International Sympathy? Who Needs It

  Foreign Secretary, William Hague, warned Israel that if it sent troops into Gaza to confront Hamas, it risked losing the sympathy of the international community.

                 On November 19th, a Jewish woman in Britain, Mindy Wiesenberger, sent the following letter to Mr. Hague, in response. The letter has been published in many newspapers, including the Times of Israel .

                 Dear Mr. Hague
                You have stated that if Israel tries to defend its population through a ground offensive in Gaza 'it risks losing the sympathy of the international community.' 

              Let me tell you something about the sympathy of the international community Mr. Hague. My father was liberated from Buchenwald concentration camp in 1945, having lost his entire family but gaining the sympathy of the international community at the time. After 6 million Jews had been annihilated at the hands of the Nazi regime, the international community had plenty of sympathy for the Jewish people. There is always plenty of sympathy for victims.

             Israel doesn't need the sympathy of the international community. What it needs is to defend its citizens.

             When as a tiny country it gained its independence in 1948 it had to absorb 800,000 Jews who were thrown out of Arab lands in the Middle East, and it did so without fuss and with dignity giving them shelter and a place of security in which their children could grow up to become productive citizens. When Jordan, Egypt, Lebanon and Syria tried to destroy Israel in 1948 and again in 1967 they took in hundreds of thousands of Palestinian Arabs, but did they give them dignity or shelter? No they left them to rot in refugee camps in order to maintain a symbol of grievance againstIsrael and use them as a political tool against the Jewish state. What has arisen in those camps is a complicated situation, but it is what has led to Gaza today. 

                So don't lecture Israel on international sympathy Mr. Hague. Not when Israel has just sent in 120 truck loads of food into Gaza to feed the Palestinian people there, because their own leadership is more interested in using its population as human shields, launching rockets against Israel from within major civilian centers.

                Don't lecture Israel on international sympathy Mr. Hague. Not when Israel targets with as much military precision as it can, only terrorists and their bases, trying its utmost to prevent civilian casualties.

                Don't lecture Israel on international sympathy Mr. Hague. Not when the Palestinian media deliberately uses images of victims of the Syrian civil war and presents them as casualties in Gaza to gain international sympathy.

               Go read your history books Mr. Hague, go see that since the beginning of the twentieth century all the Arabs wanted to do was destroy Israel. Go look at the country of Israel now since the Jews have established a state there. Go read what advances in science, medicine, biotechnology, agriculture and high tech Israel has developed, and dedicated that knowledge to making the world a better place for humanity. Can you imagine any other country that after 60 years of continuously being under attack could have achieved so much.

               So Mr. Hague don't lecture Israel on international sympathy. Israel will do whatever it takes to defend itself from outright attack on its citizens, whether it be from Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran or any other country or terrorist group that attacks it.

                And if it loses the sympathy of the international community so be it. We don't need the international community's sympathy.

              We don't need another 6 million victims.

Iran Helping Hamas In Gaza

Iran's Revolutionary Guards Aiding Jihadists, Attacking Israel as
Barack Obama does NOTHING

URGENT: Iran's Revolutionary Guard Units are in the Gaza Strip helping Hamas launch long-range rockets aimed at Tel Aviv as our allies in the Arab world fall one by one to jihadist extremism – a slide into radical Islam and Shariah law made even easier by an Obama administration unwilling to stand with Israel.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had hoped that eliminating Ahmed Jabari, the head of Hamas' military wing, combined with surgical strikes against the militant Hamas infrastructure, would be enough to contain jihadi, pro-Palestinian aggression.
It wasn't.

Since yesterday, Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile defense system has intercepted 105 rockets, while 274 have struck cities near the Gaza Strip.
Three Israeli have died, with 18 reported Palestinian causalities. New reports have revealed that Iran's Revolutionary Guard has moved in, aiding the jihadists in their attempts to wipe Israel off the map.


Then there is Hezbollah in southern Lebanon and Syria, Iran itself to the East and a radicalized Egypt to the West. The Deputy General Guide of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood has publicly denounced Israel as a "criminal enemy" and threatened to cancel the Israel-Egypt peace treaty.

Thousands of anti-government Islamist protestors are taking over Jordan.
Israel is surrounded.

TELL CONGRESS: WE WILL NOT STAND BY AS OBAMA
DELIVERS ISRAEL TO HER ENEMIES!

The pro-Islam United Nations is likewise escalating its ongoing war against the Jewish state. In a report obtained by The Washington Free Beacon, the United Nations Human Rights Commission (HRC) details a soon-to-be-launched international campaign of legal and economic warfare on AMERICAN companies doing business in Israel, including Hewlett-Packard, Caterpillar Inc., and Motorola Solutions Inc.

If these companies continue doing business in Israel against the wishes of the United Nations, the HRC "calls on civil society to actively pursue legal and political redress against non-complying business" and "to vigorously pursue initiatives to boycott, divest and sanction the businesses highlighted in this report" and "calls on the international community to consider requesting an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice" to dole out punishment.

Because of Barack Obama's FAILED leadership and FAILED foreign policy, U.S. companies doing business in Israel and the rest of our fragile economy are under assault. Now it is unclear if the collapse of moderate regimes across the Middle East and the intensifying peril of the Jewish state are a consequence of naiveté, incompetence or malicious design by a Muslim Brotherhood-friendly Obama administration.

Members of the HRC include notorious human rights abusers such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, Libya, China, and Cuba – yet their target as an alleged "violator" of human rights is ISRAEL! The Obama administration is letting them walk all over Israel and the United States of America. Barack Obama even JOINED the HRC, lumping the United States in with these Israel-defaming regimes soon after taking office in 2009. At the time, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice pandered to the pro-Palestinian, anti-Israeli claque, "Working from within, we can make the council a more effective forum to promote and protect human rights."
It's obvious whose human rights are more important to the Islamist Obama administration and the anti-Israel, anti-America zealots controlling the United Nations.

It is no coincidence that just days after Barack Obama secured a second term as president of the United States that anti-Israeli terrorists have taken on an aggressive campaign to push for a Palestinian state and destroy Israel.

Without our traditional, prominent diplomatic AND military support of the United States by its side, Israel is targeted by jihadists to become the next victim of Islamist takeover in the Middle East. We could lose our most loyal ally in the region, arguably in the world, if the White House continues to ignore the situation.

We cannot wait for Barack Obama to come to Israel's aid – we must take our fight to Congress.

Meanwhile the Palestinian Authority, the PLO's Fatah Party and the Muslim terrorist group Hamas, keep contending among themselves in a rancorous "unity" government as they cycle in explosive outbursts against Israel and diplomatic ploys to unilaterally declare Palestinian independence and "statehood."

If the overt terrorist militancy and violence of Hamas can continue to be disguised by the media, submerged into the PLO's falsely "moderate" public image, Obama will heartily welcome these maneuvers as a means to garner more European acceptance of Palestinian "legitimacy" and to end-run U.S. Congressional actions in defense of Israel.

Benjamin Netanyahu responded forcefully against the trap posed by this latest Palestinian threat in a speech at a conference earlier this year for Israeli ambassadors: "If Hamas joins the Palestinian government we will not hold negotiations with the Palestinian Authority."

Addressing the so-called "unity government" gambit, Israel's Ha'aretz news service reported that Netanyahu "added that he is ready to meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas anytime, anywhere, in order to renew negotiations."

