Interesting Quote from Al Jazeera

Jurors at the award ceremony on Thursday singled out Nour Odeh, Al Jazeera's Gaza correspondent, for particular praise for her bravery in reporting from the occupied territory. (emphasis added)

Gaza's "occupied?" I thought the Arabs ran it. Thank you Al Jazeera for speaking the truth, that the Arabs are occupying Jewish Land!

In Defense of Jerusalem and Israel

A few weeks ago on Yom Yerushalayim Dr. Mordechai Kedar of Bar-Ilan University was on Al Jazeera's Arabic TV station, being confronted with the normal Arab issues, West Bank, Jerusalem, and I felt Dr. Kedar responded very well.
Of course the one critique I have is related to one line he said regarding the future of the "West Bank" and the creation of a PA state there.
Now I will admit that he did come of very strongly, not the typical apologetic Jew that we see in the media these days (click here for an example). But there still is an idea that the Jews don't belong in YESHA.
I was speaking to someone last year about this issue, and they told me that Israel was violating "international law."
Now I'm not a law student, but I have learned enough that when someone tells me something I'm not aware of to ask what their source is. So I asked them which law they were referring to.
They explained to me that Israel was an occupying entity that came into that land, started colonizing it, and started cleansing the locals from their places of birth. This was the crime they were committing.
I of course wouldn't have it, told them that I found that either they had an incredible bias for ignoring all of atrocities committed against the Jews by Arab countries in the early part of the 1900's, or they were simply ignorant of them and victims of other people who had these biases.
But furthermore, if you go by that rational that if a foreign entity (which the Jews most certainly are not) drives natives of their land and then starts colonizing that land and claiming it as their own, then you have just displaced at least 50 Million people on the East Coast of America, and even more if you branch further out west.
Because America WAS founded on this idea of colonizing the land and driving the natives out, yet I don't think that Left-Wing academics will say that the United States is occuping the natives of America (IE Native Americans), of course they probably will claim their occuping other countries, but it is certainly not for colonization. Israel, albeit with secular motivation which might be a topic for a different post, were not invading they were returning. The fact that the Jews lived previously in the land of Israel, is only in debate by anti-Semites. Anyone with an open mind who is presented with un-biased information, will find archaeological evidence of the Jews previous reign over the land everywhere. One of the reasons the Arabs will not allow archaeological research teams onto the Temple Mount is because it would disprove their claim that the Jewish Temple never existed..

Here's the Al Jazeera interview with Dr. Mordechai Kedar (in Arabic with subtitles):

Checkpoints

There is unfortunately, a large number of people who have to travel through security checkpoints every single day, whether their have to get to a business meeting, go on a school trip, or just to see family.

They are herded like sheep through a narrow walkway where, after a tremendously long wait, they finally reach the end and it is their turn.

The security guard looks them over and then starts to pat them, as if they are some kind of criminals carrying weapons. All these people go through complete and utter humiliation when the security guard "randomly" selects them to do a strip search, when it is obvious that he doesn't care at all about catching terrorists. He's just bored and wanted to humiliate the people passing through.

They are then pulled out of line, where everyone is watching them, as they are searched form head to foot while the guard says that they have to make sure that they are not a terrorist.

Babies, grandmothers, and handicapped, with their added baggage and inability to fend for themselves are routinely pulled over and searched like everyone else.

Sounds horrible doesn't it?

What if I told you hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of people have to endure this kind of humiliation everyday?

Is this an accurate portrayal of how Israel treats Palestinians who travel through checkpoints?

I wouldn't know.

I was writing about about airport security checkpoints.

The Ethnic Cleansing of "Palestine"

Note: the following story and analysis is purely satirical (although there's probably some truth to it)

I was in the library last week and noticed that there was a stand of book's about Israel in honor of Israel's 60th birthday.

I wandered over and started to browse through them, noticing various books, some I've read and some I haven't. Books like O' Jerusalem, Dershowitz books, and others.

Then one book caught my eye.

Located on a stand about Israel (a stand supposedly to show Israel in a POSITIVE light) was the book "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine."

I have not read the book, I probably will not read the book, but even without reading that book, I can tell you that the book is full of lies.

You want to see ethnic cleansing, look at Darfur. You want to see ethnic cleansing, look at the Nazi's. Israel's relationship with it's Arab neighbors is not ethnic cleansing

Now I'm going to make a rather interesting statement: even though the premise of that book is false, that Israel is ethnically cleansing Palestinians, the creation of a Palestinian state will cause the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians (Pretty strong claim right? Watch this).

According to the Arabs they are considered to have "Palestinian nationality" in that they have the right to property in the state of Israel (more commonly know is the Right of Return or Death to Israel or "We the Arabs unabashedly declare that we hate all Jews and want you dead") , whether they be first generation, 2nd generation, 3rd...it doesn't matter. If they had a ancestor that, at one point in time, owned land there, all of his descendant's have a right to that land. (Whether they even owned the land to begin with is for another post)

Here's an example of how their claims are taken directly from a page in Jewish history and twisted to meet their false agenda.

