Israel Matzav: Hamas finds a use for women

Hamas finds a use for women

Hamas has found a use for its women aside from bearing children. Can you guess what it is?

Let's go to the videotape.

Israel Matzav: Hamas finds a use for women

Israel Matzav: A deal on Shalit?

A deal on Shalit?

There are reports of a deal in the works for the release of kidnapped IDF corporal Gilad Shalit. It's not a great deal, but it's much better than some of the deals to which former Prime Minister Ehud K. Olmert was ready to agree: The terrorists with 'blood on their hands' would be sent out of the 'Palestinian territories' (i.e. away from Israel) so that hopefully they cannot rebuild the terror infrastructure.

According to a report in the Arabic-language London-based newspaper Al-Quds Al-Arabi, Israel has agreed to release 20 Palestinian murderers with blood on their hands as part of a prisoner exchange for the captive soldier. As part of the potential agreement, the released prisoners would not be allowed to remain in the Palestinian territories after their release.

No deal has yet been signed, but the report stressed that negotiations were in final stages.

According to the report, Turkey, Egypt and Germany were privy to these most recent negotiations.

On Friday, Palestinian sources told Chinese news agency Xinhua that Egypt and Turkey are sponsoring indirect negotiations between Hamas and Israel on the release of captive IDF soldier Gilad Schalit. Germany's role was not mentioned.

The negotiations are still in the early stages and it is "still too early to talk about a breakthrough," the sources told the Chinese news agency.

On Thursday, Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal said Egypt is making vigorous moves to advance a prisoner exchange deal that would see Schalit released.

"Schalit's release depends on the Israeli position," Mashaal said. "The ball is now in [Prime Minister Binyamin] Netanyahu's court," saying Netanyahu is responsible for the lack of progress in the deal.

Also on Thursday, the US added The Army of Islam, one of the organizations responsible for the capture of Schalit, to its list of terror organizations.

I'll believe it when I see it.


Israel Matzav: A deal on Shalit?

Love of the Land: Hamas in English vs. Hamas in Arabic

Hamas in English vs. Hamas in Arabic

Khaled Abu Toameh
Hudson New York
17 May '11

http://www.hudson-ny.org/2126/hamas-english-arabic


Hamas leaders have recently been sending conflicting messages about their policies and plans that have prompted some Westerners to argue that the movement has indeed changed and that this is the time to engage with it.

But the reality is that Hamas has not changed. All one has to do is listen to what Hamas says in Arabic to understand that it does not even have any intention to change.

This week, as Palestinians marked "Nakba Day" [the Day of Catastrophe] in protest against the creation of Israel. Hamas leaders reiterated their commitment to their movement's strategy, saying the fight against Israel would continue.

Not only is Hamas not prepared to change its charter, it also has no intention to accept the three conditions set by the international community for dealing with the Islamist movement, namely renouncing violence, recognizing Israel's right to exist and accepting previous agreements signed between the Palestinians and Israel.

On the one hand, Hamas leaders have been telling Western media outlets that they accept the two-state solution on the basis of the 1967 lines.

The Hamas leaders have also been telling Western journalists -- in English, of course -- that their movement has changed and is now willing to renounce violence.

In an interview with the New York Times earlier this month, for example, Damascus-based Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal declared: "The world must deal with what Hamas is practicing today. Hamas has accepted a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders including East Jerusalem, dismantling settlements and the right of return based on a long term truce."

Mashaal complained that it was "not logical for the international community to get stuck on sentences written 20 years ago." He was obviously referring to Hamas's charter, which calls for the destruction of Israel and vows to pursue the fight against the Jewish state.

Mashaal is not the only Hamas leader to send such conciliatory messages to Western audiences. Another one is Ahmed Yousef, an advisor to Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh in the Gaza Strip.

Yousef, who has been described by some Western correspondents as a "moderate voice" in Hamas, has been entrusted with marketing his movement to the outside world.

Listening to Yousef and reading what he writes in Western newspapers, one is left with the impression that Hamas is a peaceful organization whose only goal is to live in peace alongside its Jewish neighbors.

In an article entitled, "What Hamas Wants," Yousef wrote, also in The New York Times, that Hamas has been trying to engage the international community to explain its platform for peace.

"Hamas has consistently offered a 10-year cease-fire with the Israelis to try to create an atmosphere of calm in which we resolve our differences," he said.

Such messages, however, are almost never heard in Arabic. On the contrary, in Arabic Hamas's message has always been consistent and clear.

At the same time that Mashaal and Yousef are talking in English about accepting the two-state solution, most of Hamas's other leaders are vowing in Arabic that their movement would never recognize Israel's right to exist.

Following the signing of the Egyptian-sponsored reconciliation deal between Fatah and Hamas, the Islamist movement's representatives in Syria, Lebanon and the Gaza Strip reassured Palestinians and Arabs that their movement has not abandoned its goal of "liberating all of Palestine."

