The Island of Peace - Poor impulse control or deadly ideology?

In 2011, Daqamseh said that he had not committed any crime, but rather “fulfilled his national and religious duty.” He was supported by Jordan’s Justice Minister (and his former attorney) Hussein Mjali, who called him a ‘hero’.

Fresnozionism.org..
15 April '13..





News item:

An overwhelming 110 members [out of 120] of the Jordanian House of Representatives signed a petition demanding a pardon for a Jordanian soldier who shot and killed seven Israeli schoolgirls in 1997.

Ahmad Musa Mustafa Daqamseh shot the girls during a school fieldtrip [to the Island of Peace] in Naharayim, near the Israel-Jordan border, and is currently serving a life sentence.

Here’s a description of the island:

The Island of Peace is an Israeli-Jordanian park at the confluence of the Jordan River and Yarmouk River, on the border between Israel and Jordan. …

Land along the Jordan River’s alluvial slopes and floor bed was under Jewish ownership before the establishment of the State of Israel. In 1927, Pinchas Rutenberg, founder of the Palestine Electric Company, signed an agreement with King Abdullah I of Jordan to build a hydroelectric power station. The canals and dams built for this purpose created a man-made island. …

In 1994, Israel ceded the area to Jordan as part of the Israel-Jordan Treaty of Peace. Jordan agreed to lease it back so the Israeli farmers from Kibbutz Ashdot Ya’acov could continue to cultivate the land. Farming continues under a 25-year, automatically renewable lease. A gate was established to enable Israeli tourists to visit the park without a visa or passport, on presentation of their identity cards to the Jordanian guards at the border crossing.

It is a remarkably beautiful place, and represented one of the rare instances of anything approaching normal relations between Israel and any of its Arab neighbors. In 1994, King Hussein of Jordan told PM Itzhak Rabin that “no place better illustrates the fact that we are at peace.”

The 1997 murders were horrific. Daqamseh said that the picnicking girls had ridiculed him while praying, so he opened fire on them from a guard tower with his M16. Then he climbed down and chased them, continuing to fire until his weapon jammed.

In a gesture of a kind not seen from an Arab leader before or since, King Hussein came to Israel and visited the the shiva houses of the victims, sat on the floor with mourners, and ordered that the families be compensated. “Your pain is my pain,” he said.

Daqamseh was sentenced to life in prison by a Jordanian court, which normally equates to 25 years. His defense was a form of insanity plea: he could have received the death penalty, but the court was lenient because of his “antisocial personality disorder.” And by Western standards — even by King Hussein’s — anyone who would shoot down 13 and 14-year old girls because he believed they had made fun of him would have to be crazy.

In 2001, his mother called an al-Jazeera TV program and made this statement:

I am proud of my son, and I hold my head high. My son did a heroic deed and has pleased Allah and his own conscience. My son lifts my head and the head of the entire Arab and Islamic nation. I am proud of any Muslim who does what Ahmad did. I hope that I am not saying something wrong. When my son went to prison, they asked him: ‘Ahmad, do you regret it?’ He answered: ‘I have no regrets.’ He treated everyone to coffee, honored all the other prisoners, and said: The only thing that I am angry about is the gun, which did not work properly. Otherwise I would have killed all of the passengers on the bus.

Obama Administration Goes Easy on Palestinian Authority’s Celebrating a Child-Murderer

Omri Ceren
Commentary/Contentions
20 March '11

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2011/03/20/obama-administration-goes-easy-on-palestinian-authoritys-celebrating-a-child-murderer/

I made the same point on Twitter but it’s worth asking again to a broader audience. On one side you have Israel taking a partial step in approving the construction of Jewish homes in the capital of the Jewish State. On the other side you have Palestinian Authority officials celebrating Dalal Mughrabi, a Palestinian terrorist who led the murder of 37 Israelis including 13 children.

Compare…

Clinton rebuked… Netanyahu… demanding that Israel take immediate steps to show it is interested in renewing efforts to achieve a Middle East peace agreement… Clinton called Netanyahu “to make clear the United States considered the announcement a deeply negative signal about Israel’s approach to the bilateral relationship… [and that] this action had undermined trust and confidence in the peace process and in America’s interests.”… Clinton appeared to link U.S. military support for Israel to the construction.

