Rick's Café American

Monday, 16 February 2009

GAZA ARMS SMUGGLING

Dichter: Israel must take military action against Gaza arms smuggling

By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: Gaza arms smuggling

Public Security Minister Avi Dichter urged the government to operate against the smuggling of weapons into the Gaza Strip using the same military techniques employed against rocket fire itself.

"Egyptian action is too slow and the government must set an appropriate policy for the Israel Defense Forces," he told ministers at the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem.

According to Dichter, arms smuggling remains "Achilles Heel" of the situation in the coastal territory.
"We must not wait until rockets are fired on Yavneh," he said, referring to a central Israel town struck by rockets during the war with Gaza last month.

Shin Bet Chief Yuval Diskin said Sunday that there have been several instances of arms smuggling from Egypt into Gaza since the end of the war, amid Hamas' efforts to rehabilitate the smuggling tunnels bombed by Israel.

"The Egyptians are acting [against smuggling] pretty slowly," Diskin said. "But there seems to be a positive change."

Militant groups smuggle arms and ammunitions into Gaza through tunnels dug along the border with Egypt and on boats along the coast. Egypt, which has kept its Rafah border crossing with the coastal territory largely closed, has agreed to help stop the tunnel smuggling with international technical assistance.

While Egyptian forces frequently report finding and destroying tunnels on the border with Gaza, the tunnels are usually found empty. Arrests of Palestinians accused of smuggling or caught in the tunnels are rare.

MIEP GIES MARKS HER 100th BIRTHDAY

Woman who hid Anne Frank from the Nazis marks her 100th birthday

By The Associated Press

Tags: israel news, anne frank

Anne Frank called them the "Helpers". They provided food, books and good cheer while she and her family hid for two years from the Nazis in a tiny attic apartment.

On Sunday, the last surviving helper, Miep Gies, celebrates her 100th birthday, saying she has won more accolades for helping the Frank family than she deserved - as if, she says, she tried to save all the Jews of occupied Holland.

"This is very unfair. So many others have done the same or even far more dangerous work," she wrote in an e-mail to The Associated Press this week.
It was Gies who gathered up Anne's scattered papers and notebooks after the hiding place was raided in 1944. She locked them ? unread ? in a desk drawer to await the teenager's return.

Anne died of typhus in the German concentration camp of Bergen-Belsen seven months after her arrest. British and Canadian troops liberated the camp two weeks later.

Gies gave the collection to Anne's father Otto, the only survivor among the eight people who hid in the concealed attic of the canal-side warehouse. He published it in 1947, and it was released in English in 1952 as "The Diary of a Young Girl." Retitled "The Diary of Anne Frank," it was the first book about the Holocaust to win popular appeal, and has sold tens of millions of copies in dozens of languages.

As she looked forward to a quiet birthday with her son and three grandchildren, Gies paid tribute to the "unnamed heroes" who helped Dutch Jews escape the net during the five years of Nazi occupation.

"I would like to name one, my husband Jan. He was a resistance man who said nothing but did a lot. During the war he refused to say anything about his work, only that he might not come back one night. People like him existed in thousands but were never heard," she said.

Jan Gies, who was not one of the four office workers who supplied the Frank family with their daily needs, died in 1993.

Such people fought a lonely battle in the Netherlands. Historians say collaborators were many and anti-Nazi resistance was light. Of the prewar Jewish population of 140,000, some 107,000 were arrested and deported. The Red Cross says only 5,200 of them survived the war.

Like the Franks, about 24,000 Dutch Jews went into hiding, of which 8,000 were hunted down or betrayed in exchange for a bounty.

After the war, Gies worked for Otto Frank as he compiled and edited the diary, then devoted herself to talking about the diary and answering letters from around the world. After Frank's death in 1980, Gies continued to campaign against Holocaust-deniers and to refute allegations that the diary was a forgery.

Though she ended her travels years ago and no longer gives interviews, her son Paul Gies says his mother "still receives a sizable amount of mail which she masters together with a longtime family friend."

Miep Gies suffered a stroke in 1997 which has slightly affected her speech, but she is generally in good health, her son said in an e-mail. She spends her days at the apartment where she has lived since 2000 reading two newspapers and following television news and talk shows.

A new edition of her 1987 book "Anne Frank Remembered" is due to be published this year.

Gies was born in Austria, and came to the Netherlands at age 13 to escape food shortages and live with a foster family. In 1933 she was hired as an office assistant in Otto Frank's spice business. Frank asked her in July 1942 to help hide his family in the annex above the company's warehouse and to bring them food and supplies.

The family, joined by four other Jews, hid for 25 months before they were betrayed. Repeated investigations by police and historians failed to definitively identify who turned them in.

NOT ENOUGH !!!

ADL chief: Pope Bendedict's condemnation of Holocaust denial not enough

By Shlomo Shamir, Haaretz Correspondent

Tags: Jewish World, Abe Foxman

Abe Foxman, the head of the Anti-Defamation League, sought to temper the enthusiastic responses expressed by Jewish leaders following their meeting on Thursday with Pope Benedict XVI over the reinstatement of a bishop who denies the Holocaust.

"The problematic and controversial chapter of the church and the matter of Holocaust denial do not end with the pope's declaration condemning Holocaust denial," Foxman told Haaretz.

Foxman, who was present at the meeting in the Vatican, refused to echo the compliments which other Jewish leaders feted the pope over his forceful denunciations of Holocaust denial.

"A meeting between Jews and the pope is always an important, historic event," Foxman said. Yet, "as long as the church allows an anti-Semitic bishop who denies the Holocaust to continue in his post under the aegis of the church, this means that the church is saying one thing yet doing another.

" Foxman, himself a Holocaust survivor, seeks to emphasize that he appreciates the pope's condemnation and his moving statements on his planned visit to Israel. Yet, in his words, "you cannot say that you are against anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial when you allow an anti-Semitic bishop and Holocaust denier to continue serving in the clergy."

"The church gave the bishop enough time to recant," Foxman said. "But he asked for forgiveness only from the pope and he said he is waiting for proof that indeed six million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust and the Nazis used gas chambers."

"Holocaust denial is a crime by law in key countries," Foxman said. "Only after the church recants from the rehabilitation and restores his prior standing as excommunicated can we say that the matter of the church and Holocaust denial has been solved."

The ADL is the largest Jewish organization active in the United States.

Israeli Exoskeleton Suit Enables Paralayzed People To Walk

HUGO CHAVEZ AND ANTI-SEMITISM

Hugo Chavez And Anti-Semitism

Michael Rowan and Douglas E. Schoen,

To win votes, he's using Jews as a scapegoat.

Venezuela's Hugo Chávez has launched attacks against Jews in a campaign to win support for a Feb. 15 referendum that, if passed, would allow him to run for president for life.

On Jan. 22, vandals broke into Tiferet Israel, a Sephardic synagogue only a mile from Chávez's presidential palace in Caracas, trashing Torah scrolls and spray-painting the walls with threats of death for Jews and Israel.

While he lamented the synagogue attack in a one-line statement, for weeks beforehand Chavez had vociferously rallied his supporters to protest Israel's war in Gaza, which he called a "genocidal holocaust against the Palestinian people."

He also expelled Israel's ambassador and demanded the presidents of Israel and the U.S. be prosecuted for mass murder. Immediately afterward, a pro-Chávez Web site called for boycotting Venezuela's small Jewish community, expelling Jews from the country and launching protests against the Israeli embassy and Jewish synagogues.

That's just what happened. A week before the vandalism at Tiferet Israel, vandals covered the outside walls of the synagogue with insulting phrases while anti-Semitic demonstrators gathered at the Israeli embassy--and Chavez's police stood by silently. The synagogue's security cameras captured images of the violators, but Chávez's police confiscated the tapes for an investigation that produced no arrests. In the later break-in, those same security cameras were taken by the offenders, so police currently have no tapes available for review.

In any case, in Caracas, Chávez controls the police force, which he nationalized rather than let opposition Mayor Antonio Ledezma lead them. In fact, soon after that election, Chávez thugs took over Ledezma's mayoral office, saying it was "liberated for the revolution." Since then, the office-less mayor has been powerless to address the anti-Semitic attacks or anything else, while his mum police report only to Chávez.

This is not the first time Chávez has used Jews as a scapegoat. Several times in recent years his military police have invaded Jewish schools and community centers searching for weapons, assassination plots and regime change conspiracies; naturally, they found nothing. Nevertheless, Jews have been traumatized or silenced by this scaremongering, and thousands of them have left Venezuela.

