05.23.04 (11:18 am) [edit]
Couple things I'd like to say about this. First off, it's terrible that this happened, even if I couldn't disagree with the position of this organization any more than I already do. They have a right to say what they want, no matter how wrong they may be and likewise anyone else with differing opinion.
Secondly, I really don't think this serves as a hate crime. Yes, it's terrible, yes it's a crime, but it's purely political, from where I can see. Maybe I'm wrong but, I heard no mention of slurs or anti-Muslim sentaments in this incident. All that has been recorded here is arson of a political opinion. It may or may not have anything to do with who made the statement with this display.
I think it has more to do with what the statement said. But none the less, it should be investigated to find out if it was or was not a hate crime. It shouldn't be assuemd it was or was not a hate crime.
Lastly, I'd just like to point out that in their beloved Palestinian area, if something like this happened to squash someone's right to free speech, the speaker who was squashed would have no recourse. It's just kind of ironic, don't you think? The thing they are defending and using the tools of democracy for wouldn't upheld them in a similar situation had they been there. That is the saddest irony of ironies.
I wish them luck in finding who did that. As I've said before, I'm all for protesting and counter protesting (I do it myself all the time) but the second you distroy another person's property you have now violated the law and moral codes, not to mention a loss of creidbility. While I don't completely agree with the position of the creators of this display, I do feel their frustration and I hope justice is served for them.
[line]
ANAHEIM, Calif., May 22 /PRNewswire/ -- The Southern California office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-LA) today called on local and national law enforcement authorities to treat an arson attack on a pro-Palestinian university display as a possible hate crime.
University of California-Irvine (UCI) students reported to CAIR-LA that the display challenging the wall Israel is building on Palestinian land was torched late Thursday or early Friday morning. The display, made of cardboard boxes and built by the Society of Arab Students (SAS), was a replica of Israel's new wall.
Display sponsors say the symbolic wall was built to demonstrate the negative impact Israel's barrier has on the daily live of Palestinians and on prospects for peace in the Middle East. The display was one of a number of activities during a Palestine awareness week organized by the Muslim Student Union (MSU).
"Because of the ethnic and religious nature of the display and its sponsors, we urge campus police and the FBI to investigate this attack as a possible hate crime," said CAIR-LA Public Relations Director Ra'id Faraj. "Muslim and Arab students should feel safe in exercising their First Amendment rights, free of intimidation or harassment."
On Thursday, the Orange County Human Relations Commission released its 2003 annual report that showed a 50 percent increase in hate incidents directed at members of the Muslim and Arab-American community. (UCI is located in Orange County.) In April, CAIR's own annual report on the status of American Muslim civil rights showed a 70 percent increase in anti-Muslim incidents nationwide in 2003.
There are an estimated 600,000 Muslims in Southern California. CAIR, America's largest Islamic civil liberties group, is headquartered in Washington, D.C., and has 26 regional offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada.
NOTE: CAIR offers an e-mail list designed to be a journalist's window to the American Muslim community. Subscribers to the list, called ISLAM-INFONET, receive news releases and other materials dealing with American Muslim positions on issues of importance to our society.
To SUBSCRIBE to ISLAM-INFONET, go to: http://cair.biglist.com/islam...
[line]
Source: Council on American-Islamic Relations
Couple things I'd like to say about this. First off, it's terrible that this happened, even if I couldn't disagree with the position of this organization any more than I already do. They have a right to say what they want, no matter how wrong they may be and likewise anyone else with differing opinion.
Secondly, I really don't think this serves as a hate crime. Yes, it's terrible, yes it's a crime, but it's purely political, from where I can see. Maybe I'm wrong but, I heard no mention of slurs or anti-Muslim sentaments in this incident. All that has been recorded here is arson of a political opinion. It may or may not have anything to do with who made the statement with this display.
I think it has more to do with what the statement said. But none the less, it should be investigated to find out if it was or was not a hate crime. It shouldn't be assuemd it was or was not a hate crime.
Lastly, I'd just like to point out that in their beloved Palestinian area, if something like this happened to squash someone's right to free speech, the speaker who was squashed would have no recourse. It's just kind of ironic, don't you think? The thing they are defending and using the tools of democracy for wouldn't upheld them in a similar situation had they been there. That is the saddest irony of ironies.
I wish them luck in finding who did that. As I've said before, I'm all for protesting and counter protesting (I do it myself all the time) but the second you distroy another person's property you have now violated the law and moral codes, not to mention a loss of creidbility. While I don't completely agree with the position of the creators of this display, I do feel their frustration and I hope justice is served for them.
[line]
ANAHEIM, Calif., May 22 /PRNewswire/ -- The Southern California office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-LA) today called on local and national law enforcement authorities to treat an arson attack on a pro-Palestinian university display as a possible hate crime.
University of California-Irvine (UCI) students reported to CAIR-LA that the display challenging the wall Israel is building on Palestinian land was torched late Thursday or early Friday morning. The display, made of cardboard boxes and built by the Society of Arab Students (SAS), was a replica of Israel's new wall.
Display sponsors say the symbolic wall was built to demonstrate the negative impact Israel's barrier has on the daily live of Palestinians and on prospects for peace in the Middle East. The display was one of a number of activities during a Palestine awareness week organized by the Muslim Student Union (MSU).
"Because of the ethnic and religious nature of the display and its sponsors, we urge campus police and the FBI to investigate this attack as a possible hate crime," said CAIR-LA Public Relations Director Ra'id Faraj. "Muslim and Arab students should feel safe in exercising their First Amendment rights, free of intimidation or harassment."
On Thursday, the Orange County Human Relations Commission released its 2003 annual report that showed a 50 percent increase in hate incidents directed at members of the Muslim and Arab-American community. (UCI is located in Orange County.) In April, CAIR's own annual report on the status of American Muslim civil rights showed a 70 percent increase in anti-Muslim incidents nationwide in 2003.
There are an estimated 600,000 Muslims in Southern California. CAIR, America's largest Islamic civil liberties group, is headquartered in Washington, D.C., and has 26 regional offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada.
NOTE: CAIR offers an e-mail list designed to be a journalist's window to the American Muslim community. Subscribers to the list, called ISLAM-INFONET, receive news releases and other materials dealing with American Muslim positions on issues of importance to our society.
To SUBSCRIBE to ISLAM-INFONET, go to: http://cair.biglist.com/islam...
[line]
Source: Council on American-Islamic Relations
05.23.04 (11:07 am) [edit]
[b]Sat May 22, 6:24 AM ET
[i]By ERIK STETSON, Associated Press Writer [/b][/i]
RICHMOND, Virginia - A painting Nazis stole from an Austrian Jew more than a half-century ago soon will be returned to its original owner's sole heir.
The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts is giving back "Portrait of Jean d'Albon" to art collector Julius Priester's sole heir and the manager of his estate, 78-year-old Kurt H. Schindler of Hampshire, England.
The 16th Century, French School painting is attributed to the Dutch-born Corneille de Lyon.
Schindler said he has been fighting courts, police, museums and collectors around the world since 1953 to secure the return of more than 20 paintings that rightfully were Priester's.
"We're just not making much headway," he said Friday. "This is the first one we've really recovered."
Schindler first called the museum three months ago.
"It was clear from the nature of his information that his claim was serious," said Kathleen Morris, an associate curator at the museum in Richmond. "It's our policy to respond to those kinds of claims as quickly as possible."
Morris said it was the first artwork stolen from Jewish owners during that time period the museum has been asked to return. She said the museum is investigating the history of all its artwork with gaps in ownership records between the years of 1933 and 1945.
She said Schindler's evidence, which included a photograph of the painting and a 1950s European police report, was critical to proving his claim. Eight versions of the painting are known to exist. Morris credited art historians for their research of the artist and the Internet for providing information about Jewish-owned art stolen during World War II.
"It's a shame because we're so many generations out from the people who lost their property," she said. "It's only now, as the children of these people are dying, that the information has become available."
The oil-on-wood-panel painting has been at the museum since 1950, when museum benefactor Wilkins Williams bought it from a gallery in New York. It has lain in storage since 1985, when the museum began an expansion project. Morris said the museum is certain the Wilkins family did not knowingly buy stolen art.
"They would have been as shocked as we were to find out this was stolen," she said.
Museum officials plan to display the painting for two weeks while they arrange to ship it to Schindler, Morris said.
"I was delighted," Schindler said. "I've had so many, sort of, disasters that until I actually see the thing, I won't believe it."
Schindler said he plans to keep fighting to have his estate's remaining paintings returned.
"As long as I can keep going, I'll keep going," he said.
[line]
On the Net:
The Nazi Era Provenance Internet Project: www.nepip.org.
The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts: http://www.vmfa.state.va.us
[b]Sat May 22, 6:24 AM ET
[i]By ERIK STETSON, Associated Press Writer [/b][/i]
RICHMOND, Virginia - A painting Nazis stole from an Austrian Jew more than a half-century ago soon will be returned to its original owner's sole heir.
The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts is giving back "Portrait of Jean d'Albon" to art collector Julius Priester's sole heir and the manager of his estate, 78-year-old Kurt H. Schindler of Hampshire, England.
The 16th Century, French School painting is attributed to the Dutch-born Corneille de Lyon.
Schindler said he has been fighting courts, police, museums and collectors around the world since 1953 to secure the return of more than 20 paintings that rightfully were Priester's.
"We're just not making much headway," he said Friday. "This is the first one we've really recovered."
Schindler first called the museum three months ago.
"It was clear from the nature of his information that his claim was serious," said Kathleen Morris, an associate curator at the museum in Richmond. "It's our policy to respond to those kinds of claims as quickly as possible."
Morris said it was the first artwork stolen from Jewish owners during that time period the museum has been asked to return. She said the museum is investigating the history of all its artwork with gaps in ownership records between the years of 1933 and 1945.
She said Schindler's evidence, which included a photograph of the painting and a 1950s European police report, was critical to proving his claim. Eight versions of the painting are known to exist. Morris credited art historians for their research of the artist and the Internet for providing information about Jewish-owned art stolen during World War II.
"It's a shame because we're so many generations out from the people who lost their property," she said. "It's only now, as the children of these people are dying, that the information has become available."
The oil-on-wood-panel painting has been at the museum since 1950, when museum benefactor Wilkins Williams bought it from a gallery in New York. It has lain in storage since 1985, when the museum began an expansion project. Morris said the museum is certain the Wilkins family did not knowingly buy stolen art.
"They would have been as shocked as we were to find out this was stolen," she said.
Museum officials plan to display the painting for two weeks while they arrange to ship it to Schindler, Morris said.
"I was delighted," Schindler said. "I've had so many, sort of, disasters that until I actually see the thing, I won't believe it."
Schindler said he plans to keep fighting to have his estate's remaining paintings returned.
"As long as I can keep going, I'll keep going," he said.
[line]
On the Net:
The Nazi Era Provenance Internet Project: www.nepip.org.
The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts: http://www.vmfa.state.va.us
05.23.04 (11:03 am) [edit]
[b]Saturday May 22, 5:47 pm ET
[i]Mofaz Says Israeli Pull-Out From Gaza is 'Crucial' for the State of Israel [/b][/i]
NEW YORK, May 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz tells Newsweek that disengagement from Gaza is "crucial" for the state of Israel. "If we had a partner on the other side, we could do it by agreement. If not, we should do it unilaterally," he tells Special Diplomatic Correspondent Lally Weymouth in the May 31 issue of Newsweek (on newsstands Monday, May 24).
"We cannot wait. The disengagement plan is a historic move because it is the first time we have spoken of relocating settlements. The prime minister intends to bring a new plan [to his cabinet]. Disengagement is crucial for the state of Israel," he says.
The defense minister says withdrawing from Gaza should be the first step and that it will take a year to implement the plan. A second step, he says, would require a peace partner on the Palestinian side. "It is very dangerous to mention names on the Palestinian side. As long as [Palestinian leader Yasir] Arafat is there, he will not let Prime Minister Abu Ala implement the vision of President [George W.] Bush-dismembering the terrorist infrastructure and reforming the Palestinian Authority. I believe that other pragmatic [Palestinian] leaders will change things step by step."
On the topic of the U.S.'s war in Iraq, Mofaz says the United States "has no other choice than to fight against Al Qaeda and opposition groups."
(Read Newsweek's news releases at http://www.Newsweek.com. Click "Pressroom.")
[b]Saturday May 22, 5:47 pm ET
[i]Mofaz Says Israeli Pull-Out From Gaza is 'Crucial' for the State of Israel [/b][/i]
NEW YORK, May 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz tells Newsweek that disengagement from Gaza is "crucial" for the state of Israel. "If we had a partner on the other side, we could do it by agreement. If not, we should do it unilaterally," he tells Special Diplomatic Correspondent Lally Weymouth in the May 31 issue of Newsweek (on newsstands Monday, May 24).
"We cannot wait. The disengagement plan is a historic move because it is the first time we have spoken of relocating settlements. The prime minister intends to bring a new plan [to his cabinet]. Disengagement is crucial for the state of Israel," he says.
The defense minister says withdrawing from Gaza should be the first step and that it will take a year to implement the plan. A second step, he says, would require a peace partner on the Palestinian side. "It is very dangerous to mention names on the Palestinian side. As long as [Palestinian leader Yasir] Arafat is there, he will not let Prime Minister Abu Ala implement the vision of President [George W.] Bush-dismembering the terrorist infrastructure and reforming the Palestinian Authority. I believe that other pragmatic [Palestinian] leaders will change things step by step."
On the topic of the U.S.'s war in Iraq, Mofaz says the United States "has no other choice than to fight against Al Qaeda and opposition groups."
IDF SPOKESPERSON'S ANNOUNCEMENT
05.21.04 (3:28 pm) [edit]
The following is the IDF SPOKESPERSON'S ANNOUNCEMENT...
[line]
Today's incident in Rafah is a very grave incident and the IDF expresses deep sorrow over the loss of civilian lives.
At no point in this incident was intentional fire opened in the direction of civilians.
A large procession of several hundreds demonstrators, among them gunmen, organized by the Palestinian Authority, left central Rafah along the main road towards IDF forces in Tel-Sultan.
As the crowd, with the gunmen among them, drew near IDF forces, a warning fire of a single missile was fired from a helicopter into an open area, not towards the demonstrators. In addition, flares were fired in the air to deter the crowd and to prevent endangering the demonstrators.
As this did not deter the crowd and they continued to converge on the troops, machine gun fire was opened towards a wall of an abandoned structure along the side of the road and then four tank shells were fired at this abandoned structure. It is possible that the causalities were a result of the tank fire on the abandoned structure.
The details of the incident continue to be investigated. It should be mentioned that the scene of the incident is an area of combat and an area of frequent exchanges of fire. The road has been rigged with explosive charges planted by the Palestinians. The IDF has not yet cleared the road of these explosives. At this stage it is difficult to determine the cause of the civilian casualties.
The incident is being investigated thoroughly at this time. The IDF has approached the Palestinians and offered medical assistance, including the evacuation of the casualties to Israeli hospitals.
[line]
Take a look [url=http://reducto.tblog.com]here[/url] for some good articles that go along with it, as well as some well said commentary on this issue.
D'var Torah for Bamidbar
05.21.04 (3:04 pm) [edit]
Parshat Bamidbar's first Passuk (verse) says that God spoke to Moshe in Midbar Sinai (Sinai Desert). The Midrash (1:6) derives from here that the Torah is compared to three elements: Water, fire and sand.
Rabbi Elizezer Kahan wonders how we can learn all three things from this one verse? Also, why would we need to compare the Torah to three elements?
Couldn't we think of one that would sum it all up?
A possible explanation could be that while water nurtures everything around it, it always moves to the lowest point, thus teaching us humility. While fire illuminates everything around it, its flames are always reaching higher, thus teaching us aspiration. Although those two elements are essential to the Torah, it's critical to BOTH reach high AND stay grounded, which is what sand does. You can't build a castle with water, and you'll never stay low with fire. But without the positive elements of fire and water, we wouldn't necessarily realize the qualities of sand. That's why we need each of them.
As well in our own lives, we have people around us that are very fiery (fire), and people that are very grounded (water). If we remain firmly grounded within our own limitations, while absorbing a "fiery will" to reach higher, we'll grow our own "Sinai", thereby nurturing and illuminating all that's around us!
39 melachot
05.20.04 (1:11 pm) [edit]
A. The Torah says, "Do not perform melachah on Shabbat." Melachah means work. But what's "work?" The melachot, plural for labors in Hebrew, are the 39 categories of action that the Torah interprets as work that may not be performed on Shabbat.
B. When the Torah was given, our ancestors were a large pack of nomadic desert denizens--the original Wandering Jews. It was less than two months after the Exodus when Moses--that's me--came down Mt. Sinai with the Torah, containing the charge to keep Shabbat. "Don't work on Shabbat!" charged the Torah. "But we don't work anyway," rejoined the Jews. "This is the desert, remember? Nobody has a job here!" At that point, I stepped in and pointed out that work was done: the multifaceted efforts made to construct the Mishkan--the portable, collapsible temple that moved with the camp from place to place. I explained that work associated with Mishkan-making was what the Torah meant by "work," and that these things should not be done on Shabbat from then till eternity. And so it remained.
C. Each of the 39 melachot break down into subcategories called tuldot (pronounced TOOL-dote), which means offspring. Because of their "children," the 39 melachot are also referred to as av melachot, meaning father categories.
OK, but what are they?
1. Don't eat your Wheatiesฎ
The first 11 of the 39 concern that indispensable staple of life--bread, since bread was baked on a weekly basis in the Mishkan. Since the bread tree has yet to be genetically engineered, various things must be done to bring forth bread from dirt: planting wheat, plowing the field, reaping grown wheat stalks, binding sheaves of wheat, threshing, winnowing, sifting kernels, grinding, sifting flour, kneading dough, and finally, baking. Any and all of the above are Shabbat no-nos. But since most of us are not farmers, it's unlikely that you'll find yourself doing any of these over the weekend. However, there are many tuldot that originate in these 11 prohibitions.
2. Man makes the clothes...
In the Miskhan, richly colored, ornately decorated and intricately woven materials were the fabric of daily life: the priests' uniforms, the exquisite cloth partitions, and the giant leather and cloth sheets that served as a multi-layer roof. Preparing these textiles involved the next 13 melachot: shearing, bleaching, combing and dyeing wool; spinning and weaving thread/yarn, making two loops (as an anchor on which to base material); sewing two threads together, separating two threads, tying a knot, loosening a knot, sewing two stitches (to attach sections of material), and tearing (other threads or material) in order to sew two stitches. Though stupendous be thy sartorial skills, sorry, they'll have to sit Shabbat out.
3. ...and the leather too
Our textual tour through the creation of the Mishkan takes us to the Desert Leather Factory, where the Jews of old created portions of the Mishkan's roof out of animal hides. Making leather and parchment entails seven steps, which make up Melachot Nos. 25-31: trapping deer, slaughtering it; and flaying, salting, curing, scraping and cutting its hides. Today, this translates into no weekend deer or duck huntin' out in them thar backwoods, and no leatherworking, on the Day of Rest.
4. Work? Out
The remaining eight Melachot comprise the bulk manual labors that manual labor is comprised of--when you're a working person, you can't avoid the following, and neither could the Mishkan-makers: writing two letters, erasing (old text) in order to write two letters, extinguishing a flame, igniting a flame, striking with a hammer, and carrying (an object) from one domain to another. Today, you can't avoid these either; the tuldot originating from these eight have been interpreted by halachic authorities to prohibit much of work as we know it. Among the most prominent tuldot issuing from this block of melachot are the prohibitions of using a writing instrument (source: "writing two letters"), driving (source: "igniting a flame," as in your car's combustion engine), and carrying your briefcase out your front door and down the street (source: "carrying from one domain to another").
Remarks by President Bush to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee
05.20.04 (12:42 pm) [edit]
[b]Tuesday May 18, 3:33 pm ET [/b]
WASHINGTON, May 18 /PRNewswire/ -- Following are remarks by President Bush to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee:
Washington Convention Center
Washington, D.C.
8:53 A.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all very much. Finally, AIPAC elected a President I can kiss. (Laughter and applause.)
I'm honored to be here at AIPAC; thank you for such a warm welcome. It's good to be with so many friends -- friends of mine and friends of Israel. (Applause.) For more than 50 years, the United States and Israel have been steadfast allies. AIPAC is one of the reasons why. (Applause.) You've worked tirelessly to strengthen the ties that bind our nations -- our shared values, our strong commitment to freedom. (Applause.)
By defending the freedom and prosperity and security of Israel, you're also serving the cause of America. (Applause.) Our nation is stronger and safer because we have a true and dependable ally in Israel. (Applause.) I appreciate -- (applause) -- I'm just getting warmed up. (Laughter and applause.)
I want to thank Amy for her leadership. (Applause.) I appreciate you taking time to serve a cause that -- in which you believe deeply. I want to thank Bernice for her willingness to serve, as well. (Applause.) I've known Howard for a long time. He's effective. (Laughter and applause.) I want to thank the AIPAC board -- AIPAC board members for their friendship and leadership. I'm honored to be in the presence of my friend, the Ambassador from Israel, Danny Ayalon. I appreciate you being here, Danny. (Applause.)
Ehud Olmert is with us. Ehud, it's good to see you again. Thank you, sir. (Applause.) I remember the first time we visited in 1998. I had just been re- elected as the Governor of Texas. I went to Israel, and Ehud welcomed me and three over governors to, I guess, your office. You were the Mayor, if I'm not mistaken, at that point in time. And you were focused on filling potholes and emptying the garbage of the people -- (laughter.) But we struck up a good relationship then, and it's great to see you again.
I appreciate the other ministers who are here, some of whom I have met before, some of whom I have had not the honor of meeting. I know I met Tommy before. Appreciate you all being here. Welcome to America. Thank you, Tommy. (Applause.)
I'd like to also recognize many people this morning who are learning to participate in democracy. I'm told there are over 850 students here from 50 states. (Applause.) Make sure the Texas students behave well. (Laughter.) Your mothers are watching. (Laughter.) I know there are buses outside waiting to take you to Capitol Hill. I'm told -- Howard told me there's over 500 meetings scheduled with members of the Senate and the House. That is good news. I'm sure you're going to pass this message on to them: A free, prosperous and secure Israel is in this nation's national interest. (Applause.)
AIPAC is doing important work. I hope you know that. In Washington and beyond, AIPAC is calling attention to the great security challenges of our time. You're educating Congress and the American people on the growing dangers of proliferation. You've spoken out on the threat posed by Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons. You've always understood and warned against the evil ambition of terrorism and their networks. In a dangerous new century, your work is more vital than ever. I thank you for doing your part in the cause of freedom. (Applause.)
Our nation, and the nation of Israel, have much in common. We're both relatively young nations, born of struggle and sacrifice. We're both founded by immigrants escaping religious persecution in other lands. We have both built vibrant democracies, built on the rule of law and market economies. And we're both countries founded on certain basic beliefs: that God watches over the affairs of men, and values every life. (Applause.)
These ties have made us natural allies, and these ties will never be broken. (Applause.) In the past, however, there was one great difference in the experience of our two nations: The United States, through most of our history, has been protected by vast oceans to our east and west, and blessed with friendly neighbors to our north and south. Israel has faced a different situation as a small country in a tough neighborhood. The Israeli people have always had enemies at their borders and terrorists close at hand. Again and again, Israel has defended itself with skill and heroism. And as a result of the courage of the Israeli people, Israel has earned the respect of the American people. (Applause.)
On September the 11th, 2001, Americans saw that we are no longer protected by geography from the dangers of the world. We experienced the horror of being attacked in our homeland, on our streets, and in places of work. And from that experience came an even stronger determination, a fierce determination to defeat terrorism and to eliminate the threat it poses to free people everywhere. (Applause.)
Not all terrorist networks answer to the same orders and same leaders, but all terrorists burn with the same hatred. They hate all who reject their grim vision of tyranny. They hate people who love freedom. They kill without mercy. They kill without shame. And they count their victories in the death of the innocent.
We saw the nature of this enemy again in recent days when terrorists in Iraq beheaded an American citizen, Nicholas Berg. The message that accompanied the videotape of this brutal slaying promised more such atrocities. Here's what the killer said, "We will send you coffin after coffin, box after box, slaughtered in this way." The faces of the terrorists were cloaked, but we have seen their kind before.
Followers of the terrorist ideology executed an elderly man in a wheelchair, Leon Klinghoffer, and pushed his body off the side of a ship into the sea. They kidnapped the journalist, Daniel Pearl, and cut his throat, because he was a Jew. This enemy has left blood on the streets of Jakarta and Jerusalem, Casablanca and Riyadh, Mombasa and Istanbul, Bali, Baghdad and Madrid. They have declared war on the civilized world -- and war is what they got. (Applause.)
Freedom-loving people did not seek this conflict. It has come to us by the choices of violent men, hateful men. See, we seek peace. We long for peace. Israel longs for peace. America longs for peace. Yet, there can be no peace without defending our security. (Applause.) There is only one path to peace and safety. America will use every resource we have to fight and defeat these enemies of freedom. (Applause.)
The lesson of September the 11th is clear and must never be forgotten. Emerging terrorist threats must be confronted before they can reach our country and harm our people. Every terrorist is at war with civilization, and every group or nation that aids them is equally responsible for the murders that the terrorists commit. (Applause.)
So America has led a relentless global campaign against terrorists and their supporters. We're chasing them down one by one in caves, and in shadows where they try to hide. (Applause.) We have uncovered -- we have uncovered terrorist cells on several continents. We've prevented a number of terrorist attacks. We've removed the Taliban regime, which sheltered the plotters of September the 11th. (Applause.) We have stopped shipments -- we have stopped shipments of chemical precursors and nuclear-related -- weapons-related components bound for states that sponsor terror. By speaking clearly, and by meaning what we say, countries like Libya have gotten the message and have renounced their weapons programs. (Applause.)
And for the sake of peace and security, we ended the regime of Saddam Hussein. (Applause.) That regime cast a shadow, a dark shadow of aggression over the Middle East for decades. They invaded both Iran and Kuwait. The regime built and used weapons of mass destruction against its neighbors, and its own people. The regime sponsored terror; it paid rewards of up to $25,000 to the families of Palestinian homicide bombers. That regime filled mass graves with innocent men, innocent women, and innocent children. That regime defied the demands of the free world, and America, for more than a decade. And America is more secure, and the world is better off, because that regime is no more. (Applause.)
America is on the offensive, and we will stay on the offensive until the terrorists are stopped and our people are safe. (Applause.) I will use every asset at our disposal to do our most important job, which is to protect the American people. (Applause.) And that includes the United States military. We have come to know the skill and the courage of the men and women of the United States military. (Applause.) They have fulfilled every mission their country has given to them. They and their families have endured long deployments and uncertainty. Our men and women in uniform have fought in mountain passes and desert sands in the remotest part of the world. They've lost brave friends and comrades, who will always be remembered and honored by a grateful nation. (Applause.)
They have done all this to defend our country and to advance the cause of freedom and peace. And their loved ones, and those who wear our uniform, must know that America is very grateful to their service. (Applause.)
The peace we seek depends on defeating the violent. Yet, we also have a larger mission in the world. In the long-term, we must end terrorist violence at its source by undermining the terrorist ideology of hatred and fear. Terrorists find influence and recruits in societies where bitterness and resentment are common, and hope and opportunity are rare. The world's best hope for lasting security and stability across the Middle East is the establishment of just and free societies.
And so across that vital region, America is standing for the expansion of human liberty. This historic task is not easy in a part of the world that has known so much oppression and stagnation and violence. It's hard work. Yet, we must be strong in our firm belief that every human heart desires to be free. We must be strong in our belief that free societies are hopeful societies and peaceful societies. (Applause.)
We have made progress that few would have predicted or expected just three years ago. In Afghanistan, our coalition is working with President Karzai to help the people of Afghanistan build a modern, peaceful and democratic government. In January, Afghans approved a new constitution that protects the rights of all Afghan citizens, including women. (Applause.) Through weeks of negotiation and compromise, they agreed upon a fundamental law that respects tradition and establishes a foundation of modern political rights, including free speech, due process, and a vote for every citizen. We're making progress.
In Iraq, Saddam's brutal dictatorship is gone, and in its place an Iraqi democracy is emerging. Iraqi leaders have signed a transitional administrative law that will guarantee basic freedoms. Iraq now has an independent judiciary, a free market, a new currency, more than 200 newspapers in circulation, and schools free of hateful propaganda. (Applause.)
It's hard work in Iraq. Our efforts are approaching a crucial moment. On June 30th, our coalition will transfer its authority to a sovereign Iraqi government. With the assistance of the United Nations and our coalition, Iraqi citizens are currently making important decisions about the nature and scope of the interim government. In time, Iraq will be a free and democratic nation, at the heart of the Middle East. This will send a message, a powerful message, from Damascus to Tehran, that democracy can bring hope to lives in every culture. (Applause.) And this advance of freedom will bring greater security to America and to the world. These are historic times, it's an historic opportunity. (Applause.)
Yet, as June 30th approaches, the enemies of freedom grow even more desperate to prevent a rise of democracy in Iraq. That's what you're seeing on your TV screens: desperation by a hateful few, people who cannot stand the thought of free societies in their midst. They're targeting brave Iraqis who are leaning toward democracy, such as Izzedine Salim, who was assassinated in Baghdad yesterday. They're murdering Iraqi policemen who stand as symbols of order. They're killing foreign aid workers who are helping to rebuild Iraq. They're attacking our military. Their goal is to undermine the will of our coalition and the will of America, and to drive us out before our mission is complete. They're not going to succeed. They will not shake the will of America. (Applause.)
My resolve is firm. (Applause.) The resolve of the American people is solid. Our military is skilled, spirits are high. They are determined to succeed. We understand the stakes are high for America and for the world. We will not be intimidated by thugs and assassins. We will win this essential important victory in the war on terror. (Applause.)
This is an historic moment. The world watches for weakness in our resolve. They will see no weakness. We will answer every challenge. U.S. Army soldiers and Iraqi security forces are systematically destroying the illegal militia in the south of Iraq. (Applause.) Coalition forces are working with Iraqis in Fallujah to end control by Saddam loyalists and foreign fighters. (Applause.) We're building up Iraqi security forces so they can safeguard their own country. We're flexible in our methods, but our goal is unchanging: Iraq will be free, and Iraq will be a democratic nation. (Applause.)
Freedom is also at the heart of our approach to bringing peace between Israel and the Palestinian people. The United States is strongly committed, and I am strongly committed, to the security of Israel as a vibrant Jewish state. (Applause.) Israel is a democracy and a friend, and has every right to defend itself from terror. (Applause.)
For the sake of peace, this country is committed to helping the Palestinian people establish a democratic and viable state of their own. (Applause.) Israel needs a truly responsible partner in achieving peace. (Applause.) The Palestinian people deserve democratic institutions and responsible leaders. (Applause.) Progress towards this vision creates responsibilities for Israel, the Palestinian people, and Arab nations. Before these two states -- before there can be two states, all parties must renounce violence and fight terror. (Applause.)
Security is the foundation for peace. (Applause.) All parties must embrace democracy and reform and take the necessary steps for peace. The unfolding violence in the Gaza Strip is troubling and underscores the need for all parties to seize every opportunity for peace. I supported the plan announced by Prime Minister Sharon to withdraw military installations and settlements from Gaza and parts of the West Bank. (Applause.) As I said in my statement on April 14, 2004, the Prime Minister's plan is a bold, courageous step, that can bring us closer to the goal of two states, Israel and Palestine, living side- by-side in peace and security. (Applause.)
The Prime Minister's decision has given the Palestinian people and the free world a chance to take bold steps of their own toward peace. First, the Palestinian people must reject corrupt and failed leaders, and insist on a leadership committed to reform and progress and peace. (Applause.) Second, they must renounce terror and violence that frustrate their aspirations and take so many innocent lives. (Applause.) And, finally, by taking these steps, they will have an opportunity, a fantastic opportunity to build a modern economy and create the institutions and habits of liberty. The Palestinian people deserve a better future. (Applause.) And that future -- and that future can be achieved through democracy. (Applause.)
Many in this room have worked and waited a lifetime for peace in the Holy Land. I hear that deep concern for peace. Our vision is a Middle East where young Israelis and Palestinians can play and learn and grow without living in the shadow of death. (Applause.) Our vision is a Middle East where borders are crossed for purposes of trade and commerce, not crossed for the purposes of murder and war. (Applause.) This vision is within our grasp if we have the faith and the courage and the resolve to achieve it. (Applause.)
Perhaps the deepest obstacle to peace is found in the hearts of men and women. The Jewish people have seen, over the years and over the centuries, that hate prepares the way for violence. The refusal to expose and confront intolerance can lead to crimes beyond imagining. So we have a duty to expose and confront anti-Semitism, wherever it is found. (Applause.)
Some of you attended a very important event in Berlin last month, the International Conference on Anti-Semitism. You understand that anti-Semitism is not a problem of the past; the hatred of Jews did not die in a Berlin bunker. In its cruder forms, it can be found in some Arab media, and this government will continue to call upon Arab governments to end libels and incitements. (Applause.) Such hatred can also take subtler forms. The demonization of Israel, the most extreme anti-Zionist rhetoric can be a flimsy cover for anti-Semitism, and contribute to an atmosphere of fear in which synagogues are desecrated, people are slandered, folks are threatened. I will continue to call upon our friends in Europe to renounce and fight any sign of anti-Semitism in their midst. (Applause.)
We are living through historic times. We are called to do important work in the world. We will stand together against bigotry in every land and every language. We will answer violent men with patient, determined justice. We will expand human freedom and the peace that freedom brings. And by our resolve, and by our courage, we will prevail. (Applause.)
I want to thank you -- I want to thank you for your dedication to the security of America and to the safety of Israel. I want to thank you for your warm hospitality today. May God bless America. May God bless Israel. Thank you for coming. Thank you all for your time. Thank you all. (Applause.)
END 9:32 A.M. EDT
Source: White House Press Office
05.20.04 (12:40 pm) [edit]
[b]Wed May 19, 1:46 PM ET [/b]
PERTH, Australia - The alleged Southeast Asian operations chief of an al-Qaida-linked terror group expressed interest in attacking the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, according to notes by a British-born terror suspect.
But ranking al-Qaida members suggested that the group, Jemaah Islamiyah, instead attack a prominent Jewish-linked target either the Israeli embassy or well-known Australian Jewish businessman Joe Gutnick, said the notes taken by Islamic convert Jack Roche.
Details of the notes emerged Wednesday during the third day of Roche's trial for allegedly plotting to blow up the Israeli embassy in Canberra. Roche, who has pleaded innocent, faces a maximum 25-year sentence if convicted.
Gutnick, a Melbourne mining magnate and rabbi who is one of Australia's richest men, is an outspoken supporter of Israel and known for large donations to the Israeli government.
In a notebook shown to Perth District Court by prosecutors, Roche wrote about meeting Jemaah Islamiyah's Southeast Asian operations chief, known as Hambali, and senior al-Qaida officials.
Roche wrote that Hambali, the alleged mastermind of the October 2002 bombings in Bali that killed 202 people, was interested in "doing something" at the Sydney Olympics (news - web sites). The notes did not elaborate.
Roche, writing in Indonesian, detailed how he was to be paid, how he was to recruit three Australian Muslims to help him carry out the plot, and that he received 10 days of explosives training with al-Qaida in Afghanistan.
On Tuesday, prosecutors said Indonesian terror suspect Hambali, whose name is Tiduan Isamuddin, paid Roche $80,000 to carry out an Olympics bombing to draw attention to the plight of Palestinians.
Hambali, who also is accused of masterminding the August bombing of the J.W. Marriott hotel in Jakarta that killed 12 and other deadly attacks, was captured in Thailand in August and now is being held by U.S. authorities at an undisclosed location
[b]Wed May 19, 1:46 PM ET [/b]
PERTH, Australia - The alleged Southeast Asian operations chief of an al-Qaida-linked terror group expressed interest in attacking the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, according to notes by a British-born terror suspect.
But ranking al-Qaida members suggested that the group, Jemaah Islamiyah, instead attack a prominent Jewish-linked target either the Israeli embassy or well-known Australian Jewish businessman Joe Gutnick, said the notes taken by Islamic convert Jack Roche.
Details of the notes emerged Wednesday during the third day of Roche's trial for allegedly plotting to blow up the Israeli embassy in Canberra. Roche, who has pleaded innocent, faces a maximum 25-year sentence if convicted.
Gutnick, a Melbourne mining magnate and rabbi who is one of Australia's richest men, is an outspoken supporter of Israel and known for large donations to the Israeli government.
In a notebook shown to Perth District Court by prosecutors, Roche wrote about meeting Jemaah Islamiyah's Southeast Asian operations chief, known as Hambali, and senior al-Qaida officials.
