Elder of Ziyon Daily News

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• Jordanian court rules that women without hijab are considered "sluts"
• EoZ Interview with Benjamin Weinthal
• 03/26 Links Pt2: Saudi shame; Hate Speech Illustrates True Face of BDS
• Abbas' idea of a "peace agreement" is to continue to wage war (ElderToons)
• Oxfam's criminal ties to PFLP terror (Shurat HaDin)
• 03/26 Links Pt1: Peace Now legitimizes Assad at UN Meeting; The Mythical Moderate Abbas
• Israel shoots at "fishermen" smuggling arms from Egypt (photos)
• Zionist hamsters, albino mice and Talmudic pigs!
• UMich student govt soundly defeats BDS resolution

Jordanian court rules that women without hijab are considered "sluts" Posted: 26 Mar 2014 11:30 PM PDT From Albawaba: The Jordanian Women's Union, along with lawyers across the Hashemite Kingdom, expressed shock last week after a ruling discriminating against women who do not wear the Islamic hijab was issued by the Amman Sharia Court of Appeal, according to Al Medanah News. The court announced late last week that it agreed with one lawyer's statement - based on a fatwa - that says a woman who does not cover up or wear a hijab is considered a "slut" and shouldn't be allowed to testify in court. In response, The Women's Union released a statement published on Amman net that describes the court's decision as discrimination against women and a violation of the Jordanian Constitution, which considers all Jordanian men and women as equals. On a purely unrelated note, here is a photo of Jordan's Queen Rania: (h/t Marc)

EoZ Interview with Benjamin Weinthal Posted: 26 Mar 2014 07:53 PM PDT Benjamin Weinthal is a European correspondent for The Jerusalem Post, based out of Berlin, Germany. He has also written for Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, the Guardian, and even Haaretz. Weinthal is also a fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. I caught him tonight after he gave a lecture in Manhattan about antisemitism in Europe, and I asked him a few questions. I asked him whether there were any European capitals that a Jew could freely walk around with a kippah (he also answered about whether one can walk around with an Israeli T-shirt.) I also asked him whether European attitudes towards Israel were comparable to how they viewed apartheid South Africa, what EU leaders think about Israel within the pre-1967 lines, and whether he felt that the current anti-circumcision and anti-ritual slaughter campaigns in Europe were animated by anti-Islamism or antisemitism. Ben's a real nice guy. After the interview we had a discussion about, well, everything, from BDS to the role of trade unions in anti-Israel activity and how that can be countered, to university anti-Zionism and antisemitism,  to HRW and the Marc Garlasco episode I was involved with back in 2009. Enjoy:

03/26 Links Pt2: Saudi shame; Hate Speech Illustrates True Face of BDS Posted: 26 Mar 2014 03:00 PM PDT From Ian: JPost Editorial: Saudi shame It seems the Saudis are interested in keeping up the false impression – particularly before the greater Sunni world – that it has never stopped ostracizing Israel. They do this in a feeble attempt to cover up the cooperation between the two countries. This time it was the Post's Wilner who was the fall guy for the Saudis' cowardly foreign policy. Indeed, there seems to be an inverse correlation between clandestine and formal relations: The more the Saudis secretly cooperate with Israel to prevent the Islamic Republic from obtaining nuclear weapons capability, the more the kingdom takes pains to show the world – especially the Sunni world – how it snubbed a reporter who works with an Israeli daily. Ultimately, this entire sorrowful episode is yet another depressing example of how much of decision-making in this region is guided by irrational fears and prejudices, not real shared interests, and of how hatred of Israel continues to be a rallying call for Muslims. White House Expresses "Deep Disappointment" That It Has No Balls (satire) In a statement, the White House said it had "deep disappointment" over Saudi Arabia's decision and its own apparent lack of testicles. Having such anatomical features might have enabled the administration to call the kingdom on its unacceptable behavior, but as the White House has no balls, it was rendered incapable of summoning of the courage to defend the principles it claims to have. The same lack of cojones has plagued the Obama administration in its dealings with other Middle East figures, notably Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who has continually refused to commit to a formula that would leave Israel secure as a Jewish state. Instead of taking a courageous stand and displaying integrity by drawing an actual line, the White House has highlighted its own emasculated position by letting a corrupt, incitement-fueling autocrat pretending to democratic authority scuttle prospects for a meaningful resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, allowing Abbas not to concede a thing and laying the onus on Israel to compromise on points crucial to its survival. (h/t Mightier than the Pen) White House Thinks Anti-Semitism Is "Disappointing" Wilner is not Israeli, but in such cases one is often told that this is not really about Jews or Jew hatred, but simply about Israelis. Just such thinking is promoted by the boycott movement. Yet, even if we were to buy into the notion that this is simply about Israelis–Wilner, after all, works for an Israeli newspaper–what are Israelis other than Jews who live in the Jewish state? Such moves never target Arabs living in Israel. This notion that it is not as bad to target an Israeli Jew not only promotes the belief that it is perhaps not quite right that Jews should have a state, but also that there are certain places that it is permissible to forbid Jews from living. This is the logic that imprisons Jews in ghettos, that says that certain places are off-limits for Jews. President Obama may have bowed before the king of Saudi Arabia, but this is a country where the most vicious hatred of Jews is deeply entrenched in the national culture. As Eli Lake highlights in today's Daily Beast, there are still serious concerns about the kind of incitement to hatred being promoted in Saudi school textbooks. As Lake notes, the State Department is refusing to release its most recent report on these books, yet it assures us that the Saudis are making promising progress on this matter. US Hiding Report on Radical Saudi School Textbooks US President Barack Obama stands poised to visit Saudi Arabia later in the month, to discuss "countering violent