Hitler determined a Jew by a person had at least one Jewish grandparent. If you're grandfather married a Christian and your family have only married Christians since, you are still considered a Jew.

My (as in like me, the author of this blog) grandfather came to Israel (AKA, British mandated "Palestine") from Russia in the mid-30's. On his passport (wasn't really a passport, it was more like an ID card), under nationality, was stamped "Palestinian."

Ah, here's where it gets interesting, these Arabs want to claim that they are an indigenous nation, that have lived here for millennia (just like the Jews have), yet how could a Jew have the same nationality as they do AKA "Palestinian"? The only way for this to make sense is for people who lived under the British Mandate, who were issued identification cards to be given that nationality.

Now the local Arab population did not like the name "Palestinian" at all. That word was associated with all this nasty things, like the PALESTINE Post (later to be renamed the Jerusalem Post), the PALESTINIAN Airways (later to be renamed El Al), and worst of all PALESTINIAN (later to be renamed "Israeli" or another eternal name Jew/Yid/Yihudi/Bnei Yisrael).

Yes, they didn't like that name at all, in fact if you would call and Arab a "palestinian" he would shout at you for calling him a Jew.

Anyways, to get back to the ethnic cleansing. There was no ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, because the Palestinians were the Jews. But to follow the logic of the Arabs, I would be a 3rd generation Palestinian because my grandfather was given the nationality of "Palestinian" because he happened to live in the Land of Israel during the time the British were labeling people who lived there that name.

But wait! My grandfather left Israel shortly after it became a state, do I still have that lofty status as a"Palestinian?"

According to them I do. Remember, they view anyone who had, at one in history, owned property in the Land of Israel, or even just lived there, as the rightful owners for the rest of time to their ancestors. They also, even if they left, maintain the status of "Palestinians." (You can find people who claim to be 2nd or 3rd generation "Palestinian" who live in America)

So anyways according to that I am a Palestinian.

I am also an Israeli.

Therefore if there is ever (chas v'shalom) the creation of a Palestinian state in Judea & Samaria (or let's say even if they decide to make their state somewhere else, a ploy that we know is only so they can destroy Israel) I should be able to have duel citizenship to both places, correct? I should have a Israeli passport like I do now, or I should have a Palestine passport.

Right?

WRONG!

Because I would not be allowed to have a Palestinian citizenship purely because of the fact that I AM A JEW! I would not be allowed to even visit their state because the Palestinian state would be Juden Rein! No Jews! None!

But let's say that I was living in community in Judea & Samaria (something that is very likely to happen) I would be ethnically cleansed by ISRAEL with the support of the UNITED STATES, from my home there. Israel is not the one doing the ethnic cleansing because they want to drive the Arabs out of Israel, the ethnic cleansing is going on purely for the Arabs! Its' the ARABS WHO ARE ETHNICALLY CLEANSING THE ORIGINAL PALESTINIANS, THE JEWS!

So anyways, I will probably never read the book "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine" because it will most likely a work of fiction that doesn't examine the history correctly. As Rabbi Ken Spiro put it, "The creation of Palestinian history, is one of the most successful historical fabrications in the history of the world."

But don't worry, in another 5, 10, 50, 100 years eventually the threat of the "Palestinians" will disappear, and I can guarantee you, the Jews will still be here.

Oh, and on one last note:

ALL JEWS IN THE WORLD COME HOME AND MAKE ALIYAH!!

Busted Google!

(FOR THOSE OF YOU ON FACEBOOK READING THIS YOU HAVE TO CLICK TO SEE THE ORIGINAL POST IN ORDER TO SEE THE PICTURES)

I was looking at Israel on Google Earth and found something very interesting:


If you can take a real close look..


It says "Every Human has Rights."

the obvious implication is that the United States and United Nations don't give Jews rights.

Right?

I think more likely someone was pissed that Israel is about to celebrate it's 60th birthday and he wanted to make a hint that Israel is "oppressive" to its neighbors.

Well, as I've written about on this blog many times, there is a huge difference between IDF soldiers protecting children in preschool vs Arab terrorists who send those children out to kill themselves.

Israel is B"H here to stay, the trick is for us as Jews, to unite. Once we've done that we won't have to worry about sovereignty, terrorism or our neighbors.

Happy 60th Israel!


UPDATED: I realized that I could click on those two icons. One of them was in downtown Jerusalem, the other was in Beit Lechem. I found something interesting on the Beit Lechem one, they had profiled a guy named Abdelfattah Abusrour who was teaching Arab children theater in the hope the it would bring peace.
I have to commend the guy for his attempt, but unless Arab society on a whole has takes on a similar view there will never be a peace.

This leads to another question, what kind of peace are we talking about. Everyone likes to say "Peace" all the time, it's kind of just turned into a slogan without anyone thinking what it rally means.

