Monday, September 29, 2008

Left's Lies Leave Left Looney & Limp

First, there was the Avishai Raviv GSS agent provocateur case as a sideline to the Rabin "incitement" in 1995. I discovered that the infamous cemetery swearing-in ceremony was staged and Raviv's identity began to unravel.

Now, we just had this oddly composed flyer in the Sternhell bombing which indicates not all is as it would seem, or how the Left/Media would want it to seem.

And after that, coincidentally (?), we had a Beduin shot.

And we all know who killed him, right? Yes, the Right.
The fanatic, extreme, radical, messianic, settler Right.

Wrong.



Police: Bedouin killed by unexploded ordnance

The Bedouin shepherd whose body was found Sunday near the community of Gitit in the Jordan Rift Valley was apparently killed by the explosion of a 40 mm grenade, a police autopsy has found.

The authorities published their findings Monday in a forensics report stating that the youth expired after losing massive quantities of blood, due to a wounded artery in his neck. Police postulated that the shepherd found the unexploded grenade – of the type fired by an M-203 launcher – and picked it up, which caused it to detonate. Palestinians had initially claimed that the 17-year old youth, Yehie Ata Bani Minia, had been shot by settlers...Bedouin witnesses residing in the area were interrogated, as police attempted to find out where the boy may have been shot. Later the remains of the grenade were found at the scene of the youth's death.

MK Uri Ariel (National Union-NRP) responded to the police findings and said, "For two days leftists, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Minister Haim Ramon and Defense Minister Ehud Barak have been concocting connections between the pipe bomb at Prof. Sternhell's home, the Rabin assassination, and the death of the Bedouin near Gitit – and blaming the settlers for violence and unlawful acts.

"Media correspondents and editors were quick to verbally attack 300,000 people in their usual manner, prior to a police investigation. "The Israeli Left is acting irresponsibly, time after time. It identifies totally with the enemy's claims, and when it discovers an opportunity to harm its political rivals it does so without a second thought."
(Kippah tip: BT)


Oh my, what will the Left and Media do next?


P.S. Did those Beduin really think that we wouldn't discover they were lying? What do they take us for?

Pauls' Best Wishes



Shana Tova = Happy New Year

Ahalan = How are you all!

(Kippah tip: Erin)

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

By the way, Paul's children are Jewish:

McCartney was born Linda Louise Eastman, the second-eldest of four children, to Jewish-American parents in New York City. She grew up in the wealthy Scarsdale area of Westchester County, New York and graduated from Scarsdale High School in 1960. Her father, Lee Eastman, was the son of Jewish-Russian immigrants. He changed his name from Leopold Vail Epstein to Lee Eastman. Her mother was Louise Sara Lindner Eastman—heiress to the Lindner Department Store fortune

Olmert Doesn't Know What "Critical Terrain" Is

Bill Mehlman of AFSI reminds us all of what Ehud Olmert has forgotton. Judea and Samaria, according to the Americans, is "critical terrain".

As he writes:

Nobody There But Us Facts On The Ground
William Mehlman

“There is no ‘there’ there,” Gertrude Stein famously remarked of her Oakland, California birthplace.

The “there,” whose thereness is conjectural at best in the minds of half the Israeli populace, is Judea and Samaria. Its definition is also a matter of conjecture. When former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert contemplated the 98.1 percent of it he sought to lay at the feet of Mahmoud Abbas in the mother of all “confidence-building measures,” he thought of places like Yitzhar and Eli and Tapuach. Mr. Abbas, who has been scouting digs in Ma’ale Adumim, French Hill, Gilo, Givat Ze’ev and other Jerusalem neighborhoods for himself and his PA nomenclatura must find that amusing.

...The reddest of those lines, defining the absolute limits to Israel’s territorial flexibility, oddly enough were drawn not by the IDF but by the U.S. Defense Department, specifically in a June 29, 1967 memorandum prepared by the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) under its chairman, General Earle G. Wheeler . The memorandum, a terse two-page affair with a three- page appendix and a strategic map of Israel and its immediate neighbors, was prepared in response to the Defense Secretary’s request for a post-Six Day War assessment of the “minimum territory…Israel might be justified in retaining in order to permit a more effective defense against possible conventional Arab arrack and terrorist raids.”...the Joint Chief’s memorandum blows every Kadima argument for redrawing the map of Israel clear out of the water.

As stated by the Joint Chiefs, none of whom were reported to have been Zionists, “militarily defensible borders…based on acceptable tactical principles, such as control of commanding terrain, use of natural obstacles, elimination of enemy-held salients and provisions of defense in-depth for important facilities and installations” would require Israel to hold on to all of Judea south of Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip, key portions of the Sinai, the Golan Heights and more than half of Samaria, contiguous with a thickening of the Jerusalem corridor.

...Little wonder that the Joint Chiefs’ memorandum was buried under a “classified” blanket for 16 years after it was written, ignored by eight U.S. presidents. The concept of a PLO state to rule the areas enumerated as critical to Israel’s defense by America’s top military commanders may have been the handiwork of Israel’s unhinged Left, but as Smith points out, “the U.S. doctrine of withdrawal almost to the 1949 armistice lines led to Resolution 242 adopted by the UN five months after the Johnson administration received the JCS memo. The fact was that the military logic of Israel’s territorial defense requirements was of small consequence when compared with the need to pacify the Arab countries…” The JCS memorandum thus became the skunk at the garden party.

The skunk may have been locked away, but it refused to die. Lt. General Thomas Kelly, a diplomatically insouciant armored corps officer and one time director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, trotted it out for a public airing in 1991, shortly after the Gulf War. Kelly had the temerity to attach the label “critical terrain” to the mountains of Samaria and Judea as well as their approaches. “If an enemy secures these passes,” he declared, “Jerusalem and all of Israel becomes uncovered. Without the West Bank, Israel is only eight miles wide at its narrowest point. That makes it indefensible.”...


Would you like to see this as maps?

Slide show lecture here.

Sunday, September 28, 2008

A Philological & Semantic Analysis of the "Terror Flyer"

In addition to what I already have noted (here), Steve Plaut sent me some of his thoughts which include these "observations":

- Sternhell's political outlook and opinions were repugnant before the attack and did not become any less repugnant because of the attack.

- Radical Leftist sedition does not become legitimized because of the
attack on Sternhell, no matter who carried it out.

- Critics of the radical Left do not become delegitimized because of
the attack on Sternhell, no matter who carried it out.

- Critics of Prof. Sternhell's opinions have as much right to express
their criticisms as Sternhell himself has to express his.


But there is more to this act of violence, in my humble opinion.

Let's take a look at the flyer left at the scene and try a bit of semantic and philological analysis.



My observations:

1. There is no ב"ה or בס"ד, usual heading of religious persons writing. Those abbreviations mean "with God's help".

2. The signature "the Army of the Statist Liberators" is ridiculous. The whole concept of ממלכתי, i.e., supporting the state is anathema to the radical natioanlist right.

3. Why announce an award of 1.1 million NIS? 1.1??? What was that, a typo?

4. The state of Israel is described as the "dream" (חלום) of the past 2000 years. Religious/nationalists would use the word "vision" (חזון).

5. In the list of weapons that Israel has handed over to the PA is included מכונות ירי (and why not יריה?) which is a fairly archaic term for machine guns which may indicate someone over 65. A youngster who has actually served in the army would use תת-מקלעים or straight out קלצ'ניקובים - Klatchnikovs.

6. The use of the Hebrew term for "Palestinians" is פלשתינאים which is not usual. Either פלסטינים or ערבים - Arabs would have been used.

7. The inclusion of "sins" of the state of Israel of abortion encouragement would indicate Hareidi groups, not nationalists.

8. The same for the inclusion of encouragement of "gay pride parades".

9. The use of מלכות יהודה - Kingdon of Judea instead of the Kahanist demand for מדינת יהודה - State of Judea also indicates to me Hareidi or GSS composition.

10. Sternhell isn't mentioned in the flyer and the addition of the 1.1 NIS reward for the murder of Peace Now leaders is an addition, with a different typeface.