extremism" among other things. However, a report has revealed the US has kept secret an extensive study of Saudi textbooks, traditionally rife with Islamic extremism, since the end of 2012 - casting doubts over the seriousness of the administration to tackle the root causes of Islamic extremism. The study, commissioned in a reported $500,000 State Department contract in 2011, was the most comprehensive ever commissioned. Completed in late 2012, the findings with their implications on radical indoctrination and anti-Semitism have been kept hidden from the public. However, a new report published by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington-based think-tank, quoting sources familiar with the hidden study, notes Saudi textbooks still "create a climate that fosters exclusivity, intolerance, and calls to violence that put religious and ethnic minorities at risk." Palestinian Activist: Arab Countries' Laws Relating To Women Are Stone Age Laws In an article for International Women's Day, which occurred on March 8, 2014, Palestinian activist Ahlam Akram reviewed the repeated violations of women's rights across the Arab world and claimed that laws relating to the status of the Arab woman "belong to the Stone Age." According to her, Arab countries do almost nothing to improve women's status under the pretext of preoccupation with "the grand campaign against Israel." She noted further that, despite reforms that have been enacted to grant women more liberties, for instance in Saudi Arabia, the situation of Arab women remains bleak. "Shut Up," BDS Explained: An "Open Forum" at Vassar So members of Vassar's chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine "staged an action against" the on-campus part of the class, which included picketing, urging students to drop the course, and making a lot of noise (the only dispute seems to be whether the noise could be described as "ululating" or not). Jill Schneiderman and Rachel Friedman, two of the course instructors, complained to college officials about the protest; the protesters, most of whom were "people of color," cried racism; and so the open forum was held. [Philip] Weiss is explicit about the character of this "open forum": "The spirit of that young progressive space was that Israel is a blot on civilization, and boycott is right and necessary. If a student had gotten up and said, I love Israel, he or she would have been mocked and scorned into silence. Or bedevilled by finger-snapping—the percussive weapon of choice among some students, a sound that rises like crickets as students indicate their quiet approval of a statement." In other words, at least at this Vassar forum, it was not even possible to have a debate about the desirability of BDS because the students who support BDS have no intention of engaging in a debate or even letting their opponents speak without disrupting them. But such "belligerence may be necessary," Weiss argues, to make sure that the right side wins. U.S. says glad 'noxious' U.N. rights envoy for Palestine leaving The United States on Monday welcomed the imminent departure of a U.N. human rights investigator for the Palestinian territories whom Washington accused of being biased against Israel and spreading conspiracy theories about the September 11, 2001 attacks. Richard Falk, the outgoing United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, told a news conference as recently as last week that Israeli policies bore "unacceptable characteristics of colonialism, apartheid and ethnic cleansing. In a statement to Reuters, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power condemned what she described as "Falk's relentless anti-Israeli bias, his noxious and outrageous perpetuation of 9/11 conspiracy theories." "His publication of bizarre and insulting material has tarnished the U.N.'s reputation and undermined the effectiveness of the Human Rights Council," she said. "The United States welcomes Mr. Falk's departure, which is long overdue." (h/t Stan) Hate Speech Illustrates True Face of BDS As Adam Kredo of the Free Beacon writes, a university spokesman refused to condemn the threats or to express an opinion about the attempts by the BDS activists to intimidate other students. One can only imagine the university's reaction had a similar controversy taken place involving insults or slurs directed at African Americans or other minorities. Yet, the hurling of words like "kike" and "dirty Jew" at Jewish students as well as other stunts intended to silence opposition to BDS appears not to be regarded as a serious threat to the peace of the school. The connection between anti-Semitic rhetoric and BDS is not an accident. At its core the movement is an expression of Jew hatred since it seeks to single out for special discrimination the one Jewish state in the world while disregarding every other possible human-rights issue elsewhere. Its purpose is not to redress the complaints of Arab citizens of Israel or the administrated territories under its control but rather to seek the extinction of the Jewish state via the waging of economic warfare. BDS doesn't seek to promote peace between Israelis and Palestinians but rather to aid the efforts of the latter to wipe out their opponents. Its efforts to delegitimize the Jewish state are an inherent expression of bias against Jews. As such, BDS is not so much a debatable proposition but the same sort of hate speech that university officials would have no compunction about banning or punishing if it came from the Ku Klux Klan or other racist groups. The time is now to stop divestment bullying at Michigan What followed next can only be described as brownshirt-style tactics by divestment supporters: chanting mobs, barely legal occupations of public spaces, and most egregiously serious threats against representatives in CSG, including violent ones to the point where they were "afraid to attend their classes because they felt unsafe," and racial slurs against pro-Israel students. When commentators on the Michigan Daily website spoke out against these tactics, divestment proponents posted in response, accusing anyone who disagreed with them of "racism" and denying them their "freedom of speech." This is completely unacceptable behavior and it has no place in this country, much less one of the US's premier academic institutions. Regardless of the actual nature of the resolution, and the way CSG chose to handle it, the decision was made to table it. The divestment supporters chose to ignore the democratic decision of the CSG and took the law into their own hands. A vote for this resolution is no longer a vote about human rights in the Middle East but a vote about