies do not always work. Vic's example was a speech given by Secretary Rice comparing the Palestinians' situation to that of the pre-1960s blacks. While Vic is correct that Rice's analogy does not describe the Palestinians' situation, there is an analogy based on the civil-rights movement that does describe the Middle East.

When the first black students attempted to enter Little Rock Central High School in 1957, their fellow student spat at them and physically abused them. Examples included throwing acid in their eyes, drop flaming paper from above and trapping them in the washrooms. This is what was done while the students had escorts from the 101st Airborne. The motivation was simple racism, the whites believed their space should not be "contaminated" by the presence of blacks.

Friday, June 24, 2016

'Mr. Prime Minister, go home. We'll make sure the hostages are here by tomorrow.'

...The message, Shani recalled, was clear: "You're the Air Force -- you're in charge. Is this doable? I told him, 'Mr. Prime Minister, go home. We'll make sure the hostages are here by tomorrow.' It was Friday. I kept my word -- the next day all the hostages were free."

Aharon Lapidot..
Israel Hayom..
24 June '16..

In retrospect, one can say that Brig. Gen. (ret.) Joshua Shani, the lead pilot who flew the first C-130 Hercules cargo plane in 1976's Operation Entebbe, emerged from the mission to Uganda somewhat worse for wear. The stress caused him to develop a stomach ulcer, his hair turned mostly gray, and his wife was furious with him for not telling her he would be taking part in one of the most famous hostage rescue operations in history.

Shani, who today heads aerospace giant Lockheed Martin's operations in Israel, does not necessarily see himself as a hero. In the 40 years since Operation Entebbe, he commanded the Israeli Air Force Lod Base and was the military attache to the Israeli Embassy in Washington. One has to ask: After countless books, movies, TV shows and interviews about the rescue mission, what else could be revealed?

As it turns out, many aspects of the story have been left untold, especially when it comes to the alternatives and contingencies outlined for the operation, such as using a Ugandan cargo plane, embedding El Al pilots with the troops to fly the abducted aircraft, and even a plan to have the pilots procure a backup sailboat for tens of thousands of dollars in cash.

Alongside the iconic status and heroism that have become synonymous with Operation Entebbe, over the years the mission has become a battleground where verbal wars over the versions of the event, as perceived by its architects and participants, take place.

Even Shani, in his quiet way, protests the fact that the IAF's part in the mission has been dwarfed.

"Every article you read focuses on Sayeret Matkal," he said, referring to the Israeli military's elite special forces unit, "but I can tell you that I believe the linchpin was my squadron. Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin came to me, to the squadron, to discuss things before the final decision was made. I was just a kid, an especially young squadron commander, and the prime minister of Israel walks into my office and says, 'Look me in the eye and tell me if it's doable. I've heard all the generals and experts, but I need you to tell me if it's doable. Why? Because Sayeret Matkal, which is the best in the world, incomparable for this kind of mission -- they don't really care whether it's Sde Dov or Entebbe.'"

The message, Shani recalled, was clear: "You're the Air Force -- you're in charge. Is this doable? I told him, 'Mr. Prime Minister, go home. We'll make sure the hostages are here by tomorrow.' It was Friday. I kept my word -- the next day all the hostages were free."

(Continue to Full Story)

Terror in Palestinian Arab society? What terror? - by Arnold Roth

...Even worse than the passion Palestinian Arab society has for bigotry, violence and terror directed at Jews, particularly Israeli Jews, is their utter failure to face up to what this does to them. The fact that most observers, in the region and beyond, Arab and non-Arab, don't know of this blood-lust or deny that it exists ensures that it will continue to exact a heavy price in lives and well-being on all sides of the conflict.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
24 June '16..

Here's a postscript to "15-Jun-16: What do the Palestinian Arabs think?".

Over on the Al-Monitor site, they put up an opinion piece a couple of days ago ["Poll: 65% of Palestinians want Abbas out"] that draws some conclusions from the same Palestinian Arab public opinion survey on which we based our comments. Only the conclusions they reached are quite different.