Jewish fear of Chávez mushroomed in 2007, when he entered into $20 billion worth of joint ventures with Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, including a shared bank and an airline with opaque operations that is frequented by Hezbollah terrorists. Plus, the U.S. government has designated a Chávez diplomat in Lebanon and a travel agent in Caracas as Hezbollah operators.

Indeed, Chávez and Iran speak with one voice about Jews. Chávez is a vehement supporter of Iran's nuclear ambitions and is a frequent visitor to Iran and Syria. He tends to link Israel, the U.S. and Jews in a conspiracy to rule the world through war and capitalism.

In an infamous Christmas Eve speech several years ago, Chávez said the Jews killed Christ and have been gobbling up wealth and causing poverty and injustice worldwide ever since. Chávez has declared war against the U.S.' "evil empire" and sees Israel in the same way Ahmadinejad, his partner, does.

Voters are strongly against Chávez's election-for-life referendum, and Venezuela suffers from the worst inflation and corruption rates in the hemisphere--as well as the highest murder rate in the world. But Chávez might still rig the election so it appears he won it; he has total control over who votes and how they vote through centrally controlled electronic voting machines.

There's evidence that he switched the yes and no votes on a recall referendum in 2004, that he changed a 5% victory to a landslide 28% so he could claim a mandate for his revolution in 2006, and that he planned to rig a 13% margin rejecting his president-for-life referendum but then settled for a 1% loss when General Raul Baduel and hundreds of thousands of students demanded a fair count in 2007.

The anti-Semitic campaign could provide cover for Chávez's electoral legerdemain. Always in search of an enemy to blame for his failure at dealing with poverty and corruption, Chávez has steadily vanquished opposition political parties, while Chávez's "devil"--former president George W. Bush--has exited the scene.

In a shameless display of cynicism, Chávez wants to scare his dwindling supporters into believing that the Jews are going to destroy the revolution, assassinate him and take away whatever goodies he may hand out. Chávez figures enough voters might just fall for it, making him look like an underdog who has challenged those with money and power. Meanwhile, his strategic allies in Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas stay satisfied.

Chávez needs an enemy to blame for missing eggs and meat at the market, soaring prices, rampant unemployment and crime--and who better than the Jews?

Michael Rowan and Douglas E. Schoen are political consultants and writers who have lived or worked in Venezuela since 1993. They are the co-authors of The Threat Closer to Home,published in January by the Free Press.

taken from : Forbes.com (http://www.forbes.com/2009/02/13/chavez-jews-referendum-opinions-contributors_0215_rowan_schoen.html)

BBC FIGHTS TO HIDE REPORT ON ANTI-ISRAEL BIAS

BBC Fights to Hide Report on Anti-Israel Bias

by Maayana Miskin

(IsraelNN.com) The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is fighting a court order that would force it to reveal an internal report on anti-Israel bias. The media giant has reportedly spent 200,000 British pounds (roughly $280,000) on the case.

The legal battle was started by attorney Steven Sugar of London, who contends that the report on bias in its coverage must be made public under the Freedom of Information Act. The 20,000-word report is rumored to have concluded that the BBC's coverage was biased against Israel, a conclusion that Sugar says is of public interest.

The BBC argues that the document is protected under a clause exempting information held for journalistic purposes from the Freedom of Information Act.

The case has been through Britain's Information Tribunal, High Court and Appeals Court, and will now return to the High Court. The most recent round, in the Appeals Court, ended in Sugar's favor.

The BBC has faced numerous charges of anti-Israel bias, including an official complaint from Israel in 2004 after correspondent Orla Guerin dismissed terrorists' use of a teenage would-be suicide bomber as “a picture that Israel wants the world to see.” In the complaint, Minister Natan Sharansky accused Guerin of anti-Semitism and “total identification with the goals and methods of Palestinian terrorist groups.”

In the previous year, Israel had temporarily boycotted the BBC over allegations made in a documentary on Israel's weapons arsenal.

"This is not an organization that is there to get the truth. It's there to level every real or imagined accusation against Israel,” Israeli press office director Danny Seaman said at the time.
The BBC recently aroused fury among pro-Gaza activists by announcing that it would not air an appeal for money for repairs following Israeli counterterrorism operations in the area because the appeal could undermine the station's objectivity. The decision was seen by some as a reaction to charges of anti-Israel bias during coverage of the Gaza fighting.

taken from : Israel National News (http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/129932)

MODERN SEGREGATION HAS AN ISLAMIST FACE

Modern Segregation Has an Islamist Face

by David J. Rusin

In the twentieth century, minority groups such as African-Americans struggled and sacrificed to achieve integration with the societies that had excluded them. In the twenty-first century, some Muslims hope to run history in reverse, demanding separation from their Western neighbors. Three news items highlight different stages and aspects of this phenomenon.

First, it has been revealed that a primary school in Sheffield, England, holds weekly Muslim-only assemblies. The arrangement became known due to the head mistress being forced out after she insisted on mixed gatherings instead:

A teacher, who asked not to be named, said: "The head inherited the separate assemblies and she took careful advice on what to do.

"But when she tried to stop them, she was accused of being a racist. She wanted to hold assemblies for all the pupils. That is what happens in most schools but some parents wanted things to stay as they were."

Accommodating separatism only serves to encourage the adherents of Islam described in the second article. Based on a new poll, many UK Muslims "want to create their own communities and remain segregated from British society," with 44% believing that "they should be free to develop along separate lines." The numbers are similar to those of previous surveys indicating that four in ten British Muslims would prefer to be governed by Shari'a law.

Responding to the revelation, English Democrats' chairman Robin Tilbrook said, "If people don't want to integrate, they shouldn't be here. It's not at all right to have what's really a sort of ghetto situation developing — it's going to lead to trouble."

The third story illustrates the "trouble" stemming from one such "ghetto situation." Specifically, a study has found that "radical Islamists have a stranglehold" on a section of Malmö, Sweden:
"Families who have just moved into the neighborhood and who have never been particularly religious or traditional claim that they led freer lives in their home country than in Rosengaard," the report said.

Muslim women who did not wear the veil in their home country were, for example, obliged to don it, according to the study.

The authors also singled out "cellar mosques" whose members serve as a kind of "thought police."

Abraham Lincoln warned that "a house divided against itself cannot stand." A century and a half later, the West must relearn this lesson — or risk similarly catastrophic results.

taken from : Islamist Watch Blog (http://www.islamist-watch.org/blog/2009/02/modern-segregation-has-an-islamist-face.html)

images from LatterDay's blog (http://latterdays.stumbleupon.com/)

Israel Matzav: Olmert's latest farce#links#links#links

Elder of Ziyon: The UNRWA school story was a lie

Sunday, 15 February 2009

Esser Agaroth: Typical Left-Wing Rant And Rave

Esser Agaroth: Spiderman Sighting

Israel Matzav: Maybe he prefers Neville Chamberlain?

Israel Matzav: US to stop funding UNRWA?

Israel Matzav: 'Messiah's times': Hamas and Fatah to kiss and make up

Israel Matzav: Video: IAF back in action against Hamas weapons facilities

Israel Matzav: Chemical poisons mailed to Israeli embassy in Oslo

Israel Matzav: The 'resident skeptic'

Israel Matzav: The myth of Camp David

TOO MANY BUILDINGS DESTROYED

Too Many Buildings Destroyed

The IDF continues to investigate its behavior in the Gaza Operation. While the number of dead Palestinian non-combatants seems considerably lower than the unanimous reports in the media, it appears the destruction of property was greater than planned:

A military source involved in the investigation told Haaretz, "It's clear to us that in a small portion of the combat sectors immeasurable damage was caused, and that is very difficult to justify from a legal perspective, particularly if such justifications are called for in legal proceedings with international organizations."

Call me hard-hearted callous evil and mean, but I'm not overly perturbed by this. Lost human lives are lost forever; buildings can be rebuilt. That's what Iranian funds are for, not to mention the PA being one of the top recipients of international aid worldwide. After Israel left Gaza in 2005 the Palestinians held democratic elections and a majority chose Hamas, a stridently antisemitic party that proudly calls for the anihilation of Israel; its men then shot thousands of rockets and mortars at Israeli civilians from among the populace. The citizens of Gaza never voiced any noticeable objections.

taken from : Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations (http://yaacovlozowick.blogspot.com/)

Roadside Rambles: Professor GagMe I. Stink; A Rant

Putting G-d back into our vocabulary

Putting G-d back into our vocabulary

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AMNESTY ACCUSES HAMAS GUNMEN OF KILLINGS AND TORTURE

Amnesty accuses Hamas gunmen of killings and torture

LONDON (Reuters) - Amnesty International said on Tuesday Hamas fighters in the Gaza Strip had carried out killings, torture and abductions of people accused of helping Israel, during and after the recent Israeli offensive. At least two dozen men have been shot dead by Hamas gunmen and scores of others have been shot in the legs, knee-capped or injured in other ways intended to cause permanent disability, the human rights group said.