Also in Arabic, Hamas leaders have pledged that their charter would not be changed despite the rapprochement with Fatah.

If one really wants to know what Hamas thinks, one should listen to what Hamas leaders tell their supporters in mosques and public rallies in the Gaza Strip, not what they write in the New York Times or the Guardian.

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Love of the Land: Hamas in English vs. Hamas in Arabic

Israel Matzav: A political party?

A political party?

Does this man look like a politician? In Turkey, they think he is a politician.

Speaking to Charlie Rose on Wednesday, however, the Turkish PM chimed in on the recently achieved unity agreement between rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas, indicating that he did not feel Hamas was an obstacle in achieving Mideast peace.

"Let me give you a very clear message, I don't see Hamas as a terror organization. Hamas is a political party -- it emerged as a political party that appeared as a political party," Erdogan told Charlie Rose, adding: "it is a resistance movement trying to protect its country under occupation."

Going further, the Turkish PM said the world should not "mix terrorist organizations with such an organization, and they entered into the elections," adding that Hamas "won the elections, they had ministers, and they had parliament speakers who were imprisoned by Israel, about 35 ministers and members of parliament in Israel prisons."

"Where is terrorism? They entered into the elections and after the elections this is how they were reacted, I mean, calling them terrorists, this would be disrespect to the will of the Palestinian people," Erdogan added.

Funny, Hitler won an election too.

What could go wrong?

Israel Matzav: A political party?

Love of the Land: More Details From Hamas About Their Two-Phase Solution

More Details From Hamas About Their Two-Phase Solution

Jonathan S. Tobin
Commentary/Contentions
11 May '11

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2011/05/11/more-details-from-hamas-about-their-two-phase-solution/

Over the weekend, Hamas leader Khaled Meshal danced around the question over what the Islamist terrorist group meant by its newly declared acceptance of a two-state solution. As Rick wrote on Monday, he told the New York Times that this mean a Palestinian state in every inch of the territories that were occupied by Jordan and Egypt from 1949 to 1967 including Jerusalem with no swaps of territories with Israel. When asked whether this would mean an end to the conflict, he replied, “I don’t want to talk about that.”

Yesterday, Mahmoud Zahar, another senior Hamas official, filled in a few more details about the Hamas “peace” plan. According to the Jerusalem Post, though the group now says it will accept the idea of two states, the Palestinians will not recognize Israel, because doing so would “cancel the right of the next generations to liberate the lands.” He also noted that recognition of Israel could lead to Palestinian refugees losing their right of return.

He also clarified that Hamas’s unity pact with Fatah does not mean an end to “resistance” against Israel though the Islamists are interested in maintaining the current cease-fire along the border with Gaza (that is only intermittently broken by terrorist missiles aimed at Israeli civilians), they want it understood that “a truce is not peace.”

Interestingly, Zahar also warned that Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas would not be allowed to visit Hamas-ruled Gaza anytime soon.

There are those who are interpreting these comments as progress towards peace because this is the first time that Hamas has not insisted that there will only be an Arab state between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River. That may be so. But it is also being made clear that Hamas views the current cease fire or even the proclamation of a Palestinian state which they will rule in coalition with Fatah as just an interim move that would merely be a prelude to future aggression against Israel. There is no logical reason why Israel should agree to making more tangible concessions to the Palestinians as a result of these statements since the only result will be a continuation of the conflict on more unfavorable terms in the future. If even the cease-fire with the Palestinians is not to be permanent, what possible reason would there be for Israel to accept such terms, as many in the United States and Europe are urging, as a basis for negotiations?

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Love of the Land: More Details From Hamas About Their Two-Phase Solution

Love of the Land: Hamas's Newest "Collaborators": Fatah

Hamas's Newest "Collaborators": Fatah

Khaled Abu Toameh
Hudson New York
10 May 11




http://www.hudson-ny.org/2107/hamas-collaborators-fatah

The two main partners in the new Palestinian government, Hamas and Fatah, have chosen to celebrate their unity accord by targeting anyone who helps Israel.

This means that the new unity government, which is supposed to be established in the coming weeks, would not only be opposed to compromise, but would also target those who maintain contacts with Israelis.

The timing of a recent execution in the Gaza Strip was seen as a warning message from Hamas to Fatah against continued "collaboration" with Israel.

Just hours before the signing of the Palestinian "reconciliation" pact in Cairo last week, the Hamas authorities in the Gaza Strip announced the execution by firing squad of Abdel Karim Shrair, 37, on charges of "collaboration" with Israel.

Days later in the West Bank, Palestinian gunmen believed to be members of Fatah, murdered Mohammed Khawaldi, 32, who had also been accused of "collaboration" with Israel.

