Elder of Ziyon Daily News |  |
- Dave Barry in Israel
- 6/19 Links Part 2: Alan Baker on Preconditions, Rocket Attack and The Lost Music of the Holocaust
- It's such a shame when crazed Islamists hate each other
- US gives $123 million to UNRWA
- 6/19 Links Part 1: Totten on Rouhani, the Shi'ite 'full moon', Sex Jihad in Syria and The Standing Man
- Antisemitic "Khaybar" (video) to be followed with anti-Israel film.
- Rohani's playbook is clear: Fool the West while buying time
- Gazans demand mobile provider to allow them free votes for Arab Idol
- EU audit finds €1 billion aid to Egypt is wasted
| Posted: 19 Jun 2013 05:00 PM PDT From JPost: "We're doing the Disney World version of Israel," Dave Barry says as he sits down in an overstuffed chair in the lobby of Jerusalem's Inbal Hotel.His blog has some funny stuff, including how phallic the YMCA building in Jerusalem looks.  (h/t Gidon)           |
| 6/19 Links Part 2: Alan Baker on Preconditions, Rocket Attack and The Lost Music of the Holocaust Posted: 19 Jun 2013 03:30 PM PDT From Ian: The Religious War in the Middle East Given the ongoing chaos in the Middle East and the collapse of the artificial Arab states based on the Sykes-Picot Agreement, the proposal of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry for the creation of a new Palestinian state and a joint Palestinian, Jordanian and Israeli policing mechanism in the Jordan Valley seems like a pipe dream. That sort of suggestion, disconnected from reality, clearly indicates a dangerous lack of awareness concerning the Middle East past, present and future, a kind of Lawrence of Arabia optimism and romanticism which allows him to ignore the emergence of the increasing militant Islamic aggression toward Israel and the West. All that is left is to hope that somewhere in Washington people are really paying attention and preparing to deploy for the real, first priority inevitable battle against Iran and its satellites, with their capabilities dramatically to influence world peace.Alan Baker: Preconditions have no basis in law or fact Nowhere in the history of the peace process negotiations is there any commitment to the "1967 borders."Blair: Israel's security is also security for Western world Israel's security is also our security, in the whole of the Western world," Quartet Middle East envoy Tony Blair said on Wednesday.Clinton Admits 'No Perfect Solutions' in Israel-PA Conflict Former President Bill Clinton told participants at Israel's Fifth annual Presidential Conference in Jerusalem on Wednesday, "There are no perfect solutions to the Israel-Palestine conflict."PA Terror Rocket Attack Explodes in Gaza An early morning attack intended for southern Israel following President Shimon Peres's birthday bash fizzled with at least one – and possibly two -- of the rockets intended to kill Jewish civilians exploding instead inside Gaza. A total of three rockets were fired overnight, security officials said.IDF Nabs PA Police who Murdered Young Jew at Holy Site Israeli soldiers have arrested three Palestinian Authority police officers-turned-terrorists, who shot to death a young Jewish father as he returned from praying at the tomb of the Biblical Patriarch Joseph in Samaria (Shomron).'Machsom Watch Shares IDF Weakness with the Enemy' The Samaria Residents' Council has filed a police complaint against the group.Jews Attacked in Jerusalem Say 'This Will End in Murder!' The two men stopped to call police, and immediately were set upon by dozens of Arab youth and men who began hitting them mercilessly.IDF general: Palestinians aiding US peace drive The Palestinian administration in the West Bank has tried to help the latest US peacemaking drive by quietly cutting off funds for grassroots campaigners against Israel's occupation of the territory, a senior Israeli general said on Tuesday.Spanish Gov't Funding Anti-Israel NGOs, Finds New Report The report finds that between 2009 and 2011, approximately €15 million in Spanish government and regional funds were transferred to political advocacy NGOs promoting the boycott-divestment-sanctions (BDS) campaigns. Of these, €5 million were transferred to Israeli and Palestinian Authority-based NGOs, and €10 million were transferred to Spanish NGOs.ADL: Alice Walker 'unabashedly infected with anti-Semitism' The book, which was published two months ago, features 12 essays in a section titled "On Palestine," making up a quarter of the book, that are "rife with comparisons of Israelis to Nazis, denigrations of Judaism and Jews, and statements suggesting that Israel should cease to exist as a Jewish state," the ADL said in a statement. "Walker's book also attempts to justify terrorism against Israeli civilians, claiming that the 'oppressed' Palestinians should not be blamed for carrying out suicide bombings."On the road to recovering Spain's Jewish roots A conference titled "Zamora Jewish Life: History and Re-encounters," will take place in early July, organized by Jesus Jambrina of Viterbo University in La Crosse, Wisconsin.'Lost Music' of Holocaust Comes Alive Once Again Nicholas Biniaz-Harris is a young American classical pianist who is more at home performing Bach, Beethoven and Rachmaninoff than the obscure works of Nazi concentration camp inmates.El Al Tests Anti-Missile Defense System for Passenger Aircraft (VIDEO) According to the website Defense-Update.com: "The system comprises a fiber-laser based DIRCM housed in a sealed turret