whether the Michigan community will stand by and allow the use of bullying and racial intimidation to achieve political goals on their campus. #LoyolaDivest passes, again So after more than four and a half hours of debate on Tuesday night, March 25th, 2014, Loyola University Chicago's student government (USGA) yet again passed a divestment resolution singling out Israel. The resolution passed with 12 in favor, 10 opposed, and 9 abstentions. This is a markedly different result from last week's railroaded-through resolution which passed 26-0-2. What is especially telling is that there are 9 confirmed members of Students for Justice in Palestine on the USGA board. Essentially, this means that SJP was only able to convince 3 senators of their bigoted views, while pro-Israel students valiantly swayed 17 senators to change their votes to no or abstentions. Dutch MEP Says the Pro-Israeli Camp is Growing Bastiaan Belder, a Dutch politician and Member of the European Parliament, said Monday that anti-Israel sentiment is "mostly on the Left." Belder is a Dutch politician and Member of the European Parliament with the SGP, part of the Europe of Freedom and Democracy Group. He spoke to Arutz Sheva about anti-Semitism in his country. Belder sits on the European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs. He himself is a member of the SGP, the Reformed Political Party . Israeli architects appeal to Foreign Ministry, Britain against boycott threat Israeli architects have appealed to the Foreign Ministry and the British government to help prevent the International Union of Architects from suspending their membership in the worldwide organization over the issue of West Bank settlements. The Israeli Association of United Architects has turned to the two governments after it was targeted by the Royal Institute of British Architects. "When the British prime minister [David Cameron] was here, he promised not to boycott Israel. This was his statement in front of the Knesset," Israeli architect Itzhak Lipovetzky said. Jewish Human Rights Group Says Royal Institute of British Architects Reliving Nazi Boycott Campaign Jewish human rights group the Simon Wiesenthal Center called out the Royal Institute of British Architects for allowing "itself to become the victim of an extremist group of spoilers that use tactics redolent of the Nazis' 1930s boycott campaign, 'Kaufen Nicht bei Juden' – 'Do Not Buy from Jews.'" In a letter to International Union of Architects President Prof. Albert Dubler, the Simon Wiesenthal Center's Director for International Relations Dr. Shimon Samuels wrote, "Political agitators aim to hijack your profession and blemish your mission 'to unite the architects of the world without any form of discrimination.'" Samuels called out their hypocrisy for choosing to boycott Israel, as he listed the regimes that are members of the group which have received no sanction. "Why Have The RIBA Voted To Focus On Israel As The Greatest Sinners In The World?": Prominent Architects Blast RIBA Educated at Magdalene College, Cambridge, Stephen Games is an architect and founder of the New Premises think tank. He has served as deputy editor of the organ of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), has made documentaries for BBC Radio 3, has written for The Independent, The Guardian, and the Los Angeles Times. He edited the radio talks of celebrated British architect Nikolaus Pevsner and has edited several anthologies of poetry by John Betjeman. Now, Mr Games has slammed RIBA's Council's support for Angela Brady's recent anti-Israel motion urging suspension of the Israeli Association of United Architects (IAUA) from the International Union of Architects (UIA), in a letter to the president of RIBA, Stephen Hodder: Yad Vashem rebuffs Hungarian memorial initiative Yad Vashem has decided not to participate in a project to build a Nazi occupation museum in Hungary. The House of Fates project invited representatives of the Jerusalem-based Holocaust museum and memorial to attend an international meeting of experts to discuss the memorial center to be built in Budapest. Yossi Gevir, senior assistant to the chairman at the Yad Vashem Directorate, turned down the invitation in a letter last week to Maria Schmidt, head of the House of Fates project. Chief Rabbi, Hungarian President Discuss Anti-Semitism While in Hungary for the 70th anniversary of the murder of the Hungarian Jews by the Nazis on Monday, Chief Ashkenazic Rabbi David Lau and Deputy Religious Services Minister Eli Ben-Dahan met with Hungarian President Janos Ader. The rising anti-Semitism in Hungary was a key topic in the meeting, which took place in the Hungarian capital of Budapest. Ades announced that recently a law has come into effect that would allow civilian courts to try cases of anti-Semitic expressions, in addition to the existing option of criminal court processes. Additionally, the law allows the trial of those speaking against a community, and not just against individuals. Muslims Furious That Jews Not Blamed More For Missing Plane (satire) "The default assumption must be that the Jews, either collectively or through the Zionist Entity, are behind any destructive occurrence that could be the work of humans, plus several that could not be," said Arab League Secretary-General Nabil Elaraby. "We find it unconscionable that the avenues of investigation into a tragedy in which so many citizens of a Muslim nation, Malaysia, have been affected, do not include the obvious, namely, that the Jews are to blame." He lamented that the default assumption has weakened in recent centuries, especially in the Western world, when it could serve well in both simplifying solutions to existing problems and preventing recurrences. To illustrate, Elaraby noted that dozens of questions could be satisfactorily answered by the simple premise that Jews had, through sinister means, seized control of the aircraft by hacking into its guidance system and compromising the communication systems. Jewish computer expertise is well known, and the deaths of non-Jews as the Jewish holiday of Passover approaches has been a recurring theme, as Jews require the blood of gentiles to make their matza. Israel's National Library highlights Palestinian history Convincing Israeli Arabs to share their cultural heritage with a Zionist institution isn't always easy, curator says An old advertisement poster printed on brittle green paper beckons Palestinians in Jerusalem to buy Al-Jamal cigarettes, made in Nablus. "Smoke the products of this company and sense the Arab aroma and flavor untarnished by Zionism," reads the ad. "By doing so, you will safeguard your revolution