"The peace process can only advance while maintaining security arrangements, which is becoming more difficult in light of the current situation in the region," Netanyahu continued. One grave consideration is the unremitting Palestinian objective of seizing Jerusalem from Israel for its "national capital." Another is relentless terrorist targeting of innocent civilians.
Unremitting Hamas rocket attacks upon Israel from Gaza leave Prime Minister Netanyahu little choice but to respond with military strikes against Hamas.

It is a classic case of terrorism and counter-terrorist response. Will America stand by Israel?

TELL CONGRESS: WE WILL NOT STAND BY AS OBAMA
DELIVERS ISRAEL TO HER ENEMIES!

The reality of Israel's position is grim. Unless and until the Palestinians are compelled to renounce terrorism and violence, acknowledge the Jewish state's right to exist, and negotiate true peace directly with Israel, intensifying conflict, even all-out war in the Middle East, becomes more and more likely.

Insistently, Hamas argues that its flagrantly intentional killings of noncombatants are in proper "retaliation" for Israel's "occupation." Even now, as Israel must prepare to mount yet another unavoidable offensive, Hamas (the Islamic Resistance Movement) steadfastly refuses to renounce "armed struggle," the terrorist, jihadist killing of innocent civilians.

And even now, by systematically launching its rocket attacks from populated areas of Gaza, Hamas and also Islamic Jihad (Al-Quds Brigades) resort to the barbarous practice of using human shields of women, children and elderly noncombatants.

"Moderate" Fatah, still in command over the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) as the Palestinian Authority, revealed its true anti-Israel radicalism in a recent Internal Order Document Article 17:"The armed popular revolution is the only inevitable way to the liberation of Palestine."Article 19: "The struggle will not end until the elimination of the Zionist entity and the liberation of Palestine."

Where is America? Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, the last time hostilities erupted on the West Bank, overtly blamed the Jews for the continued Palestinian-Israeli conflict, including Arab Katyusha rocket volleys striking Galilee in northern Israel from southern Lebanon!

The Obama administration routinely faults Israel for accelerating Arab strife and violence in the region, and demands the Jewish state "reverse the trend of its growing isolation" from its Arab neighbors.

"Blame the victims" is Obama's strategy for de-legitimizing Israel throughout the world, and particularly at the U.N. where his pro-Palestinian bias is overtly evident. Jewish-American conservatives before the election took out a full-page ad in leading newspapers demanding the Obama Administration "stop blaming Israel first."

Israel's peril at the UN is clear. The admissions committee of the UN Security Council issued its initial report on approval of Palestinian "statehood" in late 2011 with a close, deadlock decision – and the Palestinians greeted the stalemate by pursuing a strategy of bypassing the Security Council process altogether and seeking a rogue General Assembly vote instead.

Mahmoud Abbas has continued his relentless pursuit of unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state at the United Nations ever since. But even as the Palestinian Authority seeks statehood through the back door of the UN General Assembly, Fatah's position calls plainly for more terrorism, and Hamas is happy to oblige.

As Israel prepares for yet another obligatory war of self-defense, America MUST compel the UN to resist rewarding the terrorists. It MUST defend Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. It MUST reject the now-circulating PA draft resolution for Palestinian statehood seeking an upgraded and undeserved Observer status in the General Assembly. In essence, any such upgrade to "Nonmember Observer State" would grant legitimacy to the violent and cynical Palestinian end-run around international law.

Such ploys – overt violations of UN Resolution 242 and the Oslo Accords – have been threatened in the past, and squelched by firm, swift U.S. diplomatic resolve. Control of the Holy City, Jerusalem, continues to hang in the balance as a main prize sought by the Palestinian "state" and its rabid Israel-hating supporter governments.

In response to UN agencies' support for Palestinian repudiation of long-standing UN resolutions governing the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, the U.S. Congress is taking action, but MUST be emboldened. Long-standing U.S. law to protect Israel is in effect and restricting some UN funding – but MORE MUST BE DONE! Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has authored the UN Transparency, Accountability, and Reform Act (H.R. 2829) which authorizes the U.S. and other member states to fund only those UN activities and agencies they determine are efficient and in the national interest.

The bill has the support of some 141 co-sponsors, all Republican. Congressional Democrats have shunned it, but in a letter sent to Democrat lawmakers, Mayor Koch said it would "strengthen America's ability to lead at the UN in order to advance the interests of our nation and our ally Israel…" The U.S. presently accounts for more than one-fifth of the UN's operating budget.

Koch rightly observed, "The reason the UN is often on the side of the PLO instead of the U.S. and Israel, and on the side of dictatorships instead of democracies, is that there are no consequences for bad behavior."

The simple truth is that Barack Obama has carved out a special, shameful unpopularity for himself as the most anti-Israel president ever – and he is dragging the Democrat party down this road. We need to make sure Congress keeps it in mind – and that "it shows" in their support of Israel during these trying and dangerous days.

Unnegotiated Palestinian "statehood" IS a huge provocation certain to ignite and perpetuate untold violence. Such a "state" concocted by UN fiat would initiate terror attacks in Jerusalem or on other vital Israeli territory, and Israel's enemies would brand her necessary defensive actions "aggression" against a UN member state. Under a "Uniting for Peace" General Assembly Resolution vote, blue-helmeted "peacekeepers" could be deployed into Israel's sovereign lands and set up occupation.

In fact, United States troops, under the New-World-Order command of the United Nations, could be ordered to invade our ally – Israel!

TELL CONGRESS: WE WILL NOT STAND BY AS OBAMA
DELIVERS ISRAEL TO HER ENEMIES!

As observed by foreign affairs expert Caroline Glick, Obama is

• The first U.S. president ever to denounce Jewish property rights in Jerusalem
• The first U.S. president ever to require Israel to deny Jews property rights in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria as a precondition for peace talks with the Palestinians
• The first U.S. president ever to adopt the position that Israel must surrender its right to defensible borders in the framework of a peace treaty
• The first U.S. president ever to make Israeli acceptance of this position to surrender its right to defensible borders a precondition for negotiations
• The first U.S. president ever to accept Hamas as a legitimate actor in Palestinian politics
• The first U.S. president ever to make American support for Israel at the UN conditional on Israeli concessions to the Palestinians

Unilaterally defined Palestinian "statehood" is a rogue resolution, unlawful outside the context of a peace treaty with Israel. Such a proposal is an overt violation of prior UN Resolution 242, which requires a negotiated settlement between Israel and Palestinian representatives before any UN action may be considered on a Palestinian state. Such a proposal explicitly repudiates the Oslo Accords.

Yet Obama allows the Palestinians to gather support for this travesty, snickers at calling Netanyahu a liar while posturing as an ally of Israel – and leaves Israel twisting in the wind with Iran and battling terrorist in Gaza and the West Bank. Is this any way to treat an ally?

TELL CONGRESS: OVERRIDE OBAMA & STAND WITH ISRAEL!

Pro-Israel Republicans and Democrats in the House and the Senate MUST unite in defense of the Jewish state! Whatever the recent election tallies may finally prove to be, theREAL political fact that matters is one cold, hard fact. As Ed Koch describes it, "I have not recovered from my shock when I learned from a Gallup poll conducted in February 2010 that 48 percent of Democrats supported Israel and 70 percent of Republicans did. Those figures are permanently seared in my mind."

