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The Hamas honeymoon is over

I don't know how much credit to give this story, but it has a few pretty funny moments at the end.

Egypt has been waiting to put Hamas in its place for almost a year and a half. Ever since the organization controlling the Gaza Strip broke through the Rafah crossing, a series of issues in which Hamas refused to compromise were left without a harsh response – but now, according to a senior Palestinian Authority official, things are difference.

The uncovering of Hizbullah's terror network in Egypt was a sign that the winds have changed.

According to the source, it was only a matter of time before the Egyptians settle the score with Hamas over its conduct since it took over the Strip. "Hamas leaders were mistaken if they thought they could continue embarrassing the Egyptians on the funds and arms smuggling issue, without a response.

"The breaching of the Rafah crossing in January 2007 turned the Egyptian soil into a walkway for Hamas members, and the Egyptians were waiting to settle the account over that too."

That's not the funny part. This is:

The Hamas delegation was the only one put under tight security, the Hamas members' possessions were searched thoroughly as if they were smugglers, and senior organization members were banned entry to Cairo.

I would have paid money to see that.

Hizbullah in Gaza

Egypt arrested a cell of terrorists that were smuggling weapons into and out of Gaza. Hassan Nasrallah has admitted his men were part of the ring, and accused Egypt of supporting the Israeli side by not allowing his men to freely smuggle weapons into Gaza. Egypt is not very pleased with the goings-on, because the cell was also taking aim at the Egyptian government--a charge that Nasrallah, of course, denies.

Buried near the end of the latest Ynet article about the story is some information that leads me to one very important question:

According to the report, some of the suspects entered Egypt through the tunnels connecting between the Gaza Strip and Sinai, and the head of the network was senior Hizbullah member Mohammad Kabalan, who managed to escape. The man reportedly resided in Egypt between 2007 and 2008 in a bid to recruit and arm terrorist elements.

The question: How did Hezbullah agents get into Gaza?

One would hope they're getting in via the smuggling tunnels from Egypt. Because the alternative is that they're getting in through Israel.

In any event, Egypt is hopping mad at Hezbullah, and that's a good thing.

Egyptian officials responded angrily to Hassan Nasrallah's speech Friday, in which the Hizbullah secretary-general admitted that his organization has been smuggling weapons into Gaza.

"Nasrallah wants to turn Egypt into a playground like Lebanon," one of the officials told the London-based al-Sharq al-Awsat newspaper on Saturday.

Following the arrest of Hizbullah men in the country, the source added that "Egypt is not a playground in which others can play. Egypt is not a building without a doorkeeper."

This is literally a case of "The enemy of my enemy is my friend."

Palestinians claim the Dead Sea Scrolls

I knew the Palestinians claimed a lot of things, but I didn't know that the Palestinians claim the Dead Sea Scrolls as their own, simply by reason of the place in which they were discovered.

But the "moderate" prime minister of the Palestinians is protesting a Canadian museum's display of the scrolls.

Beginning in June, the ROM will host a six-month exhibit of the famed Dead Sea Scrolls, organized in co-operation with the Israel Antiquities Authority.

But top Palestinian officials this week declared the exhibit a violation of international law and called on Canada to cancel the show.

In letters to Prime Minister Stephen Harper and top executives at the ROM, senior Palestinian officials argue the scrolls – widely regarded as among the great archaeological discoveries of the 20th century – were acquired illegally by Israel when the Jewish state annexed East Jerusalem in 1967.

"The exhibition would entail exhibiting or displaying artifacts removed from the Palestinian territories," said Hamdan Taha, director-general of the archaeological department in the Palestinian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities.

They're our books, written by Jews. What do the Palestinians want them for, other than their constant I-me-mine meme.

The scrolls were discovered in 11 caves on the northwestern shore of the Dead Sea, mostly between 1947 and 1956, and their ownership has long been a matter of fierce dispute between Israeli and Palestinian authorities.