and prove that you respect the martyrs. You will be honored and respected by the foreigners." The eye-opening artifact, which offers insight into the political climate of the land some 80 years ago, is one of 600 British Mandate-period posters and announcements, mostly from the 1920s and '30s, recently scanned and digitized by Israel's National Library in Jerusalem. Paid for by the Arcadia Fund, the project is part of a massive undertaking by the library to make 150,000 mundane historic documents, known professionally as ephemera, available to the general public online. Hugh Laurie weighing Israel gig Israeli media has reported in recent days that Laurie is headed to Raanana in July as part of an international tour promoting his second studio album, "Didn't it Rain." Asked by Israeli journalist Shaul Amsterdamski on Twitter Tuesday if the rumors were true, Laurie tweeted "Im yirtzeh hashem" (Hebrew for "God willing"). So a performance seems to be on the table, at the very least. Palo Alto Networks to buy Israeli cybersecurity firm for $200 mln Security software maker Palo Alto Networks Inc said it agreed to buy privately-held Israeli cybersecurity company Cyvera for about $200 million to expand its offerings that protect businesses from cyber attacks. Palo Alto said the deal would close in the second half of its fiscal year 2014. Palo Alto said Cyvera's software - which protects businesses from cyber threats by blocking unknown, zero-day attacks - would help its customers to safely enable applications and protect them against threats on any device, across any network. Printing Food: Israeli Start Up Could Revolutionize the Way We Eat (VIDEO) Israeli company White Innovation is currently developing an entirely new and remarkably fast way to prepare food from the comfort of your kitchen, Israel's Channel 10 reported on Saturday. Its product, known as "Ginny", is essentially a souped-up printer that is small enough to fit on any counter. To create a meal one places a capsule of raw ingredients into one side of the machine. Then, olive oil, milk or water is injected. It then marinates for about thirty seconds and voila: a delectable feast awaits. Israeli (Settler) Wins Woman's World Thai-boxing Championship Sarah Avraham (20), of Kiryat Arba in Judea, won the Woman's World Thai-Boxing Championship in Thailand last Thursday (Mar. 20). Officially named Muay Thai, the combat sport is dubbed "the art of eight weapons" because of the use of fists, elbows, knees, shins and feet. Sarah has previously won the Israeli championship, and now, after overcoming her Brazilin opponent, has become the world champion. Sarah has an outstanding life story. Born in Mumbai, she converted to Judaism in 2008 at the age of 14 together with her family and immigrated to Israel following the terror attack on the Chabad House in November of that year. Avraham's father, Dr. Aaron Avraham, was the friend and family physician of Rabbi Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg, who were murdered when terrorists attacked the Chabad House where they served as emissaries. Sarah and her family felt drawn to the Jewish People, and thus converted and immigrated to Israel. World's first self-cleaning solar park in the Arava Valley Each night, the 20-acre facility is cleaned by 100 Israeli-made robots, which brush and clean the hundreds of solar panels, generating 9 million kilowatt hours of electricity per year. It's a technical breakthrough, said Eran Meller, CEO of Ecoppia, which built the robot cleaning crew, that could encourage more use of solar power. Solar-produced electricity contributes just a small amount of the approximately 60 billion kilowatt hours of electricity that Israel uses each year, but the government has some ideas about how to change that – beginning with its own "house." Earlier this year, the Knesset announced a new project that will make Israel's parliament "the greenest in the world," according to the Energy and Water Resources Ministry. Among other things, the project will entail installing 4,500 square meters of photovoltaic panels on the roof of the Knesset building, generating all the power the building needs to function, and then some. According to Energy and Water Resources Minister Silvan Shalom, "the Green Knesset project will be a source of pride for Israel and will inspire other countries." Pharrell Williams very happy about Israeli video American singer Pharrell Williams has paid special tribute to the Israelis who covered his award-winning single 'Happy'. The Grammy-winning rapper and record producer chose the video tribute filmed in Tel Aviv, to be shown at the UN's International Day of Happiness . 'Happy Tel Aviv-Yafo', which features toddlers to grandparents dancing and miming along to the song , was filmed in the city's Rothschild Boulevard and Dizengoff , the beach and playgrounds. The three-minute clip, which has had more than 200,000 views on YouTube, was filmed by non-profit educational group ISRAEL21c. Nicky Blackburn, a director of the group, told the Jerusalem Post: "We are delighted that Pharrell Williams and the UN chose our video for the day of happiness. "People abroad often have certain assumptions about Israel, so this was a really wonderful opportunity for us to be able to show the world what an incredibly joyful and happy place Tel Aviv actually is. (h/t Predictor92)

Abbas' idea of a "peace agreement" is to continue to wage war (ElderToons) Posted: 26 Mar 2014 01:00 PM PDT This story has been out for a few days (and in a recent linkdump) but it hasn't received the coverage it deserves: Abbas "went to the White House and said 'no' to Obama," Channel 2 news reported, quoting unnamed American and Israeli sources. Specifically, the report said, Abbas rejected Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's demand that he recognize Israel as a Jewish state. He also refused to abandon the Palestinian demand for a "right of return" for millions of Palestinians and their descendants — a demand that, if implemented, would drastically alter Israel's demographic balance and which no conceivable Israeli government would accept. And finally, he refused to commit to an "end of conflict," under which a peace deal would represent the termination of any further Palestinian demands of Israel. If a "peace agreement" doesn't mean an end to conflict, then what the hell is it supposed to mean? Those who aren't blinded by wishful thinking know exactly what his aim is. Back in 1948, the Arabs also liked to use the word "peace" when speaking to the West, confident that no one would figure out that their definition of "peace" was to eliminate Israel. Nothing has changed.