Ed Koch, former mayor of New York City, life-long Democrat, is a decent man for whom respect for truth and love of America and Israel trump the prevailing vulgar political calculations. He sees they are destroying his old party, leading our country to ruin, and imperiling the only democracy in the Middle East as Obama pursues policies that bring the region closer and closer to catastrophic, perhaps even nuclear war.

There is a 52% liberal majority of the Democrat party that no longer stands foursquare with Israel – and under the "leadership" of Obama, the betrayal of Israel is becoming party policy.

IT MUST NOT BECOME AMERICA'S POLICY.
AMERICA STANDS WITH ISRAEL.

TELL CONGRESS: STAND WITH ISRAEL!

Keep Faith,

Alan Keyes
www.DeclarationAlliance.org

Disengagement from Gaza?

Yaalon: Disengagement from Gaza Not Really Complete

Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Yaalon: If there's a disengagement, let Gazans get their own water and electricity.

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By Elad Benari, Canada

First Publish: 10/19/2012, 9:33 PM

Moshe Yaalon

Flash 90

Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Yaalon said on Friday that Israel’s 2005 disengagement from Gaza is not yet complete, since Israel continues to supply Gazans with necessities such as water and electricity.
“I think that we theoretically disengaged from Gaza but we didn’t really disengage,” he said during a gathering in Tel Aviv. “The world considers us as being responsible for what happens there. We provide themelectricity with which they manufacturethe rockets they fire at us. We provide them with water and energy and they use that against us. If there’s disengagement, I want to complete that disengagement. Let them desalinate their own water, produce their own energy, let them be connected to Egypt. Then the situation will be clearer.

“Our policy is to against Gaza is deterrence,” said Yaalon. “Targeted killing for them is a significant event. It’s not a stable situation, so the best defense is to attack. Extracting a price from them is what creates the deterrence. If there was no such deterrent we would receive rockets every day.”

Addressing the situation in Egypt, he said, “Egypt will remain unstable for a long time. Economically, Egyptians will have 87 million mouths to feed. In terms of security, the only border that does not threaten Egyptians is the one with Israel, but it's a very problematic security situation as the main problem for us is the Sinai. The Sinai Peninsula has become a haven for terrorism.

“There is an exploitation of non-governance which began already in the days of Mubarak,” explained Yaalon.  “An infrastructure of terrorist organizations, including Al Qaeda, supported by Iran and Palestinians for whom it is convenient to leave Gaza can be established in the Sinai. Sinai is Egyptian and we have a peace treaty with Egypt. We do not carry out targeted killings in the Sinai, so the terrorists have much greater freedom. We demand that the Egyptian regime show determination and sovereignty, and this will be tested.”

Yaalon warned against Egypt’s attempts to change parts of the treaty it signed with Israel, saying that “for us this is not an option. If they want to put in a military force, we’ll talk about it. But it would be a very bad precedent if we start opening agreements. President Morsi is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, but his statements have been cautious. He does not mention Israel, but on the other hand is forced to work under constraints. Although he would very much like to open the peace agreement, at the end of the day he is forced to say that he is committed to it. Because if that does not happen, American money would stop flowing into Egypt. That’s why an agreement that isn’t backed by interests is not worth the paper on which it was signed.”

Yaalon also spoke about the peace process with the Palestinian Authority and said, “[PA Chairman] Abbas does not say he wants two states for two peoples and denies the existence of the Jewish people. He also does not say that this agreement that will bring about the end of the conflict and an end to his demands. The argument with Abbas is about the very existence of Israel.

“When Condoleezza Rice heard [former Prime Minister] Olmert's proposal [to Abbas] she was surprised by its generosity, but Abbas refused immediately,” said Yaalon, adding, “I was not surprised by his reaction, because for him to agree to a solution of two states for two peoples is disastrous. He needs the conflict sustained over time. As well, as long as the PA educates young people to wear explosive belts and blow us up, there will be no peace or coexistence. Now the people of Israel know that we tried and it does not work. Abbas has no interest in reaching an agreement with us, but he will blame us. For the past twenty years, the worst terrorist attacks took place during periods of concessions. That's why we need to stand firm.”

(Arutz Sheva’s North American Desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)

Gaza Mom Chooses Israel Hospital

Gaza Mom Chooses Israeli Hospital to Save Baby
After losing 3 babies to rare birth defects at Egyptian hospitals, a Gaza mother followed doctors' advice and took her fourth to Israel.
By Chana Ya'ar
First Publish: 9/30/2012, 12:25 PM

A Palestinian Authority mother from Gaza is home with a healthy baby thanks to Israeli doctors in Kfar Sava, after a complicated surgery.

After losing three babies to rare birth defects at Egyptian hospitals, Jian Abu Agram, 31, was faced with a difficult decision last year after another child was born last April with the same condition.

After speaking with her doctors, Agram took their advice and traveled through the Erez crossing with her infant daughter to Israel, where doctors at Meir Hospital performed intestinal surgery on the little girl.

"When the doctors told me of her condition and suggested that we bring her to Israel, I didn't think for a moment of the conflict between the two peoples,” Agram told the Hebrew-language weekly local Sharon region edition of the Yediot Acharanot newspaper.

“What I considered was only one thing: to save my girl. I couldn't allow myself to lose another child.”

The infant has since recovered from the intricate life-saving treatment that she needed, and two weeks ago returned to her home

Gaza Rockets FAQ

What you need to know about the attacks on Israel’s southern region.
by Leadership Action Network


March 13, 2012

As a fragile cease-fire goes into effect, it is important to note the background facts:

(1) Over 210 rockets have been fired from the Gaza Strip at Israel over the past three days, targeting as many as one million civilians (15% of the Israeli population). Rockets reached past Ashdod to Gedera, about 20 miles south of Tel Aviv. Today alone, 47 rockets exploded in Israeli territory and 13 were intercepted by the Iron Dome defense system which protects populated areas in the target zone.

(2) Schools in southern Israel have remained closed all week in an attempt to protect children and civilians, and 200,000 children are huddled in shelters rather than in school. The preemptive action of closing schools saved many lives at an elementary school in Beer Sheva and at a preschool in Ashkol that were hit with Grad missiles. Grad missiles, which come via Sinai, are much more accurate and destructive than Kassam rockets.

(3) While Israel’s Iron Dome mobile air defense system has a 90% success rate, Israelis have been injured in these missile attacks and a million lives have been disrupted. It costs about $20,000 each time the Iron Dome is deployed. Israeli government officials clearly state that cost is not a factor in protecting the lives of the Israeli people.

(4) Israel reacted with carefully targeted responses. Of 44 strikes, 18 struck high trajectory missiles and 15 hit weapons facilities. The balance hit terrorists carrying out or supplying planned attacks.


(5) The elevated activity began after the Israeli Air Force targeted and killed two members of the Popular Resistance Committee (PRC), a terror organization funded and supported by Hamas and based in Gaza. The PRC was thought to be planning a terror attack that was to take place via Sinai in the coming days. Ahmed Karsi, a senior operative and political commander, was a leader that planned, funded and directed the combined terror attack that took place near the resort town of Eilat in August 2011. The infamous attacks included ambushing a bus going to Eilat and bombing a passenger car, leaving 8 Israelis murdered and 40 injured. The PRC was also responsible for firing rockets into Israel and attacking the Nahal Oz fuel terminal in which Israeli citizens were murdered.