for maximized reliability. A missile warning system provides the initial detection of incoming threats. When a threatening missile is detected, the warning is passed to the DIRCM that then directs a thermal tracker to acquire and track the threat. A powerful laser beam is then fired accurately at the missile causing it to be deflected away from the aircraft."Israel made Marvell more 'marvelous,' says co-founder You'd be hard-pressed to find a bigger fan of Israel in the high-tech world than Weili Dai, co-founder of Marvell Technologies. With good reason: Israel has helped make the company she runs with her husband Sehat Sutardja and brother in-law, Pantas Sutardja, into one of the most important tech companies in the world. "No matter what device you open up, you are bound to find Marvell chips," she told the Times of Israel in an interview — and the technology for many of those chips was developed in Israel.      |
| It's such a shame when crazed Islamists hate each other Posted: 19 Jun 2013 01:40 PM PDT From Reuters: Hamas said on Wednesday its relations with financial backer Iran have suffered as a result of the Islamist group's support of rebels battling Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a long-time Iranian ally.The rift between Sunni and Shiites, which was always there, is really out in the open with the Syria war. And not only that, but jihadists are also breaking with "moderate" Islamists in light of the Arab pseudo-spring, as this hilarious MEMRI video shows: Following are excerpts from interviews with Nabil Naeem, a former leader in the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, which aired on Al-Mayadeen TV on May 30, 2013, and on Al-Arabiya TV on May 31.      |
| US gives $123 million to UNRWA Posted: 19 Jun 2013 12:00 PM PDT From UNRWA's website: The United States announced a new contribution of US$123 million to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which will enable the Agency to continue its work serving a population of some five million registered Palestine refugees in the region. This latest donation brings the total U.S. contribution to UNRWA in 2013 to US$ 244.5 million.Yes, the US has donated money to the only refugee agency on Earth that guarantees that next year there will be more "refugees" than there were this year. And until the US pressures UNRWA to adopt a cessation clause in line with the UNHCR's, where citizens of a country (Jordan) are not eligible for UNRWA services and where descendants do not automatically receive refugee status, and where people who live in the boundaries of British Mandate Palestine would no longer be considered "refugees," American taxpayers will continue to pay for this useless, bloated organization whose sole purpose nowadays is to expand the "refugee" problem, not to eliminate it. (By way of contrast , in 2012, the total cash donated to UNRWA by all Arab states was less than $16M, of which Saudi Arabia gave $12M.)      |
| Posted: 19 Jun 2013 10:45 AM PDT From Ian: Michael Totten: Iran's New President is Lipstick on a Pig So what do we have here in Iran? A man who barely won fifty percent of the vote in a rigged electoral system, who supports vicious repression of Iranian democracy activists as well as international terrorist organizations, who opposes Middle East peace, and who freely admits to deceiving Western diplomats about his country's nuclear program to buy time.Hidden Report Reveals How Iran Dodges Nuclear Watchdogs Iran continues to evade U.N. sanctions on its nuclear program by changing its supply routes, erecting new front companies, and shopping the world for lower grade parts not explicitly prohibited by the U.N. Security Council, but still capable of contributing to the assembly of a nuclear power reactor. That's according to a "confidential" unpublished report by a U.N. Security Council panel monitoring sanctions on Iran, exclusively published by Turtle Bay.Russia says Iran ready to stop 20-percent enrichment Russia's foreign minister said Tuesday that Iran was willing to halt its 20-percent enrichment of uranium, which has been a key concession sought in international negotiations over Iran's nuclear program.Quartet's Tony Blair: Nuclear Iran Worse Than Military Option Quartet envoy Tony Blair told Presidential Conference participants Wednesday that facing the prospect of a military confrontation with Tehran is a better option than having to grapple with a nuclear Iran.Book on President-Elect's Tragedy Scandalizes Tehran In 1992, when Rouhani was studying for his second degree (MPhil) at Glasgow Caledonian University in Scotland, his son committed suicide. Rouhani was then 44 years old. Though he went on with his studies and life, completing his PhD at the university in 1999, his friends admit that he has never fully recovered for the tragic loss.AIPAC urges caution on Rohani In a memo to supporters, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee expressed deep suspicion of Iran's newly elected president, Hasan Rowhani, saying that he "has signaled no willingness to halt Iran's illicit nuclear program."Richard Millett: British Labour MP: "No justice in Israeli legal system. Palestinian children found guilty on flimsy evidence." The report also criticises Israel's welfare treatment of Palestinian child suspects. However, the evidence relied on by the nine lawyer committee is both mainly anonymous AND provided by organisations traditionally hostile to Israel