Sunday, June 07, 2009

And What's That Over In Jordan?

"I looked over Jordan and what did I see

coming for to carry me home...

On the way to work last week, my friend from Ofra, Avishai, asked me if I knew what those two towers over in Jordan were.

I looked and said, "which two towers?"

He said, "Those two towers. In the middle."

(click on the next picture and stare in the center)

If you can see them and know, please inform me.

And if there are any Jordanian bloggers visiting, can any of you help?

UPDATE

Thanks to the comment from Khaled, we now know that those are the Jordan Gate Towers.

The JGT is a high class commercial and residential project currently under construction in Amman, Jordan. They are located in west Amman, close to the 6th Circle. The towers are the first skyscrapers the city has seen to date and will become the tallest structures in Amman upon completion, thus surpassing the 31-floor Le Royal Hotel. The towers will also host the new Hilton Hotel, the first in Jordan.

The developers are Bahrain's Gulf Finance House, the Kuwait Investment and Finance Company (KIFC), DTZ, and Al Hamad Contracting Co.. To date it is still unknown how tall the towers will be with many estimating approximately 180m.

Since the start of construction the project has faced many problems. The halt in construction work is the third since the project started four years ago. In September 2006, three storeys of the north tower collapsed, killing four workers and injuring 15 others.

A month before that, a fire broke out on the eighth storey of the north tower, but no one was injured.

And in May 2009, a part of the crane collasped, however no injuries of damage to the buildings was reported.

Much appreciated, Khaled.

How it looks at present:

Artistic conception:

His Voice or His Master's Voice?

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu...said Sunday that he plans to deliver a major policy address laying out his proposed road to peace.

"It must be understood, we seek peace with the Palestinians and with the states of the Arab world while trying to reach as much understanding as possible with the United States and our friends abroad...My desire is to achieve a stable peace that rests on solid foundations of security for the state of Israel and its citizens."

He added, "Next week I will make an important policy speech in which I will present to the citizens of Israel our principles on achieving this peace and security."

And what did Jabotinsky once say?

He said:

Our Right: Zion is All Ours!

Do not tell me it is all the same whether verbally, or on paper, we give up Hebron, Nablus and Transjordan, because this waiver is but a trivial hollow word, and everybody will see it this way. Do not underestimate the power of waiver. How did this miracle happen twenty years ago, that the nations of the world acknowledged our right to the Land of Israel? At that time they had no idea that we have something concrete here. Only one thing they knew: that for two thousand years we did not waive our rights, and that was decisive.

Do not underestimate the power of right and don’t exaggerate the value of ongoing development and construction. I too, respect what is being built here. But God help us if it is to be the basis for our rights. Twenty years ago, during the days of the Balfour Declaration, the world invoked the criterion of right; and only when this was ascertained were we given the Declaration - our right to the whole of Eretz-Israel, undivided. Twenty years have gone by and today we have permitted them to apply the criterion of ongoing construction by accepting the truncated plan. Our right supersedes construction. Let not Gentile hands abuse our rights, but first and foremost, let not Jewish hands forfeit those rights which are eternal and indivisible. There can be no waiver and no short-cut to Zion. And Zion is all ours!

- From a recording of his voice, 1937, preserved in the Jabotinsky Institute Archive

More Natural Growth

The car jam Friday morning at Shiloh, outside the grocery store:

Can You See Me?

I'm in this picture:

Give up?

Look closely:

A Behind-the-Wall Garden, Sort Of

On Emeq Refaim Street, ever wondered what's behind this sign?

Well, here, take a look:

Arab Propaganda: Slick, Sly and Slimy

Found here:

Even before 1967, the Israeli army had been carrying out routine incursions
into the West Bank, destroying poor people’s homes and killing innocent civilians, very much like what Israel has been doing in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and Lebanon recently.

Yes, there were incursions. But they weren't routine.

They were responses and reprisals for Arab fedayeen and later, PLO/Fatah, terror raids against Israeli civilians. That is the only similarity with today: routine Arab terror attacks.

Background:

(1)

This wave of attacks on Israel became more organized in the form of
Palestinian Arab terrorist groups, called "fedayeen" (peasants who were deemed
"Men of Sacrifice" or "Suicide Fighters"), who began to conduct raids against the Israeli civilian population by 1951. The fedayeen operated from bases in the territories surrounding Israel: Egypt, Lebanon and Jordan. They were trained and
equipped, primarily by Egyptian Intelligence, to engage in hostile action on the
border and infiltrate Israel to commit acts of sabotage and murder. The fedayeen
operated mainly from locations in Jordan, so that Jordan would bear the brunt of
Israel's retaliation, which inevitably followed.

In the period 1951-1956, hundreds of fedayeen attacks were carried out against Israel; over 400 Israelis were killed and 900 injured. The IDF reacted in a series of "Reprisal Operations" many of which were carried out by infantry units, paratroopers and the special anti-terrorism Unit 101.

The fedayeen acts of terror, supported by the Arab countries led, eventually, to the outbreak of the Sinai Campaign.

The fedayeen terrorist attacks violated provision of the UN-brokered
1949 Armistice Agreement that prohibited the initiation of hostilities by
paramilitary forces. The Arab countries were never condemmed by the UN for their
acts -- it was only Israel that was condemned by the UN Security Council for its
counterattacks.

(2)

According to the Jewish Agency for Israel between 1951 and 1956, 400 Israelis were killed and 900 wounded in fedayeen attacks. Dozens of these attacks are today cited by the Israeli government as "Major Arab Terrorist Attacks against Israelis prior to the 1967 Six-Day War".

Being Exact in A Message

In an otherwise very good op-ed, I spotted this section:

"As one looks out from Rimonim, the most telling fact is what one does not see. Over the miles of rolling hills that unfold across the landscape, there is not a village, building, home or even a herd of sheep to be seen. The scene is the same at other Jewish settlements as well."

That statement is a bit problematic for me, one who has been living at Shiloh for 28 years and very much involved in getting the Yesha message out.

I know Rimmonim and if I am not mistaken, it all depends exactly from where you are looking if you don't want to see any Arab presence. Moreover, even from Shiloh, there are angles of view where no Arab village can be seen - and many other angles where they can be seen.

That was a bit too sweeping a generalization. It would be too easy to mount a rebuttal. Especially when it is asserted that: The scene is the same at other Jewish settlements as well.

I wouldn't have written that as it simply isn't true. I can't think of a single Jewish community where, no matter where you stand, you cannot see an Arab village, field or herd.

What could have been claimed truthfully is that in terms of demographic density, many visitors would be surprised to find large areas of Judea and Samaria where not a single indication of an Arab presence can be seen. Jews have not "taken over" Arab lands but have moved in. Except for Hebron and two building in Bethlehem, Jews do not live among Arabs but alongside, and in 95% of the cases, that "alongside" is kilometers apart. Some roads bring us close but that's just driving by.

Sunset Wedding

A sunset wedding at Neveh Ilan overlooking the Inner Plain rolling away towards Tel Aviv:

Some More Jewish Wedding Music

This is the second wedding events place we've encountered where the band is set off behind a glass partition. Makes for a lot less noise for those trying to enjoy each other's company. The first was the extaension to the Mitzpeh Yericho hall and now Neveh Ilan, at Adiel Libi's wedding to Ta'ir:

Inside the dancing was as normal, loud, and a bit wild:

Some More Natural Growth vs. "Settlement Freeze"

Adding on two rooms, a service area and a balcony:

Grwoing figs:

Goats:

That goat actually thought I might be Hillary Clinton:

Saturday, June 06, 2009

So, Is Someone Lying?