[...] Written mostly on parchment and partly on papyrus, the scrolls number about 900 manuscripts in all and mouldered undisturbed for roughly 20 centuries until their accidental discovery in 1947 by a young Bedouin Arab.

[...]

The caves containing the scrolls were located near Qumran, in what is now the Palestinian West Bank.

Beginning in 1947, and for nearly a decade, experts from the Rockefeller Museum in East Jerusalem, the Jordanian Department of Antiquities, and the École biblique et archéologique française excavated the caves and salvaged the scrolls, only a few of which were found whole. The rest were scattered into thousands of fragments.

Written mainly in Hebrew, and partly in Aramaic and Greek, the scrolls include about 200 copies of portions of the Jewish Bible.

At first, the scrolls were housed in the Rockefeller Museum in East Jerusalem, which was under Jordanian control at the time.

So, basically, the Jordanians, in partnership with the French and Americans, took precious Jewish artifacts away from the Jews to whom they belong. I do believe that Egypt just got back an ancient mummy from a museum in America, and I also believe that museums all over the world are negotiating the return of artifacts taken during the days of colonialism. So the Palestinians can just STFU, because those scrolls don't belong to the people who were on the land at the time of the discovery. They belong to the people who wrote the scrolls.

That being said, expect many protests. Canada is full of Israel-haters.

Stop spending out future

A video to be watched, and shared.



I don't care who's sponsoring this site. They're right.

Zamir recants; troops want investigation

Even as Danny Zamir protests, IDF reservists who served in Operation Cast Lead are asking Israeli's attorney general to investigate Ha'aretz for publishing the accounts of supposed "war crimes" without adequately checking their veracity.

The letter, signed by 65 reservists who served in Operation Cast Lead, sent the letter to Mazuz on Monday and asked that he launch an investigation against Haaretz on charges of slander for reporting on the testimonies as if they were fact and not hearsay.

"It appears to us that Haaretz did not do the minimum of checking before reporting false accusations," the letter read.

"We are fed up with being called murderers and war criminals," said Amit Barak, who initiated the letter. "We will not tolerate being treated this way after as reservists we contribute to the state and come to serve in the IDF. We expect the state to stand up for us, its soldiers."

I am sypathetic to this request. The irresponsibility of Ha'aretz continues today. However, I can't believe that the Attorney General would be able to take any action against Ha'aretz. Unless Ha'aretz could be shown to have been in violation of the law or libeled someone specific, it will be free to be irresponsible. That's the nature of press freedom. Unfortunately.

Both Backspin and CAMERA wonder if Zamir's regrets will get the play his charges got. Israel Matzav is skeptical that Zamir regrets what he did, but is rather concerned with keeping his pre-military academy going.

I hardly expect the media to cover Zamir's regrets. Dion Nissenbaum at his blog, both failed to note that the Israeli investigation found out that the allegations were unsubstantiated hearsay.

Nissenbaum quoted the Ha'aretz reporter, as if this were grounds for conviction:

"When statements came only from Palestinian witnesses or 'the hostile press,' it was possible to dismiss them as propaganda that served the enemy," Haaretz journalist Amos Harel wrote in his analysis of the allegations. "But what can be done when the soldiers themselves tell the story?"

Nissenbaum even followed up with two more posts about "war crimes," and continued to suggest that there was something to the allegations even after the IDF investigation. Now that Zamir is apparently recanting, will Nissenbaum acknowledge that he's been giving too much attention to rumors?

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Chag v'kosher sameach

Have a happy and kosher Pesach, my friends.

Hamas will never, ever recognize Israel

Talk to Hamas? Why? Because they'll eventually moderate, learn to live with Israel in a Palestinian state, side by side in peace and equality?

No, they won't. They keep saying so. The world keeps ignoring it when they do.

Dr. Ismail Radwan, a senior political leader of Hamas, stated that Hamas will not deal with or be part of any government which recognizes the occupation, and will not accept the demands of thew Quartet.