Oxfam's criminal ties to PFLP terror (Shurat HaDin) Posted: 26 Mar 2014 11:00 AM PDT Shurat HaDin just came out with a report documenting how Oxfam is illegally funding the Palestinian Arab terror group PFLP. Excerpts: A Shurat HaDin investigation indicates that even as Oxfam was attacking Scarlett Johansson and Israel for violating international law, the organization was itself violating both international law and the laws of many sovereign nations. Specifically, Oxfam's involvement with two Palestinian NGOs — the Union of Health Workers Committees (UHWC) and the Union of Agricultural Workers Committees (UAWC) — violates numerous laws against giving material and financial aid to terrorist organizations. Both the UHWC and the UAWC are well-known for their close connections to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), one of the oldest and most violent terrorist organizations in the world. The PFLP is guilty of subsidiary organizations and numerous suicide bombings, airplane hijackings, and assassinations; including some of the most notorious terror attacks of the 1970s. Our investigation has revealed that the UHWC and UAWC are not merely close to the PFLP but branches of the PFLP, founded, staffed, and operated by this designated terrorist group. ...The evidence against UHWC and UAWC leads inexorably to the conclusion that the groups are essentially subsidiary organizations of the PFLP. In effect, the UAHC is the PFLP's health organization and UAWC is the PLFP's agricultural organization. They share leadership, funding, assets, and political goals with their parent organization; and appear to be, in turn, largely controlled by it. As a result, by providing financial and material aid to the UAHC and UAWC, Oxfam directly or indirectly makes these assets available to the PFLP. It is a crime under international law, as well as US, UK, Israeli, and EU law, to provide material and financial Palestinian support to terrorist groups, including ostensibly benign branches of terrorist groups. It is our conclusion that Oxfam is currently in direct international violation of these laws, and is liable for both criminal and civil penalties as a result. The report documents recent terror attacks by the PFLP, including the Itamar massacre of the Fogel family. (h/t Yosef X)

03/26 Links Pt1: Peace Now legitimizes Assad at UN Meeting; The Mythical Moderate Abbas Posted: 26 Mar 2014 09:00 AM PDT From Ian: Peace Now legitimizes Assad at dictator-run UN parley Israel's Peace Now, represented by campaigns manager Yaniv Shacham, delivered a speech today at an international conference in Quito, Ecuador, that claims to be about peace, but which is in fact organized by a rabidly anti-Israel UN committee dominated by Syria's Assad regime and other like-minded murderous, misogynistic and homophobic dictatorships. Is Peace Now unaware that this latest "UN International Meeting on the Question of Palestine," taking place today and tomorrow under the innocuous-sounding theme of "Engaging for peace – the International Year of Solidarity with the Palestinian People," is run by the UN's Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, whose member and observer states include the mass-murdering Syrian Arab Republic, slave-holding Mauritania, women-hating Saudi Arabia, along with tyrannies large and small such as China, Belarus, Cuba, Algeria and the Lao People's Democratic Republic? Peace Now's Tweet 'Supports Terror on Israel' The terrorist, identified by Ma'an News Agency as 19-year-old Yousef Shawamrah, but reported in other sources as 15-years-old, was shot while sabotaging Israel's security fence near Hevron with two accomplices. Shawamrah ignored IDF soldiers' commands to stop and warning shots in the air, leading them to eventually shoot him, inflicting a wound he later died of at Soroka Hospital in Be'er Sheva. Regardless of the context, Oppenheimer opined on Twitter "another unarmed Palestinian child was killed today by soldiers' fire at the fence. If he isn't Israeli or at least a Jordanian judge, it doesn't matter to anyone." The tweet, with its whitewashing of Shawamrah's activities, sparked ire among dozens of internet users who wrote back sharp responses. The mythical moderate Mahmoud Abbas When Abbas is gone, the Israeli Left will sorely miss him. There will be those who will remember him as a kindly, quiet and smiling grandfather figure and mourn his absence. Others, perhaps more sage, will remember other grandfather figures, whom at their demise, the police dug in the backyards of the deceased only to find the skeletons of young children, victims of secret acts of violence, pragmatically hidden to avoid accountability. We are no closer to Peace today than we were nine years ago when Mahmoud Abbas became president of the Palestinian Authority. Abbas still demands the "right of return" and still refuses to recognize Israel as a the Jewish homeland and is not willing to declare the end of the conflict. In the almost prescient words of Abunimah from 2005: Kerry in Jordan in bid to salvage peace talks US Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Jordan Wednesday in a fresh bid to keep his Middle East peace bid on track, amid fears Israel may renege on a promise to free Palestinian prisoners and just after Arab leaders said they would never recognize Israel as a Jewish state. Kerry, interrupting a visit to Rome, was due to meet first with Jordan's King Abdullah II before holding talks with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas over dinner in a bid to "continue to narrow the gaps" between the two sides, his spokeswoman said. Fact Check: Release of Terrorists Depends on Progress in Talks Statements made in public by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and forgotten by the entire media world reveal that Israel promised to free 104 terrorists in four batches on return for the resumption of peace talks "in accordance with the circumstances of their progress." Those are the Prime Minister's words in an "open letter to the citizens of Israel" he wrote last year. Foreign media also reported at the time that "an Israeli official said no prisoners would be released before direct talks begin, and the process would then be dependent on the Palestinians proving they are 'really serious and not playing games.'" The problems with these direct quotes are that they do not fit the agenda of the Obama administration, the Palestinian Authority, the United Nations and the media establishment, which has forgotten or never learned that Journalism 101 teaches that one should check the facts. American Suicide Bombing Victim Asks Obama Not to Free Terrorist Leader Obama and Kerry