We have "Peace" with Egypt, this peace has caused us to lose the Sinai, our own oil source, half opf our then territory and the very minor issue of LETTING TERRORISTS BRING WEAPONS INTO GAZA without Israel being able to do a thing from stopping them fire thousands of rockets into Sderot.

So what will a peace look like? An Israel without Yesha? How would that produce different results than Egypt? Egypt may have signed a piece of paper, but they are still preaching the most horrific anti-semitic messages, some of which rival Nazi propaganda.

So this leads to back to Abdelfattah Abusrour, is he imagining a day where Israel will give Yesha to the Arabs and that there will be no hostility towards the smaller Israel? That's going to be hard to do especially when the state sponsored television is preaching the same message that Egypt is.

The other icon lead to the same organization this time to a woman named Nurit Peled-Elhanan, who had a child killed by an Arab terrorist. She then somehow decided that her child was killed because Israel is "occupying" their land.

This is unfortunately the conclusion one will come to if they don't dig for the facts, some of which pertain to who really has the right to this land, and who actually bought it?

I can't go into detail on this right now because I don't have all of the sources in front of me, but pardon this claim, Jews were the ones who own more land in Yesha then any Arab does. They BOUGHT it from them back in the 1800's.

Add that to the fact that the Torah also goes into detail about Israel belonging to the Jews, and it's quite surprising that there is anyone claiming that the Arabs own this land. We bought it TWICE.

But now back to Google.

Google does not have a good relationship with Israel. They insist on calling Yesha "Palestine" they show parts of Yerushalayim as "Palestine."
But still, they should take a backseat on an issue like this. It's one thing to mark fabricated borders (hey anyone can make a mistake) but to put something in blaming Israel of "occupying" and not having anything about to say about, say, Sderot (I checked, by Sderot it just says "Sderot" nothing about falling rockets.

And I used to like Google as a tech company

How the Arabs Twist it

I must say that I was quite pleased when Congress passed a bill proposing that anytime the topic of the Arabs "Right of Return" comes up, they have to mention the Jews who were thrown out of Arab countries following the creation of the State of Israel.

This is how the Arabs twist it (WARNING: This is rather disturbing):



Compare this with this

Attack on Mercaz HaRav

Apparently terrorists infiltrated the Mercaz HaRav yeshiva and killed 6 Jews. Maybe it's a little eary, but the only other news website that has anything up right now is MSNBS.

Of course this hits home for me because one of my Rabbbeim learned at Mercaz.

I don't care what people are saying, the third intifada has started, and denying it is not going to help the situation.

Building vs Terrorists? What's the Question? A short histroy

I'm getting kind of tired of the whole "Israel's 'settlers' are the obstacle peace." I was just reading something on Al Jazeera that pit the claims of both sides, Israeli and Arab against each other. The Arab claim that Israel hasn't stopped the building of "illegal settlements" and the Israeli claim that the PLO hasn't put a stop to terrorism.

Are you joking?!

All right, let's say that the Arabs did have a rightful claim, Jews are building homes, they're in the process of building. Not hurting anyone last I checked. The Arabs don't want the Jews to build for one reason. They're afraid that if enough Jews settle in that area of the Land of Israel they will eventually, a few generations down the road, be unable to claim that land as their own (which it never was to begin with).

Let's flip over the other side, the demand that Fatah (not Hamas, they're a terrorist organization remember?) has to shut down all terrorist activities.

Seeing that pretty much everything that Fatah does is in some way connected to a form of terrorism, this is a little much to hope for. Terrorism against Jews as well as Arabs, particulary Arab women.

But there's no contest, you can't compare terrorists with settlements, it's compared to apples and oranges.

I remember a few months back getting into a debate with this issue with someone, the the settlements were the obstacle to peace. I think that's ludicrous. First of all Judea & Samaria are part of the State even if they were never officially annexed. Those areas were where the kingdom's of ancient Israel were, so we have that to back us up.

The Arabs who lived there during the time when Jews were exiled to other lands, were few and far between. There was never the population that there was today. The land was unable to support a large population.

It just so happened that when the Jews returned the land started to gice forth it's fruit. The Jews were quite comfortable in the whatever land they had been exiled to and the early Zionist's numbers were quite small. They wanted to settle the land, so who did they hire to help them? The local Arabs.

Not another interesting tidbit, the land that these Arabs had lived on had been bought by wealthy Arabs during the time of the Ottoman Empire. They did not buy the land from the Arabs who lived there, and they pretty much made the people who lived there work for them for no money and very little support.

When the Zionists started coming from Europe, they bought the land from these wealthy Arabs, and hired the local Arabs to help them settle the earth.

Poor Arabs from surrounding countries heard the gates of Palestine were open (when I say Palestine, I'm referring to what the area was called, a name given to the place by the Romans who drove the Jews out. In order to spite the Jews, the Romans named the are Phillistia, which today has come across as "Palestinian." There was never a country there however, it was no man's land, that's just the name that it was refered to as) so the Arabs started coming down in large numbers to find work.

