'Iron Dome doesn’t answer threats'

Military analyst says claims of effectiveness are disingenuous.


Ben Hartman
JPost
09 May '10

Tel Aviv University professor and noted military analyst Reuven Pedatzur on Saturday strongly criticized a ballistic missile defense conference and exhibition held in Tel Aviv last week, calling the organizers’ and speakers’ claims that current defense systems can protect Israel from missile and rocket threats false and disingenuous.

Pedatzur’s harshest criticisms were reserved for the Arrow missile defense system, which, he said, does not present a defense against a possible nuclear strike from an Iranian ballistic missile. He said that since the system is not sure to work every time, and because a single atomic bomb can constitute an existential threat to Israel, the system is pointless.

He added that it didn’t matter if the system worked 99 percent of the time, and called its developers’ claims of such success rates “absurd and ridiculous.”

Pedatzur, who spent decades as an IAF fighter pilot, said “there are enough simple countermeasures that can be deployed to make the effectiveness of the Arrow basically zero.”

When asked why he thought such a conference would be held if the ineffectiveness of these programs is well known, Pedatzur replied that “for the aeronautics and defense industries, it’s a matter of money; and for politicians, supporting such projects allows them to tell the public that they’re doing something, they’re trying to find answers to the threats we face.”

(Read full article)

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Fighting the Blood Libels Made Against Israel

Stephanie L. Freid
Pajamasmedia.com
05 March '10

You’d think that fighting an uphill battle would get exhausting after a few years. But from all indications, al-Dura hoax theorist and media analyst Philippe Karsenty shows no signs of fatigue.

Karsenty came to public attention when he was sued for libel by France 2 after accusing the network of broadcasting staged footage of Mohammed al-Dura’s shooting death during a gun fight in Gaza in 2000. France 2 originally won the case, but the judgment was overturned by a Paris court in May 2008.

One would assume that would be sufficient victory needed to lay it all to rest. But a decade after al-Dura, an intrepid Karsenty insists the fight to clear Israel’s name is far from over.



Visiting Israel in February on yet another tireless round of campaigning, he was riding the high of a favorable Haaretz op-ed piece penned in January by military analyst Reuven Pedatzur. Pedatzur praised Karsenty’s relentless al-Dura investigations and accused Israel’s government of neglect. “Mohammed al-Dura — Israel’s greatest PR failure,” the title railed.

Karsenty agrees with the sentiment and his confidence is bolstered by support also flowing forth from Jerusalem Post columnist Caroline Glick.

Israel’s foreign ministry has taken a “‘let’s forget about this entire affair — we don’t care’ attitude instead of fighting for the truth,” Karsenty states as we sit together in the lobby of Tel Aviv’s David Intercontinental Hotel. “But the affair and its implications are far from over.”

Because as he continues traveling the world and airing al-Dura footage clips that he says prove the shooting was staged, the analyst arrived in Israel to be met with what he describes as complacent and patronizing apathy.

(Read full article)
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Enderlin hits bottom, keeps digging

Richard Landes
Augean Stables
02 February '10
Posted before Shabbat

Enderlin has responded to an article by Reuven Pedatzur which attacked his coverage of the Al Durah story. It’s not online, but here’s a PDF of the “deadwood” version (HT/Barry Nimat) and below a transcript (HT/CAMERA)

Regarding “Mohammed is not dead,” January 24, by Reuven Pedatzur

The claim that there was not a drop of blood at the scene [where Mohammed al-Dura allegedly was killed in 2000] is erroneous. Blood is clearly visible in the videos, and is mentioned in the reports prepared by the hospital that treated Jamal al-Dura, Mohammed’s father.

This is most interesting phrasing. Blood is clearly not visible in the videos. There’s a vague red spot where the boy was allegedly shot in the stomach, but that could (and probably is) a red rag that was previously on his thigh where he was allegedly first hit, and which “blood” in the later scene has miraculously vanished. For a gaping stomach wound from which the boy allegedly bled to death, the absence of blood at the scene is quite striking… even necessitating the adding of blood the next day. (All this evidence is discussed here.)

(Read full response)
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Enderlin's Latest Cover-Ups Attempts

TS
CAMERA/Snapshots
02 February '10

Responding to Reuven Pehatzur's Jan. 24, 2010 Op-Ed recapping evidence pointing to the staged killing of Mohammed Al Dura, France 2's Charles Enderlin writes in a letter in Ha'aretz today:

Regarding "Mohammed is not dead," January 24, by Reuven Pedatzur
The claim that there was not a drop of blood at the scene [where Mohammed al-Dura allegedly was killed in 2000] is erroneous. Blood is clearly visible in the videos, and is mentioned in the reports prepared by the hospital that treated Jamal al-Dura, Mohammed's father.

Jamal filed a libel suit in France against Dr. Yehua David and a French Jewish newspaper that published his argument that the father's scars are from an operation conducted six years earlier. Dr. David was referring only to injuries to the limbs, and not to a serious injury to Jamal's hip. An investigative judge in France accepted the suit, and the case will be heard in court.

I would like to point out that no doctor in Shifa Hospital has claimed that the child brought to the emergency room arrived at 10 A.M. The emergency room director said: "Mohammed al-Dura arrived around 1 P.M." That was 2 P.M. Israel time, because the Palestinians switched to winter time.

Pedatzur implies there was a conspiracy involving hundreds of Palestinian protesters, Shifa Hospital doctors and doctors from the military hospital in Jordan, where Jamal al-Dura was treated, and that Israeli security services did not find anything about it. Is this possible?

(Read full article)

Related: Philippe Karsenty on the Meaning of Al-Durah
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