Instead of issuing a condemnation, Fatah rushed to murder a "collaborator" in the West Bank – as if it is trying to tell the Palestinians: "You see, we are also capable of killing people who help Israel."

Fatah's failure to condemn the execution is a sign that the secular faction does not want to anger its new partner: Hamas.

Whatever Shrair did to help Israel, it could not have been more than what Abbas and Fayyad have done over the past few years. The two meet with Israelis on a regular basis and support security coordination between their security forces and the Israelis.

In the eyes of Hamas, Mahmoud Abbas and Salaam Fayyad are also "traitors" because they have agreed -- at least in English and in public -- to recognize Israel's right to exist. If Abbas and Fayyad were to stand trail before a court on all what Hamas has accused them of doing, they too would end up facing a firing squad.

Shrair, after all, was also affiliated with Fatah, and had served in their security forces before Hamas seized control over the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2007.

Citing Fatah security forces' security coordination with Israel, Hamas had previously refused to sign the unity accord, demanding an end to all forms of collaboration with Israel.

In the end, under Egyptian pressure, Hamas agreed temporarily to drop its condition.

The issue of security coordination between the Fatah-controlled security forces in the West Bank and Israel had been a major obstacle to ending the dispute between the two rival Palestinian factions.

Over the past four years, Hamas complained that this security coordination has resulted in the arrest and of hundreds of its followers in the West Bank. The coordination, according to Hamas, has also led to the elimination of many Hamas-linked institutions in the West Bank.

Hamas has also accused Fatah leaders of helping Israel during the 2008 Israeli military offensive in the Gaza Strip known as Operation Cast Lead.

But now it appears that Hamas is willing to sit in a unity government with Palestinians it still considers to be "collaborators" with Israel.

The decision to execute Shrair hours before the signing ceremony in Cairo is an indication that Hamas continues to see the issue of collaboration with Israel as a very serious matter. Many Palestinians see it as a warning and challenge to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and his prime minister, Salam Fayyad.

Love of the Land: Hamas's Newest "Collaborators": Fatah

Love of the Land: One Thousand, Four Hundred Days

One Thousand, Four Hundred Days

Paula R. Stern
A Soldier's Mother
25 April '10

In the last one thousand, four hundred days...

We sold our house and

We moved to a new house, that we bought.

My oldest daughter got engaged and married, celebrated her first, her second, and her third wedding anniversary.

My oldest son entered the army, finished basic training, advanced training, a commander's course.

He served in several combat locations and went to war against terrorists who were firing hundreds of rockets into our cities.

He finished his national service, returned his weapon and uniform and came back home.

My second son finished high school, did a year and a half of pre-military learning, and just entered the army.

My third son finished elementary school, entered junior high school and celebrated his bar mitzvah.

(Read full post)

Love of the Land: One Thousand, Four Hundred Days

Love of the Land: Journalists Buy Falsehoods on Gaza Shipments

Journalists Buy Falsehoods on Gaza Shipments

Tamar Sternthal
CAMERA Media Analysis
21 April '10

Raed Fattouh, a coordinator for the Palestinian Authority's Economy Ministry, is selling the falsehood that certain products -- wood, aluminum and commercial shipments of shoes and clothing -- are entering the Gaza Strip from Israel for the first time since the blockade began in 2007, and journalists are buying in bulk.

Wood and Aluminum

The New York Times' Fares Akram reported April 16, "Also Thursday, Israel allowed some wood and aluminum into Gaza for the first time since it blockaded the area in 2007, a Palestinian official said" (emphasis added). The International Herald Tribune, published by the New York Times, also ran a version of the Akram article including the error.

Similarly, the Agence France Presse reported April 15, in an article erroneously entitled "Israel allows first building shipment into Gaza in 3 years":

Israel allowed a shipment of construction material into the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip for the first time in three years, according to a Palestinian official.

The six truckloads of wood and aluminum entered the coastal territory via the Kerem Shalom crossing in the south, Palestinian customs official Raed Fattuh told AFP. . .

In actuality, Palestinian sources such as the Palestine Trade Center (PalTrade), the Palestinian Al-Ayyam newspaper, and the Ma'an News Agency document that tens of thousands of tons of construction material including wood and construction metal entered the Gaza Strip during the "hudna" (truce) period from June 19, 2008 to Dec. 19, 2008. Thus, the Dec. 09-Jan. 10 Gaza Strip Crossings Bi-Monthly Monitoring Report states:

During the truce or "hudna" period, that started on June 19, 2008 and ended on December 19, 2008, commercial goods were allowed to enter Gaza Strip including aggregates, cement, construction metal, wood, car tires, clothes, shoes and fruit juice.