Before you know it there are millions of Arabs who want jobs, and in the meantime, in villages that used to be poor now had great wealth from the work that they had been doing for the Jews.

Fast forward to 1947 when the surrounding Arab countries told the local Arabs in Israel to get out so they would not be mistaken for a Jews and accidentally killed in the war that there were planning for the almost created Jewish state.

A number of them did leave, they went to Syria, Iraq, Jordan (of course they weren't actually called that yet) and decided to wait for Israel to be Juden Rein so they could go and take the land that the Jews bought.

Of course the Jews won and the Arabs who had fled no longer had their homes because they had left. They were then not allowed to enter the newly formed state because whatever country they were in viewed Israel as an enemy and had no relations with them.

During the whole commotion at the UN as to what land should go to whom, Jordan and Egypt came in and illegally occupied what is today know as the West Bank and Gaza.

These areas never actually belonged to anyone, they had just passed along the no-man's land statues that they had had before Israel was created.

Fast forward to 1967 when Israel was attacked, and yes they were attacked by Egypt and Jordan, Israel captured both those areas of land in a defensive war.

Just a small side note, the media today likes to say that Israel pre-emted that '67 war because they launched the first strike.

In reality, in the days leading up to the war Egypt had set up a blockade against ships traveling to Israel and had banished the UN peace keeping force from the Israel-Egypt border. They then proceeded to set up troops along the border in preparation for striking Israel. Israel just decided to attack first and not sit around like a fish being shot out of a barrel.

Anyways last I checked land captured in a defensive war is land that belongs to the capturing country. Also given the fact that Israel wasn't driving another country from their land, they were just expelling an illegal entity and acquired the no-man's land, which strategically enabled them to have more defensible borders.

Anyways, I should make this argument stronger, but you can see where I'm going with this. All Israel is guilty of is settling land that never belonged to anyone. Whereas the Arabs are actively seeking to kill as many Jews as possible.
No comparison.

An Update...and a Death

Whew! It's been a while since I last posted. I figured that when I was on vacation I would have more time to write, and I found that I had less free time then when I was in school! But now that the semester's started I can start to have more free time.

I guess I'll just give you an update on everything that's happened in the last month before I get onto today's topic.

At the beginning of January I was visiting family in New Mexico. I love it out there, it really gives you a feeling of true serenity, being out in the desert and hearing absolutely nothing. Especially out on my uncle's ranch. My uncle is a very strange fellow, he had one goal in life, and that was to get as far away from humanity as possible. So he and his wife moved out to this beautiful 800 acre piece of land just outside of TorC.

I'll admit the lifestyle of living out of the city away from the "noise" of humanity is appealing, but I, as a Jew, can't go into hiding like that. I need to make a difference, one of the reasons I'm moving to Israel, I can get some of the serenity (at least the nature side of it) but still be making an intense statement about to future of the Jewish people.

Oh and speaking of Israel, I sent my Nefesh B' Nefesh application in last week. Hopefully everything will go smoothly and I'll get my grant and hove no problems with my Aliyah.

Now to today's story. As most of the people reading this know, this past Sunday was Super Sunday in America. A day of watching football for the guys and watching commercials for the women. It is the most expensive air time of the entire year and the cost of advertising is appoximetly 2.7 million dollars per minute.

In other words this is the ultimate in gratifying our physical desires. The guys want to watch other large men, reminiscent to the Coliseum in ancient Rome, basically try to kill the opposing players, with the excuse of a suicidal maniac running with a ball. Whereas the women want to watch the ads, ads that are meant to sell things to satisfy our physical wants. Last I checked you don't see many Super Bowl ads for things like bread, milk and toilet paper.

But Yishai Fleisher I think summed it up the best, because the next day there was a Jew killed in Dimona, a city near Be'er Sheva. A suicide bomber went into a crowded area (and it has to be a crowded area) and blew itself up.

Now just to give you an idea how sick these people are after a the medical teams had come and a crowd had gathered around, it was discovered that there had been a second terrorist who had been walking around waiting for a crowd to build up so it could set off its bomb in an even larger crowd of people.

Thank G-d it was discovered and killed, but the point, as Yishai put it, how many Jews could tell you about this attack and how many Jews could give you a play by play blow of the football game, that now really doesn't matter anymore (if it ever did).

Something to think about.

Palestinian People?...I guess not

"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct 'Palestinian people' to oppose Zionism. For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan."

-Zahir Muhsein, PLO executive committee member, in a March 31, 1977 interview with the Dutch newspaper Trauw

Imam Incites Muslims against Jerusalem

I think I'll let this video speak for itself, but it is definitely very educational to hear this coming from a Muslim leader, and what his views are. I only wish Bush and Olmert would understand this.