like Breaking The Silence, Btselem and Defence for Children International Palestine, to name but a few.Guardian's David Hearst participates in discussion on the power of the Israel lobby The meeting, on 12 June 2013, used a book by British Islamist, Ibrahim Hewitt, as the basis for discussion about the media's approach to the Israel-Palestine conflict. The discussion, between Hewitt, ex-BBC Middle East correspondent Tim Llewellyn, and Guardian foreign leader writer David Hearst, was chaired by Mark McDonald, a founder of Labour Friends of Palestine & the Middle East.Saudi role in Syria driven by fear of Shi'ite 'full moon' Saudi Arabia's former intelligence chief, Prince Muqrin, once told American diplomats the Middle East's so-called Shi'ite Crescent where the Muslim sect holds sway was "becoming a full moon" as Iranian influence spread.Kerry's Syria attack plan said grounded by Pentagon According to the report, during a meeting with high-ranking US Army officials, the secretary of state specifically demanded that the US Air Force target fields that were allegedly used to launch chemical weapons raids against rebel forces in the war-torn country.'Exercise Eager Lion' War Games Active in Jordanian Desert The 12-day war games, slated to end Thursday, was explained by a statement on the website of the U.S. Armed Forces Central Command as an opportunity to "promote cooperation and interoperability among participants," but appears clearly intended to send a warning to Jordan's northern neighbor, Syria.Report: French military training Syrian rebels French military officials are training rebels fighting to bring down the Assad regime in the current Syrian conflict, according to a report by Army Radio.Assad says Europe will 'pay price' if it arms rebels: newspaper Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has warned Europe in a German newspaper interview that it will "pay the price" if it follows Washington's lead and delivers arms to rebel forces, saying such a move would spread terrorism to the continent.Syrian pound tumbles as US plans to arm rebels Many exchange shops closed in Damascus on Tuesday, fearing more chaos a day after the Syrian currency plunged to a new record low, reflecting growing fears in the capital following a U.S. decision to arm rebel groups fighting to topple President Bashar Assad's regime.The 'Sex Jihad' News emerged a few weeks ago in Arabic media that yet another fatwa had called on practicing Muslim women to travel to Syria and offer their sexual services to the jihadis fighting to overthrow the secularist Assad government and install Islamic law. Reports attribute the fatwa to Saudi sheikh Muhammad al-'Arifi, who, along with other Muslim clerics earlier permitted jihadis to rape Syrian women.Mohamed ElBaradei: Morsi Threatened to 'Burn the Country' if I Became Prime Minister Leading Egyptian opposition figure Mohamed ElBaradei said Tuesday that President Mohamed Morsi threatened to "burn the country" if he became prime minister.Tayyip Erdoğan, "God's Gift to Turkey" There is no doubt that the Almighty has bestowed upon the world a special gift.'Standing man' inspires Turkish protesters in Istanbul A Turkish protester dubbed the "standing man" has led a vigil on Istanbul's Taksim Square days after the authorities evicted demonstrators.      |
| Antisemitic "Khaybar" (video) to be followed with anti-Israel film. Posted: 19 Jun 2013 09:00 AM PDT MEMRI has some excerpts of the upcoming Ramadan antisemitic "Khaybar" miniseries showing Jews being deceitful, bloodthirsty and cowardly:. Echo Media, the production company behind "Khaybar," has announced that it is ready to start work on its next film. Just as Khaybar uses a historical incident to push its explicitly antisemitic agenda, this film - entitled "Enough Humiliation" - uses the Arab uprisings as the hook to call for the destruction of Israel and the "liberation" of Jerusalem from Jewish control. Echo Media head Mohsen Ali says that the film is meant to unite Arabs on the "issue of Jerusalem and the stolen land of Palestine." He added that he believes that the film will be an important milestone for the company as it capitalizes on the presumed success of the Khaybar miniseries. Note that the name "Enough Humiliation" refers not to "the territories" but to the existence of Israel itself. Human rights organizations have continued to ignore calls to denounce and condemn this mass incitement against Jews that will be seen and enjoyed by hundreds of millions. My petition to HRW and Amnesty had reached over 1000 signatures. Every signature generates another email to those groups. (If anyone wants to publicly deliver the petitions to Amnesty and HRW offices in their country, let me know so we can write a press release. Both have offices in midtown Manhattan but I can't publicly deliver them - any volunteers?)      |