(Read full report)

Love of the Land: Journalists Buy Falsehoods on Gaza Shipments

Love of the Land: Secretary Clinton at Dedication of Center: Israel must jump higher, remain silent (insatiable demands)

Secretary Clinton at Dedication of Center: Israel must jump higher, remain silent (insatiable demands)

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
16 April '10

[Dr. Aaron Lerner - IMRA:

Here are Secretary of State Clinton's marching orders to Israel:

"But easing up on access and movement in the West Bank, in response to credible Palestinian security performance, is not sufficient to prove to the Palestinians that this embrace is sincere. So we encourage Israel to continue building momentum toward a comprehensive peace by demonstrating respect for the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinians, stopping settlement activity, and addressing the humanitarian needs in Gaza, and to refrain from unilateral statements and actions that could undermine trust or risk prejudicing the outcome of talks."

There is a reason she doesn't just say "prejudicing the outcome of talks" because she knows what that means.

It means that Israel cannot annex territories during the course of negotiations.

That's the same limitation Israel accepted at the start of the Oslo process.

It is the only limitation.

What about settlement construction?

Oh, that's "spirit of Oslo".

(Read full post)

Love of the Land: Secretary Clinton at Dedication of Center: Israel must jump higher, remain silent (insatiable demands)

Love of the Land: A Shocking Secret in Plain Sight: U.S. Policy Sabotages U.S. Policy

A Shocking Secret in Plain Sight: U.S. Policy Sabotages U.S. Policy

Barry Rubin
The Rubin Report
15 April '10

U.S. Deputy Ambassador to the UN Alejandro Wolff made a fairly good speech in the Security Council. But it contained the following remarkable section:

“The Palestinian Authority is, in effect, a lifeline to more than half a million people in Gaza, making sure that PA salaries are paid and social welfare payments are made on time. The PA plans to devote roughly half of its $3.9 billion budget to Gaza in 2010.”

Now it isn't my job to correct factual mistakes in official speeches made by U.S. government officials. Is half the money the Palestinian Authority (PA) spends, which largely comes from Western donors, going to Gaza where—whatever humanitarian intentions exist—it shores up the Hamas regime? No, that would be around $2 billion. The correct figure in total PA aid is $500 million.

Still, it is the equivalent of sending massive economic assistance to the Taliban government in Afghanistan on the rationale that it is helping poor Afghans. And that this were done while the Taliban was making possible the September 11 attacks on the United States.

Oh yes, and it also means that in per capita terms the Hamas domain is one of the largest recipients of Western aid on a per capita basis in the world. Even when corrected to a half-billion dollars that means that Gaza Strip residents get more Western aid per capita than Israel. Israel's aid all comes from the United States. Most of the money is tied to buying weapons from U.S. companies. In comparison, the money going into Gaza has no strings attached. Of course, it goes to individuals but bolsters the local economy and a lot of it ends up in the pockets of Hamas and its institutions.

(Read full post)

Love of the Land: A Shocking Secret in Plain Sight: U.S. Policy Sabotages U.S. Policy

Love of the Land: Obama ensures that terror has no consequences

Obama ensures that terror has no consequences

Elder of Ziyon
26 March '10

From YNet:

The Obama Administration is demanding that Israel hand over more West Bank land to exclusive PA control, including the Abu-Dis area adjacent to Jerusalem, Palestinian sources told Ynet Thursday.
According to the US vision, the move will take place as part of reverting to the state that prevailed in the West Bank before the outbreak of the last Intifada.

"The most significant demand is to restore the situation to what it was on the eve of the Intifada," one source said.

Because what could possibly be wrong with turning back the clock to the day before a war began that killed a thousand Israeli civilians?
Starting and losing a war has consequences in every part of the world except for one. Since 1967, the world - and "international law" as interpreted by most - is fixated on the idea that the Arabs can start all the wars they want against Israel. If they lose, international pressure will ensure that the previous status quo can be returned to, so there are no consequences for losing.

We have seen Egypt, Syria, the PLO, the PLO again, Hezbollah and Hamas start wars with Israel, secure in the knowledge that they will not lose anything of consequence if they lose the war. Just expendable people who are less important than "The Struggle" and perhaps a few years of negotiations and pressure.

(Read full post)

Love of the Land: Obama ensures that terror has no consequences

Love of the Land: Obama’s message

Obama’s message

Fresnozionism.org
27 March '10

When Binyamin Netanyahu visited the White House last Tuesday, he was not treated like the Prime Minister of just any banana republic. He was treated like Manuel Noriega. No interviews, no photo-ops, no dinner, and a whole pile of demands. He and Defense Minister Ehud Barak were lucky not to have been locked in a room and forced to listen to heavy metal at top volume.

As a citizen of Israel and of the US, I was insulted and embarrassed in turn. As a Jew and a Zionist who believes that the survival of the Jewish people depends on the state of Israel I was horrified. Even Barry Rubin, who has been saying for the last couple of weeks that the crisis in US-Israeli relations has been blown out of proportion, admitted today that

…now it has become reasonable to ask whether the Obama White House is running amuck on Israel, whether it is pushing friction so far out of proportion that it is starting to seem a vendetta based on hostility and ideology.

