Police spokeswoman Katarzyna Padlo said police believe it was stolen between 3:30 a.m. and 5 a.m. Friday morning, when museum guards noticed that it was missing and alerted police.
Padlo also said that the iron sign, which spanned a gate at the main entrance to the former Nazi death camp in southern Poland, was removed by being unscrewed on one side and pulled off on the other.
Police have launched an intensive search. According to Padlo, there are currently no suspects but police are pursuing several theories.
The museum curator at Auschwitz said that they have a replacement sign, which they immediately put up.
As you might imagine, a lot of people here are quite upset about this.
Noah Flug chairman of The Center of Organizations of Holocaust Survivors in Israel and president of the International Auschwitz Committee called on the Polish police and government to "make every concerted effort to track down the perpetrators and bring them to justice."
Flug said that the sign is "an item of both important symbolic and historical value."
Yad Vashem chairman Avner Shalev said he was "shocked" to learn of the theft of the sign, "which has come to symbolize the murder of 6 million Jews during the Holocaust. "
"While we don't yet know exactly who stole the sign, the theft of such a symbolic object is an attack on the memory of the Holocaust, and an escalation from those elements that would like to return us to darker days," he said in a statement. "I call on all enlightened forces in the world - who fight against anti-Semitism, racism, xenophobia and the hatred of the other, to join together to combat these trends."
Also speaking to Israel Radio, Tel Aviv-Yaffo Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau, a Holocaust survivor and chairman of the Yad Vashem Council, called the theft "frightening and painful." He said the sign was the one of the firmest proofs of the Holocaust, and was a huge contribution to the perpetuation of the victims' memory.
The thieves were not caught on security cameras.
Here's betting it shows up in Tehran.
Read the whole thing.
I've probably run the picture at the top of this post dozens of times in the last year. Until now, it was arguably an exaggeration. Now, it's looking less like one.Tehran finally came back with a counterproposal late last week, in which no uranium would leave Iranian soil. Even Hillary Clinton admits it's a nonstarter: "I don't think anyone can doubt that our outreach has produced very little in terms of any kind of positive response from the Iranians," the Secretary of State told reporters.
Given those remarks, we would have imagined that Mrs. Clinton would take it as good news that on Tuesday the House voted 412-12 in favor of a new round of unilateral sanctions on Iran. The Iran Refined Petroleum Sanctions Act would forbid any company that does energy business with Iran from having access to U.S. markets.
Instead, last week Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg wrote to Foreign Relations Chairman John Kerry urging that the Senate postpone taking up the House bill. "I am concerned that this legislation, in its current form, might weaken rather than strengthen international unity and support for our efforts," wrote Mr. Steinberg.
So let's see: Iran spurns every overture from the U.S. and continues to develop WMD while abusing its neighbors. In response, the Administration, which had set a December deadline for diplomacy, now says it opposes precisely the kind of sanctions it once promised to impose if Iran didn't come clean, never mind overwhelming bipartisan support in Congress. For an explanation of why Iran's behavior remains unchanged, look no further.
David Hazony read that Tom Friedman article that I blogged on Thursday as a call for a conventional war and not just for a 'war of words.' Friedman starts with the “war of ideas within Islam,” uses the American Civil War as an example, and then goes on to focus on which ideas are legitimate in the Arab-Muslim world and which are not, and on how many fatwas have been issued against al-Qaeda. As though he hadn’t just said anything shocking.
Hello? The American Civil War was not only a battle of ideas. The “ferocity” he refers to, the lingering antipathy against the North today, was not because Lincoln issued a fatwa or recruited columnists in the South over the Internet or wrote a bestselling book. There was horrific, physical destruction involved. Is he saying that Islam “needs” a moderate-Islamic General Sherman to scorch the earth of Saudi-funded madrasses? Literally?
Because if he doesn’t mean it literally, the metaphor suddenly makes no sense. Certain ideas are deemed illegitimate in the Muslim world because simply expressing them can get you killed. Violence is a crucial component in the equation — that’s what it means not to be part of the democratic world. So if moderate voices are to turn violent against the extremists — even if the violence is not literal but only in the form of condemnation, stopping their funding, pursuing a “war of ideas,” and so forth — first you need to remove the threat of literal violence and create a free environment in which ideas can be aired without fear. But for that you need a much bigger change than just calling for the voices of moderation to wake up. There’s a good reason why they’re asleep in the first place.
So, Mr. Friedman, which is it? A literal civil war, like the one America endured? Or a figurative one, which you call on others to wage, bravely and at high cost, with little hope of victory?