Roche wrote that Hambali, the alleged mastermind of the October 2002 bombings in Bali that killed 202 people, was interested in "doing something" at the Sydney Olympics (news - web sites). The notes did not elaborate.
Roche, writing in Indonesian, detailed how he was to be paid, how he was to recruit three Australian Muslims to help him carry out the plot, and that he received 10 days of explosives training with al-Qaida in Afghanistan.
On Tuesday, prosecutors said Indonesian terror suspect Hambali, whose name is Tiduan Isamuddin, paid Roche $80,000 to carry out an Olympics bombing to draw attention to the plight of Palestinians.
Hambali, who also is accused of masterminding the August bombing of the J.W. Marriott hotel in Jakarta that killed 12 and other deadly attacks, was captured in Thailand in August and now is being held by U.S. authorities at an undisclosed location
05.20.04 (12:38 pm) [edit]
[b]Wed May 19, 5:04 PM ET
[i]By RON FOURNIER, AP Political Writer [/b][/i]
WASHINGTON - Democrat John Kerry said Wednesday he's open to nominating anti-abortion judges as long as that doesn't lead to the Supreme Court overturning the landmark 1973 ruling that made abortion legal.
Kerry, the presumptive nominee of a party that overwhelmingly favors a woman's right to abortion, struck a moderate note as he lashed out at one of the high court's most conservative justices, telling The Associated Press he regrets his 1986 vote to confirm Antonin Scalia.
"If you're looking for me to admit that I made a mistake in my years in the Senate, there you go there's one," said the four-term Massachusetts senator.
In a 60-minute interview with AP reporters and editors, Kerry covered a range of issues, from the economy, gun rights and his differences with President Bush to Mideast violence and the mounting death toll in Iraq.
If elected, Kerry promised that virtually all U.S. combat troops will be out of Iraq away from "the death zone" by the end of his first term.
He grudgingly gave Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress credit for the creation of 900,000 jobs this year, echoed the administration's views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and seconded Bush's decision to nominate Alan Greenspan for a fifth term as chairman of the Federal Reserve.
But those were fleeting passes at bipartisanship as Kerry spent the bulk of the session criticizing Bush and fleshing out his own political vision, which critics have called muddled.
"I've heard some people say, well, what's the message? What's he doing? The message is clear, folks: We're going to make America stronger at home by being fiscally responsible, investing in health care and education, becoming energy independent, and we're going to make ourselves stronger in the world by restoring America's respect and influence with a better foreign policy. It's that simple."
Kerry said Bush has damaged relations with allies to the point that only a new president can repair them. The problem is evident in Iraq, said the decorated Vietnam War veteran who promised to avert a quagmire.
"It will not be like Vietnam," Kerry said. "I will get our troops home from Iraq with honor and with the interests of our country properly protected."
How soon? "It will not take long to do what is necessary. I'm not going to give you a specific date, but I'll tell you that I have a plan and I will put that plan in place." Republican Richard M. Nixon used similar language during the 1968 presidential race, but the war dragged on for years after his election.
Saying his goal would be achieved in his first term, Kerry explained, "Look, you may have some deployments of people for a long period of time in the Middle East depending on what the overall approach to the Middle East is. I'm not going to tell you we won't shift deployments from one place to another, but we're not going to be engaged in an active kind of death zone the way we are today."
Discussing the Supreme Court and abortion, Kerry ventured into one of the nation's most sensitive political subjects at the risk of alienating powerful Democratic interests groups fighting to maintain abortion rights secured in the Roe v. Wade case.
Court observers contend the justices are split 5-4 on the issue, and the next president may be able to help tilt the balance.
Calling himself a strict constructionist, a phrase Bush has used to describe himself, Kerry paraphrased former Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart and said: "A good justice is somebody that when you read their decisions you can't tell if they are Republican or Democratic or liberal or conservative, a Christian or a Jew, a Muslim, male or female. You just know you're reading a good judicial opinion."
Stewart, an Eisenhower appointee, served from 1958-1981.
Kerry said he has voted in favor of "any number of judges who are pro-life or pro-something else that I may not agree with," some of whom were nominated by Republican presidents. "But I'm going to make sure we uphold what I believe are Constitutional rights and I'm not going to pick somebody who's going to undermine those rights."
"Do they have to agree with me on everything? No," Kerry said. Asked if they must agree with his abortion-rights views, he quickly added, "I will not appoint somebody with a 5-4 Court who's about to undue Roe v. Wade. I've said that before."
"But that doesn't mean that if that's not the balance of the court I wouldn't be prepared ultimately to appoint somebody to some court who has a different point of view. I've already voted for people like that. I voted for Judge Scalia."
Presidents nominate a wide variety of federal judges, including the Supreme Court.
Asked if he regretted that vote, Kerry said, "Yes. Given what he has done on a number of cases." Kerry said he didn't see at the time "such a level of ideology and partisanship" he now sees in Scalia.
Kerry also said:
_ Bush and the GOP-led Congress deserve "some credit" for jobs created this year, but he said the new employment doesn't pay nearly as much as jobs lost overseas.
_ Israel has a right to defend itself with a "proper measure of restraint." Bush has used a similar two-sided approach to the issue.
_ In Iraq and Guantanamo Bay, the United States should live by the tenets of the Geneva Conventions even in instances when the treaty may not technically apply.
_ he would defend the Second Amendment's protections for gun owners.
_ has no intention of asking pro-Democratic groups spending millions in unlimited donations in the presidential election to stay out of the race
[b]Wed May 19, 5:04 PM ET
[i]By RON FOURNIER, AP Political Writer [/b][/i]
WASHINGTON - Democrat John Kerry said Wednesday he's open to nominating anti-abortion judges as long as that doesn't lead to the Supreme Court overturning the landmark 1973 ruling that made abortion legal.
Kerry, the presumptive nominee of a party that overwhelmingly favors a woman's right to abortion, struck a moderate note as he lashed out at one of the high court's most conservative justices, telling The Associated Press he regrets his 1986 vote to confirm Antonin Scalia.
"If you're looking for me to admit that I made a mistake in my years in the Senate, there you go there's one," said the four-term Massachusetts senator.
In a 60-minute interview with AP reporters and editors, Kerry covered a range of issues, from the economy, gun rights and his differences with President Bush to Mideast violence and the mounting death toll in Iraq.
If elected, Kerry promised that virtually all U.S. combat troops will be out of Iraq away from "the death zone" by the end of his first term.
He grudgingly gave Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress credit for the creation of 900,000 jobs this year, echoed the administration's views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and seconded Bush's decision to nominate Alan Greenspan for a fifth term as chairman of the Federal Reserve.
But those were fleeting passes at bipartisanship as Kerry spent the bulk of the session criticizing Bush and fleshing out his own political vision, which critics have called muddled.
"I've heard some people say, well, what's the message? What's he doing? The message is clear, folks: We're going to make America stronger at home by being fiscally responsible, investing in health care and education, becoming energy independent, and we're going to make ourselves stronger in the world by restoring America's respect and influence with a better foreign policy. It's that simple."
Kerry said Bush has damaged relations with allies to the point that only a new president can repair them. The problem is evident in Iraq, said the decorated Vietnam War veteran who promised to avert a quagmire.
"It will not be like Vietnam," Kerry said. "I will get our troops home from Iraq with honor and with the interests of our country properly protected."
How soon? "It will not take long to do what is necessary. I'm not going to give you a specific date, but I'll tell you that I have a plan and I will put that plan in place." Republican Richard M. Nixon used similar language during the 1968 presidential race, but the war dragged on for years after his election.
Saying his goal would be achieved in his first term, Kerry explained, "Look, you may have some deployments of people for a long period of time in the Middle East depending on what the overall approach to the Middle East is. I'm not going to tell you we won't shift deployments from one place to another, but we're not going to be engaged in an active kind of death zone the way we are today."
Discussing the Supreme Court and abortion, Kerry ventured into one of the nation's most sensitive political subjects at the risk of alienating powerful Democratic interests groups fighting to maintain abortion rights secured in the Roe v. Wade case.
Court observers contend the justices are split 5-4 on the issue, and the next president may be able to help tilt the balance.
Calling himself a strict constructionist, a phrase Bush has used to describe himself, Kerry paraphrased former Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart and said: "A good justice is somebody that when you read their decisions you can't tell if they are Republican or Democratic or liberal or conservative, a Christian or a Jew, a Muslim, male or female. You just know you're reading a good judicial opinion."
Stewart, an Eisenhower appointee, served from 1958-1981.
Kerry said he has voted in favor of "any number of judges who are pro-life or pro-something else that I may not agree with," some of whom were nominated by Republican presidents. "But I'm going to make sure we uphold what I believe are Constitutional rights and I'm not going to pick somebody who's going to undermine those rights."
"Do they have to agree with me on everything? No," Kerry said. Asked if they must agree with his abortion-rights views, he quickly added, "I will not appoint somebody with a 5-4 Court who's about to undue Roe v. Wade. I've said that before."
"But that doesn't mean that if that's not the balance of the court I wouldn't be prepared ultimately to appoint somebody to some court who has a different point of view. I've already voted for people like that. I voted for Judge Scalia."
Presidents nominate a wide variety of federal judges, including the Supreme Court.
Asked if he regretted that vote, Kerry said, "Yes. Given what he has done on a number of cases." Kerry said he didn't see at the time "such a level of ideology and partisanship" he now sees in Scalia.
Kerry also said:
_ Bush and the GOP-led Congress deserve "some credit" for jobs created this year, but he said the new employment doesn't pay nearly as much as jobs lost overseas.
_ Israel has a right to defend itself with a "proper measure of restraint." Bush has used a similar two-sided approach to the issue.
_ In Iraq and Guantanamo Bay, the United States should live by the tenets of the Geneva Conventions even in instances when the treaty may not technically apply.
_ he would defend the Second Amendment's protections for gun owners.
_ has no intention of asking pro-Democratic groups spending millions in unlimited donations in the presidential election to stay out of the race
05.20.04 (12:31 pm) [edit]
[b]Thu May 20,12:18 PM ET
[i]GAVIN RABINOWITZ [/b][/i]
TEL AVIV, Israel (CP) - Marwan Barghouti, a popular Palestinian uprising leader, was convicted Thursday of ordering shootings that killed four Israelis and a Greek monk and supplying funds and arms for other attacks.
Also Thursday, Israeli troops deepened their three-day-old offensive in a Gaza Strip refugee camp, killing seven Palestinians, most of them armed, and demolishing several buildings. In the West Bank, three Palestinians, including a 13-year-old boy, were killed by army fire.
Prime Minister Paul Martin said the Canadian government finds the violence "deeply disturbing."
"We are deeply troubled by the recent violence and destruction in the Gaza Strip, particularly the deaths of demonstrators, including children," Martin said in a statement released Thursday.
Meanwhile, the Tel Aviv District Court convicted Barghouti, widely seen as a potential successor of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, of five counts of murder, one count of attempted murder and one count of membership in a terrorist organization. The prosecution asked the court for five consecutive life terms.
Sentencing is set for June 6.
However, the panel of three judges cleared Barghouti of responsibility for 21 other deaths, ruling there was no evidence directly connecting him to those attacks carried out by militants linked to his organization.
At the time of his arrest in April 2002, Barghouti headed Arafat's Fatah movement in the West Bank. Israel said Barghouti also played a leading role in Fatah's violent offshoot, the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, which has carried out scores of shooting and bombing attacks on Israelis during more than three years of fighting.
The court said that Arafat looked to Barghouti to carry out his wishes, including attacks, giving legal weight for the first time to the long-held Israeli government position that Arafat has been orchestrating violence.
"Yasser Arafat did not give clear and precise instructions, but he made sure that those under him understood fully when he was interested in a ceasefire and when he was interested in attacks against Israel," the ruling said.
Arafat and his aides have denied the Israeli allegations.
In response to Barghouti's conviction, Al Aqsa leaders in the Gaza Strip threatened to kidnap Israelis as a bargaining chip for their jailed leader.
Barghouti, who flashed V-signs with shackled hands as he entered the courtroom, reiterated that he does not accept the court's authority. However, the longtime advocate of a Palestinian state alongside Israel also said he believes there will be peace if Israel withdraws from the West Bank and Gaza.
"I call on the Israeli public, 'Don't believe for one moment that you can overcome the Palestinians with force,' " he said. "Palestinians have no power, but they have justice on their side."
"One day, the Palestinians will gain their liberty and freedom and Marwan, too, will be free," said Barghouti's wife Fadwa, who was not given permission to enter Israel to attend the trial.
Meanwhile, in the Rafah refugee camp in Gaza, Israel continued its offensive despite withering international condemnation over a deadly tank attack that killed eight Palestinian protesters, most of them children, on Wednesday. Israel apologized for the shooting, that also left 50 people wounded.
Among the leaders expressing concern about Israel's offensive was Martin.
"These recent military actions by the Israeli Defence Forces and the widespread destruction of civilian property are deeply disturbing," his statement said.
"While we have consistently condemned all acts of terrorism and supported Israel's right to defend its citizens, we hold that any actions pursued by Israel must be consistent with international law and with international efforts to improve the already dire humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip.
By Thursday, the army had moved into five neighbourhoods in the camp, which is home to about 90,000 Palestinians. Light exchanges of fire were reported, and Israel helicopter gunships flew overhead.
Seven Palestinians were killed Thursday when helicopters and tanks targeted groups of militants.
Residents said troops demolished eight homes overnight, and said bulldozers moved into a street in the Brazil area of the camp Thursday, knocking down two homes and a shop in their path.
The army has no immediate comment. It has said it only targets homes that provide cover for weapons smuggling tunnels or gunmen.
Israel raided the refugee camp less than a week after Palestinian militants killed 13 soldiers in Gaza, seven of them along the Egyptian border.
In the West Bank, troops shot and killed three Palestinians, including a 13-year-old boy and a local Hamas leader, in separate clashes. In the incident involving the boy, the army said soldiers opened fire at someone throwing a firebomb.
[b]Thu May 20,12:18 PM ET
[i]GAVIN RABINOWITZ [/b][/i]
TEL AVIV, Israel (CP) - Marwan Barghouti, a popular Palestinian uprising leader, was convicted Thursday of ordering shootings that killed four Israelis and a Greek monk and supplying funds and arms for other attacks.
Also Thursday, Israeli troops deepened their three-day-old offensive in a Gaza Strip refugee camp, killing seven Palestinians, most of them armed, and demolishing several buildings. In the West Bank, three Palestinians, including a 13-year-old boy, were killed by army fire.
Prime Minister Paul Martin said the Canadian government finds the violence "deeply disturbing."
"We are deeply troubled by the recent violence and destruction in the Gaza Strip, particularly the deaths of demonstrators, including children," Martin said in a statement released Thursday.
Meanwhile, the Tel Aviv District Court convicted Barghouti, widely seen as a potential successor of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, of five counts of murder, one count of attempted murder and one count of membership in a terrorist organization. The prosecution asked the court for five consecutive life terms.
Sentencing is set for June 6.
However, the panel of three judges cleared Barghouti of responsibility for 21 other deaths, ruling there was no evidence directly connecting him to those attacks carried out by militants linked to his organization.
At the time of his arrest in April 2002, Barghouti headed Arafat's Fatah movement in the West Bank. Israel said Barghouti also played a leading role in Fatah's violent offshoot, the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, which has carried out scores of shooting and bombing attacks on Israelis during more than three years of fighting.
The court said that Arafat looked to Barghouti to carry out his wishes, including attacks, giving legal weight for the first time to the long-held Israeli government position that Arafat has been orchestrating violence.
"Yasser Arafat did not give clear and precise instructions, but he made sure that those under him understood fully when he was interested in a ceasefire and when he was interested in attacks against Israel," the ruling said.
Arafat and his aides have denied the Israeli allegations.
In response to Barghouti's conviction, Al Aqsa leaders in the Gaza Strip threatened to kidnap Israelis as a bargaining chip for their jailed leader.
Barghouti, who flashed V-signs with shackled hands as he entered the courtroom, reiterated that he does not accept the court's authority. However, the longtime advocate of a Palestinian state alongside Israel also said he believes there will be peace if Israel withdraws from the West Bank and Gaza.
"I call on the Israeli public, 'Don't believe for one moment that you can overcome the Palestinians with force,' " he said. "Palestinians have no power, but they have justice on their side."
"One day, the Palestinians will gain their liberty and freedom and Marwan, too, will be free," said Barghouti's wife Fadwa, who was not given permission to enter Israel to attend the trial.
Meanwhile, in the Rafah refugee camp in Gaza, Israel continued its offensive despite withering international condemnation over a deadly tank attack that killed eight Palestinian protesters, most of them children, on Wednesday. Israel apologized for the shooting, that also left 50 people wounded.
Among the leaders expressing concern about Israel's offensive was Martin.
"These recent military actions by the Israeli Defence Forces and the widespread destruction of civilian property are deeply disturbing," his statement said.
"While we have consistently condemned all acts of terrorism and supported Israel's right to defend its citizens, we hold that any actions pursued by Israel must be consistent with international law and with international efforts to improve the already dire humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip.
By Thursday, the army had moved into five neighbourhoods in the camp, which is home to about 90,000 Palestinians. Light exchanges of fire were reported, and Israel helicopter gunships flew overhead.
Seven Palestinians were killed Thursday when helicopters and tanks targeted groups of militants.
Residents said troops demolished eight homes overnight, and said bulldozers moved into a street in the Brazil area of the camp Thursday, knocking down two homes and a shop in their path.
The army has no immediate comment. It has said it only targets homes that provide cover for weapons smuggling tunnels or gunmen.
Israel raided the refugee camp less than a week after Palestinian militants killed 13 soldiers in Gaza, seven of them along the Egyptian border.
In the West Bank, troops shot and killed three Palestinians, including a 13-year-old boy and a local Hamas leader, in separate clashes. In the incident involving the boy, the army said soldiers opened fire at someone throwing a firebomb.
Who does Powell think he's kidding?
05.18.04 (4:18 pm) [edit]
[i][b]By MICHAEL FREUND[/b][/i]
Colin Powell has got some nerve. After a week in which 13 young Israeli soldiers had been killed by Palestinian terrorists, who then paraded the body parts of their victims through the streets of Gaza, the US secretary of state could find nothing better to do than to cozy up to the Palestinians and criticize Israel.
Shortly after arriving in Jordan this past Saturday, Powell met with the Palestinian leadership. Afterwards, he told reporters that he was pleased to have had a "constructive talk" with Palestinian premier Ahmed Qurei, along with "my colleague Nabil Shaath and so many other of my good friends from the Palestinian Authority."
His "good friends"?
This is the same Palestinian Authority that has been waging a terrorist war against Israel since September 2000 and which is directly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of innocent men, women, and children. It is the same entity that Powell's own State Department, in its recently released report on Patterns of Global Terrorism, has linked to acts of terror against the Jewish state.
And this is whom Powell considers to be his "good friends"?
Not only that, but in his remarks to the press, with a smiling Qurei standing at his side, Powell did not even bother to mention the horrific events of the preceding week. He did not see fit to condemn the Palestinians' vile desecration of Israel's dead, nor did he denounce their ongoing efforts to carry out attacks against the Jewish state.
Indeed, not once did Powell even mention the word "terrorism."
As if that weren't bad enough, Powell followed up this appalling performance with an even more shameful one the next day.
Speaking Sunday at a news conference at the World Economic Forum on Jordan's Dead Sea coast, Powell slammed Israel for demolishing Palestinian structures in Gaza that have been used to stage attacks on Israel's soldiers.
"We know that Israel has a right for self-defense," Powell said, "but the kind of action they are taking in Rafah with the destruction of Palestinian homes, we oppose. We don't think that that is productive," he added.
That Palestinian terrorists use these very same houses to attack and kill Jews doesn't seem to move Powell one whit, nor does he seem troubled by the fact that his "good friends" in the Palestinian Authority utilize the area to smuggle in weapons from Egypt. On those issues, he is strangely silent.
And yet when Israel seeks to thwart such efforts by expanding the Philadelphi Route, as the area between Rafah and the Egyptian border is known, Powell suddenly finds his voice and lambasts the Jewish state for daring to defend itself.
NEEDLESS TO say, this is hardly the first time that Powell has chosen to denigrate Israel.
Two years ago, while testifying before Congress, he outrageously accused Israel of trying to solve the Mideast conflict by killing as many Palestinians as possible. "Prime Minister Sharon has to take a hard look at his policies to see whether they will work," Powell said. "If you declare war against the Palestinians thinking that you can solve the problem by seeing how many Palestinians can be killed, I don't think that leads us anywhere" (New York Times, March 7, 2002).
In April 2001, after IDF troops entered Gaza to stop Palestinian mortar attacks against Sderot, Powell responded by rebuking Israel, saying that its actions were "excessive and disproportionate" as if there was something wrong in Israel's attempting to protect itself.
But what is truly remarkable about Powell's latest broadside over Israel's destruction of Palestinian homes in Gaza is its sheer unvarnished hypocrisy.
After all, it was just 15 short years ago that a certain American general named Colin Powell oversaw the US invasion of Panama in late December 1989. In the initial days of the war, US forces bombarded the El Chorrillo neighborhood of Panama City, where the headquarters of the Panamanian Defense Forces were located alongside the homes of thousands of innocent civilians.
According to a report prepared by the UN Economic and Social Council, the result of the US attack on El Chorrillo was that "several blocks of apartments were totally destroyed, as a result of which their inhabitants were forced to seek alternative accommodation, often at a great distance from their former dwelling. Other buildings suffered severe damage."
By the UN's estimate, the homes of at least 2,723 Panamanian families, totaling approximately 13,500 people, were affected.
An April 7, 1991, the Human Rights Watch report was even more blunt, referring to "the devastation" of El Chorrillo and asserting that Powell's forces had "violated the rule of proportionality, which mandates that the risk of harm to impermissible targets be weighed against the military necessity of the objective pursued."
Now, isn't that ironic. The same Colin Powell who blasted Panamanians out of their homes 15 years ago to protect American troops now chooses to criticize Israel for doing the very same thing. Who does he think he's kidding?
But let Powell complain all he wants. Israel has no choice but to safeguard its citizens, regardless of what the secretary of state and his "good friends" the Palestinians might think.
The writer served as deputy director of communications & policy planning under premier Binyamin Netanyahu.
Disengagement or Zionism?
05.18.04 (4:11 pm) [edit]
[i][b]By ELI POLLAK[/b][/i]
'Disengagement operates on the principle that Israel must suit its own convenience first, withdrawing from territory that has become a strategic liability, while consolidating control over territory that remains an asset" is Bret Stephens's reasoned, if at times tortuous, description of why he changed his mind and today supports withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.
The Jerusalem Post's editor explains, in two long articles, that he did not reach this conclusion easily. "I'd rather Israel seize its chances, on its own terms, than wait for winds to blow fair in Ramallah or Iraq or Brussels or Turtle Bay."
Stephens has lost hope in the Palestinians and the world at large but trusts the Israeli Left "to hold some nationally agreed line in the sand." He concludes, "Land may be a form of security, but a Zionist consensus that won't crack under moral stress is a better one."
Stephens demands a Zionist consensus but does not define its meaning. A consensus definition was coined by Chaim Weizmann, who spoke about "synthetic Zionism," a synthesis of political and settlement activity.
For Stephens, Zionism is only political; settlement per se is not of value. He chides the Jewish residents in Gaza: "The settlers must also take into account the sacrifices the rest of Israel have made on their behalf the soldiers who defend them, the tax money that subsidizes them."
It doesn't occur to him that many people in "the rest of Israel" laid their lives on the line knowingly for securing the settlements. Destroying settlements would be sacrilege to their memory. He does not consider that many of us would be extremely upset if our tax money were wasted on dismantling settlements instead of affirming the right of Jews to live in Eretz Yisrael.
Stephens, as many others, including President George W. Bush, believe "that Palestinians are entitled to live under a government of their own choosing provided they respect the rights of their Israeli neighbors to the same."
How will we know that the Palestinians "respect the rights of their Israeli neighbors"?
Jews lived in Gaza for centuries until expelled in the 1929 riots and in 1948; Kfar Darom was overrun by the Egyptian army. We have a moral and legal right to live there. Abandoning Kfar Darom is a major step toward allowing the Palestinians the luxury of having their own state without respecting our rights. The right of Jews to live wherever they please (legally, without usurping that which belongs to others) is the litmus test of Palestinian and Arab intentions. Israeli initiatives implying that parts of this world are Judenrein are a sure sign of the hostility of the Palestinian state-to-be.
BUT LAND is not mere security, it is the affirmation that the Jewish people have the same rights as any other people in this world. Taking the land away from the Jews is the antithesis of Zionism, for it implies that we will never be a normal people. Even when territory becomes a strategic liability (which the Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip is not), the utmost effort should be made to keep it.
Stephens is for disengagement because "I want to have as little to do with the Palestinians as possible."
He wants Israel to retain control over borders but concedes that Israel "might be pressured into relinquishing control over the (Gaza) Strip's ports of entry."
But then logic is replaced by wishful thinking. He claims that "withdrawal would mean Palestinians could no longer wage war against Israeli civilians at which they're so expert. If they chose to fight, it would be on terms that overwhelmingly favor Israel."
How will Israel defend itself against an onslaught of missiles from Gaza to Ashkelon and Sderot? Only by reentering Gaza as it did tragically last week. But by then, this Gaza would be armed with sophisticated weapons and more deadly land mines. The cost we paid last week for defending Green Line Israel would be a relative pittance.
A short review of the danger of a Palestinian state is also in order. Stephens writes, "I have zero confidence there's a light at the end of the international tunnel."
I concur. Today's deep enmity implies that a Palestinian state would be hostile to Israel, ruled by an oppressive dictatorial regime that will allow the "right of return" to "Palestine" (as conceded by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in his talks in Washington).
The difficult demographic problems of today will worsen. The Palestinian state will be densely populated, impoverished, and angry. Its leadership will blame Israel for all the misery it inflicts on its own population. The Arab world will mount an international campaign, fueled by oil, against the rich Israeli state that has usurped Arab homes in Jaffa, Ramle, and Jerusalem. Israel will remain a pariah state in the world, having lost not only the esteem of righteous gentiles for its folly but worse, it will have lost its self-esteem. This will not be the "Zionist consensus that won't crack under moral stress."
The only way we can "disengage" is by dismantling Israel. Nay, with present anti-Semitic levels in the world, the only possible real disengagement is to abandon our Jewishness.
As long as the world is dependent on Arab oil, and as long as immoral, corrupt Arab regimes are tolerated, Israel will be engaged by a hostile Muslim Arab world. As explained by Hebrew University's Islamist expert Prof. Moshe Sharon, Israel's very existence is an intolerable affront to Islam.
These are the facts of life, and disengagement won't change them. What distinguishes the believer from the atheist is not the messianic belief in a Greater Israel cited by Stephens, but humility. The believer acknowledges that only God is master of the universe; we are not masters of our destiny, personal or national.
I remain an optimist. It is up to us to stay true to our Zionist and Jewish ideals, to be steadfast in the face of cruel adversaries, and continue to do what is right and moral. With the help of the Almighty, this path will lead to a normal Jewish State of Israel.
[i][b]The writer is a former chairman of Professors for a Strong Israel.[/i][/b]
Hit squads and sleeper cells
05.18.04 (4:07 pm) [edit]
[i][b]By DANIEL PIPES[/i][/b]
Whence comes the main danger to homeland security in North America and Western Europe? With the single exception of the Oklahoma City bombing of 1995, notes al-Qaida authority Rohan Gunaratna, all major terrorist attacks of the past decade in the West have been carried out by immigrants. A closer look finds that these were not just any immigrants but invariably from a specific background: of the 212 suspected and convicted terrorist perpetrators during 1993-2003, some 86% were Muslim immigrants and the remainder mainly converts to Islam.
"In Western countries jihad has grown mainly via Muslim immigration," concludes Robert S. Leiken, a specialist on immigration and national security issues, in an important new monograph, Bearers of Global Jihad: Immigration and National Security after 9/11 (published by the Washington-based Nixon Center, where Leiken is employed). Leiken's research offers valuable insights.
Violent acts against the West, he finds, "have been carried out largely through two methods of terrorist attack: the sleeper cell and the hit squad."
Hit squads foreign nationals who enter the country with a specific mission (such as the 9/11 hijackers) threaten from without. Sleeper cells consist of elements quietly embedded in immigrant communities. Pierre de Bousquet, head of France's counterintelligence service, says "They do not seem suspicious. They work. They have kids. They have fixed addresses. They pay the rent."
Sleepers either run terrorism support networks of "Muslim charities, foundations, conferences, academic groups, NGOs, and private corporations" (prime example: Sami Al-Arian of the University of South Florida) or initiate violence on a signal (like the Moroccans who killed 191 persons in Madrid this March).
That said, Muslim life in Western Europe and in North America is strikingly different. The former has seen the emergence of a culturally alienated, socially marginalized, and economically unemployed Muslim second generation whose pathologies have led to "a surge of gang rapes, anti-Semitic attacks, and anti-American violence," not to speak of raging radical ideologies and terrorism.
North American Muslims are not as alienated, marginalized, and economically stressed.
Accordingly, Leiken finds, they show less inclination to anti-social behavior, including Islamist violence. Those of them supporting jihad usually fund terrorism rather than personally engage in it. Therefore, most jihadist violence in North America is carried out by hit squads from abroad.
And, contrary to expectation, these come predominantly not from countries such as Iran or Syria, or even Saudi Arabia and Egypt, for the simple reason that their nationals undergo extra scrutiny.
Islamist terrorists are not dumb; they note this special attention and now recruit intensively from citizens of the 27 countries mostly European who, thanks to the Visa Waiver Program, can enter the United States for 90 days without a visa.
But even so, there are Frenchmen and there are Frenchmen. One named Zacarias Moussaoui, an Algerian immigrant, attracts more attention than one named Michael Christian Ganczarski, a Polish immigrant of German extraction making a convert like Ganczarski the more potent jihadist.
Indeed, he is now sitting in a French jail, charged with a major role in the April 2002 bombing of a synagogue in Tunisia that killed 19 people.
To a lesser extent, the same pattern applies to Israel. Hizbullah has made a concerted effort to recruit Europeans like German convert Steven Smyrek, caught before he could strap on a bomb. Hamas deployed Britons Asif Muhammad Hanif and Omar Khan Sharif, who murdered three people at a Tel Aviv bar. The same pattern also applies to Australia such as the case of French convert and would-be jihadist Willie Brigitte.
Leiken's insights lead to important conclusions for counterterrorism.
Assimilating indigenous Muslim populations is critical to the West's long-term security.
Given that the Islamist threat in the West "emanates principally from Europe," European and North American security services should recognize that they face basically different problems: one primarily internal, the other mainly external.
Constructing immigration systems that keep out sleepers and hit squads while allowing normal business and pleasure travel should be a priority for Washington and Ottawa.
For Americans, adjusting the Visa Waiver Program and controlling land borders with Canada and Mexico are higher priorities than worrying about Iranians and Syrians.
Leiken's research guides Westerners to real homeland security. But achieving this will be a challenge, for acknowledging the European Islamist source of violence means giving up today's easy reliance on euphemisms.
[i][b]The writer is director of the Middle East Forum (www.DanielPipes.org).[/b][/i]
Revive Jerusalem
05.18.04 (4:04 pm) [edit]
Thirty-seven years after Jerusalem's reunification, the liberation of the Western Wall remains its most enduring visual symbol. Yet the capital's most significant benefit following Israel's victory was the opportunity to transform from backwater to metropolis.
Pre-1967 Jerusalem consisted mainly of poor, cramped neighborhoods of crumbling old houses or jerry-built apartment blocks hastily built in the 1950s to accommodate waves of new immigrants. The proximity of the Jordanian border with its barbed wire, land mines, and snipers obstructed commercial growth and turned the low-paying government, municipality, and Hebrew University into the city's main employers.
After the war, opportunity beckoned, and in many ways was exploited. Three decades of expansion saw new suburbs ring the city, and not only across the Green Line. Business also boomed, as did industrial areas. And in the 1990s, hi-tech parks and shopping malls sprang up from Malha to Har Hotzvim. Millions of tourists filled new hotels and restaurants. Satellite towns like Mevaseret Zion, Ma'ale Adumim, Givat Ze'ev, and Efrat blossomed, and the city seemed set to become a Greater Jerusalem of over a million inhabitants, rivaling in its vitality not only Tel Aviv but also major European cities.
In recent years, however, these accomplishments seem to be at risk. In fact, Jerusalem seems in the midst of a period of stagnation of the sort that plagued it before the 1960s. If drastic measures are not taken soon, the decline might prove irreversible.
Many new sections that were supposed to offer reasonable housing to young families, like Neveh Ya'aov and Gilo, are fast emerging as poverty pockets. Efforts to improve conditions in poor southern neighborhoods in recent decades have on the whole failed.
Other areas which had a diverse population, like Mekor Baruch, Romema, Sanhedria, and Ma'alot Dafna have become haredi, and as such discouraged business growth. Ramot and Ramot Eshkol are undergoing a similar transformation.
The younger generation, especially the secular and modern-Orthodox, is leaving in droves. Since the beginning of the 1990s, over 200,000 Jerusalemites have left. Every year another public school is closed. This year, 60 percent of the Jewish students in the education system are haredi.
The haredim of course have the same rights as any other community, but there is no question the capital's delicate balance between tradition and openness, piety and productivity, has been severely disrupted.
The city's Arab population has also grown steadily, and now stands at 33 percent. If in the past a neighborhood like French Hill was considered affluent and desirable, it now is seen as the last secular enclave sandwiched between predominantly Arab and haredi areas.
These demographics have a direct effect on the city's economy. Jerusalem is the poorest city in the country. Over 40 percent of its children live beneath the official poverty line. Businesses and industries have been fleeing it for a decade. The only growth sector in the city's decrepit center is in the anti-trendy, cut-price bazaars. The hotels are largely empty and many tourists who do brave the security situation skip Jerusalem in favor of Tel Aviv and Eilat.
It's hard to blame them. The city is so filthy that last year's State Comptroller Report featured color photographs of the piles of garbage in its streets.
All this is before anyone has taken into account the effect on the city of the security fence being built on its outskirts, and the consequent prospect that the reunited Jerusalem may very soon give way to Jerusalem the redivided. In short, if we don't do something soon, the golden era of post-'67 Jerusalem may soon become a distant memory.
Sadly, City Hall is the last organization prepared to deal with the crisis. Under haredi control for more than year by now, it seems pointless to expect from it long-term vision and concern for the interests of each the city's varied populations. It is also crippled by a deficit of NIS 600 million and an overall debt of over NIS 2 billion. Theoretically, Jerusalem has its own cabinet minister, but Natan Sharansky is powerless to do anything for the city.
Jerusalem's future is not only a national emergency, it concerns the entire Jewish world. The government should immediately assign a high-profile task force, including Diaspora representatives, with producing a comprehensive plan to revitalize the capital economically and demographically.
[i][b]The Jerusalem Post[/i][/b]
05.18.04 (2:42 pm) [edit]
BERLIN (Reuters) - National security adviser Condoleezza Rice said Monday the killing of the head of Iraq's Governing Council must not stop the transition of power to the Iraqis in six weeks.
Speaking in Berlin, Rice said the death of Izzedin Salim was "really unfortunate and sad," but such attacks were hard to prevent.
"We have known for a long time, particularly in the run-up to June 30, that there were going to be people who would try to derail the political process and the political transition," she said. "You have to keep the political transition on track."
"But the solution to this is ultimately political and Iraqi," said Rice. "It is clearly time for the occupation to end, it is clearly time for the Iraqis to be in control of their own political future."
Salim, a Shi'ite who edited several newspapers, was in a convoy waiting to enter the coalition headquarters when a bomb exploded at a checkpoint, killing six people.
Rice's comments echoed those of White House spokesman Scott McClellan, who said the "enemies of freedom" would not prevail.
He said Salim died "working to build a free, democratic and prosperous Iraq."
"The Iraqi people will continue his work and see to it that such a vision becomes a reality. The enemies of a free democratic and peaceful Iraq will not prevail. Democracy and freedom are taking root and these cowardly terrorist acts only make us more determined to finish our work," he said.
In Berlin, Rice met officials from Germany, Britain, France, Italy, Spain, Poland, Portugal, Denmark and the Netherlands to discuss Iraq, Afghanistan and the Middle East peace process.
Rice said she hoped the United Nations would adopt a resolution on Iraq "in the near future." "We are not at the text stage yet, and obviously the devil is always in the details. But I think we are on a good course to get a good resolution."
BERLIN (Reuters) - National security adviser Condoleezza Rice said Monday the killing of the head of Iraq's Governing Council must not stop the transition of power to the Iraqis in six weeks.