… and contrast:

The State Department called “disturbing” reports that Palestinian Authority officials attended the renaming of a square after a terrorist, saying it condemned such commemorations. “We are very disturbed by these reports and are seeking clarification from the Palestinian Authority,” a State Department official told JTA. “We condemn any commemoration of acts of terrorism and underscore that all parties have an obligation to end incitement.”

Assuming that State gets clarification from the Palestinians that they did indeed do what they did – a nicety our Israeli allies were not offered – will Abbas face the same fury from the White House? Will it be publicly announced that he is harming American interests? Will cuts in U.S. assistance get dangled in front of his face? Above all else, will he be instructed to make specific concessions to the Israelis lest President Obama escalate the diplomatic row into a full-blown breakdown?

The Israelis were not violating specific agreements with the United States when they got that treatment, while the Palestinian Authority is obligated to end incitement. So it would seem that what Abbas’s subordinates did was worse than what Netanyahu’s subordinates did. There are very few explanations short of personal antipathy for why the White House would be harsher with a stable democratic ally than with a terrorist-celebrating quasi-government. Certainly “objectively promoting American interests” doesn’t seem to be on the list.

Also that line about how “all parties have an obligation to end incitement,” as if the Israelis were also naming squares after terrorist child-murderers – kind of obnoxious.

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PMW runs US TV ad showing PA glorification of terror as major obstacle to peace

Palestinian Media Watch
PMW Bulletins
04 May '10

PMW has launched a TV ad campaign in Washington, D.C., to highlight the need for peace education as prerequisite for peace. The 30-second TV spot is running on CNN, FOX News, MSNBC and Headline News in the Washington area this month to point out the negative impact on peace of the Palestinian Authority’s policy to glorify terrorists.

The entire ad campaign is made possible through the initiative and financial support of a private donor.



This campaign coincides with PMW’s release this week in Washington of the new PMW report, From Terrorists to Role Models: The Palestinian Authority’s Institutionalization of Incitement. The 26-page report and additional documentation will be presented to members of Congress on Thursday in an event sponsored by Congressman Brad Sherman, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade, and Congressman Steven Rothman, member of the Foreign Operations Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee.

(Read full article)

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The Outrage: Acceptance of Palestinian Authority Incitement

Arlene Kushner
American Thinker
09 April '10

Dalal Mughrabi was a 19 year old female terrorist who led the worst terrorist attack in Israel's history - the Coastal Road Massacre of 1978. Mughrabi and her squad of terrorists came down from Lebanon via the Mediterranean by raft; they landed on the beach south of Haifa. First they killed American nature photographer Gail Rubin, and then they hijacked a bus. Ultimately, 38 innocent Israeli civilians, including 13 children, were murdered before Mughrabi herself was shot.

March 11, 2010 marked the 32nd anniversary of this horrendous event, and the Palestinian Authority was not about to let it pass. Thus was the decision made to name a square after Mughrabi in the township of El-Bireh, which is immediately adjacent to Ramallah in Samaria (the West Bank).

All of this made news in Israel, if not in the United States; it was certainly the topic of discussion on various websites -- most notably that of Palestinian Media Watch (PMW).

While the honoring of a terrorist is inherently abhorrent to the Western mind, a closer look at precisely how this particular terrorist was honored by the presumably "moderate" Palestinian Authority provides insight into precisely how obscene the current situation truly is.

A host of individuals associated with the PA, and in positions of leadership, went on record -- in Arabic, of course -- praising Mughrabi and defending their right to honor her. We can understand nothing until we see what has been said in Arabic, to the people: The talk, consistently, is of Dalal Mughrabi as shahida: martyr.

(Read full article)
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Hillary's Disproportionate Response

Jack Schwartzwald
American Thinker
08 April '10
Posted before Shabbat

When Israel imposed a ten-month ban on West Bank settlement construction last November, Hillary Clinton knew full well that the ban did not apply to Jewish neighborhoods in the eastern half of Jerusalem. Nevertheless, she described the step as a helpful "move forward toward resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict."

Now, despite the fact that Israel has apologized for its putative misstep in announcing new housing construction in these neighborhoods during Joe Biden's recent visit, Hillary has demanded total cessation of such activity, saying in an address to the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) that, "New construction in East Jerusalem or the West Bank...exposes daylight between Israel and the United States."