Something is fishy.

And see here, too.


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

P.S. Consider this in relation the above:

26/09/2008
In the name of patriotism
By Avner de-Shalit, head of the Department of Political Science at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

At the time of writing, the identity of the person or group that placed a bomb at the entrance of Prof. Zeev Sternhell's home is not yet clear. However, they should be aware that this abominable act will not deter Prof. Sternhell, or any other member of academia, from having his say. Just as it is impossible to prevent painters from painting, it is impossible to prevent scholars from trying to discover the truth and publish their conclusions, even if they are controversial.

Of course, we must not get carried away into making collective accusations. The attempt to harm Prof. Sternhell was not carried out by "the right" or "the settlers." But even if a "small handful" or "extremists" are responsible for it, it serves as a sad example of the state of Israeli society on the eve of Rosh Hashanah 5769 and testifies to the prevailing atmosphere.

That is because it reflects a society that on the one hand is frighteningly violent, and on the other does not exhibit enough will to confront violence. These patterns of violence, which are taken from the repertoire of the criminal underworld, include phone threats, written threats, and in the end a physical attack or attempted assassination. They are directed against the ideological "other" - someone whose views not only differ from those of the violent group, but who is not "one of ours." In this atmosphere, a person who criticizes the country in general or the settlement enterprise in particular is certainly not a good Jew, so he is "other," not only in his opinions but also in terms of the group he is affiliated with. From here it is a short path to threats and physical attack.

The attempt to harm Prof. Sternhell is also an example in another sense. If it really was done by people from the right, as seems to be the case at the moment, it proves the extent to which the concepts "Zionism" and "patriotism" have become empty of content, or simply have had their content distorted.

After all, who was the target of this attack? Prof. Sternhell is one of Israeli society's and Zionist history's outstanding figures. A person who lost everything he held most dear in the Holocaust, but survived, immigrated to Israel, became an army officer, a teacher and one of the greatest scholars in Israel and the world over. Prof. Sternhell has devoted the past 40 years to researching fascism and the rise of the radical right in Europe - the Jew who rose from the ruins of the Holocaust and pointed an accusing finger at fascism and its sources, without an inferiority complex, but with pride, a unique academic sensitivity and while remaining faithful to the principles of research.

Prof. Sternhell's research deals with intolerance, political hatred, anti-enlightenment and fascism. He has won international recognition and admiration, as well as the Israel Prize, but has also been the target of a great deal of violence and hatred. Any violence is unacceptable and deserves condemnation, but we should stop for a moment and think: What have we come to if those who speak in the name of patriotism attack a man like that?

Therefore all of us - including the spiritual leaders of those whose opinions are not the same as Prof. Sternhell's - are obliged to wake up and strongly condemn the act, educate toward nonviolence, and explain to their students that love of the land should not be separated from love of man, which also means tolerance for a person's views and opinions. We must also demand that the legislature and law-enforcement authorities do not make light of threats of this kind. We must not allow a climate that tolerates violence.

The Sarah Palin Beauty Contest Clip

Israel Running out of Territories for Peace

Some people think that it's lucky for Israel that Ehud Olmert has resigned (but not yet been replaced) as Prime Minister of Israel. Olmert seems to be running an End-of-Season Sale.

For according to this news report, it would appear that Israel is running out of land to fulfill the policy of "territories for peace".

Olmert said to offer Palestinians Jordan Valley land swap

Outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has offered the Palestinians sovereignty over the Jordan Valley, in exchange for Israel retaining three main settlement blocs in the West Bank, Army Radio reported on Sunday.


Since the Arabs continue to claim that all of Israel is "colonized Palestine", that Tel Aviv is a "settlement" and that Jewish rule in Jerusalem where King David established his kingdom some 1600 before Muhammed announced desert visions and where Abraham (Ibrahim in the Quran) offered his bound son Isaac as a sacrifice some 3500 years earlier, is outright theft and a sacrilegious act, Olmert's offer will probably be rebuffed.

As a last try, we understand that Olmert will be offering the PA envelopes in addition as well as some of his wife's paintings. The latter, we fear, might cause more terror attacks.

Girl Meets Boy; Girl's Name Before Boy's

Dr. Michal Hertz and Benjamin Lee Shargel were married Saturday in Brooklyn. Rabbi Burt Aaron Siegel officiated at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

The couple will use the surname Hertz-Shargel.



Source

vs.

Julie Patricia Binder, a daughter of Sue Alexander Binder and Dr. James P. Binder of Wausau, Wis., was married Saturday evening to Joshua Max Feldman, a son of Katherine Vorwerk and Robert S. Feldman of Amherst, Mass. Rabbi Dan Danson officiated at the American Club, a resort hotel in Kohler, Wis.

Ms. Binder, 26, is keeping her name.



Source

Olmert's Other Envelope or, The Real Tragedy

The envelope that announces the support, love and backing of Israel's leading cultural and media elite, that is.

Here, Ethan Bronner explains in today's NYTImes:-


But it turns out that there are others who deeply regret Mr. Olmert’s departure: many in the nation’s peace camp. Never mind, they say, that Mr. Olmert came from the hawkish right and that they despised him for decades; he now embraces the need for a negotiated peace accord with the Palestinians, and indeed the entire Arab world, as a practical necessity and possibility, in a way that no other Israeli leader ever has. And now, having allowed himself to be dragged down by money, he will not be able to bring his efforts to fruition. This, they say, is the Greek tragedy of Ehud Olmert.

“I never voted for Olmert in my life but this year I really grew to like and respect him,” remarked Ron Pundak, who runs the Peres Peace Center and has been active in coexistence efforts for years. “He developed empathy for the other side, for its past tragedy and its present tragedy. And he understood that it is in Israel’s long-term interest to end that tragedy with a two-state solution.”


Oh, and how does the NYT entitle this piece?

Yep, just like an Israeli journalist would:

Israel’s Demi-Greek Tragedy

And that's the real tragedy.

Why?

Lack of logic.
Lack of learning from your mistakes.
Lack of learning from your enemy's mistakes.
And lack of response/rebuttal from his political opponents. There's no balance here.


Like here:-


Mr. Olmert, he said, is part of a group of one-time rightists who now seek a negotiated two-state solution largely because of a change in Palestinian attitudes. “He would say that today there is a real partner that seeks reconciliation and peace,” the aide said of Mr. Olmert. “It’s not just I who has changed, but the Palestinians as well.”

In truth, Mr. Olmert’s public statements over the past year show a worldview almost indistinguishable from that of Israel’s left - those who have long favored a return of all or nearly all of the territory Israel won in the 1967 war in exchange for promises of peace from Palestinians and the rest of the Arab world.

So discerning.
Actually, it is good to read newspapers.

You can learn a lot.


P.S.

And there is hope -


Nahum Barnea...said in an interview that...since most Israelis have little faith in the current Palestinian leadership or the likelihood of a peace deal being enforced by it, Mr. Olmert’s embrace of negotiations has been largely dismissed as inconsequential.



P.P.S. Remember this piece?

Watch the Watch...band

I thought I saw something a bit odd in this photograph from Friday's Maariv newspaper of Benjamin Netanyahu:



Then I spotted it:



First off, Bibi is lefthanded.

How many people do you know who write lefthanded and wear their watches on that same hand?

Second, the band.

I would have thought a metal band, either silver of gold, plated or not.

But material (leather?). Is that stylish today?

Bakri's Bosom (No, Not Omar the Cleric)

Well, lookee here:



The story of this rather revealing picture?

Revealed: Radical cleric Bakri's pole-dancer daughter

As the daughter of firebrand cleric Omar Bakri Mohammed, Yasmin Fostok might be expected to share his fanatical beliefs. But the radical Muslim's daughter has ditched his extreme interpretation of Islam - as well as most of her clothing.
The busty blonde has been revealed as a topless, tattooed pole dancer...

...She grew up a devout Muslim and in her teens wore a veil. She left school in Enfield at 16 after her parents arranged a marriage to a Turk but the couple separated.