Speaking in Berlin, Rice said the death of Izzedin Salim was "really unfortunate and sad," but such attacks were hard to prevent.
"We have known for a long time, particularly in the run-up to June 30, that there were going to be people who would try to derail the political process and the political transition," she said. "You have to keep the political transition on track."
"But the solution to this is ultimately political and Iraqi," said Rice. "It is clearly time for the occupation to end, it is clearly time for the Iraqis to be in control of their own political future."
Salim, a Shi'ite who edited several newspapers, was in a convoy waiting to enter the coalition headquarters when a bomb exploded at a checkpoint, killing six people.
Rice's comments echoed those of White House spokesman Scott McClellan, who said the "enemies of freedom" would not prevail.
He said Salim died "working to build a free, democratic and prosperous Iraq."
"The Iraqi people will continue his work and see to it that such a vision becomes a reality. The enemies of a free democratic and peaceful Iraq will not prevail. Democracy and freedom are taking root and these cowardly terrorist acts only make us more determined to finish our work," he said.
In Berlin, Rice met officials from Germany, Britain, France, Italy, Spain, Poland, Portugal, Denmark and the Netherlands to discuss Iraq, Afghanistan and the Middle East peace process.
Rice said she hoped the United Nations would adopt a resolution on Iraq "in the near future." "We are not at the text stage yet, and obviously the devil is always in the details. But I think we are on a good course to get a good resolution."
05.18.04 (2:37 pm) [edit]
Mon May 17,11:15 AM ET[/b]
To: National Desk
Contact: Maggie Goldberg of the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation, 973-379-2690 or media@crpf.org
SPRINGFIELD, N.J., May 17 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation (CRPF) announced today the results of its first research funding cycle of 2004 and one of the exceptional grantees is at the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot, Israel. This is the first time CRPF has funded spinal cord injury research in the state of Israel.
Only 15 neuroscientists were awarded funding in CRPF's first grant cycle of 2004, including the Weizmann Institute's Mike Fainzilber, Ph.D. Fainzilber will receive a two-year grant of $149,600 USD to further his work on investigating changes in gene expression after injury to a nerve.
"CRPF has proudly supported the work of many of the most accomplished neuroscientists in the world," said Christopher Reeve, CRPF's Chairman of the Board. ""The Weizmann Institute, as I saw first-hand when I visited Israel last year, has established preeminence in the field of paralysis research." Dr. Fainzilber will identify changes in genes that are activated very early in the regenerative process, and attempt to modulate the injury- induced changes with the application of a unique peptide. Peptides are compounds made of two or more amino acids that combine to make proteins. The data generated using this model has the potential to identify new molecules important for regenerative growth and the potential to move the field forward in an innovative and significant way. Identification of such genes will hopefully allow their future exploitation in new clinical approaches to enhance regeneration in patients with nerve injuries.
"We were very glad to learn that CRPF decided to support this project, since we hope that once we know the full complement of these genes, researchers will find ways to bypass the system and activate them in nerves which cannot normally regenerate," said Dr. Fainzilber. He added, "CRPF support is crucial to us for two reasons, firstly because without this financial support we simply would not be able to carry out the project, and secondly because it is very encouraging to know that we have the attention and hopefully future input and support from some of the best people in the field of nerve regeneration."
Dr. Fainzilber's inspiration to pursue a cure for paralysis was motivated by the 1976 Israeli commando operation at Entebbe (Uganda) which successfully freed 104 hostages, the passengers and crew of Air France Flight 139, which had been hijacked by PFLP terrorists. Israeli soldier Sorin Hershko was wounded in the neck during the operation and became completely paralyzed. Dr. Fainzilber, who was a young teenager working on a summer biology project on regeneration in marine invertebrates at the time, recalls, "It seemed to me to be the height of painful irony that a starfish I was studying could be cut into six different pieces and each piece would regenerate, while a small wound in the wrong place could forever paralyze a human being in the prime of his life."
Dr. Fainzilber says of his work, "Every nation and every generation in human history has had its own Christopher Reeve and Sorin Hershko. We hope that with the help of the CRPF we can make our own small contribution to the chance that the coming generations will be spared this scourge."
Every research application submitted to CRPF is reviewed by the Foundation's Science Advisory Council, a panel of accomplished neuroscientists who volunteer their time and expertise to evaluate proposals based on scientific merit, relevance to CRPF's research priorities, and promise for clinical application. This rigorous process ensures that CRPF funds only the most meritorious science that is targeted at developing effective therapies for paralysis and dysfunctions caused by spinal cord injury and other central nervous system disorders.
CRPF's Individual Research Grants are awarded twice yearly with application deadlines in June and December of each year. For a complete list of grantees or more information on CRPF's research programs and the research projects that are funded, visit: http://www.christopherreeve.o...
The Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation (CRPF) is committed to funding research that develops treatments and cures for paralysis caused by spinal cord injury and other central nervous system disorders. The Foundation also vigorously works to improve the quality of life for people living with disabilities through its grants program, paralysis resource center, and advocacy efforts. For more information, please call 973-379-2690 or visit http://www.ChristopherReeve.o...
http://www.usnewswire.com/" title="http://www.usnewswire.com/" target="_blank"http://www.usnewswire.com/
ฉ 2004 U.S. Newswire 202-347-2770/
Mon May 17,11:15 AM ET[/b]
To: National Desk
Contact: Maggie Goldberg of the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation, 973-379-2690 or media@crpf.org
SPRINGFIELD, N.J., May 17 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation (CRPF) announced today the results of its first research funding cycle of 2004 and one of the exceptional grantees is at the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot, Israel. This is the first time CRPF has funded spinal cord injury research in the state of Israel.
Only 15 neuroscientists were awarded funding in CRPF's first grant cycle of 2004, including the Weizmann Institute's Mike Fainzilber, Ph.D. Fainzilber will receive a two-year grant of $149,600 USD to further his work on investigating changes in gene expression after injury to a nerve.
"CRPF has proudly supported the work of many of the most accomplished neuroscientists in the world," said Christopher Reeve, CRPF's Chairman of the Board. ""The Weizmann Institute, as I saw first-hand when I visited Israel last year, has established preeminence in the field of paralysis research." Dr. Fainzilber will identify changes in genes that are activated very early in the regenerative process, and attempt to modulate the injury- induced changes with the application of a unique peptide. Peptides are compounds made of two or more amino acids that combine to make proteins. The data generated using this model has the potential to identify new molecules important for regenerative growth and the potential to move the field forward in an innovative and significant way. Identification of such genes will hopefully allow their future exploitation in new clinical approaches to enhance regeneration in patients with nerve injuries.
"We were very glad to learn that CRPF decided to support this project, since we hope that once we know the full complement of these genes, researchers will find ways to bypass the system and activate them in nerves which cannot normally regenerate," said Dr. Fainzilber. He added, "CRPF support is crucial to us for two reasons, firstly because without this financial support we simply would not be able to carry out the project, and secondly because it is very encouraging to know that we have the attention and hopefully future input and support from some of the best people in the field of nerve regeneration."
Dr. Fainzilber's inspiration to pursue a cure for paralysis was motivated by the 1976 Israeli commando operation at Entebbe (Uganda) which successfully freed 104 hostages, the passengers and crew of Air France Flight 139, which had been hijacked by PFLP terrorists. Israeli soldier Sorin Hershko was wounded in the neck during the operation and became completely paralyzed. Dr. Fainzilber, who was a young teenager working on a summer biology project on regeneration in marine invertebrates at the time, recalls, "It seemed to me to be the height of painful irony that a starfish I was studying could be cut into six different pieces and each piece would regenerate, while a small wound in the wrong place could forever paralyze a human being in the prime of his life."
Dr. Fainzilber says of his work, "Every nation and every generation in human history has had its own Christopher Reeve and Sorin Hershko. We hope that with the help of the CRPF we can make our own small contribution to the chance that the coming generations will be spared this scourge."
Every research application submitted to CRPF is reviewed by the Foundation's Science Advisory Council, a panel of accomplished neuroscientists who volunteer their time and expertise to evaluate proposals based on scientific merit, relevance to CRPF's research priorities, and promise for clinical application. This rigorous process ensures that CRPF funds only the most meritorious science that is targeted at developing effective therapies for paralysis and dysfunctions caused by spinal cord injury and other central nervous system disorders.
CRPF's Individual Research Grants are awarded twice yearly with application deadlines in June and December of each year. For a complete list of grantees or more information on CRPF's research programs and the research projects that are funded, visit: http://www.christopherreeve.o...
The Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation (CRPF) is committed to funding research that develops treatments and cures for paralysis caused by spinal cord injury and other central nervous system disorders. The Foundation also vigorously works to improve the quality of life for people living with disabilities through its grants program, paralysis resource center, and advocacy efforts. For more information, please call 973-379-2690 or visit http://www.ChristopherReeve.o...
http://www.usnewswire.com/" title="http://www.usnewswire.com/" target="_blank"http://www.usnewswire.com/
ฉ 2004 U.S. Newswire 202-347-2770/
NEWSWEEK: 'The End Of Dreams'
05.16.04 (4:34 pm) [edit]
[i][b]by Joshua Hammer, Newsweek (Apr. 26 issue)
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4767254/" title="http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4767254/" target="_blank"http://msnbc.msn.com/id/47672...[/b][/i]
Maj. Gen. Yisrael Ziv first tried to kill Sheik Ahmed Yassin last September. He remembers the day well, and with some regret. As Israel's chief of military operations, Ziv had ordered an airstrike on the three-story building in Gaza City where the Hamas spiritual leader was meeting with his inner circle. Huddled with other Israeli commanders around a screen that displayed real-time satellite imagery, Ziv watched as an F-16 jet unloaded a 250-kilogram bomb on the target. Ziv was worried; at the last minute he had reduced the size of the bomb by half, hoping to lower the chance of civilian deaths. "We saw in a few seconds that people were pouring out through the smoke," Ziv told NEWSWEEK, still rueful that he hadn't used a bigger bomb. "We learned very soon that Yassin had survived." Six months after that, an Israeli missile blew Yassin apart as he left a mosque following dawn prayers, and Ziv was one of the first to be informed.
Last Saturday, Ziv and his colleagues were back in action. Hours after a suicide bomber killed himself and an Israeli policeman near the Gaza border, Israel moved to eliminate Abdel-Aziz Rantisi, the new Hamas leader in the area. An Israeli helicopter fired two missiles at Rantisi's car, destroying it; he was later pronounced dead at a hospital. Even some prominent Israeli doves supported the hit. "Whoever deals with murder will pay the price and it will lead to his own death," former prime minister Shimon Peres told Israeli TV. Hamas quickly vowed revenge.
Ziv, 47, has become a point man in Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's stark new approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Having judged that a negotiated peace with the Palestinians is impossible, Sharon now seems intent on achieving a different goal: a manageable war. As he's outlined in recent weeks, Sharon plans to withdraw unilaterally from the Gaza Strip and four isolated West Bank settlements. He'll keep six major settlement blocs, sealing off both Israel and those enclaves behind security fencesand use Israel's assassination squads to strike out against the leaders of any lingering resistance. Last week, in a stunning departure from U.S. policy, President George W. Bush endorsed the broad outlines of Sharon's initiative, declaring that that it was "unrealistic" to expect that Israel would withdraw to its 1967 boundaries and agreeing with Sharon that Palestinian refugees be resettled only in a Palestinian state. Bush called Sharon's limited withdrawals "historic and courageous actions" that "can put an end to one of the world's longest-running conflicts."
The Sharon-Bush deal could also achieve the opposite. The two leaders have taken a big detour from the "Roadmap," a three-stage plan drafted by the United States and three partnersRussia, the European Union and the United Nations. The new initiative effectively cuts the Palestinians out of the negotiations, and it deprives them of future bargaining chips such as the "right of return" for refugees. For the foreseeable future, the Palestinians will be left with control over Gazabut not its borders or airspaceand isolated patches of territory in the occupied West Bank.
U.S. administration officials insisted that the new plan was only a step toward a permanent peace, still to be negotiated. But Palestinian leaders called Bush's endorsement a betrayal, and Sharon seemed to agree that it could only be regarded as an Israeli triumph. "The Palestinians understand that this plan is ... the end of their dreams," Sharon told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz before traveling to Washington. In another candid interview with the newspaper Yediot Ahronot, he said, "In the unilateral plan, there is no Palestinian state. This situation could continue for many years."
Sharon believes that he can keep a lid on Palestinian violence. The 375-mile line of fences and walls that Israel is building inside the West Bank has made it increasingly difficult for would-be suicide bombers to cross the Green Line. Since January there have been only four successful suicide bombings inside Israel. (By contrast, 19 suicide bombers struck Israel during March 2002, the worst month of the intifada.) Sharon's targeted killings of Palestinians"surgical operations," as Israel commanders prefer to call themhave also impaired the militants' capabilities. "Hamas is really under siege," says a Palestinian journalist in regular contact with Hamas's military wing. "Israel is terrifying them, paralyzing the leadership."
Sharon's war is now in the hands of men such as Ziv, an affable, veteran paratrooper and the former head of Israel's Gaza Division. Ziv is one of a handful of major generals who debate moral, logistical and legal issues before each targeted killing. Every assassination must be approved by military Chief of Staff Moshe Yaalonand, if the target is considered important enough, by Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz and Sharon himself. Ziv insists that targeted killings are carried out only as a "last resort." Last June, Ziv and his team set their sights on Abdullah Kawasmeh, commander of Hamas's military wing in Hebron, who had recruited a half dozen young men to kill more than 10 Israelis in suicide attacks. The Israeli Army initially hoped to seize and interrogate Kawasmeh, says Ziv, "but we learned [through informants] that Kawasmeh always wore an explosive belt, so we couldn't arrest him." An Israeli elite unit shot him dead as he left evening prayers at a neighborhood mosque.
Israeli critics of the relentless killing campaign worry that Hamas is preparing a "spectacular" attack, and believe the long- term effect of such an assassination policy will be counterproductive. "If you're doing [these killings] without a political solution, without creating an alternative vision or a sense of hope, you are going to lose," says Ami Ayalon, a former director of Shin Bet, Israel's domestic intelligence agency. In the short term, anyway, the Palestinians have been deprived of hopeand Ariel Sharon has emerged as the clear winner.
[i]With Joanna Chen in Jerusalem
ฉ 2004 Newsweek, Inc.[/i]
05.16.04 (4:20 pm) [edit]
:cry:
[line]
[b]Fri May 14, 3:08 PM ET
[i]By AARON KEITH HARRIS, Associated Press Writer [/b][/i]
TEL AVIV, Israel - Israel's bitter argument over its military presence in the Gaza Strip cut through a bereaved family who on Friday buried a young soldier killed in Gaza this week.
The father of 20-year-old Sgt. Lior Vishinsky says his son died needlessly, while his stepfather says he was a hero who gave his life for his country.
Israel's presence in the Gaza Strip has been the subject of intense public debate in recent months. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon presented a plan to pull the settlements and the military out, but hard-liners in his Likud Party rejected the plan on May 2.
Shlomo Vishinsky, 60, an Israeli stage actor, blamed Likud hard-liners for his son's death and said he was "a patsy for the Likud."
But Lior's stepfather, Moti Giladi, 57, said his stepson was "a Zionist at heart" who took pride in his army service and who believed that his work destroying Palestinian weapons-smuggling tunnels in Gaza was saving Israeli lives.
Sharon and his supporters argue that leaving Gaza where 7,500 heavily guarded Jewish settlers live among some 1.2 million Palestinians would improve Israel's security. Opponents say a pullout would be a reward for Palestinian violence.
On Friday, Shlomo Vishinsky told the Haaretz daily newspaper hid son volunteered for the Gaza unit because he didn't want "the army to be controlled" by hard-liners and that Lior "couldn't understand what Israel was doing in the Gaza Strip."
But his stepfather said Lior's military service in the Gaza Strip was heroic.
"We learned today that he was a hero," Giladi said, describing the crowds of people who lined Tel Aviv streets to salute and blow kisses as Lior's funeral motorcade passed by on the way to the Kiryat Shaul military cemetery.
Giladi married Lior Vishinksy's mother Osnat eight years ago. They are both actors.
Lior completed an officers training course two months ago before volunteering for the special engineering unit that patrols arms smuggling in Gaza.
He was killed Wednesday in southern Gaza, along with four other soldiers, when their explosives-laden armored personnel carrier was hit by a makeshift Palestinian rocket. The blast scattered the soldiers' remains over a nearly half-mile radius.
As the truck bearing his son's Israeli flag-draped wooden casket stopped at the cemetery's edge, Shlomo Vishinsky nervously stood by until a white-bearded rabbi came to comfort him.
Several hundred mourners trailed the casket as six of Lior's comrades carried it to the grave.
Fighting back tears, Shlomo Vishinsky recited "kaddish," the Jewish prayer for the dead. After the service he sat talking with a group of soldiers, one of whom leaned over to embrace him.
[line]
[b]Fri May 14, 3:08 PM ET
[i]By AARON KEITH HARRIS, Associated Press Writer [/b][/i]
TEL AVIV, Israel - Israel's bitter argument over its military presence in the Gaza Strip cut through a bereaved family who on Friday buried a young soldier killed in Gaza this week.
The father of 20-year-old Sgt. Lior Vishinsky says his son died needlessly, while his stepfather says he was a hero who gave his life for his country.
Israel's presence in the Gaza Strip has been the subject of intense public debate in recent months. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon presented a plan to pull the settlements and the military out, but hard-liners in his Likud Party rejected the plan on May 2.
Shlomo Vishinsky, 60, an Israeli stage actor, blamed Likud hard-liners for his son's death and said he was "a patsy for the Likud."
But Lior's stepfather, Moti Giladi, 57, said his stepson was "a Zionist at heart" who took pride in his army service and who believed that his work destroying Palestinian weapons-smuggling tunnels in Gaza was saving Israeli lives.
Sharon and his supporters argue that leaving Gaza where 7,500 heavily guarded Jewish settlers live among some 1.2 million Palestinians would improve Israel's security. Opponents say a pullout would be a reward for Palestinian violence.
On Friday, Shlomo Vishinsky told the Haaretz daily newspaper hid son volunteered for the Gaza unit because he didn't want "the army to be controlled" by hard-liners and that Lior "couldn't understand what Israel was doing in the Gaza Strip."
But his stepfather said Lior's military service in the Gaza Strip was heroic.
"We learned today that he was a hero," Giladi said, describing the crowds of people who lined Tel Aviv streets to salute and blow kisses as Lior's funeral motorcade passed by on the way to the Kiryat Shaul military cemetery.
Giladi married Lior Vishinksy's mother Osnat eight years ago. They are both actors.
Lior completed an officers training course two months ago before volunteering for the special engineering unit that patrols arms smuggling in Gaza.
He was killed Wednesday in southern Gaza, along with four other soldiers, when their explosives-laden armored personnel carrier was hit by a makeshift Palestinian rocket. The blast scattered the soldiers' remains over a nearly half-mile radius.
As the truck bearing his son's Israeli flag-draped wooden casket stopped at the cemetery's edge, Shlomo Vishinsky nervously stood by until a white-bearded rabbi came to comfort him.
Several hundred mourners trailed the casket as six of Lior's comrades carried it to the grave.
Fighting back tears, Shlomo Vishinsky recited "kaddish," the Jewish prayer for the dead. After the service he sat talking with a group of soldiers, one of whom leaned over to embrace him.
Arafat Finally Speaks Out On His Genocidal Intentions ... It still falls on def ears?
05.16.04 (4:16 pm) [edit]
Sat May 15, 6:21 AM ET [/b]
RAMALLAH, West Bank - Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat urged his people Saturday to "terrorize your enemy," as he bitterly marked the 56-year anniversary of the establishment of Israel.
In a speech broadcast live on Palestinian television, Arafat repeatedly called on his people to be steadfast in their struggle against Israeli occupation.
He ended the speech with a quote from the Koran. "Find what strength you have to terrorize your enemy and the enemy of God," he said.
The phrase in the Koran refers to Muslims' wars against pagans. It is followed by a phrase saying "if they want peace, then let's have peace."
[LINE]
So lemme get this straight. Arafat said that the Jews are the enemy of God and [basically, due to the quote from the koran's context] that Jews are pegans. Arafat also said that the Palestinians should "terrorize" their enemy, the Jews. Now, this is just conjecture here, but doesn't that mean innocents as well? If I am led to believe that, how many more Palestinians are led to believe that by their LEADER, Mr. Arafat?
So then, is that enough proof for you? I'm just taking the facts. Is this not logical?
05.16.04 (4:09 pm) [edit]
Any Christians out there who are insulted by this? Just curious. Any Christians who are not insulted by this? Thoughts?
[line]
[b]Sat May 15,11:16 PM ET[/b]
BEIRUT, Lebanon - The Islamic guerrilla group Hezbollah is airing a promotional TV spot comparing the abuse of Iraqi prisoners to the suffering of Jesus, based on a trailer for Mel Gibson's movie "The Passion of the Christ."
The 40-second spot, made by Hezbollah's satellite TV station, Al-Manar, shows images of a coalition soldier kicking an Iraqi prisoner and a man and woman cowering in terror as troops burst into their home. The words "no mercy" and "no compassion" flash on the screen.
The soundtrack for Gibson's film plays in the background as the title, "The Passion of the Iraqis," appears next to the infamous photo of a hooded Iraqi prisoner standing on a box with wires attached to his outstretched arms.
The clip started airing a few days ago.
"The suffering of Jesus Christ is a universal theme. It is something everyone, including us as Muslims, believes in," Ibrahim Mousawi, who heads Al-Manar's political programs, told The Associated Press on Saturday.
"We are simply using a universal theme to get an important message across: that the pain of the Iraqi people is deep, the level of torture appalling," Mousawi said.
Muslims revere Jesus Christ as a prophet but not as the messiah. They believe someone else was crucified in his place.
"The Passion of the Christ" received an exceptionally warm welcome and drew large audiences in the Arab world, which usually bans movies depicting any of the prophets recognized by Islam.
Al-Manar, known for its diatribes against Israel, has aired controversial programming in the past. A miniseries it showed last year about the founding of Israel, "Al-Shatat," was denounced by Washington and the Jewish state as anti-Semitic propaganda.
Israel and the United States regard Hezbollah, based in south Lebanon, as a terrorist group. Lebanon regards it as a legitimate resistance movement against Israeli occupation of Arab lands.
[line]
I'll tell you right now, I'm insulted by it. I feel like this is a plea to Christians that basically says, "Hey, don't punish us! We're like Jesus! Jesus was also killed by the Jews! We at least believe in Jesus as a prophet. The Jews do not. Come help us kill the Jews! (under their breaths) Then we'll kill you. (big grin)"
Perhaps I'm being overly sensative. But I am insulted by this.
Any Christians out there who are insulted by this? Just curious. Any Christians who are not insulted by this? Thoughts?
[line]
[b]Sat May 15,11:16 PM ET[/b]
BEIRUT, Lebanon - The Islamic guerrilla group Hezbollah is airing a promotional TV spot comparing the abuse of Iraqi prisoners to the suffering of Jesus, based on a trailer for Mel Gibson's movie "The Passion of the Christ."
The 40-second spot, made by Hezbollah's satellite TV station, Al-Manar, shows images of a coalition soldier kicking an Iraqi prisoner and a man and woman cowering in terror as troops burst into their home. The words "no mercy" and "no compassion" flash on the screen.
The soundtrack for Gibson's film plays in the background as the title, "The Passion of the Iraqis," appears next to the infamous photo of a hooded Iraqi prisoner standing on a box with wires attached to his outstretched arms.
The clip started airing a few days ago.
"The suffering of Jesus Christ is a universal theme. It is something everyone, including us as Muslims, believes in," Ibrahim Mousawi, who heads Al-Manar's political programs, told The Associated Press on Saturday.
"We are simply using a universal theme to get an important message across: that the pain of the Iraqi people is deep, the level of torture appalling," Mousawi said.
Muslims revere Jesus Christ as a prophet but not as the messiah. They believe someone else was crucified in his place.
"The Passion of the Christ" received an exceptionally warm welcome and drew large audiences in the Arab world, which usually bans movies depicting any of the prophets recognized by Islam.
Al-Manar, known for its diatribes against Israel, has aired controversial programming in the past. A miniseries it showed last year about the founding of Israel, "Al-Shatat," was denounced by Washington and the Jewish state as anti-Semitic propaganda.
Israel and the United States regard Hezbollah, based in south Lebanon, as a terrorist group. Lebanon regards it as a legitimate resistance movement against Israeli occupation of Arab lands.
[line]
I'll tell you right now, I'm insulted by it. I feel like this is a plea to Christians that basically says, "Hey, don't punish us! We're like Jesus! Jesus was also killed by the Jews! We at least believe in Jesus as a prophet. The Jews do not. Come help us kill the Jews! (under their breaths) Then we'll kill you. (big grin)"
Perhaps I'm being overly sensative. But I am insulted by this.
Real Points From The Source
05.16.04 (3:50 pm) [edit]
I am now going to outline some of my own personal views and positions on various issues. If there was any question before, hopefully these would answer them. I think they are completely consistant with everything in my archives that I have written about my personal politics.
*I do not agree with Israeli PM Ariel Sharon on everything. I do not think he is a good PM. I was happy when Benjamin Nitanyahu was in office because he did better for Israel. Ariel Sharon was elected on the principle that he would keep Israel safe and not bend to the violent actions against the Jewish state. I feel that he hasn't done this as promised. That is the wonderful thing about democracy. He can be elected out of office. I do not think he is a bad man nor an evil man. I feel that he is not right for this position. His Gaza Settlement plan that was on the table is wrong. There is so much I disagree with and a little that I agree. I am ever critical because I want what is best for my country. Ariel Sharon in office is not what is best.
*Palestinians have every right to exist just as the Jews do. This does not mean they are allowed to murder Jews. I am fine with them having their own state. I encourage it. The Jews are allowed to have their's. The Palestinians need to stop and crack down on terrorism and work on their own people's building up. If they were to concentrate on their own perfection, rather than the destruction of someone else, they would be living not only in peace, but in prosperity. I wish those who feel the same the best. Anyone who kills or sponsers the killing of innocents is marked for death. In society, we make sure to keep citizens safe from danger. Those who seek to murder anyone, and are successful, are dangerous. These are the people that should be brought to justice.
*There is a difference between being critical of Israel, and the downright hatred for it and it's Jewish residents. There is no crime in being critical of Israel and it's policies. I myself have been known to be critical of Israel. The line is drawn when the conclusion is that Israel should not exist and give in completely to it's enemies. Anyone who says, "I love Jews, it's Zionists that deserve to be blown up" is a closet antisemite. Israel is the Jewish state. Zionism (not just the modern movement) is part of Judaism. Even if a religous Jew does not support the modern state of Israel, like a small sect does, they still believe that Zion (Israel) is the homeland of the Jews. The only difference between that miniscual sect of religous Jews and the rest of Jewry is that they disagree on how Jewish ownership of Israel should manefest. "Jews against Zionism" et all, think that when the redeemer comes to Zion, that the Jews will be gathered into Israel. The prodominant view of most of religous Jewry is that the state of Israel is the first flowering of our redemption. Any way you slice it, Jews believe in a claim to Israel. And, the "Jews against Zionism", many of them live in Israel. My view is that God gave Israel to the Jews. For over 3,000 years it has belonged to the Jewish people and throught the whole of that time, Jews have live there. The Arabs can have whatever they like in the rest of the Middle East. The teenie-tiny territory of Israel is all we wish to retain. If I were any kind of diplomat, if I could speak for my people, this is what I would say. Do whatever you like to the rest of it. Allow us to exist with our place and we won't bother you and you won't bother us. Fair? It is what I believe.
*I am a religous Jew. For anyone to tell me that I am wrong for holding my views or I am evil has a serious problem. You don't have to agree with me. I don't care. I can respectfully disagree with someone. That's all it is, really. All it comes down to is people holding different views. In the end, rather than argue, we can simply respectfully disagree. No one's views will be changed, so why bother? Let the Jews live in peace and you can live in peace too. I hold my principles near and dear. For having my dogmatic principles, to be chastized and villifyed is wrong, anti-Jewish, and worse than anything my thoughts could ever do. My ideals are that of peace and live and let live. I have every right to defend myself when attacked. No one has the right to be attacked.
*When you chastize someone and call them evil or whatever rotten name of your choosing because of their beliefs that are harmless to all; that is evil. When you do not listen to what someone has to say and accuse instead of asking questions and listening to better understand where someone is coming from, that is horribly wrong and highly immoral. Questioning something is how we all learn. If you never raised your hand in school and asked a question, where would you be? Think on that. If you, instead of asking a teacher or a friend, just made up your own "fact", would that be right?
These are all just musings that I wanted to get off my chest so I posted them on my web log. If you have any questions about what I have said here, please ask me. I am receptive to kind conversation. Accusations rather than breaking the walls of misunderstanding help no one. I posted this for me and who ever needs to hear it. Please don't make up your own assumptions about anyone else's feelings. Base your ideas off of what people have to say, not what you think they think.
I will write more installments of this as more thoughts come to me.
05.16.04 (3:12 pm) [edit]
[b][i]MICHELLE DARDASHTI[/i]
Jewish Telegraphic Agency[/b]
NEW YORK -- A new survey speaks volumes about Saudi Arabian attitudes toward Jews, Christians and the West.
The survey, which examined 93 state-sponsored textbooks, found that Saudi students are being taught that "Jews are wickedness in its very essence," "Zionism is a nationalist, racist and aggressive movement," and the West "is the source of the past and present misfortunes in the Muslim world."
"This report is a smoking gun," said David Harris, executive director of the American Jewish Committee, which conducted the survey in cooperation with the Center for Monitoring the Impact of Peace.
"Despite Saudi government statements to the West promoting unity, friendship and tolerance, the report clearly demonstrates a disturbing pattern of hateful language."
For Arnon Groiss, director of the Voice of Israel's Arabic news division and the man responsible for compiling and translating the data in the study, the most compelling finding was "the extent of the paranoia the Saudis are trying to instill in their children regarding the West, beyond the expected anti-Semitism and anti- Zionism."
This is the fourth report Groiss has issued for the center, following two on Palestinian and one on Israeli textbooks.
In many ways, it could be the most significant.
The study comes as increasing attention is being paid to anti-Semitism in Saudi Arabia, a long-time U.S. ally. The Saudis also have come in for criticism since it was found that 15 of the 19 hijackers in the Sept. 11 terror attacks were Saudi citizens, and that Saudi money helps fund Palestinian terrorist groups.
Andre Marcus, the founding chairman of the center, which has offices in both New York and Jerusalem, said the educational system is key, since decisions taken at an autocratic political level don't necessarily make it down to the street.
Elsewhere in the Arab world, that disconnect -- for example, between the Palestinian Authority's peace agreements with Israel and the anti-Israel messages in Palestinian textbooks and official media -- makes it much more difficult for peace to succeed, Marcus added.
"Textbooks are a powerful tool. I would say even more than the media, more than TV."
Attitudes toward the Jewish people and Israel -- which doesn't even exist on Saudi maps -- are particularly noteworthy in light of the plan for Mideast peace that Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Abdullah proposed last year.
Marcus points to another reason why a study on the Saudis is so critical: In the cradle of Islam, Saudi Arabia's educational system exerts an influence on curricula in other Muslim countries.
The textbooks promulgate the Saudi belief that Islam is the only true religion and followers of other religions can't be trusted or befriended.
Marcus characterized the books' sentiments as "very much against peace and an education of peace."
The study also illustrates the Saudi position on the legal standing and duties of women and children, as well as notions of government and society.
Given the tight controls on information in Saudi Arabia, information for the study was gathered with great difficulty, from Saudis who want to see the educational system revamped.
These are people "who are tired of seeing education used as propaganda, and would like to see some changes in their own country," Marcus said.
The report has two objectives, he said: The first is to promote greater awareness of the "brainwashing" taking place in Saudi Arabia and the second is the construction of an educational system "that is more democratic and allows children to think freely."
Harris said the study is "creating quite a buzz on Capitol Hill," with senators asking for copies. The report also was presented to the State Department on Feb. 4, the day of its release.
"Our goal in the end is not to embarrass the Saudis," Harris said. "Our goal is to get the textbooks changed."
Yet the report's backers don't expect the report to produce major changes any time soon.
Groiss, who has spent 30 years monitoring Middle Eastern affairs, says he recognizes that entrenched interests in the Muslim world will work to forestall change.
One of the few "Western-friendly" excerpts Groiss found was the Saudi denunciation of terrorism. The catch, of course, lies in how the Saudis define terrorism.
According to Groiss, "everything that falls within the category of jihad or martyrdom is not terror." If violence can be justified as "for the sake of God" then it is considered permissible, and even is encouraged, he said.
Students are given examples of what constitutes legitimate examples of jihad -- including the struggles over Kashmir and "occupied Palestine."
Members of the American Jewish community met with the Saudi foreign minister in September and spoke with him about initial findings in the survey, which was already under way.
"They admit that there's some problematic material," said Ken Bandler, a spokesman for the AJCommittee. "But they don't seem to be doing much about it.''
[i]
For more JTA stories, go to http://www.jta.org[/i]
[b][i]MICHELLE DARDASHTI[/i]
Jewish Telegraphic Agency[/b]
NEW YORK -- A new survey speaks volumes about Saudi Arabian attitudes toward Jews, Christians and the West.
The survey, which examined 93 state-sponsored textbooks, found that Saudi students are being taught that "Jews are wickedness in its very essence," "Zionism is a nationalist, racist and aggressive movement," and the West "is the source of the past and present misfortunes in the Muslim world."
"This report is a smoking gun," said David Harris, executive director of the American Jewish Committee, which conducted the survey in cooperation with the Center for Monitoring the Impact of Peace.
"Despite Saudi government statements to the West promoting unity, friendship and tolerance, the report clearly demonstrates a disturbing pattern of hateful language."
For Arnon Groiss, director of the Voice of Israel's Arabic news division and the man responsible for compiling and translating the data in the study, the most compelling finding was "the extent of the paranoia the Saudis are trying to instill in their children regarding the West, beyond the expected anti-Semitism and anti- Zionism."
This is the fourth report Groiss has issued for the center, following two on Palestinian and one on Israeli textbooks.
In many ways, it could be the most significant.
The study comes as increasing attention is being paid to anti-Semitism in Saudi Arabia, a long-time U.S. ally. The Saudis also have come in for criticism since it was found that 15 of the 19 hijackers in the Sept. 11 terror attacks were Saudi citizens, and that Saudi money helps fund Palestinian terrorist groups.
Andre Marcus, the founding chairman of the center, which has offices in both New York and Jerusalem, said the educational system is key, since decisions taken at an autocratic political level don't necessarily make it down to the street.
Elsewhere in the Arab world, that disconnect -- for example, between the Palestinian Authority's peace agreements with Israel and the anti-Israel messages in Palestinian textbooks and official media -- makes it much more difficult for peace to succeed, Marcus added.
"Textbooks are a powerful tool. I would say even more than the media, more than TV."
Attitudes toward the Jewish people and Israel -- which doesn't even exist on Saudi maps -- are particularly noteworthy in light of the plan for Mideast peace that Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Abdullah proposed last year.
Marcus points to another reason why a study on the Saudis is so critical: In the cradle of Islam, Saudi Arabia's educational system exerts an influence on curricula in other Muslim countries.
The textbooks promulgate the Saudi belief that Islam is the only true religion and followers of other religions can't be trusted or befriended.
Marcus characterized the books' sentiments as "very much against peace and an education of peace."
The study also illustrates the Saudi position on the legal standing and duties of women and children, as well as notions of government and society.
Given the tight controls on information in Saudi Arabia, information for the study was gathered with great difficulty, from Saudis who want to see the educational system revamped.
These are people "who are tired of seeing education used as propaganda, and would like to see some changes in their own country," Marcus said.
The report has two objectives, he said: The first is to promote greater awareness of the "brainwashing" taking place in Saudi Arabia and the second is the construction of an educational system "that is more democratic and allows children to think freely."
Harris said the study is "creating quite a buzz on Capitol Hill," with senators asking for copies. The report also was presented to the State Department on Feb. 4, the day of its release.
"Our goal in the end is not to embarrass the Saudis," Harris said. "Our goal is to get the textbooks changed."
Yet the report's backers don't expect the report to produce major changes any time soon.
Groiss, who has spent 30 years monitoring Middle Eastern affairs, says he recognizes that entrenched interests in the Muslim world will work to forestall change.
One of the few "Western-friendly" excerpts Groiss found was the Saudi denunciation of terrorism. The catch, of course, lies in how the Saudis define terrorism.
According to Groiss, "everything that falls within the category of jihad or martyrdom is not terror." If violence can be justified as "for the sake of God" then it is considered permissible, and even is encouraged, he said.
Students are given examples of what constitutes legitimate examples of jihad -- including the struggles over Kashmir and "occupied Palestine."