On March 11th, the very day of Mr. Biden's departure from Israel, Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah organization proceeded (albeit "unofficially") with the dedication of a public square in el Bireh to Dalal Mughrabi, the female leader of the deadliest-ever terrorist attack against Israel. This was followed by a four-day seminar, under Palestinian Authority auspices, entitled, "Martyr Dalal Mughrabi Camp."

Ironically, these actions do not seem to have exposed much daylight between the Palestinian Authority and the United States. The explanation for the incongruity may be found in the fact that, during her AIPAC address, Hillary misattributed the Mughrabi celebrations to Hamas, thereby granting undeserved absolution to Israel's theoretical peace partners, Abbas and the PA. (Pity America's ally, Israel, wasn't the beneficiary of such largesse.)

Hillary then went on to explain that the dedication of the square "insults the families on both sides who have lost loved ones...in this conflict."

(Read full article)
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Hillary Clinton's unfortunate mistake

Itamar Marcus, Nan Jacques Zilberdik
and Barbara Crook
Palestinian Media Watch (PMW)
23 March '10

Someone in the State Department is giving Secretary of State Hillary Clinton imprecise information about Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.

In her speech to AIPAC yesterday, Clinton condemned Hamas for renaming "a square after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis," saying it was "wrong and must be condemned." On the other hand, Clinton "commended" PA Chairman Abbas.

Clinton's condemnation of Hamas alone, because the municipality that named the square after the terrorist is run by Hamas, was erroneous. In fact, it has been the Palestinian Authority and Mahmoud Abbas, not Hamas, who have been leading the Palestinians in glorifying Dalal Mughrabi, the terrorist bus hijacker who was responsible for the killing of 37 civilians, whom Clinton accurately called the "terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis."

Palestinian Media Watch has documented the continuous Mughrabi veneration by Abbas and the Palestinian Authority in recent years, both in connection to the square near Ramallah on the West Bank and in many other contexts. The following are 15 examples of the glorification of this one particular terrorist, Dalal Mughrabi. Five by Abbas himself, five by the Palestinian Authority or its leaders, and five by Fatah or its leaders:

1) It was Abbas himself who defended the naming of the square after Mughrabi: "I do not deny it. Of course we want to name a square after her." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Jan. 17, 2010]

2)It was Abbas himself who on December 31, 2009 honored that same terrorist Mughrabi by sponsoring a celebration of her birthday. [PA TV (Fatah) News, Dec. 29, 2009]
It was Abbas's Fatah youth movement who prepared the Mughrabi square for the ceremony. [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, March 8, 2010]

3)It was Abbas himself who funded a computer center after that same terrorist. "Present at the event were President Mahmoud Abbas's advisor... inaugurating the [Dalal Mughrabi] center, funded by a contribution from the President's [Abbas's] Office." [Al-Ayyam, May 5, 2009]

(Read full report)
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Moral blindness -- and truth and justice betrayed

Melanie Phillips
The Spectator
23 March '10

How utterly extraordinary. Hillary Clinton made a big speech today to the US Jewish lobby group AIPAC – a speech of no small importance given the crisis in relations between the Obama administration and Israel. But in this speech, as Israel Matzav notes, she committed an astounding howler. Referring to the recent Palestinian naming of a square in Ramallah in honour of terrorist Dalal al Mughrabi, she said:

When a Hamas-controlled municipality glorifies violence and renames a square after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis, it insults the families on both sides who have lost loves ones in this conflict.

But Ramallah is not a Hamas-controlled municipality. Hamas controls Gaza. Ramallah is in the West Bank and is controlled by Fatah. The naming of the square was a Fatah event glorifying a Fatah terrorist. Does Clinton not know this? Of course she does. What this whopper tells us is that she – and the benighted Obama administration that wrote her lamentable speech – cannot and will not acknowledge that Fatah is a terrorist organisation that glorifies a terrorist who murdered not only dozens of Israelis but also the niece of an American Democratic senator.

Clinton and the Obamites cannot and will not acknowledge this because their whole Middle East strategy revolves around forcing Israel to give a state to Fatah -- because they ‘deserve’ it as moderate peaceful statesmen-in-waiting. As if. The fact that the Obamites are actually bullying Israel into accepting a Fatah-run terrorist state was unfortunately all-too graphically demonstrated when Fatah named its square after Mughrabi. So Clinton, purporting to attack the glorification of terrorist violence, turned the instigators into Hamas instead.

