Peace Treaty or Not, Palestinians Dream of Destroying Israel

U.S. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry may be able to force Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, under threats and pressure, to sign a "framework agreement" with Israel. But as this week's rally of hatred in the Gaza Strip shows, even after the signing of a Palestinian-Israeli "peace" treaty, a large number of Palestinians will not abandon there dream of destroying Israel..... "Jihad in Palestine is not terrorism. Jihad in Palestine is a sacred duty." — Yusef Rizka, representative of Hamas

Khaled Abu Toameh..
Gatestone Institute..
25 March '14..

A mass rally held in the Gaza Strip on March 23 showed that Hamas continues to enjoy popular support among Palestinians. Tens of thousands of Palestinians took to the streets to attend the rally commemorating the 10th anniversary of the assassination of Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

Hamas officials claim that nearly one million Palestinians attended the rally in the center of Gaza City.

This means that Hamas, which seeks to destroy Israel, remains as strong as ever in the Gaza Strip, despite Egypt's undeclared war against the Palestinian Islamist movement.

The Egyptian war has indeed hurt Hamas, especially in wake of the destruction of hundreds of smuggling tunnels along the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt. Hamas's popularity among Palestinians, however, as shown by the mass rally, evidently remains unaffected.

Addressing the crowd, Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh admitted that the Egyptian war has harmed his movement. "Hamas is going through difficult times," he said. "We are also facing harsh challenges."

Haniyeh added that despite Egyptian security measures against his movement and the Gaza Strip, Hamas was not in a state of panic.

At the rally, defiant Hamas leaders repeated threats to pursue terror attacks against Israel. One Hamas official, Fathi Hammad, even expressed optimism that his movement and other Palestinian terror groups would be able to destroy the "Zionist entity in a few years."

Hamas seems to be hoping, however, that the rally will send a message not only to Israel, but also to the Palestinian Authority and Egypt. The message that Hamas is seeking to relay to Egypt is that, despite the ongoing Egyptian blockade of the Gaza Strip, the movement is not showing any sign of weakness.

The Negev, the Bedouin and the Truth

...These would all be fair and logical arguments, if any of them were based on fact or an iota of truth. In reality these are six major myths or mantras that have been repeated so many times that even members of the government of Israel have blindly adopted them as truth.

Ari Briggs..
The Times of Israel..
25 March '14..

One could argue that if the conflict with the Palestinians was miraculously solved, the next conflict simmering under the surface would be the fate of the Bedouins in the Negev.

For decades, NGOs have educated the world with a shocking narrative of an indigenous population under threat of extinction. We are told that the Bedouin citizens of Israel live in a mere 45 historical villages and are forced to build illegally because their communities are not recognized by the state. That they can’t provide for their families because the government doesn’t allocate adequate funding to their communities. Above all else, apparently all they are asking for is 5% of the Negev.

These would all be fair and logical arguments, if any of them were based on fact or an iota of truth. In reality these are six major myths or mantras that have been repeated so many times that even members of the government of Israel have blindly adopted them as truth.

The first of these myths is the issue of indigenous status. Internationally accepted determinants of indigenous status rely on the following five determinants being met: 1. Original Inhabitants. 2. Extended period of Time. 3. Pre-Colonial Sovereignty. 4. Group connection to the Land. 5. External Validation.

The Bedouin that currently reside in the Negev are not the original inhabitants of the area. Even if a very limited amount of these nomadic tribes were in the area two or even three hundred years ago, this is not considered as an extended period of time warranting the title indigenous. This does not place them in the area before the first colonialist invasion by marauding Arabs from Arabia in the 8th Century CE or the beginning of the long period of Ottoman domination that started in the 1500’s.

Nomadic life also precludes any specific fixed connection to the land. There is no long-standing proof in Bedouin tradition establishing a spiritual connection between them and the Negev specifically, a logical result of their relatively brief presence there and to their nomadic lifestyle.

Although the UN Committee on Indigenous People did bestow indigenous status on the Bedouin of the Negev, the fact that no other Bedouin tribe in the Middle East ever made a claim of being indigenous raises questions as to the motives and authenticity of such a claim and raises the obvious questions of the committee’s objectivity.

Major myth number two is the Bedouin claim of “historical villages” which can be easily refuted with historical aerial photographs. Tens of aerial photographs of these so-called historical villages have been examined and made publically available and show that these villages did not exist prior to 1945.

No one is denying that there were nomadic tribes living in the Negev earlier than the 1940s. However, due to the nature of these tribes, no permanent residences were established. There are signs of cultivation in the aerial photography that was examined, but the form of farming used was seasonal, not long term, in order to supply feed for their herds as they moved from place to place.

Myth three is the existence of only 45 “unrecognized” villages where tens of thousands of Bedouin live. A map funded by the now infamous OXFAM in 2006 institutionalized this. Today anyone using Google Earth/Maps can easily see that there are not 45, but thousands of illegal residential clusters/hamlets/villages spread throughout the Northern Negev between Beersheva, Arad & Dimona.

A Preposition too far at the New York Times

...The Times needs to correct the false impression left by Rudoren when she reported “continued construction of settlements” and, in the future, make it clear to readers that construction is taking place within existing settlements. Such wording still may not please everyone, certainly not the New York Times, but it has the advantage of accuracy – an objective the Times should not so easily discard.

Leo Rennert..
American Thinker..
25 March '14..

If you were to read in your local newspaper an article about construction of highways, it goes without saying that readers would understand that more roads are being built.

Ditto in the West Bank, where New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief Jodi Rudoren tells readers about Israel’s “continued construction OF settlements.”. Such construction, she reports, is not sitting well with Palestinians. As for Times readers, they naturally would surmise that Israel is building more settlements, or additional settlements.