Members of the American Jewish community met with the Saudi foreign minister in September and spoke with him about initial findings in the survey, which was already under way.
"They admit that there's some problematic material," said Ken Bandler, a spokesman for the AJCommittee. "But they don't seem to be doing much about it.''
[i]
For more JTA stories, go to http://www.jta.org[/i]
D'var Torah for Behar/Bechukotai
05.14.04 (4:34 pm) [edit]
In the middle of Parshat Behar, the Torah implores us to "perform the laws without logical explanations, the laws with logical explanations we should keep, and we should also perform them" (25:18, loose translation).
The Torat Kohanim, which is brought down in Rashi (26:3), clarifies the reason why the verse uses different terms by explaining that it's not enough to just perform the commandments (Mitzvot), but we have to LIVE them. It goes on to explain that if a person just performs the Mitzvot without learning more about them, they will end up performing less, and resenting those that perform more. It would then make sense that we're commanded to keep (learn about the reasons) the commandments that have reasons, as well as performing those that we don't understand.
But if we turn ahead to the very first verse of Parshat Bechukotai, the Torah adds a new requirement that we "walk in God's laws". What does it mean, and how does walking fit into our understanding?
Rav Nachum Zev explains that when a group of people is sitting, you can't tell when one of those people can't walk. It's only when they get up and walk away that you can tell. The same is true with Jews keeping the Torah's laws. The way to really tell if someone is keeping the commandments properly is by observing them as they "walk" in the world.
It's critically important to follow the Torah's rules, and to understand them. But the final challenge is that when we're faced with everyday trials and tribulations, we don't give in to temptations, maintain those Torah standards, and walk the TRUE walk of life!
How to run a military prison
05.14.04 (4:27 pm) [edit]
[i][b]By DAVID BRINN, The Jerusalem Post[/i][/b]
When I first joined the ranks of the IDF in the summer of 1990 as a 30-year-old reservist corporal in the Military Police, it wasn't the thought of being stationed in a military prison among hardened Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists that was terribly scary.
My fear was the possibility that I might witness scenes of horrifying torture and humiliation of prisoners by my colleagues and superiors. How would I react in such a situation? Would I possess the internal strength to stand up and resist such basic violations of human rights, or would I sit still and passively accept those atrocities? Such thoughts chilled me as I entered my first IDF prison 14 years ago to serve as a jailer, the fear that the Israeli soldier, a fellow Jew, could be capable of inhumane treatment of prisoners.
Seeing the pictures of abuses of Iraqi prisoners by US soldiers at the Abu Ghraib facility near Baghdad reminded me of my own trepidations back then. Whether this inexcusable affront to Western, democratic sensibilities could have been prevented will take a thorough investigation of the US military to determine. Could such a travesty occur at an Israeli military prison? Almost certainly not.
A senior Pentagon official has said that the US military units responsible for prisoners in Iraq were not given specifics on permissible techniques for questioning.
In the IDF, there was no such ambiguity. In fact, the entire reasoning behind sending a raw yet comparatively aged recruit like me to serve in military prisons was part of a carefully conceived and implemented plan by the IDF to ensure that such dehumanizing practices would never occur.
When I was inducted for shlav bet army service in the summer of 1990, it was still the height of the Palestinian intifada that had begun in 1987. The IDF had been forced to open up numerous facilities to house all the Palestinians who were being detained daily for rock-throwing, tossing Molotov cocktails, and worse offenses. These prisons - such as Ketziot, Ofer, Dahariya and Megiddo - were being run predominantly by conscript soldiers between 18 and 21, young men who were not necessarily capable of reigning in their feelings about the people in their charge.
Out of the 95 fellow conscripts I was inducted with, 90 were assigned to the Military Police. "We need you to go to these prisons and be in charge of the hour-by-hour contact with the prisoners," an officer told us during basic training. "We need mature, thoughtful people who aren't going to blow up and let their emotions dictate their actions. There are certain rules that have to be abided by, and you are the best people to ensure they are observed."
So for the next 14 years, I joined conscripts, officers, and other reservists down on the ground with Palestinian detainees, making things run. Huge shipments of food delivered daily had to be dispersed, prisoners had to be taken to doctors and to dentists. Others had appointments with their attorneys, and every day there were staggered visits from family members. All of this required coordination, cooperation, and mutual respect.
Our group of reservists received daily instructions from the young officers who were permanently stationed at the prison. Reservist officers accompanied us everywhere to make sure the different activities were carried out in the most efficient and businesslike manner.
There was a rigid order of checks and balances at work for every activity. For any abuse of prisoners to be carried out, there would have to be a huge conspiracy of silence to which dozens, if not hundreds, of soldiers would have to be part of. The block commander - generally a 20-year-old officer - reported directly to the prison commander, a career army officer.
Our reserve officers came from all walks of life but, to a man, their underlying credo was "Follow the rules." In no corner would have there been any tolerance or simply turning the other way in the event of anything remotely resembling abusive or humiliating behavior.
I WON'T deny that there was no love lost between the soldiers and the prisoners. And even among the "cooler heads" of the reservists, there was plenty of talk about the "Palestinian dogs" that we were in charge of.
But a telling example describes how such racist talk stayed within the ranks and was not allowed to spread. A reservist guard whose job was to watch us military police from one of the many towers surrounding Machane Ofer was walking through our block on the way to his position. He made eye contact with a prisoner on the other side of the fence. The prisoner didn't back down, and the soldier began yelling unprintable things about the prisoner's mother and started to cock his weapon in the prisoner's direction. Within five seconds, the soldier was surrounded by military cops who herded him out of the block.
Justice was quick. Within minutes, the prison commander personally apologized to the prisoner and his block leader, and the soldier had his next leave from the base rescinded.
After spending more than a year of my life in such situations, I can say that the above incident was the closest I came to witnessing any type of prisoner abuse in the IDF.
I make no claims of knowing what goes on when the Shabak takes a prisoner away for interrogation, but I can say that prisoners I saw who returned from such interrogation walked under their own direction and looked no different than when they were taken.
I'm proud of my service in the army and the high moral standard that I saw enacted day after day by ordinary Israelis put into difficult circumstances. Of course, the IDF certainly isn't perfect, and I can remember cringing more times than I would like at some uncivilized or hurtful behavior by soldiers toward prisoners.
These incidents fostered hate and served the interest of neither side in the conflict. But senseless macho posturing is far different than deliberate humiliation. And just as the IDF realized this years ago when they were forced to deal with the dilemma of soldiers guarding civilians, the US military will have to grapple with its mistakes and draw its own conclusions. The question is not why the atrocities at Abu Ghraib took place but how the Americans can stop it from happening again.
[i]The writer, a former news editor of The Jerusalem Post, is the editorial director of ISRAEL21c (www.israel21c.org). He retired from active IDF duty in 2003.[/i]
The Palestinian winners and losers
05.14.04 (4:19 pm) [edit]
[i][b]By MATTHEW GUTMAN, The Jerusalem Post[/b][/i]
As Israel tallied the death toll from what pundits have called "the armored personnel carrier disasters" in the Gaza Strip this week, the Palestinians tallied their own winners and losers.
Islamic Jihad has crowned itself the winner. Millions of viewers across the Arab world witnessed the "redemption" of Islamic Jihad on Arab satellite stations like al-Jazeera when it paraded the remains of the six soldiers killed Tuesday after their explosives-laden APC virtually disintegrated when it ran over a mine. Within 24 hours, the terrorists managed to blow up another APC, this time killing five soldiers.
According to Khalid al-Batch, an Islamic Jihad spokesman, the group also created the impression that it negotiated with Israel over the bodies. "The agreement states that the body parts will be returned to their families. In exchange, Israel will withdraw and will discuss the repatriation of martyrs," in this case suicide bombers, he told The Jerusalem Post.
Israel would also discuss the repatriation to the West Bank of Palestinian fighters deported to Gaza following the resolution of the May 2002 standoff at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, Batch said.
Israeli officials from Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz and Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Moshe Ya'alon on down vehemently denied that Israel "negotiated with terrorists."
An IDF spokesman denied any negotiations, calling the possible transfer of deported Palestinians back to the West Bank "entirely baseless. Israel left [the Gaza City neighborhood of] Zeitun entirely on its own accord."
05.14.04 (4:16 pm) [edit]
[b][i]By MARGOT DUDKEVITCH[/i][/b]
Two IDF soldiers were killed and two moderately wounded when Palestinians opened fire at soldiers deployed in the Rafah refugee camp near the border with Egypt, late Friday afternoon.
The soldiers were part of forces deployed in the camp to safeguard other troops searching for the remains of two other soldiers that were killed on the Philadelphia Route, Wednesday evening, when their armored personnel carrier was hit by an anti-tank missile.
One of the soldiers went to give an elderly Palestinian woman food the troops had received, when Palestinians opened fire killing him. Other soldiers who reached the site to assist and rescue the soldier were also shot at and in the gunfire one soldier was killed and two others were wounded.
OC Southern Command Maj.-Gen Dan Harel together with the senior IFD echelon are currently assessing the situation regarding a possible response to the attack.
Intensive exchanges of gunfire were reported between Palestinians and IDF forces in the Rafah refugee camp on Friday night hours after the soldiers were killed.
Two Palestinians were killed in the fighting, Israel Radio reported.
Several times IAF helicopters were deployed to fire missiles at groups of armed Palestinians who have been shooting with light weapons, grenades, rockets and sniper fire at troops deployed in the area.
Dr Yair Ben-David, deputy head of the Soroka Hospital in Beer Sheva, said that two IDF casualties arrived at the hospital suffering from gunshot wounds. He described their injuries as moderate but stable
Earlier, combat helicopters fired missiles at an open area to deter groups of armed Palestinians spotted approaching troops.
Bulldozers have destroyed a number of buildings at the edge of the town since operations began Friday to widen the Philadelphia corridor.
On Friday morning, Defense minister Shaul Mofaz told reporters that Palestinians had used United Nations and Red Cross ambulances to transport body remains to areas under their control. Visiting soldiers at an army base in the southern Gaza Strip, Mofaz said he expected UN Sec.-Gen Kofi Annan to address the issue.
UNWRA spokesman Paul Mccann replied that his organization has no information on the use of its ambulances to transport body remains. "We will be pleased to receive more concrete information and proof."
Israeli bulldozers Friday started smashing buildings in a Palestinian refugee camp close to a military patrol road where five soldiers were killed in a Palestinian attack two days earlier.
Palestinians are protesting the act and calling for international intervention.
Associated Press described frantic residents waving white flags, removing valuables in cartons and plastic bags, and carting away furniture, doors and window frames.
Helicopters fired three missiles, wounding six Palestinians. Early Friday, a Palestinian attempting to plant a bomb alongside a Jewish settlement near Rafah was killed when the device exploded prematurely, the army said.
Israel Radio said the military planned to demolish hundreds of buildings in the camp, adjacent to the road where Wednesday's attack on an Israeli armored vehicle took place, to remove possible Palestinian vantage points or cover for potential attackers. The move is also expected to make it more difficult for Palestinians to dig arms-smuggling tunnels from the Palestinian side of the city to the Egyptian side.
Chief of staff Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon said, "There's a process whereby the first row of houses is abandoned and used for digging tunnels for smuggling weapons and cover for shooting," he said. "We've been forced to destroy houses here in the past and apparently we'll have to destroy more houses in the future."
The Israeli military said that so far, it has demolished only one house used as cover by gunmen, and several other buildings were damaged unintentionally by wide armored vehicles moving through narrow alleys.
Palestinian Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat called for American intervention to halt the destruction.
"This is a catastrophe. At a time when the Israelis are speaking of disengaging from Gaza this is really re-engaging," he told The Associated Press. "I hope that President Bush, who says he is encouraged by disengagement, will interfere to stop the demolitions."
The Israel Defense Forces decided to widen the Philadelphia Corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border in order to allow troops greater operational flexibility in that strategic area. The decision came about after consultations between Prime Minister Sharon, Defense Minister Mofaz and top security officials.
The work required to widen the corridor was originally planned to begin just as soon as all the remains of the soldiers killed Wednesday have been found and the searches can be called off, according to a senior official.
Widening the corridor, scene of round-the-clock battles between IDF forces and Palestinian gunmen, will require demolishing abandoned as well as populated dwellings of the locals living adjacent to the border area on the Palestinian side. Some of the buildings have been used by Palestinians as bases of operation. Many of the buildings have been commandeered by Palestinian gunmen from ordinary Palestinian civilians.
The work will not be conducted along the entire route but will concentrate mainly in the area where the attack on the APC occurred. "The aim is to distance the threat of any rocket or mortar fire at the soldiers who patrol the route," one official told the 'Post. The official noted that if and when the disengagement plan will be put into action, Israel will maintain control of the area.
The IDF said that widening the corridor will also make it harder for Palestinians to launch longer-range missiles at soldiers, settlements and Israeli communities inside the Green Line. It will also make it harder for Palestinians to lay mines against IDF vehicles in the area. Eleven soldiers died in two days on attacks on their APC's in Gaza.
Just as importantly, the army says, widening the corridor between Egyptian Rafah and Palestinian Rafah will disrupt Palestinian weapons tunnels activity. The tunnels are used to smuggle weapons, ammunition and drugs from the Egyptian side of the border into the Gaza Strip.
The Palestinian Authority on Friday called Israel's plans to widen the Philadelphia Corridor a "huge catastrophe" and urged international intervention to avert the IDF's plans.
MK Yossi Sarid (Meretz) claims that the widening of the Philadelphia route entails the destruction of "half of the city of Rafah" in a matter of days. He warned that this would be considered a war crime, and "even though Israel has received the White House's approval, Bush's unbrella will do us no good," he said.
[i]with the Associated Press[/i]
[b][i]By MARGOT DUDKEVITCH[/i][/b]
Two IDF soldiers were killed and two moderately wounded when Palestinians opened fire at soldiers deployed in the Rafah refugee camp near the border with Egypt, late Friday afternoon.
The soldiers were part of forces deployed in the camp to safeguard other troops searching for the remains of two other soldiers that were killed on the Philadelphia Route, Wednesday evening, when their armored personnel carrier was hit by an anti-tank missile.
One of the soldiers went to give an elderly Palestinian woman food the troops had received, when Palestinians opened fire killing him. Other soldiers who reached the site to assist and rescue the soldier were also shot at and in the gunfire one soldier was killed and two others were wounded.
OC Southern Command Maj.-Gen Dan Harel together with the senior IFD echelon are currently assessing the situation regarding a possible response to the attack.
Intensive exchanges of gunfire were reported between Palestinians and IDF forces in the Rafah refugee camp on Friday night hours after the soldiers were killed.
Two Palestinians were killed in the fighting, Israel Radio reported.
Several times IAF helicopters were deployed to fire missiles at groups of armed Palestinians who have been shooting with light weapons, grenades, rockets and sniper fire at troops deployed in the area.
Dr Yair Ben-David, deputy head of the Soroka Hospital in Beer Sheva, said that two IDF casualties arrived at the hospital suffering from gunshot wounds. He described their injuries as moderate but stable
Earlier, combat helicopters fired missiles at an open area to deter groups of armed Palestinians spotted approaching troops.
Bulldozers have destroyed a number of buildings at the edge of the town since operations began Friday to widen the Philadelphia corridor.
On Friday morning, Defense minister Shaul Mofaz told reporters that Palestinians had used United Nations and Red Cross ambulances to transport body remains to areas under their control. Visiting soldiers at an army base in the southern Gaza Strip, Mofaz said he expected UN Sec.-Gen Kofi Annan to address the issue.
UNWRA spokesman Paul Mccann replied that his organization has no information on the use of its ambulances to transport body remains. "We will be pleased to receive more concrete information and proof."
Israeli bulldozers Friday started smashing buildings in a Palestinian refugee camp close to a military patrol road where five soldiers were killed in a Palestinian attack two days earlier.
Palestinians are protesting the act and calling for international intervention.
Associated Press described frantic residents waving white flags, removing valuables in cartons and plastic bags, and carting away furniture, doors and window frames.
Helicopters fired three missiles, wounding six Palestinians. Early Friday, a Palestinian attempting to plant a bomb alongside a Jewish settlement near Rafah was killed when the device exploded prematurely, the army said.
Israel Radio said the military planned to demolish hundreds of buildings in the camp, adjacent to the road where Wednesday's attack on an Israeli armored vehicle took place, to remove possible Palestinian vantage points or cover for potential attackers. The move is also expected to make it more difficult for Palestinians to dig arms-smuggling tunnels from the Palestinian side of the city to the Egyptian side.
Chief of staff Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon said, "There's a process whereby the first row of houses is abandoned and used for digging tunnels for smuggling weapons and cover for shooting," he said. "We've been forced to destroy houses here in the past and apparently we'll have to destroy more houses in the future."
The Israeli military said that so far, it has demolished only one house used as cover by gunmen, and several other buildings were damaged unintentionally by wide armored vehicles moving through narrow alleys.
Palestinian Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat called for American intervention to halt the destruction.
"This is a catastrophe. At a time when the Israelis are speaking of disengaging from Gaza this is really re-engaging," he told The Associated Press. "I hope that President Bush, who says he is encouraged by disengagement, will interfere to stop the demolitions."
The Israel Defense Forces decided to widen the Philadelphia Corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border in order to allow troops greater operational flexibility in that strategic area. The decision came about after consultations between Prime Minister Sharon, Defense Minister Mofaz and top security officials.
The work required to widen the corridor was originally planned to begin just as soon as all the remains of the soldiers killed Wednesday have been found and the searches can be called off, according to a senior official.
Widening the corridor, scene of round-the-clock battles between IDF forces and Palestinian gunmen, will require demolishing abandoned as well as populated dwellings of the locals living adjacent to the border area on the Palestinian side. Some of the buildings have been used by Palestinians as bases of operation. Many of the buildings have been commandeered by Palestinian gunmen from ordinary Palestinian civilians.
The work will not be conducted along the entire route but will concentrate mainly in the area where the attack on the APC occurred. "The aim is to distance the threat of any rocket or mortar fire at the soldiers who patrol the route," one official told the 'Post. The official noted that if and when the disengagement plan will be put into action, Israel will maintain control of the area.
The IDF said that widening the corridor will also make it harder for Palestinians to launch longer-range missiles at soldiers, settlements and Israeli communities inside the Green Line. It will also make it harder for Palestinians to lay mines against IDF vehicles in the area. Eleven soldiers died in two days on attacks on their APC's in Gaza.
Just as importantly, the army says, widening the corridor between Egyptian Rafah and Palestinian Rafah will disrupt Palestinian weapons tunnels activity. The tunnels are used to smuggle weapons, ammunition and drugs from the Egyptian side of the border into the Gaza Strip.
The Palestinian Authority on Friday called Israel's plans to widen the Philadelphia Corridor a "huge catastrophe" and urged international intervention to avert the IDF's plans.
MK Yossi Sarid (Meretz) claims that the widening of the Philadelphia route entails the destruction of "half of the city of Rafah" in a matter of days. He warned that this would be considered a war crime, and "even though Israel has received the White House's approval, Bush's unbrella will do us no good," he said.
[i]with the Associated Press[/i]
Islam has lost its way
05.13.04 (6:15 pm) [edit]
[b][i]By SHMULEY BOTEACH[/i][/b]
Supporters and opponents of the war in Iraq finally have something to agree on. Both are justifiably sickened by the abusive photographs coming out of Abu Ghraib prison. Both argue that American credibility has been eroded in the Arab world and that the photographs have inflamed Islamic hatred of America.
Get real. The Arabs hate America with or without these photographs. They detested the United States before these pictures were published, and they would detest the US had these pictures never been taken. They hate us when we liberate them, and they hate us when we are wicked enough to abuse them. In short, they hate us no matter what.
Indeed, many Arabs have reached a point of such implacable hatred toward America and Israel that it has become positively self-destructive. They are even incapable of identifying their own interests. When Abraham Lincoln humbly sauntered through the conquered Confederate capital of Richmond on April 2, 1865, he was mobbed by ecstatic crowds of newly freed slaves who held their children up to see the great emancipator. But President George W. Bush had to sneak into Baghdad last Thanksgiving in absolute secrecy. The Arabs hate their own liberators. Bullets, rather than gratitude, currently welcome the soldiers who freed them from the butcher of Baghdad. But the Arab world is incapable of offering a thank you because that sense of indebtedness would only increase their sense of humiliation at the hands of America.
Let us be blunt. Muslim civilization is losing its ability to mold good and decent people. A religion that once distinguished itself for its benevolence and religious tolerance is producing a generation of hate-filled malcontents.
Many Arabs and Muslims talk about their 'humiliation.' Indeed, Mahathir Muhammad mentioned the word "humiliation" five times in his infamous anti-Semitic address at the Organization of the Islamic Conference. How strange that the Arabs do not seem to be embarrassed at the fact that they are now the poorest people on Earth, have a female illiteracy rate of more than 50%, have translated fewer books into Arabic over the past 1,000 years than Spain does in a single year, and are giving birth to children who in all likelihood will never taste a single day of political freedom. What does humiliate them, however, is the sight of American soldiers in their cities trying to build power grids and help them formulate a constitution.
Imagine a man who, due to being a hothead, cannot hold a job, fails to support his family, and watches his illiterate children walk around in dirty rags. His family's lowly station causes him no embarrassment. But what does humiliate him is when kindly neighbors leave food parcels at his doorstep. He hates them because they make him feel beholden.
This warped sense of Arab pride is the major cause of Arab hatred. But in truth, it no longer matters why the Arabs hate us. The far more important question is how to respond.
Alarmingly, many American commentators are now arguing that since the Arabs are so implacably hostile, it is better to fight a dirty war against them and be successful than fight a humane war and fail. Rather than lose soldiers in deadly street-to-street combat, should we not just pulverize Fallujah and carpet-bomb Najaf? Since neither the US nor Israel will ever be given credit for its humane war tactics, and the torture of a few rogue soldiers will be used to misrepresent all American soldiers as sadists, why not just remove the restraints and inflict a crushing blow upon Arab terrorism?
Here is the answer: If we do so, not only is it immoral but because it is immoral, we will ultimately lose the war. America and Israel are strong not because they have market economies but because they are good. And if there is one lesson history has taught us it is that, in the end, good always triumphs over evil. Any country that is interested in its long-term survival better had ensure that it is an upright and virtuous society or, as history has shown, it will not last.
Far from being an obscure theological concept, the triumph of good over evil is a demonstrable human truth. When countries are good, their populations become proud to be their citizens and will therefore sacrifice greatly on the country's behalf. Israelis have little compunction about putting in so much time for military service because they absolutely believe in the justice of their cause. Contrast that with the Arab armies, where conscripts are taken by the barrel of a gun to serve, which accounts for their usually dismal performance in war. Good always triumphs over evil because people are honored to be associated with the good and will fight doggedly to be attached to the light. Hitler's armies lost the Second World War because the darkness of his cause could ultimately never inspire his divisions the way the cause of liberty could inspire the Allies.
We often hear that the Arabs are a proud nation, but that is in appearance only. If the Palestinians were a proud people, they would pick up bricks to build schools and universities rather than hurl them at Israeli soldiers.
No people could be proud of the direction Arab civilization seems to be taking. A once-majestic civilization that has now become synonymous with religious murder, violence, and poverty has little to take pride in. And since self-esteem cannot motivate them, the only thing the Arabs have left is hatred. But what they really hate is themselves. Little do the Arabs realize that part of the reason that they hate themselves is that they have become so immoral. Time will tell whether they will summon the courage to better their actions rather than blame others for their ills.
But the lesson for the United States and Israel is that so long as they never impugn the justice of their cause with tragic abuses such as at Abu Ghraib, they will continue to inspire new generations of patriots who are willing to irrigate the tree of liberty even if, as Thomas Jefferson said, it must be done with the blood of patriots.
[i]The writer is a syndicated US radio host and author of 14 books including The Private Adam: Becoming a Hero in a Selfish Age.[/i]
05.13.04 (1:14 pm) [edit]
GAZA (Reuters) - Palestinian officials handed the remains of Israeli soldiers killed in Gaza City to Israeli officials on Thursday morning, a Palestinian security official said.
Earlier on Thursday Egyptian mediators received the remains of the six soldiers killed when their vehicle was blown up, as part of a deal worked out with Palestinian militants.
They were brought by ambulance and handed over in a box to the Israelis who were waiting with another ambulance at the Erez Crossing just north of the Gaza Strip (news - web sites), the security official told Reuters.
The Israeli military had no immediate comment.
Israel had sought the remains as a condition for withdrawing troops after a two-day incursion in Gaza City's Zeitoun district that also left at least 16 Palestinians dead and 185 wounded.
The troops withdrew earlier on Thursday, but Israel had insisted that no deal had been made.
A Palestinian security chief told reporters that Palestinian President Yasser Arafat had ordered that the body parts be taken from militants who took them from the scene of Tuesday's explosion.
[line]
I just hope it's really the remains of those soldiers and not a fake!
This is excellent news!
GAZA (Reuters) - Palestinian officials handed the remains of Israeli soldiers killed in Gaza City to Israeli officials on Thursday morning, a Palestinian security official said.
Earlier on Thursday Egyptian mediators received the remains of the six soldiers killed when their vehicle was blown up, as part of a deal worked out with Palestinian militants.
They were brought by ambulance and handed over in a box to the Israelis who were waiting with another ambulance at the Erez Crossing just north of the Gaza Strip (news - web sites), the security official told Reuters.
The Israeli military had no immediate comment.
Israel had sought the remains as a condition for withdrawing troops after a two-day incursion in Gaza City's Zeitoun district that also left at least 16 Palestinians dead and 185 wounded.
The troops withdrew earlier on Thursday, but Israel had insisted that no deal had been made.
A Palestinian security chief told reporters that Palestinian President Yasser Arafat had ordered that the body parts be taken from militants who took them from the scene of Tuesday's explosion.
[line]
I just hope it's really the remains of those soldiers and not a fake!
This is excellent news!
05.13.04 (1:03 pm) [edit]
I have a question following this article...
[line]
[b]Thu May 13, 7:13 AM ET
[i]By TAMER ZIARA, Associated Press Writer[/i][/b]
RAFAH, Gaza Strip - Hundreds of Israeli troops fanned out along the Egyptian border Thursday to search for remains of five comrades killed in the bombing of a military vehicle, while Israeli missile strikes on a Palestinian refugee camp killed 11 people and wounded 29 others.
The five soldiers were killed Wednesday when Palestinians blew up an Israeli armored vehicle, the second such attack in two days. In three days of rapidly escalating violence, 11 Israeli soldiers and 27 Palestinians have been killed since. At least 235 Palestinians have been wounded.
Early Thursday, Israeli forces pulled out of Gaza City following the biggest offensive in the area in years. The military said it had completed its search for body parts from six soldiers killed in the first bombing, a huge explosion that destroyed an armored vehicle on Tuesday.
The army left behind a swath of destruction in Gaza City: A multi-story building was destroyed, scores of houses were damaged, agricultural land was uprooted and local infrastructure was pulverized.
The army said the damage resulted from Palestinian resistance and the impact of the explosion that destroyed the armored vehicle. "There was a lot of collateral damage over a large area," said military spokeswoman Maj. Sharon Feingold.
The escalating violence renewed debate in Israel over its continuing presence in Gaza, where 7,500 Jewish settlers live among 1.3 million Palestinians. Israeli commentators said the violence was increasingly reminiscent of Israel's guerrilla war in Lebanon that ended with a sudden pullout in 2000.
Following Wednesday's armored vehicle attack, as many as 1,000 Israeli soldiers and dozens of tanks and armored personnel carriers fanned out in the border area between Gaza and Egypt.
The forces continued to search Thursday for body parts, which were scattered over a large area, and secured the narrow road near the Rafah refugee camp where the attack took place.
Israeli officials said Egypt was assisting in the recovery effort. Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon, the army chief, told Israel Radio that Cairo had agreed to allow army rabbis to search for remains on the Egyptian side of the border. There was no immediate comment from Egypt.
The vehicle that exploded was carrying a ton of explosives, used to blow up weapons-smuggling tunnels between Egypt and Gaza, military sources said. The army said it had been attacked by a rocket-propelled grenade.
The force of the blast sent body parts flying up to a half a mile away, the sources said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The dual attacks dealt a tough blow to the standing of Israel's military and raised new questions about its continuing presence in Gaza.
A bereaved father of one of the soldiers harshly criticized the government, giving new sting to the debate.
Shlomo Vishinsky, a well-known actor, blamed Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Likud Party for his son Lior's death, saying the young man had been a "patsy" of the party's hard-line policies.
"I want the funeral cortege to leave from the Likud headquarters, so that Lior's death will not have been in vain, so that other mothers will not have to suffer," he told the Yediot Ahronot daily. "It's clear that no one wants to be in Gaza, except the members of the Likud."
Sharon has called for evacuating Gaza and uprooting the 21 Jewish settlements there. But Likud members less than 2 percent of Israel's population overwhelmingly rejected the proposal in a nonbinding vote on May 2.
Opinion polls have shown that a solid majority of the general public favored the plan, and Sharon has pledged to push forward with the proposal.
Dovish Israeli politicians said the violence would persuade Israelis of the need to leave Gaza. A similar debate over Israel's occupation of southern Lebanon a bloody war against Hezbollah guerrillas led to an Israel withdrawal in 2000.
In new violence, Israeli helicopters fired at least five missiles into Rafah, Palestinian sources said. One of the missiles killed seven people, and an attack several hours later killed four others, including a 15-yar-old boy, hospital workers said.
Palestinians said a 19-year-old man in Rafah was killed by Israeli gunfire.
The army said it had fired missiles at armed militants. Residents said at least four of the dead were militants.
Later Wednesday, Israeli gunboats shelled the Gaza shoreline. There were no further details.
The bloody back-to-back attacks on Israeli forces in Gaza reversed a trend of "routine" Israeli operations in Palestinian areas in recent months, in which dozens of Palestinians were killed and wounded but Israeli casualties were few.
Tuesday's attack in Gaza City was especially gruesome. Militants displayed soldiers' body parts for TV cameras, prompting the Israeli offensive.
Israel pulled out of the city's Zeitoun neighborhood after militants agreed to return soldiers' body parts in a deal worked out with the Palestinian Authority and Egypt.
Israel had insisted it would not negotiate with the militants over the body parts and was apparently not an official part of the agreement to return them. Israel had asked the International Committee of the Red Cross to mediate.
Though some of the corpses were incomplete, the army said late Wednesday that pathologists positively identified all six soldiers, and four would be buried on Thursday.
[line]
So, if you were Israel, how would you handle this situation? Body parts of your soldiers that have been killed are being held for ransom by these people who killed them. What are you giong to do?
I have a question following this article...
[line]
[b]Thu May 13, 7:13 AM ET
[i]By TAMER ZIARA, Associated Press Writer[/i][/b]
RAFAH, Gaza Strip - Hundreds of Israeli troops fanned out along the Egyptian border Thursday to search for remains of five comrades killed in the bombing of a military vehicle, while Israeli missile strikes on a Palestinian refugee camp killed 11 people and wounded 29 others.
The five soldiers were killed Wednesday when Palestinians blew up an Israeli armored vehicle, the second such attack in two days. In three days of rapidly escalating violence, 11 Israeli soldiers and 27 Palestinians have been killed since. At least 235 Palestinians have been wounded.
Early Thursday, Israeli forces pulled out of Gaza City following the biggest offensive in the area in years. The military said it had completed its search for body parts from six soldiers killed in the first bombing, a huge explosion that destroyed an armored vehicle on Tuesday.
The army left behind a swath of destruction in Gaza City: A multi-story building was destroyed, scores of houses were damaged, agricultural land was uprooted and local infrastructure was pulverized.
The army said the damage resulted from Palestinian resistance and the impact of the explosion that destroyed the armored vehicle. "There was a lot of collateral damage over a large area," said military spokeswoman Maj. Sharon Feingold.
The escalating violence renewed debate in Israel over its continuing presence in Gaza, where 7,500 Jewish settlers live among 1.3 million Palestinians. Israeli commentators said the violence was increasingly reminiscent of Israel's guerrilla war in Lebanon that ended with a sudden pullout in 2000.
Following Wednesday's armored vehicle attack, as many as 1,000 Israeli soldiers and dozens of tanks and armored personnel carriers fanned out in the border area between Gaza and Egypt.
The forces continued to search Thursday for body parts, which were scattered over a large area, and secured the narrow road near the Rafah refugee camp where the attack took place.
Israeli officials said Egypt was assisting in the recovery effort. Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon, the army chief, told Israel Radio that Cairo had agreed to allow army rabbis to search for remains on the Egyptian side of the border. There was no immediate comment from Egypt.
The vehicle that exploded was carrying a ton of explosives, used to blow up weapons-smuggling tunnels between Egypt and Gaza, military sources said. The army said it had been attacked by a rocket-propelled grenade.
The force of the blast sent body parts flying up to a half a mile away, the sources said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The dual attacks dealt a tough blow to the standing of Israel's military and raised new questions about its continuing presence in Gaza.
A bereaved father of one of the soldiers harshly criticized the government, giving new sting to the debate.
Shlomo Vishinsky, a well-known actor, blamed Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Likud Party for his son Lior's death, saying the young man had been a "patsy" of the party's hard-line policies.
"I want the funeral cortege to leave from the Likud headquarters, so that Lior's death will not have been in vain, so that other mothers will not have to suffer," he told the Yediot Ahronot daily. "It's clear that no one wants to be in Gaza, except the members of the Likud."
Sharon has called for evacuating Gaza and uprooting the 21 Jewish settlements there. But Likud members less than 2 percent of Israel's population overwhelmingly rejected the proposal in a nonbinding vote on May 2.
Opinion polls have shown that a solid majority of the general public favored the plan, and Sharon has pledged to push forward with the proposal.
Dovish Israeli politicians said the violence would persuade Israelis of the need to leave Gaza. A similar debate over Israel's occupation of southern Lebanon a bloody war against Hezbollah guerrillas led to an Israel withdrawal in 2000.
In new violence, Israeli helicopters fired at least five missiles into Rafah, Palestinian sources said. One of the missiles killed seven people, and an attack several hours later killed four others, including a 15-yar-old boy, hospital workers said.
Palestinians said a 19-year-old man in Rafah was killed by Israeli gunfire.
The army said it had fired missiles at armed militants. Residents said at least four of the dead were militants.
Later Wednesday, Israeli gunboats shelled the Gaza shoreline. There were no further details.
The bloody back-to-back attacks on Israeli forces in Gaza reversed a trend of "routine" Israeli operations in Palestinian areas in recent months, in which dozens of Palestinians were killed and wounded but Israeli casualties were few.
Tuesday's attack in Gaza City was especially gruesome. Militants displayed soldiers' body parts for TV cameras, prompting the Israeli offensive.
Israel pulled out of the city's Zeitoun neighborhood after militants agreed to return soldiers' body parts in a deal worked out with the Palestinian Authority and Egypt.
Israel had insisted it would not negotiate with the militants over the body parts and was apparently not an official part of the agreement to return them. Israel had asked the International Committee of the Red Cross to mediate.
Though some of the corpses were incomplete, the army said late Wednesday that pathologists positively identified all six soldiers, and four would be buried on Thursday.
[line]
So, if you were Israel, how would you handle this situation? Body parts of your soldiers that have been killed are being held for ransom by these people who killed them. What are you giong to do?
One of those lame survey things
05.12.04 (10:06 pm) [edit]
1) Hood: On my jacket.
2) If you could shave something into your head, what would it be? i honestly don't know.
3) If you could dye your hair one colour, what would it be? i like my hair colour.
4) If you could have a tattoo, what and where would it be? well, i don't like tattoos and they're against my religion. temporary tatoos or henna i'd put on the small of my back and it'd be some kind of intracate design.
5) If you could turn into any animal real or imaginary what would it be? a winged tiger.
6) If you could meet one person in this world, who would it be? Um, I duno.
7) What's your favourite brand of gum? orbit gum! Fabulous!
8.) What's your favourite Mentos commercial? i hate those damn comercials.
9) What colour is your toothbrush? red
10) What colour is your toothpaste? red, lol.. it's cinimon flavored!
11) Is the glass half empty or half full? full.
12) What's on your ceiling? a big ugly light that's not plugged in
13) What's your favourite colour? red
14) Which do you prefer- Cool Ranch or Nacho Cheese Doritos? I don't eat dorritos.
15) What's your favourite flavour of Snapple? OOOH! I like watermelon and cranberry! but they're all good because they're made from the best stuff on earth!
16) Who is your favourite character from The Breakfast Club? wow, i'm old.
17) Which one, Coke or Pepsi? SNAPPLE!
18) What's your sign? Aries
19) If you were a dog, what would your name be? Fox
20) How do you eat an Oreo? I don't eat oreos; I DEVOUR them!