Her message to renounce violence, recognise Israel and abide by previous signed agreements (this from an administration that has torn up America’s own agreements with Israel) was addressed solely to Hamas. To Fatah, whose leaders declare they will never accept a Jewish state, whose armed wing continues to commit acts of terror and who have gone back on countless agreements, not one word of criticism.

The rest of Clinton’s speech was as bad if not worse.

(Read full article)
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[Includes barefaced lie covering up PA] Secretary of State Clinton's Remarks at the 2010 AIPAC Policy Conference

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
23 March '10

[Dr. Aaron Lerner - IMRA:

"When a Hamas-controlled municipality glorifies violence and renames a square after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis, it insults the families on both sides who have lost loves ones over the years in this conflict."

Pop quiz.

What square was recently renamed after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis?

Answer: A square in Ramallah was named after the terrorist Dalal Mughrabi.

And who controls the Ramallah municipality?

Answer: Fatah.

Bonus question: Why does Clinton attribute the incident to Hamas?

Answer:: How do you spell cognitive dissonance?]

==============================

(Applause.)

Hillary Rodham Clinton
Secretary of State
Washington Convention Center

Washington, DC

March 22, 2010
www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2010/03/138722.htm

Thank you. Thank you for that welcome. And it is wonderful to be back at AIPAC with so many good friends. I saw a number of them backstage before coming out, and I can assure you that I received a lot of advice.(Laughter.) I know I always do when I see my friends from AIPAC. And I want to thank Lee Rosenberg for that introduction. And congratulations, Rosy; you're going to be a terrific president. (Applause.

(Read full speech)
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Palestinians Glorify a Terrorist

Daniel Mandel
Frontpagemag.com
23 March '10

Does building homes threaten peace? Or does holding a ceremony honoring as a hero and role model a terrorist who murdered dozens of civilians? Last week, Israel announced it would be doing the former. Palestinians did the latter. The Obama Administration condemned the Israeli words; it ignored the Palestinian deeds.

What could be wrong with building 1,600 homes for Jews in eastern Jerusalem? Nothing, except for Palestinians who do not accept Israel’s existence and intend as a first step towards ending it to set up their own Jew-free state and divide Israel’s capital in the process.

What could be wrong with the Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestinian Authority (PA) publicly honoring Dalal Mughrabi, who led the 1978 coastal road terror attack that killed 37 Israeli civilians? Everything, where peace is concerned but, apparently, nothing where the Obama Administration is concerned.

Visiting Vice-President Joseph Biden condemned the Israeli building project. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called it “an insult to the United States.” Senior Obama adviser David Axelrod described it as “destructive” and an “affront.” But no such words – in fact, no words at all – issued from this Administration over the PA publicly glorifying Mughrabi, which also occurred during Biden’s visit.

The Obama Administration has noisily opposed Jewish construction in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem. But last year even it accepted Israel’s unilateral concession (unreciprocated by the PA) of a ten-month building freeze in the West Bank, excluding Jerusalem. Indeed, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton welcomed this concession and called it “unprecedented” – which it was.

After all, throughout the Oslo process, Israel built homes for existing Jewish communities without Palestinians breaking off talks, and little wonder: an Israeli commitment to cease building such homes does not feature in the Oslo agreements. The use of such a pretext for walking out of talks could only have gone so far.
However, last year, the Obama Administration arrived on the scene.

(Read full article)
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Why glorify the murderers?

By Ron Kehrmann, Yossi Mendelevich and Yossi Zur
Los Angeles Times
17 March '10
Posted before Shabbat

Vice President Joe Biden took umbrage last week when Israel announced during his visit that it had approved new housing construction in East Jerusalem. But another contentious incident that took place during Biden's visit got far less scrutiny.

March 11 marked the 32nd anniversary of the deadliest terrorist attack in Israel's history, and this year the Palestinian Authority decided to honor the 19-year-old leader of the attack, Dalal Mughrabi, by naming a square in a town outside Ramallah after her. The commemoration was scheduled for the anniversary.

The official ceremony was ultimately canceled to avoid antagonizing Biden during his visit, but the square was nevertheless named for Mughrabi, and several dozen Palestinian students from President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement gathered in her honor for an unofficial dedication.

So what was the deed that deserved this commemoration? On a Saturday in March 1978, the squad of Palestinian terrorists led by Mughrabi entered Israel by boat from Lebanon and made their way to the main road between Haifa and Tel Aviv. By day's end, they had murdered 38 innocent men, women and children.