Others have been severely beaten, tortured or ill-treated, it said in a report.

Most were abducted from their homes and later dumped, dead or injured, in isolated areas, or found in the morgue of one of Gaza's hospitals. Some were shot dead in hospitals where they were receiving treatment for injuries, Amnesty said.

The abuses have taken place since the end of December 2008, during and after the 22-day Israeli military offensive which killed some 1,300 Palestinians, the rights group said.

Amnesty International called on Hamas, the Islamist group which runs the Gaza Strip, to end the alleged campaign immediately and to agree to the establishment of an independent national commission of experts to investigate them.

"It's not clear whether this was something that was ordered or the top leadership effectively losing control of the guys with the guns," said Donatella Rovera, an Amnesty researcher who wrote the report.

Asked for comment on the report, Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said that, during the war, Israel deployed many informants to work against Hamas fighters and provided information that led to the killing of armed activists.

Hinting that some of those suspected of helping Israel were killed, he said: "There were also family feuds and people settling scores. Therefore, it is unjust to hold Hamas accountable for what happened."

"The government of national unity (Hamas) had the duty to implement the law and the resistance factions had the right to protect themselves," he said.

ESCAPED PRISONERS

The targets of the campaign by Hamas forces and militias include former detainees, accused of helping Israeli security forces, who escaped from Gaza's Central Prison when it was bombed by Israel on December 28, Amnesty said.

Others were former members of the Palestinian Authority security forces and other activists of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah party, a rival to Hamas, it said.

Hamas, which won a Palestinian parliamentary election in 2006, routed Fatah forces in Gaza to take over the territory a year later.

An Amnesty International fact-finding team which visited Gaza during and after the Israeli offensive recorded testimonies from a number of victims, as well as medical sources and eyewitnesses who corroborated their stories.

Scores of others were too afraid to speak publicly for fear of retribution by Hamas forces or militias, the group said.

Among cases investigated by Amnesty, it said three brothers from the Abu 'Ashbiyeh family, from Jabalia in northern Gaza, were killed within 24 hours of escaping from Gaza's Central Prison in December.

Another former detainee at the prison, Jamal al-Ghandour, aged in his mid-50s, was shot dead in his bed in al-Shifa hospital on December 28 by unmasked gunmen wearing plain clothes in front of relatives and other witnesses, it said.

Amnesty sought a meeting with Hamas to discuss the allegations but it was cancelled at the last minute, a spokeswoman for the group said. It would try to follow up on the report with Hamas, she said.

Israel Matzav: Obama to drop dropped sanctions against Iran!#links#links

Israel Matzav: Obama <strike>to drop</strike> <i>dropped</i> sanctions against Iran!#links#links

Israel Matzav: Funny how the world media missed that, isn't it?#links#links#links

Israel Matzav: 'Good' and 'bad' anti-Semites#links#links#links

Israel Matzav: Cyprus unloads weapons from Gaza-bound ship#links#links#links

Israel Matzav: Hamas converted medicine bottles into grenades#links#links

Saturday, 14 February 2009

Maj. Gen. Avi Mizrahi Is Right

IRAN AND THE BOMB

Iran and the Bomb

Remember the tremendous international glee late in 2007, when a muddled NIE report sort of said the Iranians had halted their nuclear program or perhaps not but then again who knows? At the time I took the highly unusual step of reading the document, and was surprised (or actually, not) to find that about 98% of the reportage was wrong.

Well, it now appears that the report was wrong. Or rather, since it didn't actually say anything, and thus couldn't be wrong, it was misleading.

Is the media world reporting on this change of mind (which is coming, I remind you, from the Obama administration, not the Likud)? Well, to be honest, now that you ask, umm, you know, I mean, hmmn... no, not really. I saw mention of it at the Jerusalem Post but decided they weren't a good enough source for what the American administration thinks. Soccerdad has pointed me to the LA Times, not one of my regular haunts, but since it's an important American paper I'm linking to them. As for the question, where is everyone else? I have no idea.

taken from : Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations (http://yaacovlozowick.blogspot.com/)

WHO WAS KILLED IN GAZA ?

Who Was Killed in Gaza?

Haaretz cites an IDF report listing 1,134 Palestinian fatalities in the recent Gaza operation, 673 of whom were from Hamas or other fighting formations, 288 were non-combatants, and the rest have not yet been identified. Apparently the IDF is making lists by name, so as to know in each case who the dead person was.

My understanding is that the investigation is not yet complete.

taken from : Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations (http://yaacovlozowick.blogspot.com/)

The Dream of a Nation

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THE U.S. POLICY OF PLACATING TERRORISTS

The U.S. Policy of Placating Terrorists

Why U.S. Policy Leans Too Close to Terrorist Appeasement

"A well-organized plan to infiltrate and influence U.S. policymakers at the highest levels has been operating on American soil for well over a decade." And the Muslim Brotherhood is involved -- who else?

Clare M. Lopez of the Intelligence Summit explains in Human Events: "Why U.S. Policy Leans Too Close to Terrorist Appeasement,"

Under the Bush administration we had no Iran policy. Now, our policy leans too close to appeasement. How did it get this way?

America’s foreign policy toward Iran did not reach this level of malleability overnight or by accident. A well-organized plan to infiltrate and influence U.S. policymakers at the highest levels has been operating on American soil for well over a decade. Conceived in Tehran under the direct authority of the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the plan set out to create a network of top U.S. academics, diplomats, journalists, NGOs, and think tanks that would advocate a policy of appeasement towards Iran. Iran’s top strategic objective has always been to buy time for its nuclear weapons program, which now is well along in developing the three critical components: enriched uranium, warhead weaponization, and a credible missile delivery system.

Beginning in the late 1990s, a de facto alliance between Muslim Brotherhood fronts in the U.S. (such as CAIR -- the Council on Islamic American Relations) and frank Tehran regime advocates like the American-Iranian Council (AIC) openly began to promote public support for a U.S. foreign policy based on the favored positions of the Islamic Republic. In 2002, a new pro-Iran group was formed by a young Swedish-Iranian immigrant named Trita Parsi. That group, the National Iranian-American Council (NIAC) quickly established itself as the nexus of a growing network of individuals and organizations that openly lobby for a U.S. policy of acquiescence, diplomacy, incentives, and negotiations with the Tehran regime -- while strongly opposing coercive diplomacy, sanctions, or threat of military action. Part and parcel of this advocacy on behalf of Tehran is a pattern of antipathy towards Israel that minimizes its security concerns and dismisses its legitimate defense needs.

Under Parsi, who is closely connected to the Tehran regime, the NIAC network has expanded to include a growing number of new groups. Some of them -- such as The Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran (CASMII) -- are NIAC clones. CASMII was founded in December 2005 to oppose all forms of pressure on Iran. Others, such as the Center for a New American Security (CNAS, founded in February 2007) play the role of useful idiots. CNAS had Dr. Susan Rice, the Obama administration’s appointee as Ambassador to the UN, on its Board of Directors.

Dr. Vali Nasr, who has been named senior advisor to U.S. Afghanistan/Pakistan envoy Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, was one of the authors of a September 2008 CNAS publication called Iran: Assessing U.S. Strategic Options. Nasr’s chapter, "The Implications of Military Confrontation with Iran," urged the U.S. to take the military option for dealing with Iran off the table and instead focus on how best to accommodate Tehran’s rising power in the Middle East region. The Campaign for a New American Policy on Iran (CNAPI) launched its pro-Iran activities with a cross-country event called The Folly of Attacking Iran Tour, which crisscrossed the U.S. in February and March 2008.

The American Foreign Policy Project (AFPP) was founded in December 2008 with an “experts list” that reads like a remix of other CAIR and NIAC affiliates, including former Ambassadors Thomas Pickering, James Dobbins, and William Miller plus well-known academic figures such as Professors Gary G. Sick of Columbia University and Juan R. Cole of the University of Michigan. These groups’ interlocking Boards of Advisors, Directors, and Experts include many other nationally-known figures from public policy and international business arenas, including some big oil companies.

All are associated in one way or another with Trita Parsi and NIAC and all advocate a policy of accommodation with Iran.