Reported:

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says there have never been any informal agreements between Washington and Israel allowing West Bank settlement growth. Speaking Friday in Washington...Clinton forcefully denied claims by Israeli leaders they had an understanding with the Bush administration that Jewish expansion in the occupied West Bank was permitted in certain instances under the "road map" for peace..."We have the negotiating record, that is the official record, that was turned over to the Obama administration by the outgoing Bush administration," Clinton said. "There is no memorialization of any informal and oral agreements."

Oh, oh. Is someone lying?

We will be hearing something like:

But I want to say one thing to the American people. I want you to listen to me. I'm going to say this again: we did not have any understandings with that country, Israel or any of its administrations. And I never told any State Department official to lie, not a single time; never. These allegations are false. (*)

To remind you, at the official Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs site, fifth paragraph up from the end of Bush's letter:

Then-President George W. Bush wrote former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in 2004, “In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949, and all previous efforts to negotiate a two-state solution have reached the same conclusion.”

If you check Ambassador Michael Oren's book, "Six Days of War", page 105, you'll read that although Israel claimed, under the 1950 Tripartite Agreement, that they deserved to be defended now that the Suez Canal was shut to them and the Straits of Tiran were blockaded:

"White House and State Department archives were frantically searched for the text of the pledges Dulles made to Golda, as well as other U.S. commitments to Israel' few were readily found"

Will Hillary please order another check?

--------------
(*)

The original, in case you forgot:

But I want to say one thing to the American people. I want you to listen to me. I'm going to say this again: I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. I never told anybody to lie, not a single time; never. These allegations are false.

More Comment on the Cairo 'Cantillation'

Ethan Bronner:

...“I am not a Greater Israel guy and I have no objection to dismantling settlements as part of a peace deal, but getting so hung up on freezing settlement growth is not wise because it is not the most important issue out there,” argued Efraim Inbar, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar Ilan University.

The far bigger concern, he said, is that the Palestinians are unable to make similar concessions because of their political divisions and weakness.

Israelis have turned rightward and most analyses suggest that the reason is a growing fear of regional threats, notably Iranian-backed parties like Hezbollah and Hamas, on Israel’s borders.

Sarah Honig, a columnist for The Jerusalem Post, a conservative paper, put it this way a week ago in a column: “Settlements aren’t the problem and removing them isn’t the solution. Israel foolishly dismantled 21 Gaza Strip settlements in 2005. Did peace blossom all over as a result? Precisely the reverse occurred. The razing of Israeli communities was regarded as terror’s triumph, expediting the Hamas takeover.”

The settlements are a complex issue that resonates in surprising ways here. Zionism began 125 years ago through the Jewish purchase of land in Palestine and the building of settlements (*) on what the Jews saw as their ancient homeland. When Israel won additional territory in the 1967 war, a conflict it felt was imposed on it, many here viewed it as the miraculous continuation of Jewish national rebirth in the biblical heartland. Religious Jews began settling there, but others were attracted by low prices, open space and a pioneering ethos.

Criticism ensued immediately, including American government condemnation. The Fourth Geneva Convention forbids a country to settle its civilians in areas conquered militarily. Israel set up military outposts that turned into civilian settlements...

The Israelis say they had unwritten agreements with the Bush administration to continue building, as long as no new settlements were built. Bush officials say that is only partially true. The Obama administration says such winks and nods are over. It is signaling the Arab world that it is shifting policy. Whether it does so, and how the Netanyahu government responds, will make for high drama in the coming months.

(*)

[notice how the term "settlements" - and, for that matter, "Palestine" - is anachronistically used here. of course, it's better than "colonies" which actually was the official term in all Zionist publications. but more importantly, it wasn't just the Jews who "saw as their ancient homeland this country. the whole world did.]

and from letters-to-the-editor in the NYTimes:

To the Editor:

In President Obama’s push for Mideast peace, one key unasked question is: Can the Islamic world accept a non-Muslim state in the middle of an Arab-dominated region? If the answer is no, then all negotiated agreements are nothing more than subterfuge.

Howard Schwartz
Englewood, N.J.

-----------

To the Editor:

To those of us who desire a just peace in the Middle East, it was disappointing to see President Obama, in the interest of evenhandedness, gloss over some inconvenient truths.

To create an appearance of equivalence between the Holocaust and the condition of the Palestinians, he said of them: “For more than 60 years, they’ve endured the pain of dislocation. Many wait in refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza and neighboring lands for a life of peace and security that they have never been able to lead.”

The inconvenient truth, which he failed to acknowledge, is that, for the first 19 of those 60 years, the West Bank and Gaza were administered by Jordan and Egypt, respectively, and that it was under the administration of the Arab nations that the Palestinians were confined to refugee camps.

At any time during those first 19 years, the Arab nations could have provided “a life of peace and security” by, for example, establishing a Palestinian state or integrating the people into their own countries. Instead, they kept them confined to the camps as pawns in a propaganda war against Israel.

At the same time, Jewish refugees from Arab countries were forced to flee their homes by the backlash to the establishment of Israel.

In contrast to the actions of the Arab nations, Israel took them in, sometimes requiring daring rescue missions, and integrated them into their modern, Western-oriented society, just as they did, one might add, for the Arabs who chose to remain as citizens of Israel.

Joel S. Engel
Armonk, N.Y.

Spies in Washington - And They're Not Jewish

Gosh what is the world coming to?

State Dept. Retiree Accused of Spying

Official, Wife Passed Secrets to Cuba For Decades, Federal Prosecutors Say

A former State Department official with top-secret security clearance and his wife have been charged with spying for Cuba over the past three decades, passing information by shortwave radio and correspondence exchanged in local grocery stores, federal prosecutors said.

State Department officials said last night they were still assessing the potential damage to the government's security and intelligence operations and declined to comment further.

...The couple, Walter Kendall Myers, 72, and his wife, Gwendolyn Steingraber Myers, 71, were charged with conspiring to act as illegal agents and to communicate classified information to the Cuban government. They pleaded not guilty and were ordered held in jail pending further court proceedings.

Myers is the scion of one of Washington's most storied families. His mother, Elsie Alexandra Carol Grosvenor Myers, was the granddaughter of Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone.

The allegations are "incredibly serious and should serve as a warning to any others in the U.S. government who would betray America's trust by serving as illegal agents of a foreign government," said David S. Kris, assistant attorney general for national security.

...The court papers describe several conversations in which Myers and his wife express their strong emotional ties to the communist country...

More on Obama's Cairo 'Cantillation'

...The second notable point in the speech is Obama’s analogy between the plight of Palestinians and that of African-Americans under slavery and Jim Crow. The context here is Obama’s advice to Palestinians to adopt non-violent means in resisting Israeli occupation. As before, Obama has taken a page from Al Qaeda’s book, in which the alleged humiliation and oppression of Muslims are compared to the tribulations of African-Americans. Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al Qaeda’s number two leader, often invokes this same history by drawing on the examples of Malcolm X and the Black Panthers to argue that only violence and rejection can lead to political change, and to convince African-American soldiers to desert the U.S. armed forces.