(6) The Israeli government considers “Hamas responsible for all of the terrorist activity in Gaza, and demands that it carry out its responsibility.” Hamas is funded, supported and trained by Iran. According to the Council on Foreign Relations, Iran provides Hamas “significant support, which some diplomats say could amount to $20 million to $30 million per year.” The latest dangerous developments could also be seen as an attempt by Iran to divert the world’s focus off their nuclear ambitions.

(7) Since the fall of Mubarak’s government in 2011, Hamas has been able to smuggle advanced weapons into Gaza with the help of the Bedouins who control much of the Sinai. “We have smuggled thousands of shoulder-launched (surface-to-air) SAM missiles to Gaza through the tunnels for a transporting fee,” a Bedouin tribal leader told CNN. According to the same report, large stockpiles of RPGs, machine and anti-aircraft guns are also being held by Bedouins to fight the Egyptians whom they have accused of committing treason. According to military sources, it is only a matter of time before Hamas escalates the war on Israel with missiles that can reach Tel Aviv.

(8) A 2009 New York Times article reports that “even Israel’s critics agree that Hamas’ regular use of rockets to fire at civilians in Israel, and its use of civilians as shields in Gaza, are also violations of the rules of war. Israeli military men and analysts say that its urban guerrilla tactics, including the widespread use of civilian structures and tunnels, are deliberate and come from the Iranian Army’s tactical training and the lessons of the 2006 war between Israel and Iranian-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon.”

(9) Since the 2005 withdrawal, the rocket attacks from Gaza have reached as far north as Rehovot, just 12 miles south of Tel Aviv, resulting in thousands injured and numerous deaths. In 2011, an average of two rockets a day were terrorizing Israeli civilians. Many attacks deliberately target children in kindergartens and school buses. The constant attacks have caused long-term psychological disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), with children particularly affected. According to the U.N.’s Palmer Report (paragraph 71), “The enormity of the psychological toll on the affected population cannot be underestimated….The purpose of these acts of violence, which have been repeatedly condemned by the international community, has been to do damage to the population of Israel.”

(10) Hamas’ arms caches are deliberately hidden in civilian homes, schools, and heavily populated areas to create a moral dilemma for the Israel Defense Forces. During the 2008/9 Operation Cast Lead, Hamas officials called upon Palestinian civilians, including children, to congregate near buildings that contained military units, bombs and/or rockets. Prior to striking, the Israeli Air Force dropped leaflets warning of coming attacks, losing the element of surprise and possibly putting themselves at risk in order to save Palestinian lives. The Israeli military also made hundreds of thousands of phone calls to warn civilians of strikes near or targeting their homes where terrorists had taken refuge. The Israel Defense Forces operate in a strategic manner in order to target terrorists while minimizing collateral damage.

(11) Hamas, a militant offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, violently wrested control of Gaza from the Palestinian Authority in 2007. The United States has classified Hamas as a terrorist organization, as have Britain, the European Union, Japan and Canada. Jordan banned Hamas in 1999.

(12) Contrary to media reports, Hamas recognizes that Gaza is not occupied by Israel. On January 3, 2012, in response to Hamas Politburo Chief Khaled Mashaal’s statement that Hamas will demonstrate against Israel, Hamas Foreign Minister Mahmoud al-Zahar said, "Against whom could we demonstrate in the Gaza Strip?... [Only] when Gaza was occupied, that model was applicable."

(13) The Hamas charter is awash with anti-Semitism. Excerpts:

“The time of judgment shall not come until Muslims fight the Jews [and kill them] so that the Jews hide behind and trees and stones and each tree and stone will say: ‘O Muslim! there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him’.” — Article 7

“The Nazism of the Jews targeted both women and children. The terror they spread is directed at everyone. They fight people by destroying their livelihood, stealing their money and trampling their dignity. Their horrible treatment of people is like that of the worst war criminals.“ — Article 20

(14) Hamas continues to refuse to recognize the State of Israel. In a public address delivered on Al-Aqsa TV in December 2011, Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniya declared: “The principles [of Hamas] are definitive and non-negotiable: Palestine means Palestine in its entirety, from the [Jordan] River to the [Mediterranean] Sea. There will be no concession of a single inch of the land of Palestine.” This clearly targets the elimination of the State of Israel.

(15) Hamas suppresses free speech in Gaza and Palestinians who dare to speak about Hamas’ human rights abuses put themselves at risk. In January 2012, Mahmoud Abu Rahma, International Relations Director at the Gaza based Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, was stabbed multiple times. Rahma had been receiving threats since his article, “The Gap Between Resistance and Governance,” was published. Palestinian journalists in Gaza believe Hamas militiamen were responsible for the attack.

(16) The Gazan economy is growing. According to the World Bank, growth in Gaza during the first half of 2011 was 28%. Currently, Israel allows all goods of a civilian nature to enter Gaza via established land corridors, with the exception of arms, weapons, war materials, and certain items that can have both military and civilian applications. In the fourth quarter of 2011 alone, over 190,000 tons of supplies entered Gaza through Israel. These supplies included but were not limited to food, water, medicines, hygiene products, clothing, and school supplies.

Call to Action

Make everyone aware that:

• Firing missiles from Gaza at innocent civilians, particularly defenseless children cannot continue and must be condemned by all.
  
• No government can tolerate such acts against its people, and Israel is no exception.
  
• Hamas is funded and supported by Iran.
  
• Iran's continuing export of terror is yet another reason why a nuclear Iran is unacceptable not just for Israel, but for the entire region and the world at large.
  

Write to your Senators, Congressman, the President, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of State – and urge them to condemn the actions of Hamas against innocent civilians.

Aid To Gaza

Aid For Sale

Aid for sale in Hamas' Gaza
by Asaf Romirowsky and Nicole Brackman
Philadelphia Daily News
March 4, 2009

There was a bit of head-scratching going on recently in the hallowed halls of the UN.

After weeks of rebuking Israel for preventing humanitarian aid to flow into Gaza, UN officials were forced to cancel deliveries of aid into the Hamas-controlled territory after terrorists broke into a UN Relief and Works Agency warehouse and made off with 800 tons of blankets, food and other basic commodities to sell them to the highest bidders.

Israeli officials have been saying all along that Hamas routinely diverts humanitarian aid. In April, fuel trucks destined for UNRWA warehouses were overtaken. It was reported in August that Hamas gunmen had hijacked more than 10 trucks destined for the Palestinian Red Crescent Society full of food and medical supplies.

All that is only more ironic given the worldwide castigation of Israel for allegedly preventing humanitarian aid to flow into Gaza during the military operation.

And the criticism wasn't limited to the issue of aid. The UN (and the international community) was quick to condemn Israel for allegedly targeting an UNRWA-run school, despite widespread acknowledgement that Hamas routinely employs such facilities as "civilian shields" in an attempt to draw Israeli fire.

The incident where IDF fire hit an UNRWA school in the Jabalya refugee camp in Gaza is indeed tragic. At the time, UNRWA insisted there were no terrorists in the school compound and the Israelis were "careless," with UNRWA Operations Director John Ging claiming that mortars had hit the school, killing dozens and wounding more.

Just days ago, though, UN officials admitted that Israel had not hit the school at all, but an area outside it. Ging admitted that his original claims were wrong.

It may have taken the embarrassment over such a glaring error to get the UN to acknowledge what the Israelis have been saying all along: that Hamas' callous use of civilians as shields is itself a humanitarian crisis.