The Iranian regime makes no attempt to disguise its links to this network. NIAC, for instance, was openly mentioned in the 7 December 2007 issue of the government-controlled Aftab News, where the NIAC network was called the regime’s “Iran lobby in the U.S.” In March 2007, the Fars News daily described NIAC as ‘a non-profit’ organization with headquarters in Washington, D.C. that was established to counter the influence of AIPAC [the American-Israeli Political Action Committee, a legal lobby group] and to enlist the support of Iranian expatriates living in the U.S. in order to ‘penetrate U.S. politics.’

Maneuvering behind Washington, D.C. policymaking scenes to exert influence on U.S. decision makers is pretty standard for a host of legitimate interest groups, including many foreign countries. Concern is indicated, however, when the guiding influence behind such maneuvering emanates from the top levels of a regime like Iran’s that holds top spot on the Department of State’s state sponsors of terror list, makes no secret of its hatred and enmity for the U.S. and our ally Israel, and acts in myriad ways to support those who have assassinated, held, kidnapped, killed, and tortured American civilians and military over a 30-year period. The expanding influence of this pro-Iran lobby on U.S. foreign policy attests to a determined and sophisticated operation that serves only the interests of regime implacably hostile to America’s own national security interests.

taken from : B'NAI ELIM (http://bnaielim.blogspot.com/)

Parshat Yitro: Sanctification and Blessing

Parshat Yitro: Sanctification and Blessing

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Friday, 13 February 2009

Israel Matzav: Oh joy! Time Magazine says Fatah weighing new intifadeh#links#links

Israel Matzav: Pope meets with Jewish leaders at the Vatican#links#links#links

Israel Matzav: But is it too late?#links#links

Israel Matzav: Israeli television depicts Avigdor Lieberman as Darth Vader on election night#links#links#links

Israel Matzav: Hamas web site shows kidnap of IDF soldier#links#links#links

Israel Matzav: Just like us?#links#links#links

SAUDIS INFLUENCED MUMBAI MASSACRE

SAUDIS INFLUENCED MUMBAI MASSACRE

12 February 2009

The Saudi Connection to the Mumbai Massacres:

Strategic Implications for Israel
Col. (res.) Jonathan Fighel

The Mumbai attacks have been linked to Lashkar-e-Taiba and radical Islamic groups in Kashmir generally. Yet it would be a mistake to see Lashkar only as a local organization with only a local agenda.

Saudi Arabia has contributed very much to what Lashkar-e-Taiba looks like, how it thinks, its motivation, ideology, and funding. Saudi Arabia presents itself as the protector and the spearhead of the defense of Muslims around the world against what they define as the Western cultural attack.

The Saudis are very committed to recruiting, funding, and funneling ideology to embattled Muslim minorities, and use Muslim charities as their tool to implement this policy. The Saudi methodology is to take advantage of a humanitarian crisis to get a foot in the door. Who could be against assisting widows and orphans and setting up schools and clinics? Some of the money is indeed funneled to support terrorism - families of suicide bombers.

The notion of global Islam has also penetrated to Gaza and exists under the umbrella of Hamas, which is enabling a revival of global jihadi organizations there such as Jaish al-Islam and others. This phenomenon is radicalizing the already radicalized society in Gaza.

Hamas could agree to a hudna (calm) for fifty years, but there will be no recognition of Israel or a cessation of the struggle against it. If Hamas was ready to act pragmatically, it would no longer be Hamas. And then the frustrated factions within Hamas would break off and join up with the radical global jihadi organizations in Gaza.

The similarity of the November 2008 attack in Mumbai to the attack on the Savoy Hotel in Tel Aviv in 1975 was striking. At that time, a Palestinian organization based outside the borders of Israel, in a safe haven in Lebanon, had undergone months of specialized training. With a high level of prior intelligence, several very dedicated assault groups attacked a high-value target.

The Mumbai attacks were not a conventional suicide attack. Since 1998, al-Qaeda's hallmark has been suicide attacks, based upon the whole rationale of jihad, sacrifice and martyrdom. But the attacks in Mumbai did not resemble 7/7 in London or the attacks in Madrid or any other al-Qaeda-style attacks.

What Is Lashkar-e-Taiba?

The Mumbai attacks have been linked to Lashkar-e-Taiba and radical Islamic groups in Kashmir generally. Yet it would be a mistake to see Lashkar only as a local organization with only a local agenda.

The creation and flourishing of Lashkar-e-Taiba would not have been possible unless they were supported by three major elements. The first is the ideology of global jihad. The second is funding and support from external sources. And the third is a territorial base which enables them to conduct activities and maintain training camps.

What is Lashkar-e-Taiba and why is it relevant to the Middle East? Lashkar collects funds from Pakistanis and Kashmiris, as well as the Pakistani community in the Persian Gulf, in the United Kingdom, and elsewhere. Its website appears under the name of Jamaat ud Dawa and the group maintains ties to religious and militant groups around the world. The Jamaat ud Dawa website links directly to the Hamas website.

The Saudi Connection

Since the beginning of the 1990s, Saudi Arabia has contributed very much to what Lashkar-e-Taiba looks like, how it thinks, its motivation, ideology, and funding. Saudi newspapers at the time published calls for jihad to support all Muslim struggles around the world. Kashmir was seen as a place where jihad was taking place, so donations were solicited for the Muslims living there. Allah was said to bless the warriors of this financial jihad.

In August 1999, the Saudi newspaper Al Jazeera reported on a press conference conducted by the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY), a Saudi-based charity supervised by the government. The group's secretary-general, Maneh al-Johani, praised the role played by Saudi Arabia in providing assistance to Muslims around the world, especially in Kashmir. Johani equated the Kashmir issue with the situation in Kosovo and Palestine, and called on Muslims to help the Kashmiri people.

Radical Wahhabi, Salafi, Saudi Islam sees the world in confrontation, with zones of jihad where Muslim minorities are struggling politically and religiously against other forces. The struggle can be with Israel, Serbia, India, or the Philippines. Saudi Arabia presents itself as the protector and the spearhead of the defense of Muslims around the world against what the former Supreme Religious Authority of Saudi Arabia, the late Sheikh Abdul Aziz Ibn Baz (Ben Baz), defined as the Western cultural attack.

This is the ideology behind Saudi politics. The Saudis are very committed to recruiting, funding, and funneling ideology to those Muslim minorities, and use Muslim charities as their tool to implement this policy. In September 2000, the Saudi newspaper Al Jazeera reported on an additional press conference by WAMY Secretary-General Johani, who discussed Saudi Arabia's role in providing aid to Kashmir and asked the Islamic countries to play an effective part in saving Kashmir's Muslims. Johani described the Kashmiri people's jihad and noted that they had suffered thousands of casualties. "The Kashmiri people want to protect their Islamic entity and we must help them," he concluded. Since the end of the war in Afghanistan in 1989, the Saudi contribution to entrenching the phenomenon of global jihad around the world has mushroomed, whether in Chechnya, the Philippines, Kosovo, or the Palestinian territories. Yet for all this, Saudi Arabia is not held accountable.

The Saudi methodology is to take advantage of a humanitarian crisis to get a foot in the door. Who could be against assisting widows and orphans and setting up schools and clinics? It is a methodology that has been duplicated all around the world. Since direct assistance to armed groups is problematic for Saudi Arabia, they use "charities," which are actually organizations that use the social network called the dawa to propagate their ideology through mosques, health clinics, and madrassas, to influence minds and recruit supporters to Wahhabi-style ideology and commitment. Some of the money is indeed funneled to support terrorism - families of suicide bombers.

It is now evident that the so-called Saudi non-governmental charities are closely monitored by the Saudi government. The Saudis have understood that they were under pressure from the West and so they were very willing to sacrifice the Al-Haramain charity. It was banned and dismantled, but other charities were not, like the Islamic Relief Organization (IRO). The Saudi charities just change names and, unfortunately, nothing concrete is being done. There is no all-out campaign to dismantle all those charities.

Training Camps in Pakistan

Lashkar-e-Taiba has created an infrastructure inside Pakistan which is relevant to struggles beyond the boundaries of Kashmir or India. It has created an operational capability in its training camps through the use of highly skilled instructors, veterans of the Afghan war. Some well-known terrorists have passed through those training camps before launching their attacks. The shoe bomber, Richard Reid, was trained in a Lashkar training camp, as was Dhiren Barot, a British subject and a Hindu who converted to Islam, who was the mastermind of a failed gas cylinder bombing plot in London and who also prepared detailed blueprints for al-Qaeda of the buildings in New York's financial district.