insisted that Israel release terrorists who had murdered civilians just to get Abbas, the terrorist leader of the Palestinian Authority, to the negotiating table. Keeping him at the negotiating table might require releasing one of the worst monsters in Israeli custody. Now an American who was wounded along with his son in a suicide bombing masterminded by that monster is asking Obama to show some decency. Mr. President: I am writing for your immediate consideration. It has been reported in the press and confirmed to me by a Knesset member that President Abbas requested your assistance in securing the release of Marwan Barghouti as a condition for continued peace talks with Israel. I sincerely request that you please not assist in any way in the release of this unrepentant mass-murderer. Danny Danon: If more terrorists go free, I will resign I knew that as much as we desire peace and normalcy for this region, our Palestinian counterparts have never tired in making demands without any corresponding willingness to offer concessions and prove themselves as real negotiating partners. While many Israelis viewed these talks as a harmless diversion to placate some of our allies abroad, I warned my colleagues of the dire implications these talks would have on our security. Though I was extremely concerned that our government might concede strategically important territory or relinquish parts of our historic homeland, what angered me most was the Palestinian demand as a precursor to even coming to the table that we release more than a hundred of their prisoners — men and women with blood on their hands. In essence, the demand was that we set murderers free for the privilege of negotiating peace. Jordanian king vows to protect Jerusalem Abdullah's speech to the Arab League Summit in Kuwait came as tensions between Israel and Jordan have bubbled up over demands by Knesset lawmakers that Israel impose sovereignty over the Temple Mount. Jordan "will work to help Jerusalem's Arab population stay on their land, support their steadfastness, strengthen their presence and stand up to address Israeli violations and measures, particularly those targeting Al Aqsa Mosque, by all available means and in coordination with our brothers in the State of Palestine," Abdullah said, referring to the mosque atop the disputed holy site. Arab League backs refusal to recognize Jewish state Arab leaders fully back a Palestinian refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, a joint statement said on Wednesday. "We express our total rejection of the call to consider Israel as a Jewish state," said the final declaration of the two-day Arab summit in Kuwait. The move was widely expected after a draft statement endorsed by foreign ministers on Sunday stressed a "categorical rejection" of the demand for recognition of Israel as a Jewish state and rejected "all pressures exerted on the Palestinian leadership" to agree to that demand. BBC News 'analysis' romanticises the Arab League Leaving aside the fact that the utopian dream of "smashing down the border fences" promoted here by the article's writer Gerald Butt is contradicted even by the Arab League's founding document which states clearly in Article 8 that each member country "shall pledge itself not to take any action tending to change" the form of government of the others, Butt also misleads BBC audiences by eliminating from view one very important part of the Arab League's raison d'etre. That same founding document – dating from March 22nd 1945 – includes an "annex on Palestine". At its second session in December 1945 the Arab League declared a formal boycott of "Jewish products and manufactured [goods] in Palestine", declaring them to be "undesirable in the Arab countries" and opining that "to permit them to enter the Arab countries would lead to the realization of the Zionist political objectives". Abbas says 'Jewish state' demand not up for debate Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas told the Arab League Summit in Kuwait on Tuesday that he has so far refused to even discuss recognizing the Jewish State — a key demand of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — and that by raising the issue Israel was trying to disrupt the peace talks. "Israel has not missed an opportunity to derail US peace efforts, including raising new demands, such as the demand for recognition as a 'Jewish state,' which we have refused to so much as discuss," Abbas could be seen saying in video footage from the conference. Blaming Israel Despite the Facts The facts are no obstacle for those who are determined to stick to their narrative about Israel not wanting peace. With Secretary of State John Kerry's peace process on the brink of failure, the New Republic's John Judis has trotted out the familiar themes about Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu being the one to blame. Judis goes on at length about Netanyahu's perfidy but toward the end of the piece, he is forced to let drop an important nugget of information. When asked by Kerry to keep negotiating on the basis of the framework he has crafted to try and give both sides something to work with, Abbas said no. As Judis writes: "Kerry proposed that the two sides agree to the framework with reservations—a tactic that had doomed the Quartet's framework proposal—but Abbas was not ready to agree to the proposal even with reservations." White House: No Plans to Free Pollard The reports say that the US also wants Israel to commit to continue negotiaions with the PA. "There are no plans to release Jonathan Pollard at the moment," said State Department Spokeswoman Jen Psaki. "Jonathan Pollard was convicted of espionage against the United States – a very serious crime. He was sentenced to life and is currently serving his sentence." Psaki stopped short of clearly denying the reports that it had offered Israel a deal in which Pollard will be freed. Slurring Israel with the Crimea Comparison The fact that a particularly unpleasant blog post appeared on Al Jazeera pushing the Israel-Russia comparison might not be considered all that consequential. Al Jazeera may have greatly expanded its programming in the anglosphere, but as is apparent from the piece in question, the commentary given here is hardly of either a mainstream or overwhelmingly credible character. Yet, watered down versions of the same accusations made at Al Jazeera have also appeared in the Economist and are now even being made by peers in Britain's parliament. We may well find that, wildly inaccurate as this comparison undoubtedly is, for the undiscerning it has some traction. Apart from the fact that Vacy Valanza's piece for Al Jazeera makes