Ehud Ya’ari, one of Israel’s most respected commentators, said,

(Read full post)

Love of the Land: Obama’s message

Love of the Land: Analysis: The Legacy of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh

Analysis: The Legacy of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh

Jonathan Spyer
GLORIA Center
26 March '10
Posted before Shabbat

Wherever departed Hamas official Mahmoud al-Mabhouh is now, he is presumably (I don't share this presumption. Y.) enjoying the considerable trouble the nature of his exit is causing his Israeli enemies.

The British decision to expel an unnamed Israeli diplomat following the conclusion of an investigation into the alleged use by Israel of cloned British passports in an assassination operation probably does not signal the onset of a general crisis in relations between London and Jerusalem. Still, it is not an everyday act, and the language used by the foreign secretary in announcing the expulsion was notably harsh.

This affair has so far traveled along similar lines to the last major set-to between the UK and Israel over the issue of Israeli intelligence activities overseas. In 1986, a number of forged British passports were discovered in an Israeli diplomatic pouch in West Germany. This incident was followed a year later by the apprehending of a Palestinian employed as a double agent by Israeli intelligence, together with a cache of weapons, in a northern English town. The result was the expulsion from Britain of Arie Regev, an official at the Israeli Embassy. Regev was widely regarded as the chief of the Mossad station in the UK.

Then, as now, the anger of senior British officials was real, not feigned. And the public revelations of the events meant that a response of a public nature was also inevitable. But the substantive response was a managed one. Cooperation between Israeli and British intelligence services suffered for a while. But channels of communication stayed open via Washington. Information of really crucial importance continued to be shared.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: Analysis: The Legacy of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh

Love of the Land: A reality too terrible to admit

A reality too terrible to admit

Jonathan Spyer
Haaretz
26 March '10

Jonathan Spyer is a senior research fellow at the Global Research in International Affairs Center at the Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya.

The Obama administration's approach to the Middle East is characterized by an apparent desire to revive the sunny illusions of the 1990s peace process - in an era that is far more uncertain and dangerous. This is particularly noticeable in the Israeli-Palestinian arena, in which the United States, the dominant world power, sets the parameters of debate. As a result, international discussion of the conflict is now more detached from reality than at any time in the past 40 years.

There are two layers to the edifice of unreality in which mainstream debate on the Israeli-Palestinian issue is now taking place. The first and most obvious one concerns the Hamas enclave in Gaza. It is now over four years since the movement's victory in elections to the Palestine Legislative Council, and nearly three years since the Hamas coup in Gaza. It is therefore past time to acknowledge that a single, united Palestinian national movement no longer exists.

Since this is, apparently, a reality too terrible to be admitted, the U.S. and the Europeans have chosen, in public at least, to ignore it. The fiction that the West Bank Palestinian Authority speaks in the name of all Palestinians is politely maintained. Behind the scenes, however, the reality is widely acknowledged. The intended means for coping with it constitutes the second layer of illusion.

The inability of even mainstream Fatah-style Palestinian nationalism to accept partition as the final outcome of the conflict has prevented its resolution twice - in 2000 and 2008. This type of nationalism understands the conflict as one that pits a colonial project against a native, authentic nationalism.

From such a perspective, partition of the land means admitting defeat. But Palestinian nationalism does not feel defeated. It is characterized, rather, by a deep strategic optimism. From its point of view, it is therefore not imperative to immediately conclude the struggle - but it is forbidden to end it. Hence the endless reasons why the partition deal somehow can never be inked.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: A reality too terrible to admit

Love of the Land: Ashton in Gaza: When the "experts" are clueless

Ashton in Gaza: When the "experts" are clueless

Elder of Ziyon
22 March '10

One of the more frustrating parts of watching the Middle East is when one sees that people who should have some basic knowledge, who present themselves as experts, and who urge actions based on their experience and expertise, are completely clueless.

Meet Catherine Ashton.

Lady Ashton is the high representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and vice president of the European Commission. She visited Gaza last week, and, armed with the latest on-the-ground intelligence, wrote an op-ed for the New York Times describing exactly what needs to be done to make the Middle East a happy place again.

Here is her first paragraph:

It is the process of entering the Gaza Strip that strikes you most. At the Erez checkpoint you go into what looks like a modern airport terminal. Leaving it you move through a winding maze of gates and walls and emerge, like a time-traveler transported backwards, on a dirt track. This is where the industrial center of Gaza used to be, before the shelling just over a year ago. Now, people with donkeys and carts carry stones from the rubble.