I'm sure you all recall the article by Michael Fenenbock that I posted earlier this week that argued that Israel's supporters ought to target the incumbent Swedish government in the upcoming Swedish election.Why Carl Bildt is Driving the Israelis Up the Wall
September 19, 2010, that’s the target. Send the best political campaign professionals in the world into Sweden’s national elections. Make Reinfeldt and Bildt pay a price.”
That’s the suggestion of political consultant Michael Fenenbock in an op-ed in Israel’s largest daily, Yedioth Ahronoth. The reason is that the EU has once again proclaimed that Jerusalem should be the capital city of a future Palestinian state, something for which rotating EU president “Reinfeldt and his Rasputin-like partner Carl Bildt” ought to be punished.
“We have the means, the experience and skill to cause these guys political pain in Sweden,” writes Fenenbock, who has previously run campaigns for Ted Kennedy and others in the US.
That’s somewhat ironic. For decades now an anti-Semitic-tainted extreme Left has been mouthing off about a “pro-Israel Lobby” that is alleged to control the world’s political destiny. When finally someone turns up who claims to represent just such a lobby, it also turns out that he intends to bring down the non-socialist government. That’s going to lead to some really hard-to-reconcile internal conflicts in many quarters.
The fact, however, is that there is a tense relationship between Sweden and Israel right now. That’s on the political plane. As regards trade and cultural exchanges, on the other hand, the atmosphere has never been better.
Carl Bildt’s rather arrogant style (he recently claimed that Israel is trying to influence the EU through a policy of “divide and rule”) underscores some Israelis’ impression that Bildt did not merely convey the demands expected during his country’s EU presidency, but rather that he has taken on the task with a dedication bordering on fervour. As though he truly burns with enthusiasm to put Israel in its place.
This past autumn’s headline-making story in which this country’s biggest daily paper spread stories about Israeli organ harvesting, stories deeply rooted in anti-Jewish mythology, without being admonished by the Swedish government, has scarcely done anything to mend bridges.
In Israel, the EU’s and Sweden’s incessant demands are perceived as highly one-sided. And not without some justification.
Last week the Israeli media presented leaked details about what was probably the previous Israeli government’s proposal to the Palestinians: then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is reported to have made an offer for a future Palestinian state on 99.3% of the pre-1967 territory. As well as the partitioning of Jerusalem. The Palestinians declined. Yet again. So who exactly is being unreasonable?
The current Israeli government emerged as a response to the previous centre coalition, which received nothing in reply to its far-reaching concessions. If today we are hearing a sharp tone of voice from Prime Minister and others, it is not solely a cause of the situation we see today – it is in equal measure a response to Palestinian intransigence.
That a Swedish non-socialist government would be hostile to Israel is unthinkable. So how exactly are we to interpret Carl Bildt?
It’s that same old problem: trying to extract responsibility from the only party that has ever been shown to be capable of behaving responsibly, while never demanding responsibility from the one party that really should be shouldering it. Instead of perhaps using our immense financial aid to the Palestinians to persuade them in the appropriate direction.
The question is whether it would work. From the Israeli viewpoint, it is more convenient to bicker with Sweden, and to joke about rigging our election process, than it is to pursue an uncertain centrist policy that would require some extremely hazardous concessions. That makes Carl Bildt the Likud government’s excuse to shift its focus. And that may not have been the intention.
For the record...
The18
The18 has no connection to the Israeli government. The18 has no connection to any NGO’s or institutional Jewish organizations. The18 is competely independent.
Indeed, The18 has precisely the same relationship to the Israeli government as Prime Minister Reinfeldt’s government has to the Swedish newspaper “Aftonbladet.”
As Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt put it in his August 2009 refusal to condemn the Swedish newspaper for accusing Israelis of organ harvesting, “Freedom of expression is a cornerstone of democracy.” (Associated Press, August 20, 2009)
The18 is free to act independent of any institutional, government, or NGO influence or control.
The18 Sweden
The18 Sweden does not advocate on behalf of any Swedish political party.
The18 Sweden is not tasked with persuading Swedes to vote one way or another. The18 Sweden does not endorse a candidate or party. The18 Sweden’s goal is to maintain focus on the issue of Reinfeldt and Bildt’s EU Jerusalem initiative. And its consequences for Swedes and Sweden.
To achieve that end, The18 Sweden will mount an independent public campaign.
The18 Sweden’s intention is to ask hard questions of Prime Minister Reinfeldt and Foreign Minister Bildt. And to ask them in Sweden, in the context of the September elections, via a public campaign mounted from a Swedish – not a Jewish – perspective.