Radwan added that Hamas will not accept the abandonment of legitimate Palestinian rights, and will not be part of any government which recognizes Israel as a legitimate entity on the historic lands of Palestine.

In a written statement received by the Palestine Information Center on Monday evening, Radwan said that Hamas will never recognize the occupation and will not grant it legitimacy.

This is from a Palestinian media outlet. And there's more.

Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, stated that any new government in Ramallah, under any name, will not be legitimate without a submission to legislative council for a confidence vote. He added that talks on rebuilding Gaza are another deceit by the Ramallah government.

In a statement to the Quds Press, Sami Abu Zuhri, spokesperson of Hamas, called on Fateh movement “to free itself from the US preconditions”.

“We are not the problem”, Abu Zuhri said, “The problem is in those who link the success of the talks with an American blessing”.

He also said that Ramallah government is illegitimate, and that any new government will not be legitimate unless it is presented and approved by the legislative council.

Abu Zuhri further said that the term of president Mahmoud Abbas in office had already ended, and added that this issue is one of the problems obstructing unity talks.

It's all there, for those who want to see it. But that won't be the media, international negotiators, the UN, the EU, and most especially, Jimmy Carter.

In every generation, they rise against us. Tonight, we celebrate the failure of our enemies to destroy us. Hamas will be a story told around the Seder tables many years from now, if at all.

Beverly Giesebrecht - kidnapped or run away?

Beverly Giesebrecht aka Khadija Abdul Qahaar, the woman who converted to Islam to honor her new brethren's breathtaking victory of 911, who created a pro-Jihadi Web site, Jihad Unspun, was allegedly kidnapped by her Taleban colleagues.

My guess would be that it is not a kidnapping at all. It is just a playacting, based on the old and honorable tradition still strong in some rural areas - the fake kidnapping of the bride. Now she is, most probably, in some exclusive cave with a breathtaking view, tending to her hubby's guns, horses and goats.

And on the face of the evidence available

I would say: let it go, folks. Finders keepers.

Cross-posted on SimplyJews

Passover

Mom's in town for Passover, and as the holiday is tomorrow, posting will necessarily be light. I'll be cooking, let's see, in the morning. Then driving to Northern VA, where I will be cooking in the afternoon, and attending a Seder in the evening. Then tomorrow, lather, linse, repeat.

I cooked tonight, in fact. Trader Joe's is selling kosher for Passover Empire meat products, so we had Chicken McMeryl tonight (home-made chicken nuggets) and, well, home-made french fries as well. And an awesome salad from Trader Joe produce. Trader Joe's has amazing produce.

I'll say it again tomorrow, but happy Passover to my Jewish readers.

AP shills for terrorists, again

The AP reports a terror attack as follows:

Israeli police kill Palestinian at demolition site
Israeli police fatally shot a Palestinian motorist Tuesday as he tried to run down officers guarding the demolition of the home of a militant who killed three Israelis with a construction vehicle in July.

Notice the headline does not state that the Palestinian was committing a terror attack, and thus was--at least--a "militant".

The driver's body was laid out on the street under a white plastic sheet with one of his hands sticking out near his white car, its windshield shattered by about 20 bullet holes.

We're still not calling him a "militant"--of course, the AP would never use the word "terrorist" to describe, well, a Palestinian terrorist. Only in a quote by an Israeli, anyway.

"One terrorist who was driving a vehicle attempted to run over a number of border police," Rosenfeld said. "The three border police were injured lightly on the legs when the vehicle hit them, they opened fire and shot and killed the terrorist at the scene."

And yet, the AP continues:

Police who witnessed the shooting said the driver came toward the roadblock at high speed.

And then you get a little of that famous color that the AP has allowed its writers to add:

At the time of the shooting, the demolition was still under way. Border police with their fingers on the triggers of automatic rifles stood guard while a crane-mounted pulverizer jaw methodically bit off chunks of stone and concrete walls and sent rubble crashing to the ground. They wrecked the top floor of a two-story home where Dwayat had lived, and left the neighbor's residence downstairs intact.