21) Which milk is your favourite? i like half & half. it's yum in coco pebbles!
22) Are you a righty or a lefty or ambidextrous (that means both)?right... in most things
23) Which is your favourite Adam Sandler and Rosie O'Donnell movie?I like little nickie. I didn't know rosie was in that. She must have played the hell beast.
24) What do you wear to bed? pajamas
25) When you notice a person of the opposite sex, what do you notice first? if they're acting stuffy or not
26) Have you ever been attacked by a big dog? i was attacked by a terrior when i was 3. it was a big dog to me then.
27) Do you ever save your AOL conversations? always ;)
28) Do you eat chicken fingers with a fork? who does that?
29) Do you eat the stems of broccoli? yesh!
30) Boxers or briefs? i wear breifs.
31) If you could streak in front of one person's house, whos would it be? bwahahahaha
32) If you could be anything in a kitchen, what would you be? a japanese knife.
33) Guys, would you ever ask a random girl for her shirt? not a guy
34) If you could be one gardening tool, which one would it be? lawn mower.
35) What kind of shoe would you be if you had the option to be a shoe? stilleto
36) What kind of corn would you be? popcorn
37) What's your favourite Jell-o flavour? strawberry
38) Which do you prefer, mud wrestling or Jell-o wrestling? ky jelly wrestling!
39) What's under your bed? boxes of stuff
40) Who are your crushes? michael
41) What's the best number in the world? 9
42) Favorite t.v. show? SouthPark
43) Favorite Anime? um, no
44) Favorite band? Dave Matthews Band!
45) Favorite food?shabbos food!
46) Any pets? Pharoah my baddass black fat cat
47) Anything else you would like to say about yourself? I am cool.
Religion & Politics
05.12.04 (7:17 pm) [edit]
You know, I got to thinking about the connection between Religion and Politics lately. I have come to the conclusion that the two are [i]very[/i] close. I would even venture as far to say that Religion drives Politics and, therefore, they are linked.
I mean think about it. It doesn't matter what you religion you follow, but your philosophy influences your vote, your opinions, your ideals. Religions give fourth various philosophies. Take, for example, Christianity. I'll use them because I'm removed from it and so I can't have bias. I'm not a Christan. By the way, these are all observations. This is just how I see it. I could get it all wrong, after all as I said, I'm not a Christian. By the way, these are all generalizations as well. I hope I don't offend anyone because there are just so many differences we all have to the generalities. Forgive me for being so blanket.
Anyway, you have SO many sects of Christianity. You have the rightist Christians who claim to go by the book, you have the leftist ones who claim they don't have to go by the book... sounds familiar?
In order that I not be misunderstood, this is not a slam at either the right or the left. I'm just musing here, but lets go deeper into these thoughts.
Let's call leftist Christians "modern" for now. Modern Christians have newer ideas. They tend to be pro-choice, and just, generally, be more lax on issues that pertain to the individual, politically. They tend to be more lax religiously. They don't go out and preach the gospels so much. They have a more live and let live mantality. Their philosophy seems, to me, as if they don't think there's a right or wrong; who are they to say who is right? That has to come from a religious and philosophical outlook, I think.
Conservative Christians let's go ahead and call traditionalists. They tend to be more pro-life, and they want to see more control over society. People can't just go around and do what they want, there has to be rules. This comes from how they believe in God. "This is what God told us, this is what we have to do." It stems from their dogma, their philosophy, their relgion.
Now this comparison could be anyone, just about. I chose Christianity also because it is so diverse within one group. Let's go beyond that...
Buddhists. Buddhists tend to be more left-leaning. This is also because, like the modern Christians, they take a more live and let live point of view. "Who am I to tell people what to do? What if I'm wrong?"
Contrast with Muslims.
"You have to do this. Allah, God, whatever, said you must." To them, they are the only truth. Islam is the light and they must spread it. Their politics are influenced by their relgion, just like everyone else.
I suppose atheists would fall under more left leaning. That's part of their philosophy and is sometimes similar to Buddhism in that rite. I their case, because they don't have a religion or a belief in God, it must by a philosophy from their "ism" that drives their political views.
And me, an Orthodox Jew? Well, the whole reason I was thinking about this was because I started taking a tally of what I believe and how it effects my political opinoins. I feel that I can not sponser something I don't believe in or agree with. I don't sponser murders of innocents, no matter who they are or where they are from. I am really upset about what's been going on in the news lately with all the beheadings. I'm really upset about the Iraqi prisoner abuse.
All of these are inhuman acts. They are against my religion and my whole philosophy. I am pro-life and tend to take a right of center stance on things (however, I'm known to go back and fourth. On most things I'm dead center). That's just a sampling of how my religion and my philosophy influences my politics. There's so much more!
So I think that religion and politics are not necissarily one in the same, however, I do think they are closely related, to say the least. What do you think?
Nick Berg, 6 IDF martyrs, and the Hatuel family - a connection?
05.12.04 (5:12 pm) [edit]
This came from =http://www.litopia.com/cgi-lo...Rabbi Brody's website. This is very interesting. I thought it more than appropriate to post it here. Please read ...
[line]
Is there a connection between the savage murder of [url=http://www.israelnationalnews...]Nick Berg[/url] in Iraq and the atrocious death of the [url=http://www.israelnationalnews...]six IDF soldiers[/url] in Gaza yesterday? Do both these nightmares have anything to do with Hamas henchmen pumping entire clips of AK47 shells into [url=http://www.israelnationalnews...]Tali Hatuel's and her four daughters'[/url] bodies at zero range, while filming the whole bloody massacre on video?
You'd better believe there's a connection - a spiritual one. Moshiach and redemption are fast on the way. Never in the history of the Jewish people has there been such a spiritual awakening, not only here in Israel, but in the USA and the Commonwealth as well. Thousands of people from all walks of life are rediscovering their roots. You know what that means? The growing light of genuine faith is chasing away the darkness of evil. According to Kabbala, the Satan can't stand that; he's fighting back with all his might, because his end is near.
The Satan has now donned the costume of radical Islam. The Satanic manifestations - whether known as Hamas, Hizbolla, Jihad Islami or whatever - have in the span of ten short days exhibited a measure of sadistic, cannabalistic brutality which would give even an Edgar Allen Poe or a Dracula sleepless nights. When I heard about the mob on the streets of Gaza playing soccer with the decapitated head of an Israeli soldier, my limbs felt like jelly, my mouth went dry, beads of sweat appeared on my forehead, and my throat was choaked with tears.
The Jewish people people have news for you, Mr. Satan - we're going to continue kicking your butt. The IDF, with G-d's help, will continue doing what it must do. In my humble opinion, Lt.-Gen. Moshe Yaalon is the best, most level-headed IDF Chief of Staff there ever was, and I'm sure - with Hashem's guidance - that he'll do what needs to be done. But, I'm not talking about the armed war; the spiritual war is what we're out to win.
If you're sitting in your office or living room - whether it be New York, LA, London, Toronto, or Melbourne - and you want to actively support Bugi Yaalon and the courageous boys on the front, all you have to do is to open up a Gemorra, Tehillim, or Chumash - whichever is your favorite spiritual ammo - and fire away. The Chofetz Chaim teaches that every word of Torah creates an angel from the good side. The better the Torah, the stronger the angel. Such angels are the spiritual power that will bring about the utter defeat of evil, soon, amen.
Hedonism-bot
05.11.04 (7:50 pm) [edit]
HAHA!
Now that's frikkin' great!
Abuse
05.11.04 (1:59 pm) [edit]
Check out this -- http://www.tblog.com/template... from Jbrookin's blog.
My sentament's exactly here, jbrook. That is just totally barbaric!
What those few soldiers did was also horrible and unexcusable. The difference here being, the U.S. recognizes that and is dealing with it properly. Beheading people, especially [i]innocent[/i] people(not even the ones who did that to those Iraqis) is just plain wrong!
Shavuot
05.11.04 (1:33 pm) [edit]
A. Shavuot (Weeks, pronounced shah-VOO-oat) is a Jewish holiday that simultaneously commemorates two things: the reaping of the spring wheat harvest and the Giving of the Torah. It is called Pentecost in English, and always falls on the sixth and seventh of the Hebrew month of Sivan.
B. Shavuot is the second of the Shloshah Regalim, or Three Pilgrimages, at which every Jewish male was required to present himself in the Beit Hamikdash, the Temple. Negative Mitzvah #325 (Leviticus 23:25) prohibits work on "Atzeret," the Torahs phrase for this holiday, during which all Shabbat prohibitions are in force with the exception of preparing food and carrying in public.
C. Shavuot also caps off the Counting of the Omer, the 49-day count between the second day of Passover and the bringing of the First Grain Offering, made of an omer (an ancient measure) of the first wheat flour from ones harvest. Though the Temple no longer stands, the omer must be counted even without the offering.
How do I celebrate Shavuot?
1. Study All Night
You've done that in college anyway, haven't you? Weve all had times when we stayed up to the wee hours of the morning, cramming for that exam or playing our favorite sci-fi shoot-em-up on that old PC. Now, how about doing it for Torah? That's just the idea of this age-old custom, in which Jews show their love for Torah by studying it from dark to dawn the first night of the holiday. The reason? The night before the Torah was given, our forefathers warmed their mattresses when they should have been sleepless with excitement over the next day's big event. To cosmically correct this, we stay up and study, preferably in large groups, and preferably at your local synagogue.
2. Package for You
Go to shul to pick it up. The physical Giving of the Torah was a one-time event. But every year, the Torah is spiritually given anew. To all Jews. To receive the Torah for yourself, head to your nearest synagogue to hear the Ten Commandments read. Don't forget to bring the kids.
3. Everything Goes with Cheese
When our ancestors received the Torah, they learned the kosher laws for the first time. Chief among those laws is the separation of meat and dairy foods and dishes, with separate sets of utensils for each. Upon learning this, they realized their pots and pans were "non-Kosher," as they had been used for meat and milk together, and thus could not use them to make dinner (or breakfast or lunch, for that matter) until they were "koshered," or ritually restored to kosher status. So, what to do? Make something milchig (Yiddish for dairy)! And that's just what they did, fashioning a makeshift meal out of cheese/dairy anything. And that's just what we've been doing on the first day of Shavuot ever since.
This year, Shavuot falls at sundown on May 25th and goes out at sundown on may 27th!
05.11.04 (1:09 pm) [edit]
[b]Tue May 11, 2004 03:04 PM ET
[i]By Nidal al-Mughrabi[/i][/b]
GAZA (Reuters) - Palestinian militants blew up six Israeli soldiers riding in an explosives-packed troop carrier during a raid in the Gaza Strip Tuesday in the deadliest ambush against Israeli forces in 18 months.
The armored vehicle was torn apart after troops and tanks backed by helicopter gunships stormed a teeming neighborhood of Gaza City in the early hours, killing eight Palestinians and wounding over 120 in battles that went on into Tuesday evening.
Senior Islamic Jihad political leader Khader Habib said militants were holding the soldiers' mangled body parts and would not release them until there was a total halt to Israeli raids and Israel opened talks on release of jailed fighters.
"We are not negotiating," General Moshe Yaalon, Israel's army chief of staff, said at Tel Aviv airport after cutting short a trip to Poland because of the Gaza deaths.
Soldiers searched house-to-house, and the army vowed to stay until the recovery of all the remains, some of which Palestinian militants flourished triumphantly in blood-spattered bags before local journalists brought to the scene.
After the lethal ambush, Israel fired a helicopter missile into another part of city. The Islamist group Hamas said its fighters had been targeted but escaped unhurt. Medics said an 18-year-old bystander was killed and five people were wounded.
The fresh cycle of violence followed a May 2 vote by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's rightist Likud party against his plan to pull out of Gaza, where 7,500 Jews live in settlements amid 1.2 million Palestinians on land taken in the 1967 Middle East war.
The army said it had struck at the "terrorist infrastructure" in Gaza behind a series of attacks, including the killing of a settler and her four daughters on May 2.
The troop carrier, loaded with explosives for demolishing suspected weapons workshops, ran over a powerful, improvised mine and was "blown to pieces," a senior military official said.
It erupted in a massive fireball that mushroomed above buildings in the Zeitoun district, a Hamas stronghold that lies north of the fortified Jewish settlement of Netzarim.
The strike was likely to drive a deeper wedge between Israeli hard-liners who say a Gaza withdrawal would be a "reward for Palestinian terror" and a majority of Israelis who see the fenced-in Strip as a costly liability that should be abandoned.
"We are fighting a cruel, inhuman enemy and we won't stop fighting it and hurting it no matter where it hides," Sharon said in a speech to parliament hours after the ambush.
COORDINATED AMBUSH
The troop carrier was torn apart as invading Israeli forces battled gunmen in Zeitoun. Hamas said its fighters ambushed the vehicle, stopping it with an anti-tank missile and then detonating bombs planted at the spot.
The blast sprayed body parts in all directions. A masked Hamas gunman displayed what he said were soldiers' remains in a blood-stained plastic bag as Palestinian onlookers shouted "Allahu akbar" (God is greatest).
Israeli General Dan Harel told a news briefing: "We are searching house-to-house, every roof, every balcony to find pieces of the personnel carrier and the bodies... Our commitment is to bring them to burial and when we succeed we will leave."
The International Committee of the Red Cross said it had agreed to the army's request to act as an intermediary.
Recovering the bodies of Israelis killed in violence is of utmost importance to the Jewish state on political and religious grounds. Israel swapped hundreds of Arab prisoners in January for an abducted businessman and the bodies of three soldiers.
Tuesday's ambush will remind many Israelis of the high cost of Gaza's small, exposed settlements. A new poll reaffirmed most Israelis were willing to cede the impoverished, coastal strip.
Sharon apparently wants to bloody militants as much as possible before any pullout to prevent them claiming victory.
"Every time we try to restore peace, (Israel) responds with military actions," Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie said.
Palestinians fear the underlying aim of Sharon's unilateral "disengagement plan" is to cement Israel's grip on larger West Bank settlements and so deprive them of a viable state envisaged by a tattered U.S.-backed "road map" plan.
President Bush angered Palestinians in April when he said Israel could expect to keep parts of the West Bank under any final peace deal. But Bush reaffirmed in a letter to Qurie this week that a "two-state solution" must be negotiated, a senior Palestinian official told Reuters Tuesday.
Tuesday's ambush was the deadliest against troops in Palestinian areas since November 2002, when nine soldiers and three settlers were killed in the West Bank city of Hebron.
[i]ฉ Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved.[/i]
[b]Tue May 11, 2004 03:04 PM ET
[i]By Nidal al-Mughrabi[/i][/b]
GAZA (Reuters) - Palestinian militants blew up six Israeli soldiers riding in an explosives-packed troop carrier during a raid in the Gaza Strip Tuesday in the deadliest ambush against Israeli forces in 18 months.
The armored vehicle was torn apart after troops and tanks backed by helicopter gunships stormed a teeming neighborhood of Gaza City in the early hours, killing eight Palestinians and wounding over 120 in battles that went on into Tuesday evening.
Senior Islamic Jihad political leader Khader Habib said militants were holding the soldiers' mangled body parts and would not release them until there was a total halt to Israeli raids and Israel opened talks on release of jailed fighters.
"We are not negotiating," General Moshe Yaalon, Israel's army chief of staff, said at Tel Aviv airport after cutting short a trip to Poland because of the Gaza deaths.
Soldiers searched house-to-house, and the army vowed to stay until the recovery of all the remains, some of which Palestinian militants flourished triumphantly in blood-spattered bags before local journalists brought to the scene.
After the lethal ambush, Israel fired a helicopter missile into another part of city. The Islamist group Hamas said its fighters had been targeted but escaped unhurt. Medics said an 18-year-old bystander was killed and five people were wounded.
The fresh cycle of violence followed a May 2 vote by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's rightist Likud party against his plan to pull out of Gaza, where 7,500 Jews live in settlements amid 1.2 million Palestinians on land taken in the 1967 Middle East war.
The army said it had struck at the "terrorist infrastructure" in Gaza behind a series of attacks, including the killing of a settler and her four daughters on May 2.
The troop carrier, loaded with explosives for demolishing suspected weapons workshops, ran over a powerful, improvised mine and was "blown to pieces," a senior military official said.
It erupted in a massive fireball that mushroomed above buildings in the Zeitoun district, a Hamas stronghold that lies north of the fortified Jewish settlement of Netzarim.
The strike was likely to drive a deeper wedge between Israeli hard-liners who say a Gaza withdrawal would be a "reward for Palestinian terror" and a majority of Israelis who see the fenced-in Strip as a costly liability that should be abandoned.
"We are fighting a cruel, inhuman enemy and we won't stop fighting it and hurting it no matter where it hides," Sharon said in a speech to parliament hours after the ambush.
COORDINATED AMBUSH
The troop carrier was torn apart as invading Israeli forces battled gunmen in Zeitoun. Hamas said its fighters ambushed the vehicle, stopping it with an anti-tank missile and then detonating bombs planted at the spot.
The blast sprayed body parts in all directions. A masked Hamas gunman displayed what he said were soldiers' remains in a blood-stained plastic bag as Palestinian onlookers shouted "Allahu akbar" (God is greatest).
Israeli General Dan Harel told a news briefing: "We are searching house-to-house, every roof, every balcony to find pieces of the personnel carrier and the bodies... Our commitment is to bring them to burial and when we succeed we will leave."
The International Committee of the Red Cross said it had agreed to the army's request to act as an intermediary.
Recovering the bodies of Israelis killed in violence is of utmost importance to the Jewish state on political and religious grounds. Israel swapped hundreds of Arab prisoners in January for an abducted businessman and the bodies of three soldiers.
Tuesday's ambush will remind many Israelis of the high cost of Gaza's small, exposed settlements. A new poll reaffirmed most Israelis were willing to cede the impoverished, coastal strip.
Sharon apparently wants to bloody militants as much as possible before any pullout to prevent them claiming victory.
"Every time we try to restore peace, (Israel) responds with military actions," Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie said.
Palestinians fear the underlying aim of Sharon's unilateral "disengagement plan" is to cement Israel's grip on larger West Bank settlements and so deprive them of a viable state envisaged by a tattered U.S.-backed "road map" plan.
President Bush angered Palestinians in April when he said Israel could expect to keep parts of the West Bank under any final peace deal. But Bush reaffirmed in a letter to Qurie this week that a "two-state solution" must be negotiated, a senior Palestinian official told Reuters Tuesday.
Tuesday's ambush was the deadliest against troops in Palestinian areas since November 2002, when nine soldiers and three settlers were killed in the West Bank city of Hebron.
[i]ฉ Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved.[/i]
05.11.04 (12:57 pm) [edit]
You know, I don't see Israel threatoning to Nuke anyone.
[line]
[b][i]By Associated Press[/i]
Originally published May 11, 2004, 8:36 AM EDT[/b]
TEHRAN, Iran -- Iran's top nuclear negotiator warned Israel on Tuesday that his country would retaliate if the Jewish state were to attack Iranian nuclear facilities.
Israel and the United States suspect Iran is secretly building nuclear weapons under cover of a nuclear energy program. In the past, Israel has said it would not allow Iran to build a nuclear bomb.
In 1981, Israeli fighter-bombers destroyed a nuclear reactor that was under construction outside Baghdad because it feared Iraq would acquire a nuclear weapon.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said last month Iran was a threat to Israel, "maybe the main existential threat."
In an interview with state television, Iran's chief negotiator on nuclear affairs, Hasan Rowhani, warned that an Israeli attack would have severe consequences.
"Israel knows our hands are well equipped," Rowhani said. "If such an incident happens, it will meet a resolute response from our side."
Rowhani did not explain what he meant by saying Iran was "well equipped," but Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani said in December that Iran would strike back with long-range missiles if Israel were to attack its nuclear facilities.
Shamkhani said Iran's Shahab-3 missile, which has a range of about 810 miles, would be one of the weapons used. Israel is about 600 miles west of Iran.
Suspicion of Israel and its agents is pervasive in Iran. On Saturday, Iran's armed forces closed the new Imam Khomeini International Airport on its first day of scheduled flights. Citing security concerns, the armed forces spoke of possible links between Israel and a Turkish company that has a contract to operate the airport. The Turkish company rejected the allegation.
Turkey has military links with Israel.
Iran is building its first nuclear reactor, which is expected to come on stream next year. It has been criticized by the International Atomic Energy Agency for failing to disclose certain aspects of its nuclear program. Iran has promised to cooperate fully with IAEA inspectors and insists its program is for peaceful purposes.
[i]Copyright ฉ 2004, The Associated Press[/i]
You know, I don't see Israel threatoning to Nuke anyone.
[line]
[b][i]By Associated Press[/i]
Originally published May 11, 2004, 8:36 AM EDT[/b]
TEHRAN, Iran -- Iran's top nuclear negotiator warned Israel on Tuesday that his country would retaliate if the Jewish state were to attack Iranian nuclear facilities.
Israel and the United States suspect Iran is secretly building nuclear weapons under cover of a nuclear energy program. In the past, Israel has said it would not allow Iran to build a nuclear bomb.
In 1981, Israeli fighter-bombers destroyed a nuclear reactor that was under construction outside Baghdad because it feared Iraq would acquire a nuclear weapon.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said last month Iran was a threat to Israel, "maybe the main existential threat."
In an interview with state television, Iran's chief negotiator on nuclear affairs, Hasan Rowhani, warned that an Israeli attack would have severe consequences.
"Israel knows our hands are well equipped," Rowhani said. "If such an incident happens, it will meet a resolute response from our side."
Rowhani did not explain what he meant by saying Iran was "well equipped," but Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani said in December that Iran would strike back with long-range missiles if Israel were to attack its nuclear facilities.
Shamkhani said Iran's Shahab-3 missile, which has a range of about 810 miles, would be one of the weapons used. Israel is about 600 miles west of Iran.
Suspicion of Israel and its agents is pervasive in Iran. On Saturday, Iran's armed forces closed the new Imam Khomeini International Airport on its first day of scheduled flights. Citing security concerns, the armed forces spoke of possible links between Israel and a Turkish company that has a contract to operate the airport. The Turkish company rejected the allegation.
Turkey has military links with Israel.
Iran is building its first nuclear reactor, which is expected to come on stream next year. It has been criticized by the International Atomic Energy Agency for failing to disclose certain aspects of its nuclear program. Iran has promised to cooperate fully with IAEA inspectors and insists its program is for peaceful purposes.
[i]Copyright ฉ 2004, The Associated Press[/i]
Update: My Letter Was Published
05.10.04 (6:23 pm) [edit]
You may remember the letter I wrote to the campus newspaper (If ya don't, here's the link to my posting of it here -- http://www.tblog.com/template... ). I recieved a response from the editor asking me for my last name so that they could print it (check this out, if you missed that too -- http://www.tblog.com/template... ).
Today, I picked up a copy of the campus paper. My letter was printed. However, I'm a bit miphed because they really shortened it and took out a lot of what I said as well as changed some wording around. There really was no reason for that, other than perhaps they needed space. I sort of find that irresponsible and against honesty in reporthing on the part of the editors, but it's no big deal. After all, it's a college newspaper and the minds we're talking about aren't as sharp as most real papers and other media outlets. And I did write to them because they weren't honest in their origional article. I guess it's kind of ironic. It's alright though. They were able to keep the basic message of the letter so I am glad for that. Our voices must be heard and media bias musn't be allowed to continue. In my prodominantly Muslim school, I feel this is a victory.
Here's a scan of the letter, as published in the campus newspaper:
Hazak hazak vetishazek!
Who Needs Organized Religion?
05.10.04 (4:18 pm) [edit]
[i][b]by Tamar Frankiel[/b][/i]
Surely we dont. After all, were the descendants of Abraham, the man who sought G-d on his own, who listened to the personal call of G-d to leave his home and birthplace. He left behind the organized religion of Mesopotamia and never founded one of his own. Dont the prophets rail at the dulling effects of organized religion?
Judaism has always been among the least organized religions, and one could argue that its for the best. We can follow most of the mitzvot as individuals or families in the privacy of our own homes. To have a full prayer service, we only need a quorum of ten. And if we want to learn, we can simply sit down with someone more learned than ourselves. This is barely organized religion. Why do we need big synagogues with their committees and lecture series? The best argument for organization is probably to educate the children, but even that could be handled on a small scale.
When we complain about organized religion, its because we recognize that it can easily become empty. The great Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik wrote of this tendency in his famous book, The Lonely Man of Faith. Our religious communities often become what he calls the majestic community, projects of humanity in the creative aspect of mastering the world. Religion becomes a way of creating pleasure and satisfaction, rising above mere animal survival by providing comfort and happiness.
But there is often something missinga sense of meeting heart to heart in what Rabbi Soloveitchik called the covenantal community. In the covenantal community, we reveal ourselves to one another in our deepest essence; we see each others unique truth. This can be hard to find in many of our religious organizations, where we readily become preoccupied with mastering disorder and maintaining the organization itself. Then, when our synagogues are missing that special quality, were tempted to bail out and search for true and deep relationships elsewhere, often just in the friendships life brings us.
This doesnt solve the problem, however, because there is another answer to the question, Who needs organized religion?
G-d does. G-d is in need of man. G-d asks us to change the world. If we want personal religion, we can have it in our own homes. But we are also called to transform the world at large. We may personally prefer to travel the more intimate road of Abraham and his companions. But G-d also wants us to remember King David and his son Solomon, who built a Temple whose light shone out into the world.
We find our personal nourishment in the divinely-guided relationships we form, inside or outside of synagogues. Our sources of inspiration can be our spouses or our best friends, our chavura or our monthly luncheon, our rabbi or our dentist. But wherever the inspiration comes from, we must take that energy and put it to use for the communitythe covenantal community working within the majestic community. Judaism insists that ultimately there is no separation between the personal and the public realm. G-ds will is manifest in both.
We may feel differently about these two levels of community and relate to them differently. That is because we suffer from a sense of separation between soul and body, the internal and external. Our challenge is to overcome that separation and make the majestic community reflect more fully the integrity of the intimate covenantal community.
Fusing these two worlds requires some sacrifice. It may mean wading through bureaucracy and putting up with people who are not on the same spiritual wavelength. Each day, we have to patiently reimagine the community we ultimately want to create so that it expresses more light and loving kindness than when we began. This sacrificial action is the nature of giving to G-d. In this mode, we dont go to synagogue to receive, but to give.
When we do this, another truth appears: religious organizations are where were more likely to find what Kabbalah calls our Companions, those who travel the same spiritual pathways as we do. Yes, there are people in synagogues who are there for extraneous reasonsbecause their kids are in Hebrew school or because they feel obligations to their parents faith. But even those reasons are a thread of connection, a sign of wanting to be in the covenantal community that stretches across the generations.
And most people are there for much deeper reasons. They are searching too. We may find, when we begin to reveal ourselves more deeply, that a new Companion is sitting next to us at one of those unending committee meetings.
So before you cancel your membership, look at your relationship with organized religion. Sometimes you may find that it is truly not responsive, and you may have to seek elsewhere. But you may also find another way, and other people right where you are, to help you transform your local organized religion into a living religious organisma radiant center of vitality, joy, and hope.
http://www.askmoses.com" title="http://www.askmoses.com" target="_blank"http://www.askmoses.com
05.10.04 (3:33 pm) [edit]
It's about time.
[line]
[i][b]By ASSOCIATED PRESS[/i]
WASHINGTON[/b]
US President George W. Bush this week will levy economic sanctions against Syria for supporting terrorism and not doing enough to prevent militant fighters from entering neighboring Iraq, congressional and administration sources said Monday.
The sanctions, which the White House will impose as early as Tuesday, are being ordered because the administration believes Syria has aggravated tensions in the Middle East by supporting militant groups.
The United States is ordering the sanctions "because they will not fight terror and they won't join us in fighting terror," Bush said in an interview last week with the Cairo-based newspaper Al-Ahram International.
"We've asked them to do some things and they haven't responded," Bush said. "And Congress passed a law saying that if Syria will not join - for example, booting out a Hezbollah office out of Damascus - that the president has the right to put sanctions on."
Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk al-Sharaa said Monday that there is a "unanimous Arab decision" to condemn the sanctions.
Al-Sharaa, speaking after a meeting of Arab ministers in Cairo, Egypt, said US allegations that his country is not cooperating in the fight against terrorism are "unfounded" since his country has agreed with other Arab countries on the need to combat terrorism.
Syria Accountability Act requires Bush to sanctions
Bush signed the Syria Accountability Act in December, one month after Congress overwhelmingly approved it. It bars US exports to Syria of dual-use items that could have military applications. It also requires Bush to choose at least two of six possible economic or diplomatic sanctions.
Congressional sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they have been told the administration plans to choose three sanctions. One would bar Syrian planes from flying over or landing in the United States. Another would prohibit new investments by US oil companies in Syria.
It was not clear whether other US business operations in Syria would also be prohibited. Bilateral trade with Syria is about $300 million a year.
One source said the third penalty would be a ban on US exports to Syria, other than food and medicine.
Syria provided the United States with intelligence on al-Qaida after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Though some US officials have played down the importance of that, the cooperation probably discouraged the administration from imposing sanctions that would have reduced diplomatic contacts.
Syria has been on the State Department's list of terror-sponsoring nations for its support of groups like Hamas and Hizbullah. US officials have also said that Syria hasn't done enough to prevent anti-American fighters and arms from crossing its border with Iraq.
It's about time.
[line]
[i][b]By ASSOCIATED PRESS[/i]
WASHINGTON[/b]
US President George W. Bush this week will levy economic sanctions against Syria for supporting terrorism and not doing enough to prevent militant fighters from entering neighboring Iraq, congressional and administration sources said Monday.
The sanctions, which the White House will impose as early as Tuesday, are being ordered because the administration believes Syria has aggravated tensions in the Middle East by supporting militant groups.
The United States is ordering the sanctions "because they will not fight terror and they won't join us in fighting terror," Bush said in an interview last week with the Cairo-based newspaper Al-Ahram International.
"We've asked them to do some things and they haven't responded," Bush said. "And Congress passed a law saying that if Syria will not join - for example, booting out a Hezbollah office out of Damascus - that the president has the right to put sanctions on."
Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk al-Sharaa said Monday that there is a "unanimous Arab decision" to condemn the sanctions.
Al-Sharaa, speaking after a meeting of Arab ministers in Cairo, Egypt, said US allegations that his country is not cooperating in the fight against terrorism are "unfounded" since his country has agreed with other Arab countries on the need to combat terrorism.
Syria Accountability Act requires Bush to sanctions
Bush signed the Syria Accountability Act in December, one month after Congress overwhelmingly approved it. It bars US exports to Syria of dual-use items that could have military applications. It also requires Bush to choose at least two of six possible economic or diplomatic sanctions.
Congressional sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they have been told the administration plans to choose three sanctions. One would bar Syrian planes from flying over or landing in the United States. Another would prohibit new investments by US oil companies in Syria.
It was not clear whether other US business operations in Syria would also be prohibited. Bilateral trade with Syria is about $300 million a year.
One source said the third penalty would be a ban on US exports to Syria, other than food and medicine.
Syria provided the United States with intelligence on al-Qaida after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Though some US officials have played down the importance of that, the cooperation probably discouraged the administration from imposing sanctions that would have reduced diplomatic contacts.
Syria has been on the State Department's list of terror-sponsoring nations for its support of groups like Hamas and Hizbullah. US officials have also said that Syria hasn't done enough to prevent anti-American fighters and arms from crossing its border with Iraq.
A Photo-Diary of a Current Event
05.10.04 (2:44 pm) [edit]
In constance with the previous post below, I'd just like to show everyone some more pictures of the shooting that happened at a funeral for fallen victims of terror. You may remember a story about a pregnant woman and her daughters who were brutally murdered and filmed by their murderers as they bled to death in their car? Well, their memorial service was held and Palestinian gunmen saught to finnish the job on their loved ones. Here's some more actual photos from what happened:
[i][b]A Jewish settler runs with his child for safety as others take cover behind cars during an attack by Palestinian gunmen during a memorial service on the Kissufim Road into the Gush Katif settlement block in the Gaza Strip May 9, 2004. Settlers gathered for the memorial service for Tali Hatuel and her four children who were killed at this spot by Palestinian gunmen last week. REUTERS/Gadi Kabalo
Reuters - May 09 1:46 PM[/b][/i]
[i][b]A Jewish settler takes cover during an attack by Palestinian gunmen during a memorial service, on the Kissufim Road into the Gush Katif settlement block in the Gaza Strip , May 9, 2004. Israeli soldiers on Sunday killed two Palestinian gunmen disguised as women who opened fire at Jewish settlers attending a memorial for a family gunned down on a Gaza Strip road last week, security sources said. REUTERS/Gadi Kabalo
Reuters - 23 hours, 34 minutes ago[/b][/i]
[i][b]An Israeli settler protects his daughter during an attack by Palestinian militants on the road linking the Gush Katif settlement block in the Gaza Strip with the Kitsufim crossing between Israel and the Gaza Strip Sunday May 9, 2004. Palestinian militants fired on a group of settlers holding a memorial ceremony at the spot where a pregnant woman and her four young daughters were killed by militants last week. Settlers armed with assault rifles and soldiers returned fire, the army said. Writing in the background reads, in Hebrew, 'Rooting Out Settlements,' at right in blue, and 'Victory For Terror,' at left in red. (AP Photo/Edi Israel)
AP - 23 hours, 35 minutes ago[/b][/i]
[i][b]Jewish settlers take cover as one of them holds his machine gun during an attack by Palestinian militants on the road linking the Gush Katif settlement block in the Gaza Strip with the Kitsufim crossing between Israel and the Gaza Strip Sunday May 9, 2004. Palestinian militants fired on a group of settlers holding a memorial ceremony at the spot where a pregnant woman and her four young daughters were killed by militants last week. Settlers armed with assault rifles and soldiers returned fire, the armysaid. Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the shooting. The Isreali army killed two of the attackers, the Isreali military said. (AP Photo/Edi Israel)
AP - May 09 1:55 PM[/b][/i]
It's amazing the theropy these people are going to need, to say the least.
05.10.04 (2:18 pm) [edit]
So someone's going to tell me that they shouldn't have shot back at these gunmen who were firing on innocents at a FUNERAL for someone else who was killed by similar likes? What if your loved one died and someone wanted to kill you as you mourned at their funeral? Unacceptable.
[line]
![]()
=http://img19.photobucket.com/...
[i][b]A Jewish settler runs with his child for safety as others take cover behind cars, during an attack by Palestinian gunmen, during a memorial service on the Kissufim Road into the Gush Katif settlement block, in the Gaza Strip, May 9, 2004. Israeli soldiers on Sunday killed two Palestinian gunmen disguised as women who opened fire at Jewish settlers attending a memorial for a family gunned down on a Gaza Strip road last week, security sources said. REUTERS/Gadi Kabalo [/b][/i]
http://townsvillebulletin .news.com.au/common/story_page/0" title="http://townsvillebulletin .news.com.au/common/story_page/0" target="_blank"http://townsvillebulletin .new...,7034,9522608%255E401,00.html
PARENTS used their bodies to shelter terrified children yesterday as Palestinian gunmen opened fire on Jewish settlers attending a memorial service.
The memorial was for a pregnant woman and her four children, shot down at close range on Sunday on a Gaza Strip road.
TV cameras captured dramatic footage of settlers running for cover as bullets whizzed by.
Israeli forces returned fire, killing the two gunmen, who were disguised as women.
An army spokeswoman said so far the body of one gunman, "dressed in women's clothes", had been recovered.
No Israelis were hurt in the attack, which was claimed by the militant Islamic Jihad.
At the height of the incident, footage showed settlers ducking for cover next to their cars or lying flat on the ground.
Some ran under fire to an armoured bus.
The incident occurred on the same section of road leading to the Gush Katif Jewish settlement bloc where last Sunday's killing took place.
Sunday's attack contributed to the landslide defeat of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Gaza withdrawal plan.
Mr Sharon's Likud Party heard about the family being killed as they were voting on the plan.
The Prime Minister yesterday announced he was cancelling a trip to Washington to give him time to present a new version of the plan to ministers by the end of the month.
Mr Sharon was expected in Washington on May 14-15 to speak at a meeting of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPIC), which is traditionally attended by the US president.
President George W. Bush controversially endorsed the withdrawal plan during Mr Sharon's visit to the White House last month.
So someone's going to tell me that they shouldn't have shot back at these gunmen who were firing on innocents at a FUNERAL for someone else who was killed by similar likes? What if your loved one died and someone wanted to kill you as you mourned at their funeral? Unacceptable.