the bizarre claim that the establishment of Israel was itself a violation of international law, and that Israel is annexing the West Bank "supported by monies from Jews worldwide through rich Zionist organizations," the main thrust of the argument is one accusing the West of "hypocrisy." The claim is that the West singled out Russia yet turns a blind eye to Israel behaving in a highly comparable way. Of course, if the anti-Israel camp is going to now start leveling accusations about the hypocrisy of opposing some occupations but not others, then they may be inviting some rather hard-to-answer questions about their own disinterest in every other occupation from China in Tibet to Turkey in Cyprus. Canada's Irwin Cotler happy to be banned by Russia Cotler said the blacklisting "only inspires me to redouble my efforts to advance the cause of human rights for all." "I stand in solidarity with the Russian people and those fighting for human rights and democracy. Their day will come and [President Vladimir] Putin will be no more," he said. Cotler suspects the ban is for introducing a bill regarding Sergei Magnitsky, who was an accountant and auditor in Moscow who uncovered a corruption scheme and testified against several senior Russian officials, according to the Huffington Post. Magnitsky subsequently was imprisoned and died in jail in 2009 at 37. 'Iran arms ship may have been bound for Sinai, not Gaza' The Klos-C arms shipment seized by Israeli forces on March 5 may have been bound for Sinai rather than the Gaza Strip, a US official and two Middle East analysts told Reuters on Tuesday. Israel denied the report, with a Jerusalem official dismissing it as speculation. The report cast doubt on Israel's assertion that the Iranian cargo was bound for the Palestinian enclave to serve terror cells there, and said that Israel may have obfuscated its real destination in order to spare Egypt the humiliation of conceding the security unrest in the peninsula. Reuters Goes Overboard With Anonymous Sources Which brings us to Reuters. Reporter Dan Williams gives a soapbox to claims that the Klos-C weapons ship intercepted by Israel was delivering arms to Sinai jihadis, and not, as Israel claims, to Gaza. Unfortunately, all the voices that this report is based on are anonymous. All assess the story, but there are no hard facts that weren't previously known. And Israel has already denied the report. Palestinian Unification Still Far Away Despite Televised Optimism On Saturday, tens of thousands of Palestinian mourners marched behind the coffins of three gunmen who were killed late Friday night. Officials of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, Palestinian Authority, Islamic Jihad, Fatah, Hamas and other parties all marched in unison to the Jenin refugee camp's cemetery. Sweilem said people should not read too much into that image, adding that the moment was "symbolic" and that in reality, the actual situation on the ground among Hamas, Fatah and other parties is far removed from feelings of unity. Two reconciliation agreements signed in 2012 remain unimplemented and the bifurcation between the Fatah-ruled West Bank and Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip shows no sign of abating. "None of these parties were holding the Palestinian flag," Sweilem told said. "Everyone was holding his own flag: Fatah had their flag, Hamas had their flag, and so on. When it came to Palestinian nationalism, there was a great lack," he said. Hamas, Iran Reportedly Renew Alliance; Financial Support Resumes, Terror Chief Meshaal to Meet Ayatollah Khamenei Hamas, the terror group ruling Gaza, has renewed its alliance with Tehran, after a two-year hiatus, when Cairo, under Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Morsi, stepped up its strategic and financial backing, according to Middle East news site Al-Monitor on Tuesday. Al-Monitor said Iranian financial support for Hamas has resumed, but at "a level lower than that which preceded the rupture between the two at the end of 2012." Hamas PM Haniya Extols Martyrdom, Says: We Shall Rock Tel Aviv Al-Aqsa TV US says Egypt's executions of 529 Muslim Brotherhood men would impact future American aid US State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said the way Egypt proceeds regarding the trials and death sentences will have consequences for future American aid. Secretary of State John Kerry said on March 12 he would decide "in the days ahead" whether to resume American aid to Egypt after suspending the funds last year over the ouster of President Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood and a crackdown against protesters. Obama's Turkey is Stuffed It was once conventional wisdom among administration-friendly policy wonks that President Barack Obama's most successful foray into Middle East relations was his attempt to elevate relations with Turkey. Whatever else might be said about his confused, weak and reactive policy in the region, he had built a personal friendship with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and pulled Turkey back from forging a closer relationship with Iran. President Obama saw Turkey as a model of Islamic democracy, where an Islamic party had been tamed by the everyday demands of governance, and had led the country to strong economic growth. Yet over the past year, Erdogan has shown increasingly authoritarian tendencies in the face of rising protests. Earlier this month, the Turkish government blocked Twitter, a self-defeating move that the White House felt compelled to criticize. Turkish court lifts Twitter ban A Turkish court Wednesday ordered the lifting of last week's Twitter ban, which came after the social media site was used to spread audio recordings implicating Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in corruption. The administrative court in Ankara will inform the telecommunications regulator TIB, which is expected to grant access to Twitter in the coming hours, private NTV television said. Israel and Turkey Nearing Compensation Agreement for Gaza Flotilla Incident Turkish media outlets are reporting that Turkey and Israel are getting ready to sign a compensation agreement for the families of the Turkish citizens killed on board the Mavi Marmara Gaza flotilla in 2010. The signing of the agreement would restore diplomatic relations between the two countries. Turkey's Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said the deal is expected to be signed after the country's local elections next week, and would then go to parliament for approval. Subsequently, ambassadors from both nations would be reassigned to each country, theHurriyet daily newspaper reported.