Oooh. Scary people, police officers with their hands on the triggers of their weapons. Five bucks says their hands were not on the triggers, but parallel to the triggers, which is standard military/police safety procedures, but which non-gun owning reporters don't comprehend. And then there's this bit of moral equivalency:

"I didn't see in the past that they demolished a house of any Israeli who killed a Palestinian," said the attacker's father Tassir Dwayat, standing in front of the house as it was destroyed.

Name the last Israeli terrorist who killed a Palestinian. Nothing like comparing apples with sea horses.

And here's the most egregious little bit to the AP article. The author spends some time explaining why the home is being demolished. It was the home of the terrorist who took a construction vehicle and used it to kill three Israelis. The AP reports the attack, but then adds this little throwaway in the last paragraph:

Before his rampage, Dwayat had been fined $50,000 for building his house without a permit, and a demolition order was on file, which could have motivated his attack.

Get it? It's always Israel's fault. Israel causes terrorism, no matter what. Destroy the home, don't destroy the home--it doesn't matter. The AP will find a reason to blame Israelis for their own deaths.

Anti-missile progress

With the recent launch of a North Korean missile in the news, it's a bit reassuring to know that Israel had a successful test of the Arrow anti-ballistic missile rocket.

The test was conducted jointly by the IAF and the US Missile Defense Agency. The Arrow is a project developed in cooperation by the IAI and Boeing.

The defensive missile was launched around 11 a.m. from the army's Palmahim base near Ashdod, and intercepted a Blue Sparrow missile fired by a fighter jet and impersonating a Shihab 3.

In other anti-missile news, the United States recently had a successful test of an Airborne Laser (ABL.) Here's a video explaining how it works.



Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Happy anniversary maybe

A week late the New York Times has a Memo from Cairo, For Egypt, Promise of 1979 Peace Still Unfulfilled. Of course the article is mostly reported through the prism of how little Egypt has gained from the Camp David Accords.

But mention of the anniversary also served as a reminder of promises unfulfilled. Egyptians were told that the treaty would lead to a comprehensive peace, and it did not. They were told that it would allow the government to focus on political, social and economic development, instead of war. But they still live in an authoritarian state, defined for many by poverty.

Egyptians were told that the treaty would give them a voice to advocate for the Palestinians. But few see it as having turned out that way.

That Egypt regained all the territory it lost during the Six Day War is acknowledged, but almost as a footnote. (Israel Matzav noted that Egypt viewed the regaining of the territory the main reason for the treaty.)

The most interesting aspect of the report is that the reporter notes the generational difference in attitudes towards the treaty with Israel - older people generally support it; younger people don't.

Still no effort is made to show how the official attitudes towards Israel shape the popular views. It would appear that the "cold peace" is the result of official hostility towards Israel. Which begs the question, what exactly does the United States benefit from the billions of dollars it's invested in Egypt over the past thirty years?

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Fodder for the Internationals: Home destruction is legal

Oh, this ruling is going to get the ISM peace creeps into a tizzy.

The Jerusalem Magistrate's Court denied a restitution claim filed by the family of the suicide bomber who carried out the 2001 attack on the Sbarro restaurant in Jerusalem.

The family demanded monetary compensation from the State for razing their house, in the West Bank city of Jenin.

Izz al-Din Shuheil al-Masri blew himself up in the middle of the Sbarro restaurant on August 9, 2001. The deadly attack, which included a 70kilogram (15-pound) explosives belt rigged with nails, nuts and bolts, claimed the lives of 15 people, including seven children, and left 130 wounded.

[...] Judge Yoel Tsur, presiding over the hearing, ruled Monday that razing and sealing off of terrorists' homes was a legal act of war. Tsur cited a Supreme Court ruling stating that such an act could be used as a measure of deterrence and that it complies with international law.

And I don't really care. You know what this case really proves? How well the security fence is working. Attacks like the Sbarro bombings used to come at the rate, sometimes, of two a day. Children were being ripped apart by metal shrapnel on a regular basis.