In short, the framing of the United States’ relationship with the Muslim world as one based on friendship rather than enmity, while superficially and rhetorically laudable, is fraught with difficulties and pitfalls, not least because it can unwittingly give credence to the idea that there might in fact be a clash between the United States and Islam. I can imagine a long-bearded man now smiling in a cave on the Afghan-Pakistan border.

- - - -

The list of deliverables was exceedingly short. The only firm promise was to a pursue a two-state solution to the Palestine issue—which will be extremely difficult to achieve. There were hints of a softer approach to Hamas (now it’s an organization with “support” and “responsibilities” instead of a terrorist group)

- - - -

Let it be said, though, that the harsh rhetoric on Israel plus slaps like no-state-dinner for Mr. Netanyahu at the White House have been replaced by the balanced cadences of the Cairo speech: The Israelis have to do this, the Palestinians and Arabs have to do that.

But the chickens have already come home to roost. The hope, a perennial one, obviously is that the Arabs will be so overjoyed by the U.S. manhandling Israel that they will rally to Old Glory en masse, doing America’s bidding throughout the Greater Middle East. This is not how the Mideast works. To make the point, the spokesman of the Egyptian foreign ministry told the New York Times: “We will judge everything by the degree of Israeli commitments, and measures that are taken.”

In so many words: “Mr. President, now that you have pressured the Israelis, we want to see more of it. And more. And then, perhaps, we’ll do you a favor on other matters.” We are back at the oldest game of the Middle East. It is called “Let the U.S. Deliver Israel, Then We Might Start Acting in Our Own Interest.”

- - - -

Both Bush and Obama spoke of Palestine and their desire to see the creation of a state for Palestinian Arabs to live beside Israel. But Bush conditioned U.S. support for Palestine’s independence on a cessation of terrorism. Obama does not. And while he certainly condemned “violence” (perhaps terrorism is too loaded a term for Obama), he implied equivalence between this and the dislocation felt by some Palestinian Arabs.

Source

P.S.

Cantillation is the ritual chanting of readings from the Bible in synagogue services.

Friday, June 05, 2009

Guess Who

The BBC's headline reads:

Three die in Palestinian clash

in West Bank

Okay, three guesses, who killed them?

a) Jewish "settlers"

b) Jewish soldiers

c) Jewish Border Police personnel

Try a fourth guess:

Three people have been killed in clashes as Palestinian Authority forces tried to arrest several Hamas militants holed up in the West Bank.

Illegitimate, Obama Says?

So, Obama says Jewish civilian residential communities in Judea and Samaria are illegitimate?

Israel hastens to destroy outposts, extentions, expansions, etc.

Well Aviad Visoli, Attorney, thinks and says otherwise:

Enforcing the Law in the Outposts? Fraud, Ignorance, Ethnic Discrimination,
and Governmental Corruption

The impassioned attack by the extreme Left against the residents of the Jewish outposts in Judea and Samaria, under the guise of the obligation to uphold the Rule of Law and maintain an orderly society, is a foul mixture of blurring the facts, legal ignorance, selective enforcement of the law, ethnically based discrimination, and the worst kind of abuse of governmental power, by means of abuse of the power of the Supreme Court, the Israel Defense Force, and the Police, for political means.

Fraud and Deception

In the Jewish sector of Judea and Samaria there are some 3,000 buildings in the midst of some manner of legal proceedings regarding illegalities violating Building & Planning regulations. Amongst those, there are tens of open cases regarding illegal construction in outposts. In relation to the population of 300,000 residents, a figure of 1% lawbreakers per 1000 residents. This can be compared to 10,000 illegal units just in the Arab Sector C, out of a population of 60,000 Arabs living in Sector C, or a ratio of 18% lawbreakers. That is to say, 18 times greater percentage of lawbreakers than amongst the settler population!

The State Comptroller, in his most recent annual report, dating from the beginning of May 2009, states that in the State of Israel there are 100,000 illegal buildings, a ratio of 1.5% per 1000 residents, two thirds of them in the Bedouin sector in the Negev. The number of illegal buildings in the sector has doubled since 2002. The State Comptroller's report quotes a statement by a senior member of the Department of the Interior, relating to the Building & Planning law: "the area of the Carmel is already out of control, and we are on the verge of collapse in the Wadi Ara area as well." (Building Criminals Flourish, and the State is Helpless, The Marker, 22.5.09)

In the Jewish sector in Judea and Samaria the level of law enforcement is much higher than within the Green Line, and even more so than in the Negev and the Galilee. Enforcing the law fairly, in this case, means that for every building that is destroyed in an outpost, 18 buildings would be destroyed in the Arab sector of Judea and Samaria, and 60 buildings within the Green Line.

Legal Ignorance

All the outposts in Judea and Samaria were founded, and have been continuously situated where they are, for between 2-10 years or more. One of the claims against the settlers is that they invaded the land without clear title, where Palestinians claim ownership. Since the settlers have occupied the land for far more than 30 days, there is a de facto presumption of ownership, and the only way to abrogate that presumption is in a civilian court of law. That is the precise decision of the Supreme Court in the "Peace House" case:

The 3rd section of the law regulating the removal of invaders requires the fulfillment of three conditions necessary to create the right to take the law into one's own hands to regain property from which one has been expelled: full legal rights to the property, illegal possession by the invader, and taking the law into one's own hands within 30 days of the day of the invasion... Considerations of the public good stand behind the principle that disagreements regarding rights of possession are to be resolved within the court system, and not by force between the disputing parties. Ruling on fundamental rights of ownership between parties ... through agreed upon mediators in the civilian judicial system ... where the right of ownership has not been decided, the law does not allow for one side to unilaterally seize property without the other sides' agreement. The right to the preservation of property supersedes the argument over fundamental rights, and until a decision is reached in the proper court, it is forbidden to change the status by forcibly removing the possessor from his holding. "

Another claim leveled against the civilian settlers is the construction of buildings without building permits. The Planning and Construction Law (1965) defines all the legal requirements involved with acquiring building permits and the (criminal) sanctions for building without a permit.

The Knesset established the equality of law which applies to citizens of the State of Israel on both sides of the Green Line in the Law for the Extension of the Emergency Measures (Judea, Samaria, and Gaza- Criminal Jurisprudence and Legal Aid) 1977. It is this law which enables Israeli citizens who commit crimes in Judea and Samaria to be brought to trial.

All the laws of Israel have been applied to Israeli citizens in Judea and Samaria- with the exception of the law of Planning and Construction. In the area of Judea and Samaria, in gross violation of the law, the State conducts all legal enforcement processes regarding Planning and Construction with administrative orders and through governmental supervisory and planning commissions, and not through the court system. The result is that while within the Green Line 100,000 final legal demolition orders have been issued due to building irregularities, in Judea and Samaria not a single legal demolition order has been issued.

Using administrative steps in place of legal measure discriminates against settlers on the one hand, and at the same time precludes charging them with criminal charges due to building violations. It is meaningless to speak of building violations in outposts as long as the State refuses to turn to the courts to obtain demolition orders. Administrative punishment of this type violates international legal covenants on which the State of Israel is a signatory, as well as international law which declares that all citizens are equal in the eyes of the law.