Except this ain’t so. Israel is not building more settlements. Whatever housing construction is planned or under way takes place in settlements. Inside settlements. Within settlements. But there is no proliferation of settlements, as Rudoren suggests. For several years, Israel has not built additional settlements or expanded the boundaries of existing ones. Rather, housing construction generally has been confined within the bounds of existing settlements.

The who and probable why of attempts to bring down Ya’alon

...Indeed, he behaved as a leader ought to. When the leader in an open society is considering a significant shift in national policies, it is reasonable for him to share his thinking with policy elites, whether in academia or the media, to prepare the ground and gauge their responses. Doing so in private enables leaders to consider major shifts away from the spotlight...He spoke off the record to prevent a diplomatic embarrassment for himself and the country. They leaked his remarks in order to embarrass him and initiate a diplomatic crisis.

Caroline Glick..
Our World/JPost..
24 March '14..

If this is a coincidence, it is an extraordinary one. Twice in less than two months, remarks that Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon made in closed forums about key issues on Israel’s national security agenda were leaked to the media. In both cases, the media used the leaked remarks to foment a crisis in relations between Israel and the Obama administration.

In both cases, the Obama administration has used the opportunities created by the Israeli media to bash Ya’alon and pressure Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to fire him.

In January, Yediot Aharonot leaked Ya’alon’s private remarks about US Secretary of State John Kerry’s irrational focus on the mordant peace process between Israel and the Palestinians at a time when there is both relative peace in Israel, and Israel’s neighbors are undergoing political upheavals and civil war. Together with the other two musketeers of Israel’s far-left media – Haaretz and Channel 2, Yediot used the story to provoke a fight between the Netanyahu government and the Obama administration. Acting on cue, the White House and State Department demanded that Ya’alon apologize for remarks that were made in private. Ya’alon sufficed with a terse statement that he was sorry if anyone took offense from his private remarks.

And now, two months later, Ya’alon’s remarks have been leaked again.

Last week Ya’alon spoke at a forum at Tel Aviv University that was closed to the media. There he bemoaned the Obama administration’s abandonment of the US’s traditional role as the world’s policeman and considered its significance for Israel. With regard to Iran’s nuclear program, Ya’alon said that the time had come for Israel to recognize that the US has not met its expectations and taken the lead to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. As a consequence, “We [Israelis] have to look out for ourselves.”

Haaretz published Ya’alon’s leaked remarks and then, with its partners, Yediot and Channel 2, set about fomenting a crisis in relations with the US. As it did in January, last week the Obama administration jumped at the opportunity. State Department spokeswoman Jan Psaki stopped just short of demanding Ya’alon’s resignation.

What is going on here? Obama and Kerry say far worse things about Israel’s leaders as a matter of course than Ya’alon said about either of them. And nothing Ya’alon said was wrong. Nothing that he said was unique. Similar statements are being heard from spurned US allies around the region and the world. Not only were Ya’alon’s statements reasonable, the vast majority of Israelis share his sentiments both on the untrustworthiness of US security guarantees and on the absence of prospects for peace with the PLO.

So why leak his remarks and present them as unforgivable faux pas?

The ever more bizarre and vile world of Jimmy Carter

...If he has become politically toxic even during the administration of the president whose foreign policy and predilection for picking fights with Israel most resembles his own, it is due to his own intemperate and indefensible views on the Middle East and his not-so-subtle echoes of the anti-Semitic Walt-Mearsheimer “Israel Lobby” thesis. Obama’s snubs in the wake of Carter’s “apartheid” slurs are simply a matter of political awareness that it wasn’t possible to align oneself with such a discredited figure. That the 39th president would blame the Jews, rather than himself, for this predicament is as vile as it is predictable.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary Magazine..
24 March '14..

Former President Jimmy Carter is back in the news this week publicizing a new book about women’s rights. But, as is often the case with Carter, he drew more interest for comments he made about Israel and its supporters. When asked on NBC’s Meet the Press yesterday by Andrea Mitchell why it was that Barack Obama never called upon him for advice, he made it clear that the Jewish state was the reason he has been treated like a pariah:

I—that’s a hard question– for me to answer—you know, with complete candor. I think the problem was that– that in dealing with the issue of peace in– between Israel and Egypt– the Carter Center has taken a very strong and public position of equal treatment between the Palestinians and the Israelis. And I think this was a sensitive area in which the president didn’t want to be involved.

When he first came out with his speech in Cairo calling for the end of all settlements and when he later said that the ’67 borders would prevail, he and I were looking at it from the same perspective. But I can understand those sensitivities. And I don’t have any criticism of him.

Lest anyone think this was a slip of the tongue, he repeated the assertion in more stark terms this morning during a fawning interview with Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough on the same network’s Morning Joe program:

I think that sometimes an incumbent president doesn’t want to be very friendly with me because it might looked upon as more friendly toward the Palestinians instead of the Israelis. So we try to be balanced. That’s the only issue that separates me from Obama anyway. And I was very proud of him when he made a speech in Cairo and said no more settlements when he said the 67 borders would prevail except for minor modifications. Those things are very compatible with what I believe.

Carter might consider that the reason a successor wouldn’t wish to be burdened with a relationship with him was, at least in part, due to the Georgian’s insufferable personality and chronic self-righteousness. But there may be some truth to his assertion that his stands on the Middle East are at the root of the problem. Far from being an innocent victim of political influence for being “even-handed,” however, his lack of influence is due to the fact that his bias and slanders against the Jewish state have effectively marginalized him.

Striking terrorism relentlessly, both appropriate and to be encouraged

...Those who wish to avoid the dubious pleasure of having a rocket explode in their backyard or a Palestinian suicide bomber explode on their street would do better to support and encourage those who tirelessly work to keep such threats at bay.