Now, Hamas and its terrorist brethren have no other way to murder children than to do it with weapons that can't kill and wound 145 people at one blow. Not that that stops them from targeting children.

The fence is working.

What lessons does the Israel-Hezbollah war hold for the United States?

According to the Washington Post the U.S. Army is looking at the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah to determine how the United States should focus its own armed forces:

Since then, the Defense Department has dispatched as many as a dozen teams to interview Israeli officers who fought against Hezbollah. The Army and Marine Corps have sponsored a series of multimillion-dollar war games to test how U.S. forces might fare against a similar foe. "I've organized five major games in the last two years, and all of them have focused on Hezbollah," said Frank Hoffman, a research fellow at the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory in Quantico.

A big reason that the 34-day war is drawing such fevered attention is that it highlights a rift among military leaders: Some want to change the U.S. military so that it is better prepared for wars like the ones it is fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, while others worry that such a shift would leave the United States vulnerable to a more conventional foe.

I thought that the American experiences in Iraq have taught the importance of counter-insurgency operations. But are these two approaches mutually exclusive?

Interestingly, the article doesn't mention anything about the role of the media in the war. Nor does it mention if the American military has contacted Gen. Yaacov Amidror, (.pdf) who seems to take a contrary position to the assumptions mentioned in the report.

The adoption of two erroneous assumptions – that terror is more determined and
resilient than the democratic state and that victory is always a matter of the mind and
not a product of coercive physical measures – has induced many to believe that there is
no military method to cope with terror in order to vanquish it. These kinds of assertions
have become more common in much of the discourse concerning Israel’s war with
Hizbullah in 2006 and the war of the U.S.-led coalition against insurgent forces in Iraq.
History – even the history of the State of Israel – proves that this contention is seriously
mistaken.

As Daniel Pipes explains:

Victory over insurgencies is possible, Amidror argues, but they do not come easily. Unlike the emphasis on size of forces and arsenals in traditional wars, he postulates four conditions of a mostly political nature required to defeat insurgencies. Two of them concern the state, where the national leadership must:

* Understand and accept the political and public relations challenge involved in battling insurgents.
* Appreciate the vital role of intelligence, invest in it, and require the military to use it effectively.

Another two conditions concern counterterrorist operations, which must:

* Isolate terrorists from the non-terrorist civilian population.
* Control and isolate the territories where terrorists live and fight.

If these guidelines are successfully followed, the result will not be a signing ceremony and a victory parade but something more subtle – what Amidror calls "sufficient victory" but I would call "sufficient control." By this, he means a result "that does not produce many years of tranquility, but rather achieves only a ‘repressed quiet,' requiring the investment of continuous effort to preserve it."

Politically this can be difficult. So the question remains if Western powers have the capacity to maintain a military force sufficient to control an insurgency indefinitely. But declaring a war over after a month clearly will leave the conventional force "defeated." Clearly, even according to Gen. Amidror, perceptions are important.

If they are, the Post's story unfortunately reinforces a rather inaccurate perception.

Another question is whether the U.S. military is taking the proper lessons from the Israel-Hezbollah war. Its studies have focused almost exclusively on the battle in southern Lebanon and ignored Hezbollah's ongoing role in Lebanese society as a political party and humanitarian aid group. After the battle, Hezbollah forces moved in quickly with aid and reconstruction assistance.

But as Barry Rubin points out, portraying Hezbollah as a benign political party only tells part of the story:

Yes, Hizballah is a political party but that’s where the similarity to the Labour or Conservative parties ends. The name gives it way. At least historically, the Labour party is supposed to represent workers; the Conservative party those who are either better-off or favor the historical status quo more. But Hizballah means, in Arabic, literally, the Party of God. That’s who they represent, or think they do, and their purported constituent is a bit harder to please than the trade unions and the local gentry or greengrocers.
And the Hizballah parliamentary delegation is called the Loyalty to the Resistance group. Resistance has become the codeword for the Iran-Syria-Hizballah-Hamas-Iraqi insurgent (a nice word for terrorist) bloc which seeks to promote Islamist revolution throughout the Middle East. What are they resisting? Peace and moderation. Who are they resisting? America, Israel and the West. How are they resisting? Assassinations, car-bombs, kidnappings, and suicide attacks are high on the list of favored tactics.
Of course, Hizballah like other revolutionary Islamists has social welfare programs. But the purpose of these is to build its mass base so it can seize power, and then to do all the things it wants to do .