She told The Sun: 'I've done pole dancing, but I like to keep it quiet.

'I don't normally do topless work, but I'm willing to go topless if the venue is right.'

She said she did not get on with her father. 'His views are nothing to do with me,' she added. 'I am an adult, my own person. I do my business and he does his.'...

...But last night Bakri's protests he know nothing about his daughter's new lifestyle were undermined by claims he personally paid for her to have a breast enlargement operation. According to The Sun, he paid £4,000 in cash to a clinic in London for the operation that launched her career as a pole dancer. A friend told the newspaper: 'Her dad's ashamed of her behaviour but she'd never have become a pole dancer if he hadn't paid for her bigger boobs.



I guess it happens to the best...and the worst.

And he's the fellow who threatened Paul McCartney.

(Kippah tip: Zalmi)

HH #184

Haveil Havalim here.

Sneaking Toward and Into Jerusalem

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?


The Second Coming,
William Butler Yeats
November 1920



Mark Mackinnon has published an almost literary description of a Muslim pilgrim's trek to reach his holy site in Canada's Globe & Mail entitled, "Going through hell to reach heaven" on Sept. 27 but it lacks two very salient and interelated facts.

The first is that for all his overt sympathy for the Muslim's plight, he does not inform his readers that, on the other side of the coin, Jews are prohibited from praying at the very same site.

They may visit but no overt religious devotional acts are permitted as they are considered a disturbance of the public order which, in reality, means Muslim sensitivities.

The second is that in quoting Mr. Deek saying, "the more of us who go there, the stronger the Islamic side of the argument will be", it should have been emphasized that while Israel at least partially, subject to security considerations, allows tens of thousands of Muslim worshippers there, it acts against its own Jewish self-interests by forbidding any Jewish worship and weakens its own case.

Of course, he didn't know when he penned his piece of this development:-

Arabs Attack Jews near Patriarchs' Cave

(IsraelNN.com) Arabs attacked two Jewish youths with stones and foreign objects Saturday night and then stoned soldiers who were called to rescue them. One of the youths was hospitalized with a broken nose. The attackers escaped.


I guess Muslims attacking Jews to prevent them from reaching another holy site is not newsworthy enough to rate an extensive journalism piece. Or is it?

Mark, if you're reading this, perhaps a story on how Muslims violently and with malice aforethought seek to limit the religious freedom of Jews?


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

P.S. I wasn't referring to this song, the lyrics of which are based on Yeats' poem but if you like it, here it is:


Gee, Me Agreeing With Kissinger

“Senator McCain is right. I would not recommend the next President of the United States engage in talks with Iran at the Presidential level. My views on this issue are entirely compatible with the views of my friend Senator John McCain. We do not agree on everything, but we do agree that any negotiations with Iran must be geared to reality.”

Henry Kissinger

And Now, A Priest's Tale

I've been smacking around a few Rabbis lately (here, about Rabbi Lynn and here, concerning Rabbi Steve). So, let's have a priest's tale:-

Suit: Priest Counsels Couple, Then Moves In With Wife

JOLIET -- A west suburban man is suing a former Catholic priest for allegedly providing marriage counseling to the man and his estranged wife, then quitting the church and moving in with the wife.

Stephen Crane of Elmhurst filed the lawsuit in Will County Circuit Court against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Joliet and Christopher Floss, a former priest at the Elmhurst Visitation Parish.The suit seeks damages relating to his divorce and the breakup of the family. Crane accuses Floss of professional negligence, infliction of emotional distress and alienation of affection. The church is charged with negligent supervision and retention of the priest. According to the suit, Stephen and Maureen Crane sought marriage counseling from Floss in the spring of 2006 at the church rectory.

But in October 2006, at Floss' suggestion, Maureen Crane began individual counseling with Floss, both at the church and in the family home, the suit claims. Those sessions occurred almost daily, and Floss also began E-mailing Maureen Crane regularly, the suit claims. In December 2006, the church choir arranged a pilgrimage to Rome, and Floss advised the couple to take the trip, where he would renew their marriage vows, the suit claims. However, while in Rome in January 2007, Maureen Crane asked her husband for a divorce.

The suit claims that upon his return home, Stephen Crane was advised by his daughter that her mother had said she was in love with Floss, but it was supposed to be a secret, the suit claims. Others in the parish notified of the affair told Stephen Crane they were not surprised to learn of the inappropriate relationship. The suit claims that later in January 2007, Floss left the priesthood, and in February 2007, Maureen Crane left the family home to move in with Floss at a residence in Woodridge.

BBC Self-Censors

I read this at the JPost:

London police said they arrested three men under the Terrorism Act early Saturday. The arrests were near the home of the publisher of a forthcoming book about the Prophet Muhammad.


And sure enough, it is also reported at BBC, but with one major difference:-

Three men held under terror act

The men, aged 40, 22 and 30 have been taken to Paddington Green police station where they remain in custody.

They were arrested under the Terrorism Act 2000 on suspicion of the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism.

It is thought that the men were suspected of attempting to set fire to a publishers in Islington, north London, the BBC understands.
A small fire was put out at a property in Lonsdale Square.

Two of the men were stopped by armed officers and arrested in the street and the third was stopped in a car at 0225 GMT on Saturday.

The men were arrested by officers from the Metropolitan Police's Counter Terrorism Command in a pre-planned, intelligence-led operation.

Two men were arrested outside a property in Lonsdale Square, and the third following an armed vehicle stop near Angel Tube station on Upper Street.

Police are searching four properties in Walthamstow, Ilford and Forest Gate.


That's right - no Muhammed.

Where did the Islamic connection go?

Censored?

The London Times is more forthright:-

SCOTLAND YARD’S counter-terrorist command yesterday foiled an alleged plot by Islamic extremists to kill the publisher of a forthcoming novel featuring sexual encounters between the Prophet Muhammad and his child bride. Early yesterday
armed undercover officers arrested three men after a petrol bomb was pushed through the door of the north London home of the book’s publisher. The Metropolitan police said the target of the assassination plot, the Dutch publisher Martin Rynja, had not been injured.
Thanks for a private press.

Another Member of the League of Trembling Israelites

So, this was the reason for not inviting Sarah Palin to the anti-A rally?

Rabbi Steve Gutow, executive director of the liberal-leaning JCPA,



told the Forward that the decision was motivated not by politics but by tax considerations. The organizations feared that having an unbalanced panel of politicians could put their not-for-profit 501(c)(3) status in jeopardy, especially in the final 60 days of the presidential campaign, Gutow explained.

“The tax issue was the most important factor,” he said. “We had lawyers telling us this would violate the tax code. There is no question we would never put our tax status at risk.”


In other words, he and others feared that a liberal, multicultural candidate who has made sure his relatives overseas are properly cared for would dare to touch the tax status of one the "the most powerful lobby groups" (as the antisemites keep reminding us all) and his liberal progressive party and fellow politicans would do the same?

Is he crazy?

Does he take us for idiots?

The tax-exempt status would be at risk - and Gutow wouldn't protest and wouldn't mobilize others to do the same? He isn't an activist?

Oh, he is.

Steve, it seems, is not only an "activist", (- a la Obama?) but way before being a Rabbi:

Steve Gutow, Executive Director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, is an activist, organizer, attorney, rabbi, and advocate for social justice


But the funniest thing (okay, I'm being sarcastic) is that he was willing to go to jail two years ago for Darfur but today, he's scared so much that he would not protest the tax-exempt status of the Presidents' Conference.

I’m going to jail. Along with interfaith religious leaders, members of Congress, and others, I am going to be arrested in Washington, D.C., today outside the Embassy of Sudan in a public protest of the continuing genocide in Darfur.


Another member of The League of Trembling Israelites.

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Paul Newman Accepted The Challenge



Odd that both the New York Times and the BBC, two of the biggest new sites don't list "Exodus" among the first list of Newman's films.



The LATimes doesn't include the film in the list of his "best films" to be picked by readers. CNN includes it.