The first person Mughrabi and her gang of terrorists encountered was Gale Rubin, an American photojournalist taking photos of birds near the beach. They killed her and continued on their deadly path.

(Read full article)
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Two dedications

Fresnozionism.org
16 March '10

Yesterday, the newly rebuilt Hurva (which means ‘ruin’ in Hebrew) Synagogue, located in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, was rededicated.

Started in 1701, the Hurva was destroyed for the first time (by unpaid Arab creditors) in 1720. Rebuilt in 1864 by the Sultan’s architect with money from Montefiore, the Rothschilds and Jewish communities around the world, the synagogue was the tallest structure in the Jewish quarter — which is itself on a hill, making it reach higher than the al-Aqsa Mosque — it was a magnificent structure. Benjamin Balint writes,

It also was a forum for public assemblies. Here the city’s Jews held a memorial service for Queen Victoria; celebrated the coronation of King George V; thrilled to the orations of such Zionist leaders as Theodor Herzl and Zeev Jabotinsky; and, in 1942, conducted a mass prayer service for the victims of Hitler’s genocide.

Naturally, the jealous and racist Muslim world found the existence of such a Jewish structure unacceptable. In 1948, Jordanian troops overran the Jewish Quarter, expelled the Jews and blew up the Hurva. After 1967 plans were made to rebuild it, but in a gesture of misplaced generosity to Muslim sensibilities, only a memorial arch was built. After all, how could anything Jewish be allowed to overshadow the Muslim holy places?

Now it has yet again been rebuilt, in a form similar to the 18th century version. And — guess what — the Arabs are furious!

Jews have lived in the Old City since long before Muhammad was a gleam in his father’s eye, but Palestinians insist that any part of the city that was conquered and ethnically cleansed by the Jordanians in 1948 is “Arab East Jerusalem,” so they declared a “day of rage” today, complete with the usual stone- and firebomb-throwing.

(Read full post)
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Tom Gross: Palestinian Authority honours terrorist; White House mute

Tom Gross
National Post
16 March '10

The papers are full of reports about the startling criticism of Israel by the Obama administration — a criticism of a type not used by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton against many human rights abusing-governments the world over during the past year. (Who cares, for example, that 50,000 Muslim Burmese refugees are on the verge of starvation in Bangladesh, when you can bash Israel day after day, as the Obama administration did last week?)

The Los Angeles Times noted that “Hillary Rodham Clinton’s harsh words stunned Israel.”

The Wall Street Journal reported that “Clinton levied a blistering rebuke of Israel”

The Washington Post wrote that “Relations with Israel have been strained almost since the start of the Obama administration. Now they have plunged to their lowest ebb since the administration of George H.W. Bush… In her call [to Netanyahu], Clinton appeared to link U.S. military support for Israel to the construction in east Jerusalem."

Even the Anti-Defamation League, one of America’s largest liberal organizations, with close ties to the Democratic Party, says it is “shocked and stunned by the Obama Administration’s public dressing down of Israel.”

WHITE HOUSE SILENT

At the same time as rebuking Israel, neither the White House nor State Department had anything to say about the fact that the U.S.-financed Palestinian Authority, led by “moderate” Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, renamed a central public square in Ramallah on Thursday in honor of Dalal Mughrabi, the woman who in 1978 helped carry out the deadliest single terrorist attack in Israel’s history.

(Read full article)
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Of grievances and perceptions

Soccer Dad
14 March '10

Last week in an article about the eviction of two Arab families from the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, Isabel Kershner of the New York Times summed it up:

For those who want to see a peaceful resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the eviction of the Ghawis has touched on two sensitive nerves: the fate of East Jerusalem, where Israel and the Palestinians vie for control, and the abiding grievances of Palestinian refugees from the 1948 war.

She mentioned two things: both sides are competing and the Palestinians have a grievance. In fact most of the article centers around the Palestinian claims and how even some Israelis support the Palestinian case. The history leaves out inconvenient details such as:

On April 13, 1948, a convoy of ambulances, armored buses, trucks loaded with food and medical equipment, and 105 doctors, nurses, medical students, Hebrew University personnel, and guards headed for Mt. Scopus. The convoy was ambushed in the middle of Sheikh Jarrah, the lead vehicle hit a mine, and gangs of armed Arabs attacked. Seventy-eight Jews were murdered, among them 20 women and Dr. Haim Yaski, the hospital director. In the following months the hospital and university ceased to function. After the Six-Day War, when the area was returned to Israel, a memorial was built in their honor in Sheikh Jarrah on the road leading to Mt. Scopus.