In the name of the principle of equality before the law- a basic principle of Israeli and international law- violations of building regulations in Judea and Samaria must be treated the same way they are within the Green Line, and to allow residents of the outposts to defend themselves against demolition orders due to suspicion of illegal construction within the walls of a courtroom, as every other citizen is allowed to do.

Discrimination based on Ethnic Background

The principle of equality before the law means that if the State desires to enforce a law- it must be enforced equably. The same enforcement measures must be taken against citizens east of the "Green Line" as are taken against citizens to the west. The same enforcement must be applied to Jews and to Arabs. The reality is, the law is enforced more than 100 times as vigorously against the settlers as a group, and against the outposts specifically, while there is severe under-enforcement against the Beduins, residents of the Ara valley in the north, and the Carmel ridge and the Galilee.

The call to harass the residents of the outposts, to close the Jews in the settlements into 'ghettos' and to forbid them natural expansion, is reminiscent of the darkest periods of Jewish history. These unethical demands carry a strong scent of anti-semitism.

The full picture is even worse- Every citizen of the State of Israel who wants to build applies to the local authorities, who decide whether or not to give him a permit. The enforcement of building regulations is also the exclusive jurisdiction of the local authorities. The fact that in Judea and Samaria local authorities do not have the mandate to grant building permits or to enforce them is extreme discrimination against residents of Judea and Samaria, whether comparing them to other citizens of Israel, or to the Arabs of Judea and Samaria.

Political Corruption of Governmental Powers

The fact that every building permit must receive the approval of the Minister of Defense not only discriminates against the residents of Judea and Samaria, but it also turns an administrative matter of building permits into political intercourse, which is fundamentally improper.

The fact that Ehud Barak, the head of the Labor Party, is also the Minister of Defense who wants to harass his political opponents, destroy their homes, and expel them from their land, only emphasizes the absurdity of having Barak control the ability to build in Judea and Samaria, as well as the requirement that the Minister of Defense agree to each building permit.

The fact that Ministers of Defense over the past ten years have uttered blatantly political declarations about their unwillingness to permit construction in Judea and Samaria, discriminating against the Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria and preventing them from meeting the legal requirements for construction. Therefore it is inconceivable to enforce laws which citizens are a priori incapable of fulfilling, due to government harassment policies. Instead of harassing settlers, affirmative action should be employed due to the long history of discrimination against the process of building and planning in the settlements.

Another fundamental principle of the Rule of Law in a democratic country is that ministers and politicians are precluded from interfering with the enforcement of the law. Just as the Minister of Defense cannot decide to initiate prosecution against his political opponents, it is inconceivable that the head of the Labor Party Ehud Barak would be allowed to send soldiers to destroy the homes of his political opponents. This is a gross violation of the principles of legality and equality, and corrupt political interference with the law enforcement authorities of the State of Israel.

In addition, the use of IDF soldiers to destroy civilian housing is fundamentally untenable. A soldier who is drafted into mandatory service to protect his country, and not to be the political servant of Barak in destroying his own home, or the home of a friend.

The Government of Israel decided in 1998 that the enforcement of Israeli law on Israeli citizens of Judea and Samaria falls under the authority of the Israeli Police force, and not soldiers serving in the IDF. In light of that decision, the Attorney General to the Government, issued a directive "Rules for Enforcing the Law on Israelis in Judea and Samaria and Gaza" on the 2nd of September 2nd, 1998. Ehud Barak's use of IDF soldiers for these purposes is political, inappropriate, and patently illegal, with all that that implies.

The intensive use that the extreme Left has made of the Supreme Court to advance their agenda of hatred towards the settlers is not only an improper use of legal process, but an unacceptable politicization of the Supreme Court. Activists from the Left exploit the fact that the Supreme Court is unable to hear evidence or to hold orderly hearings, including joining all relevant parties to a claim, as well as the lack of right of appeal and the abrogation of right of the individual to appear before his accusers. All this is done to achieve political gains against the hated settlers, after having lost the recent elections. They proceed under the assumption that the judges of the Supreme Court hold opinions similar to their own. Beyond the abusive and political use of the Supreme Court, this has also contributed significantly to the ongoing deterioration of the faith the public has in the Supreme Court.

Injury to the State of Israel

The demands of foreign governments, in harmony with extreme left wing parties and movements in Israel and the Palestinian Authority, to enforce the law with a firm hand and by exacting power over a small group of Jews who live in outposts in Judea and Samaria, is a grave blow to the sovereignty and the right to govern of the State of Israel. There is no other country in the world that would accept this degree of blatant interference with internal matters between its citizens and/ or its policies of law enforcement on its residents.

The independence and democratic rule of every country is expressed in its sovereign legislation, which applies equally to all its citizens. The existence of law and the enforcement of the law upon its citizens is the internal concern of each state. The principle of equality before the law, which is one of the foundation stones of the Rule of Law, obligates the state to enable each citizen to affirm the law equally. If they violate the law, they must be subject to the same equal enforcement process and with the same force of law, by the state itself, and not suffer the whim of extreme racial and discriminatory pressure from foreign governments.

In Conclusion

The demand of leftist politicians to 'evacuate' outposts in Judea and Samaria is an illegal call, discriminating, on the basis of ethnicity, against the residents of Judea and Samaria. It is worth noting that their degree of compliance with the law, is much greater than in any other sector of society.

From the standpoint of the Rule of Law, enforcement must be applied equally upon every citizen of Israel, by the exclusive means of the enforcing arms, the courts of the country and the police force. It is not acceptable to discriminate against the residents of Judea and Samaria, relative to Beduin camps in the Negev, or the illegal construction which is much more common in the Arab sector in the Galilee, the Carmel, and the Ara valley.

The involvement of Ministers in general, and the Minister of Defense Ehud Barak in particular, in questions of law-enforcement in the outposts is political, inappropriate, illegal, and much more of a violation of the law than the violation of the Building & Planning regulations by the Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria.

The pressure by foreign governments to 'evacuate' outposts is unacceptable interference with the sovereign government of Israel and its internal matters. The call to enforce Israel's laws in an undemocratic, racist, and anti-semitic in a fashion that arouses the worst associations from recent and distant history of the Jewish people.

The residents of the outposts have license to take the most extreme legal measures against any person who tries to harass them, to defame them, to discriminate against them on a racial basis, to use the soldiers of the IDF in a manner which is patently illegal, and to engage the police for corrupt political maneuvers. Within that framework, it is possible and desirable to sue for personal damages from each person who violated the law, basic laws, international law, and the fundamental rights guaranteed to every citizen on an equal basis.

A Marty Peretz Pile-On

Marty Peretz piles it on:

...let me make clear that in the 42 years since the Six Day War, the Palestinians haven't shown any serious readiness to make peace with Israel that would encourage Jerusalem to make any more one-sided concessions in advance that experience proves will just be pocketed and not be reciprocated at all...

...the United Nations General Assembly sanctioned and provided for a "Jewish state" in Palestine and an "Arab state" in Palestine already in late 1947. I will make my not-at-all-pedantic little point again: The imagined Arab state was not denoted as Palestinian because no one in their right mind at the U.N. saw a Palestinian people on the horizon. The local Arabs were mostly satraps of the surrounding Arab countries. They defined themselves within tribes and clans, extended families and gangs of ruffians There was no national vision with which to see the lost opportunity.