Despite the new information, it's worth taking a close look at the historical ties between UNRWA and Hamas. UNRWA has long been a major employer for Hamas members, and has lent its facilities to Hamas and other terror organizations for weapons-related purposes.

For example, in May, we learned that Awad al-Qiq, who was targeted by the Israeli military, was a U.N. employee and headmaster of a top prep school in Gaza. Al-Qiq, a science teacher, was also in the rocket business while at the same time educating Palestinian youth.

Since Hamas' takeover of Gaza in 2006 after Israel's unilateral withdrawal in August 2005, UNRWA hasn't raised explicit objections to the brutal Hamas violence that enabled the terrorist group to take the Gaza Strip by force.

UNRWA appears to be chiefly concerned with its own survival and continued funding. As Karen AbuZayd, the commissioner general of UNRWA, said after the Hamas takeover, "We are not scared. Donor countries have not in any way said they will stop their aid to UNRWA.

"On the contrary, we were approached by many of these countries, even Israel, asking us to continue our services to Palestinian refugees and perhaps even extend these services to do things we haven't done before."

To be perfectly blunt, the theft of humanitarian aid by Hamas (not to mention its ruthless use of its own people as targets as well as shields) only proves the point: Dead civilians are not Israel's goal but Hamas'.

According to Hamas' thinking, the more Palestinian victims there are, the more the international community will try to pressure Israel to avoid any further military operations.

Now that the shooting has stopped, the Obama administration has pledged to provide some $900 million to help rebuild Gaza. Governments and NGOs serious about assisting Palestinian Gazan society must insist on accountability whereby that reconstruction funding is allocated independently and transparently.

When it comes to doling out the money, UNRWA and Hamas - both of whom seem to be more focused on empty rhetoric rather than working towards a peaceful Palestinian civil society - should be bypassed.

Asaf Romirowsky is an associate fellow at the Middle East Forum and manager of Israel and Middle East affairs for the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia. Nicole Brackman is a former Soref Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Dear Citizen Of Gaza

I Am The Soldier Who Slept In Your Home

Hello,

While the world watches the ruins in Gaza, you return to your home which remains standing. However, I am sure that it is clear to you that someone was in your home while you were away.

I am that someone.

I spent long hours imagining how you would react when you walked into your home. How you would feel when you understood that IDF soldiers had slept on your mattresses and used your blankets to keep warm.

I knew that it would make you angry and sad and that you would feel this violation of the most intimate areas of your life by those defined as your enemies, with stinging humiliation. I am convinced that you hate me with unbridled hatred, and you do not have even the tiniest desire to hear what I have to say. At the same time, it is important for me to say the following in the hope that there is even the minutest chance that you will hear me.

I spent many days in your home. You and your family's presence was felt in every corner. I saw your family portraits on the wall, and I thought of my family. I saw your wife's perfume bottles on the bureau, and I thought of my wife. I saw your children's toys and their English language schoolbooks. I saw your personal computer and how you set up the modem and wireless phone next to the screen, just as I do.
I need you to understand me, us, and hope that you will channel your anger and criticism to the right places.

I wanted you to know that despite the immense disorder you found in your house that was created during a search for explosives and tunnels (which were indeed found in other homes), we did our best to treat your possessions with respect. When I moved the computer table, I disconnected the cables and lay them down neatly on the floor, as I would do with my own computer. I even covered the computer from dust with a piece of cloth. I tried to put back the clothes that fell when we moved the closet although not the same as you would have done, but at least in such a way that nothing would get lost.

I know that the devastation, the bullet holes in your walls and the destruction of those homes near you place my descriptions in a ridiculous light. Still, I need you to understand me, us, and hope that you will channel your anger and criticism to the right places.

I decided to write you this letter specifically because I stayed in your home.

I can surmise that you are intelligent and educated and there are those in your household that are university students. Your children learn English, and you are connected to the Internet. You are not ignorant; you know what is going on around you.

Therefore, I am sure you know that Qassam rockets were launched from your neighborhood into Israeli towns and cities.

How could you see these weekly launches and not think that one day we would say "enough"?! Did you ever consider that it is perhaps wrong to launch rockets at innocent civilians trying to lead a normal life, much like you? How long did you think we would sit back without reacting?

I can hear you saying "it's not me, it's Hamas". My intuition tells me you are not their most avid supporter. If you look closely at the sad reality in which your people live, and you do not try to deceive yourself or make excuses about "occupation", you must certainly reach the conclusion that the Hamas is your real enemy.

The reality is so simple, even a seven year old can understand: Israel withdrew from the Gaza strip, removing military bases and its citizens from Gush Katif. Nonetheless, we continued to provide you with electricity, water, and goods (and this I know very well as during my reserve duty I guarded the border crossings more than once, and witnessed hundreds of trucks full of goods entering a blockade-free Gaza every day).

Despite all this, for reasons that cannot be understood and with a lack of any rational logic, Hamas launched missiles on Israeli towns. For three years we clenched our teeth and restrained ourselves. In the end, we could not take it anymore and entered the Gaza strip, into your neighborhood, in order to remove those who want to kill us. A reality that is painful but very easy to explain.
You must lead a civil uprising against Hamas.

As soon as you agree with me that Hamas is your enemy and because of them, your people are miserable, you will also understand that the change must come from within. I am acutely aware of the fact that what I say is easier to write than to do, but I do not see any other way. You, who are connected to the world and concerned about your children's education, must lead, together with your friends, a civil uprising against Hamas.

I swear to you, that if the citizens of Gaza were busy paving roads, building schools, opening factories and cultural institutions instead of dwelling in self pity, arms smuggling and nurturing a hatred to your Israeli neighbors, your homes would not be in ruins right now. If your leaders were not corrupt and motivated by hatred, your home would not have been harmed. If someone would have stood up and shouted that there is no point in launching missiles on innocent civilians, I would not have to stand in your kitchen as a soldier.

You don't have money, you tell me? You have more than you can imagine.

Even before Hamas took control of Gaza, during the time of Yasser Arafat, millions if not billions of dollars donated by the world community to the Palestinians was used for purchasing arms or taken directly to your leaders bank accounts. Gulf States, the emirates - your brothers, your flesh and blood, are some of the richest nations in the world. If there was even a small feeling of solidarity between Arab nations, if these nations had but the smallest interest in reconstructing the Palestinian people - your situation would be very different.

You must be familiar with Singapore. The land mass there is not much larger than the Gaza strip and it is considered to be the second most populated country in the world. Yet, Singapore is a successful, prospering, and well managed country. Why not the same for you?

My friend, I would like to call you by name, but I will not do so publicly. I want you to know that I am 100% at peace with what my country did, what my army did, and what I did. However, I feel your pain. I am sorry for the destruction you are finding in your neighborhood at this moment. On a personal level, I did what I could to minimize the damage to your home as much as possible.
Instead of sinking into self-pity, build a flourishing and prospering country.

In my opinion, we have a lot more in common than you might imagine. I am a civilian, not a soldier, and in my private life I have nothing to do with the military. However, I have an obligation to leave my home, put on a uniform, and protect my family every time we are attacked. I have no desire to be in your home wearing a uniform again and I would be more than happy to sit with you as a guest on your beautiful balcony, drinking sweet tea seasoned with the sage growing in your garden.