Lashkar-e-Taiba is headed by Muhammad Saeed, who plays a key role in the group's operational activities, terrorist training camps, ideology, and in its worldwide activities. Saeed was reportedly arrested in Pakistan in February 2009. Saeed determines where the graduates of the Lashkar camps in Pakistan are sent to fight and in 2005 he personally organized the infiltration of Lashkar militants into Iraq. He was in Saudi Arabia at the time, with the knowledge of the Saudi government (you cannot enter Saudi Arabia without permission). He also arranged for Lashkar operatives to be sent to Europe as fundraising coordinators. So Saudi Arabia again was a launching pad for sending highly-trained mujahidin to the war against the Americans in Iraq. This shows the global nature of Lashkar-e-Taiba. It is not just a provincial organization but one that has a global reach.

Haji Mohammad Ashraf has been Lashkar's chief financier since 2003, expanding the organization and increasing its fundraising activities. Mahmoud Mohammed Ahmad Ba'aziq, a Saudi national, served as the Lashkar leader in Saudi Arabia during the 1980s and 1990s, before Ashraf, and coordinated fundraising activity with non-governmental charities and businessmen in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi regime is aware of the money going to Lashkar in Saudi Arabia for its activities around the world.

Lashkar operations chief Zakir Rehman Lakvi was also reportedly arrested in a Pakistani raid on a Lashkar training camp. He was one of the masterminds of the Mumbai attack and was in constant cellular phone contact with the attackers. Lakvi has been very much involved in military operations in Chechnya, Bosnia, and Iraq.

Lashkar-e-Taiba would not have evolved to the scale they have reached without Saudi assistance. One key Saudi who helped build Lashkar into such an efficient and highly-trained organization is Abdul Aziz Barbaros. Barbaros, whose real name is Abdul Ahman el-Dosfari, fought with al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. He was one of the founding members of Lashkar in Kashmir after the end of the Afghan war. He also traveled to Bosnia to assist the al-Qaeda-oriented mujahidin brigades there. During the 1980s and 1990s Barbaros served as a critical link between Lashkar, wealthy and pious Saudi financiers, and Pakistani and Muslim fanatics around the world.

Hamas leader Sheikh Yassin in Gaza routinely delivered speeches addressed to Lashkar-e-Taiba militant rallies in Kashmir and Pakistan. This is an example of the general mindset of radical Islamic solidarity. The Hamas leader in Gaza showed that he cared about what was happening with other Muslim minorities around the world, as they should care about what is happening in Gaza or the West Bank. This is not necessarily directly connected to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In Iraq, this is seen as a struggle against the American "Crusade occupation." This reflects Bin Laden's 1998 declaration of jihad, when he spoke of the Islamic front against the Crusaders and the Jews. So everything is linked and what happened in Mumbai has a wider perspective.

Global Islam Penetrates Gaza

The notion of global Islam has also penetrated to Gaza and to some extent in the West Bank. This phenomenon exists under the umbrella of Hamas, which enables a revival of global jihadi organizations in Gaza such as Jaish al-Islam and others. The emergence of these groups is worrying because they are very much inspired by the global jihadi, Saudi Wahhabi ideology - a strict interpretation of Islam which is being interpreted into political and terrorist activity. What is important in this phenomenon is the radicalization of the already radicalized society in Gaza.

The bottom line is that we are seeing the same pattern of global jihad-oriented groups starting to be active in Gaza. They have carried out some attacks, mostly directed against foreign, Western institutions like the YMCA and the American School. Yet they have played only a marginal role in attacks against Israeli targets.

Hamas in Gaza

I think the situation of Hamas control in Gaza is irreversible. From my reading of Hamas publications in Arabic, it is clear that there is no way back, only ahead, to take control in the West Bank if they become strong enough. Hamas could agree to a hudna (calm) for fifty years, but there will be no recognition of Israel or a cessation of the struggle against it.

If Hamas was ready to act pragmatically, it would no longer be Hamas. It would be something else. And then the frustrated factions within Hamas would break off and join up with the radical global jihadi organizations in Gaza. Those organizations hope to provide a refuge for Hamas radicals who believe that any normalization or pragmatism would be harmful to the Hamas cause.

This is not just my hypothesis. The declarations of Hamas leaders Zahar and Siam have hinted that if Hamas were to lose its real identity, people would shift their loyalties and activities to a more genuine Islamic organization, not a pragmatic, opportunistic, hudna-style one.

Should we talk with Hamas? Is the international community ready to sit down with al-Qaeda? There is no difference. It is a total misrepresentation to say Hamas is like the IRA. There is no political wing of Hamas disconnected from the operational wing. There are no pragmatists to speak to. At the end of the day, those who believe that trying to talk to Hamas is the right way to conduct business here in the Middle East will be in for a big disappointment.

* * *

Col. (res.) Jonathan Fighel is a senior research scholar at the International Institute for Counter Terrorism (ICT). He is also a member of the International Academic Counter Terrorism Community (ICTAC) and serves as a consultant and expert witness for the U.S. Department of Justice on Hamas trials, as well as to private U.S.-based law firms in cases of prosecuting al-Qaeda terrorism. His expertise also includes the Palestinian Authority, Islamist terror groups (Hamas, PIJ, al-Qaeda), funding, Palestinian terrorism and the Palestinian suicide terrorism phenomenon. This Jerusalem Issue Brief is based on his presentation at the Institute for Contemporary Affairs in Jerusalem on December 9, 2008.

taken from : B'NAI ELIM (http://bnaielim.blogspot.com/)

COLE CHOPS LOGIC

Cole Chops Logic

Juan Cole gives his subjective and factually questionable take on the results of our elections. As regular readers will be aware, Cole is not the best place to go for informed content, in spite of the title of his blog, but it can be a fine place to go for the gags. Today's post contains this one:

Israel is 20% Arab, which should yield 24 seats in the Knesset, but only 9 were apparently elected, down from 12. Attempts were made to disqualify some Arab parties from running, but the Supreme Court struck them down.

Let's see: If 20% of Israelis are Arabs, while the Arab parties only gleaned 7-8% of the votes, and the point of our post is to make sure everybody understand how bad Israel is, let's create the impression that most Arabs were disqualified from voting. There, that ought to work, as long as no one really stops to think about what I just said...

By the way, the reality is even further from Cole's thesis. Something like one of the eight percent of votes garnered by the Arab parties came from the far-left Jews who voted for Hadash, a sort of communist party which has one Jewish MP on its list to prove its cross-national solidarity, and indeed he attracts cross-ethnic votes. Which means that at the very most 40% of the Arabs voted for Arab parties. The proportion of abstainers was a bit higher among the Arabs, but even so it looks like a majority of the Arabs voted for regular Zionist parties; they didn't even converge on the Left-wing Meretz party, which almost disappeared for lack of votes across the board. In the past, when the Haredi Shas party used to control the Ministry of the Interior and its control of funds for the municipalities, one of their MKs was voted in by Arabs, but that wasn't the case this time. Looks like the Arabs voted for Labor, Kadima, Likud.... Lieberman?

taken from : Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations (http://yaacovlozowick.blogspot.com/)

Israel's Design Hot Spots: Nahalat Binyamin - Israeli Design Blog - Coolil.com

Israel's Design Hot Spots: Nahalat Binyamin - Israeli Design Blog - Coolil.com

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ISLAM CONTROLS THE HOUSE OF LORDS ?

Thanks to Nikon-Man for his post of this video on his blog

I agree with his words:

With Mr.Geert Wilders safely back in the Netherlands (having failed in his attempt to open British Parliamentary eyes to the danger of Radical Islam ), Lord Ahmed must be hugging himself crazy by now !!.

Not Since the rise of Nazism have such bully-boy tactics been so well employed .Had Mr.Geert Wilders come to talk about say "Israeli war crimes in Gaza " , I'm quite sure there would have been a different outcome to this story .

now the video

Thursday, 12 February 2009

"NAZIS NEEDED" - ANTI-SEMITISM UNDER AUTHORITIES INDIFFERENCE

The Age‘s elevated shot doesn’t reveal such fascinating detail. AAP merely describes people “carrying placards calling for an end to what was described as a ‘massacre’”. Meanwhile, in Paris:

Vandals hurled Molotov cocktails at a synagogue in a Paris suburb yesterday in the latest outbreak of anti-Semitic violence in France since the start of Israel’s Gaza offensive ...