And it goes without saying that this part of his biography is missing:

His father was Jewish and his mother was born to a Slovak Catholic family at Ptičie (formerly Peticse) in the former Kingdom of Hungary, now in Slovakia...Newman had described himself as Jewish, stating that, "it's more of a challenge".[Skow, John. - "Verdict on a Superstar". - TIME. - December 6, 1982]



A short film clip from 1959 on the filming of "Exodus" can be seen here.

So, his Jewish background and Israel connection are avoided by mainline media outlets. They couldn't face the challenge.

Friday, September 26, 2008

And Talking About Treif vs. Kosher

I just mentioned this matter in this previous post.

Rabbis to Form Task Force on Kosher Food

Responding to accusations of abuse of workers at the nation’s largest kosher slaughterhouse, an organization of Orthodox Jewish rabbis announced that it was forming a task force to devise Jewish principles and ethical guidelines on the kosher food industry and business in general. The group, the Rabbinical Council of America, said it would publish the results in a guide. Rabbi Asher Meir, an author and expert in Jewish business ethics, will lead the task force. The kosher industry has come under scrutiny since a May 12 raid at Agriprocessors in Postville, Iowa, resulted in the arrest of nearly 400 illegal immigrants in one of the nation’s largest such cases. State officials say dozens of under-age workers were employed there in violation of child labor laws.

Treif

Treif is the Hebrew word for very non-kosher.

Like in describing this meal:-


a group of Jews had dinner with the Iranian President Thursday in New York.

...Ahmadinejad said. "Zionism is a political party that has nothing to do with Jewish people."

The Iranian leader gave a lengthy discourse on the need for religion in both private and public life, and the decline of morality in countries where politicians reject religion.

..."A lot of it was very challenging," said Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb who was also a speaker. She said that while Ahmadinejad had not denied the Holocaust in his speech (whew!), he had minimized it in the way he spoke about World War Two.

"Our world views are rather different. But unless we ...dialogue face to face, how will we create any kind of understanding?" Gottlieb told Reuters, adding that she chose to attend because "peace is better than war."

Source


But it wasn't only Jews eating treif:


Arli Klassen, executive director of the Mennonite Central Committee...asked [Ahmadinejad] to avoid rhetoric that "is heard as a threat to destroy the state of Israel," to allow religious freedom in Iran and to be transparent about Iran's nuclear program.


Rabbi Lynn




is an old acquaintance of Iran's president having traveled to see him in April and she still wants to meet and talk with him despite all that has happened since then.

(Here, in Iran,



she actually has her head covered but I don't think she normally is that Jewishly modest - but maybe that's part of her Judaic renewal?)

I was wondering, if foreign workers badly treated by America's largets meatprocessors is being attack as not kosher, i.e., treif, by persons who are concerned about their human rights being violated, can that dinner above have been very not-kosher?

Or perhaps Rabbi Lynn doesn't keep kosher?


P.S. Is her poem kosher?

...O Iran
Revelation bursts forth from your soil
draped in ten thousand shades
of illumination.
You returned my people to Jerusalem
restored the Temple
provided my relatives with a Persian home for thirty centuries
and I did not know.
Now I jump over fires on Norouz
go to the garden of roses
the first Sabbath after Passover
recite poetry
at Hafez's tomb
touch my forehead to the clay earth of Jamkaran
where the Mahdi is hidden
but everywhere present.


P.P.S.

And if by now, you don't think something is out of the ordinary, go here where Rabbi Lynn is active.

Isabel Kershner Takes On Israel's Radical Right

The New York Times' Isabel Kershner takes on the Yesha scene in an article today entitled, "The Radical Right Takes On Israel".

Takes on all of Israel?

Really?



It is, surely, the "radical right" that she describes, as well as using these terms such as: "elements of Israel’s settler movement", "Hard-core right-wing settlers", "extremist bastion", "the religious, ideological wing of the settlement movement", "so-called hilltop youth" and "the more militant activist part".

Nevertheless, she does not provide any standard of judgment for the uninitiated reader. Is she talking about 10,000 persons, 1 million or 250 teenagers? Of course, one terrorist or fanatic is more than enough, as Yigal Amir proved. Still, my point is that she was not describing a known quality but was drawing a general picture, providing background. And while using terminology that shielded her from being accused of making sweeping generalizations, I think that in not informing the reader as to what is the true picture, she was transferring impressions and not facts. In other words, her reporting was a bit biased.

For example, in writing that there have

been bouts of settler violence for years, notably during the transfer of Gaza to the Palestinians in 2005


she is misleading because both in absolute numbers of incidents and in relative to the monstrosity of the acts done to the Gush Katif and Northern Samaria revenants, what actually happened was minor, although regrettable, and cannot be compared in violence to any similar event on that scale in other countries.

She also failed to let her readers know that the person responsible for the terror attack at Yitzhar, which she describes fairly, was the same person the army killed a week or so later as he tried to throw a molotov cocktail at soldiers. In other words, the residents of Yitzhar were facing a quite determined killer.

In another instance, she writes,

In Samaria, the biblical name for the northern West Bank, and in Binyamin, the central district around the Palestinian city of Ramallah, settlers recently ousted their more mainstream representatives in local council elections, voting in what they called “activist” mayors instead. These new mayors, like the Samaria council’s Gershon Mesika, reject what they see as the more compromising policies of the Yesha council...


First, Samaria was not only the Biblical name but it is the geographical name used until today. Secondly, the mayor, or head of the Binyamin Reginla Council, Avi Roeh, is not more activist than the former head, Pinchas Wallerstein, for sure. Thirdly, as for Gershon's activism, well, have you heard a Jew say 'eh'? And fourthly, as she does mention the friction with the Yesha Council, she couldn't speak with Dani Dayan, the Council's Chairman? Note: I called her up, spoke with her and made that very suggestion.


And one more example of troublesome writing. She relates to Rechalim

Rahelim, a Samarian community of 45 families founded in 1991, has been labeled an illegal outpost


but could have added "...founded in November 1991 in protest following an Arab terror attack on civilian buses which killed a mother of 7 children and the bus driver, a father of two".

I guess not all the facts fit.

Most Ridiculous Moments of Paul McCartney's Gig

The Lord Paul came to Israel this week and performed last night.

Consider this:-

On stage he addressed fans in English but with a smattering of Hebrew, the Associated Press reported, wishing fans happy new year ahead of the Jewish holiday next week.

During Give Peace a Chance, he stopped and let fans sing the chorus, while fireworks lit the sky during Live and Let Die, AP said.


That was for the Israelis.

And the Pals.?

Since arriving in the region the singer has visited the town Bethlehem in the West Bank.

Sir Paul said he had hoped to visit a music school in the West Bank town of Ramallah but was forced to change his plans over security concerns.



A Lost Beatle in the Middle East.

Paul on security:-

The star was in a more reflective mood, however, when he compared the barrier Israel is building in and around the West Bank to the Berlin war.

"I went through the Berlin Wall in the years when it was still standing and it was so symbolic," he said after passing through the barrier to get between Jerusalem and Bethlehem.

"It's sad to think people can be physically divided like that. It's not good for anyone."


Paul, that wall in Berlin was erected to keep Germans and other oppressed peoples in.

Our barrier is to keep the barbarians out - but we still have this problem with Qassams and mortars and Grads.

Can you help stop those?


P.S. The AP reports:

A radical Muslim preacher in Lebanon also called on McCartney to cancel the show.


Actually, he threatened to kill him.

Thursday, September 25, 2008

The Quirks of Film Censorship

According to this story, Israel is less of a censoring country than England.

Seems that

a council has lifted its Monty Python ban after 28 years. There was a huge controversy when the silly burghers of Torbay in Devon slapped an X-rating on the Life Of Brian movie.

And that it

is still banned by in some towns — including Aberystwyth where Mayor Sue Jones-Davies was a star of the film.

Sue, 51, played Judith, Brian’s girlfriend, but she is now a Plaid Cymru councillor.
She said: “Given what’s on TV today, it’s amazing a ban in Aberystwyth still exists — I think it should be lifted.