...Now, the Obama administration is engaged in another try at the peace process, egged on presumably by the preposterous idea that, if Bibi only utters the magic phrase "two-state solution" and halts construction even for natural growth in every single one of the settlements, America's troubles in the world of Islam will not only ease but be transformed. Not surprisingly, Hilary Clinton, our martinet secretary of state, has enthusiastically rushed to formulate these instructions to Israel in the harshest possible terms.

This has been a long detour to coming back to my view of settlements.

From my point of view, there are settlements and then there are settlements. I'll get to the differences soon.

But the idea of stopping all construction in all settlements means that once again the Israelis will be ceding something in advance and for nothing in return. This is a destructive negotiating tactic and will encourage the same kind of intransigence...

In fact, the 2003 "road map" made distinctions among settlements, envisioning that most would be vacated by Israel but that the largest would remain sovereign Israeli territory. The very largest happen to cling to Jerusalem. I wouldn't withdraw from them in a million years. Not even the crankiest peacenik in Israel would pull out from Ma'aleh Adumim...And if I were Netanyahu, I would expect also to be able to increase defensive settlements in the Jordan Valley rift as a protection against Palestinian terror flowing east to west and west to east between the kingdom and the new Palestine...

On Blindness in Foreign Policy

From Jonathan Tobin's

Obama’s Age of Moral Equivalence

Speaking of the Arab-Israeli conflict, [Obama] says: “If we see this conflict only from one side or the other, then we will be blind to the truth.”

But there is more than one type of blindness. The search for the truth is not merely an exercise in which all grievances are considered the same. To assert the truth of the Holocaust is appropriate — if unfortunately necessary when addressing an Arab audience — as is calling on the Palestinians to “abandon violence” and to cease “shooting rockets at sleeping children” or blowing up old women on buses.

But the problem with this conflict is not that both sides won’t listen to each other or give peace a chance...

...Israel recognized the legitimacy of Palestinian aspirations and began the process of handing over large portions of the area reserved by the League of Nations for the creation of a Jewish National Home for the creation of a Palestinian equivalent. But Israel offered these same Palestinians a state in virtually all of the West Bank and Gaza as well as part of Jerusalem in 2000 and again in negotiations conducted by the government of Ehud Olmert just last year. So, the problem is not that the Israelis don’t want the two state solution...

Even more obnoxious than this refusal to see that the truth about the conflict isn’t to be found through an even-handed “plague on both your houses” approach is his comparison of the Palestinians’ plight to that of African-Americans in the United States before the civil rights era. Israelis have not enslaved Palestinians.

The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians rests on the latter’s unwillingness to come to terms with the former’s existence. The plight of Palestinians in Gaza is terrible but it is a direct result of their own decision to choose war over peace, not a lack of understanding on the part of the Jews. Going to the Middle East while ostentatiously avoiding Israel and picking a fight with its leadership sends a message that will resonate throughout the Arab world. His signal that America is now an impartial broker rather than Israel’s ally can only encourage a Palestinian people that continue to reject peace.

Obama's Corrosive Golden Mean

Peter Wehner is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C. He served in the Bush White House as director of the office of strategic initiatives.

From his:

The Not So Golden Mean

The best way to view President Obama's speech in Cairo is to understand the way Obama views himself and the rhetorical devices he employs. In this case, the key to unlocking Obama's speech may be Aristotle's golden mean, the search for a mid-point between extremes. Obama's rhetorical template is an increasingly familiar one: he gives voice to one side of a dispute and then the other. And Obama -- our philosopher-king, the Voice of Reason in an unreasonable world -- interprets and arbitrates these disputes, putting them in just the right context and arriving at just the right solution. Or so we are led to believe. The trouble is that Obama's approach at times distorts history and mistreats our closest allies.

...Obama's fourth "golden mean" deals with Israel and the Palestinians. In this section, Israel is portrayed as home to a historically persecuted people. Threatening Israel with destruction is "deeply wrong" and only serves to "evoke in the minds of Israelis this most painful of memories while preventing the peace that the people of this region deserve." At the same time, "it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people -- Muslims and Christians -- have suffered in pursuit of a homeland." The situation for the Palestinian people is "intolerable." America "will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own." The result is a "stalemate"; both sides have "legitimate aspirations" but also suffer from "a painful history that makes compromise elusive." We cannot see this conflict "only from one side or the other" because that will "be blind to the truth." And it is time to act on what everyone knows to be true: Israel will not go away and the Palestinians need a state. To that end, Palestinians must abandon violence. "Resistance through violence and killing is wrong and does not succeed," Obama said. "It is a sign of neither courage nor power to shoot rockets at sleeping children, or to blow up old women on a bus," he went on.

Israelis, on the other hand, must acknowledge that just as Israel's right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine's. The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop. Israel must also live up to its obligations to ensure that Palestinians can live, and work, and develop their society. And just as it devastates Palestinian families, the continuing humanitarian crisis in Gaza does not serve Israel 's security; neither does the continuing lack of opportunity in the West Bank . Progress in the daily lives of the Palestinian people must be part of a road to peace, and Israel must take concrete steps to enable such progress.

Among the problems with Obama's speech is that in order to make his narrative fit, he must manipulate history, sometimes subtly and sometimes not, sometimes by what he omits and sometimes by what he states...

...Then there is the issue of Israel and the Palestinians. What is troubling about Obama's account is the moral equivalence he asserts between Israel and the Palestinians is false. It also ignores what Israel is: democratic and lawful, willing to grant rights to its Arab citizens, willing to hold itself accountable for its mistakes, a country of bustling energy, entrepreneurial spirit, and a thriving civil society. Israel is among the most admirable and impressive nations in the world, and that we have ever seen. And all of this despite living in a region that for the most part despises her and in some instances wants to destroy her.

Beyond that, Obama perpetuates falsehoods, including the one that Israelis deny the Palestinian right to exist just as Palestinians deny Israel's right to exist. That is true only in rare cases, and in any event it fails to take into account Israel's many good-faith efforts to give the Palestinians a homeland, including in 2000, when Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered almost all of the territories the Palestinians had asked for. Yasir Arafat rejected the offer and began a second intifada. And in Gaza in 2005 Israel did what no other nation -- not the Jordanians, not the British, not anyone -- has ever done before: provide the Palestinians with the opportunity for self-rule. In response, Israel was shelled by thousands of rockets and mortar attacks. Hamas used Gaza as its launching point. Yet it is Israel , according to Obama, that must make yet more concessions and give up yet more land, as if stopping settlements will fundamentally transform Palestinian attitudes. It will not. The sine qua non for progress is for the Palestinian leadership to make its own inner peace with the Jewish state. If it did, as Jordan has, a Palestinian homeland would surely follow; and if it does not, peace is impossible. Israel has already shown it can make peace with Arab countries and give up huge swaths of land (like the Sinai Desert) if only those nations reconcile themselves to the existence of Israel and cast aside their violent animus toward her.

The suffering of the Palestinian people is real and tragic and needs to end. But the source of that suffering lies with a corrupt leadership and the complicity of other Arab nations. To cast all the blame on Israel is deeply unfair...