Zvika Fogel..
Israel Hayom..
24 March '14..

The search for a less intimidating name for terrorism has become all the rage lately. It started with the term "low-intensity conflict," meant to differentiate the war on terror from a full-scale war with an organized enemy's army, and has recently settled on the term the "battle between the wars."

Is there anyone out there who believes the soldiers on the ground -- those whose mission it is to storm terrorists -- care about the euphemisms used by politicians and generals? Field commanders and the troops on the ground know exactly what it is -- a war for the very future of the State of Israel.

According to reports made public by the Shin Bet security agency, the past year has seen more than 100 terror attacks a month in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria. Not attempted attacks or intended attacks, but actual terror attacks, which included planting explosives, the use of Molotov cocktails, and shooting and stabbing attacks.

The operations and intelligence efforts security forces pursue are neither a "low-intensity conflict" nor a "battle between wars." It is a daily battle against an enemy that is trying to destroy us, and it has a name -- it is called a struggle for survival.

Like to Guess Who's Faulting Israel for Going After Palestinian Terrorist?

...A classic example of soft-pedaling Palestinian terrorism by the New York Times.

Leo Rennert..
American Thinker..
24 March '14..

On March 22, Israeli security forces ended a lengthy search for Hamza Abu El-Hijja, a Palestinian terrorist involved in shootings of Israelis and in planning more attacks. They cornered him in the West Bank town of Jenin, leaving him with two options -- he could surrender or shoot it out. He chose the latter, wounding two Israeli soldiers in an ensuing firefight that also claimed the lives of two other Palestinian terrorists -- one a member of the terrorist group Islamic Jihad and the other a member of the terrorist wing of President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah party, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade.

In reporting this episode, the New York Times plays down the serious threat posed by Abu El-Hijja and instead criticizes Israel for going after him.

Herewith the headline on page 10 of the March 23 news section: “Israeli Raid Leaves 3 Dead In West Bank Refugee Area.” No indication of Abu El-Hijja’s terrorist credentials, or the terrorist identity of the other two Palestinians, or that Abu El-Hijja’s decision to opt for a shootout caused the lethal firefight. Just the opposite, the headline blames the “Israeli raid” for the deaths of the three terrorists.

The article itself, by Jerusalem bureau chief Jodi Rudoren and correspondent Fares Akram, is just as wide of what actually happened as the headline. Again blaming Israel for pursuing a dangerous terrorist, the lead paragraph evinces the same slant as the headline: “Israeli forces killed three Palestinians and wounded at least seven others when their attempt to arrest a person suspected of being a militant in the restive Jenin refugee camp erupted into a violent clash.” No indication of the terrorists stripes of Abu El-Hijja. And it was Israel’s attempt to arrest him -- not his decision to shoot it out -- that sparked a “violent clash.” Abu El-Hijja is exonerated, while Israel is blamed for going after him.

The Bad Habit of Lying Repeatedly and Shamelessly About Israel and Bethlehem

...This lie, as easily exposed as it is, is unbelievably resilient. It has been repeatedly debunked. And yet people keep repeating it or refuse to retract it even after they’ve been given overwhelming evidence that what they’ve said is not true. And people have seen others called out on the lie, and yet they repeat it themselves. Why? Why not invoke Qalqilya – a place in the West Bank where numerous suicide attacks were launched from? For people indifferent to Qalqilya’s history as a source of terror attacks during the Second Intifada (like many of the folks at Christ at the Checkpoint), images of this city would be very compelling. Why lie about Bethlehem?

Dexter Van Zile..
The Algemeiner..
23 March '14..

Last week, approximately 600 Christians descended on Bethlehem to attend the 2014 Christ at the Checkpoint Conference organized by Bethlehem Bible College. The organizers and presenters of this conference say that they want to promote peace between Israel and the Palestinians, but they just cannot stop themselves from engaging in an ugly propaganda war against the Jewish state.

In other words, they cannot refrain from lying about Israel, repeatedly and shamelessly.

Three times during the conference, attendees were told that Israel has constructed a security barrier that completely surrounds the city of Bethlehem. Two people called it a wall and a third described it as a wall and fences.

No matter how they describe it, the security barrier, which was constructed to stop terrorists from crossing from the West Bank into Israel, does not surround the city. Even the map of the West Bank provided in the program for Christ at the Checkpoint shows this. The eastern and southern sections of the city are not confined by a wall.

Nevertheless, on the first night of the conference, Bethlehem Mayor Vera Baboun said the city is “surrounded with a wall.” I was in the audience when she said this and there were Palestinian Christians sitting next to me who didn’t bat an eye after hearing this lie.

This was not an honest mistake. Baboun is the mayor of the city, for heaven’s sake. We all know politicians lie, but this is a bit much.

Mayor, will you please stop lying?

Then, in a short film shown to the audience on the first full day of the conference, March 11, Qustandi Shomali, a professor at Bethlehem University, said “Bethlehem is surrounded by a wall and the Bethlehem population cannot reach very easily other areas in the West Bank.”

Again, I was in the audience when this film was shown and no one in the audience voiced a word of objection. Not one word. And again, this was not an honest mistake, for Shomali lives in nearby Beit Sahour. He knows that Bethlehem is not surrounded by a wall.

Professor, will you please stop lying?

And then on Friday, March 14, the last day of the conference, Sami Awad, executive director of Holy Land Trust, a Palestinian non-profit, appeared in a short film in which he claimed that “Today, Bethlehem is a city that is completely surrounded by walls and fences. The wall completely engulfs the city.”

I was not in the room when the film was shown, but it is on Youtube, right here. It goes without saying, (but has to be said), this was not an honest mistake. Holy Land Trust is headquartered in Bethlehem. Awad works in the city. He knows the route of the barrier.