Ashton is stating as fact that the heartless Israelis, for no discernible reason, reduced the Erez area to rubble during Operation Cast Lead and bombed the formerly prosperous industrial area to the stone age.

Love of the Land: Ashton in Gaza: When the "experts" are clueless

Love of the Land: Hillary Clinton's unfortunate mistake

Hillary Clinton's unfortunate mistake

Itamar Marcus, Nan Jacques Zilberdik
and Barbara Crook
Palestinian Media Watch (PMW)
23 March '10

Someone in the State Department is giving Secretary of State Hillary Clinton imprecise information about Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.

In her speech to AIPAC yesterday, Clinton condemned Hamas for renaming "a square after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis," saying it was "wrong and must be condemned." On the other hand, Clinton "commended" PA Chairman Abbas.

Clinton's condemnation of Hamas alone, because the municipality that named the square after the terrorist is run by Hamas, was erroneous. In fact, it has been the Palestinian Authority and Mahmoud Abbas, not Hamas, who have been leading the Palestinians in glorifying Dalal Mughrabi, the terrorist bus hijacker who was responsible for the killing of 37 civilians, whom Clinton accurately called the "terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis."

Palestinian Media Watch has documented the continuous Mughrabi veneration by Abbas and the Palestinian Authority in recent years, both in connection to the square near Ramallah on the West Bank and in many other contexts. The following are 15 examples of the glorification of this one particular terrorist, Dalal Mughrabi. Five by Abbas himself, five by the Palestinian Authority or its leaders, and five by Fatah or its leaders:

1) It was Abbas himself who defended the naming of the square after Mughrabi: "I do not deny it. Of course we want to name a square after her." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Jan. 17, 2010]

2)It was Abbas himself who on December 31, 2009 honored that same terrorist Mughrabi by sponsoring a celebration of her birthday. [PA TV (Fatah) News, Dec. 29, 2009]
It was Abbas's Fatah youth movement who prepared the Mughrabi square for the ceremony. [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, March 8, 2010]

3)It was Abbas himself who funded a computer center after that same terrorist. "Present at the event were President Mahmoud Abbas's advisor... inaugurating the [Dalal Mughrabi] center, funded by a contribution from the President's [Abbas's] Office." [Al-Ayyam, May 5, 2009]

(Read full report)

Love of the Land: Hillary Clinton's unfortunate mistake

Love of the Land: Moral blindness -- and truth and justice betrayed

Moral blindness -- and truth and justice betrayed

Melanie Phillips
The Spectator
23 March '10

How utterly extraordinary. Hillary Clinton made a big speech today to the US Jewish lobby group AIPAC – a speech of no small importance given the crisis in relations between the Obama administration and Israel. But in this speech, as Israel Matzav notes, she committed an astounding howler. Referring to the recent Palestinian naming of a square in Ramallah in honour of terrorist Dalal al Mughrabi, she said:

When a Hamas-controlled municipality glorifies violence and renames a square after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis, it insults the families on both sides who have lost loves ones in this conflict.

But Ramallah is not a Hamas-controlled municipality. Hamas controls Gaza. Ramallah is in the West Bank and is controlled by Fatah. The naming of the square was a Fatah event glorifying a Fatah terrorist. Does Clinton not know this? Of course she does. What this whopper tells us is that she – and the benighted Obama administration that wrote her lamentable speech – cannot and will not acknowledge that Fatah is a terrorist organisation that glorifies a terrorist who murdered not only dozens of Israelis but also the niece of an American Democratic senator.

Clinton and the Obamites cannot and will not acknowledge this because their whole Middle East strategy revolves around forcing Israel to give a state to Fatah -- because they ‘deserve’ it as moderate peaceful statesmen-in-waiting. As if. The fact that the Obamites are actually bullying Israel into accepting a Fatah-run terrorist state was unfortunately all-too graphically demonstrated when Fatah named its square after Mughrabi. So Clinton, purporting to attack the glorification of terrorist violence, turned the instigators into Hamas instead.

Her message to renounce violence, recognise Israel and abide by previous signed agreements (this from an administration that has torn up America’s own agreements with Israel) was addressed solely to Hamas. To Fatah, whose leaders declare they will never accept a Jewish state, whose armed wing continues to commit acts of terror and who have gone back on countless agreements, not one word of criticism.

The rest of Clinton’s speech was as bad if not worse.

(Read full article)

Love of the Land: Moral blindness -- and truth and justice betrayed

RubinReports: The EU’s Think Tank: Engage Hamas and Islamist Movements; Iranian Nuclear Weapons Not a Threat

The EU’s Think Tank: Engage Hamas and Islamist Movements; Iranian Nuclear Weapons Not a Threat

By Barry Rubin

“Stephen Spender [the great British poet] said to me recently, `Don’t you feel that any time during the past ten years you have been able to foretell events better than, say, the [government]? I had to agree to this….Where I feel that people like us understand the situation better than so-called experts is not in any power to foretell specific events, but in the power to grasp what kind of world we are living in.”
--George Orwell, War Diary, June 8, 1940

Does the flow of reports from the EU's official research center advocating engagement with Hamas, Hizballah, and Muslim Brotherhoods as well as negated any threat from Iranian nuclear weapons show the direction of European policy? In the face of the greatest challenge to freedom and stability at present, many institutions are on the other side.