Obama's Bright Idea

...Rather than build confidence in the region Obama has spread anxiety and emboldened Israel’s foes to do what they have perfected over 60 years — just wait it out, foment the grievances of the Palestinian people and console themselves that furnished basements in Jerusalem are the moral equivalent of exploding buses.
Obama is all about honesty, he says. Well, he either honestly believes his distorted retelling of history or he’s doing this because he’s out of options. An honest explanation would have been that he hasn’t a clue how to stop the Iranians from getting nuclear weapons and he can’t begin to solve the Hamas-Fatah problem — so beat up on Israel. And when that doesn’t work (because the notion of stopping natural growth of neighborhoods in a democratic society is hooey) at least he can argue it was through no fault of his that we don’t have peace in our time.

Source: Jennifer Rubin

Charles Krauthammer Hammers Obama

Excerpts from:

The Settlements Canard

(at the Washington Post, it's entitled: "The Settlement Myth". The WashPost is too tender and there's a different version)

Obama the Humble declares there will be no more "dictating" to other countries...An admirable sentiment. It applies to everyone -- Iran, Russia, Cuba, Syria, even Venezuela. Except Israel. Israel is ordered to freeze all settlement activity.

...What's the issue? No "natural growth" means strangling to death the thriving towns close to the 1949 armistice line, many of them suburbs of Jerusalem, that every negotiation over the past decade has envisioned Israel retaining. It means no increase in population. Which means no babies...for every child born, someone has to move out. No community can survive like that. The obvious objective is to undermine and destroy these towns -- even before negotiations. To what end?

...why turn towns to rubble when, instead, Arabs and Jews can stay in their homes if the 1949 armistice line is shifted slightly into the Palestinian side to capture the major close-in Jewish settlements, and then shifted into Israeli territory to capture Israeli land to give to the Palestinians?...The entire "natural growth" issue is a concoction. It's farcical to suggest that the peace process is moribund because a teacher in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem is making an addition to her house to accommodate new grandchildren -- when Gaza is run by Hamas terrorists dedicated to permanent war with Israel and when Mahmoud Abbas, having turned down every one of Ehud Olmert's peace offers, brazenly declares that he is in a waiting mode -- waiting for Hamas to become moderate and for Israel to cave -- before he'll do anything to advance peace...

...Obama says he came to Cairo to tell the truth. But he uttered not a word of that. Instead, among all the bromides and lofty sentiments, he issued but one concrete declaration of new American policy: "The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements," thus reinforcing the myth that Palestinian misery and statelessness are the fault of Israel and the settlements. Blaming Israel and picking a fight over "natural growth" may curry favor with the Muslim "street." But it will only induce the Arab states to do like Abbas: sit and wait for America to deliver Israel on a platter. Which makes the Obama strategy not just dishonorable but self-defeating.

Read it all.

Backlash Beginning

Speech concerns some Israel backers

...some pro-Israel Democrats expressed concern about some of his remarks.

In what's become his trademark manner, Obama offered tough words for both Israelis and Palestinians in his address at Cairo University.

Rep. Eliot Engel (D-NY)...did concede there was one part of the speech he didn't agree with. “Where I have a problem is when settlements are mentioned alone,” he said, not in direct conjunction with steps Palestinians must take.

Obama’s firm statement on settlements have become a key concern for many American supporters of Israel, and especially those on the right side of American politics.

John Bolton, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under President Bush, seized on Obama's settlement remarks, saying, "When you criticize your strongest ally in an environment like that, it is intended to send a message to that ally.” .

Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), another outspoken supporter of Israel and a potential Senate candidate next year...warned, “The Palestinians and Hamas have humiliated the Western parties that have tried to work with them."

Staunch Israel allies on the Democratic side of the aisle were more laudatory, buffering Obama's domestic position with the Jewish community.

Rep. Nita Lowey (D-NY), chairwoman of the State and Foreign Operations Appropriations Subcommittee, praised the trip and the speech..."While compromise will be required on both sides, the Palestinians and Arab states must unequivocally denounce terrorism, recognize Israel, cease anti-Israel incitement at home and within the United Nations, and support viable PA institutions."

Some pro-Israel officials grumbled that Obama wasn’t more forceful in urging Arab states to follow the model of slain Egyptian president Anwar Sadat in recognizing the Jewish state.

Mostly, though, mainstream Israel advocates like AIPAC have held off of public criticism of the new president, and are trying to convince the administration to narrow its demands for a settlement freeze to apply only to settlements on land that is expected ultimately to form part of a Palestinian state.

On Historical and Religious Roots

From Ynet:

...speaking at an Israeli museum opening in the West Bank hours after US President Barack Obama called in a speech in Cairo for a halt in settlement construction...also attended by Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov (Yisrael Beiteinu), Head of the Civil Administration in the West Bank Brig. General Yoav Mordechai and Director-General of the Antiquities Authority Shuka Dorfman, as well as respected persons from the Christian, Muslim and Jewish communities...[Knesset Speaker Ruby Rivlin said]:

"The opening of this site as a museum is a refreshing building project in days in which there is a grave threat to the settlements and to the legitimacy of our presence here...Any opening of an important site such as this is a clear and significant statement that we have not abandoned these regions and will not cease in underscoring our national and historic roots in these areas...he added that his dedication speech was not meant to serve as a rebuttal to Obama's speech in Cairo a few hours prior, saying that "our commitment to this piece of land did not start today or with the beginning of President Obama's tenure. Cultural and archeological rehabilitation efforts began over 40 years ago."

...The museum, located along the Jersualem-Jericho road, sits in a spot affiliated with the Byzantine Empire – the location of the story of the good Samaritan. Even in the event of Israeli land concessions that include maintaining position of primary settlement blocks in the West Bank, the spot would not be likely to remain in Israeli hands.

The Obama Whamma

While a bit of narcissism is required to be a blogger, it would be foolish of me to write up a minor treatise of President Obama's 'Speech'.

So, we'll pick and paste:

1.

But Mr. Obama’s calibrated remarks also asked listeners in a region shaken by hatred to take two steps that have long been anathema: forgetting the past and understanding an opposing view. For a president who proclaimed a goal of asking people to listen to uncomfortable truths, it was clear that parts of his speech resonated deeply with his intended audience and others fell on deaf ears, in Israel as well as the Muslim world.

Obama has now announced [and said]:

‘And one of the points I want to make is, is that if you actually took the number of Muslim Americans, we’d be one of the largest Muslim countries in the world,’ Mr. Obama said.

Uh? Here are some statistics of the number and percentage of Muslims in various countries:

Indonesia: 207,105,000 (88.2%);

Pakistan: 167,430,801 (95%);

India: 156,254,615 (13.4%);

Turkey: 70,800,000 (99%);

Egypt: 70,530,237 (90%);

Nigeria: 64,385,994 (45%);

Iran: 64,089,571 (98%);

Algeria: 32,999,883 (99%);

Morocco: 32,300,410 (99%);

Afghanistan: 31,571,023 (99%)

Saudi Arabia: 26,417,599 (100%)

USA: 4,558,068 (1.5%)

Islam has demonstrated through words and deeds the possibilities of religious tolerance and racial equality.

And it only got worse. It was terrible. My heart is heavy for my country and the free world.