Home to Europe’s biggest Muslim and Jewish populations, France has recorded more than 55 anti-Semitic incidents since Israel launched its Gaza offensive last month, drawing appeals for calm from politicians and religious leaders. Three other synagogues have been firebombed in the past two weeks and vandals have sprayed anti-Israeli graffiti on at least two other Jewish places of worship.

Jews haven’t been so vilified since Islamists attacked the US on 9/11.

UNIVERSAL TORAH: YISRO

UNIVERSAL TORAH: YISRO

By Rabbi Avraham Greenbaum

Torah Reading: YISRO Exodus 18:1-20:23Isaiah 6:1-7:6, 9:5-6 (Sephardi ritual: 6:1-13).

WE ARE ALL CONVERTS

It is fitting that the parshah which tells of the Giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai is named after Yisro (Jethro), Moses' father-in-law -- a convert. Indeed, all those who witnessed the Giving of the Torah were "converts". Thus (as noted in the commentary on Parshas SHEMOS) the Covenant at Sinai was accompanied by the three components of conversion: circumcision (Rashi on Ex.12:6), ritual immersion in the waters of the Mikveh (Ex. 19:10) and burned offerings (Ex. 24:5). For before G-d, we are all converts -- GERIM, "dwellers" in a land and on an earth that is not ours but G-d's. We are all here only by the grace of G-d, utterly dependent upon His kindness and compassion.

Thus no one can claim that the Torah belongs to him by right through ancestral or other merit. There is no room for pride, arrogance or the exploitation of the Torah for worldly advantage. The Torah is not the property of an exclusive caste. It "belongs" only to one who keeps it. The Torah was given in the Wilderness, no man's land, on the lowest of all mountains -- Sinai, the eternal symbol of humility. For only through humility can we "receive" and accept the Torah, which belongs to G-d alone. Receiving the Torah means having the humility to accept it as it is, the way it has come down to us, without trying to "modify" it according to our own ideas and wishes.

And when we are willing to accept and follow the Torah as it actually is -- fulfilling NA'ASEH VE-NISHMAH, "we will (first) DO it and (then) HEAR (and understand) it" (Ex. 24:7) -- then we can come to understand how the Torah lifts us out of our slavery to this-worldliness, with its many false gods. Then we can hear the voice of redemption that calls to us every day: "I am HASHEM your G-d who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of slaves" (Ex. 20:2).

Slavery to the idols of the mundane world is ignominious. Yet the Torah accords the greatest honor to those who have the courage to leave this servitude behind and "go out into the wilderness" in search of G-d -- like Jethro. According to tradition, Jethro had investigated every conceivable way of interpreting and living in this world, every world-view and "lifestyle". Only when Jethro came to HaShem and His Torah did he know he had found the truth. "Now I KNOW that HaShem is great above all the gods" (Ex. 18:11). The Zohar comments: "When Jethro came and said, 'Now I know that HaShem is great.' then the Supreme Name was glorified and exalted" (Zohar, Yisro 69). In other words, the revelation of G-d's light and power is greatest precisely when it comes out of darkness and concealment. Only when we have seen evil and know its power can we understand the greatness of G-d's saving hand. Only one who was a slave truly understands what it means to have been freed. This is "the superiority of the light that comes out of darkness" (Ecclesiastes 2:13).

Thus Jethro the Convert was accorded the honor of having the parshah narrating the Giving of the Torah named after him, and of contributing the hierarchical system of "captains of thousands, captains of hundreds, captains of fifties and captains of tens" through which the Children of Israel are governed. Jethro's name also contains and alludes to the name of another humble convert who was accorded the greatest honor: Ruth the Moabitess, who was the great grandmother of King David, MELECH HAMASHIACH.

* * *

TWO MILLION PROPHETS

Rambam (Maimonides) in "Foundations of the Torah", the opening section of his comprehensive Code of Law, explains the significance of the revelation at Sinai, which was witnessed by at least two million people:

"The people of Israel did not believe in Moses our Teacher because of the signs he wrought. For one who believes on account of signs always has some residual doubt in his heart that maybe the sign was brought about through magic and witchcraft. All the signs that Moses performed in the wilderness were performed to meet specific needs, not to bring proof of his prophecy.

"Then how did they come to believe in him? The answer is: At Mount Sinai, where we ourselves (not a stranger) saw with our own eyes and where we ourselves (not someone else) heard with our own ears the thunderous sounds and flashing lights and how Moses approached and entered the thick cloud. We heard The Voice speak with him as we listened: 'Moses, Moses, go and say to them.' From where do we learn that the Assembly at Mount Sinai and that alone is the final proof of the truth of Moses' prophecy -- proof that leaves no room for further doubt? As it says, 'Behold I am coming to you in the thickness of the cloud in order that the people may hear when I speak with you and also they will believe in you forever' (Ex. 19:9).

"It follows that the very ones to whom he was sent were the witnesses to the truth of his prophecy, and he had no need to perform any further sign, since he and they were both witnesses to the matter. It is like two witnesses who both saw the same thing. Each one is witness that his friend is telling the truth. Neither witness needs further proof of what his friend is saying. Similarly, all Israel were witnesses to the truth of Moses' prophecy and he had no need to perform any sign. For one who believes on account of signs still entertains doubts in his heart.
"Accordingly if a prophet arises and works great miracles and wonders and seeks to deny the prophecy of Moses our Teacher, we do not listen to him and we know clearly that those signs were brought about through magic and witchcraft. For the prophecy of Moses does not depend upon signs, such that we should compare the signs of one prophet to the signs of another. We ourselves saw it with our own eyes and heard it with our own ears. The prophets who deny the truth of Moses' prophesy are like witnesses who tell a person who saw something with his own eyes that it was not as he saw it. The person simply does not listen to them, for he knows for certain that they are false witnesses." (Rambam, Yesodey HaTorah 8:1-3).

* * *

"AND ISRAEL ENCAMPED"

"And Israel encamped there, facing the mount" (Ex. 19:2) -- the Hebrew verb VAYICHAN ("encamped") is in the singular. They encamped "as one man with one heart" (Rashi ad loc.) -- united. Observing today's rainbow variety of jostling Israelites -- ever-critical, argumentative, obstinate and apparently incapable of agreeing about anything -- it is hard to imagine how all the Children of Israel actually did unite at Sinai to receive the Torah.

This is particularly difficult to imagine for those who have delved into the intricacies of Talmudic law and reasoning, and who know how the Torah repeatedly seems to fly completely in the face of reason and good common sense. How could those two million Israelites collectively agree to accept this elaborate, complex, reason-defying code in all its minute details? What brought them to do so? And the fact is that today's observant descendents of those Israelites, despite the fact of having come from communities spread out all over the world, still all fundamentally agree to accept this code without changing a letter!

The very faith of Jews in the Torah for thousands of years in the face of almost constant adversity and persecution is itself proof of the uniqueness of the Assembly at Sinai, when we all collectively witnessed the same one truth of G-d and agreed to accept the Torah. Only a completely unique divine revelation could have been powerful enough to instill in two million people a faith that has lasted for thousands of years, a faith for which, over the generations, many millions laid down their very lives.

It is ironic that many people today question the historicity of the revelation at Sinai. We live in an age that prides itself on instantly recording its own daily history in the form of incessant news in the press, on TV, radio and Internet. And we are witnesses to the way in which the media have become manufacturers of endless streams of idolatrous images that totally distort the meaning of the world they supposedly reflect.

If we are to begin to internalize the magnitude of the Giving of the Torah, which took place without media coverage, we must try to think ourselves out of our own noisy, sophisticated world. We must try to project ourselves back into the stark, awesome, silent grandeur of the "wilderness", the MIDBAR, where man's existential reality as a GER, a wanderer and a stranger in this world, is writ large. Out of the silence of the MIDBAR spoke a voice: MEDABER. And the voice was forever inscribed in the hearts of those who heard it and taught it to their children from generation to generation.

* * *

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A PERSON AND A STATUE

In the above-quoted passage from Rambam about the uniqueness of Moses' prophecy, he states that "the prophets who deny the truth of Moses' prophecy are like witnesses who tell a person who saw something with his own eyes that it was not as he saw it."

The prophets to whom he is referring include those who founded the two major world religions which are rooted in and yet deviate from the Torah: Christianity and Islam. Both drew the bulk of their teachings from the Torah. Yet both implicitly and explicitly deny the finality of Moses' prophecy, seeking to "undo" the laws of the Torah (such as circumcision, the dietary laws, complete Sabbath observance and many others).