Crossword Puzzles Are Political, Too?

David Levinson Wilk thinks so.

According to the puzzle database maintained by Cruciverb.com, ever since that game-changing day in 2005, OBAMA has appeared regularly as an answer in New York Times crossword puzzles. With its wonderfully convenient alternating series of commonly used vowels and consonants, OBAMA has been the answer to the clues “Senator who wrote ‘Dreams From My Father,’” “Future senator who delivered the 2004 Democratic convention keynote address” and “Presidential candidate born in Hawaii.”

But what about MCCAIN? Shockingly, not once has MCCAIN been an answer in a crossword in the New York Times, The Washington Post or the Los Angeles Times. No MCCAIN, no JOHNMCCAIN, no SENATORMCCAIN, not even his most recent sobriquet, the presidential-sounding JOHNSMCCAINIII.


And the reason?

Simple. Letters and vowels and consonants:

...Diane McNulty, a New York Times spokeswoman, said, “The answer is obvious for anyone who does crosswords. It is because ‘Obama’ is a five-letter name that alternates vowels and consonants. It’s got three vowels out of five letters, starting and ending in vowels. So it is much more crossword-friendly than ‘McCain,’ which is a harder word to put in a crossword. If McCain’s name was Obama, then his name would have been used many more times in crosswords.”


I like that: If McCain’s name was Obama, then his name would have been used many more times in crosswords. And if my grandmother had wheels, would she be a bus?

Is there a solution to this puzzling situation??

Is there any indication that crosswords can “right” themselves in the generations ahead? I’m not so sure. In perhaps the shrewdest political move of his career, the Democratic presidential nominee and his wife gave their oldest child another crossword-friendly five-letter name containing commonly used vowels and consonants: Malia.

Words Are A Double-Edged Sword

“Only one who is willing to attack Ofra with tanks, will be able to stem the tide of fascism threatening to drown Israeli democracy”.

Professor Zev Sternhal, Davar, April 5, 1988


I decry violence.

I therefore, first and foremost, express disdain for people like Professor Sternhal (prounounced Shtern-hall) who use their intellectual standing and position to preach violence. Even Haaretz notes that in


his remarks in the media, specifically an article he wrote in Haaretz which justified an attack by Palestinians on settlers...


And, of course, I condemn the bomb attack against him, whoever did it. It is immoral, illegal and unproductive.

I do, however, find it odd that pro-Pals., those of the "peace camp", always manage to explain away Pal. terror by assigning its cause to Jews/Israeli/Zionists. Pal. terror is a reaction to Jewish colonization, settlements, raodblocks, occupation, harrassment and much more. It's always our fault.

So, what is the illogic in that someone would think that Sternhhal was attacked due to something he did?

Like writing in Haaretz on May 11, 2001, justifying Arab terror against settlers, calling on Arabs to murder settlers and encouraging them to place explosive charges, but only on the eastern side of the Green Line.


"There is no doubt regarding the legitimacy of the armed resistance in the territories themselves. If the Palestinians had a bit of sense, they would concentrate their struggle against the settlements. [...] They would similarly refrain from placing explosive charges on the western side of the Green Line."


or in (now defunct) Davar in April 1988:


"Fascism cannot be stopped with rational arguments. This can be stopped only by force, and when there is willingness to risk a civil war. When necessary, we shall have to forcibly deal with the settlers in Ofrah or in Eilon Moreh."


If I define the peace camp (which I don't) as fascist, can I write the same words about, say, Shenkin Street in Tel Aviv where the cafes are full of pacifists and progressives?

More this past August:


It is there, between Hebron and Yitzhar, that the settlements are burying the democratic Jewish state...the unwillingness to confront groups of toughs who flout the law and government decisions is a disgrace in itself, it is not the major obstacle to ending the occupation...a mafia-like culture of theft, lies and deception developed in the territories...a minority took control of the fate of the entire society and held it hostage, due both to the left's ideological impotence and a lack of character, determination and leadership. If society does not find the emotional strength to remove the noose of the settlements, nothing but a sad memory will remain of the Jewish state as it still exists."


Those are fighting words.

As is recorded in Matthew 26:52: Then said Jesus...all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. The pen is not always mightier than the sword.




P.S. Note, too, how Peace Now director makes political capital:


In the wake of the attack and the discovery of the fliers, police have beefed up security around the home of Peace Now secretary general Yariv Oppenheimer.

House Cleansing

Cleansing.

That's right, not cleaning.

This advertiser promises help with house cleansing.




Spotted at a bus stop near the Macheneh Yehudah market.

It offers to ward off the evil eye, help with a your wife/husband, potency, health and a host of other really crucial matters in life.

As for the afterlife...

Moose

Caught this at LGF:-

Rep. Alcee Hastings told an audience of Jewish Democrats Wednesday that they should be wary of Republican VP nominee Sarah Palin because “anybody toting guns and stripping moose don’t care too much about what they do with Jews and blacks.”


Alcee is black or Afro-American.

He couldn't be racist, right?

After all, I tote a gun.

Pictures (and less than 1000 words)

On September 24th, the Women in Green group drove out to Samaria, Shomron, the heartland of Israel, which is too often portrayed as the home of Jewish extremists threatening local Arabs.

In fact, of course, it is miles of green, rolling hills with fabulous, productive Jewish communities, serving as the real defence of the lowlands of Israel. From these hills one can see Tel Aviv, Hadera, Netanya, etc. spread out below, which are in fact 'only a Katyusha rocket away', if the Arabs got their long-held dream of driving the Jews from their homes.

Here are two pictures Gemma Blech photographed.




To see more, go here.

And The Pavement Work Continues

At my bus stop on Emeq Refaim Street.

Slowly and surely.




A New Morning to A New Day

Looking out towards the east from my home in Shiloh:


GSS Goes Soft

Haaretz is reporting, from Reuters (who else?) a turn-about by Israel's security services regarding the effectiveness of the security barrier vis-a-vis Jerusalem:-

Shin Bet: Separation fence fueling attacks by East Jerusalem Arabs

The West Bank separation barrier is fueling attacks by East Jerusalem Arabs who feel isolated from fellow Palestinians and are increasingly likely to lash out independently, the Shin Bet security service said on Wednesday...The findings by the Shin Bet, which has usually championed tough tactics against a Palestinian uprising that erupted in 2000, appeared to dovetail with Palestinian arguments that a peaceful resolution of Jerusalem's status is key to addressing the causes of political violence in the city.

..."Awareness of the fence is creating a long-term estrangement between Jerusalem and the West Bank," the Shin Bet said in a statement, adding that some Palestinian attacks had been motivated by a grassroots desire "to ensure Jerusalem does not disappear from the political agenda".


But consider this in that story:-

"In the past, terrorists from East Jerusalem acted mainly as support units for attacks, usually under instruction by outside networks in the Gaza Strip (and) West Bank," the Shin Bet said.


So, let me think this through.

If in the past there were terrorists from the east Jerusalem neighborhoods, as support groups or whatever (and I would challenege the factual veracity of that statement), before the security barrier, why were they violent then? They weren't getting cut off. Doesn't sound logical.

If they get cut off entirely, what's to prevent them from still trying to kill Jews when they have no means of moving in and about Jerusalem? Will they be less motivated?

Moreover, before 1967, when all of Eastern Jerusalem was in Arab hands with no barrier between it and the areas of Judea & Samaria (the, shhh, "WB"), why were Jews getting shot at from the Old City walls?

A wall is a reason to kill Jews? The Pals. that dumb?

Or is someone in the Shabak, the GSS that dumb?

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

So, You Want to Blog?

Across the globe, 184 million people have started a blog and over three-quarters of active Internet users read blogs. Technorati's annual 'State of the Blogosphere' report reveals the latest figures behind blogging in a week-long series of releases.

The blogosphere is overflowing with content with almost a million blog posts a day. In the U.S. alone, 77.7 million people visit blogs of which two-thirds are written by males, half of them aged 18 - 34.