Where the REAL Apartheid is

This from the Jerusalem Post:

This week the Bush Administration legitimized Arab anti-Semitism. In an effort to please the Saudis and their Arab brothers, the Bush administration agreed to physically separate the Jews from the Arabs at the Annapolis conference in a manner that aligns with the apartheid policies of the Arab world which prohibit Israelis from setting foot on Arab soil.

Evident everywhere, the discrimination against Israel received its starkest expression at the main assembly of the Annapolis conference on Tuesday. There, in accordance with Saudi demands, the Americans prohibited Israeli representatives from entering the hall through the same door as the Arabs.

At the meeting of foreign ministers on Wednesday, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni called her Arab counterparts to task for their discriminatory treatment. "Why doesn't anyone want to shake my hand? Why doesn't anyone want to be seen speaking to me?" she asked pointedly.

Israel's humiliated foreign minister did not receive support from her American counterpart. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who spent her childhood years in the segregated American South, sided with the Arabs. Although polite enough to note that she doesn't support the slaughter of Israelis, she made no bones about the fact that her true sympathies lie with the racist Arabs.

As she put it, "I know what it is like to hear that you cannot go on a road or through a checkpoint because you are a Palestinian. I understand the feeling of humiliation and powerlessness."

Rice's remarks make clear that for the Secretary of State there is no difference between Israelis trying to defend themselves from a jihadist Palestinian society which supports the destruction of the Jewish state and bigoted white Southerners who oppressed African Americans because of the color of their skin. It is true that Israel has security concerns, but as far as Rice is concerned, the Palestinians are the innocent victims. They are the ones who are discriminated against and humiliated, not Livni, who was forced - by Rice - to enter the conference through the service entrance.

The Bush administration's tolerance for discrimination against Israel was not merely ceremonial. Diplomatically, the conference was equally prejudicial. At Annapolis, the US joined the Arabs in placing the lion's share of blame for the absence of peace between Israel and the Palestinians on Israel. But you wouldn't know that from listening to Olmert, who is working steadily to hide what happened there.

Olmert obfuscates the truth because his political stability rests in the hands of his hawkish coalition partners Yisrael Beiteinu and Shas. Both warned before the summit that if Olmert made any concessions on either Jerusalem or the so-called outpost communities in Judea and Samaria they would bolt his coalition and so spur new elections.

Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu expressed satisfaction with the outcome of the summit. Both Shas leader Eli Yishai and Yisrael Beiteinu leader Avigdor Lieberman dismissed Annapolis as a pathetic joke and claimed that there is no reason for them to resign from the Olmert government. But these assertions are deliberately misleading.

The fact that the Israeli-PLO joint statement made no specific mention of Jerusalem, and that the government didn't announce a timetable for destroying the so-called outpost communities and expelling the hundreds of Israeli families who live in them, doesn't mean that Israel made no concessions on these issues. In fact, the Olmert government made massive concessions on these issues.

The Israel-PLO joint statement at Annapolis contains a joint pledge "to propagate a culture of peace and nonviolence; to confront terrorism and incitement, whether committed by Palestinians or Israelis."

Although Olmert, Lieberman and Yishai dismiss this Israeli acceptance of moral equivalence with Palestinian jihadists as a meaningless rhetorical concession, the government's move is rife with political and legal implications. US Ambassador Richard Jones's unprecedented meeting this week with Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch made clear that the US demands that Israeli courts interpret Israeli law in a prejudicial manner in order to demonize Israeli opponents of Palestinian statehood and the ethnic cleansing of the Jews from Judea and Samaria.

Their meeting also signaled that the US expects Israel to treat lawful building activities by Jews in Judea and Samaria and even in sections of Jerusalem as criminal acts. Since the Olmert government accepts that Israel is morally indistinguishable from the Palestinian Authority, it is hard to foresee it preventing the criminalization of its political opponents. From now on, Israelis who oppose the diplomatic moves of the Olmert government can expect to be treated as the moral equivalents of Palestinian terrorists.

At Annapolis the Americans accepted the role of sole arbiter of Israeli and Palestinian compliance with their commitments to the so-called 'Roadmap' and the peace process. They also committed themselves to reaching a comprehensive peace treaty by the end of 2008. But as former US Middle East mediator during the Clinton administration Dennis Ross has admitted, these goals are contradictory. It is impossible to both ensure Palestinian compliance and the achievement of a peace treaty in that timetable.

Writing in The Washington Post after the Oslo peace process collapsed at Camp David and the Palestinian jihad had begun, Ross explained, "The prudential issues of compliance were neglected and politicized by the Americans in favor of keeping the peace process afloat….Every time there was a behavior, or an incident, or an event that was inconsistent with what the peace process was about, the impulse was to rationalize it, finesse it, find a way around it, and not to allow it to break the process."

"What the peace process was about" for the Clinton administration was signing peace agreements. It was not about ensuring that the Palestinians were actually interested in living at peace with Israel. When Rice stated that "failure is not an option," in the coming peace process, she made clear that the same is the case for the Bush administration today. She wants an agreement. Whether the Palestinians are serious about peace or not is none of her business.