The relaxation of the stringencies of Torah law by these man-made religions made them more acceptable to the non-Israelite nations. As Rambam states at the very end of his Code of Law (Hilchos Melachim 11:4 uncensored version): "Man does not have the power to grasp the thoughts of the Creator of the Universe. For our ways are not His ways, nor are our thoughts His. All that happened in the wake of Yeshu of Nazereth and that Ishmaelite who arose after him came only to straighten the way for Melech HaMashiach and to rectify the entire world to serve HaShem together. Thus it is written: 'And then I will turn to all the nations a pure language so that all of them will call upon the name of HaShem and serve Him with one accord' (Zephaniah 3:9). The whole world has thus become filled with the knowledge of the Torah and the commandments. This knowledge has spread to the farthest islands. And when the true MELECH HAMASHIACH arises and succeeds, they will all immediately know that 'their fathers inherited falsehood' and that their prophets and their fathers deceived them."

Despite the attraction of the two new religions for non-Israelites, neither one of them ever made serious inroads among the Jews. Indeed it was precisely because the founders could not attract the Jews that they turned to the non-Jews for recruits.

In Rambam's IGERET TEIMAN (letter to the Jews of Yemen written in 1172 C.E. encouraging them to reject the forced conversion to Islam to which they were being subjected), he explains why the two new religions held no attractions for those who understood the intricate depths of the Torah:

"Their only wish was to compare their lies to the Law of HaShem. But the work of G-d bears no comparison to the work of man except in the eyes of a little child who has no understanding of either. The difference between our religion and the other religions that seek to compare themselves to it is like the difference between a living, conscious man and a statue. The statue is carved out of a piece of wood overlaid with gold or silver or chiseled out of a piece of marble and made to look like a man. An ignorant fool does not know the difference between G-dly wisdom and this artifact made in the form of a man. The statue looks like a man in its structure and outward appearance. But it only seems like a man because the ignorant onlooker doesn't know what is inside either a man or a statue. However, the wise man knows the difference between what is inside the two. The wise man knows that inside the statue is nothing, while the inside of the living man, ADAM, is filled with truly amazing wonders and works that testify to the wisdom of the Creator -- the nerves, the flesh, the bones, the bodily limbs and their all their interconnections."

Shabbat Shalom!

Avraham Yehoshua Greenbaum

--

AZAMRA INSTITUTE
PO Box 50037 Jerusalem 91500 Israel
Website: www.azamra.org

PLAYING TO WIN

Playing to Win

Imagine a game with two players. One player is playing to win, the other is playing to a draw, without actually going in for the kill. Even if the first player is weaker than the second player, if the game goes on long enough the odds are on his side... because he is playing to win.

Einstein famously said, "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."

Like many pacifists, Einstein assumed that war would become more destructive. Instead the Western powers have long ago stopped fighting to win, and rather than unleashing their full strength, chose to begin fighting to a draw, or to maintain a slightly improved balance of power vis a vis the enemy.

While some believed that this style of limited warfare is the product of the Cold War's Mutually Assured Destruction, in which war had to be scaled down for fear of unleashing a nuclear armageddon... this inability to finish the fight has become most pronounced when Western powers fight conflicts with third world guerrillas or terrorists.

There are several factors that explain why we stopped playing to win, and accordingly have begun slowly losing.

1. Instant Communications - Like sausage, wars used to be 'made' mostly out of sight. Individuals might have personal experience of a battlefield, but few outside the military would have much visceral interaction with the war itself. With the American Civil War and the Crimean War that began to change. Photography and popularized first person accounts began the process of bringing war into the "living room", horrifying and repulsing millions.

By the time the technology had developed to the point where video broadcasts could be conducted from the field, or any civilian could capture some of the action on a cell phone, the barriers had been breached.

Naturally it would be the more civilized countries which placed a higher value on life and did not censor their media, that would receive the worst of this exchange. While the guerrillas and terrorists can always intimidate and silence, and in any case tend to operate in cultures with higher mortality rates that place less value on human life, Western nations cannot and do not function so.

The result is that civilized countries begin practicing excessive restraint on the battlefield, this not only gives the enemy more freedom of movement, it creates an entirely new strategic doctrine that involves using civilians as human shields, hospitals and civilian areas as bases, and even deliberately generate atrocities in order to foster propaganda victories.

In this environment, propaganda victories become real victories if they harm the morale of a Western power. The more the civilized side restrains its forces, the more power and territory, the enemy gains.

2. Liberalism - While the welfare of civilians on the enemy side was a legitimate concern, it was never supposed to be a greater concern than the lives of our own soldiers. Yet Liberalism has managed to accomplish exactly that as on the battlefield, with civilized nations putting the lives of soldiers at risk to protect enemy civilians.

This development has turned the human shield from a punchline, into a potent defensive measure, and a propaganda offensive tool. As liberalism routinely assumes that their home society is usually at fault, and that the stronger party is also the guilty party, a liberal culture cripples the very military that seeks to defend it.

A liberal culture propounds that the only legitimate cause for waristhe defense of a weaker party against a stronger party. This paradox necessitates wars that are no longer defensive wars, but nation building wars to tear down a sovereign nation, on behalf of an oppressed populace or minority within its borders.

Such wars may be legitimate or not, on an individual basis, but they bury the primary justification for war, that of self-defense or the suppression of a vital and active threat. By doing so they also shift the priority from the military to the diplomatic, and from military accomplishment to nation building through winning the hearts and minds of the enemy civilian population-- an approach destined to undermine any purely military approach. Wars are no longer fought in pursuit of victory, but in order to build a better world... and we stop playing to win.

3. The Supremacy of Diplomacy - War becomes a means of enforcing a diplomatic objective. When diplomacy fails, we go to war. When the enemy meets our demands, we end the war. Then we rinse and repeat the whole cycle all over again.

Since modern diplomacy was envisioned as a peacemaking tool, these demands must be peacemaking demands as well. This makes war inherently contradictory and disreputable, and creates situations in which we endlessly pursue peacemaking diplomacy to avoid war, only to be tricked, and then restart the peacemaking cycle again. When we finally try to break the cycle of hollow diplomatic charades with war, universal condemnation follows.

War then becomes a halfhearted effort to hurt the enemy just enough to convince them to give in to our peacemaking demands. Unfortunately when the enemy has no interest in giving in, the military campaign quickly becomes a painful bloody drawn out mess with no real objective except buzzwords such as "Stabilization" and "Reining in the Extremist Elements Who Stand in the Way of Peace."

The latest example of such a misguided military campaign could be seen in Gaza, but it can just as well be seen in Iraq, and for that matter Vietnam. If you're not playing to win, but assuming that the enemy will give up and come to the negotiating table, then you're playing to lose... particularly against an enemy who knows how the game is played, and knows that all he needs to do is stay alive long enough for you to give up and go away.

4. Forgetting How to Fight - When the USSR was dismantled, the Yeltsin government attempted to give away land to farmers, only to discover that after generations of collectivization, too few knew how to farm anymore.

So national skills can disappear under the boot of socialism. There was a time in American history when the instinctive response to an attacker was force. Today the instinctive response is to run away and wait for the police to take care of it.

After a generation we have very nearly forgotten what war is, and what it's for. Afghanistan and Iraq proved that our soldiers still know how to fight, but our politicians and military command have often forgotten. As war becomes subservient to diplomacy, as the culture of liberalism and instant communications bring war into the living room and treat all military actions as atrocities-- we lose the ability to play to win and to fight to win, instead snatching diplomatic defeat from the jaws of a military victory.

But Playing to Win is the only real game in town. As Western powers and civilized nations stop playing to win, the terrorists who do play to win, begin winning. Our advantages in resources, organization and numbers can only hold out for so long unless we too begin playing to win.

taken from : Sultan Knish (http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/2009/02/playing-to-win.html)

Israel Matzav: Not so stunning#links#links#links

Israel Matzav: Obama pressing Peres to choose Livni? UPDATE: Yes, he did#links#links#links

Israel Matzav: Lebanese television host and terror victim May Chidiac calls it quits in a tearful farewell, live on television#links#links#links

Israel Matzav: Who should be Israel's next foreign minister?#links#links

Israel Matzav: Is A.Q. Khan on the Mossad's hit list?#links#links

Israel Matzav: Glick: Israel must follow India's example#links#links

Israel Matzav: A game plan for Netanyahu#links#links

Israel Matzav: A curveball from Washington?#links#links

Roadside Rambles: Note to Self

TERRROR AND ANTI-SEMITISM NOW THE "NORM"

Terror and anti-Semitisim now the "Norm"

Who will say “NO” to evil?