Sami, will you please stop lying?

Probably not. This is not the first time Awad has uttered this falsehood. He said it to an audience of Christians in Galveston, Texas, in 2009. He was called out on it in a piece published on CAMERA’s website in 2012. And yet he said it again two years later. Did he expect not to get caught?

The upshot is this: Three different people offered the same lie to an audience comprised mostly of Evangelical Protestants from the United States and Europe. They told people that the city in which they were currently staying was surrounded by a security barrier, when in fact it isn’t.

This lie has been repeated so many times it is astounding.

How did the 30,000 remaining Palestinian refugees from ’48 morph into 5 million?

...If those truly inspired by a desire to reach a two-state deal would honestly grapple with finding a just resolution to the problem of 30,000 Palestinian refugees from the 1948 War, a solution could easily be found. However, if we fail to challenge the fabricated figure of 5 million, then, even when the last actual Palestinian refugees from ’48 have passed on, Palestinian leaders (and activists provided a forum by sympathetic media groups) will still have an endless supply of ‘refugees’ to bludgeon Israel, and thus stymie a possible peace agreement – all of which helps to explain the position of the Palestinian President at the White House last week.

Adam Levick..
CiF Watch..
23 March '14..

The Times of Israel reported today that, during his meeting with Barack Obama last Monday, Mahmoud Abbas not only refused to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, but reiterated his refusal to abandon the so-called “right of return” for Palestinian “refugees”.

To understand why Abbas continues playing the “refugee” card, a brief look at how the world’s refugees are treated is necessary.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is the UN agency responsible for aiding all the world’s refugees - “all” the world’s refugees, that is, except for the Palestinians. The tens of millions of actual refugees this agency aids receive initial assistance – which often entails helping to resettle them in a new state – and then they are no longer refugees.

According to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) – the UN agency which deals exclusively with Arabs of Palestinian descent – ‘Palestinian refugees‘ are defined as “persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine during the period 1 June 1946 to 15 May 1948, and who lost both home and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 conflict.” And, the number of Palestinian refugees from the ’48 war who are still alive – out of the initial 711,000 or so – is estimated to be roughly 30,000. However, due to UNRWA’s expansive definition of who qualifies for “refugee” benefits – which includes the children, grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren of Palestinian Arabs who may have once lived in Historic Palestine – over 5 million Arabs of Palestinian descent are considered “refugees”. This means that 99 percent of their clients are NOT in fact refugees.

Remarkably, under UNRWA’s bizarre rules, even Arabs of Palestinian descent who are citizens of other Arab states – such as Jordan – are still considered “refugees“.

(Additionally, given that there are 30,000 actual Palestinian refugees, and UNRWA has a payroll of 29,000 employees, the ratio of UNRWA employees to actual refugees is nearly 1:1. In contrast, UNHCR, which handles roughly 43 million refugees throughout the world, has a payroll of only 7,685.)

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Can You Imagine? Europeans Fund Lawfare Against “Allies” Israel and Canada

...Quite simply, the primary function of this organization appears to be to wage “lawfare” against Israel’s judicial system in an effort to sabotage its legal process and subvert the democratic structures for determining Israeli policy.

Tom Wilson..
Commentary Magazine..
23 March '14..

The growing European hostility toward the Jewish state is well publicized, as is the corresponding European support for the Palestinians and their agenda. The Palestinian Authority’s largest funder is not the oil-rich and supposedly sympathetic Arab world. It is not even the United States. No, despite its own critical financial situation, the largest single funder of the dubious Fatah-run mini-state in the West Bank is the European Union. Given the way in which the PA is known to squander huge sums of money through corruption, that it is guilty of torturing and persecuting political opponents, openly incites genocidal levels of Jew-hatred among its population and generally obstructs the peace process at every turn, this level of European funding ought to raise some eyebrows.

Yet, in addition to this direct funding to the PA, European countries are also channeling large amounts of money to highly politicized activist groups, and in doing so financing the legitimacy war being waged against Israel. In a report released by NGO Monitor earlier this month, it has been exposed that the EU, along with several other European governments, is paying for the waging of what has come to be known as “lawfare” against Israel. More noteworthy still is the way this funding is also being used by one particularly hostile and activist NGO to even pursue Canada, a close of ally of Israel, at the UN. The large body of evidence here really does have to be seen to be believed. Yet there is no denying it: European countries are indeed financing “lawfare” against two nations that they purport to consider friends.

The Palestinian NGO in question is the cryptically named Norwegian Refugee Council, a title that offers few clues as to the group’s actual activities. Quite simply, the primary function of this organization appears to be to wage “lawfare” against Israel’s judicial system in an effort to sabotage its legal process and subvert the democratic structures for determining Israeli policy. NGO Monitor reports that NRC has financed at least 677 cases that received full legal representation in court and other administrative bodies in Israel. According to an eyewitness report, the strategy here is to “try every possible legal measure to disrupt the Israeli judicial system… as many cases as possible are registered and that as many cases as possible are appealed to increase the workload of the courts and the Supreme Court to such an extent that there will be a blockage.”

Funny thing is, Ya'alon's comments do perfectly reflect the State Dept policies

...Ya'alon is one of the most significant and successful professionals that has risen in the field of security. His professional analysis on security issues field have been proven to be free of an agenda, and therefore not slanted. That is why he has accurately predicted events and warned against them. However, the State Department seems to view Ya'alon as an obstacle to forming the framework peace agreement.

Rav/Colonel (res.) Eliezer Schonwald
Israel Hayom..
23 March '14..