Although reporting on Palestinian non-compliance with their commitments to fight terror will harm prospects for speedy "progress," accusing Israel of filching on its commitments will actually speed things along. Alleging Israeli non-compliance will force the pliant Olmert government to make further concessions to the Palestinians.

In light of this, it is clear that contrary to Yishai and Lieberman's dismissive treatment of what happened at Annapolis, Olmert's acceptance of the Americans as both judge of compliance and guarantor of "progress" means that Israel already made massive concessions.

On Jerusalem, for instance, although Yishai is right that Jerusalem is not specifically mentioned in the joint statement, the fact is that Israel agreed to negotiate the status of its capital city by agreeing to discuss all outstanding issues. Since the Americans want a Palestinian state within a year and they know that Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas will not make any concessions on Jerusalem, they can be expected to pressure Israel to accept the Palestinian position. The thousands of Arab Jerusalemites now applying for Israeli citizenship are a clear sign that the Arabs understand that Israel has already made massive concessions on the city. And Yishai must know this.

The American status as arbiters of compliance has far reaching implications for Israel's ability to cope effectively with the security situation in Gaza and the Western Negev. Since Hamas seized control of Gaza in June, Abbas has opposed any wide-scale IDF counter-terror offensive on the area. Abbas has claimed - probably rightly - that an Israeli ground offensive in Gaza would weaken his position in Palestinian society since the Palestinians support Hamas's positions more than they support him. Given that the Americans are committed to strengthening Abbas, it is obvious that they will veto any Israeli plan to conduct an offensive in Gaza aimed at restoring security to the Western Negev.

Then there is Judea and Samaria. Lieberman claims that he can remain in the government because Olmert has yet to announce a timetable for throwing the Jews out of their homes in the so-called outpost communities. But that isn't Olmert's responsibility anymore. He ceded it to the Americans at Annapolis. They will set the timetable for expulsions, not Olmert. And it isn't only the Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria that are now at risk.

By anointing the State Department arbiter of Israeli compliance, the Olmert government gave the Americans the right to veto IDF operations in Judea and Samaria. As the guarantors of progress in the peace process, the Americans will tell the IDF where it can - or more precisely where it cannot - erect roadblocks. The Americans will tell the Israelis what cities and towns to transfer to Fatah control. They will tell Israel what guns and armor to transfer to the Palestinians, what to do with terror fugitives and when and how many terrorists it must release from its prisons.

Actually, the US has been constraining Israel's counter-terror operations in Judea and Samaria for months now. That these American efforts have harmed the effectiveness of the IDF's operations is something that Ido Zoldan's widow can attest to. Zoldan, after all, was murdered last week by Fatah terrorists who owed their ability to move about freely to Israel's decision to bow to American pressure and dismantle 24 roadblocks and curb its efforts to arrest Fatah terror bosses.

In essence, what we see in Olmert's and Livni's machinations is a repeat of Ariel Sharon's and Livni's political maneuvering in the period that preceded the withdrawal from Gaza. In both cases, Israel's senior leaders abide by the basic political understanding that a fight postponed is a fight won.

In 2004 Sharon lacked the political strength to announce openly that he was going to completely withdraw from Gaza and destroy all the Israeli communities in the area. So he allowed the Likud to hold a referendum on his plan to withdraw and authorized Livni to draft the so-called compromise plan according to which the destruction of Israeli communities would take place in four stages over several months and that each stage would require separate government approval.

By the time the Likud rejected his plan, Sharon was strong enough to ignore the will of his party. And when the withdrawal took place, far from taking place in four stages, it took place in four days. Livni and Sharon could ignore their previous commitments because when the time came to pay the piper, they had already destroyed their opponents.

Today, by pretending that the joint declaration at Annapolis was a big nothing, Olmert and Livni are repeating the maneuver. By the time they start throwing Jews out of their homes, they won't need Shas or Yisrael Beiteinu anymore.

Lieberman and Yishai are under no obligation to leave the government. They can stay for as long as they like. But they cannot pretend that by staying they are not full partners in the government's policies. As Annapolis made clear, those policies include dividing Jerusalem, destroying the Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria and compromising the security of the State of Israel.

Bush-Who the HELL is Abbas you idiot?

Well Annapolis is over and it didn't have the dramatic effects that everyone was expecting. The fact the PM of Israel is ONCE AGAIN sitting down offering more land to a leader who's sole purpose in being there is to eventually be able to kill as many Jews as possible.

But this "Palestinian leader" is probably the most interesting in all of the leader's who have come to the White House before to solve "The Situation," (oh wait there was only one, Arafat. There was nobody before him).


The brainchild of Bush was that we would throw the Jews out of Gaza and then have the Arabs come in a create a stable, functioning society that would bring prosperity to the world.