Why are terror and anti-Semitism now accepted by politicians, pundits and academicians?

February 10, 2009

Does it outrage you, as it does us at FLAME, that an openly Islamist-terrorist group like Hamas can be actively supported with hundreds of millions of dollars from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA)---an organization funded in part by $89 million dollars a year of U.S. taxpayer dollars? Are you shocked, as we are, to see thousands of demonstrators in the United States carry banners that say "Zionism = Nazism" or even "Jews are Terrorists"?

Okay, perhaps you are no longer surprised by the anti-Israel machinations of the UN or the anti-Semitic slogans of ultra-leftists. But what of former President Jimmy Carter, who accuses Israel of apartheid and tacitly supports Hamas's rocket attacks on Israeli civilians . . . at least until the "occupation" ends? How did you like the dozens of media reports during the recent Gaza war that chastised both Israel and Hamas equally by referring to a morally neutral "cycle of violence" or those that condemned Israel for "disproportionate" use of force?

This week's Hotline article, by Judah Pearl, father of the slain Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, decries the increasing acceptance---even celebration---of evil, here in the United States and abroad. Read his choice words for politicians like Jimmy Carter, media pundits like Bill Moyers, and academics on our college campuses. As for the latter, Mr. Pearl is a professor of computer science at UCLA and knows whereof he speaks. (He is also president of the Daniel Pearl Foundation, established in memory of his son to promote cross-cultural understanding.)

Pearl's words are refreshing to those of us who are still disgusted by bad people and evil deeds. They are also a call to action to continue our insistence on telling the truth in the press, in our churches and synagogues, and in our classrooms.

Best regards,

Jim SinkinsonDirector, FLAME

P.S.

Since Jimmy Carter is on a new book tour and again touting his bizarre analysis of the Middle East, I refer you to the FLAME position paper published in response to his last tome. I think you'll agree that the FLAME piece, which appeared in scores of publications nationwide and reached millions of Americans, makes short work of the Carter argument . . . simply by laying out the facts and logic, tools that Carter has little use for. Please see this position paper---"Jimmy Carter, Israel and the Jews: Is our former President ignorant, malevolent---or both?"---and pass it along to friends and colleagues. I also commend you to a recent article FLAME posted in the Outstanding Articles section of its website: "Using the Holocaust to Attack the Jews" by Walter Reich, which appeared recently in the Washington Post. It's excellent. Of course, if you agree that FLAME's outspoken brand of public relations on Israel's behalf is critical, I urge you to step up and support us. Remember: FLAME's ability to influence public opinion---to stand up against Islamist terror and anti-Semitism---comes from Israel's supporters like you, one by one. I hope you'll consider giving a donation now, as you're able---with $500, $250, $100, or even $18. (Remember, your donation to FLAME is tax deductible.) To donate online, just go to http://www.factsandlogic.org/make_a_donation.html. Now more than ever we need your support to ensure that Israel gets the support it needs---in the face unrelenting criticism at the U.N and under continued attacks from Hamas in Gaza.

Daniel Pearl and the Normalization of Evil

When will our luminaries stop making excuses for terror?

By Judah Pearl, February 3, 2009, Wall Street Journal

This week marks the seventh anniversary of the murder of our son, former Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl. My wife Ruth and I wonder: Would Danny have believed that today's world emerged after his tragedy?

The answer does not come easily. Danny was an optimist, a true believer in the goodness of mankind. Yet he was also a realist, and would not let idealism bend the harshness of facts.

Neither he, nor the millions who were shocked by his murder, could have possibly predicted that seven years later his abductor, Omar Saeed Sheikh, according to several South Asian reports, would be planning terror acts from the safety of a Pakistani jail. Or that his murderer, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, now in Guantanamo, would proudly boast of his murder in a military tribunal in March 2007 to the cheers of sympathetic jihadi supporters. Or that this ideology of barbarism would be celebrated in European and American universities, fueling rally after rally for Hamas, Hezbollah and other heroes of "the resistance." Or that another kidnapped young man, Israeli Gilad Shalit, would spend his 950th day of captivity with no Red Cross visitation while world leaders seriously debate whether his kidnappers deserve international recognition.

No. Those around the world who mourned for Danny in 2002 genuinely hoped that Danny's murder would be a turning point in the history of man's inhumanity to man, and that the targeting of innocents to transmit political messages would quickly become, like slavery and human sacrifice, an embarrassing relic of a bygone era.

But somehow, barbarism, often cloaked in the language of "resistance," has gained acceptance in the most elite circles of our society. The words "war on terror" cannot be uttered today without fear of offense. Civilized society, so it seems, is so numbed by violence that it has lost its gift to be disgusted by evil.

I believe it all started with well-meaning analysts, who in their zeal to find creative solutions to terror decided that terror is not a real enemy, but a tactic. Thus the basic engine that propels acts of terrorism -- the ideological license to elevate one's grievances above the norms of civilized society -- was wished away in favor of seemingly more manageable "tactical" considerations.

This mentality of surrender then worked its way through politicians like the former mayor of London, Ken Livingstone. In July 2005 he told Sky News that suicide bombing is almost man's second nature. "In an unfair balance, that's what people use," explained Mr. Livingstone.

But the clearest endorsement of terror as a legitimate instrument of political bargaining came from former President Jimmy Carter. In his book "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid," Mr. Carter appeals to the sponsors of suicide bombing. "It is imperative that the general Arab community and all significant Palestinian groups make it clear that they will end the suicide bombings and other acts of terrorism when international laws and the ultimate goals of the Road-map for Peace are accepted by Israel." Acts of terror, according to Mr. Carter, are no longer taboo, but effective tools for terrorists to address perceived injustices.

Mr. Carter's logic has become the dominant paradigm in rationalizing terror. When asked what Israel should do to stop Hamas's rockets aimed at innocent civilians, the Syrian first lady, Asma Al-Assad, did not hesitate for a moment in her response: "They should end the occupation." In other words, terror must earn a dividend before it is stopped.

The media have played a major role in handing terrorism this victory of acceptability. Qatari-based Al Jazeera television, for example, is still providing Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi hours of free air time each week to spew his hateful interpretation of the Koran, authorize suicide bombing, and call for jihad against Jews and Americans.

Then came the August 2008 birthday of Samir Kuntar, the unrepentant killer who, in 1979, smashed the head of a four-year-old Israeli girl with his rifle after killing her father before her eyes. Al Jazeera elevated Kuntar to heroic heights with orchestras, fireworks and sword dances, presenting him to 50 million viewers as Arab society's role model. No mainstream Western media outlet dared to expose Al Jazeera efforts to warp its young viewers into the likes of Kuntar. Al Jazeera's management continues to receive royal treatment in all major press clubs.

Some American pundits and TV anchors didn't seem much different from Al Jazeera in their analysis of the recent war in Gaza. Bill Moyers was quick to lend Hamas legitimacy as a "resistance" movement, together with honorary membership in PBS's imaginary "cycle of violence." In his Jan. 9 TV show, Mr. Moyers explained to his viewers that "each [side] greases the cycle of violence, as one man's terrorism becomes another's resistance to oppression." He then stated -- without blushing -- that for readers of the Hebrew Bible "God-soaked violence became genetically coded." The "cycle of violence" platitude allows analysts to empower terror with the guise of reciprocity, and, amazingly, indict terror's victims for violence as immutable as DNA.

When we ask ourselves what it is about the American psyche that enables genocidal organizations like Hamas -- the charter of which would offend every neuron in our brains -- to become tolerated in public discourse, we should take a hard look at our universities and the way they are currently being manipulated by terrorist sympathizers.

At my own university, UCLA, a symposium last week on human rights turned into a Hamas recruitment rally by a clever academic gimmick. The director of the Center for Near East Studies carefully selected only Israel bashers for the panel, each of whom concluded that the Jewish state is the greatest criminal in human history.

The primary purpose of the event was evident the morning after, when unsuspecting, uninvolved students read an article in the campus newspaper titled, "Scholars say: Israel is in violation of human rights in Gaza," to which the good name of the University of California was attached. This is where Hamas scored its main triumph -- another inch of academic respectability, another inroad into Western minds.

Danny's picture is hanging just in front of me, his warm smile as reassuring as ever. But I find it hard to look him straight in the eyes and say: You did not die in vain.

taken from : B'NAI ELIM (http://bnaielim.blogspot.com/)

Monday, 16 February 2009

Sunday, 15 February 2009

Saturday, 14 February 2009

Friday, 13 February 2009

Thursday, 12 February 2009

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