The media can spin their subjugation and adulation a million different ways, but America did not vote for a "Muslim presidency," which is what this is. Obama deceitfully hid his Muslim background and schooling and his agenda. Little did America know that Obama's objective would be a conversion of this nation to "the largest Muslim country in the world". From the moment he spoke as President, in the inaugural address, Islam was falsely given a preeminent place in the creation of America. In this speech, he quoted from the Koran three times. Why doesn't anybody comment on this? Why doesn't anyone ever comment on what he projected vs. what he is? Why won't all those talking heads state the obvious?

4.

Avigdor Lieberman can rest east after being berated for telling Mubarak that if doesn't want to come and visit Israel that he can go to hell.

Mubarak Absent from Obama Speech; Boycott or Coincidence?

5.

Barack Obama’s speech in Cairo is one of the most bizarre orations ever made by a U.S. president, not a foreign policy statement but rather something invented by Obama, an international campaign speech, as if his main goal was to obtain votes in the next Egyptian primary.

That approach defined Obama’s basic themes: Islam’s great. America is good. We’re sorry. Be moderate (not that you haven’t always been that way). Let’s be friends...[the speech's] effect on Middle East issues and U.S. interests is another matter entirely.

The first problem is that Obama said many things factually quite untrue, some ridiculously so. Pages would be required to list all these inaccuracies. The interesting question is whether Obama consciously lied or really believes it...

The second problem is the speech’s unnecessarily extreme one-sidedness. Obama portrays the West as the guilty party...In the Middle East if you say you’re to blame, that communicates to the other side that their cause is right and they're entitled to everything it wants. If you apologize, you’re weak...

Third, Obama undermined the existing states. True, to Obama's credit, he did talk about reform, democracy, and equal rights for women. Yet the speech suggests to listeners is: democracy plus Islam equals solution. If Islam is so perfect and has such a great record—except for a tiny minority of extremists—why shouldn’t it rule?..

Finally, Obama played into the stereotype that Israel is the central political issue in the region...Yet he in no way seemed to condition Palestinians getting a state on their record. His administration may think this way but he didn’t make that clear...Everything specific concerning Israel’s needs and demands--an end to incitement, security for Israel, end of terrorism, resettlement of refugees in Palestine—weren’t there. While Israel was specifically said to violate previous agreements on the construction within settlements issue—an assertion that’s flat-out wrong—there was no hint that the Palestinians had done so...

Thursday, June 04, 2009

Arab Settlements - It's Gaining

I suggested terming Arab villages inside Israel as "settlements".

This outlet seems to think the word isn't bad but applies it to Judea and Samaria:-

During a recent visit to Israel Waters spoke out against the wall on the West Bank, which aims to prevent terrorism but some argue actually harms Palestinian settlements.

Obama's Error

In suggesting that the Quran is the source for the principle that if one kills even one person, it is as if he has killed all of mankind President Obama erred.

The source is Jewish, Sanhedrin 4:5:

...for we find concerning Cain who killed his brother, it is written, "the bloods of your brother cry" (Genesis 4:10); it does not say, "your brother's blood" but "bloods" - his blood and the blood of his offspring.

Another interpretation of "brother's bloods" - his blood was dashed on the trees and on the stones. Therefore man was created singly, to teach you that whoever destroys a single soul of Israel, Scripture accounts it as if he had destroyed a full world; and whoever saves one soul of Israel, Scripture accounts it as if he had saved a full world. And for the sake of peace among men, that one should not say to his fellow, "My father is greater than yours;" and that heretics should not say, "There are many powers in Heaven." Again, to declare the greatness of the Holy One, blessed be He, for man stamps out many coins with one die, and they are all alike, but the King, the King of kings, the Holy One, blessed be He, stamped each man with the seal of Adam, and not one of them is like his fellow. Therefore each and every one is obliged to say, "For my sake the world was created." And lest you say, "What do we need with this trouble?" Has it not already been said, "He being a witness, whether he has seen or known, if he does not utter it..." (Leviticus 5:1). And should you say, "What need is there for us to be
responsible for the blood of this one?" Surely it is said, "And when the wicked perish, there is joy" (Proverbs 11:10).

UPDATE

Dr. Andrew Bostom wrote:

Immediately following the murderous acts of jihad terrorism committed on September 11, 2001, Ibn Warraq highlighted the tragic irony of many apologists quoting selectively from Qur’an 5:32-“whoso slays a soul . . . shall be as if he had slain mankind altogether; and whoso gives life to a soul, shall be as if he has given life to mankind altogether”- attempting to demonstrate that the Qur’ran disapproved of violence and killing.

Firstly, these wonderful sounding words come from a preexisting Jewish text (Mishnah, IV Division 5), “Thus was created a single man, to teach us that every person who loses a single soul, it shall be written about him as if he has lost the entire world, and every person who sustains a single soul, it shall be written about him as if he has sustained the entire world.”

And apologists for Islam-just like President Obama-quote the Koranic words out of context. For the very next verse offers quite a different meaning from that of 5:32, which was “laid…down for the Israelites,” as stated in verse, 5:33, continuing:

“…Our apostles brought them [the Jews] veritable proofs: yet it was not long before many of them committed great evils in the land. Those that make war against Allah and His apostle [Muhammad] and spread disorder shall be put to death or crucified or have their hands and feet cut off on alternate sides, or be banished from the country. (Qur’an 5:33)”

What's Unique In This Picture?

In Saudi Arabia yesterday in the King's Palace:

That's right, the Saudi King is stitting next to a Jew and a former serviceman in the IDF.

The Raising...and Lowering of Outpost "Pnei Shiloh"

A few people decided to "establish" an outpost community next to Shiloh, on the other side of Highway 60, on an abandoned army base.

I didn't take part but Yonah Tzoref provdied me with a few pictures from which I have selected these:

It's up:

It's being reviewed:

It's being filmed and recorded:

It's down:

The Border Police woman making sure it becomes history:

Good For Malcolm

...some early signals from the administration already have some American Jews worried. Weeks of public and private jousting by the Obama administration with Israel and its American Jewish supporters have taken a toll so great that even the president’s scheduled trip to the former Nazi concentration camp at Buchenwald, Germany elicited this reaction.

“Frankly I’m much more concerned about living Jews than paying tribute to dead Jews,” said Malcolm Hoenline, executive director of the Conference of Major Jewish Organizations.

Source

Three Letters-to-the-Editor at the NYT

Here:-

To the Editor:

Let’s remember that Israel is the only country that gave land to the Palestinians for their autonomous rule. Jordan and Egypt did not do so during the 19 years that they controlled the West Bank and Gaza, but Israel did so by withdrawing from Gaza four years ago. The Palestinian response was not peaceful coexistence, but missiles and terror.

Settlements are not the problem here. Israel has destroyed settlements and displaced its citizens from their homes in Gaza. But the Palestinians didn’t build peaceful towns in the settlements; they used them as missile launching pads.

The world needs to avoid distractions, like settlements and border details, and focus on Arab willingness to live in peace. Peace means no missiles, no terror, no kidnappings.

Until the Arabs are willing to accept peace, Israeli overtures will go the same way as the Gaza withdrawal.