Compare Kershner's care in preserving the Palestinian narrative in the Sheikh Jarrah story to the way she handled the Israeli narrative in the case of honoring Dalal Mughrabi:

The woman being honored, Dalal Mughrabi, was the 19-year-old leader of a Palestinian squad that sailed from Lebanon and landed on a beach between Haifa and Tel Aviv. They killed an American photojournalist, hijacked a bus and commandeered another, embarking on a bloody rampage that left 38 Israeli civilians dead, 13 of them children, according to official Israeli figures. Ms. Mughrabi and several other attackers were killed.
To Israelis, hailing Ms. Mughrabi as a heroine and a martyr is an act that glorifies terrorism.

But, underscoring the chasm between Israeli and Palestinian perceptions, the Fatah representatives described Ms. Mughrabi as a courageous fighter who held a proud place in Palestinian history. Defiant, they insisted that they would not let Israel dictate the names of Palestinian streets and squares.

Note that here the dispute is reduced to a matter of perceptions, as if a "bloody rampage" that claims the lives of "38 Israeli civilians" isn't the very definition of terrorism.

(Read full post)
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Barack Hussein Obama vs Israel

Daniel Greenfield
Sultan Knish
14 March '10

The manifold organs of the ObamaMedia are abuzz with outrage over what they are calling Israel's "insult" to the United States. But what was the nature of this awful and outrageous insult? Did Israeli officials pull off V.P. Biden's rug to show off his bald head underneath. Did they ask him why the suit of his pants is so shiny. Did they make him sit at the kiddie table?

More to the point did Israeli TV air calls for a Jihad against America, as Palestinian Arab TV did? Did Israel name a square after the murderer of an American photographer, as the Palestinian Authority did? Did an Israeli Anchorman do a skit in blackface during Obama's visit, as a Turkish anchorman did during Obama's visit to Turkey? Are Israeli religious institutions issuing Fatwahs against America, as Al Azhar University, which Obama visited and spoke at, has done? Are Israeli leaders funding terrorism against America, as the Saudi King, before whom Obama bowed, does?

No, none of those incidents were described as insults. Nothing that Muslim countries did to mock, humiliate and murder Americans were even noticed at all. None of them produced furious condemnations from the White House or two hours of Hillary Clinton screeching on the phone at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. So what did Israel do that was so awful, so horrible and terrible? It built houses. Yes, civilian houses. Not army bases or nuclear missiles or walls. Houses.

Israel approved a construction project to build housing for its own people, in its own capitol city, Jerusalem. Some of the housing will be built in the Shimon HaTzadik neighborhood, situated around the grave of Shimon the Righteous, a Jewish religious figure famed for rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. A neighborhood where Jews have lived for over a century. As well as Ramat Shlomo, a thriving neighborhood with thousands of Jewish families living in it.

The Obama Administration's objections to Jews living in Jerusalem are purely racial and religious. If Israel were approving a construction project to build housing for Arab Muslim citizens of Israel, Biden, Hillary and their media troupe wouldn't be screeching about it to the high heavens. It is only because Jews are to live there, that they have a problem with it. Their objections therefore are purely based on race and religion-- and completely racist.

(Read full article)
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PA TV honors anniversary of terror attack with interview of terrorist's sister

Itamar Marcus/Nan Jacques Zilberdik
Palestinian Media Watch (PMW)
13 March '10

(Clinton called [xxxxxxx] “to make clear the United States considered the announcement a deeply negative signal about [xxxxxxx] approach to the bilateral relationship and counter to the spirit of the vice president’s trip,” Crowley said. Clinton, he said, emphasized that “this action had undermined trust and confidence in the peace process and in America’s interests.”)

If you guessed that the call was to Abbas and the "deeply negative signal" was this event, you would be incorrect. Also, you are not a member of the Obama administration. Y.



March 11th, 1978 was the date of the worst terror attack in Israel's history, when 37 people were murdered in a bus hijacking known as the "Coastal Road Massacre." Official Palestinian Authority TV opened its broadcasting last week on the 32nd anniversary of the terror attack by praising it as:

"A glorious chapter in the history of the Palestinian people... [near Tel Aviv] in the heart of the occupation state. The operation shocked the occupation entity."