Questions will be asked about the consequences of Sweden’s EU Jerusalem initiative for Swedes and Sweden. The18 Sweden public campaign will be directed at a Swedish audience and delivered by Swedes.
The Hebrew caption reads "Where the hell is that country that keeps me busy all day long?"
The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that the US has a problem with Iranian-backed terrorists intercepting the video feed from drones in Iraq. Militants in Iraq have used $26 off-the-shelf software to intercept live video feeds from U.S. Predator drones, potentially providing them with information they need to evade or monitor U.S. military operations.
Senior defense and intelligence officials said Iranian-backed insurgents intercepted the video feeds by taking advantage of an unprotected communications link in some of the remotely flown planes' systems. Shiite fighters in Iraq used software programs such as SkyGrabber -- available for as little as $25.95 on the Internet -- to regularly capture drone video feeds, according to a person familiar with reports on the matter.
U.S. officials say there is no evidence that militants were able to take control of the drones or otherwise interfere with their flights. Still, the intercepts could give America's enemies battlefield advantages by removing the element of surprise from certain missions and making it easier for insurgents to determine which roads and buildings are under U.S. surveillance.
The drone intercepts mark the emergence of a shadow cyber war within the U.S.-led conflicts overseas. They also point to a potentially serious vulnerability in Washington's growing network of unmanned drones, which have become the American weapon of choice in both Afghanistan and Pakistan.
...
U.S. military personnel in Iraq discovered the problem late last year when they apprehended a Shiite militant whose laptop contained files of intercepted drone video feeds. In July, the U.S. military found pirated drone video feeds on other militant laptops, leading some officials to conclude that militant groups trained and funded by Iran were regularly intercepting feeds.
In the summer 2009 incident, the military found "days and days and hours and hours of proof" that the feeds were being intercepted and shared with multiple extremist groups, the person said. "It is part of their kit now."
...
Senior military and intelligence officials said the U.S. was working to encrypt all of its drone video feeds from Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, but said it wasn't yet clear if the problem had been completely resolved.
Some of the most detailed evidence of intercepted feeds has been discovered in Iraq, but adversaries have also intercepted drone video feeds in Afghanistan, according to people briefed on the matter. These intercept techniques could be employed in other locations where the U.S. is using pilotless planes, such as Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, they said.
Writing in Haaretz - Haaretz! - Ari Shavit explains that there is no peace partner (Haaretz put the wrong headline on this). The ultimate solution is not the total liberation of the Gaza Strip or a Palestinian state. It is the liberation of all of Palestine.
Haniyeh did not say so outright, but his words are clear. Hamas is demanding Ramle and Lod, Haifa and Jaffa, Abu Kabir and Sheikh Munis. It is also demanding the land on which this article was written and the land on which this article was printed - the land on which the editorial offices of Haaretz are located and the land on which the Haaretz printing plant is located. The land, the entire land. Greater Palestine.
In recent years, quite a number of experts have promised us that Hamas does not really mean it. Hamas is only playing tough, but its intentions are lofty: cease-fire, Green Line, coexistence. Live and let live. But no message conveyed by any senior Hamas member to any diplomat behind closed doors is equal in status to the message conveyed by Haniyeh to the masses. What counts is only the direct and open statement made by the Palestinian leader to his people. Palestine, all of Palestine. Every piece of Israeli land on which any Israeli citizen lives. His home, your home, our home. The land beneath our feet.
Ostensibly, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas is an alternative to Hamas. Two days ago Abbas told Haaretz correspondent Avi Issacharoff that an agreement could be reached within six months. There's one small problem: Similar things were said to us when the Beilin-Abbas agreement was formulated in 1995. Similar things were said to us on the eve of Camp David 2000. Similar things were promised us when the Geneva Initiative was signed in 2003. Similar things were promised us when Israel went to Annapolis in 2007.
But every time an Israeli leader took another significant step toward Abbas, Abbas became evasive. To this day Abbas has not responded positively to the offer of 100 percent made to him by former prime minister Ehud Olmert 15 months ago.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas — currently in the 60th month of his 48-month term, a declared non-candidate for re-election (in the event there is ever another Palestinian election), presently governing only half of the putative Palestinian state — has told Haaretz that a peace agreement could be reached within six months if Israel will make more pre-negotiation concessions.
Peace could be reached not only in our time but with four full months left over to complete Netanyahu’s 10-month settlement freeze. Abbas will hold the football himself.