The only person who could make that dream a reality is you. Take responsibility for yourself, your family, your people, and start to take control of your destiny. How? I do not know. Maybe there is something to be learned from the Jewish people who rose up from the most destructive human tragedy of the 20th century, and instead of sinking into self-pity, built a flourishing and prospering country. It is possible, and it is in your hands.

I am ready to be there to provide a shoulder of support and help to you.

But only you can move the wheels of history.

Regards,
Yishai, (Reserve Soldier)

The above was a letter that was originally published in the Hebrew-language daily newspaper Ma'ariv, and translated into English by the Independent Media Review and Analysis (IMRA)

The War With Israel Is Over ... They Won

M. Ibrahim

From an Arab to his Arab Brethren ...

To my Arab brothers: The War with Israel Is Over - and they won. Now let's finally move forward With Israel entering its fourth week of an incursion into the same Gaza Strip it voluntarily evacuated a few months ago, a sense of reality among Arabs is spreading through commentary by Arab pundits,letters to the editor, and political talk shows on Arabic-language TV networks.

The new views are stunning both in their maturity and in their realism. The best way I can think of to convey them is in the form of a letter to the Palestinian Arabs from their Arab friends:

Dear Palestinian Arab brethren: The war with Israel is over. You have lost.Surrender and negotiate to secure a future for your children. We, your Arab brothers, may say until we are blue in the face that we stand by you, but the wise among you and most of us know that we are moving on, away from the tired old idea of the Palestinian Arab cause and the "eternal struggle" with Israel.

Dear friends, you and your leaders have wasted three generations trying to fight for Palestine, but the truth is the Palestine you could have had in 1948 is much bigger than the one you could have had in 1967, which in turn is much bigger than what you may have to settle for now or in another 10 years. Struggle means less land and more misery and utter loneliness. At the moment,brothers, you would be lucky to secure a semblance of a state in that Gaza Strip into which you have all crowded, and a small part of the West Bank of the Jordan.

It isn't going to get better. Time is running out even for this much land, so here are some facts, figures, and sound advice, friends. You hold keys, which you drag out for television interviews, to houses that do not exist or are inhabited by Israelis who have no intention of leaving Jaffa ,Haifa , Tel Aviv, or West Jerusalem . You shoot old guns at modern Israeli tanks and American-made fighter jets, doing virtually no harm to Israel while bringing the wrath of its mighty
army down upon you.

You fire ridiculously inept Kassam rockets that cause little destruction and delude yourselves into thinking this is a war of liberation. Your government, your social institutions, your schools,and your economy are all in ruins. Your young people are growing up illiterate,ill, and bent on rites of death and suicide, while you, in effect, are living on the kindness of foreigners, including America and the United Nations. Every day your officials must beg for your daily bread, dependent on relief trucks that carry food and medicine into the Gaza Strip and the West Bank , while your criminal Muslim fundamentalist Hamas government continues to fan the flames of a war it can neither fight nor hope to win.

In other words, brothers, you are down, out, and alone in a burnt-out landscape that is shrinking by the day. What kind of struggle is this? Is it worth waging at all?

More important, what kind of miserable future does it portend for your children, the fourth or fifth generation of the Arab world's have-nots? We, your Arab brothers, have moved on. Those of us who have oil money are busy accumulating wealth and building housing, luxury developments, state-of-the-art universities and schools, and new highways and byways. Those of us who share borders with Israel, such as Egypt and Jordan , have signed a peace treaty with it and are not going to war for you any time soon. Those of us who are far away, in places like North Africa and Iraq , frankly could not care less about what happens to you. Only Syria continues to feed your fantasies that someday it will join you in liberating Palestine , even though a huge chunk of its territory, the entire Golan Heights, was taken by Israel in 1967 and annexed. The Syrians, my friends, will gladly fight down to the last Palestinian Arab.

Before you got stuck with this Hamas crowd, another cheating, conniving, leader of yours, Yasser Arafat, sold you a rotten bill of goods - more pain, greater
corruption, and millions stolen by his relatives - while your children played in the sewers of Gaza.

The war is over. Why not let a new future begin?

Youssef M. Ibrahim, a former New York Times Middle East Correspondent and Wall Street Journal Energy Editor for 25 years, is a freelance writer based in NewYork City and Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.

Hamas Inflates Numbers

January 22, 2009
War Is Deceit: Gaza doc says Palestinian death toll inflated

Will the world take note? What do you think? War Is Deceit Update: "Gazan doctor says death toll inflated," from Ynet, January 22 (thanks to all who sent this in):

What really is behind the numbers reported on the number of civilian casualties in the Gaza Strip? Italian newspaper Corriere Della Sera reported Thursday that a doctor working in Gaza's Shifa Hospital claimed that Hamas has intentionally inflated the number of casualties resulting from Israel's Operation Cast Lead. "The number of deceased stands at no more than 500 to 600. Most of them are youths between the ages of 17 to 23 who were recruited to the ranks of Hamas, who sent them to the slaughter," according to the newspaper article.
The doctor wished to remain unidentified, out of fear for his life.

A senior Palestinian Health Ministry official later denied the claims, and the Israel Defense Forces' estimate on the number of casualties in Gaza has also remained unchanged.

Despite the claims, the IDF stood behind its estimate that between 1,100 to 1,200 people were killed in the Strip during the fighting, more than two-thirds of them Hamas members.

The army initially believed that the number of civilian casualties was higher, as many Hamas men walked outside their houses dressed in civilian clothes, leaving their weapons at home.

Dr. Moaiya Hassanain, who is in change of the emergency department at the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza, denied the figures presented by the Italian paper.

Hassanain told Ynet that the Palestinian figures were issued cautiously, without any political considerations, and that several casualties may not have been reported as their bodies are still under the rubble or have not been handed over to the rescue forces and authorized medical officials.

'Mostly armed teenagers'

A Tal al-Hawa resident told the newspaper's reporter, "Armed Hamas men sought out a good position for provoking the Israelis. There were mostly teenagers, aged 16 or 17, and armed. They couldn't do a thing against a tank or a jet. They knew they are much weaker, but they fired at our houses so that they could blame Israel for war crimes."

The reporter for the Italian newspaper also quoted reporters in the Strip who told of Hamas' exaggerated figures, "We have already said to Hamas commanders – why do you insist on inflating the number of victims?"...

For propaganda's sake, Einstein.

The Evil of Hamas

From her lips to God's ear: The fury of a bereaved Palestinian mother captures evil of Hamas in Gaza

Tuesday, January 6th 2009, 4:00 AM

Katib/Getty


The collateral damage that has been inflicted on the residents of Gaza is a sorrowful consequence of living under the rule of rocket-firing fanatics. It is because of Hamas, and only Hamas, that Palestinians are suffering.

At least some of them know the identity of their tormentors. A New York Times dispatch captured an excruciating moment that took place in a hospital morgue, where a mother had just found half of the body of her 17-year-old daughter.

"May God exterminate Hamas!" screamed the woman in crystal-clear understanding that the terrorist band's reckless, inhuman actions had brought death to her child.

There will likely be more tragedies as Israel presses an assault on Hamas by air and, now, on the ground. Each will trace to Hamas' refusal to desist, once and for all, from raining rockets onto Israeli soil. And, perversely, each will increase pressure on Israel to stand down prematurely.

Calls for a truce have mounted with the European Union, the secretary general of the UN, Arab countries and others urging both sides to come to an immediate ceasefire.