PA TV's praise of the attack was part of the introduction to an interview with Rashida Mughrabi, sister of terrorist Dalal Mughrabi, who commanded the attack. She also praised the attack and called for further terror against Israel, to whom she referred as "the Zionist enemy":

"This is a day of glory and pride for our Palestinian people and a blow to the Zionists... we must unite, and our rifles must unite, against the enemy who steals our land."

The following is from the PA TV interview with Rashida Mughrabi:

Host: "Now, dear viewers, we move on to a glorious chapter in the history of the Palestinian people. On this day in 1978, the Shahida (Martyr) Dalal Mughrabi prepared to meet her God by carrying out a self-sacrifice operation of Martyrdom-seeking [near Tel Aviv] in the heart of the occupation state. The operation shocked the occupation entity at the time and has left its mark until today and for years to come. Dalal Mughrabi, the Palestinian Shahida (Martyr), has become a symbol and model of resistance, sacrifice, and Martyrdom-seeking; a model of giving and of redemption of the homeland."

Rashida Mughrabi, sister of terrorist Dalal Mughrabi: "This is a day of glory and pride for our Palestinian people and a blow to the Zionists, who view it as a day of blood for them. It is a day of pride for us, just as the day which they see as [Israeli] Independence Day, is our day of catastrophe...

(Read full article)
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The rationale behind censorship: “Moderate” Palestinian leadership honours mass terrorism as Joe Biden leaves town. And the BBC’s response is?

Robin Shepherd
robinshepherdonline.com
14 March '10

So, let’s just accept that Israel’s handling of the Ramat Shlomo settlements announcement during US vice-president Joe Biden’s recent visit was cack handed and self-defeating. Prime Minister Netanyahu has admitted as much by apologising. It was a diplomatic faux pas, and it provoked a torrent of protest from the State Department to the Palestinian Authority. It also received saturation coverage in every major outlet in the western media. Hold that thought.

Now consider the response to the Palestinian Authority’s decision last week to celebrate the worst terrorist atrocity ever perpetrated inside Israel (the 1978 bus massacres which left 38 dead including 13 children) by naming a central square in Ramallah after its perpetrator, Dalal Mughrabi. That was a statement of values and intent, glorifying mass terrorism and signalling to Israel and the world that the Palestinians can never be trusted to abide by civilised norms. It tells you everything you really need to know about Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians and why peace with them has proved elusive for more than six decades. What follows is a list of the western news outlets that have covered what, I repeat, is an immensely significant and illustrative story:

1. The New York Times. 2. Nobody… That’s right, every other major media outlet in the western world has effectively censored it. Apart from the New York Times (and I am grateful to Tom Gross
for pointing that out) the story has been ignored.

If you really want to understand the reason why Israel faces such appalling demonisation and defamation across the western world, stop and think about this for a moment.

(Read full post)
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Remembering Dalal Mughrabi

David Hazony
Contentions/Commentary
12 March '10
Posted before Shabbat

The Palestinian Authority just pushed off plans to honor Dalal Mughrabi by renaming a square just outside Ramallah after her. Her claim to fame? In 1978 she headed up one of the most horrific acts of terror every undertaken in the name of Palestine. In the attack, she and 11 others under her command landed on a beach north of Tel Aviv and started shooting and hurling grenades at passing cars and buses on the highway. They then hijacked a bus. Anyone who tried to escape was gunned down. Thirty-eight Israelis, including 13 children, were killed in the Coastal Road Massacre. Another 71 were wounded. In response, Israel launched an assault on southern Lebanon, where her Fatah bosses were based.

We don’t know why the PA has delayed the renaming of the square, but they insist that it’s not because, say, she might not put the Palestinians in the best light.

(Read full post)
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There is a reason Israel doesn't roll over when Mahmoud Abbas bats his eyelashes

Stephanie Gutmann
Telegraph.co.uk
11 March '10

Like many of my friends in Israel I am still scratching my head over the announcement by Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai that he will grant construction permits in contested East Jerusalem — just as Vice President Biden swanned into town to play Big White Peace Broker between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

The announcement seems to have temporarily sabotaged talks that Biden was eager to set up… now, chop-chop (Air Force Two is idling on the runway for goodness sake!) and he has reacted in his characteristic over-the-top way, by saying that the lack of an agreement over Palestine, is “endangering US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

Oh please. Like what’s really irking the Taliban and Al-Qaeda is the placement of borders over in Palestine. If there was a “final status agreement” everybody would settle down and take up crocheting. The VP’s comment reveals some profound confusion about how the region works.