Again, perceptions are important. Hezbollah's roles can't be ignored, but neither should they be whitewashed, which is what the reporter seems to be doing.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Why does the NYT publish op-eds about news stories that have already been debunked?

Phillip Weiss is concerned that the New York Times is not sufficiently anti-Israel and asks:

Why does the 'Times' only let Arabs criticize Israel?

He elucidates his point:

The reader sees Bisharat and says, Well, he would feel that way, he's Arab, and it's an ancient feud. But there are many non-Arabs who would gladly lift a pen against the oppression done in our name.

I'm sorry but has he ever read Roger Cohen or Nicholas Kristof? Or the editors of the Times? Nor should he forget that one of the most prominent anti-Israel columnists over the years was Anthony Lewis.

The op-ed in question was by one George Bisharat who cited the recently debunked charges that Israeli soldiers had engaged in war crimes. (via memeorandum) They weren't just debunked, but Ethan Bronner the Israel correspondent of the Times reported on the debunking! As Noah Pollak notes:

Except that there never was any "chilling testimony" -- there were rumors circulated by an anti-IDF activist, which were breathlessly republished by Haaretz and its American counterpart, the Times. His opening claim does, however, set an appropriately mendacious tone for the rest of the piece. Bisharat says that Israel committed six separate violations of international law during Operation Cast Lead, and the first one he cites lays the foundation for the five that follow:

Pollak also effectively refutes Bisharat's other arguments.

According to Legal Insurrection, it appears that Bisharat has a habit of manufacturing history. (h/t Israel Matzav.)

But why did the NY Times run an op-ed after one of its principal points had been refuted by its own reporting? Was running an anti-Israel op-ed that important?

Crossposted at Soccer Dad.

Slow day in the office, Mr Levy?

We, the bloggers, can allow ourselves to write (or not to write) about whatever tickles our fancy on any given day. There is no carrot at the end of the road, no fixed hours and, aside of a very few followers, no captive audience. Only other bloggers that drop by from time to time to commiserate.

It's completely different with journalists. There are schedules, editors, readers, the salary day, the presses, the stresses, the... whatever, you get the drift. So what do you do when you* are a Gideon Levy of Haaretz doubtful fame, there is a slow day in the office and, besides, due to your total lack of charm and tact, general anti-establishment tendencies and a poisoned pen, no one tells you anything for quite a long time?

Well, what you do is sit down, stir your accumulated bile and poison with your trusty pen and produce a masterpiece on a subject you don't know anything about, don't have any opinion of, but, as usual, are loath to confess to these two drawbacks. A result: a totally empty of contents and disconnected page in Haaretz titled Was Israel's reported strike in Sudan an exercise in propaganda?.

I can save my readers the need to read the article, by quoting the only two factual sentences in it:

Nobody [read Gideon Levy] knows for sure what was bombed, how much and why. Sudan, after all, is far away.

Everything else is... how to define it? No, not hearsay, Mr Levy doesn't even attempt to add some invented titillating details to his piece. Just a jamboree of bile, poison and condescending, so typical for a pathetic hack on a slow day.

(*) I don't mean you, my dear reader. Far be it from me to compare a normal human being with Gideon Levy of Haaretz. No, really...

P.S. Fresh from the press - an example of better things to do and how to do it: Urinating dog triggered argument resulting in 3 officers' deaths. See, Mr Levy, a much more respectable way for you to earn your shekels.

Cross-posted on SimplyJews