...said Technorati's chief executive Richard Jalichandra, via VentureBeat. 'Blogs are media. That is the difference now. They are as relevant as the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal. The blogger with 5,000 readers may be just as credible a source of information for those 5,000 people as anyone else.'

According to Technorati's report, a blogger can earn around USD 75,000 (EUR 50,800) a year with a unique audience of 100,000. The mean annual revenue from blogging, however, is somewhat more sobering at just USD 6,000 which isn't too bad when annual investment in a blog costs, on average, USD 1,800.



Source

Terror Atttempt Today Near Shiloh

As Haaretz reports:-

IDF soldiers foil attempted attack at West Bank roadblock

Israel Defense Forces troops foiled a terror attack on Wednesday, stopping a convoy of Palestinian vehicles as it attempted to run them over after having burst through a West Bank roadblock.

Soldiers positioned near the Palestinian village of Singil [or Sinjil*], north of Ramallah, fired warning shots into the air after noticing the three vehicles, including a tractor, speeding toward them.

The troops, who were IDF reservists, succeeded in detaining four Palestinians who have been handed over to police for interrogation. Troops also confiscated the tractor.

No IDF soldiers were wounded in the incident, nor was any property damage caused.


And the JPost adds:-

The IDF said that the Palestinians tried driving through an earth barrier near
the settlement in three vehicles - two cars and a bulldozer. While initial
reports claimed that it was a terror attack, defense officials said it was
possible that the incident was criminally-motivated.

The soldiers shot in the air and at the bulldozer and captured the assailants who were then transferred into police custody.


I understand that there was a long traffic jam but violence by Arabs was prevented.


(*)

The French Count Raymond de St. GillesVI of Toulouse built a castle in Sinjil to protect the passage of passing caravans.[2] The town's name derives not from an Arabic nomenclature but a corruption from the French. Another non-"Palestinian" phenomenom.

Satellite view and Shiloh is 2.5 km NE.

No Pissing in the Wind in London

Well, as long as it's not in the direction of Mecca.

Seems that London's Olympic Park toilets to be built in preparation for the next games in 2012 will turn away from Mecca out of respect for Islamic law

Story:-

Toilet facilities are being built at London's Olympic Park so Muslims will not have to face Mecca while sitting on the loo. The Olympic Delivery Authority has said it wants to produce an ideal venue for people of all cultures, faiths, ages and abilities for the 2012 Games and beyond.

The Islamic religion prohibits Muslims from facing the Kiblah - the direction of prayer - when they visit the lavatory.

An ODA spokeswoman confirmed that a 'percentage of general toilets would not face Mecca' out of sensitivity.

She could not say how many toilets would turn away from the East.

...Last year, thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money was used to ensure toilets at Brixton prison in London did not offend Islamic law...


And if you are having trouble about finding your way, use this:-




(Kippah tip: CR)

Hari Is Full of Sh*t

Sorry to return to Johann Hari, after just yesterday bashing him about a bit.

But I in reading the below story, I immediately recalled an earlier insult he launched against Israel. But first thing first.

Here's the news:-


Report: Palestinian effluent endangers underground water reservoirs

Report by Environmental Protection Ministry, Civil Administration, Israeli National Parks Service finds most West Bank streams contaminated by wastewater. Lack of Israeli-Palestinian cooperation may lead to severe pollution of underground reservoirs, it warns...58 million cubic-meters of untreated effluent are being pumped into the streams in the West Bank...The problem, said sources in the NPS and the Civil Administration, is that politics seem to be overshadowing both sides' environmental needs, as the Palestinians see any such cooperation as a collaboration with their occupiers. So much so, in fact, that even the relatively simple solution of connecting Palestinians cities to auxiliary, rear-guard Israeli treatment pipelines, was deemed unacceptable.


It is also claimed that


only 70% of the Jewish communities east of the Green Line are connected to treatment facilities. Moreover, illegal outposts and unauthorized settlement expansions are not connected to any wastewater treatment centers and are pumping effluent into sewage pits.


although I know that the Civil Administration is quite careful about sewerage and has installed many treating unit. And, after all, the sewerage output is minimal from the small demographics involved.

And The Jerusalem Post item here.

Palestinian towns and cities produce an estimated 56 million cubic meters of
sewage per year, 94 percent of which isn't treated at all. Israeli settlements
produce an estimated 17.5 million cubic meters per year, 31.5% of which isn't
treated. Most Israeli sewage is treated either in Israel or in the West Bank,
although many settlements have not yet built proper facilities...


And now, let's recall Hari (here):


the state of Israel...has provided the one lonely spot in the Middle East where gay people are not hounded and hanged, and where women can approach equality...But...a remembered smell fills my nostrils. It is the smell of shit. Across the occupied West Bank, raw untreated sewage is pumped every day out of the Jewish settlements, along large metal pipes, straight onto Palestinian land. From there, it can enter the groundwater and the reservoirs, and become a poison.


Oh, my gosh! Could it be that it is Hari who is full of shit?

That only Jews are responsible?

But wouldn't that be akin to antisemitism, blaming Jews for the world's ills?

Something To Lose Your Head Over

Athletes to Leave Their Brains to Concussion Study

N.F.L...retired players are planning to literally give their brains to a new center at Boston University’s School of Medicine devoted to studying the long-term effects of concussions.

A dozen athletes, including six N.F.L. players and a former United States women’s soccer player, have agreed to donate their brains after their deaths to the Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy.

On Thursday, the center will announce that a fifth deceased N.F.L. player, the former Houston Oilers linebacker John Grimsley, was found to have brain damage commonly associated with boxers.

The former New England Patriots linebacker Ted Johnson, one of the players who has agreed to donate his brain, said he hoped the center would help clarify the issue of concussions’ long-term effects, which have been tied to cognitive impairment and depression in several published studies. The N.F.L. says that, in regard to its players, the long-term effects of concussions are uncertain.


This is an important study:-

[John] Grimsley died in February at 45 after he shot himself in the chest in what police ruled an accident. Subsequent analysis of his brain tissue confirmed the presence of neurofibrillary tangles that had already begun to affect Grimsley’s behavior and memory, said Dr. Ann C. McKee, an associate professor of neurology and pathology at the Boston University School of Medicine and a co-director of the new brain-study center.

Of the six former N.F.L. players’ brains that have been examined in this manner, Grimsley’s was the fifth to be found to have chronic traumatic encephalopathy...

Who Said There Are No Crazy Rabbis?

Rabbi Menachem Froman, in his Chassidic costume (?), found here:



He's the Rabbi who sought to defile himself by shaking the hand of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin in 1997 in Gaza with his phylacteries on:



The Sheikh refused to do so.

And now this. What will his flock in Tekoa think/do?


More on Froman:

ElderofZiyon

and Mere Rhetoric

I'm Attacked

By Phillip Weiss.

Here.

We Didn't Do It

5 Palestinians killed after Egypt forces detonate smuggling tunnels

At least five Palestinians were killed and four others were wounded on Tuesday when Egyptian forces blew up two smuggling tunnels beneath the Egyptian-Gaza border, medical workers and residents said. Residents said the tunnels, used to bring goods from Egypt into the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, collapsed when Egyptian soldiers detonated explosives in an attempt to curb smuggling.

Egyptian officials were not immediately available for comment.


That was the headline and the story as it appeared in today's Haaretz and quoted from Reuters.

But Reuters had this headline:-

Five Palestinians die in Gaza border tunnel blasts

Haaretz was...cheating?

Or was Reuters not reporting something newsworthy?

Like Arabs killing Arabs. Shades of Menachem Begin. Remember?

Goyim kill goyim and the Jews are blamed


P.S. And notice that the Egyptians don't give a damn about the media. They aren't available. In fact, they've been killing more Pals. recently than Israel.

As the AP reports:-

In recent months, 42 people have been killed in tunnel collapses.


The Pals., of course, don't mention anything about terror support regarding these tunnels. For example, PNN reports:-

Palestinians are using these tunnels to import food, fuel and other necessities from the Egyptian side during the Israeli economic blockade on the Gaza Strip and its 1.6 million residents.