I don't know who he was kidding but the fact that it's turned into a terrorist nest I think has burst Bush's bubble.

But Bush is a man who is obsessed with democracy. Democracy in Afghanistan, democracy in Iraq, and "Mr. Palestine" wants democracy in these new terror states that he stays up at night dreaming about. How do we make a democracy? Oh, I know, we have elections! Then the people will vote in a leader who I can then negotiate with.

There's just one problem with that, the Arabs voted in a terror group which was inevitable because both parties that were running were terror groups. Those STUPID people! They voted in the WRONG terror group!

There's a key difference between Hamas and Fatah, Hamas is a devoutly religious group and they answer to no one except "Allah." Bush doesn't speak that language so he can't negotiate with them.

Fatah on the other hand are not as religious when it comes to Allah, they are more religious when it comes to something that Bush can give them, MONEY!

So we have a group that has been given the opportunity to democratically vote the leader they want in order to represent them in the pathway for them to acquire a state, which they never did anything to actually deserve. They can't ever vote for the right party!

So it should make sense that you take the party that lost and that's who you're going to invite to Annapolis to make a new Middle East, because this guy is obviously backed by the people he's supposedly representing right?

Mr. Bush, get you're head out of your tush and go read a Bible (after you've spent about 2 days underwater in a mikve to cleanse yourself of all of the sins you've done)

EDITOR'S NOTE: I am going into finals and will probably not be able to post for the next 2 weeks or so.

Hell yes! Aaron Klein!

Terrorists in search of 72 virgins

Here we go again

The 39th president of the United States, Jimmy Carter, who has most recently in the last come to the forefront of news headlines with his book 'Palestine: Peace not apartheid,' is going to be releasing a movie.
Because I don't want to foul up this blog, I will not be posting a link to the trailer, but you can look for it yourself.
This will certainly be a move that will be, in Carter's words, "accurate, yet provocative."
I got news for you, Mr. I'm-so-cool-because-after-I-stopped-being-president-I-didn't-go-to-
Wyoming-and-spend-the-rest-of-my-life-fishing, I don't care if you want to be provocative, what I do have is the accuracy of your claims.
After I see this movie I'm sure I'll have a lot to say about it

Ann Coulter off her Rocker!

Now she's done it! Made her feelings come out. Ann Coulter thinks that Jews should convert to Christianity! Look bimbo, this "Fast-track program" religion left out some very important things. Like for instance G-d, many times, says that the Jewish people are an eternal nation who he will never break his covenant with.
Anyways, its late, fast foward to 1:20, that's when it really starts to get good!

The World wants to prove an "occupation"

An excellent video released from the Elders of Zion.

Hitle- I'm mean Ahmadinajad's Speech at Columbia University

A minute by minute account:

Liveblogging Ahmadinejad's Columbia University Speech

3:06. "Best of luck to all of you," he says, wrapping things up, to robust applause, a few boos. He seems pretty tired but happy with his performance. Wonder where he's going to lunch. Michael's? Elaine's?

3:04. Ahmadinejad agrees to an earlier request from President Bollinger, and invites Columbia students and faculty to visit Iran and meet with Iranian academics and students. Considering the spate of jailings of Iranian-American scholars, you've really got to pity the parent who's faced with that release form.

3:02. Now here's a problem for the White House: China and Russia are sympathetic to Ahmadinejad's argument that the U.S. shouldn't get to decide who gets to join the nuclear club.

2:59. Here's a problem for all you Democratic presidential contenders: Ahmadinejad basically shares your criticism of President Bush's policy on Iran.

2:55. Ahmadinejad claims that the IAEA "has verified" that Iran's nuclear program is being used for peaceful purposes. Actually, they're still trying to prove you're not, which is the assumption of the U.S., Britain, France, etc. He just called nations pursuing nuclear weapons "backward, retarded." Oh, the field day "The Daily Show" will have if he's ever forced to eat those words.

2:52. We know that Iran is funneling arms, cash and fighters into Iraq. We know that they are backers of Hezbollah, a terrorist organization. Can they do those things and still be a "peace-loving nation," Mr. President? All this peace and love talk is making him sound like Dennis Kucinich. A fascist, anti-semitic, possibly nuclear-armed Dennis Kucinich.

2:50. "In Iran, we don't have homosexuals like in your country." Ladies and gentlemen, the first indisputably crazy thing he's said all day.

2:43. Ahmadinejad., who has a PhD in "transportation engineering and planning from the Science and Technology University," according to his official bio, draws on advancements in science and technology as a basis for his jury's-not-out position on the Holocaust. There are two legs to his position, though, and one at least is pretty widely shared in his part of the world: The Palestinians had nothing to do with World War II.

2:41. Why does your nation support terrorism? "We're a cultured nation, we don't need to resort to terrorism," he says, smiling.

