Israel Matzav: Keeping Iran afloat

Keeping Iran afloat

One of the leaders of Europe's drive to keep Iran afloat and
ready for nuclear warfare is Austria.

“In the first eight months of this year, Austrian firms supplied goods and services worth a total of 189 million euros to the Islamic Republic, more than, for example, to Israel, Thailand or Ireland,” the Vienna daily Die Presse reported recently.

Austrian energy giant OMV continues to refuel Iran Air planes, in contrast to many fuel suppliers across Europe.

“While top-ranking British, European politicians are quite vocal about new Iran sanctions, Austria remains silent,” Dr. Diana Gregor, a Vienna-based specialist who has written and lectured on Austrian-Iran relations, wrote to The Jerusalem Post by e-mail on Friday.

“In recent years, Austria has strongly contributed to keeping the Iranian regime from international isolation, and has not taken any steps toward destroying the economic basis of the dictatorship of the ayatollahs and the Revolutionary Guards,” Gregor wrote.

Yacov Stiassny, from the Israel-based Central Committee for Jews in Austria, told the Post by phone from Bat Yam on Friday, “Yes, it is obvious what they [the government in Vienna] should be doing, but they are not doing it. Business is more important to Austria than its commitment to the Jewish people and Israel. It is a pity.

“Instead of taking care of the Jews who fled Austria, the Austrians are doing business with Iran,” he said.

But why should anyone be surprised at that? This is what went on at OMV's shareholders' meeting in May 2008.

Was the company's investment in Iran a "miscalculation" because of the Islamic Republic's nuclear program and the sanctions imposed for violating United Nations Security Council resolutions calling for the regime to halt enrichment of uranium, asked Dr. Hava Bugajer, an OMV shareholder and president of the Women's International Zionist Organization in Austria.

"The details are to be negotiated" and there is "no foreseeable result" regarding the implementation of the deal, replied CEO Wolfgang Ruttenstorfer to a packed auditorium at the Austrian Center Vienna.

OMV sees time as an ally and is waiting for "political change in the USA," Ruttenstorfer said in response to questions about sanctions against Iran at the stockholder meeting. [Think they're expecting Barack Hussein Obama to be the next President of the United States? CiJ]

He declined to comment on whether OMV's gas deal would violate the US Iran Sanctions Act, which prohibits large energy investments in Iran and spells out penalties for conducting more than $20 million of annual business in Iran's energy sector.

OMV spokesman Thomas Huemer told the The Jerusalem Post that "OMV as a company does not have a moral responsibility toward a particular state."

Bugajer told thePost that Ruttenstorfer' responses were "not really answers."

The problem, as I described at length in that post, is that the Austrians see themselves as victims of the Nazis, when in fact Hitler sprung from among the Austrians and much of the hierarchy of the World War II German army came from Austria. The Austrians feel no sympathy and no empathy for Israel or Jews. And don't expect that to change.

Israel Matzav: Keeping Iran afloat

Love of the Land: Israeli wins gold in fencing; Austrian hosts don't play 'Hatikva'

Israeli wins gold in fencing; Austrian hosts don't play 'Hatikva'

JPost Staff
15 November 09

(Congratulations to Daria and her teammates, both for the win, and for knowing at 14, what's expected of you.)

Israeli fencer Daria Strelnikov won the gold medal at the cadet's fencing world championship in Austria Saturday night. However, as the 14-year-old athlete stood at the podium waiting to hear the Israeli national anthem, she was greeted by a disturbing quiet.

Strelnikov and a fellow teammate on the podium decided to fill in the silence by singing Hatikva themselves. They were joined by their coach, and other supporting voices in the crowd.

Love of the Land: Israeli wins gold in fencing; Austrian hosts don't play 'Hatikva'

Love of the Land: The Schoenau Ultimatum

The Schoenau Ultimatum

Yehuda Avner

JPost
03 September 09

How does one treat terrorists? Deal with them and you're done for; don't and innocents die. Take the case of Schoenau. It is a tale of infamy that seized the assemblage of the Council of Europe in September 1973.

The Council of Europe in Strasbourg is that continent's approximation to a representative house. At the time in question, its 400-odd delegates watched with various degrees of curiosity as a stooped, aging woman with a face deeply scarred with tragic lines mounted the podium. She was prime minister Golda Meir, and she was there at the invitation of the European Council to state the case for Israel.

Generally speaking, Golda Meir preferred to speak extemporaneously, but since this was a formal occasion, protocol required she deliver a pre-prepared address. I, her in-house speechwriter, drafted one. In its preparation I had torn up a dozen or more versions, leaving tooth marks on my pen as I wrote and rewrote page after page, scribbling deranged doodles while mentally struggling for concise, rhythmic, salvationary nouns and alliterative descriptions in my effort to give her words a defining oratory.

Finally, a coherent theme emerged and a speech surfaced. It thanked the council and individual European parliaments for raising their voices in support of Soviet Jewry's right to freely emigrate to Israel (this was at the height of the worldwide "Let My People Go" campaign), delved into the intricacies of the Middle East conflict, pleaded for "the European Council's help to enable the Middle East to emulate the model of peaceful coexistence that the council itself had established," and perorated with a quote from the great European statesman Jean Monnet, that "peace depends not only on treaties and promises. It depends essentially upon the creation of conditions which, if they do not change the nature of men, at least guide their behavior towards each other in a peaceful direction."

To my consternation Golda never enunciated a single one of these words. Instead, she scanned the assembly from end to end, jaw jutting, her expression defiant, and after combing back her hair with the fingers of both hands, brandished the written speech, and in a caustic tone said, "I have here my prepared address, a copy of which I believe you have before you. But I have decided at the last minute not to place between you and me the paper on which my speech is written. Instead, you will forgive me if I break with protocol and speak in an impromptu fashion. I say this in light of what has occurred in Austria during the last few days."

CLEARLY, THE woman had decided it was idiotic to read her formal address after the devastating news which had reached her just before leaving Israel for Strasbourg: A train carrying Jews from communist Russia en route to Israel via Vienna was hijacked by two Arab terrorists at a railway crossing on the Austrian frontier. Seven Jews were taken hostage, among them a 73-year-old man, an ailing woman and a three-year-old child. The terrorists issued an ultimatum that unless the Austrian government instantly closed down Schoenau, the Jewish Agency's layover near Vienna where the émigrés were processed before being flown on to Israel, not only would the hostages be killed, but Austria itself would become the target of violent retaliation.

The Austrian cabinet hastily met and, led by chancellor Bruno Kreisky, capitulated. Kreisky announced that Schoenau would be closed forthwith, and the terrorists were hustled to the airport for safe passage to Libya.

Read All at :

Love of the Land: The Schoenau Ultimatum

'No Jews' policy employed at Austria hotel - Haaretz - Israel News

'No Jews' policy employed at Austria hotel

By DPA
Tags: Austria, Anti-Semitism

A hotel in the Austrian region of Tyrol that said it does not accept Jewish guests has caused shock in the local media and tourism industry, the daily Tiroler Tageszeitung reported Sunday.

A Vienna family of seven had had tried to make a reservation at the Haus Sonnenhof apartment hotel in the village of Serfaus, but the owner replied by e-mail that although the room was free, she did not want to take in Jewish guests because of "bad experiences" in the past.

Read All at :

'No Jews' policy employed at Austria hotel - Haaretz - Israel News