"Other necessities"? Hmmm.

Even the Winston-Salem Journal gets it right:-

Palestinians use many tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border to smuggle in weapons, cash and contraband.

New Term

Blogress.

Found over at Taranto.

As in "Blogress Michelle Malkin notes that Biden also told Couric..."

Seems that last year there was a blogress competition.

But besides meaning "major, influential, powerful and successful female blogger", it can also mean a blogging convention, like in "congress" or is it "tigress"?

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Ms. Clean Livni Getting Dirtier

Update below

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

Despite getting the nod from Israel's President to form a government coalition to replace resigning Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Tzipi Livni may be overtaken by legal steps.

Tomorrow, a three-pronged appeal against the results of last week's primaries in Kadima begins its legal road. Shaul Mofaz's own legal advisor is taking the case and claims that:

a) Mofaz's reps never attended nor agreed to that one half-hour extension. In fact, a signature of one of his reps was forged as she was in a car with MK Otniel Schneller on the way back from Haifa at the time she was supposed to be at the tribunal session that extended the ballot voting time.

b) Over 70 ballots have mathematical problems, shall we say (there were only 110 ballot boxes all together). Hundreds of votes are in the balance and Livni won by only 431, to remind you.

c) At one place, Barka El-Gharabiya, I think, they extended the time further on their own.

d) The publicizing of the exit polls before the closing of the elections was in direct violation of a previous election decision made by Supreme Court Judge Cheshin a few years ago regarding the Knesset elections.

I watched Channel One TV and now the Politka program and the news sounds quite damaging.


(In Hebrew, here's one report from yesterday. I can't at the moment locate a link, even in Hebrew to Channel One TV's "Mabat" program)

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


...Tzion Amir, petitioned an internal Kadima court on Sunday alleging illegalities in the voting in 80 out of the 114 polling stations in last Wednesday's party leadership race...The Ometz organization asked Attorney-general Menahem Mazuz to investigate the primary, citing the extension of the voting by half an hour, the early broadcast of exit polls while people were still voting and problems at polling stations in Beit Jann, Baka-Jatt and Rahat...Activists loyal to Mofaz found many examples of polling stations where more people voted than were permitted. They found at least 257 examples of votes that were cast but not counted.


Source

Old Bias in "New Jerusalem" Headline

Reuters headlined their story on the terror attack thus:-

New Jeruslem vehicle "attack" as Livni seeks govt

The indeed is an Old City, because it is within the walls which were built in 1520-30, and the so-called "New" city is that which started to be built in 1854.

But since 1967, it is one city. One unified city. Reunited after the Jordanians split it in 1948 for it was to be a corpus separatum.

There may be "new neighborhoods" but no "New Jerusalem".

Jerusalem is 3000 years old!

License for Terror

The terror attack the other night was claimed by a group previously unheard of:

Nisour al-Jalil (Victory of the Galilee) notified the Arabic media that it was responsible for sending the terrorist. The caller provided details of the attacker's identity that were unconfirmed at the time, lending credence to the cell's claim.


His motive for killing Jews might have been romantic, sort of:

On Tuesday morning, Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben Ruby said the terrorist was suffering from unrequited love. Mughrabi apparently wanted to marry his cousin, but when the would-be lover's advances were spurned he decided to pour his anger out on the Jewish Israelis instead.


Source

In any case, I think the Transportation Ministry should review all the East Jerusalem Arabs' driving capabilities and make sure they really do deserve to possess a licence to drive.

Just to make sure the streets are safe from that aspect.

Black Humor

This is what's missing from the CSI series.


What is it, you non-Hebrew reading people are asking yourselves?

Well, it's a garbage collection container, belonging to the municipality of Tel Aviv-Jaffa.

And it reads, literally:


The Tossing of Bodies Into This Container is Permitted
As Long As The Body is Wrapped.
And an emergency telephone number is provided in case of infractions.
What a country! They think of everything.

Hijab Misses the Point, Natch

Nadia Hijab, (*) senior fellow at the Institute for Palestine Studies in Washington, has an op-ed in the Int'l Herald Tribune that I spotted.



Entitled, The odds against Tzipi Livni , she takes a pessimistic view, alright, a Pal. view, of what is disguised as a peace process. She doesn't think that Tzipi Livni can deliver a peace with the Palestinians.

And one main reason involves me. Well, me and some 300,000 other Jews in Judea and Samaria, not including almost a quarter of a million Jews in eastern Jerusalem neighborhoods.

Here, Nadia explains:-

...Israeli political and military leaders can no longer control the settlement movement they launched and supported soon after Israel occupied the Palestinian territories of the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza in 1967 [and]...They have colonized the territories in a way that swallows up the best land and water and maintains sovereignty over East Jerusalem...The right-wing leaders of the Israeli settlement movement are too strong to budge. To prove it, the settlers have been escalating their attacks on Palestinians - and even on Israeli soldiers - unchallenged by Israel's politicians, military or courts...


That reads quite complimentary actually but, as usual, this Pal. researcher just doesn't understand the 'enemy' and seeks to project. "Attacks" are not many and the few that are are usually reactions to Pal. terror attacks. Arabs who attack are seeking to liberate, Hijab would have it, always. Jews, though, are evil.

Secondly, I am willing to accept all compliments but she exagerates the political power of the revnent movement. I don't think we are that coalesced and coordinated, we are split among too many breakaway groups but nevertheless, the idea of Jews returning to their ancestral homeland combined with the refusal of ASrabs to recognize that and seek a compromise, historically and at the present, is what is our real strength.

The best land is occupied...by Arabs, by the way. Where 99% of we Jews live in Judea and Samaria empty of any Arab habitation and development over the past 500 years or more, unless, of course, Nadia is referring (surprise! surprise!) to all of what she thinks is Palestine, i.e., all of Israel. Don't forget, in the 19 years that Judea and Samaria (WB) was in Jordanian hands, that is, Arab hands, it was underdeveloped, purposefully so. Arab growth over 1300 years in the area was insignificant if compared to what we have done in less than 40 years.

And so, what sounds like a commentary is actually propaganda. Again.




----------------

(*)

Born in Syria to Palestinian Arab parents, Hijab grew up in Lebanon, earning her B.A. and M.A. in English Literature from the American University of Beirut...she left for Qatar and then England in 1975, as the Lebanese civil war intensified.
In England, she became the Editor-in-Chief of Middle East Magazine and was a frequent commentator on the BBC and several other TV, radio, and print outlets.
In 1989, Hijab moved to New York to begin what was to be a 10 year period with the United Nations Development Programme. During that time she served in several departments within UNDP and helped organize the organization's contribution to the 1993 World Conference on Human Rights. After the UN, Hijab has worked as a consultant for organizations such as the World Bank, UNICEF, UNDP, and Columbia University on issues such as human rights, human development, gender, and the media. She joined the Institute for Palestine Studies as a Senior Fellow in 2006. She was also a founder and has served as co-chair of the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, and a member and past president of the Association of Arab American University Graduates.

J Street Is A One-way Street

SultanKnish.

He Doesn't Know His Tuches From His Elbow

Unlike Jackson Diehl, Johann Hari (*)



has a different take on the peace process.

Like:

The window of opportunity for a two-state peace is closing. Before it jams shut, the Israelis need to hear the plea coming through the checkpoints. Divide the land. Divide it now. Divide it properly. Or we will all end up battling forever – over nothing but soil soaked in blood and cordite.


which is in A last chance for peace in Israel? over in The Independent UK yesterday.

Of course, he missed this incident of an acid attack on an Israeli soldier.

And then, as a true 'lover of Israel', he gets fuming of the Irgun:-

...Her [Tzipi Livni's] father was the Military Director of the Irgun, the underground Jewish militia that spent the 1930s and 40s targeting the British occupying forces and Arab civilians who were trying to prevent the creation of the state of Israel. Livni was brought up to revere their tales of blowing up marketplaces, cafés and hotels; she proudly defends them to this day.