2:37. We're onto the Q&A. Asked about his position on Israel, Ahmadinejad says, "We are friends of the Jewish people," and goes on for a bit about "loving" all nations and peoples. The questioner asks him to state whether he advocates the destruction of Israel, yes or no. Ahmadinejad gets a little touchy, sort of (that smile again), and asks why his answer doesn't count as an answer. Medium applause.

2:33. He states in closing that his is a peace-loving nation that wants to extend its hand in friendship to all other nations. There's lots of applause at first, and it's quickly followed by boos. Very loud boos.

2:28. Ahmadinejad's just finished railing about the decades of Western exploitation and adventurism in the Middle East. That's pretty undeniable. On the Holocaust: Why are scholars "who want to approach the question from a different perspective" thrown into jail, he wants to know. That is the case in Germany, at least, where denying the Holocaust is a crime. Also: not a bad, dare we say it, question to ask.

On Israel: The Holocaust happened in Germany, why should the Palestinians have to suffer for it? Now that it's Washington's policy to help the Palestinians establish statehood, we're wondering how helpful -- truly helpful -- Iran has been in that endeavor.

2:19. If you watched Ahmadinejad's "60 Minutes" interview, you'd have seen how he threw the abuses at Abu Ghraib, the infinite-seeming detention of foreigners at Guantanamo, and the NSA's super-secret surveillance program back at his interviewer. This is what John McCain, Lindsey Graham and others mean when they say violating the Geneva Conventions in the war on terror undermines America's ability to challenge rogue nations. When someone like Ahmadinejad illustrates this point, that's got to sting someone, somewhere.

He is pretty clearly talking about the U.S. now, when he talks about nations that misuse power and knowledge to "try to control all in the name of combating insecurity and terrorism." He continues, "They do not respect the privacy of their people, they tap telephone calls and try to control their people... by using precise scientific methods and planning, they begin their onslaught on the domestic cultures of nations." Try asking whether they agree with that last part before the U.N. General Assembly, and see how many hands shoot up.

2:14. Ahmadinejad is quoting verses on the origins of knowledge from the Quran, and names a range of prophets from the Judeo-Christian tradition as well as from Islam as those who "delivered humans from ignorance, negligence, superstitions, unethical behavior and corrupted ways of thinking with respect to knowledge."

2:07. Bollinger closed his speech to rousing applause, which made us wonder why the audience is even here. The clappers don't speak for everyone.

Ahmadinejad: "In Iran, we actually respect our speakers. We don't think it's necessary before the speech is even given to come in with a series of claims---"

[Loads of applause]

"--to attempt in a so-called manner to provide vaccination of some sort to our students and faculty. The text read by the gentleman here was an insult to information and the knowledge of the audience here. In a university environment, we must allow people to speak their mind, to allow everyone to talk, so that the truth is revealed by all."

We get why Bollinger introduced Ahmadinejad the way he did, but it's a little inconsistent with his defense of having Ahmadinejad there in the first place.

2:03. We were starting to wonder why Bollinger invited Ahmadinejad in the first place, but he's explained it: "Frankly and in all candor, Mr. President, I doubt that you will have the intellectual courage to answer these questions. But your avoiding them will have meaning for us."

1:58. Bollinger just spanked his guest hard for questioning whether the Holocaust happened. "You are either brazenly provocative or stunningly uneducated," he says, to loud applause. Bollinger challenges Ahmadinejad to stand by this position. Sort of weird, after that diatribe about academic and intellectual freedom, but necessary in this forum. Also: We will inevitably misspell Ahmadinejad's name at some point in this liveblog. We'll fix later, promise.

1:56. "Mr. President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator." Wow. Bollinger came under fire big time for inviting Ahmadinejad to speak, and he certainly isn't making it easy for the Iranian ruler with this introduction. It's probably more the case that he's going the extra mile because of the controversy. Wonder if Ahmadinejad knew this was coming.

1:52. Columbia University President Lee Bollinger is introducing the featured speaker, first with some words about academic freedom and freedom of speech, then with some words about recently jailed Iranian-American academic Haleh Esfandiari and others. One is still jailed in Iran; Bollinger announces the university has extended a visiting faculty invitation to him.

1:48. Welcome to The Gate's liveblog of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speech at Columbia University. The audience was thanked for its civility -- in other words, please don't make a ruckus. Attendees won't be allowed to get up and ask the Iranian president questions; instead, they may write down one question on an index card and pass them down to be collected by ushers. Two student leaders seated at a desk near a stage will choose among and ask the questions, in a Q&A to follow Ahmadinejad's half-hour speech.

Sure, We'd let Hitler speak

Message to Liberals

From the Life-of-Rubin blog:

You're not unpatriotic because you have an opposing opinion.

You're not unpatriotic because you oppose the war.

You're not unpatriotic because you hate our President.

You're unpatriotic because you give comfort and honor to our enemies.

You're unpatriotic because you interview them and give them a stage to play their mind games.

You care more about respecting an evil murderous dictator then you're own President. Even that doesn't make you unpatriotic, but it does make you wrong.