Not even those on the Left in Israel believe in this process any more. Ari Shavit, writing in today’s Haaretz, notes that:
There’s one small problem: Similar things were said to us when the Beilin-Abbas agreement was formulated in 1995. Similar things were said to us on the eve of Camp David 2000. Similar things were promised us when the Geneva Initiative was signed in 2003. Similar things were promised us when Israel went to Annapolis in 2007.
Six months is in fact exactly what Abbas promised at the beginning of the Annapolis Process in 2007, only to reject still another Israeli offer of a state 12 months later.
You can visit the GFCA website by clicking here.
This is a video clip that was recorded on 8mm film during the Six Day War. It was recently discovered in a closet and converted to a modern day format.
Warning for those interested: Background singer is female
Humanity is no longer split between conservatives and liberals, reactionaries and progressives, though both sides are informed by the older politics. Today the battle lines are drawn between expanders and restrainers; those who believe that there should be no impediments and those who believe that we must live within limits. The vicious battles we have seen so far between greens and climate change deniers, road safety campaigners and speed freaks, real grassroots groups and corporate-sponsored astroturfers are just the beginning. This war will become much uglier as people kick against the limits that decency demands.
Farofa:
That is a reactionary position. It says inequalities must stand. The poor shall remain poor and the rich rich.
Perhaps then you could explain why I call for redistribution.
The battle is precisely between those who wish to defend the poorest and weakest people from exploitation and those who wish to rip their lives apart in the pursuit of profit. Is that really so hard to understand, if you don't bend your mind to misunderstanding it?
Monboit is an important journalist. He's a scientist with a PhD and an author. He's not just some bleary-eyed graduate student who hasn't yet confronted the grown up world, nor an elderly blogger who never did. He's more radical than many in his camp, true, but many of them admire him for it. He also dislikes Israel and works at a newspaper that detests Zionism, and this conflation of themes may or may not be a coincidence. Rather not, I think, but that's a topic for a rainier day.
Interestingly, the Economist published a thoughtful rejoinder to Monboiot, five days before his column:
Today “The Leopard” is best-known for a single line: “If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change.” It is a fine line, but it is also one that can easily be misinterpreted. Today’s European leaders talk about things changing, but in ways designed to appeal, all too often, to the side of Europe that is old, tired and anxious. Buzzwords of the moment include a “Europe that protects” (a phrase recently used by both President Nicolas Sarkozy of France and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany). It is a horribly defeatist slogan. What about a Europe that makes its citizens strong, or one that equips them to compete? Europeans can live off their inherited wealth for a bit longer, and many still lead largely enviable lives. There is much that is fine and even noble about Europe, including its ambitions to reduce social inequalities. But Europe’s rivals are young and hungry. The old continent should resist the allure of a genteel surrender.
Ultimately, the Monboits of this world aren't important; human nature is stronger, if not in Europe then in Asia. Yet before the defeatists fade comfortably away, let's remind ourselves that one of the most noble things about humans is that they insist on striving.
Originally posted by Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations
"The next day, we started talking about maps. Olmert showed me one map and I brought back one of ours. He showed me a new map and I brought back a map of ours. And so it went. We agreed that 1.9 percent would be with you and Olmert demanded 6.5 percent. It was a negotiation, we didn't complete it. As a shopper enters a store, that's how we held the talks."
According to Abbas, a few days before Operation Cast Lead, he told then-U.S. president George W. Bush that despite extensive American efforts, the talks had not been completed. "He asked me if it would be all right if on January 3 we sent [chief negotiator] Saeb Erekat, and Israel would send an envoy to complete the talks. But a few days before the departure for Washington, Saeb called Shalom [Turgeman, Olmert's political adviser] and said the situation did not allow it. Everything got stuck."
According to the map proposed by Olmert, which is being made public here for the first time, the future border between Israel and the Gaza Strip would be adjacent to kibbutzim and moshavim such as Be'eri, Kissufim and Nir Oz, whose fields would be given to the Palestinians. Olmert also proposed giving land to a future Palestinian state in the Beit She'an Valley near Kibbutz Tirat Tzvi; in the Judean Hills near Nataf and Mevo Betar; and in the area of Lachish and of the Yatir Forest. Together, the areas would have involved the transfer of 327 square kilometers of territory from within the Green Line.
The implementation of the Olmert plan would require the evacuation of tens of thousands of settlers and the removal of hallmarks of the West Bank settlement enterprise such as Ofra, Beit El, Elon Moreh and Kiryat Arba, as well as the Jewish community in Hebron itself.
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