[line]
[i][b]A Jewish settler runs with his child for safety as others take cover behind cars, during an attack by Palestinian gunmen, during a memorial service on the Kissufim Road into the Gush Katif settlement block, in the Gaza Strip, May 9, 2004. Israeli soldiers on Sunday killed two Palestinian gunmen disguised as women who opened fire at Jewish settlers attending a memorial for a family gunned down on a Gaza Strip road last week, security sources said. REUTERS/Gadi Kabalo [/b][/i]
http://townsvillebulletin .news.com.au/common/story_page/0" title="http://townsvillebulletin .news.com.au/common/story_page/0" target="_blank"http://townsvillebulletin .new...,7034,9522608%255E401,00.html
PARENTS used their bodies to shelter terrified children yesterday as Palestinian gunmen opened fire on Jewish settlers attending a memorial service.
The memorial was for a pregnant woman and her four children, shot down at close range on Sunday on a Gaza Strip road.
TV cameras captured dramatic footage of settlers running for cover as bullets whizzed by.
Israeli forces returned fire, killing the two gunmen, who were disguised as women.
An army spokeswoman said so far the body of one gunman, "dressed in women's clothes", had been recovered.
No Israelis were hurt in the attack, which was claimed by the militant Islamic Jihad.
At the height of the incident, footage showed settlers ducking for cover next to their cars or lying flat on the ground.
Some ran under fire to an armoured bus.
The incident occurred on the same section of road leading to the Gush Katif Jewish settlement bloc where last Sunday's killing took place.
Sunday's attack contributed to the landslide defeat of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Gaza withdrawal plan.
Mr Sharon's Likud Party heard about the family being killed as they were voting on the plan.
The Prime Minister yesterday announced he was cancelling a trip to Washington to give him time to present a new version of the plan to ministers by the end of the month.
Mr Sharon was expected in Washington on May 14-15 to speak at a meeting of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPIC), which is traditionally attended by the US president.
President George W. Bush controversially endorsed the withdrawal plan during Mr Sharon's visit to the White House last month.
05.09.04 (1:11 pm) [edit]
They came to my town a few weeks ago.
[line]
[b]Fri May 7, 2:28 PM ET
[i]KRIS MCCUSKER [/b][/i]
TORONTO (CP) - A group of about 100 Toronto Jewish school children heard first-hand accounts Friday from survivors of terrorism in Israel in an effort to spread peace.
The message was delivered by One Family, Israel Emergency Solidarity Fund, which help survivors of terrorism rebuild their lives. "They told us about the terrorism and I think it's very wrong because Jews are the kind of people that just want to be left alone," said Sean Yakubowicz, 13, one of the students at USDS Jewish Day School who listened to the presentations.
Yakubowicz, who has relatives in Israel, said he feels for the Jewish population there and wonders why the attacks continue.
"We should live peacefully," he said.
The organization was founded in September 2001 as a grassroots effort in response to the ongoing tragedies affecting families and children in Israel. Since then, it has distributed more than $7.5 million in various forms of financial, emotional, psychological and assistance.
One survivor of terrorism who spoke to the Grade 6, 7 and 8 students, was Sigal Naveh, 26.
She was injured in a suicide bombing at a shopping mall in Israel in May 2003 and spent about a month in hospital recovering from her injuries.
"We have a lot of power to stay in Israel, to live in Israel. This is our country, this is your country," Naveh told the students as a part of delegation to spread the word about One Family.
"We are inviting you to come to Israel. It's not so bad like you see on the BBC and in the news," she added. Pam Albert, the executive director of the Canadian chapter of One Family, said speaking to young people in a forum like this one is important.
"They really raise awareness of how we need to come together as a country and help victims, I think not only in Israel but all over the world," Albert said.
"If we would all join together in our countries around the world in peace, it could be, I think, that peace grows. It has a synergistic effect. So, anger and hate can grow and so can peace," she added.
The organization offers several different programs including an orphan's fund, post-attack response centres, family healing retreats, workshops and a big brother and big sister project.
They came to my town a few weeks ago.
[line]
[b]Fri May 7, 2:28 PM ET
[i]KRIS MCCUSKER [/b][/i]
TORONTO (CP) - A group of about 100 Toronto Jewish school children heard first-hand accounts Friday from survivors of terrorism in Israel in an effort to spread peace.
The message was delivered by One Family, Israel Emergency Solidarity Fund, which help survivors of terrorism rebuild their lives. "They told us about the terrorism and I think it's very wrong because Jews are the kind of people that just want to be left alone," said Sean Yakubowicz, 13, one of the students at USDS Jewish Day School who listened to the presentations.
Yakubowicz, who has relatives in Israel, said he feels for the Jewish population there and wonders why the attacks continue.
"We should live peacefully," he said.
The organization was founded in September 2001 as a grassroots effort in response to the ongoing tragedies affecting families and children in Israel. Since then, it has distributed more than $7.5 million in various forms of financial, emotional, psychological and assistance.
One survivor of terrorism who spoke to the Grade 6, 7 and 8 students, was Sigal Naveh, 26.
She was injured in a suicide bombing at a shopping mall in Israel in May 2003 and spent about a month in hospital recovering from her injuries.
"We have a lot of power to stay in Israel, to live in Israel. This is our country, this is your country," Naveh told the students as a part of delegation to spread the word about One Family.
"We are inviting you to come to Israel. It's not so bad like you see on the BBC and in the news," she added. Pam Albert, the executive director of the Canadian chapter of One Family, said speaking to young people in a forum like this one is important.
"They really raise awareness of how we need to come together as a country and help victims, I think not only in Israel but all over the world," Albert said.
"If we would all join together in our countries around the world in peace, it could be, I think, that peace grows. It has a synergistic effect. So, anger and hate can grow and so can peace," she added.
The organization offers several different programs including an orphan's fund, post-attack response centres, family healing retreats, workshops and a big brother and big sister project.
GOLD!
05.08.04 (11:19 pm) [edit]
[url=http://lefty201.tblog.com]Lefty201[/url] sent me a great website:
[url=http://www.nicedoggie.net/]The Anti-Idolitarian Rottweiler.[/url]
I'm just in awe of how funny and awesome this site is. I encourage everyone to head over there and to check out lefty201's blog! :) Here's some gold for you ( http://WWW.nicedoggie.net/mt/... ):
[line]
[b]August 18, 2003
Memo From the TrollHunter General:
As posted by the TrollHunter General himself, Nekama, over at LGF.[/b]
We would like to take this opportunity to thank the TrollHunter General and, with his blessing, adopt this creation of his (slightly edited to fit this place):
MEMO
This is an automated reply from the Bullshit Detector at The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler. Your recent post contained troll-like characteristics which resembles the type of message sent by spoiled ISM members on summer holiday, college students who have recently inhaled Noam Chomskys foul rantings, Adam Shapiro wannabes, Nazi sympathizers, or genuine Koranimals.
In order to prevent another thread being hijacked, and to send your message to the appropriate department for response (FOAD, GAZE, Go Away Gordon, or The Bus To Rachel Corries Tomb Is Leaving - Be Sure Youre Under It), kindly reply to the following questions:
1. Are you aware that the Disputed Territories never belonged to the Palestinians and only came into Israeli possession as a result of the 1967 six day war in which Egypt, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon all massed forces at Israels border in order to push the Jews into the sea. The Arabs lost and Israel took control of the land. Do you agree that if the Koranimals dont want to lose territory to Israel, then they shouldnt start wars? Do you agree that there is justice that Israel, who as far back as 1948 has always sought peace with her far larger neighbors, should live in prosperity - making the desert bloom - while the residents of 19 adjacent Arab countries who are blessed with far more land as well as oil wealth live in their own feces?
2. Did you know that the Palestinians could have had their own country as far back as 1948 had they accepted the UN sponsored partition plan which gave Israel AND the Palestinians a countries of their own on land which Jews had lived on for thousands of years before Mohammed ever had a wet dream about virgins? The Arabs rejected the UN offer and went to war with the infant Israeli nation. The Arabs lost and have been whining about it ever since. Do you agree this is like a murderer who kills his parents and asks for special treatment since he is now an orphan?
3. Can you tell us ANY Arab country which offers Jews the right to be citizens, vote, own property, businesses, be a part of the government or have ANY of the rights which Israeli Arabs enjoy? Any Arab country which gives those rights to Christians? How about to other Arabs? Wouldnt you just LOVE to be a citizen of Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Iran, or Syria?
4. Since as many Jews (approximately 850,000) were kicked out of Arab countries as were Arabs who left present day Israel (despite being literally begged to stay), why should Arabs be permitted to return to Israel if Jews arent allowed to set foot in Arab countries? Can you explain why Arabs can worship freely in Israel but Jews would certainly be hung from street lamps after having their intestines devoured by an Arab mob if they so much as entered an Arab country?
5. Israel resettled and absorbed all of the Jews from Arab countries who wished to become Israelis. Why havent any Arab countries offered to resettle Arabs who were displaced from Israel, leaving them to rot for 60 years in squalid refugee camps? And why are those refugee camps still there? Could it be that the billions of dollars that the UNWRA has sent there goes to terrorist groups like Hamas, Islamic Jihad, El Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, or Hezbollah? How did Yassir Arafat achieve his $300 million in wealth? Why arent these funds distributed for humanitarian use?
6. Did you know that the Arabs in the disputed territories (conquered by Israel in the 1967 war which was started by Arabs) and who are not Israelis already have two countries right now? And that they are called Egypt and Jordan?
7. If your complaint is about the security fence which Israel is finally building in the Disputed Territories, are you aware that it is built solely to keep the brave Arab terrorists out so that they can no longer self detonate on busses, in dining halls or pizzerias and kill Jewish grandmothers and schoolchildren? Why are the Arabs so brave when they target unarmed civilians but even when they outnumber their opponents they get their sandy asses kicked all the way to Mecca when they are faced with Jewish soldiers? Why do Arab soldiers make the French look like super heroes?
8.Please explain why you are so concerned about Arabs, who possess 99% of the land in this region and are in control of the worlds greatest natural resource, which literally flows out of the ground? Cant their brother muslims offer some of the surplus land and natures riches to the Palestinians? Or is it true that Arabs are willing to die right down to the last Palestinian?
9. Why do you not exhibit the same level of concern for say, people in Saudi Arabia who are beheaded, subject to amputation, stoning, honor killing etc.? What about women who are denied any semblance of basic civil rights, including the right not to be treated as property for the entertainment and abuse of her father, brothers, or husbands? What about the Muslims in Sudan and Egypt who are still enslaved, or the women there whose genitalia are barbarically cut off? How about the oppression of Shiites by Sunnis, the gassing of the Kurds by Iraq, or the massacre of Palestinians by Jordan (Black September)? Why doesnt this concern you?
10. Did you ever stop to wonder how much better off everyone in the region would be if Arabs stopped trying to kill Jews and destroy Israel? What would happen if the Israelis gave up their weapons and disarmed? Would they live to see the next day? But what would happen if the Arabs completely disarmed? You know the answer: They would all be AT PEACE! And if there is no war to rile them up, the Arabs would be forced to look at their own repressive, pre-medieval societies. Why would they want to do that when there are Jews to kill?
11. Have you heard People who define themselves primarily by what they hate, rather than who they love, are doomed to failure and misery? Can you see the parallels to the Arabs, who are blessed with land and oil, but still gladly train their children to kill themselves in order to kill Jews? Have you heard Golda Meirs words to the effect of There will be peace when the Arabs love their children more than they hate ours? Why do the Arabs hate so much?
Please state your answers to the questions listed above. If you need assistance or require additional study, then please refer to the following links:
History of the Middle East Conflict:
Thousands of women killed for honor:
Muslims lament Israels existence:
Disputed Territories Forgotten Facts
The size of Israel compared to neighboring countries in the region
Jews expelled from Arab Countries
One Million Jews flee Arab countries why no right of return for them?
Middle East Facts
Middle East Truth
Larry Miller on Hypocrisy
Please respond to the items listed above. Based on your answers a thoughtful reply or instruction to FOAD will be provided.
Thank you for writing to the Empire.
Signed,
Imperial Troll Hunter General Nekama,
Troll Early Warning Detection Team
Why Fake Media?
05.08.04 (10:27 pm) [edit]
People often tend to think of Al Jazeera, otherwise known as Jihad TV, as an actual and factual source of information. Recently, I was musing this and wondering exactly why this might be. I mean, the common person is easily fooled by this fake media outlet, as they sometimes are with the Daily Show, into thinking of it as real news (note: The Daily Show is more realistic than Al Jazeera).
So why is this? I mean, Al Jazeera's reports are easy to see through and highly opinionated, often displaying outright bias against anything having to do with the US or Israel or anyone that "ain't so popular" in the Arab world. Just recently, Al Jazeera blamed [i]Israel[/i] for U.S. troop's abuse of Iraqi's -- http://english.aljazeera.net/... (cut to Jon Stewart: "Wha HUH!?")!!! How can anyone of slightly higher intelligence than a turnip be actually duped into believing that Jihad TV is a media force of complete and reliable fact?
I narrowed it down to a few of theories:
[u][b]1. Appearance[/b][/u]: Like the Daily Show, which is often confusing to the common westerner (and even some French -- hey, they like Jerry Louis, need I say more...), Al Jazeera has [i]neat-o[/i] graphics! They have nice news tickers, written in Arabic, that jet accross at the bottom of the screen (I wonder if it really says "HAHA westerners! We fooled you!" over and over again). It bares a striking resemblence to many western news media stations. Basically, it hijacks the western news media's reputation for being semi-objective and truthworthy by mimicing the appearance, which demands attention and encourages the viewer to stay tuned at attention.
[u][b]2. Conditioning[/b][/u]: The average westerner is public highschool educated. In public highschool, they have student bulletins. It's sort of a Pavlovian effect, in that, during the student bulletins in highschool, the entire school is conditioned to listen and stay quiet for those few moments that the bulletins are read. This conditions the western attention span to assume, automatically, to pay attention to small, easily digestible tidbits of information. For example: "Billy McDoogle would like to say that his opponent, Don Kent, may have better posters, but Billy is a more reliable vote for Class President." Contrast that with: "Israelis better at manipulating media" ([url=http://english.aljazeera.net/...]Source[/url] ).
[u][b]3. Self Hatred/Hatred of the West[/b][/u]: It has come to be a fad, at least in the states, to hate one's own country and, in turn, apologize to everyone who's not an American for everything that America does that's bad (while leaving out what America does that's good). It's a guilt thing. Why they feel guilty on a personal level, I duno? I guess it's trendy. However, that's much like Al Jazeera. Except they don't apologize for what they do, but rather, talk about everything America does that sucks (and let's not forget Israel too!). This kind of resonates as a kindred thing with self-hating Americans, in that, now they have someone to tell them what they need to apologize for (even if it's made up). Outside of the U.S., it's just a fad to hate the U.S., so Al Jazeera really helps most non-Americans in hating us. Al Jazeera's a real tool, in that respect (and many others).
[u][b]4. Blindness and refusal to examine things logically[/b][/u]: Lots of people, accross out globe, refuse to stop and think about things, especially when it comes to questioning something that they don't really feel like questioning. They'll go on and on to tell you that you should always question your sources, but they forget to mention that you should question even the ones you agree with! That serves under a catagory of ignorace, I suppose. And when we have ignorance, we have mobs. That's exactly what I see some of the mantalities of people being. [i]"Grab your tourches and pitchforkes! We're going to git 'em!"[/i] People hear something and they decide that, because they agree with it, they don't want to question it and instead go off the deep end in believing it.
[u][b]5. Straight from the source![/b][/u]: "It origionates from the Arab world, duh, so it must be true!" People often confuse the fact that Al Jazeera is run by people in the Middle East and the fact that when something comes from straight from the horses' mouth (or in this case, the camel's tush), it's probably less tainted. That is silly. When something comes from the source, this scenario flies better when non-biased individuals report on it. However, in the Arab world (that's pretty much the whole Middle East, with the exception of Israel; it's not Arab), there is racism, poor schooling, superstition, and blind hatred. Much of this is part of what clouds Jihad TV's objectivity. They just hate the west so much, or have been perpetually taught to believe they should hate them, that they'll automatically report on things poorly. They've got some malice against, so they have a clouded view of, reality. Which is why we get so confused, as westerners, when we see a report by them. If something is supposed to be more accurate when it comes from the source, why would Al Jazeera be tainted? Therefore, anything they say must be true! Well, if that were the case, then, logically speaking, there'd be no such thing as fake media anywhere.
And we all know the answer to that.
[line]
note: If you don't like satire, you shouldn't have read this.
D'var Torah for Emor (Leviticus 21:1-24:23)
05.07.04 (11:42 am) [edit]
Parshat Emor's very first Passuk (verse) says (21:1) "Hashem said to Moshe: Speak to the Kohanim, the sons of Aaron, and tell them: Each of you shall not contaminate himself to a dead person."
*Firstly, why does it use double wording that Moshe should "say" AND then "tell" the Kohanim?
*Secondly, why is it so important that they not contaminate themselves by touching the dead?
Sages explain the double language to include a warning for parents to teach their children the importance of Mitzvot (commandments) in general, and this one specifically.
Still, what's the significance of the warning?
Rabbi Yochanan Zweig explains our Passuk beautifully by pointing out the grammar being used: The Torah didn't say that parents should just "tell" their children of the commandment, but rather that they should also "speak" to them of it. The difference is that telling someone to do something imposes the speaker's will on them, while speaking to him or her about it shows them that it's for their good, and that the speaker is together with them.
Rather than saying, "Do as I say", the parent says, "Do as I do", which is much more effective. In our case, the Torah "tells" us the facts, that a dead person contaminates those who touch it, and the reason behind it (because the dead can't improve themselves) "speaks" to our very essence as Jews.
As it turns out, the Torah is teaching us a very pertinent lesson, to parents and non-parents.
Not only should we be able to TELL why our actions follow commandments, but also realize that our actions SPEAK by example!
Random Thoughts on Iraq and Our Country
05.07.04 (11:26 am) [edit]
So I was watching the senate hearing (or whatever they're calling this meeting) that's was telivized a few moments ago about the soldiers who abused Iraqis. The senator of Alabama (R) actually brought up a good point. I really wanted to post it here and perhaps add a little to it. It's kind of a seperate topic than this meeting on TV, but I thought it'd be vailid here, if not appropriate for this meeting (which I think it was also).
I've heard lots of people say, "Impeach Bush!" and "Get us out of Iraq!" and "Send our government officials to war!" (government officials is usually substituted with something to the effect of 'chicken halk', but whatever).
But the senator of Alabama (his actual name escapes me, I'm sorry. Call me a bad American if you want, but at least I was watching this thing on tv. Were you?) said, and I'm paraphraizing: "People forget that we [the senate] voted to go to war in Iraq. You could not have done it with out us letting you..."
And you know what, people really have forgotten that. Or at least it seems that way to me. If you want to impeach Bush (because of the Iraq issue, not because you just plain don't like him. Some people feel that way and that's just really petty, IMHO), then you must want to impeach the entire senate. Or, at least the majority who voted to go to war.
That would be very silly indeed.
Who would we replace these people with? Someone 'more qualifyed' and appointed by someone? Whom? Are you aware that it would cost the country so much money to go through so many impeachment cases? We'd have to do it lawfully in court. You can't just 'kick' people out of office. You have to stage something more similar to a court case or trial in order to even have the chance to de-chair someone. It would be more of a mess than the troops being in Iraq!
It makes me feel as if those who suggest this don't care and just want to push their own agendas (which are in the minority) and this is a Democracy, last time I checked. The President can't go to war without the approval of the senate. The senate approved, we went to war. It's fact, it's history, it's reality.
And another thing, "send our officials to war instead...." What's THAT gonna do? Only the physically able are taken when they SIGN UP for the military. (I stress the sign up part because these soldiers VOLENTARILY joined the service. Do not forget that.) Have you seen these old politicians in the senate? Have you seen the President? They're not physically able to tie their shoes, some of them. (ok, that's kind of an erexaggeration) But, they are too old and not in proper shape to actually be in combat. If they were civilians who tried to sign up for the military, in this condition, they'd be turned away.
Do we want to be protected or do we want to just be silly?
Thing is, we're at war. That's the bottom line. We're at war and it was approved by our senate and it was our President's decision that was approved by our senate in our democratic government. That's the reality. You can't go back. You can't pretend it's not there. It's there. Real soldiers who signed up for the service willingfully are now over there and fighting to protect us and to protect the people of Iraq (with the exception of the renagades who horribly and un-Americanly abused Iraqi civilians). War, by nature is not pretty. It's not fun. It's not 'yahoo let's just party' time. It's war. Get over it.
And I think it's time we start thinking of more serious ways to get through it, in a unified manner that strives for the common good for all peoples.
05.07.04 (10:50 am) [edit]
I'm not sure how to feel about this.
[line]
[b]Thu May 6, 4:08 PM ET
[i]By GAVIN RABINOWITZ, Associated Press Writer[/b][/i]
JERUSALEM - An Israeli cab driver was convicted Thursday of involuntary manslaughter for unwittingly driving a Palestinian suicide bomber to the site of a Christmas Day attack.
Ofer Shwartzboim was arrested in January, weeks after a Dec. 25 suicide bombing killed four Israelis at a bus stop near Tel Aviv. Investigators determined Shwartzboim transported the bomber to the area for $22.
Shwartzboim confessed to taking the bomber and an accomplice to the site, but he argued that he had no idea the men were planning an attack.
He said the men had ordered a taxi from a nearby Arab-Israeli town near the boundary with the West Bank. During the short ride, they told him they were going to get money from an employer and did not have permits to be in Israel, according to a statement from the Israeli prime minister's office issued at the time.
Shwartzboim told interrogators he often drove illegal Palestinian workers into Israel, the prime minister's office said. It is illegal to assist Palestinians without permits to enter the country. The law is aimed at preventing suicide attacks.
The bomber and his accomplice paid Shwartzboim $22 for the ride.
Under a plea bargain agreement, Shwartzboim, a 39-year-old resident of the West Bank settlement of Oranit, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and will be sentenced to six months of community service, the judge ruled.
Shwartzboim also will have his license to drive a cab revoked for life.
In the past, Israeli Jews have been convicted of selling arms to Palestinians. But this was the first time a Jew was arrested for helping a bomber carry out an attack since violence erupted in September 2000.
Arab citizens of Israel have been convicted of assisting attackers from the Palestinian territories.
I'm not sure how to feel about this.
[line]
[b]Thu May 6, 4:08 PM ET
[i]By GAVIN RABINOWITZ, Associated Press Writer[/b][/i]
JERUSALEM - An Israeli cab driver was convicted Thursday of involuntary manslaughter for unwittingly driving a Palestinian suicide bomber to the site of a Christmas Day attack.
Ofer Shwartzboim was arrested in January, weeks after a Dec. 25 suicide bombing killed four Israelis at a bus stop near Tel Aviv. Investigators determined Shwartzboim transported the bomber to the area for $22.
Shwartzboim confessed to taking the bomber and an accomplice to the site, but he argued that he had no idea the men were planning an attack.
He said the men had ordered a taxi from a nearby Arab-Israeli town near the boundary with the West Bank. During the short ride, they told him they were going to get money from an employer and did not have permits to be in Israel, according to a statement from the Israeli prime minister's office issued at the time.
Shwartzboim told interrogators he often drove illegal Palestinian workers into Israel, the prime minister's office said. It is illegal to assist Palestinians without permits to enter the country. The law is aimed at preventing suicide attacks.
The bomber and his accomplice paid Shwartzboim $22 for the ride.
Under a plea bargain agreement, Shwartzboim, a 39-year-old resident of the West Bank settlement of Oranit, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and will be sentenced to six months of community service, the judge ruled.
Shwartzboim also will have his license to drive a cab revoked for life.
In the past, Israeli Jews have been convicted of selling arms to Palestinians. But this was the first time a Jew was arrested for helping a bomber carry out an attack since violence erupted in September 2000.
Arab citizens of Israel have been convicted of assisting attackers from the Palestinian territories.
A Vast Conspiracy : Nothing funny about this top-ten list.
05.06.04 (11:10 pm) [edit]
I just want to say; WOW. How come I never heard about all these? I must have missed it when I dosed off at the last secret meeting!
[line]
[b]May 06, 2004, 8:35 a.m.
[i]By Steven Stalinsky[/i][/b]
Abd Al-Munim Said, head of the Al-Ahram Research Center in Egypt, once said: "We thought that by the end of the 20th century, the Arab mind would be open enough not to explain everything with a 'conspiracy theory'...the biggest problem with conspiracy theories is that they keep us not only from the truth but also from confronting our faults and problems...This way of thinking relates any given problem to external elements, and thus does not [lead] to a rational policy to confront the problem."
Since 9/11/01, conspiracy theories against the U.S., the Jews, and the Zionists have been rampant in the Arab world. These notions are spread not only by marginal personalities and media outlets, but, more important, by prominent members of mainstream governments and media.
Some of last year's most far-fetched conspiracy theories in the Arab world include: U.S. soldiers cannibalized Iraqi civilians; the U.S. was responsible for the car bomb that killed Iraqi Shia leader Muhammad Bakir Al-Hakim; the Jews were behind the explosion of the space shuttle Columbia; the U.S. was behind the SARS virus; and the Iraq war was launched to coincide with the Jewish holiday Purim. The following highlight the top ten Arab conspiracy theories in recent months:
[b]10.[/b] Pakistani Jamaatud-Dawa chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed was quoted in the Islamic Republic News Agency on November 13, 2003, stating that al Qaeda was not responsible for the Riyadh bombing that month. Rather, "It is a Jewish and American conspiracy against the mujahadeen and al Qaeda."
[b]9.[/b] According to an editorial in the November 20 Yemen Times, the Istanbul bombings during Ramadan this past November could not have been committed by Muslims, as "the international Zionist establishment was keen on instigating this crime. This is strongly supported by the fact that no Muslim in his right mind could ever condone such crimes."
[b]8.[/b] The Islamic Republic News Agency reported on February 28 that the U.S. captured Osama bin Laden in a tribal region of Pakistan. It claimed that Donald Rumsfeld's recent trip to Pakistan was related to the capture. The report said that the U.S. will announce the capture shortly before the November presidential elections.
[b]7.[/b] Professor Galal Amin, a professor at the American University of Cairo, writing in the April 1 edition of Egypt's Al-Ahram Weekly, explained: "There is still doubt that the September [11] attacks were the outcome of Arab and Islamic terror.... Many writers...suspect that the attacks were carried out by Americans."
[b]6.[/b] Writing in Kuwait's Al-Watan on March 14, columnist Adnan Zayid Al-Kazimi identified the real culprit in the Madrid bombings: "I claim with certainty that the ones who attributed all evil to the Arabs and the Muslims are the Zionists, those who are closest to carry out such an operation like the other operations [that they carried out]."
[b]5.[/b] Said Al-Subki, columnist for the Saudi daily Al-Watan, also blamed the Madrid bombings on the Jews in its March 19 edition. He criticized Arab intelligence services for being "incapable of discovering the hidden Zionist fingers planning many terror operations in order to entangle the Arabs and Muslims."
[b]4.[/b] Deputy editor of the Egyptian government daily Al-Gumhouriyya wrote an article on March 18 that accused the Jews of perpetrating every terrorist attack throughout the world. Regarding the Madrid bombings that took place March 11, Abd Al-Wahhab Adas claimed, in reference to the explosives and cassettes of the Koran found at the site, "It is obvious that the Jews are the ones who placed these things, in order to prove to the entire world that the Arabs and Muslims are behind the bombings." Adas added about the Jews: "It is they who are behind the events of September 11."
[b]3.[/b] In an interview with Al-Arabiyya TV, Lebanese Druze leader and parliamentarian Walid Jumblatt stated on March 21 that, as part of a "born-again Christian" scheme that included 9/11, the CIA controls Osama bin Laden.
[b]2.[/b] According to the Iranian Mehr News Agency, Hossein Sheikholeslam, the former Iranian ambassador to Syria, stated that the series of bombings that hit Damascus in the last week of April were "a bid to force Iraq's neighbors to submit to their Iraq policy, the U.S. and the Zionist regimes orchestrated such terrorist attacks." He noted, "This is not the first time that the U.S. and Israel have employed al Qaeda elements to help them reinforce their terrorist objectives."
[b]1.[/b] After the bombing in Yunbu, Saudi Arabia, on May 1, Crown Prince Abdullah stated: "Zionism is behind terrorist actions in the kingdom. I can say that I am 95 percent sure of that."
[i]Steven Stalinsky is executive director of the Middle East Media Research Institute[/i]
[line]
Sidenote: I must talk to the cheif "Madriha" about this! Someone leaked! They're on to us!!! :lol:
05.06.04 (1:55 pm) [edit]
It's official: He's SCARED! And, well, he should be.
[line]
[b]Thu May 6, 4:55 AM ET
[i]By MOHAMMED DARAGHMEH, Associated Press Writer[/b][/i]
RAMALLAH, West Bank - Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat fortified his West Bank headquarters with old cars and barrels of concrete Thursday, fearing an Israeli invasion is imminent, Palestinian officials said.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon last month said he is no longer bound by a promise to the United States not to harm the Palestinian leader.
The United States immediately rebuked Sharon for his comments. But the veiled threat raised speculation that Israel might target Arafat, whom it accuses of backing Palestinian militant groups.
Earlier this week, Israeli troops briefly surrounded Arafat's compound during an overnight raid. The army said Arafat was not the target of the raid, but Palestinian officials said the veteran leader fears for his life.
"We expect an Israeli aggression," said a Palestinian security official, speaking on condition of anonymity. "They come every night and we worry that they will come and attack the president so we are taking security measures."
Dozens of old cars were placed in piles in the main courtyard outside Arafat's headquarters Wednesday. Hundreds of barrels of concrete were spread throughout the area, in a move to prevent tanks from moving in. Cement trucks were in the compound Thursday filling more barrels.
A senior Palestinian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Arafat knew the measures would not be enough to stop Israeli bulldozers and tanks.
"Arafat wants to confirm by these measures that he's ready for resistance and that he will not surrender to any Israeli invasion," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Israeli security officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there were no immediate plans to attack the Palestinian leader. But they said Israel has a standing plan on how to snatch Arafat from his headquarters and expel him.
Israel has confined Arafat to his Ramallah compound for more than two years. Israel has said he is free to leave but might not be allowed to return.
Last September, Israel's Cabinet decided Arafat should be "removed" after a pair of suicide bombings killed 15 Israelis. It has repeatedly threatened him since then, but never taken any action.
Israel's recent assassinations of two leaders of the militant group Hamas have added to Palestinian concerns about Arafat.
It's official: He's SCARED! And, well, he should be.
[line]
[b]Thu May 6, 4:55 AM ET
[i]By MOHAMMED DARAGHMEH, Associated Press Writer[/b][/i]
RAMALLAH, West Bank - Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat fortified his West Bank headquarters with old cars and barrels of concrete Thursday, fearing an Israeli invasion is imminent, Palestinian officials said.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon last month said he is no longer bound by a promise to the United States not to harm the Palestinian leader.
The United States immediately rebuked Sharon for his comments. But the veiled threat raised speculation that Israel might target Arafat, whom it accuses of backing Palestinian militant groups.
Earlier this week, Israeli troops briefly surrounded Arafat's compound during an overnight raid. The army said Arafat was not the target of the raid, but Palestinian officials said the veteran leader fears for his life.
"We expect an Israeli aggression," said a Palestinian security official, speaking on condition of anonymity. "They come every night and we worry that they will come and attack the president so we are taking security measures."
Dozens of old cars were placed in piles in the main courtyard outside Arafat's headquarters Wednesday. Hundreds of barrels of concrete were spread throughout the area, in a move to prevent tanks from moving in. Cement trucks were in the compound Thursday filling more barrels.
A senior Palestinian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Arafat knew the measures would not be enough to stop Israeli bulldozers and tanks.
"Arafat wants to confirm by these measures that he's ready for resistance and that he will not surrender to any Israeli invasion," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Israeli security officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there were no immediate plans to attack the Palestinian leader. But they said Israel has a standing plan on how to snatch Arafat from his headquarters and expel him.
Israel has confined Arafat to his Ramallah compound for more than two years. Israel has said he is free to leave but might not be allowed to return.
Last September, Israel's Cabinet decided Arafat should be "removed" after a pair of suicide bombings killed 15 Israelis. It has repeatedly threatened him since then, but never taken any action.
Israel's recent assassinations of two leaders of the militant group Hamas have added to Palestinian concerns about Arafat.
How about this weather?
05.06.04 (12:28 pm) [edit]
Geeze! It's SO hot here right now! Right now in SoCal, at the start of Mayo, it's 95 degrees and smoldering! The air is so heavy and you go take a shower to get rid of all the sweat and when you come out, you feel no cleaner because it just comes back. I have to go to class later and boy am I not looking forward to it. There is no airconditioning in my Math class and the temp is only going to rise.
We have some fires going on too, which is just peachy (... not)!
Thank goodness it's not like the ones we had in winter session though. The sky was black and everywhere you went, it smelled like ceder burning!
Man, it's just unbarable right now.
Ok, I'm done complaining. Anyone got nicer weather? Let me know so that I can book my vacation now! :wink:
I feel like I'm in Florida in August!
05.06.04 (11:50 am) [edit]
[b]Wed May 5, 4:28 PM ET
[i]By HUSSEIN DAKROUB, Associated Press Writer[/i][/b]
BEIRUT, Lebanon - Israeli warplanes fired missiles at a suspected guerrilla hideout in south Lebanon on Wednesday, shortly after Hezbollah gunners fired on Israeli jets, security officials said.
The Lebanese officials in southern Lebanon said two Israeli fighter jets fired a total of four missiles at a valley near the village of Zibqine, seven miles southeast of the port city of Tyre and four miles north of the Israeli border.
Hezbollah officials in south Lebanon said at least four air-to-surface missiles were launched in the afternoon attack.
Black smoke billowed from the area. There was no immediate word on casualties.
In Israel, the army said jets "targeted and destroyed" two Hezbollah posts.
The Israeli airstrike, the first in south Lebanon since March, came two hours after Hezbollah anti-aircraft guns fired on Israeli warplanes flying over the region.
Earlier Wednesday, shells from Hezbollah anti-aircraft fire landed on an Israeli community along the border, the Israeli army said. No one was hurt.
The Lebanese army command said four Israeli planes fighter jets violated Lebanese airspace over southern and central Lebanon, and anti-aircraft batteries "confronted" them before the planes returned to Israel.
Lebanon repeatedly has complained to the United Nations about Israeli reconnaissance flights, and Hezbollah has made it policy to retaliate for Israeli overflights by firing anti-aircraft fire at the planes. Some of the shells crash across the border in Israel.
The Israeli military said Hezbollah has continued to target Israeli towns "under the guise of anti-aircraft fire."
"The state of Israel is determined not to allow terror acts emanating from the border with Lebanon," the army said.
The last Israeli airstrike in Lebanon was March 23, when Israeli helicopter gunships fired on gunmen in the south, killing two and wounding one. The gunmen were preparing to launch rockets into Israel, according to Lebanese security officials.
The Israeli military commander responsible for the northern border with Lebanon, Maj. Gen. Benny Gantz, accused Hezbollah of deliberately aiming at targets inside Israel.
"This is not anti-aircraft fire. It was carried out under cover of anti-aircraft fire and it was deliberately aimed at our towns and communities," he told Israeli Army Radio.
A Hezbollah official also ruled out a wider escalation on the Lebanese-Israeli border. But Sheik Hassan Ezzeddine, Hezbollah's media chief, warned that "Hezbollah will continue to fire on Israeli jets that violate Lebanon's airspace."
A U.N. statement expressed "great dismay" over the situation, calling on Israel to halt its overflights of Lebanon and Hezbollah to stop "the ensuing and dangerous anti-aircraft fire."
The region has been relatively quiet since Israel withdrew its forces in 2000 after an 18-year occupation.
Hezbollah, which waged a guerrilla war against the Israelis, has repeatedly clashed with Israeli soldiers. Israel has launched airstrikes and artillery attacks against guerrilla positions.
[b]Wed May 5, 4:28 PM ET
[i]By HUSSEIN DAKROUB, Associated Press Writer[/i][/b]
BEIRUT, Lebanon - Israeli warplanes fired missiles at a suspected guerrilla hideout in south Lebanon on Wednesday, shortly after Hezbollah gunners fired on Israeli jets, security officials said.
The Lebanese officials in southern Lebanon said two Israeli fighter jets fired a total of four missiles at a valley near the village of Zibqine, seven miles southeast of the port city of Tyre and four miles north of the Israeli border.
Hezbollah officials in south Lebanon said at least four air-to-surface missiles were launched in the afternoon attack.
Black smoke billowed from the area. There was no immediate word on casualties.
In Israel, the army said jets "targeted and destroyed" two Hezbollah posts.
The Israeli airstrike, the first in south Lebanon since March, came two hours after Hezbollah anti-aircraft guns fired on Israeli warplanes flying over the region.