There are those in Israel who stress out over the hysterical, enraged comments made by the U.S. State Department in response to Defense Minister Moshe (Bogie) Ya'alon's remarks. But precisely the outrage tells me that something else is going on and that this isn't about being offended but a strategic, calculated response.

Whoever looks at Ya'alon's remarks on U.S. policy in the Middle East and particularly in Iran, does not understand what exactly upset the State Department and what so angered the Americans they demanded an explicit apology from the defense minister. After all, Ya'alon's comments perfectly reflect the State Department's policies, one by one.

If people in the State Department think there's a problem, the problem is not what Ya'alon said but with whoever formed the negligent, out-of-touch foreign policy. It seems the U.S. State Department truly believes their competent, calculated foreign policy succeeded in preventing the chaos in Egypt in recent years, succeeded in thwarting the ongoing slaughter in Syria, stopped Iran's nuclear arms race, and deterred Russia from annexing the Crimean peninsula. According to the Americans, only Ya'alon is unaware of their great success and sees it as a failure.

Even if the State Department (whether under the current or previous administrations) wanted to bring peace and prosperity in the spirit of the American democratic vision -- they prove, time and again, that they cannot form policies or lead global reforms. Yet this does diminish the department's confidence in its abilities. It is confidant it has the key to solving the Israeli-Arab conflict. Here and now. Even if that means one side is forced to conform to their plans (its no secret that usually that means Israel). After all, these are the rules of the game. Under the pretense of friendship and cooperation, Israel is expected to agree to America's demands.

The “Right of Return” Is Not About “Refugees”. Not Now, Not Ever.

...The half of the Palestinian polity that is not openly dedicated to Israel’s destruction is unwilling to recognize Israel as the Jewish state … For those of you who think that this has anything to do with the refugee issue — you’re wrong. In 1947, there wasn’t a single refugee, and the Palestinian and the Arab world was not willing to recognize a nation state for the Jewish people. That is a core issue, the core issue …

Rick Richman..
Commentary Magazine..
23 March '14..

In “A Jewish State,”the Wall Street Journal notes that “the right of return, with its implicit promise to eliminate Israel, is the centerpiece of the conflict” between Israelis and Arabs. The Journal observes that it is a “right” recognized “for no other refugee group in the world,” and that its acceptance by Israel would risk “a demographic time bomb that could turn the country into another Lebanon, sectarian and bloody.” The Journal explains the Palestinian rejection of a Jewish state as follows: “As to why Mr. Abbas won’t accept a Jewish state, it’s because doing so means relinquishing what Palestinians call the ‘right of return.’”

The Journal’s otherwise excellent editorial confuses a tactic and a goal. The reason the Palestinians won’t accept a Jewish state is not because it means relinquishing the “right of return.” It is the other way around: they won’t relinquish the “right of return” because it would mean accepting a Jewish state. Nor is this simply a matter of substituting the converse for the Journal’s formulation. Rather, it reflects a fundamental point that Ron Dermer (then one of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s closest aides and currently Israel’s ambassador to the U.S.) made in a May 2009 AIPAC presentation. Dermer’s point was that the “core issue” in the conflict was not refugees, but recognition:

The half of the Palestinian polity that is not openly dedicated to Israel’s destruction is unwilling to recognize Israel as the Jewish state … For those of you who think that this has anything to do with the refugee issue — you’re wrong. In 1947, there wasn’t a single refugee, and the Palestinian and the Arab world was not willing to recognize a nation state for the Jewish people. That is a core issue, the core issue …

The Palestinians use a definition of “refugee” that makes their “refugeehood” hereditary. Other refugees get resettled; Palestinian refugees get born. They may have never lived in Israel, but they are classified as “refugees” at birth, on grounds that their grandparents (or great grandparents) were refugees 65 years ago. This is why each year the number of Palestinian refugees increases, while the number of other refugees in the world decreases. The Palestinians have been repeatedly offered a state to which their refugees could “return,” but they repeatedly reject it, clinging to a specious “right” of “return” to Israel not because it is necessary for the “refugees,” but because it is a tool in the fight against the Jewish state.

Peace, trust and Abbas?

...How anyone can seriously urge Israel to place its trust in this man's good faith and ability to deliver on a peace that requires painful compromise on both sides is simply beyond our comprehension.

Frimet/Arnold Roth..
This Ongoing War..
23 March '14..

Demonstrating the utility of utterly flexible principles, the man at the top of the Palestinian Arab power structure, Mahmoud Abbas, is quoted in an Associated Press report tonight calling for the Obama administration "to intervene to save the peace talks".

Alert readers may recall yesterday's somewhat different message from Abbas, one in which he "rejected most of the proposals made by Obama during their meeting at the White House"... and presented himself to the Palestinian 'street' as the political figure with "the guts to say no to Obama..."

This Saturday variation on the Friday man is connected to what happened in Jenin today. The AP version comes from Mohammed Ballas:

"Israeli troops killed three Palestinians in an early morning raid that was followed by a clash with angry protesters in a West Bank town on Saturday, the military and Palestinian security officials said, in the deadliest incident in months... [It] started with an Israeli raid, which the military said aimed to arrest Hamza Abu el-Heija, a 22-year-old Hamas operative wanted for involvement in shooting and bombing attacks against Israelis. Lt. Col. Peter Lerner described el-Heija as a "ticking bomb" and said he was wanted for months and was allegedly in the final stages of planning a major shooting attack against Israelis. Palestinians officials said the military ringed the house in the Jenin refugee camp overnight and ordered el-Heija outside. When he refused to come out, the soldiers stormed the building and a shootout ensued. Lerner said everyone but el-Heija had left the building before the shootout. The military says el-Heija first shot an attack dog that was sent inside and then opened fire on the troops outside, wounding two soldiers. When he attempted to escape while still shooting at the Israelis, the troops returned fire and killed him, Lerner said. [AP]

So just where was Abbas and his PA forces in all this? Avi Issacharoff, writing in the Times of Israel today, explains that there's a "new reality in the refugee camps of the West Bank", and here's how it looks:

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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. Check-it out! 
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The worst alternative by Caroline Glick

...To paraphrase Winston Churchill, the Israeli one-state plan is the worst possible plan for managing the Palestinian and pan-Arab conflict with Israel, except for every other plan that has been tried from time to time. It presents Israel with considerable threats and challenges. But on balance, as I show in my book, these threats are less acute and less dangerous than the ones Israel now faces. Moreover, the Israeli one-state plan is a viable prospect, which similarly distinguishes it from all the other ideas on offer.