Both sides? Let's start with one: the bad actor.

All the world knows that Israel would give up the fight in the event Hamas stopped firing and agreed to verifiably disarm. Those terms are both the short-term fix and the long-term solution that the international community should be demanding.

Lacking either one, Israel is waging a high-risk, highly skilled operation to destroy Hamas' capacity to lob missiles at will into Israeli territory, some with a range of 25 miles. The group's arsenal is formidable.

More than 3,000 rockets hit Israel in 2008. More than 500 have struck since Hamas ended a "truce" on Dec. 19. And, 10 days into the offensive, Hamas was still able yesterday to fire several dozen, including one that blasted an empty kindergarten.

The weapons stores must be dismantled and Hamas' supply routes - tunnels into Gaza from Egypt - must be shut, with oversight to prevent Hamas from rearming. Israel and the U.S. are properly seeking such terms.

Hamas' unending barrage had forced hundreds of thousands to live in fear, yet the onslaught drew barely a fraction of the outrage now directed at Israel's exercise of self-defense.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy went so far as to say, revoltingly, that Israel had hurt the cause of peace in the Mideast by sending ground troops into Gaza. There had been no peace - and there will be no peace until Hamas lacks the will and/or the way to attack.

Given no choice but to push in that direction, the Israeli military has done an extraordinary job of targeting Hamas fighters and arms in crowded environments - while holding down civilian casualties. It is up against demented enemies who sacrifice their own people.

Gaza's Rocket Scientists

Gaza has its version of rocket scientists

Westerners seem to expect more civilized behavior from Israel than from its adversaries.

Mark Steyn
Syndicated columnist

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/gaza-israel-think-2272631-hamas-president#slComments

So how was your holiday season? Over in Gaza, whether or not they're putting the Christ back in Christmas, they're certainly putting the crucifixion back in Easter. According to the London-based Arabic newspaper al Hayat, on Dec. Hama 23 Hamas legislators voted to introduce Sharia – Islamic law – to the Palestinian territories, including crucifixion. So next time you're visiting what my childhood books still quaintly called "the Holy Land" the re-enactments might be especially lifelike.

The following day, Christmas Eve, Samuel Huntington died at his home at Martha's Vineyard. A decade and a half ago, in his most famous book "The Clash Of Civilizations," professor Huntington argued that Western elites' view of man as homo economicus was reductive and misleading – that cultural identity is a more profound behavioral indicator than lazy assumptions about the universal appeal of Western-style economic liberty and the benefits it brings.

Very few of us want to believe this thesis.

"The great majority of Palestinian people," Condi Rice, the secretary of state, said to commentator Cal Thomas a couple of years back, "they just want a better life. This is an educated population. I mean, they have a kind of culture of education and a culture of civil society. I just don't believe mothers want their children to grow up to be suicide bombers. I think the mothers want their children to grow up to go to university. And if you can create the right conditions, that's what people are going to do."

Thomas asked a sharp follow-up: "Do you think this or do you know this?"

"Well, I think I know it," said Secretary Rice.

"You think you know it?"

"I think I know it."

I think she knows she doesn't know it. But in the modern world there is no diplomatic vocabulary for the kind of cultural fault line represented by the Israeli/Palestinian dispute, so even a smart thinker like Dr. Rice can only frame it as an issue of economic and educational opportunity. Of course, there are plenty of Palestinians like the ones the secretary of state described: You meet them living as doctors and lawyers in Los Angeles and Montreal and Geneva … but not, on the whole, in Gaza.

In Gaza, they don't vote for Hamas because they want access to university education. Or, if they do, it's to get Junior into the Saudi-funded, Hamas-run Islamic University of Gaza, where majoring in rocket science involves making one and firing it at the Zionist Entity. In 2007, as part of their attempt to recover Gaza from Hamas, Fatah seized 1,000 Qassam rockets at the university, as well as seven Iranian military trainers.

At a certain unspoken level, we understand that the Huntington thesis is right, and the Rice view is wishful thinking. After all, when French President Sarkozy and other European critics bemoan Israel's "disproportionate" response, what really are they saying? That they expect better from the despised Jews than from Hamas. That they regard Israel as a Western society bound by civilized norms, whereas any old barbarism issuing forth from Gaza is to be excused on grounds of "desperation."

Hence, this slightly surreal headline from The New York Times: "Israel Rejects Cease-Fire, But Offers Gaza Aid." For whatever that's worth. Wafa Samir Ibrahim al-Biss, a young Palestinian woman who received considerate and exemplary treatment at an Israeli hospital in Beersheba, returned to that same hospital packed with explosives in order to blow herself up and kill the doctors and nurses who restored her to health. Well, what do you expect? It's "desperation" born of "poverty" and "occupation."

If it was, it would be easy to fix. But what if it's not? What if it's about something more primal than land borders and economic aid?

A couple of days after Hamas voted to restore crucifixion to the Holy Land, their patron in Tehran (and their primary source of "aid") put in an appearance on British TV. As multicultural "balance" to Her Majesty The Queen's traditional Christmas message, the TV network Channel 4 invited President Ahmadinejad to give an alternative Yuletide address on the grounds that it was a valuable public service to let viewers hear him "speak for himself, which people in the West don't often get the chance to see."

In fact, as Caroline Glick pointed out in The Jerusalem Post, the great man "speaks for himself" all the time – when he's at the United Nations, calling on all countries to submit to Islam; when he's presiding over his international conference of Holocaust deniers; when he's calling for Israel to be "wiped off the map" – or (in his more "moderate" moments) relocated to a couple of provinces of Germany and Austria. Caroline Glick forbore to mention that, according to President Ahmadinejad's chief adviser, Hassan Abbassi, his geopolitical strategy is based on the premise that "Britain is the mother of all evils" – the evils being America, Australia, Israel, the Gulf states, Canada and New Zealand, all the malign progeny of the British Empire. "We have established a department that will take care of England," Mr. Abbassi said in 2005. "England's demise is on our agenda."

So when Britain's Channel 4 says that we don't get the chance to see these fellows speak for themselves, it would be more accurate to say that they speak for themselves incessantly but the louder they speak the more we put our hands over our ears and go "Nya nya, can't hear you." We do this in part because, if you're as invested as most Western elites are in the idea that all anyone wants is to go to university, get a steady job and settle down in a nice house in the suburbs, a statement such as "England's demise is on our agenda" becomes almost literally untranslatable. When President Ahmadinejad threatens to wipe Israel off the face of the map, we deplore him as a genocidal fantasist. But maybe he's a genocidal realist, and we're the fantasists.

The civilizational clashes of professor Huntington's book are not inevitable. Culture is not immutable. But changing culture is tough and thankless and something the West no longer has the stomach for. Unfortunately, the Saudis do, and so do the Iranians. And not just in Gaza but elsewhere the trend is away from "moderation" and toward something fiercer and ever more implacable.

To be fair to President Ahmadinejad's hosts at Channel 4, the "department that will take care of England" probably doesn't get the lion's share of the funding in Tehran. On the other hand, when Hashemi Rafsanjani describes the Zionist Entity as "the most hideous occurrence in history," which the Muslim world "will vomit out from its midst" with "a single atomic bomb," that sounds rather more specific, if not teetering alarmingly on the "disproportionate." Unlike its international critics in North America and Europe, Israel has no margin for error.