The most recent paper, entitled, “Engaging Hamas: Rethinking the Quartet Principles,” is written by Carolin Goerzig, a fellow at the Institute. Other than having visited the Gaza Strip, it isn't clear what her qualifications are.

Here's how the paper is explained on the think tank's site: "Progress can only be made towards peace in the Middle East by engaging--not isolating--Hamas, without whom there can be no viable Palestinian state. Hamas’ acceptance of the Quartet Principles is a precondition for negotiations, but as Carolin Goerzig argues, it is time for a paradigm shift."

But actually she argues that acceptance should not be a precondition to pro-Hamas activities by the EU. And did anyone consider that with Hamas there can be no viable Palestinian state--it's already staged one violent coup against the Palestinian Authority--or Israeli-Palestinian peace.

The paper points out that the EU has three conditions for recognizing Hamas: renunciation of violence, recognition of Israel’s right to exist, and a commitment to all agreements signed by the PLO and Israel. Doesn’t sound all that demanding does it? But she thinks it’s too much to ask. Indeed she suggests that:

“A softening of these requirements could directly contribute to a transformation of Hamas, and in turn strengthen the prospects for peace in the Middle East.”

So in other words they should be engaged while still trying to destroy with violence Israel and previous agreements. And this is supposed to teach them they are making a mistake to maintain current policy? And this is supposed to make peace more possible?

The author argues that the EU has been moving toward recognizing Hamas and is pleased. She argues:

“Considering that the isolation of Hamas has proven to be a setback for peace efforts, waiting for the right time to engage might turn out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy and reinforce the belatedness of the EU’s response capacity.”

I’m not sure what belatedness of response capacity means, but nowadays EU rhetoric is inclined to the empty academic-sounding phrase. But at any rate it is not the isolation of Hamas that has set back peace efforts but the fact that Hamas still rules the Gaza Strip.

Here’s my favorite argument of hers for silliness: “The emphasis on supporting Fatah may have indirectly contributed to the inability of Hamas to renounce violence.” Why? Because EU forces are training the Palestinian Authority’s police and not those of Hamas! So Hamas would be more likely to renounce violence if the EU trained its forces, using that training, of course, to commit acts of terrorism and try to destroy Israel.

OK, one more. She explains why the Quartet should not demand that Hamas renounces violence by saying: “Renouncing violence can–paradoxically – make peace less rational.”

Yes, quite a paradox, isn’t it?

But why listen to me? Here’s a typical piece of Hamas rhetoric from a high-ranking leader, deputy minister of religious affairs Abdallah Jarbu, who expresses its mainstream view:

"[The Jews] suffer from a mental disorder, because they are thieves and aggressors....They want to present themselves to the world as if they have rights, but, in fact, they are foreign bacteria–a microbe unparalleled in the world. It's not me who says this. The Koran itself says that they have no parallel: 'You shall find the strongest men in enmity to the believers to be the Jews.'

"May He annihilate this filthy people who have neither religion nor conscience. I condemn whoever believes in normalizing relations with them, whoever supports sitting down with them, and whoever believes that they are human beings. They are not human beings. They are not people. They have no religion, no conscience, and no moral values." (Memri translation)

Obviously, he's not saying this kind of thing because the EU hasn't persuaded him otherwise, though he might like Europeans to train Hamas's soldiers to wipe out that "foreign bacteria." Is it asking too much for those who write about such topic to look at what the radicals say and do? Is it asking too much for “respected” institutions to exercise some quality control over what they publish?

PS: To show the EU line, consider also Amr Elshobaki and Gema Martín Muñoz, "Why Europe must engage with political Islam," Papers for Barcelona Number 10, also just published, whose title tells you what it advocates, and it isn't talking about--or just about--the most moderate forces.. The site explains:

"It is time to engage with the Islamists in the Middle East and North Africa. As Amr Elshobaki and Gema Martín Muñoz argue, there is no prospect of a credible democratic transformation of the Arab world without the full integration of one powerful player that forms part of the reality of Southern Mediterranean countries: political Islam."

But again the question could be asked if there is a prospect for creating stable democracies with the full integration of Islamism as it actually exists today, as opposed to a moderate Islam-oriented movement which barely exists in most countries (perhaps Iraq is the main exception) and would have to overcome and defeat the radicals.