Israel shoots at "fishermen" smuggling arms from Egypt (photos) Posted: 26 Mar 2014 07:00 AM PDT YNet reports: Israeli naval troops in the Mediterranean Sea opened fire in the early hours of Wednesday morning on suspected Palestinian smugglers travelling in two boats from Sinai to the Gaza Strip. The Palestinians said that four people on the boats had been wounded. It is not clear what exactly the boats were carrying, but the IDF said that the boats were damaged, and that they had heard secondary explosions after they had opened fire. During the incident, gunmen on the Gaza coast opened fire on the Israeli vessels. There were no injuries to the Israeli troops, who returned fire. The incident occurred at around 3 am, several hundred meters from the Gaza coastline. Soldiers from a nearby naval base were patrolling the area when they noticed two small boats making their way back from the Sinai coast to southern Gaza. The IDF is still unclear as to what the boats were carrying, but the secondary explosions have raised suspicions that the two vessels were carrying weapons. Arab media, however, are claiming that Israel shot only at innocent fishermen. Time to play everyone's favorite game, "Who's telling the truth?" Do fishermen often have armed friends waiting for them to return to shore at 3 AM? Moreover, does this fire look like it came from Israeli shooting or from some explosively flammable materials already on the boat still burning several hours later after sunrise? Sorry, this game is too easy. But then again, it always is.

Zionist hamsters, albino mice and Talmudic pigs! Posted: 26 Mar 2014 05:00 AM PDT It's been months since we have seen the claims of Palestinian Arabs that Israel releases wild boars specifically to attack their crops. (Mahmoud Abbas made the same claim in a much heralded 2011 speech and the media ignored it.) Apparently, Jordan is plagued with being attacked by these boars, so they now know who to blame! Mustaqila quotes Jordanian media outlets as saying that Israel sends wild boars to Jordanian territory to sabotage their crops of Jordanians, and destroy the agriculture of Jordan. The author says that Israel used to attack Jordan with planes, but now it attacks the nation with pigs. Similarly, we are told, after Israel signed the peace agreement with Egypt, they conspired to destroy Egypt economically by releasing starving hamsters and albino mice into Egypt to ravage their crops. The climax of the article: According to the views of experts in science and epidemiology, the Israeli pigs' sabotage mission is a cornerstone of the Talmud and the Torah, which says in one of the texts: "Send diseases to your neighbors," and the neighbor here means a non-Jew, because Jewish law forbids damaging fellow Jews but they can attack non-Jews. Ah, so raising wild pigs to attack gentiles is a Talmudic edict! I missed that the first time I went through Talmud, but I'll keep an eye out for it this time. It's good to know these obscure mitzvot.

UMich student govt soundly defeats BDS resolution Posted: 26 Mar 2014 02:41 AM PDT From Michigan Daily: After hours of discussion and debate, the Central Student Government reversed the indefinite postponement of the controversial divestment resolution and subsequently voted to not pass it in a 25-9 vote with five abstentions early Wednesday morning. Hundreds of students lined the second floor of the Michigan Union and entered the Rogel Ballroom on a first-come, first-served basis Tuesday evening, and more than 2,000 viewers watched CSG's live-stream of the six-hour-long event. University Police regulated the large crowd that formed both inside and outside the Union and organized the crowds to line up on State Street. Students allowed into the meeting were given tickets and encouraged not to leave the room once they entered. When the meeting began, the number of people in the room exceeded its 375-person capacity. An additional 200 students were seated in the nearby Pendleton Room as an overflow space. It was voted on in a secret ballot, an amendment to the rules decided by the assembly to ensure the safety of individual representatives. Pro-Israel students were insulted and threatened for opposing the BDS resolution, so the student government felt it had to vote secretly to ensure their own safety. It is obvious which side they were afraid of. This pretty much explains how the anti-Israel crowd works in a nutshell - with threats, intimidation and creating a toxic environment. I watched part of the livestream of the debate. The haters brought in Max Blumenthal who didn't address the actual issues of the resolution so much as he launched a 30 minute anti-Israel screed filled with half-truths, slanders and lies about supposed Israeli crimes going back to 1947. He hilariously described himself as a "professor" in a university in Gaza that was a victim of Israeli "scholasticide." He mentioned his book many, many times and even displayed it a few times as he was talking. He was followed by a Hillel representative who, while effectively calling Blumenthal out for challenging Israel's existence rather than working for peace, often attacked Israel herself by distancing herself from its policies and history, saying at least twice that Israeli actions she disagreed with were "shameful." A few law students then described in detail why the resolution should not pass according to the criteria within student law itself, and one pointed out a number of historic lies within the resolution. This was followed by a professor who gave a lecture about the history of the conflict. It was reasonably even-handed, if poorly organized and somewhat boring, but the anti-Israel crowd attacked him mercilessly in their tweets as being pro-Israel for saying things like Israel's 1967 war was defensive and the only violations of international law in that war were from the Arabs who intended to mass murder Israelis. In the end, answering a question, he said that he felt the BDS movement had made impressive gains. Then the pro-divestment crowd sent out a large set of anti-Israel speakers, who instead of addressing the resolution simply rehashed anti-Israel rhetoric. As usual, the pro-Israel side appealed to logic, law, even handedness and real peace, the anti-Israel crowd simply appealed to emotions. No one, as far as I saw, attacked Palestinian Arab rejectionism, antisemitism, corruption, misogyny, honor killings or infighting. My poster made for the occasion was retweeted a few dozen times by those following the proceedings, and then it was attacked by the haters as well.

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