Caroline Glick..
Column One/JPost..
20 March '14..

PLO chief Mahmoud Abbas must have gotten a kick out of it on Monday when he visited the White House and President Barack Obama praised him as “somebody who has consistently renounced violence, has consistently sought a diplomatic and peaceful solution that allows for two states, side by side, in peace and security.”

After all, the same day the men met, Abbas’s regime continued its week-long celebration of the deadliest Palestinian terrorist attack on Israel to date.

On March 11, 1978, PLO terrorists commandeered a passenger bus on the coastal highway and massacred 37 people, including 12 children.

Dalal Mughrabi, a female terrorist, led the raid. Ever since, she has been lionized by the PLO.

While he met with Obama, Abbas’s adviser Sultan Abu al-Einein proclaimed that Mughrabi was the ultimate role model for Palestinian women.

In Einein’s words, (reported by Palestinian Media Watch), “In March, [we mark] Palestinian Women’s Day, in March, Palestinian Mother’s Day also occurs, in March… [we remember Dalal Mughrabi] who would not agree to anything other than to establish her state between Jaffa and Lebanon in her special way.”

Einein urged Palestinian youth to follow Mughrabi’s example of mass murder. “Let the young people hear me: Allah, honor us with Martyrdom, Allah, give us the honor of being part of the procession of Martyrs.”

The Israeli Right didn’t need the Mughrabi festival to understand that Obama’s claim that Abbas wants peace is ridiculous. As Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon explained last Saturday, Abbas is “a partner for taking, not for giving.”

Israeli Leftists, who have slavishly championed Abbas, are finally catching on. Last month, in an op-ed in Haaretz, long-time PLO champion Shlomo Avineri acknowledged the dynamic at work in the two-state policy model and how Abbas uses it to Israel’s disadvantage.

Avineri wrote that it is not that Abbas “is no partner for talks, but that he is an excellent partner for talks — as long as they are talks designed to lead Israel to make more and more concessions, and to put them in writing. Then, on one pretext or another, he is unwilling to sign and brings the negotiations to a halt, so they can be restarted in the future ‘where they left off’: with all the previous Israeli concessions included, and no concessions having been put forward by the Palestinian side.”

In other words, Abbas negotiates not to achieve peace, but to weaken Israel.

Skip this post if Mahmoud Abbas is your idea of a 'peace partner'

...When Yasser Arafat, Abbas' unlamented predecessor in office, returned from the Camp David talks in 2000, he famously celebrated the failure of those talks too. He shortly afterwards engineered the eruption of the Arafat Terror War, that commenced on Jewish New Year's Day of that year.

Frimet/Arnold Roth..
This Ongoing War..
21 March '14..

Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Arab political figure who this past January notoriously commenced the tenth year of the four year presidential term to which he was elected in 2005, adds another peace-seeking notch to his growing list of career 'achievements'. As Herb Keinon writes in today's Jerusalem Post ["Israeli Official: Palestinians Celebrating Failure of Peace Talks"], Abbas returned yesterday (Thursday)

to a hero's welcome in Ramallah, where he told thousands of Palestinians at a rally that in his meeting on Monday with President Obama, "I have honored my pledge and kept my promise" not to give up Palestinian rights.

Some hero. Some honor.

This is disturbing on several levels, even by Abbas' shabby standards. When Yasser Arafat, Abbas' unlamented predecessor in office, returned from the Camp David talks in 2000, he famously celebrated the failure of those talks too. He shortly afterwards engineered the eruption of the Arafat Terror War, that commenced on Jewish New Year's Day of that year.

Dennis Ross, the presidential envoy who played a central role for the US government at Camp David, summed up Arafat's strategy in 2002:

Let me give you the sequence, because I think it puts all this in perspective. Number one, at Camp David we did not put a comprehensive set of ideas on the table. We put ideas on the table that would have affected the borders and would have affected Jerusalem. Arafat could not accept any of that. In fact, during the 15 days there, he never himself raised a single idea. His negotiators did, to be fair to them, but he didn't. The only new idea he raised at Camp David was that the temple didn't exist in Jerusalem... [Source: Congressional Record, April 22, 2002]

It appears Abbas adopted much the same strategy in the White House this week.

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Dhimmitude as the root of non-recognition

...But the Jews are one of the few non-Muslim peoples to have achieved self-determination. A nation of former slaves has committed the unforgiveable sin of overturning the natural order: Israel has repeatedly defeated the Arab Muslims on the battlefield. For the humiliated to now humiliate their traditional oppressors is unbearable.

Lyn Julius..
Times of Israel..
22 March '14..

You’ve heard it from a senior Palestinian. You’ve heard it from Mahmoud Abbas, endorsed by Fatah. You’ve heard it from the Arab League.

In the US-brokered peace framework talks, the Arab side has decisively rejected the Israeli demand: “recognise Israel as a Jewish state”.