Earlier Wednesday, shells from Hezbollah anti-aircraft fire landed on an Israeli community along the border, the Israeli army said. No one was hurt.
The Lebanese army command said four Israeli planes fighter jets violated Lebanese airspace over southern and central Lebanon, and anti-aircraft batteries "confronted" them before the planes returned to Israel.
Lebanon repeatedly has complained to the United Nations about Israeli reconnaissance flights, and Hezbollah has made it policy to retaliate for Israeli overflights by firing anti-aircraft fire at the planes. Some of the shells crash across the border in Israel.
The Israeli military said Hezbollah has continued to target Israeli towns "under the guise of anti-aircraft fire."
"The state of Israel is determined not to allow terror acts emanating from the border with Lebanon," the army said.
The last Israeli airstrike in Lebanon was March 23, when Israeli helicopter gunships fired on gunmen in the south, killing two and wounding one. The gunmen were preparing to launch rockets into Israel, according to Lebanese security officials.
The Israeli military commander responsible for the northern border with Lebanon, Maj. Gen. Benny Gantz, accused Hezbollah of deliberately aiming at targets inside Israel.
"This is not anti-aircraft fire. It was carried out under cover of anti-aircraft fire and it was deliberately aimed at our towns and communities," he told Israeli Army Radio.
A Hezbollah official also ruled out a wider escalation on the Lebanese-Israeli border. But Sheik Hassan Ezzeddine, Hezbollah's media chief, warned that "Hezbollah will continue to fire on Israeli jets that violate Lebanon's airspace."
A U.N. statement expressed "great dismay" over the situation, calling on Israel to halt its overflights of Lebanon and Hezbollah to stop "the ensuing and dangerous anti-aircraft fire."
The region has been relatively quiet since Israel withdrew its forces in 2000 after an 18-year occupation.
Hezbollah, which waged a guerrilla war against the Israelis, has repeatedly clashed with Israeli soldiers. Israel has launched airstrikes and artillery attacks against guerrilla positions.
Outside Users
05.06.04 (11:21 am) [edit]
I have come to the decision recently to temporarily block outside users from commenting. This is only an experiment and I mean it not to offend my visitors from far away and outside of the tblog community. I am putting this message up so that some people who are outside users and who comment frequently in kind do not become insulted. Again, I appriciate all comments that are in kind and I want those of you who do visit to know that this is not a punishment unto you. Ney, I appriciate all of you and your loving and kindness.
Commenting for outsiders will return at the proper venture. However, at this time I must, unfortunatly postpone that. Please keep coming back despite these circumstances. Posts will always be added! I am providing an alternative for outside users to contact me. If you wish to get hold of me, comment, or just plain talk, you can reach me at my email: [b]tigress_of_red@yahoo.com[/b].
I am more than happy to post any letters, if you'd like. :)
Again, please don't be discouraged! Thank you to everyone! Now, back to our regularly scheduled program. :D
Why the Palestinians are in such a state
05.05.04 (6:15 pm) [edit]
Now THIS is a great article. Very brilliant and ever so true! I first saw it on [url=http://rsheinfield.tblog.com]rsheinfield's blog[/url].
[line]
[i][b]By Mark Steyn, Telegraph.co.uk[/i]
(Filed: 27/04/2004)[/b]
There was an hilarious piece in the Washington Post on Sunday, under the plaintive headline, "Why Did Bush Take My Job?" The author was Saeb Erekat, and the job he claims Bush has taken from him is "senior Palestinian negotiator" with the Israelis. The other day, speaking in support of the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, President Bush stated the obvious: it was "unrealistic" to expect a return to the armistice lines of 1949, and theres no point wasting time discussing the Palestinian "right of return" to whats now Israel, because its never going to happen.
Travel
But this shift in favour of the "realities on the ground" sent "moderate Arab opinion" into a tizzy. Returning from a visit to America, Egypts president, Hosni Mubarak, dropped in on Jacques Chirac in Paris. "Today there is hatred of the Americans like never before," he told Le Monde. And, in what sounded suspiciously like a threat, Mubarak added: "American and Israeli interests will not be safe, not only in our region, but anywhere in the world." Did he mention that when he was back at the ranch with Bush?
And thats a guy American taxpayers give $2 billion a year to. In return for which, they get Mohammed Atta flying through the office window and vile state-funded Egyptian media that license anti-Americanism as a safety valve for disaffection that might otherwise be targeted more locally. Thanks a bunch, Hosni. The Guardian reported this as a "damaging rebuff to President George Bushs policies", though its difficult to conceive of anything less "damaging" to Bush than being insulted by some third-rate Arab strongman dependent on US aid.
Now Mr Erekat has joined the chorus. "Why did Bush take my job?" To be honest, Id forgotten whether or not Mr Erekat currently held it. Periodically he resigns from Arafats cabinet for some reason or another, but quietly returns to his post a couple of months later - "senior Palestinian negotiator" being the Palestinian equivalent of those ancient Cabinet titles Tony Blair can never quite get rid of.
Edward Heath, in his time as Lord Privy Seal, was once addressed by some foreign dignitary as "Lord Heath" and famously responded that he was neither a lord nor a privy nor a seal. The "senior Palestinian negotiator" is not "senior", speaks for no viable faction within either the dignified (Arafatist) or efficient (Hamas) parts of the Palestinian Authority, and hasnt negotiated anything in a decade.
He last resigned last summer, after Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian prime minister, went off to negotiate with Ariel Sharon and accidentally left his "chief negotiator" out of the negotiating team. I guess someone else was taking Mr Erekats job back then.
Mr Erekats real job is to look good in a suit and go on television and sound reasonable when, as on September 11, the excitable chaps in Ramallah are dancing in the street and singing the Arabic version of Happy Days Are Here Again. And he is, of course, "democratically elected", being presently in the ninth year of a five-year term. So Yasser keeps him around to do the CNN-BBC interviews when Hanan Ashrawi is washing her hair and they need someone to do the autopilot drone of "root causes", "desperation", "cycle of violence".
But, if Bush did "take my job", its because Erekat is not up to it. For 10 years, the world has been trying to give a state to the Palestinians and the Palestinians keep tossing obstacles in their path. The latest innovation was a suicide-bomber arrested with explosives bearing HIV-infected blood, the thinking being that anyone who survived would get Aids. Unfortunately, the heat of the explosion kills the virus. But, in his combination of depravity and incompetence, the "Aids bomber" neatly encapsulates the present state of Palestinian "nationalism". The only way the Palestinians will get any kind of state is if Israel and America inflict it on them and eliminate such lethargic middle-men as Mr Erekat.
So Sharon is withdrawing from Gaza, abandoning the settlements and building a wall. This is bad news for those Palestinians who take a more nuanced approach to Jews - who think that, if you accidentally infect yourself while strapping on the HIV bomb, you should have the right to state-of-the-art treatment from an Israeli hospital. But theyll have to make the best of it. Israel has concluded that, if you cant "live in peace" with your neighbour, the priority is to live.
What a strange world the Middle East is. For 10 years, in northern Iraq, the Kurds have run a pleasant, civilised, pluralist, democratic de facto state, but external realities require them to be denied one de jure. For the same period, in the West Bank and Gaza the Palestinian Authoritys thugs, incompetents and bespoke apologists have been lavished with EU aid and transformed their land into an ugly, bankrupt Arafatist squat. But external realities require the world to defer to the "Chairman" as a de jure head of state, lacking merely a state to head.
Meanwhile, Lakhdar Brahimi, the UNs special envoy to Iraq, has told French radio listeners that "the great poison in the region" is Israeli "domination" and told American television viewers that the Israelis "are not interested in peace, no matter what you seem to believe in America". Well, he certainly hit the ground running. A week in town and he is already sounding like any decades-old Arab despot. In The Spectator a year ago, I warned against handing over Iraq to the UN: it would simply "install as high commissioner a non-Iraqi Arab bureaucrat" whod "effectively wind up as an Arab League minder, there to ensure that the Iraqis didnt get any funny ideas (rule of law, representative government) which might unduly discombobulate the Egyptians, Saudis et al." But even I didnt think theyd ship over such a walking, talking clich้ of Arab League man as Mr Brahimi.
If its any consolation to Saeb Erekat, Bush may have usurped his job in Palestine, but in Iraq Mr Brahimi is sounding as if he has usurped Bushs. And thats a lousy exchange.
[i]ฉ Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2004[/i]
What do people around here really stand for?
05.05.04 (4:27 pm) [edit]
So I decided to try and be the nice gal the other night. I wrote to one of my "fans" here on tblog and, in a peaceful and kind manner, asked them a question. The following exerpts are the correspondence in their entirety. Nothing was cut out nor added. Each italicized exerpt is the messages in their entirety. The bolded/italicized messages are from the other person. Here was my initial letter:
[i]I just wanted to ask you in private this question because I didn't want to embarass you or put you on the spot. I'm being respectful so I'd expect you do to the same.
I was wondering about your feelings on this article and the event that it is about:
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=61758" title="http://www.israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=61758" target="_blank"http://www.israelnationalnews...
I provide for you an excerpt:
"It was also learned that the terrorists not only murdered the 34-year-old mother of four who was eight months pregnant along with her children, but then ran up to the vehicle and took a video of the results of their actions, filming the young victims as they bled to death."
Now, if I may also be so bold as to enquire; how am I, as a Jew, supposed to feel about that, in your humble opinion?
Thanks! I look forward to talking it over with you like people. :)
-Tigress[/i]
Pretty fair. Just asking someone's opinoin, right? I believe that (unlike other people around here) in order to promote true understanding, if we have a problem or an issue with someone else, rather than accusing them, we should ask them their position and let them speak for themselves. Otherwise, we have a petty little witch hunt. That helps no one. And since so many around here love to do that to me, I refuse to emulate that. Which is why I wrote the above. Fair enough?
This was the direct response:
[i][b]I will read it and respond. Will you please read the following and respond:
http://www.reliefweb.int/w/rwb.nsf/0/4d0d94cc1fa2c1ae852 56cde0052815b?OpenDocumen t" title="http://www.reliefweb.int/w/rwb.nsf/0/4d0d94cc1fa2c1ae852 56cde0052815b?OpenDocumen t" target="_blank"http://www.reliefweb.int/w/rw...[/i][/b]
Ok, so we have a dialogue here. I'll bite. It is perfectly fair for the other person to request something of me. I also want to be understood as well as understand. I wasn't quite clear on everything, so I wrote this:
[i]Gladly. What are you asking about it?[/i]
That's all I wrote. I then was given this slightly aggitated and sort of rude sounding reply:
[b][i]Okay, you like to play games. You post attacks against Israelis. You never post attacks against US Soldiers or Palestinians.
As a Jew, how do you feel about the Israel government doing the following:
"In another incursion, Israeli occupying forces killed 8 Palestinian civilians, including a pregnant woman who bled to death under ruins of her destroyed house in an incursion this morning into al-Boreij refugee camp. In addition, the Israeli army destroyed a mosque and 14 houses, when they, reinforced with dozens of heavy military vehicles and helicopters, raided the camp which is based in the central Gaza Strip. This wide scale Israeli military operation came less than 24 hours after a similar operation in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, which left 3 Palestinians dead, 39 others wounded and a number of houses destroyed. Incursions like these have become a systematic policy of the Israeli occupying forces."
I'll pre-empt you: if you say it is "protecting Israel" . The Palestinians consider their feeble attacks back at Israel "self-defense" too.[/i][/b]
Well. That didn't sound so nice. In fact, that just sounded really angry. I replied:
[i]Am I sensing a bit of hostility? There is really no need for that.
Ok, first I'd just like to say that I have posted about attacks on U.S. soldiers in Iraq. Many times. I have also posted attacks on Palestinians and even praised the jailing of a IDF captian, most recently, who was jailed for being negligent in the murder of a Palestinian boy.
That said, I'm not sure why you are reversing the question without first answering mine. I shall do my best to respond in the absence of your response. I look forward to reading yours.
As a Jew, as well as a supporter of Israel, I feel that this incident in 2003 was quite uncalled for. I think that the slaughter of an innocent, un-born child, no matter where they are from or who's they are is a crime. I feel that the slaughter of any innocent is the same. This incident was most unecissary and should not have been fashioned in this way. I think that the officers who did this need to be seriously punished.
"I'll pre-empt you: if you say it is "protecting Israel" . The Palestinians consider their feeble attacks back at Israel "self-defense" too."
Wow, a pre-emptive strike! You obviously don't know me at all if you think that is what I was going to say. The innocents involved in this, especially the mother and un-born child, posed no threat to Israeli security.
Such measures like this one are not productive and do not aid in the protection of the Jewish state.
So too suicide/homocide bombs do not aid for the protection of anyone. I'm not sure why you even defend such horrible acts as that if you are opposed to the one committed by the IDF in this incident.
Once again, I look forward to your response to my inquiry.[/i]
So, I layed it out. Even though they were avoiding mine. This came back:
[i][b]I think that what the Palestinians did yesterday in killing that pregnant woman and her children was a tragedy and a crime. It is late and I am too tired to explain in detail. I am sickened by what is going on in the Middle East and it is the fault of Bush and Sharon.[/i][/b]
Ok, that's still avoiding my initial private message's question. I replied:
[i]Um, with all due respect, I think that was kind of avoidant. That didn't really answer my questions and I took the utmost care to answer yours in full, even though I was the initiator. Typically speaking, in a real debate that wouldn't truly fly as a response. I think I deserve a little more than that.
How about this; to make it more flexible for you (because I understand that it is quite late and I have been in your position before), why don't you expand upon that thought in a message tomorrow. That way, you can sleep on it and clear your head so that you can be better up for the challenge. :)
I am also curious as to how you think this is all Bush and Sharon's fault and am looking forward greatly to your full response and the clarification of your last message.
Thanks so much! Love to you and God bless :)[/i]
And it is now, two (2) days later that I have still recieved nothing. Is it safe for me to assume that I will not hear anything more from this person in reguard to this conversation? I'm leaning towards that. I know what I stand for. I layed it out for him, quite plainly I may add; just as I have layed it out plainly numerous times before here at the Lair.
If I were one to assume, would it be right of me to assume that these people, like the one I conversed with here, only really stand for name callling, accusing, and assuming I fit the mold of something that I am not?
There is more than meets the eye here. I believe in expressing open communication between individuals. I stand for that on a great level.
Perhaps other people just have their own agendas of how things should play out and really don't care what other people have to say, even in their own defense. Sounds very much like a witch hunt to me.
But, then again, I don't assume. I wait eagerly for the day that this person, and all his friends are willing to sit down and talk with me like good, respectful people.
Israel's Story in Maps
05.05.04 (2:48 pm) [edit]
"The best-ever cartographic collection, online and in print, documenting the Jewish people's claim to the Land and the nation's struggle to survive." ... Or so it says on the site.
This is some highly educational stuff!
The kibbutz's dream has changed
05.05.04 (2:45 pm) [edit]
I was talking to someone last night about Kibbutzes. I just found this really interesting article about the changes going on therein. Enjoy!
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[i]In their book, Jo-Ann Mort and Gary Brenner capture a snapshot of the vast -- and rapid -- changes taking place on the kibbutz today. [/i]
[i][b]by Ellis Shuman, Jewsweek[/b][/i]
In the month of December, the United Kibbutz Movement formally adopted a new definition of what constitutes a kibbutz. On a "renewed" kibbutz, the movement decided, the cardinal principle of "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" would no longer necessarily guide the members.
Instead, differential wages were allowed and a policy of home ownership, where the members' homes are listed legally in their own name, was pursued.
This sea change in kibbutz ideology did not occur overnight, but was actually the result of kibbutzim struggling to transform and adapt as Israeli society itself changed. Since before Israel's founding, the kibbutz had represented Israel's spirit and unique nature, but from a socialist, left-wing perspective. In the past several decades, Israel became a free-market economy, and the kibbutzim had no choice but to alter their dream in order to survive.
In their book Our Hearts Invented a Place: Can Kibutzim Survive in Today's Israel? (Cornell University Press, October 2003), authors Jo-Ann Mort and Gary Brenner tell the story of the kibbutz's changeover and struggle for survival. The authors do this by comparing three distinct models of change exemplified by different communities:
Gesher Haziv -- a kibbutz that has decided to pursue privatization.
Hatzor -- a kibbutz that diversified its economy while creating a social safety net for its members.
Gan Shmuel -- a community that is attempting to hold on to the traditional kibbutz model.
By conducting interviews with the members of these three communities, the authors sought to "capture a snapshot of the vast -- and rapid -- changes taking place on the kibbutzim today."
These changes, which fundamentally changed Israel's unique social experiment, were essential to the future of many of the nearly 260 kibbutzim around the country, home to some 120,000 citizens. Many of the communities are deeply in debt, and have been forced to sell ownership of their factories and agricultural lands in order to stay afloat.
As one kibbutz member told the authors, "The founders [of the kibbutz] had a dream, which they fulfilled a hundred times. The current generation must alter that dream in order to survive."
The history of the kibbutz within the political framework of Israel's story can be a dry account not easily understood. The authors wisely decided to present their treatise on the changing kibbutz based primarily on interviews with the kibbutz members themselves. The alternative viewpoints expressed, both for and against communal change, accurately reflect the internal struggles within the kibbutz today.
The Arabist letter
05.05.04 (2:34 pm) [edit]
This article really made me think.
[line]
[b]May. 5, 2004 23:19
[i]The Jerusalem Post[/b][/i]
Back when George Shultz was US secretary of state, he made a practice of asking every newly appointed ambassador to locate his country on a globe. When the unsuspecting emissary put his finger on, say, Thailand, Shultz would correct him: "Your country is here," his finger on the United States.
The story comes to mind on news that some 50 former American diplomats, taking their cue from their British counterparts, have put their names to a letter denouncing President George W. Bush's policies vis-a-vis Israel and the Palestinians.
"By closing the door to negotiations with Palestinians and the possibility of a Palestinian state, you have proved that the United States is not an even-handed peace partner," say the diplomats. "Your unqualified support of Sharon's extra-judicial assassinations, Israel's Berlin Wall-like barrier, its harsh military measures in the occupied territories, and now your endorsement of Sharon's unilateral plan are costing our country its credibility, prestige, and friends."
This sounds like a serious critique, by serious people, of administration policy. The letter was published under the auspices of a Washington-based nonprofit, the American Educational Trust, which publishes a magazine called the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. WRMEA claims to promote "Middle East solutions which it judges to be consistent with the charter of the United Nations and traditional American support for human rights, self-determination and fair play." The magazine's publisher, former US ambassador to Qatar Andrew Killgore, is the letter's principal signatory.
It's worth taking a look at the magazine's Web site, www.wrmea.com. Its April cover story is titled "Gaza: The IDF's shooting range." (The article, by Gideon Levy, is reprinted from Haaretz.) There is an article on the "USS 'Liberty' cover-up." The site prominently features an electronic ticker on "Your tax dollars sent to Israel," which as of this writing are said to exceed $90 billion over the years. (That, however, is considerably less than the $112 billion the US has spent in one year in its war in Iraq, for which WRMEA also has a ticker going.)
Aside from its editorial content, WRMEA is sponsoring an ad campaign which calls for "the Palestinian refugees' right to return." And there is this appeal for individual donations: "Journals of opinion do not bring in the same advertising revenue as mainstream magazines. Big corporations and the Zionist lobby want to control the editorial content around which their ads will be placed."
Killgore has received awards from the Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee in 1992 and the Islamic Association for Palestine in 1994. As it happens, 1994 was the year in which the two groups jointly sponsored a fund-raiser in Annandale, Virginia, in which featured speaker Muhammad Siam, a Hamas leader, appealed for funds for jihad against Israel.
This isn't to suggest that Killgore shares their agenda. But it does give some indication of the circles in which he and his fellow signatories travel, and the views to which they subscribe. It also gives the lie to WRMEA's claim that it offers mainstream views of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is an anti-Israel, pro-Arab organ and ought to be honest enough to present itself as such.
Which brings us back to the Shultz story.
Suffusing WRMEA's pages is the conceit that they represent truly "American" views, untarnished by the Zionist lobby and independent of the presumably Zionist-controlled media. Of course this is a crackpot claim, given that in survey after survey Americans overwhelmingly identify with Israel against the Palestinians. On the other hand, Killgore's views are not that far from those of many State Department officials, as attested by the fact that he was awarded the 1997 "Foreign Service Cup," by the Diplomatic and Consular Officers, Retired (DACOR) group, which cited the "courage" of his Mideast advocacy.
Right now, America desperately needs a diplomatic corps to serve as its instrument in reshaping the Middle East. To judge by the Killgore letter, what Americans are getting instead is an Arab lobby within and alongside its State Department, representing views far outside the US mainstream. This week's letter should serve as a wake-up call to Bush that he needs to ensure that his Mideast ambassadors and foreign service officers are with him, not against him. He is, after all, their boss.
05.05.04 (2:25 pm) [edit]
Breaking news!
[line]
[b](AFP)
5 May 2004 [/b]
HASBAYA, Lebanon - Israeli warplanes violated Lebanese airspace on Wednesday, causing supersonic booms over southern Lebanon and prompting anti-aircraft fire, an AFP correspondent said. Two loud bangs shook Hasbaya and other nearby areas of the western Bekaa, a district in southeast Lebanon, at around 10:30 am (0730 GMT), he said.
Moments later, anti-aircraft batteries in the areas opened fire, he said.
Booms were later heard over the main southern cities of Tyre, Sidon and Nabatiyeh, police and AFP correspondents said.
In early December, the United Nations hailed a decline in the number of frequent Israeli violations of Lebanese airspace.
The previous month it issued a strong condemnation of the Jewish state for its persistent intrusions since its pullout from the south of the country in 2000 after 22 years of occupation.
The Shiite radical Hezbollah guerrilla movement - backed by Syria and Iran - has threatened Israel with costly reprisals if its aircraft continue their repeated incursions into Lebanese airspace.
Breaking news!
[line]
[b](AFP)
5 May 2004 [/b]
HASBAYA, Lebanon - Israeli warplanes violated Lebanese airspace on Wednesday, causing supersonic booms over southern Lebanon and prompting anti-aircraft fire, an AFP correspondent said. Two loud bangs shook Hasbaya and other nearby areas of the western Bekaa, a district in southeast Lebanon, at around 10:30 am (0730 GMT), he said.
Moments later, anti-aircraft batteries in the areas opened fire, he said.
Booms were later heard over the main southern cities of Tyre, Sidon and Nabatiyeh, police and AFP correspondents said.
In early December, the United Nations hailed a decline in the number of frequent Israeli violations of Lebanese airspace.
The previous month it issued a strong condemnation of the Jewish state for its persistent intrusions since its pullout from the south of the country in 2000 after 22 years of occupation.
The Shiite radical Hezbollah guerrilla movement - backed by Syria and Iran - has threatened Israel with costly reprisals if its aircraft continue their repeated incursions into Lebanese airspace.
To All Our "Friends" Fans!
05.05.04 (2:21 pm) [edit]
I almost died laughing when I saw this! Was "Friends" over last week or is the finale tomorrow? HEHE! Everyone should BUY this shirt!
hahaha :lol:
Web diaries become hot medium for talk on Israel
05.04.04 (7:25 pm) [edit]
I thought that this was an interesting article and I felt it apropriate to post it, where else, but my own blog! :wink: Perhaps next time, they'll include the Lair! :D It really is a great article though. What's REALLY cool, is they mentioned Rabbi Brody in this article! YAY!
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[i][/i]By Sarah Bronson, Haaretz[/i][/b]
Last summer, 400 people attended the going-away party for Rich and Sara Brownstein, who were about to immigrate to Israel from California. Rich said that "they all wanted to know what we were going to do when we got to Israel," so after his arrival in Jerusalem he posted photos on his website and an essay about how the first few days had gone. Since then, he has regularly posted essays about daily life as an American in Israel, weaving his political opinions throughout. Over time, the site, brownsteins.net became a blog, a virtual diary of the Brownsteins' adventures.
Blogs - or, to the uninitiated, web logs - are the hot medium through which millions around the world "publish" their views every day. In Israel alone, 33,000 people have create web diaries through Israblog.co.il, an IsraBlog spokesman said. The number of active, English-language blogs with Jewish content increased 4,000 percent in the last year, according to the founder of protocols.blogspot.com, a site that tracks activity in what it calls "J-Blogs," or Jewish blogs.
Anglo File found that blogs by English-speaking immigrants has doubled in the last two years; at least two dozen well-publicized "Anglo-Isra-blogs" recount the writers' cultural or political observations about this country.
Blogs by Anglo-Israelis play a unique role in helping readers abroad form opinions about Middle East politics. "Anglo-Isra-blogs, [like] most English publications in Israel, have some of their largest impact in English-speaking countries like the United States," said Steven Weiss, the Protocols founder. "As in all topics, blogs [about Israel] have the potential to be more effective than other media because of the immediacy and interactivity that are part of the medium ... After a major event or news revelation of any sort, you can find many [other bloggers] looking to Anglo-Isra-blogs for their reaction."
Shai Tsur, who maintains shaister.com said his blog draws hits from Germany, Brazil and Japan; his regular readers include an employee at the Pentagon. "Israel gets so much bad press," he said. "It would be nice to think I'm providing a little counter to that."
Bloggers told Anglo File that their hobby offers many benefits, including an easy way to communicate with friends abroad and a central place to notify others, after a terrorist attack, that they are alright. The bloggers also appreciate the ability to receive readers' feedback through posted comments, to include hyperlinks to relevant news articles, and to share photos without using email bandwidth.
But the main allure of blogging is the opportunity to publicize one's views easily and cheaply. Adrian Edmonds, the British writer behind ExpatEgghead.blogspot.com, said "I've gotten a letter published in Haaretz, but that's a one-off thing that doesn't repeat itself. As an individual, one doesn't often have a voice. Blogging is a way of expressing it." His readers hail from Israel, the United States military, the U.K., and France.
Tsur, who started blogging while still living in the US, said "I would read the papers and have these conversations in my head about the articles. I decided to get my thoughts out there to share with whoever might want to read it. I'm an opinionated person and this is the perfect outlet."
A common thread in Anglo-Isra-blogs is the right-of-center political positions of most of the writers. Edmonds noted that "I was fascinated by the number of [English-language Israeli] bloggers who are right-wing. I couldn't find any that were left-of-center. I wanted to put my viewpoint across, more of a Peace Now viewpoint."
Other than their generally right-wing leanings, Anglo-Israeli blogs are as varied as those who write them. For example, on treppenwitz.com, David Bogner muses humorously about his mid-life crisis, while at Tsarphati.blogspot.com, an American immigrant who is newly observant records his observations about the religious community, Judaism, and the Hebrew language.
Lazerbrody.com is the work of Rabbi Lazer Brody, otherwise known as "Rabbi Rambo" and "the Lazer Beam." His blog focuses on suggestions for stress reduction and other methods of self-improvement. But Anglosaxy.blogspot.com, which, like ExpatEgghead is authored by an English gentile who married an Israeli, is self-described as containing "A Brit's insight into life in the Holy Land ... teaching, writing, drinking and anything else in the present continuous."
At least two Anglo-Isra-blogs are connected to formal print publications: Brianblum.blogspot.com contains essays on Israeli family life that form the basis for the writer's widely published column, "This Normal Life," and Judy Lash Balint posts supplemental updates to her book The Jerusalem Diaries at jerusalemdiaries.blogspot.com.
Jennifer Tocker, a Minnesota native and writer of just-jennifer.com, points out that there are "Israeli bloggers," who "are active about posting what's going on in Israel from every aspect," while others, like her, are "Israelis who blog," posting their diaries of personal, everyday life. But "in Israel there's no way you can post about life here without posting the background." Her blog draws many North American readers, she said, who "are curious about the average person in Israel."
Arabs For a FREE Jewish State
05.04.04 (6:51 pm) [edit]
So this is in my links section. I just wanted to point this group out. They are a Yahoo! group of Palestinians and all other Arabs, Druze Bedowins, Maronites who support Jewish self determination Zionism and the upright State of Israel. They are working to
This is a must see and it's quite refreshing, actually. Enjoy!
Condoleezza Rice fundraises for the PA
05.04.04 (1:25 pm) [edit]
I love Condi now. Any comments on this?
[line]
[i][b]By MICHAEL FREUND, Jerusalem Post[/i][/b]
Congratulations would appear to be in order for US National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.
In addition to her already weighty responsibilities as President George W. Bush's chief adviser and confidante, Rice has now added a new task to her resume: chief fund-raiser for Yasser Arafat.
According to a May 3 article in The Washington Post, the Bush administration has launched a "diplomatic offensive" aimed at allaying Arab concerns regarding the president's recent embrace of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Gaza withdrawal plan. Among other things, the paper notes, "the administration in recent days has tried to emphasize its concern for the Palestinians."
This has included an effort to drum up financial support for the PA.
"As part of the diplomatic offensive," the report says, "national security adviser Condoleezza Rice last week called some Arab countries that were behind in making payments to shore up the Palestinian Authority."
Isn't that thoughtful of her. With American casualties mounting daily in Iraq, Osama Bin-Laden still on the run, and North Korea threatening to develop more nuclear weapons, doesn't Rice have better things to do than making sure Arafat can balance his checkbook?
Indeed, Rice's telethon on behalf of the PA is particularly astonishing in light of some of the Palestinians' recent actions.
Just this past weekend the PA transferred funds to Hamas-affiliated organizations in Gaza, claiming that economic conditions in the territories were the reason for the move. But if the PA itself is truly in such need of funds that the US national security adviser must intervene, why is it showering money on Hamas terrorists?
Moreover, it is difficult to comprehend why Rice is seeking to keep the PA afloat despite all the evidence indicating that it is actively engaged in terror against Israel.
In the past three years, and particularly during Operation Defensive Shield, Israel has uncovered thousands of official PA documents including many with Arafat's handwritten approval proving direct PA financing of terrorist attacks and other acts of violence.
Even the State Department, in its annual report released last month on "Global Patterns of Terrorism," linked the PA with terror.
"The PA's efforts to thwart terrorist operations were minimal in 2003," the report said, and "some personnel in the security services, including several senior officers, have continued to assist terrorist operations."
Doesn't Rice read her own government's reports? If not, then she is probably also unaware that PA incitement against both Israel and the US has continued unabated in recent months.
The Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS), an official arm of the US government, monitors electronic and print media worldwide and publishes a daily digest of translations.
According to the FBIS, PA television broadcast a Friday prayer sermon from the Zayid bin-Sultan mosque in Gaza on March 26, in which the preacher called upon Allah to "shake the land under the Zionists and the United States and its allies. O Allah, show us a black day for the Jews, the Americans, and their supporters. O Allah, avenge the blood of our martyrs."
Just two weeks earlier, the FBIS reported, a sermon broadcast on PA television on March 14 had this to say: "Here are the Jews today taking revenge for their grandfathers and ancestors, the sons of apes and pigs This is the extremist tendency of Jews. They are extremists and terrorists who deserve death, while we deserve life, since we have a just cause."
More recently, on April 30, a Palestinian preacher again prayed for the downfall of America, telling his audience on PA television, "O Allah, support our kinfolk in Iraq. O Allah, direct the shots of the holy warriors for your sake. O Allah, shake the land under the pillars of the United States and its allies."
This too was documented in a FBIS digest, yet that does not appear to have prevented Rice from seeking to bail the PA out of financial trouble.
IT HAS been nearly seven months now since three Americans were killed by Palestinian terrorists in an attack on a US diplomatic convoy in Gaza on October 15. Under US pressure the Palestinians eventually arrested several suspects, who then "escaped" from a Palestinian prison last month under extremely suspicious circumstances.
Last month it was reported that the US now has evidence indicating that PA Chairman Arafat personally authorized the attack in order to "convey a message" to Washington (Ma'ariv, April 14).
Based on Rice's recent telephone activity, it would seem fair to say that the message has gotten through loud and clear; for instead of shutting down all financial support to the PA, Washington is inexplicably trying to keep Arafat's lines of credit open.
In so doing, the Bush administration is not only undermining the moral clarity of its own war on terror, it is also indirectly facilitating the funding of anti-Israel terrorist attacks.
If Rice insists on continuing to serve as a fundraiser, she would do well to consider adopting a better cause to promote. Rather than collecting money for Yasser Arafat and his hired hands of terror, she might wish to lend a hand to their many victims. They are, I would think, far more deserving of her time and assistance.
[i]The writer served as director of communications & policy planning under former premier Binyamin Netanyahu.[/i]
05.03.04 (8:32 pm) [edit]
This is completely disgusting! I demand Justice!
[line]
08:30 May 03, '04 / 12 Iyar 5764
(IsraelNN.com) IDF officials continue to investigate yesterdays terror attack on the Kissufim Road leading into Gush Katif that claimed the lives of Tali Hatual and her four children. They were gunned down in cold blood as they drove in their family vehicle.
Preliminary reports indicate that an army patrol vehicle passed the scene ahead of the Hatuals, and was even hit with gunfire. The two soldiers in the non-armored vehicle sustained light shrapnel injuries from the gunfire. The question being asked is why they did not stop and return fire, and engage the terrorists in a shootout as is the standard response. Instead, they continued traveling to the Kissufim Checkpoint.
The preliminary response appears to be they were injured in their hands and therefore, were unable to return fire. [b]It was also learned that the terrorists not only murdered the 34-year-old mother of four who was eight months pregnant along with her children, but then ran up to the vehicle and took a video of the results of their actions, filming the young victims as they bled to death.[/b]
IDF officials indicate the investigation into the attack continues to determine if the soldiers and officers involved responded appropriately.
Source: http://www.israelnationalnews...
This is completely disgusting! I demand Justice!
[line]
08:30 May 03, '04 / 12 Iyar 5764
(IsraelNN.com) IDF officials continue to investigate yesterdays terror attack on the Kissufim Road leading into Gush Katif that claimed the lives of Tali Hatual and her four children. They were gunned down in cold blood as they drove in their family vehicle.
Preliminary reports indicate that an army patrol vehicle passed the scene ahead of the Hatuals, and was even hit with gunfire. The two soldiers in the non-armored vehicle sustained light shrapnel injuries from the gunfire. The question being asked is why they did not stop and return fire, and engage the terrorists in a shootout as is the standard response. Instead, they continued traveling to the Kissufim Checkpoint.
The preliminary response appears to be they were injured in their hands and therefore, were unable to return fire. [b]It was also learned that the terrorists not only murdered the 34-year-old mother of four who was eight months pregnant along with her children, but then ran up to the vehicle and took a video of the results of their actions, filming the young victims as they bled to death.[/b]
IDF officials indicate the investigation into the attack continues to determine if the soldiers and officers involved responded appropriately.
Source: http://www.israelnationalnews...
Neighborhood Bully
05.03.04 (7:46 pm) [edit]
This is one of the best things I've read! Of course it was written by the amazingly talanted and legendary Bob Dylan, otherwise known as Robert Zimmerman! Rock on, Bob! Rock on!
[line]
Well, the neighborhood bully, he's just one man,
His enemies say he's on their land.
They got him outnumbered about a million to one,
He got no place to escape to, no place to run.
The neighborhood bully just lives to survive,
He's criticized and condemned for being alive.
He's not supposed to fight back, he's supposed to have thick skin,
He's supposed to lay down and die when his door is kicked in.
The neighborhood bully has been driven out of every land,
He's wandered the earth an exiled man.
Seen his family scattered, his people hounded and torn,
He's always on trial for just being born.
Well, he knocked out a lynch mob, he was criticized,
Old women condemned him, said he should apologize.
Then he destroyed a bomb factory, nobody was glad,
The bombs were meant for him,
He was supposed to feel bad.
Well, the chances are against it and the odds are slim,
That he'll live by the rules that the world makes for him.
'Cause there's a noose at his neck and a gun at his back,
And a license to kill him is given out to every maniac.
He got no allies to really speak of,
What he gets he must pay for, he don't get it out of love.
He buys obsolete weapons and he won't be denied,
But no one sends flesh and blood to fight by his side.
Well, he's surrounded by pacifists who all want peace,
They pray for it nightly that the bloodshed must cease.
Now, they wouldn't hurt a fly,
To hurt one they would weep,
They lay and they wait for this bully to fall asleep.
Every empire that's enslaved him is gone,
Egypt and Rome, even the great Babylon.
He's made a garden of paradise in the desert sand,
In bed with nobody, under no one's command.
Now his holiest books have been trampled upon,
No contract he signed was worth what it was written on.
He took the crumbs of the world and he turned it into wealth,
Took sickness and disease and he turned it into health.
What's anybody indebted to him for?
Nothin', they say,
He just likes to cause war.
Pride and prejudice and superstition indeed,
They wait for this bully like a dog waits to feed.
What has he done to wear so many scars?
Does he change the course of rivers?
Does he pollute the moon and stars?
Neighborhood bully, standing on the hill,
Running out the clock, time standing still.
Neighborhood bully.