| Rohani's playbook is clear: Fool the West while buying time Posted: 19 Jun 2013 07:15 AM PDT Here's an interesting snippet from a New York Times report, February 8. 2004: In part because of their desire to avoid another confrontation in the Middle East, Britain, France and Germany won American approval in October for a diplomatic initiative in which Iran agreed to suspend its enrichment activities at Natanz, which it maintains is a peaceful facility, and to accept additional inspection protocols.Today, the Western media and even most politicians have almost unanimously declared this same Hassan Rohani to be a reformer, a moderate, someone the West can do business with! On what do they base this? Well, on nothing, except that Rohani isn't as bombastic as Ahmadinejad.  Yoel noticed something notable in Rohani's press conference on Monday, that was not reported anywhere.This "moderate reformer" stated that "If sanctions have any benefits, they will only benefit Israel. It has no benefits for others. We will make the enemy [Israel] understand that it has no option but to bow its head in front of the great Iranian nation and not wave its ax [at it]." Are these the words of a moderate? As TOI notes: According to Ze'ev Maghen, an Iran scholar at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar Ilan University and Jerusalem's Shalem College, Rowhani is himself convinced of the necessity of an advanced nuclear weapons program, and interested in using soft language merely as a stalling tactic in best Iranian negotiating tradition. A few months after the 2004 NYT article above, Rohani made a speech where he said: If one day we are able to complete the fuel cycle and the world sees that it has no choice -- that we do possess the technology -- then the situation will be different. The world did not want Pakistan to have an atomic bomb or Brazil to have the fuel cycle, but Pakistan built its bomb and Brazil has its fuel cycle, and the world started to work with them. Our problem is that we have not achieved either one, but we are standing at the threshold. Rohani has a track record of putting a smiling face on Iran's buying time to build a nuclear weapon. Now he has the best platform possible to do so. And the Iranian regime is playing the Western world like a flute.      |
| Gazans demand mobile provider to allow them free votes for Arab Idol Posted: 19 Jun 2013 05:30 AM PDT The conclusion of Arab Idol is coming up, and Palestinian singer Mohammed Assaf has reached the finals.  So they are protesting the mobile service provider! Some claim that their text messages in support of Assaf are not getting delivered. Naturally, a conspiracy theory is growing, that some unnamed Arab businessmen are colluding against Assaf's victory, for reasons that are unclear. Meanwhile, PA president Mahmoud Abbas is not above personal lobbying of the judges in the program: "I no longer know what to say," Lebanese singer Raghib Allama, a member of the jury, told Assaf."But I can sum it up like this—your voice is measured by a gold balance."Wealthy Palestinian Arab businessmen are also stuffing the ballot boxes, with billionaire Munib Masri saying that everyone should get out the vote and saying that "dozens of businessmen have purchased and sent thousands of messages in support of the artist." The finals are set for next week. While Assaf is undeniably handsome and has a good voice, part of his appeal is also that he has sung songs that deny the existence of Israel.      |
| EU audit finds €1 billion aid to Egypt is wasted Posted: 19 Jun 2013 02:24 AM PDT From FT.com: The €1bn in EU aid supplied to Egypt over the past seven years has done little to achieve its stated aims of improving democracy and human rights in the country, according to a damning assessment by the bloc's spending watchdog.Aid by the US to Egypt dwarfs that from the EU. And the US is not obligated to send one cent! JPost noted last week: At Friday's State Department daily press briefing one reporter asked, "How much is the US obligated to provide to Egypt under the Camp David Accords?" Nothing at all, the spokesman responded a day later, obviously after consultation with Foggy Bottom policy makers.So who lobbies for continued US aid to Egypt? In part, Israel. In prior years when Congress tried to link aid to Egypt to democratic reform and respect for human rights, some of the loudest objections came from the Israeli embassy in Washington, whose diplomats scurried to Capitol Hill to explain how vital that aid was to maintaining their peace treaty.US aid to Egypt is far more expansive than that from the EU, but it seems clear that much the money being sent by USAID is being wasted. Two years ago, Egypt claimed to have rejected USAID money exactly because of the strings attached - that they require human rights and democracy to flourish. But they seem to still accept it, as nothing on the USAID site mentions any problem. Perhaps the reason is that the Muslim Brotherhood considers all the Western money flowing indirectly into its coffers to be a jizya tax on the West. Just last month, John Kerry pushed through an extension on military aid to Egypt with seemingly no conditions: Discreetly, the US State Department renewed military aid to Egypt last month. The announcement was made only 7 June. The administration of Barack Obama avoided a public debate that would be embarrassing on the latter's support for the new political regime in Egypt, run by the Muslim Brotherhood. At any rate, the EU audit proves that any Western money being sent as an incentive to improve human rights and democracy in Egypt is being thoroughly wasted. Just as importantly, it proves that the West is reluctant to reign in aid even when it is shown to be a waste - it is harder to stop a program than to start it. (Think about UNRWA, over sixty years after it was supposed to have disappeared.) Will the EU do a similar audit on money sent to the PLO, directly and through NGOs? (h/t Elliott E)      |
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