How would Livni's parents have responded to mass punishment – blockades, checkpoints, bullets? Would they shrug and surrender? The leader of the Irgun, Menachem Begin, wrote that every British attempt to "break our backs... only made us stronger and more determined". The same is happening with Palestinian nationalists today. Stripped of a state, they are fighting for one – and every Israeli attack makes them more radical and enraged.

But does Livni see the parallel?


Let's review that.

Those targetted "Arab civilians who were trying to prevent the creation of the state of Israel" were killing innocent Jews anywhere and everywhere and especially civilians - in marketplaces, on buses, on back roads of kibbutzim, etc. In fact, more than trying to stop the creation of Israel, they preferred to kill Jews, like in Hebron where they actually were opposed to modern Zionism as a political movement and in Tzfat (Safed).

The British never negotiated with the Jews after the Mandate was in place but ordered them about and shut down the gates to the country and in the face of millions trying to get out of Europe. They unilaterally partitioned the country. Israel has been negotiating and offering and yielding constantly. There is no parallel in this comparison.

Hari doesn't know, as my grandmother used to say, "his tuches from his elbow."



------------

(*)

Johann Hari is a columnist for the Independent newspaper, and writes regularly for the gay magazine Attitude and the New Statesman.

Aged 28, he has already written his first book, God Save the Queen?, a critique of the monarchy, and written a play, Going Down in History, which won critical acclaim at the Edinburgh Festival.

In 2003 he was named Young Journalist of the Year by the Press Gazette awards. A Cambridge graduate, he was also the Times Student Journalist of the Year in 2000.

Western Wall at Jericho Center?

Sent to me by EH.

Hey, this is a great example of "Love of Zion" but let's not get carried away. You might end up moving all of Judea and Samaria to the U.S.

Christian group building replica of ‘Wailing Wall’

(Excerpts)

Every Home for Christ, which evangelizes in about 100 nations, will spend $2.3 million on a replica of the Western Wall - also known as the Wailing Wall - and an auditorium to house it. Construction inside its Springs headquarters, the Jericho Center for Global Evangelism, is scheduled to begin Oct. 1, with a grand opening set for April 1.

"Evangelical Christians have very strong ties to Israel because of our Judeo-Christian tradition," said Dick Eastman, the international president of Every Home for Christ...

The replica will fill 2,500 square feet of an 8,000-square-foot, 300-seat auditorium, which will be used to train missionaries and teach about prayer.

About 50 tons of stone will be used to construct the mini two-story wall that, along with the auditorium, is being financed by donations. Stones will be cut from an ancient mine outside Jerusalem used for thousands of years to build the city's most impressive structures...

The wall will be free and open to the public 24 hours a day. The hope is to have Christians and Jews praying together, said Eastman, who thought up the replica-wall idea.


And as for praying together, how about just meditating? We're still two different religions.

"Settler" Humor

I do not like the term "settler".

I do not use it.

It reflects negatively on the historic Jewish endeavor to reestablish and reconstitute in the land of our forefathers, our ancient 3000 year old patrimony, a homeland as a renewed political entity.

I have selected another word, less pejorative, which is "revenant" and have explained here four years ago why I prefer it and why I chose it.

But, I like humor and when this came across my screen, I knew it had to appear at my blog, too. So, enjoy.

You Might Be a "Settler" If...

House / Neighborhood

You might be a settler if live in a bank but are flat broke.
You might be a settler if your electricity goes off at least once a week.
You might be a settler if your son does his army service near your house.
You might be a settler if “Little House on the Prairie” reminds you of home.
You might be a settler if your house resembles a tin can on a hill top.
You might be a settler if your succa looks better than your house.
You might be a settler if cable TV doesn’t come out to your parts and you’re thankful for that.
You might be a settler if you pick up your plane20tickets at the butcher shop, (since his wife is a travel agent).
You might be a settler if the local park bench attracts dozens of teens on a Friday night.
You might be a settler if you took out that damn park bench.
You might be a settler if your kids’ playground has concrete walls against snipers.
You might be a settler if you can sleep through loudspeakers blasting recorded prayers in Arabic.
You might be a settler if people borrow your house when you’re away for the weekend.
You might be a settler if on Saturdays you walk in the street and leave the sidewalks to the cats.
You might be a settler if you assemble to pray on a street corner instead of a synagogue.
You might be a settler if you have a minyan at the supermarket and pray you can pay the bill.

Guns

You might be a settler if your wife shoots better than you.
You might be a settler if you carry an automatic weapon into a bank but don’t plan to rob it.
You might be a settler if you wear a gun to synagogue.
You might be a settler if you have shot a menacing neighborhood dog.
You might be a settler if you think “going to the range” has nothing to do with golf.
You might be a settler if you don’t lock your door but you sleep with a Colt 45 under your pillow.

Car / Road

You might be a settler if your car has gotten stoned more often than you.
You might be a settler if the bus you ride has inch thick opaque bullet proof windows and stops at your settlement only when the driver feels like it.
You might be a settler if repairmen make sure they leave your house well before dark.
You might be a settler if you recite the prayer for the road when leaving home, and mean it.
You might be a settler if you don’t wear a seatbelt because you might need to get out quick.
You might be a settler if your car is plastered with faded bumper stickers protesting almost 2 decades of government policy.
You might be a settler if you share the road with mule powered vehicles.
You might be a settler if you have driven through=2 0a herd of goats on your way to work.
You might be a settler if you’re late to dinner because a family of wild boar was crossing the road.
You might be a settler if you hitchhike with your whole family.
You might be a settler if you have an orange ribbon dangling in your car.
You might be a settler if you teach your kids how to drive on unpaved security roads.
You might be a settler if your car was outfitted with rock resistant windows and you drive with them rolled down.
You might be a settler if you stop for hitchhikers.

Misc

You might be a settler if your wife says keeps your hands off the cake she just baked, because it’s for soldiers.
You might be a settler if your wife walks around wearing a baseball cap.
You might be a settler if your daughter wears a skirt over her jeans.
You might be a settler if your parents can hardly understand what your kids are saying.
You might be a settler if your kids don’t get hig h but are high on hill tops.
You might be a settler if you follow Moses but the Evangelicals support you.
You might be a settler if you get lost when you leave home because everything is called Rabin.
You might be a settler if your coworkers are afraid to visit you.
You might be a settler if your day job is guarding a kindergarten.
You might be a settler if you attend more than 10 weddings a year.
You might be a settler if you attend more than 10 memorials a year.
You might be a settler if you’ve been to Hevron and Joseph’s Tomb.
You might be a settler if folks in Tel Aviv, that you have never met, hate your guts.

Gov’t

You might be a settler if when you put up a shed it gets reported to the U.N.
You might be a settler if Bush and Rice don’t want your kids to live where you do.
You might be a settler if the senior politician mocks your American accent but calls his life work the “Pis Process”.
You might be a settler if your radio station was shut down.
You might be a settler if you don’t use your phone because it’s tapped.
You might be a settler if you’ve been arrested for demonstrating.
You might be a settler if you’re not allowed to go home during the olive harvest.
You might be a settler if the party you want to vote for is outlawed.
You might be a settler if your house has been declared a “closed military zone”.
You might be a settler if you’ve lived in your house while half a dozen governments have come and gone.

Outlook

You might be a settler if you think Haaretz is the place to live, Maariv is evening prayers and Yediot is a kind of toilet tissue.
You might be a settler if you take being called an “obstacle to peace” as a compliment.
You might be a settler if you think the security wall is to keep the rising oceans from flooding your house.
You might be a settler if you can’t sell your house, but that’s OK because you don’t want to.
You might be a settler if the government offers you money to abandon your home and you say “stuff it”.
You might be a settler if you’re told to go back to where you came from and you say: “I DID”.
You might be a settler if you think that God is not just your copilot but your Captain.
You might be a settler if you still hope and pray that this Rosh Hashana will herald our redemption.


Now, if anyone wants to claim authorship, please let me know.