Photos From The Renaissance Faire
05.03.04 (6:59 pm) [edit]
I went to the Renaissance Pleasure Faire yesterday. It was so great! I had a really good time. I drank mead (honey that has been fermented into alcohol. It's kind of like a honey wine) for the first time! It was REALLY yummie, let's put it that way. It tasted like sweet, alcoholic honey water. We walked around, we saw a play and people singing dirty songs ... it was beautiful. It was out in the boonies, kind of though. It was 103 degrees out there. I didn't wear a full-on costume. It was just too hot! Lots of people were wearing beautiful and elaborate costumes though. I don't know how they could stand it in such heat, but a good time was had by all.
So now, I'd like to share some of the cool photographs I took while we were there:
This is a woman in a knight's costume. They had a jousting match and the knights who jousted wore these outfits and ran towards eachother.
Here's the May Pole and people are just getting ready to start dancing around it. Long ago, the May Pole was used in spring as all the elligable women would dance around the May Pole and the men would watch and decide which one they wanted to courte.
These people are a band of singers. They sing dirty old drinking songs. Some of it was really out there and just down right crude. Yea, it was great!
Ok, so you think this guy is posing? Well, I have to tell you no, this man is not posing there on perpose. This guy is ACTUALLY passed out. I thought I just had to take this picture because it's just so hilarious! On the way home, one of my friends said, "You know, you're going to feel really bad if it turns out that guy was dead." To which I replied, "I won't know if he was dead or not. His friends near by didn't seem to nervous. I'll just assume he was simply passed out and enjoy the photo." I'm 95% sure the guy was not dead.
This is the sign from the dirty play that we saw by Sound & Fury. It was 20 minutes long and HILARIOUSLY funny. People were rolling in the isles. Also quite crude and simply wonderful!
Here's one of the players from Testacles presented by Sound & Fury. He was great! They all were!
This is just a carving I saw on one of the boothes and I thought I'd snap a picture because it looked really pretty.
This is the Queen's Chariotte thingie. These men carried her in it durring a mock procession. I wouldn't mind traveling like that!
So, like I said, I didn't dress up in a big, hot costume. Instead, I wore normal clothes except for the way I did my hair. I made little horns! My costume idea: I dressed as a Nymph. (The mythological creature, not what you were thinking!) My boyfriend took this picture when we got home before I took it down.
I can't wait until next time!
"Little T."
05.03.04 (5:18 pm) [edit]
THIS is one of THE most adorable things I've seen!
| adopt your own virtual pet! |
I think I'm in love! :wink:
Racism is Racism
05.03.04 (4:02 pm) [edit]
I was catching up and reading an old issue of Newsweek the other day. I saw an article about Justin Timberlake and how he has "Lost Cred" in the black entertainment industry.
Basically, his black fans are upset that when the whole "wardrobe malfunction" fiasco happened, he kind of stepped back and "didn't really take responsibility for his part in the happening," but rather, let Janet take all the heat for her boobie.
Now I'm not a Justin fan. In fact, I think his music basically sucks. N'Sync sucked. Whatever it is he's doin' now, I'm not sure because I really don't follow him. I don't hate him; I just ain't a fan of his work. I do, however, believe in fairness to all. Which is why this article that was published in Newsweek, of all things, got me perturbed.
My favourite quote from this article is from someone identified as a close friend of Janet Jackson: "It's just maddening because he was as black as black could be until Super Bowl night. In his mind, he was as black as 50 Cent because he knew the words to a Marvin Gaye song. He rolled in both worlds, living it up. But as soon as something went wrong, we got a chance to see how white he really was."
Oh. Ok, I get it. So like when O.J. Simpson lied about killing his wife and got off, he was also acting white, eh? And I don't even think he knows the words to anything by Marvin Gaye!
Gimme a BREAK!
Dare I point out that 50 cent is a convicted criminal who has shot people!? Is that "acting black"?! And I also would venture as far as to say that 50 cent probably doesn't know the words to anything by Marvin Gaye either!
(Side note: I wonder why Mr. 'Friend' wished to remain anonymouse? Hmmm.)
I just love it when minorities get all mad and start flinging racism back. I'm a minority, I don't do that! Racism is racism people. As a Jew, should I get mad about Farrakhan and start calling him the N word? No! I'd be horrible for doing that! (I do think he's an ass though!) Should any non-Jew who is mad at a Jew call them a kike? No!
So why is it that some black man (who isn't even directly involved in the situation, mind you) is allowed to make assholic statements against the characters of "all whites in general"? I just hate double standards! IF you want a non-racist, colour-blind society, it has to start with YOU! If you're mad about something or someone's actions, don't go acting like a racist about it!
Yea, ok. Justin may have done the wrong thing by letting Janet take most of the heat for the incident; but when you throw race into the mix and start bitching about how "whitey f'ed you over" once again, that's just crap.
But wait, the story gets better. I give you now another excerpt from the respective Newsweek article:
After Timberlake agreed to cohost Motown's upcoming 45th-anniversary show on ABC with Lionel Richie, black activist groups launched a phone and e-mail protest. "[His selection] is a cultural insult to the black community," says Najee Ali, executive director of Project Islamic Hope. Timberlake soon bailed out, citing a scheduling conflict.
That's right, people. (I just rolled my eyes) What if it was a black artist we were talking about? Just change the name Justin Timberlake to Antwan Jones. Would black people be protesting his concerts or whining about how he really "showed his true colours"? If white people protested the black guy's concerts because of this crap, they'd be racist. Wouldn't they? Then I guess these black people with extraordinarily poor taste in music who are boycotting Justin just because of this incident are RACISTS!
You want to boycott him because you don't like the music? Fine! If you are boycotting him because he's a white guy who sings "black songs" and you don't like that he "acted white," we have a serious problem here.
Words to the un-wise:
Judge on individual actions. Don't be stupid and say, "Duh, it's because they're ____, that they suck!" Racism is racism!
A Racist On the Rise
05.03.04 (2:57 pm) [edit]
This is very scary. What's even scarier, is that I've really been feeling this around tblog! Lots of hateful sentaments, lots more hate comments here than usual, people are just angry. I'm not sure what is causing such a rise like this. It almost feels as if something is going to burst and the gates of hell will open. We all should try and be more understanding of one another and fight back at this rise of hate. Each and every one of us. The article below is mind-blowing.
[line]
[i]After a post-9/11 slump, hate groups see a surge [/i]
[i][b]By Rebecca Sinderbrand, NewsWeek[/b][/i]
May 10 issue - September 11 wasn't kind to the white-power movement. After the terrorist attacks, several of the nation's largest hate groups lost members and money, and some all but collapsed after bitter internal power struggles. At the same time, many of the movement's high-profile leaders left the scene: Former Klansman David Duke went to prison for tax evasion and mail fraud. William Pierce, head of the National Alliance, the country's largest white nationalist organization, died of cancer. World Church of the Creator head Matthew Hale was arrested in 2002 for plotting to kill a federal judge; he was convicted last week and now faces up to 50 years behind bars.
But in recent months a new leader has given the movement a burst of momentum. Billy Roper, a 32-year-old former schoolteacher from Arkansas, has spent months quietly reaching out to disenfranchised racists and neo-Nazis across the country, uniting them under his new group, White Revolution. "Billy Roper is clearly a rising star among hard-core racists," says Mark Pitcavage of the Anti-Defamation League.
Soft-spoken and polite to a fault, Roper looks and sounds less like a white supremacist than an avuncular union organizer. In a phone interview he apologizes that allergies have left him with a stuffy nose, and calmly explains how he hopes to end the factional squabbling and focus on their main goal: fighting the influence of Jews, African-Americans and other minorities. "Let's be honest, the Jews have a disproportionate impact in our society," Roper says. "All we're saying is, white people have to fight for their rights, too."
Klan and skinhead activitymarches, rallies, cross burningsrose significantly last year, according to a new report by the Southern Poverty Law Center. And more headlines are on the way. Duke is busy planning a homecoming party and a national speaking tourand he's eying an open Louisiana congressional seat.
Roper's next big act will be in Topeka, Kans., where he is planning a major demonstration at this month's 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education court decision. "We'll make our voice heard," he says. The question is, which voice will he usethe softer tone he uses in public, or the harder line he takes privately with supporters? The day after the 9/11 attacks, Roper posted a statement on the Web that read, in part: "Anyone who is willing to drive a plane into a building to kill Jews is alright by me... The enemy of our enemy is, for now at least, our friend." The war on terror may have distracted extremists for a time, but it would appear that hatred's familiar habits are back in force again.
05.03.04 (2:41 pm) [edit]
In case you haven't heard...
[line]
JERUSALEMIsraeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was dealt a huge blow by his Likud party Sunday when it overwhelmingly rejected his plan to withdraw unilaterally from the Gaza Strip.
Sixty-one percent of the ruling party members who voted rejected the scheme, public television reported hours after polling ended.
The television figures, aired early Monday, were based on 53 percent of the votes cast.
Just 38 percent of the votes casted were in favor of the plan, according to the television report.
About 40 percent of the Likuds 193,000 members turned out for the crucial vote, according to initial estimates. Only Likud members were allowed to vote on Sharons plan.
The rejection by his own party of the plan he spent most of the past several months promoting is one of the most serious setbacks Sharon has suffered since taking office as prime minister in March 2001.
The centerpiece of his US-backed disengagement plan is a withdrawal of most troops and the removal of all 21 Jewish settlements from the Gaza Strip.
Currently some 8,000 Jewish settlers live in the Gaza Strip along with 1.5 million Palestinians.
In a statement issued by his office, Sharon promised to respect the outcome of the vote, but did not elaborate on how that would materialize.
I will consult the ministers, the Likud and the coalition parties in the coming days to hold in-depth discussions on the consequences of this vote, he added.
Observers said the vote was directly influenced by a day of bloodshed, notably the slaying of a settler woman and her four young daughters in the Gaza Strip.
The United States voiced the hope that Sharon would nonetheless go ahead with his plan to unilaterally withdraw from Gaza.
Our own view has not changed: The president welcomed Prime Minister Sharons plan to withdraw settlements from Gaza and a part of the West Bank as a courageous and important step toward peace, the White House said in a statement.
Justice Minister Tommy Lapid, of the secular party Shinui party, deplored the referendum result.
This is the victory of a small group of extremists, he said. I was dreaming of a coalition with Labor, Likud and Shinui. Now this dream could be history.
But Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said a unilateral withdrawal from Gaza Strip remained Israels only option.
The prime minister had warned earlier he considered the referendum chiefly a moral dutynot legally required or bindingand that he would press on with the Gaza withdrawal even if Likud members voted it down.
But his defeat was likely to shatter the fragile government coalition and Sharon could have to seek the general publics endorsement of his plan or submit it only to the cabinet.
Few commentators expected the hard-nosed prime minister to resign but the Labor-led opposition demanded early elections.
Sharon had stressed that Israelis needed to realize that the whole of biblical Palestine could not be under Israeli control without incurring a huge human, financial and political cost.
But settlers and members of the nationalist right-wing have accused Sharonthe architect of Israels settlement policy over decadesof letting his children down.
Most of the Likud ballots were cast after two Palestinian gunmen shot a pregnant woman from the Gaza Strip settlement bloc of Gush Katif and her four daughters, aged between two and 11.
Israeli soldiers gunned down the two perpetrators of the attack, jointly claimed by the Islamic Jihad group and Popular Resistance Committees, a loose alliance of radical groups.
In reaction, Israeli helicopters staged a raid on a Gaza City building housing two radio stations, including one with links to the Islamist movement Hamas, that caused no injuries.
Commentators said the deadly ambush, on residents of a settlement which under Sharons plan is to be dismantled by next year, helped sway the balance in favor of its opponents.
The Palestinian Authority was swift to urge Sharon to resume negotiations following the rebuff of his plan, which he claimed he had to draw up in the absence of a suitable negotiating partner on the Palestinian side.
After this failure, the Israeli government should immediately resume negotiations with the representatives of the Palestinian people in order to seriously implement the roadmap, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat top adviser Nabil Abu Rudeina told AFP.
He was referring to an internationally drafted peace blueprint which was approved by both sides last year, but which Sharon recently declared dead.
For his part, Palestinian negotiations minister Saeb Erakat predicted that the humiliating defeat suffered by Sharon could prompt him to scale down his withdrawal from the flashpoint Gaza Strip.
After this defeat, Sharon could announce that he will relinquish only some parts of the Gaza Strip and withdraw partially from the territory, not completely, he told AFP.
-- AFP
In case you haven't heard...
[line]
JERUSALEMIsraeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was dealt a huge blow by his Likud party Sunday when it overwhelmingly rejected his plan to withdraw unilaterally from the Gaza Strip.
Sixty-one percent of the ruling party members who voted rejected the scheme, public television reported hours after polling ended.
The television figures, aired early Monday, were based on 53 percent of the votes cast.
Just 38 percent of the votes casted were in favor of the plan, according to the television report.
About 40 percent of the Likuds 193,000 members turned out for the crucial vote, according to initial estimates. Only Likud members were allowed to vote on Sharons plan.
The rejection by his own party of the plan he spent most of the past several months promoting is one of the most serious setbacks Sharon has suffered since taking office as prime minister in March 2001.
The centerpiece of his US-backed disengagement plan is a withdrawal of most troops and the removal of all 21 Jewish settlements from the Gaza Strip.
Currently some 8,000 Jewish settlers live in the Gaza Strip along with 1.5 million Palestinians.
In a statement issued by his office, Sharon promised to respect the outcome of the vote, but did not elaborate on how that would materialize.
I will consult the ministers, the Likud and the coalition parties in the coming days to hold in-depth discussions on the consequences of this vote, he added.
Observers said the vote was directly influenced by a day of bloodshed, notably the slaying of a settler woman and her four young daughters in the Gaza Strip.
The United States voiced the hope that Sharon would nonetheless go ahead with his plan to unilaterally withdraw from Gaza.
Our own view has not changed: The president welcomed Prime Minister Sharons plan to withdraw settlements from Gaza and a part of the West Bank as a courageous and important step toward peace, the White House said in a statement.
Justice Minister Tommy Lapid, of the secular party Shinui party, deplored the referendum result.
This is the victory of a small group of extremists, he said. I was dreaming of a coalition with Labor, Likud and Shinui. Now this dream could be history.
But Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said a unilateral withdrawal from Gaza Strip remained Israels only option.
The prime minister had warned earlier he considered the referendum chiefly a moral dutynot legally required or bindingand that he would press on with the Gaza withdrawal even if Likud members voted it down.
But his defeat was likely to shatter the fragile government coalition and Sharon could have to seek the general publics endorsement of his plan or submit it only to the cabinet.
Few commentators expected the hard-nosed prime minister to resign but the Labor-led opposition demanded early elections.
Sharon had stressed that Israelis needed to realize that the whole of biblical Palestine could not be under Israeli control without incurring a huge human, financial and political cost.
But settlers and members of the nationalist right-wing have accused Sharonthe architect of Israels settlement policy over decadesof letting his children down.
Most of the Likud ballots were cast after two Palestinian gunmen shot a pregnant woman from the Gaza Strip settlement bloc of Gush Katif and her four daughters, aged between two and 11.
Israeli soldiers gunned down the two perpetrators of the attack, jointly claimed by the Islamic Jihad group and Popular Resistance Committees, a loose alliance of radical groups.
In reaction, Israeli helicopters staged a raid on a Gaza City building housing two radio stations, including one with links to the Islamist movement Hamas, that caused no injuries.
Commentators said the deadly ambush, on residents of a settlement which under Sharons plan is to be dismantled by next year, helped sway the balance in favor of its opponents.
The Palestinian Authority was swift to urge Sharon to resume negotiations following the rebuff of his plan, which he claimed he had to draw up in the absence of a suitable negotiating partner on the Palestinian side.
After this failure, the Israeli government should immediately resume negotiations with the representatives of the Palestinian people in order to seriously implement the roadmap, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat top adviser Nabil Abu Rudeina told AFP.
He was referring to an internationally drafted peace blueprint which was approved by both sides last year, but which Sharon recently declared dead.
For his part, Palestinian negotiations minister Saeb Erakat predicted that the humiliating defeat suffered by Sharon could prompt him to scale down his withdrawal from the flashpoint Gaza Strip.
After this defeat, Sharon could announce that he will relinquish only some parts of the Gaza Strip and withdraw partially from the territory, not completely, he told AFP.
-- AFP
05.03.04 (2:34 pm) [edit]
In all nations, there are those in positions of power, be they great or be they lower than great, who abuse the populice and those around them. All nations have these individuals and, therefore, this problem. In Israel, the government takes care of the problem and jails those people. In Gaza and the West Bank, those people run free, and even run their civilization, kidnapping the children to kill themselves for Allah.
My condolences to the Palestinian boy's family. My congradulations to the officials of Israel in administerring justice by jailing this captain.
[line]
[b]Last Update: 03/05/2004 22:45
[i]By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent, and Haaretz Service [/b][/i]
A military court on Monday sentenced an Israel Defense Forces captain found guilty last month of causing the death by negligence of Mohammed Ali Zeid, 16, in October 2002.
Captain Zvi Koratski was sentenced to six months in prison and a further six months on probation. He was also demoted to the rank of first lieutenant.
The conviction is one of the first of the current intifada pertaining to a case in which a Palestinian was killed.
Koratski served as deputy commander of an artillery battalion that on October 5, 2002 dispersed demonstrating Palestinians in the village of Nazlat Zeid, southwest of Jenin. He shot and killed the Palestinian youth, who was on the porch of his house. The Palestinian was apparently hit after soldiers fired in the air to impose a curfew.
A B'Tselem human rights organization investigator heard of the circumstances of Mohammed Ali Zeid's death the day after the incident from the young man's cousin and classmate, Mohammed Smir Zeid. According to him, at approximately 2 P.M., his cousin came to his house to study for a math test.
Mohammed Smir Zeid said that 10 minutes later they heard a jeep close to the house. Then they heard a soldier announce the imposition of a curfew on the village. The youths looked out the window and saw the jeep. "I saw the soldier sitting next to the driver open the door, holding a weapon," Mohammed Smir Zeid said.
According to Mohammed Smir Zeid, the jeep was some 10 meters from his home. "The soldier pointed his weapon at us, but did not say anything to us," he said. "Mohammed and I turned away, and suddenly I heard a shot fired very close to me. Mohammed took a step or two, and fell to the ground."
Mohammed Smir Zeid called his father, who told him to call his uncle, Mustafa Zeid, to bring his car and take his wounded son to hospital. The men were held up at two military checkpoints. Mohammed Ali Zeid was pronounced dead at the hospital.
In all nations, there are those in positions of power, be they great or be they lower than great, who abuse the populice and those around them. All nations have these individuals and, therefore, this problem. In Israel, the government takes care of the problem and jails those people. In Gaza and the West Bank, those people run free, and even run their civilization, kidnapping the children to kill themselves for Allah.
My condolences to the Palestinian boy's family. My congradulations to the officials of Israel in administerring justice by jailing this captain.
[line]
[b]Last Update: 03/05/2004 22:45
[i]By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent, and Haaretz Service [/b][/i]
A military court on Monday sentenced an Israel Defense Forces captain found guilty last month of causing the death by negligence of Mohammed Ali Zeid, 16, in October 2002.
Captain Zvi Koratski was sentenced to six months in prison and a further six months on probation. He was also demoted to the rank of first lieutenant.
The conviction is one of the first of the current intifada pertaining to a case in which a Palestinian was killed.
Koratski served as deputy commander of an artillery battalion that on October 5, 2002 dispersed demonstrating Palestinians in the village of Nazlat Zeid, southwest of Jenin. He shot and killed the Palestinian youth, who was on the porch of his house. The Palestinian was apparently hit after soldiers fired in the air to impose a curfew.
A B'Tselem human rights organization investigator heard of the circumstances of Mohammed Ali Zeid's death the day after the incident from the young man's cousin and classmate, Mohammed Smir Zeid. According to him, at approximately 2 P.M., his cousin came to his house to study for a math test.
Mohammed Smir Zeid said that 10 minutes later they heard a jeep close to the house. Then they heard a soldier announce the imposition of a curfew on the village. The youths looked out the window and saw the jeep. "I saw the soldier sitting next to the driver open the door, holding a weapon," Mohammed Smir Zeid said.
According to Mohammed Smir Zeid, the jeep was some 10 meters from his home. "The soldier pointed his weapon at us, but did not say anything to us," he said. "Mohammed and I turned away, and suddenly I heard a shot fired very close to me. Mohammed took a step or two, and fell to the ground."
Mohammed Smir Zeid called his father, who told him to call his uncle, Mustafa Zeid, to bring his car and take his wounded son to hospital. The men were held up at two military checkpoints. Mohammed Ali Zeid was pronounced dead at the hospital.
A Quote
05.03.04 (2:16 pm) [edit]
I get a weekly email sent to me called "Charlie Fink's Quote of the Week." Many of you reading this may receive it too. At any rate, I thought I'd share this week's quote because it really says a lot in so little words.
It also has individual meaning to each reader....
[b][i]War is cruelty. There's no use trying to reform it, the crueler it is the sooner it will be over.[/i][/b]-William Tecumseh Sherman
What does this quote say to you?
Plays Ponder Problems of Palestine
05.03.04 (2:13 pm) [edit]
[b]Mon May 3, 8:40 AM ET
[i]By Simi Horwitz [/b][/i]
NEW YORK (Back Stage) - Amid the ongoing crisis in the Mideast, the current spate of plays about Jews, Israelis, Arabs, and their evolving relationships is perhaps not surprising.
Still, the range of tone and vision voiced in these works seems striking. The plays (some running, others closed) include "Golda's Balcony," "Sixteen Wounded," "Roar," "Fist," "Rite of Return," and, of course, "Homebody/Kabul."
The latter, Tony Kushner's play, slated for a May run at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, is the most complex of the lot in its multilayered examination of Western perceptions of the Muslim world, although it does not specifically address the lives of Palestinians, Israelis, or Jews.
William Gibson's "Golda's Balcony" (now playing at the Helen Hayes (news) Theater), on the other hand, tackles the issue head-on, presenting a highly sympathetic view of Israel. Still, Gibson's vision is by no means one-dimensional, with his depiction of a pained Prime Minister Golda Meir (Tovah Feldshuh (news)) watching Israel become aggressively militaristic and hating every minute of it, yet seeing no option.
"Sixteen Wounded" (recently opened and closed at the Walter Kerr Theater), by newcomer Eliam Kraiem, attempts to offer the Palestinian perspective on the crisis without denigrating the Israeli experience. In this play, set in Holland, the politics emerge through the evolving relationship between a Palestinian (Omar Metwally) and a Jew (Judd Hirsch). Nevertheless, the play seems to favor the Palestinian, an appealing figure who throughout airs his views, recounts his family's sense of displacement, and justifies Palestinian terrorist activity in general and the suicide bombers in particular. The Israeli side is never voiced, the Jew in this instance being rootless, with no special interest in Israel. In the end, however, the play unwittingly (or perhaps wittingly) boosts Israel's stance, despite Kraiem's desire to write a character study as opposed to a drama that advocates any political posture.
"I've become increasingly less interested in Mideastern politics and more concerned with the differences and similarities between two men -- a Palestinian and a Jew -- both of whom have had to deal with extremely oppressive circumstances (at different times in their lives)," notes Kraiem, an American of Israeli descent. "I'm looking at the ways in which they have maintained or not maintained their national identities."
Playwright Misha Shulman, an Israeli living in America, is not interested in subtle character studies at all, or so it would appear. Indeed, his play "The Fist" (which recently played Off-Broadway at Theater for the New City) is an old-fashioned political drama with characters mouthing opposing viewpoints. Set in Israel, the play describes a family in turmoil over the decision of an adult son not to serve in the army any longer. He has become a "refusenik" -- a conscientious objector who cannot accept Israel's position regarding the Palestinians -- and he is a source of humiliation to his father and grandfather. "The Fist" voices both sides convincingly and is unexpectedly disturbing and ambiguous.
Still, the playwright clearly comes down on the side of the refusenik. The title alone is a giveaway. It refers to a poem by Israeli poet Yehudah Amichai. In the heat of family battle, the refusenik cites the poem as a kind of apologia for Palestinian terrorism. He quotes, "'Even the fist was once an open palm and fingers.' Something made their hands into a fist. We are that something."
"Truthfully, when I started writing this play I was ambivalent in my views," says Shulman, who also played the refusenik. "It took me the whole writing process to decide that I support the refusenik. But I didn't want to write propaganda. That's why I set the play in the context of a family, where each character has a very personal connection to the crisis. One character is a Holocaust survivor; another has killed an Arab child. And then there is the uncle who was recently killed by a suicide bomber. Israel is a society in pain and that's what I wanted to show."
At the opposite end of the spectrum, there is "Rite of Return" by Victoria Linchon, an American of Taiwanese extraction. In this piece (currently running at Theater for the New City), which takes place in the Mideast and suburban U.S.A., almost all of the characters, including the adopted Christian daughter of liberal Jewish parents, have been stripped of their identities, if not literally tortured, by either Israelis or American Jews. That aside, "Rite of Return" considers the plight of the socially/politically/psyc hologically disenfranchised (Palestinians among them) in search of roots and homeland--and all that those terms imply, literally and metaphorically speaking.
"Roar," by Palestinian-American Betty Shamieh, is a departure from the others on several fronts, most notably its setting: Detroit. "Roar" (now playing Off-Broadway at the Harold Clurman Theater) is essentially a traditional family drama -- awash in intergenerational conflict and infidelity -- coupled with identity politics. The family's American-born teenage daughter has her sights set on a singing career and is largely removed from the concerns of her Palestinian elders, short of the personal entanglements that ensue. Her parents, aunt, and uncle, by contrast, are Palestinian refugees with varying emotional connections to the Mideast. It's made clear that they've all been brutalized in refugee camps, mostly at the hands of Jordanians working with Israelis.
Still, they have moved on. Now residing in Detroit, they own a number of buildings, although they continue to live very modestly, pretending to be supers instead of landlords. At one point, the mother of the family says that no one would rent an apartment from Arab landlords. She is the most politically committed member of the clan, nostalgically yearning for Palestinian music and food and abhorring her brother-in-law's cultural self-denial. He has changed his name and converted to Judaism, or so he alleges to his colleagues in the music business. He believes that if the truth about his ethnicity were known, he would not be hired, let alone rise within the ranks. The characters' assumptions about Israelis and Jews and life in America are never challenged. They're presented as axiomatic truths. To that extent, the play is political.
That said, "Roar" is in no way a polemic. In fact, it's far more closely allied to a TV movie, with its depiction of a stunningly ordinary immigrant family enduring interpersonal miseries. But then, that ordinariness is precisely playwright Betty Shamieh's point.
"The vast number of Palestinian families are just like the one I describe," Shamieh stresses. "They make money, have sex, go about their lives. They are no different from anyone else. And that is what I was trying to show. I also wanted to show an unabashedly sexual Palestinian woman, the kind of women I grew up with. Again, that's an image Americans are not familiar with."
Reuters/Back Stage
05.03.04 (9:40 am) [edit]
More of what WhyNot and his little chums like to see...
[line]
[b]Sun May 2, 7:36 AM ET
[i]By ALON BERNSTEIN, Associated Press Writer [/b][/i]
KISSUFIM CROSSING, Gaza Strip - Palestinian militants attacked an Israeli vehicle near the entrance of a Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip (news - web sites), killing four children and their mother, the Israeli army said. Two attackers were killed.
The attack near the entrance of the Gush Katif bloc of settlements came as the ruling Likud Party was holding a referendum on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites)'s plan to pull out of Gaza. Israel had stepped up security in Gaza ahead of the vote.
The militants opened fire near the settlement of Nezer Hazani killing the five family members and wounding a motorist in a second vehicle before detonating a bomb, the army spokesman said.
Two soldiers were wounded by gunfire, and the attackers were killed by return fire, the army said.
The militant Islamic Jihad and Popular Resistance Committees, an umbrella group of militants, claimed responsibility for the "heroic" attack in a call to The Associated Press.
The attack was the deadliest on Israeli settlers in Gaza in many months, and it was unclear how it would affect Sunday's vote. Polls have shown voters are closely divided over the withdrawal plan.
Sharon has said his plan would boost Israel's security in the absence of a peace agreement with the Palestinians. His opponents have accused Sharon of caving in to Palestinian militants.
There has been a spike in Gaza violence since Sharon announced his intentions to exit the territory several months ago, with each side trying to claim victory ahead of a withdrawal.
Israel had gone on high security alert Sunday ahead of the referendum, dividing Gaza into three sections and restricting Palestinian travel.
More of what WhyNot and his little chums like to see...
[line]
[b]Sun May 2, 7:36 AM ET
[i]By ALON BERNSTEIN, Associated Press Writer [/b][/i]
KISSUFIM CROSSING, Gaza Strip - Palestinian militants attacked an Israeli vehicle near the entrance of a Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip (news - web sites), killing four children and their mother, the Israeli army said. Two attackers were killed.
The attack near the entrance of the Gush Katif bloc of settlements came as the ruling Likud Party was holding a referendum on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites)'s plan to pull out of Gaza. Israel had stepped up security in Gaza ahead of the vote.
The militants opened fire near the settlement of Nezer Hazani killing the five family members and wounding a motorist in a second vehicle before detonating a bomb, the army spokesman said.
Two soldiers were wounded by gunfire, and the attackers were killed by return fire, the army said.
The militant Islamic Jihad and Popular Resistance Committees, an umbrella group of militants, claimed responsibility for the "heroic" attack in a call to The Associated Press.
The attack was the deadliest on Israeli settlers in Gaza in many months, and it was unclear how it would affect Sunday's vote. Polls have shown voters are closely divided over the withdrawal plan.
Sharon has said his plan would boost Israel's security in the absence of a peace agreement with the Palestinians. His opponents have accused Sharon of caving in to Palestinian militants.
There has been a spike in Gaza violence since Sharon announced his intentions to exit the territory several months ago, with each side trying to claim victory ahead of a withdrawal.
Israel had gone on high security alert Sunday ahead of the referendum, dividing Gaza into three sections and restricting Palestinian travel.
Like other nations, or a light unto them?
05.03.04 (9:29 am) [edit]
[b]May. 1, 2004 22:47
[i]By NACHMAN SHAI, Jerusalem Post[/b][/i]
On the eve of Independence Day and Memorial Day, we were told that the number of Israeli residents is 6,780,000 81% of whom are Jewish.
We were also told that in 1948 there were 800,000 people here Jews, Arabs, and others. That, in a nutshell, is the story of the 56 tumultuous years since Israel was founded. But that is not the whole story.
The saga of Israel's 56 years is one of the most moving and unusual tales of the last century.
The journey the Jewish people took from Holocaust to revival is one to which we are too close to appreciate and understand. We know only that our founding fathers were brilliant in deciding to frame within one week Holocaust Remembrance Day, Remembrance Day for the Fallen of Israel's Wars (and now victims of terrorism, too), and Independence Day.
It is a difficult but meaningful week because it encompasses in a very short time the heroic story of the Jewish people through the 20th century and because it has long-term lessons for us as a nation and as individuals.
ABOUT THREE weeks ago I went with hundreds of Jerusalemites to the small Belgian town of Charlerois to watch a "fateful" basketball game the European final (ULEB) between Hapoel Migdal from Jerusalem and Real Madrid from Spain.
It was certainly not a historic event, even though Hapoel won the game and returned to Jerusalem bathed in waves of affection. But I asked myself: Why did that event draw so much attention? Why did the newspapers splash it on their front pages? And why did thousands of Israelis take themselves and their families to Charlerois?
There was a simple and very important answer: We want normalcy!
Our 56 years of independence have been full of great difficulties and conflicts. Turmoil became Israel's trademark, especially since the Yom Kippur War approximately halfway between 1948 and now.
That fault line, which was an existential threat to the State of Israel, led to a political reversal, to the shattering of one camp, one party, one stream's monopoly, and to Israel's becoming a "normal" country with two large blocs competing with each other.
But the normalcy, the human desire to be "a nation like all others," clashed with the heavy burden this country took upon itself from its early days and the tasks it wished to fulfill along the way: immigration, absorption, development, construction, education, science, culture everything quickly without a moment to stop and feel self-satisfaction.
That is why Ben-Gurion asked the 600,000 who comprised the Yishuv in the early days to be "a light unto the nations," and opined that otherwise there was no justification for the Jewish state. What was it meant to be? Just another country, another group of people living on a small piece of land, with political sovereignty?
That is what Ben-Gurion did not want. The vision he embraced and carried out to a large extent was to prove that this country could and should be different.
Today it seems that task is too much for us. Instead of "a light unto the nations," we have become "like the nations," like other countries.
That is how a nice, modest athletic victory became a national event. We want trivial events to top the news instead of terrorism, instead of the bleeding conflict, instead of new economic sanctions or one scandal or another. We want peace and quiet.
Is that a sign of weakness? Does that mean we have given up? That we are no longer worthy of Ben-Gurion's vision, or even Herzl's?
I don't think so. Even now, in the heat of military conflict, we are not deterred.
We insist on continuing our routines. That means we are strong, that we still have the strength that got us this far.
But it would be nice to introduce an element of stability, of routine, into that way of life. How beautiful it is when millions go out on Pessah to see the beauty of our country. How wonderful it can be at the end of Independence Day to give the Israel Prize to our best and most talented.
How moving it can be to meet the many organizations we have for self-help and outreach that supplement government and foster civil society.
This is how we can be both "a light unto the nations" and "like other nations." There is no contradiction; the two complement each other.
On our 56th Independence Day we rested, we were proud. Now, we need to get ready for another difficult year.
[i]The writer is director-general of the United Jewish Communities-Israel and recently retired chairman of the board of the Israel Broadcasting Authority.[/i]
Analysis: Sharon disengages from the Likud
05.03.04 (9:25 am) [edit]
[i][b]By ANSHEL PFEFFER, the Jerusalem Post[/b][/i]
The Likud has never spurned its leader. From its early Revisionist origins in the 1920s, the party faithful always rallied around Jabotinsky, Begin, Shamir, and Netanyahu, no matter what.
Dissenters were ostracized and eventually found themselves on the outside.
Ariel Sharon is different. After building a military and then a political career out of antagonizing his superiors, he is now doing the same thing to his supporters from the top of the pyramid.
Last night's results were the most striking example yet, but not the first. He has been defying the Likud's central committee in the same way almost since his elevation to party chairman in 1999. So far, it seems to have worked well for him.
Two years ago he defied the central committee that rejected his resolution in favor of a Palestinian state and went on to soundly beat Netanyahu's leadership challenge and lead the Likud to an overwhelming elections victory.
After yesterday's defeat it seems that Sharon is sticking to the same strategy. There's no question, he didn't spend 73 years clawing his way to the top just to resign after a small fraction of the 1.7 million people who voted personally for him three years ago, rejected a plan endorsed by the US president.
Sharon's aides were talking last night about the real referendum from their point of view, the clear majority in not only the Israeli public as a whole, but among the Likud's voters also, in favor of disengagement. They are predicting now a public backlash against the Likud of such a magnitude, that the same party members who yesterday were almost showing him the door, out of fear of losing power, will re-endorse him, disengagement plan and all.
Sharon's game plan now is to sit out the storm and wait for his party members to realize the hard electoral facts. Neither Uzi Landau, nor Nomi Blumenthal or Michael Ratzon, or any other Knesset member who opposed the plan, will bring in the votes that Sharon has. The leaders of the opposition camp in the Likud last night rushed to swear allegiance to the vanquished leader.
MK Gilad Erdan told The Jerusalem Post, "we haven't humiliated Sharon. Tomorrow, he will still be the prime minister, and with a more stable coalition. We appreciate what he did in asking the party."
The victors have no option but Sharon. Despite losing, the prime minister emerges with one tangible political gain.
He has effectively neutralized any high-profile challengers in the party. None of the prospective contenders is in a position to capitalize on Sharon's debacle, since they were all made to toe the line and support the program. Any hopes that Netanyahu might have entertained will have to be put on hold.
All that said, the referendum can on no account be considered a victory for Sharon. For the third time, his team ran a campaign in which Sharon's leadership was virtually the only selling point. In the 2001 and 2003 elections, it worked beyond their wildest dreams. Despite the negative polls, until last weekend they still believed that the leadership principle would kick in, and that the Likud rank and file would step back from the brink and not humiliate Arik.
Lior Horev, one of Sharon's main campaign advisors, admitted that the prime minister's image, in a referendum that he initiated, on the plan he devised, was the pivotal element and this time, "it failed."
Horev blamed the Likud members who "couldn't bear the burden of responsibility; they didn't want to be the ones to vote on removing Jews from their homes."
Sharon would have preferred having a general referendum, he said, but it would have taken too long to legislate. After last night, it seems that Sharon will try and give the public its choice all the same.