©MARK STEYN

Hamas Must Not Win in Gaza

Egypt's Mubarak to EU: Hamas must not be allowed to win in Gaza

By Barak Ravid, Avi Issacharoff and Zvi Bar'el

Tags: Gaza, Israel, Israel News

Hamas must not be allowed to win its conflict with the IDF, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Monday told a delegation of European foreign ministers in a closed conversation.

The comment occurred even as Hamas, for the first time since the fighting began, sent representatives to Cairo to discuss a cease-fire. Following a meeting with Egyptian intelligence officials, Hamas officials said they had received an Egyptian proposal and would consider it.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Monday told French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who was visiting Jerusalem, that Israel would not honor a cease-fire imposed by the UN Security Council without its consent. Arab states are currently pushing for a Security Council resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire.

Israel is mainly pinning its hopes on the United States and France to thwart the Arab effort in the Security Council. However, it has sent messages to several Security Council members informing them that Israel will not accept an imposed cease-fire, and especially that it will not accept any resolution that places Israel and Hamas on the same level by calling for both to cease their fire impartially.

The European foreign ministers, headed by Karel Schwarzenberg of the Czech Republic, whose country currently holds the European Union's rotating presidency, came to Jerusalem after visiting Cairo, and briefed Livni on their meeting with Mubarak. Inter alia, they reportedly told her that Mubarak had said Hamas "must not be allowed to emerge from the fighting with the upper hand."

Regarding Israel's demand that Egypt halt arms smuggling from its territory into Gaza as part of any cease-fire agreement, the ministers said Mubarak denied that any such smuggling takes place. He insisted that the weapons arrive not via tunnels from Sinai, but in barrels thrown overboard from ships passing near Gaza's coast.

The ministers told Livni it is imperative to achieve a cease-fire as soon as possible, so as to enable peace talks between Israel and the PA to resume. They also asked for Israel's aid in sending humanitarian assistance into Gaza, to which Livni agreed.

On another issue, Israel asked France to press the Red Cross to arrange to visit kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit, who is held by Hamas in Gaza. Shalit holds dual French-Israeli citizenship. Sarkozy will apparently raise this issue with Syrian President Bashar Assad, who has influence with Hamas' Damascus-based political wing, when he meets him today in Damascus.

Livni also told the European foreign ministers that Israel "would not be able to ignore the Shalit issue in the framework of any cease-fire."

The Egyptian cease-fire proposal would require Israel to end its military operation and withdraw from Gaza, while Hamas would have to end rocket fire into Israel. The border crossings into Gaza would reopen, but PA officials would be stationed at the Rafah crossing with Egypt.

In addition, Egypt is demanding that Hamas resume reconciliation talks with Fatah.

Moussa Abu Marzouk, deputy head of Hamas' political wing, told Reuters that Hamas was open to a truce, but said taht any proposal must guarantee an Israeli withdrawal and an end to the blockade of Gaza.

"Any initiative not based on ending the aggression, opening the border crossings and an Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip has no chance of succeeding," he said.

Meanwhile, Turkish Justice Minister Mehmet Ali Sahin charged in Antalya on Saturday that "Israel is the world's greatest terrorist provocateur. The war on terror cannot succeed as long as Israel continues its provocations."

He was followed on Sunday by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who, during a visit to Saudi Arabia, blamed Israel for the outbreak of fighting. "Hamas observed the truce for six months, but Israel did not honor the agreement to lift the embargo on Gaza," he said. "People in Gaza live in a sort of prison. Essentially, all of Palestine is a prison."

Also on Sunday, Jordanian Prime Minister Nader Dahabi said Jordan was liable to reconsider its relations with Israel in light of the Gaza operation.

... Just The Beginning

U.S. Intelligence Official about Israel: “This is just the beginning”

U.S. Intelligence official "breaks silence" on Israel situation"

31 December 2008: Northeast Intelligence Network director Doug Hagmann interviewed a highly-placed U.S. intelligence official late yesterday who not only confirmed rumors about escalated and more intensive Israeli military operations against the Muslim terrorists in Gaza, warned of the increasing probability of abandonment of Israel by the U.S. and other Western countries based on what he termed “malicious intelligence.”

“Remember that term,” advised this well-placed intelligence official, “you’ll be hearing it again.”

“This is just the beginning,” stated this intelligence official, who wished to remain anonymous. This official stated that the possibility for a much more protracted ground war is more likely today than at any other time in the past, adding that Israel is exercising her right to protect herself from her enemies in Gaza. But there is a catch, noted this official, and a big one at that: Israel could be about to lose the support of the United States.

“I have every reason to believe, based on what I’ve seen at my level of [security] clearance especially over the last several years, that Israel will soon be completely on their own… or worse.” When asked what could be worse than losing the support of the United States, he stated: “when our administration provides more support to Arab countries [with] financial and military aid, undercutting Israel’s defense efforts all while pushing Israel to succumb to the pressure of unreasonable demands designed to end with their political annihilation as a nation.”

According to this official, the U.S. has been slowly proceeding down this road. He cited the 2005 surrender of Gush Katif to the Palestinian Authority as one critical example of the slow dismantlement of Israel as a viable nation. “Despite critical intelligence outlining in every possible manner imaginable that this would be a disastrous move leading to the events we are seeing today, it was done anyway,” he stated.

“We are seeing the very scenario play out today that was outlined in intelligence briefs three and four years ago. Knowing that, there is something very wrong with this picture,” he stated.

He added that Western media is also playing a very big role in the current war in the Middle East, thanks, in part, to carefully worded statements prepared by political officials in Washington. Officials in the current administration, like some previous administrations, submit carefully crafted informational releases to a media that is controlled by those having special interests that are contrary to a legitimate peace in the Middle East.

“The game is rigged. At the highest levels of power in the U.S. and even by some in power in Israel, the game is rigged,” he emphasized.

The next obvious question in this interview was, of course, “how is it rigged?” followed by ”how are you in a position to know?”

This official responded by stating that he has spent the last two decades serving in “an unfortunate position where intelligence and politics meet and often collide.” Now, merely days away from retirement, he stated that he is looking forward to leaving his position after conducting over 20 years of intelligence work “that has been molded and massaged to advance the agendas of a select few.”

He continued: “When an intelligence work product that has been thoroughly and properly vetted is submitted to those in Washington, and I see a completely different and entirely inaccurate product intentionally submitted and aired in the media, only to be told ‘that is the way it must be,’ then I know it’s time for me to leave.”

“It is obvious to me that most Americans don’t understand or don’t care what is actually happening in the Middle East relative to Israel. People don’t understand history, or have been subjected to revisionist history based on lies and more lies. Add to that a media that fails to provide an accurate assessment of what is taking place in Israel, in Gaza, and you end up with a very bad situation for Israel,” stated this source. He added that the disinformation coming and going to and from Washington is getting worse, as is the media bias against Israel.

The events currently taking place in Israel are extremely perilous for Israel and especially perilous for the national security of the United States, according to this source. Contrary to the accepted assessments of “Middle East experts” in the news, our intelligence services have “ample evidence to prove active collusion and support between HAMAS and other terrorist organizations, both Sunni and Shite. Further, there is a level of Iranian complicity in this war that is not being talked about, or being dismissed out of hand because of the schism between the Sunni and Shia sects,” stated this source.

The Real Story Of The Raid On Gaza

BREAKING POINT VIDEO