If you have time you can also read another paper published by the institute and described on its site as follows:

"The Iranian nuclear issue: a never-ending story," by Rouzbeh Parsi. "Iran is seeking nuclear technology that could be used to create weapons. But is the West justified in assuming that Iran’s nuclear aspirations extend to the acquisition of nuclear weapons, and to aggressive belligerence?" The author explains that maybe Iran is just seeking peaceful nuclear energy, or maybe wants to have the ability to build a nuclear weapon without ever actully doing so. So what's all the fuss about?

These are the three papers published by the EU's think tank on the Middle East in the last year: engage Hamas, engage Islamists, Iran's nuclear program isn't a threat. Naturally, there are no papers arguing the opposite propositions.

RubinReports: The EU’s Think Tank: Engage Hamas and Islamist Movements; Iranian Nuclear Weapons Not a Threat

Love of the Land: PM Netanyahu corrects Secretary of State Clinton at AIPAC

PM Netanyahu corrects Secretary of State Clinton at AIPAC

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
23 March '10

Secretary of State Clinton sent a clear message to Israel in her AIPAC address that she and the Obama administration intend to continue with the "automatic pass" policy vis-a-vis official Palestinian compliance. That's "official" Palestinian compliance, since the verbiage can flow about "Palestinians" in general - while taking great care never to associate the criticism with the ruling Palestinian Fatah/PA leadership, this keeping Mahmoud Abbas and the rest of his team squeaky clean.

This dangerously destructive policy, that encourages Palestinian noncompliance, has a profound impact on the efficacy of third party supervision.

Simply put, since we already know that the United States has a "automatic pass" policy when it comes to official Palestinian compliance, it would be reckless and irresponsible to agree to an arrangement that hinged on the compliance assessment of the United States rather than leaving this ultimately up to the sovereign State of Israel itself.

So here is the line in Secretary of State Clinton's address to AIPAC, in which she bent over backwards to avoid criticizing the PA for an incident that the PA postponed during VP Biden's recent visit to avoid a PR fiasco. That's PA-Fatah postponed - not Hamas. But Mrs. Clinton's heavy blinders shield her from this truth:

"When a Hamas-controlled municipality glorifies violence and renames a square after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis, it insults the families on both sides who have lost loves ones over the years in this conflict."

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton
AIPAC Conference March 22, 2010
www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2010/03/138722.htm
==================================================

And here is how Prime Minister Netanyahu responded:

"Regrettably, the Palestinian Authority has also continued incitement against Israel.

A few days ago, a public square near Ramallah was named after a terrorist who murdered 37 Israeli civilians, including 13 children. The Palestinian Authority did nothing to prevent it."

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu
AIPAC Conference March 22, 2010
www.pmo.gov.il/PMOEng/Communication/PMSpeaks/speechaipac220310.htm
==============================================================

If anything, Mr. Netanyahu was generous in understating the involvement of Fatah-PA. Its not that they did nothing to prevent it, they promoted it and were intimately involved in it.

So now we come to an interesting challenge for friends of Israel - and organizations that are friends of Israel.

Do they accept Mrs. Clinton's heavy blinders wording - and in turn the "see no evil hear no evil speak no evil" approach towards the PA.

Or do they reject such obfuscation and call for Washington to put an end to its "automatic pass" approach with the PA.

Love of the Land: PM Netanyahu corrects Secretary of State Clinton at AIPAC

Love of the Land: [Includes barefaced lie covering up PA] Secretary of State Clinton's Remarks at the 2010 AIPAC Policy Conference

[Includes barefaced lie covering up PA] Secretary of State Clinton's Remarks at the 2010 AIPAC Policy Conference

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
23 March '10

[Dr. Aaron Lerner - IMRA:

"When a Hamas-controlled municipality glorifies violence and renames a square after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis, it insults the families on both sides who have lost loves ones over the years in this conflict."

Pop quiz.

What square was recently renamed after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis?

Answer: A square in Ramallah was named after the terrorist Dalal Mughrabi.

And who controls the Ramallah municipality?

Answer: Fatah.

Bonus question: Why does Clinton attribute the incident to Hamas?

Answer:: How do you spell cognitive dissonance?]

==============================

(Applause.)

Hillary Rodham Clinton
Secretary of State
Washington Convention Center

Washington, DC

March 22, 2010
www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2010/03/138722.htm

Thank you. Thank you for that welcome. And it is wonderful to be back at AIPAC with so many good friends. I saw a number of them backstage before coming out, and I can assure you that I received a lot of advice.(Laughter.) I know I always do when I see my friends from AIPAC. And I want to thank Lee Rosenberg for that introduction. And congratulations, Rosy; you're going to be a terrific president. (Applause.

(Read full speech)

Love of the Land: [Includes barefaced lie covering up PA] Secretary of State Clinton's Remarks at the 2010 AIPAC Policy Conference