Of course, US secretary of state John Kerry himself has said he does not see the need for such recognition. Others have poo-poo’d the demand, producing all manner of objections, red herrings and distractions. These have been ably swept away by commentators such as Gilead Ini. It’s all about the Palestinian refusal to waive their ‘right of return’ – turning the Jewish state into an Arab-majority state by overwhelming it with millions of returning refugees and their descendants, he explains.

So much for two states for two peoples. Lest there be any room for doubt, what the Palestinians have in mind is the impending Arabisation of Israel : two states for one (Arab) people.

So far, few have remarked on the religious and cultural underpinnings of the Arab rejection of ‘recognition of Israel as a Jewish state’.

The Muslim denial of collective minority rights is rooted in the historical rejection of non-Muslim peoplehood. Dhimmitude, a term coined by the historian Bat Ye’or, describes the Islamic practice of denying equality to Jews and Christians who live under Muslim rule. Islam offers them religious autonomy, not national freedom. The orthodox Palestinian line has been to deny Israel’s existence, but to offer to allow Jews, after Israel’s demise, to live in a “secular and democratic” Palestinian state. Implicit even in the Saudi peace initiative, hailed by many Israelis as a moderate and reasonable blueprint, is the notion that, in return for ‘normalisation’ ,the Jews of Israel must agree to submit to the traditional cultural and political dominance of the Muslims.

For 14 centuries, Jews, whose presence predated Islam in the Middle East and North Africa by up to one thousand years, lived in an atmosphere of ‘cordial hatred’ alongside Muslims. It is debatable whether Jews ‘had it better’ under Muslims than Christians; that, according to the acclaimed historian Bernard Lewis, is another myth. ’Despised but indispensable’ Jews were spared conversion to Islam because they could be exploited for their essential skills – as international traders, usurers and craftsmen.

But Jews had few rights under Islamic tutelage. They surrendered their right to self-defence to Muslims, paying ‘protection money’ – the jizya poll tax – in order to guarantee their physical safety. They had to submit to ritual humiliations reminding them of their cursed and lowly status – they had to wear special clothing, could not build their homes higher than the Muslim, could not bear witness against a Muslim in court. These rules were mostly abrogated following pressure from the European colonial powers in the 19th century, but, following the rise of 20th century Arab nationalism and now Islamism, indigenous (non-Arabs and) non-Muslims are once again being denied their rights. The Assyrian Christians, the Kurds and the Copts, experienced – and still experience – vicious persecution. But only one group – the Jews – who once numbered almost a million before 1948 – have been ‘ethnically cleansed’ from the region.

The Dynamic Duo - Washington Post and NY Times Blame Israel for Syrian Aggression

...In both instances -- at the Times and at the Post -- the headlines were seriously misleading in blaming Israel for Syrian aggression, when the articles actually make it clear that it was the other way around. First, the Syrian bombing; then the Israeli response. It’s not that the headline writers were squeezed by not having sufficient space to get it straight. At both papers, the headlines run across the entire width of the page.

Leo Rennert..
American Thinker..
21 March '14..

In its March 20 edition, the Washington Post runs the following headline on page A10: “New Tensions after Israeli planes hit three Syrian army positions on Golan Heights.” In a similar vein, the New York Times headline on page A6 reads as follows: “Israeli Strikes on Syrian Army Sites Raise Concern About Entanglement.”

Readers who scan only headlines -- and they are legion -- are left with the distinct impression that Israel is stirring trouble and violence along the Syrian border. It’s a false impression, of course. As is actually made clear in the body of the actual articles.

At the Post, the lead paragraph of correspondents Ruth Eglash and Liz Sly inform readers that Israeli
warplanes attacked Syrian military positions “in retaliation for a bombing the previous day” And they elaborate in the third paragraph that the Israeli raid was a “response to a bombing along the line Tuesday that injured four Israeli soldiers.”

The article makes clears what the headline does not -- that Syrian bombing that injured four Israeli soldiers prompted retaliatory action by Israel. The “tensions” mentioned in the headline were triggered by Syrian aggression -- not by Israeli counterstrikes.

Ditto at the New York Times, where correspondent Isabel Kershner leads off by telling readers that Israeli airstrikes against Syrian military positions came “as a specific response to a bomb attack against Israeli forces along the frontier a day earlier.”

In both instances -- at the Times and at the Post -- the headlines were seriously misleading in blaming Israel for Syrian aggression, when the articles actually make it clear that it was the other way around. First, the Syrian bombing; then the Israeli response.

It’s not that the headline writers were squeezed by not having sufficient space to get it straight. At both papers, the headlines run across the entire width of the page.

Associated Press' allegedly objective journalism

...We completely understand why the PA do the revolting things they do, according to their own values. But as one of the world's most influential sources of news reporting, what's AP's excuse?

Frimet/Arnold Roth..
This Ongoing War..
21 March '14..

While politicians from the EU parliament in Brussels are here tonight to tell us the murderers of our family members must walk free because this "is central to the peace process", one of the world's major sources of syndicated news reports implies the killers are not killers at all.

An Associated Press article, "Jailed militant key to Mideast talk", published on Wednesday, is the latest in a series that paint Marwan Barghouti as a Mandela-like man of peace who, if only he were sprung from jail, would take his natural place in the pantheon of Palestinian Arab statespersons and blaze a path to wherever it is they believe the Palestinian Arabs are heading. (CIFWatch documented similar media efforts in an excellent analysis last year.)

We personally sat through the murder trial of Marwan Barghouti back in 2004. The hearing was in Tel Aviv, in the Magistrates Court complex that rarely gets the kind of lavish media attention in evidence that week. Aljazeera's TV crew were there along with reporters from all over. A motley assemblage of lawyers from Israel, the PA and overseas were too, intent on defending the 'great' man from the lowly offenses of which he was charged. Some of the most entertaining moments on the trial's first day involved one of those would-be advocates, an unusually boorish individual intent on making a splash, being physically picked up by the security people and thrown out the door of the court room and onto the floor of the adjacent lobby.