(Continue to Full Post)

Oslo and the Peace Process That Enabled Hate - by Evelyn Gordon

...By ceding territory to an unrepentant terrorist organization, the Oslo Accords enabled an entire generation to be raised on a steady diet of hatred for Israel. And in so doing, they mortally wounded the very two-state solution they sought to promote.

(AP Photo / Hatem Moussa)

Evelyn Gordon..
Analysis from Israel..
23 June '16..
Link: http://evelyncgordon.com/the-peace-process-enabled-hate/

Writing in the Jerusalem Post on Monday, historian Efraim Karsh made a point I’ve made many times before: Contrary to the popular notion that Israel’s “occupation” spurs Palestinian terror, the numbers inarguably prove that terror increases whenever Palestinians gain control of territory and drops whenever Israel reasserts control. In fact, Karsh said, Israel’s average annual death toll from post-Oslo terror (dating to 1993) is roughly triple the level pre-Oslo. But while he correctly cites the absence of Israel’s military as a major reason for this increase, another factor is no less important: By giving the Palestinian Authority control over schools and airwaves, Israel enabled it to launch a campaign of hate education that has significantly boosted the motivation for anti-Israel terror.

Before discussing what this education entails, consider two demonstrations of its efficacy. One is last summer’s Fikra Forum poll comparing the attitudes of East Jerusalem Palestinians, who aren’t under Palestinian civilian control, to those in the West Bank and Gaza, who are. Overwhelmingly, it found, Jerusalem residents were more moderate:

A majority (62 percent) think Israel will still exist, as either a Jewish or a bi-national state, in 30 or 40 years – compared with just 47 percent of West Bankers and 42 percent of Gazans who think so … Thirty percent of East Jerusalem’s Palestinians, as against a mere 18 percent of West Bankers, say that there were Jewish kingdoms and temples in Jerusalem in ancient times…

A stunning 70 percent say they would accept the formula of “two states for two peoples – the Palestinian people and the Jewish people.” In the West Bank, the comparable figure is 56 percent; in Gaza, 44 percent. An equally noteworthy 40 percent in East Jerusalem say that “Jews have some rights to the land along with the Palestinians” – as against just 13 percent in the West Bank or 11 percent in Gaza. And concerning Jerusalem itself, only 23 percent of its Palestinian residents insist on Palestinian sovereignty over the entire city – just half the percentage with that view in either the West Bank or Gaza.

The second is an interview with the Times of Israel earlier this month by former New York Times reporter David Shipler, who recently published a revised version of his Pulitzer Prize-winning book on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Asked what had changed in the 30 years since Arab and Jew: Wounded Spirits in a Promised Land was originally published, Shipler said the biggest change was the way Palestinian positions and views of Israel have hardened.

“Land for peace seemed like a possible and legitimate idea back then. Most Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza I talked to went back in history to 1967. They wanted to turn the clock back by an Israeli withdrawal from the territories conquered in the Six Day War,” Shipler said.

“But in speaking to people now, I understood that the time frame has become 1948 for the Palestinians. It’s always been about historical grievances and a clash of national narratives, but there are now more severe distortions of history, especially on the Palestinian side. Now Israelis are seen only as colonialists. There is no recognition of Jewish history in the Land of Israel, of the Holocaust, and the real reasons for the creation of Israel,” he continued.

Shipler also noticed that three decades later, there is less—if any—daylight between individual Palestinians’ expressed opinions and the official line of the Palestinian leadership.

“The conversations I had with Palestinians this time were more militant and less nuanced than in the early ’80s,” he said.

The bottom line is that, after more than two decades of PA indoctrination, Palestinians who have been living under Palestinian civilian control are far more anti-Israel and less willing to compromise than they were in 1986, and also than their peers who spent those decades under Israeli civilian control. Nor is that surprising when you examine what the PA teaches its children.