Bruce Dov Krulwich
Beit Shemesh, Israel, June 3, 2009

•

To the Editor:

Re “Obama on Obama,” by Thomas L. Friedman (column, June 3):

If President Obama believes that “nowhere is truth-telling more important than the Middle East,” he should be telling the truth to the Palestinians on what is the most fundamental issue underlying the conflict: Israel is a Jewish state and Palestinian refugees will “return” to the nascent Palestinian state, not to Israel.

It is not sufficient to tell the Palestinians that they must stop incessant incitement against Israel and Jews. The truth goes much deeper than that. They must be told that the war of 1948 is truly over and that their future lies in building their own state. But this truth always seems too delicate to broach.

This is not an issue that can be shuffled off to final-status negotiations. If a meaningful peace process is to begin, Israelis must see that the Palestinians acknowledge Israel’s core issue, just as Israel is expected to acknowledge the Palestinians’ core issue.

Perhaps most important, the Palestinian leadership must embrace the truth in order to prepare its people for peace.

Gregg M. Mashberg
New Rochelle, N.Y., June 3, 2009

•

To the Editor:

Re “Israel and U.S. Can’t Close Split on Settlements” (front page, June 2):

This split stems from a significant disconnect that should not be chalked up to mere semantics. Rather, the descriptive language used in defining this split reveals its depth.

The Obama administration views the Israeli presence in the West Bank as unlawful because the settlements sit on occupied territory; the Netanyahu administration views the Israeli presence in the West Bank as lawful because the settlements sit on disputed territory.

Referring to all Jewish communities in the West Bank as “settlements” suggests that each is a far-reaching outpost isolated from Jewish population centers when many are just “suburbs” of Jerusalem. Only final borders arrived at through direct and unconditional negotiations among the principals will end this Israeli-United States split.

David S. Kasdan
Cortlandt Manor, N.Y., June 2, 2009

Saudi "Settlements"

Minority Saudi Shi'ites get land near Yemen border

Ismaili Shi'ites, a majority in the Najran area but a minority in mainly Sunni Saudi Arabia, have long complained of discrimination and poor living standards.

Saudi authorities are keen to improve security along the border with Yemen, a country they see as a possible staging post for attacks against them by al-Qaida. State news agency SPA said late on Sunday that King Abdullah had decided to allocate about 1,200 sq km (463 sq miles) to people in Najran.

Mohammad al-Askar, a leading Ismaili activist, said...40,000 Najranis were waiting for land, some of them for 20 years. "The king has answered some of the aspirations of the Najrani people. This decision will improve the living standards of Najranis," Askar told Reuters. "People in Najran have been celebrating since this morning."

...While Najran's Shi'ites are natural enemies of Sunni al-Qaida, analysts and diplomats say the land distribution should help deter them from turning to other illegal activities such as smuggling. Saudi Arabia and Yemen share a long mountainous border porous enough to be used for all sorts of trafficking, from illegal Muslim pilgrims to drugs and weapons.

King Abdullah last year removed Najran's governor after the Ismaili Shi'ites complained about efforts to settle Sunnis of Yemeni origin and give them housing and jobs in an effort to further marginalize Ismailis. Violent clashes broke out in 2000 between hundreds of Ismailis and the police in Najran.

Last week, some 181 Ismaili citizens asked the new governor, a son of the king, to pacify the impoverished area by ending discrimination and improving living standards. Saudi media have reported plans to improve Najran infrastructure and the government is setting up an industrial hub in nearby Jizan province to create jobs in the relatively poor south.

Wednesday, June 03, 2009

Avishai vs. The Temple Mount

Bernard Avishai has a post over a TPM entitled Holy Jerusalem.

Some excerpts:

Imagine that both the Islamic world and the Palestinian nation suddenly agreed that the mosques on the Noble Sanctuary in Jerusalem's old city were not that holy after all; that the Jews were welcome to take them down and build a temple if they wanted to. Could Jews really want this? Okay, forget the animal sacrifices. I mean a temple that, whatever its rites, purports to be ground zero of divinity, the building of buildings on the spot of spots--the here and now of a holy of holies. If Jews believed in such things would they be practicing Judaism at all?

and

Similarly, the Wailing Wall (whose sovereignty is not in dispute) is "holy" in for most every Jew. The night my son was born, in June 1973, I myself cradled my head in its stones and shared my joy with my deceased parents. But I did not do so because I thought I was close to the destroyed ancient arc of the covenant. Rather, I thought I was close to the ghosts of the many Jews who had wept there before me, nursing their losses and mysterious hopes.

Anyway, Jews who claim the Temple Mount today mean holy in a more muscular sense than this. Their Psalmist's Hebrew often sounds like a mental straight-jacket. They imply that the soil of the mount carries traces of God's existence, like basements carry radon. They mean holy in the take-off-your-sandals sense of the word: objectively dangerous, not subjectively poignant. They mean something they are prepared to take on the whole world for, fight and die (and kill) for. Is this Judaism?

and

The wall suggests the supersession of a form of worship which has been long abandoned, and was challenged by Pharisees even in its time--abandoned for good (Hegel might say cunning) reasons that Roman centurions could hardly understand when they tore the temple down: a self-perpetuating priesthood, a hierarchy of fetishists, a sacrificial cult, a comic understanding of sin.

Sidra insists that, after the temple was destroyed, Jews were left, not with divine places or stuff, but only metaphor (God is like this, God is like that). This invitation to poetic innovation engendered our talent for freedom. The Wailing Wall's holiness depends on the Temple Mount being bare of anything meaningful to Jews except for the reminder of the immensity of absence itself. The wall is the evocative symbol (in a religion of symbols) of what is no longer there and, by itself, no longer evocative.

and finally

In any case, something new is happening in this city, and it isn't either the Judaism I knew as a child or a return to an ancient practice. It is a hybrid politicized religion, if that's the word; a new a claim of return, much like Mussolini's claim to return to Rome; a claim carried by ward-of-the-state orthodox families averaging seven children each, reinforced by neo-Zionist devotion to settlement, and a deep sense of grievance over a more recent destruction of European life, what Sidra calls Judaism's new "ruined shrines."

Make no mistake: the people who wish this new Jerusalem to rise will not be talked out of their goals, certainly not by speeches or editorials (or bloggers). The only hope is that what's left of Israel's secular majority will be pushed, and supported, by what's left of the West to stop them.

So, I left this comment there:

Allow me to pick up on one point of fact rather than dispute Avishai's ideological points. He writes: "Similarly, the Wailing Wall (whose sovereignty is not in dispute)". Really?

Let's ignore Arafat's refusal to recognize the past existence of a Temple at Moriah - which would mean the Kotel is bereft of any significance. But Arafat did orient himself not only on Islamic exclusivism of any Jewish link to "Palestine" but on this document: REPORT of the Commission appointed by His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, with the approval of the Council of the League of Nations, to determine the rights and claims of Moslems and Jews in connection with the Western or Wailing Wall at Jerusalem, December, 1930

As I have explained (here), not only do the Pals. reject any Jewishness in a religious sense, but the Jewish nationalism that extends from that. Avishai could not only cradle his head in the Wall's stones, he could even bang it against them for all it would help his approach to the hostility, antagonism and outright negation the Pals. possess towards any form of Zionism and anything to do with non-Islamic sovereignty over the Kotel.

And that's a fact.