Two main factors (among many) persuaded us to be there. One: Marwan Barghouti had personally given post-massacre shelter and money to members of the Hamas gang that planned and carried out the bombing of the Sbarro restaurant in Jerusalem in which our teenage daughter was murdered three years earlier. He was, in legal terms, an accessory after the fact to the terrorism.

And one of the five victims for whose murder Barghouti was charged was a very Jewish-looking, traditionally bearded man, driving his car in 2001 along one of Judea's intercity desert roads and shot dead from a distance by Barghouti's sharp-shooters and a volley of 13 bullets. Only this was no Jew. He was in fact a young, bearded Greek Orthodox monk, Tsibouktsakis Germanus, also known as Father Herman, from the ancient monastery at Wadi Kelt. Shot dead while looking Jewish.

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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. Check-it out! 
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Kerry’s cogent connections by Sarah Honig

...It may be inconsiderate of Israel’s incurable nudniks to hinder Kerry’s grand design for self-aggrandizement, but the 40 or so mentions of the Jewish state in that nearly 67-year-old resolution don’t absolve Ramallah figurehead Mahmoud Abbas of the need to accept the legitimacy of Jewish self-determination right here – in our homeland (to which he fantastically but significantly denies that we even have a smidge of a historic connection). It doesn’t absolve him because for him and his people resolution 181 is a dead letter. They had never accepted its legitimacy.

Tel Aviv, November 29, 1947 –
Untenable and implausible
though this hodgepodge
partition was, Jewish multitudes
rejoiced in the streets

Sarah Honig..
Another Tack..
21 March '14..

It’s a huge relief to realize that US Secretary of State John Kerry doesn’t share the postmodern contempt for history. Or at least so it seems, because when it suits him, Kerry resorts to instructive historical perspectives. Wowed by his superior wisdom, in all its wondrous and infinite manifestations, we’re humbly thankful for the cogent connections he makes.

Just last week he intimated that Israelis have become insufferable nudniks by harping on what evidently cramps his style – that tedious demand that the Arabs recognize the fundamental legitimacy of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

“It’s a mistake for some people,” he told the House Foreign Relations Committee without naming names, “to be raising it again and again as the critical decider of their attitude toward the possibility of a state, and peace, and we’ve obviously made that clear.”

Besides, what nameless Israelis obstructively dwell upon is anyway old hat, which is where Kerry’s esteemed history-steeped acumen comes in: “‘Jewish state’ was resolved in 1947 in Resolution 181 where there are more than 40-30 mentions of ‘Jewish state.’” That settles it then. All done and dusted.

Once again Kerry’s incisive intellect homed in on history’s essential core, the crux of the matter that eludes lesser minds. Indeed UN General Assembly Resolution 181 of November 29, 1947 is the vital touchstone.

Nonetheless, there’s just one niggling little question that must be put to Kerry: did the Arabs accept Resolution 181?

Getting them to bloody belatedly agree to Resolution 181 is what the demand for recognition of Israel as a Jewish state is all about. Accepting the resolution and accepting the Jewish state are one and the same – synonyms, for all intents and purposes.

It may be inconsiderate of Israel’s incurable nudniks to hinder Kerry’s grand design for self-aggrandizement, but the 40 or so mentions of the Jewish state in that nearly 67-year-old resolution don’t absolve Ramallah figurehead Mahmoud Abbas of the need to accept the legitimacy of Jewish self-determination right here – in our homeland (to which he fantastically but significantly denies that we even have a smidge of a historic connection). It doesn’t absolve him because for him and his people resolution 181 is a dead letter. They had never accepted its legitimacy.

The Palestinians’ refusal to recognize the Jewish state’s legitimacy means that they reserve for themselves the right to Arabize the de facto body politic known provisionally as Israel by overrunning it with millions of so-called refugees.

In other words, rather than be accepted as rightfully a Jewish state, Israel is regarded as at best a multinational temporary entity and a candidate for impending Arabization. It wouldn’t be left in peace unless it submits meekly to said Arabization and the eradication of its Jewishness.

This is a surefire recipe for perpetuating the conflict (albeit by mutating means) rather than ending it, as presumed pursuers of peace would ostensibly wish to do. The refusal to accept the Jewish state’s legitimacy is tantamount to affirming a lasting Arab aspiration to obliterate the Jewish state, hot on the heels of an arrangement that would falsely parade as peace.

Unmitigated Arab opposition to Jewish statehood was what to begin with made Resolution 181 such a categorical non-starter.

Dear AP - Barghouti’s Crimes are “Alleged”?

...Israel isn’t a police state or a banana republic where criminals do not receive a fair trial. That Barghouti was acquitted for 33 other murders due to lack of evidence is further proof that Israel does not convict without due process. So why then does the AP still refer to Barghouti’s “alleged” crimes?

Simon Plosker..
Honest Reporting Backspin..
20 March '14..

Israel prides itself on the strength of its judicial system and the rule of law, which is certainly comparable to those of other Western democracies such as the U.S. or UK.

Palestinian terror leader Marwan Barghouti was convicted in a civilian trial in an Israeli courtroom in 2004. But how does the Associated Press describe him?

According to several top officials, the Palestinians are seeking the freedom of Marwan Barghouti, who is serving multiple life sentences for his alleged role in killings of Israelis, as part of any plan to extend negotiations with Israel beyond an April deadline.

The term “alleged” is commonly used, including by the media, to describe something yet to be proved. In the case of a criminal legal case, it would describe someone who has yet to be convicted.