Almost everyone — Israeli and Palestinian alike — admits in private that with Hamas busy stock-piling Iranian weapons and tightening its law enforcement and Sharia noose on the citizens of the Gaza Strip, there was little chance either side’s leader, Mahmoud Abbas or Bibi Netanyahu, would commit to terms that change the status quo significantly. Both, in their own way, are quite preoccupied with very large existential threats. Whether a border is moved a few miles to the east or west seems quite trivial. A permanent status agreement is merely a trophy the Obama-ites would like to hang on their wall. Both leaders, to a certain extent, will help their friends in the US keep the office walls looking perky, even though those ever-waffling American friends are increasingly less useful to either side.

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The Middle East Peace Scam

Daniel Greenfield
Sultan Knish
09 March '10

For nearly twenty years the great sham of the Middle East Peace Process has dragged on. And this despicable scam has consisted of only one policy, only one platform and only one plan. Pressuring Israel for more concessions.

Year in and year out, new peace conferences were declared and new plans for peace were hammered out. All of them had one thing in common, they carved up Israel for a non-existent peace. When Arafat and his gang of terrorists made a concession, it was to demand 5 percent less of Israel in the current phase of negotiations. When Israel made a concession, it was to turn over another 10 percent of land to its worst enemies in this phase of negotiations... in exchange for them putting off their demands for that 5 percent into the next phase of the negotiations. And this sick charade in which Israel gave and the terrorists took was the peace process.

While this great surrender process was going on, outside the bombs went on exploding, tearing apart buses, restaurants, malls and families-- the politicians and diplomats in charge excused the terrorists and damned Israel if it so much as lifted a finger to defend itself, or erected a single checkpoint to catch at least one of the terrorists on the way to kill a dozen people in Jerusalem.

And now finally the Vice President of the United States arrives in Israel to reaffirm his absolute commitment to Israel's security, a commitment he and just about every other politician who let that phrase trip lightly off their lips, honors by pressing Israel to surrender again the terrorists. He arrives and condemns the greatest impediment to peace. Jewish families living in the capital of their own nation.

Biden did not take the time to condemn Abbas for his failure to hold elections, for his attendance at a funeral for the terrorists in his own militia who murdered an Israeli Rabbi, for his violation of the Gaza Jericho agreement or for his recent threats of a Holy War against Israel. Not even the Palestinian Authority naming a municipal square two days ago after Dalal Mughrabi, one of the Coastal Road Massacre bus hijackers, resulted in any statements of condemnation. Let us for a moment balance the horrifying scene of Jews moving into new apartments in Jerusalem, vs the Coastal Road Massacre in which Fatah terrorists murdered Gail Rubin, an American nature photographer, hijacked a bus, and murdered 38 passengers, 13 of them only children.

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Will VP Biden visit square honoring murderer of 37 civilians in Ramallah?

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
07 March '10

Will U.S. Vice President Biden join with the leadership of the Palestinian Authority and honor Dalal Mughrabi, a terrorist who murdered 37 civilians in 1978?

No.

But the "friends of peace" - the "moderate peace partners" Mr. Biden will meet in Ramallah will.

Question: Where are the comments from American officials - and others - that it is "inappropriate" for the PA to do this the same week that V.P. Biden is visiting. That its the "wrong time" and "counterproductive" to celebrate the murder of civilians the same week that the launching of proximity talks with Israel are being finalized? ]

Bulletin
March 7, 2010
Palestinian Media Watch

PA to name square for murderer of 37 on anniversary of her attack
http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=1715
by Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik
p:+972 2 625 4140 e: pmw@palwatch.org
f: +972 2 624 2803 w: www.palwatch.org

Another chapter is unfolding in the ongoing confrontation between Israel and the Palestinian Authority over the naming of a square after the terrorist Dalal Mughrabi. In December, Palestinian Media Watch publicized that the Municipality of Ramallah planned to name a public square in honor of the terrorist Dalal Mughrabi, who led the worst terror attack in Israel's history when she and other terrorists hijacked a bus and murdered 37 civilians in 1978.

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