Eurobarometer:

59% of Europeans believe
ISRAEL IS THE BIGGEST THREAT TO WORLD PEACE

Results of a new poll commissioned by the European Commission show that Israel is believed by Europeans in 15 countries to be the greatest threat to world peace, greater than North Korea, Iran, or Afghanistan.

While the European Commission will release the full results of the poll on Monday, the International Herald Tribune reported that the 7,500 people polled living in the European Union (500 in each of the 15 E.U. member states) were presented with a list of 15 countries and asked if these countries present a threat to world peace. Shockingly, Israel was rated first.

This poll is an indication that Europeans have bought into the vilification and demonization campaign directed against the State of Israel and her supporters by European leaders and media.

"These shocking results, that Israel is the greatest threat to world peace, bigger than North Korea, Iran and Afghanistan, defies logic and is a racist flight of fancy that only shows that antisemitism is deeply embedded within European society, more now than in any other period since the end of World War II," said Rabbi Marvin Hier, the Center's dean and founder.

"If the results of this survey are as reported, then Israel should draw the only conclusion possible: that the European Union and its members should play no role in any future Middle East peace process," Hier concluded.

Center officials are scheduled to meet with Javier Solana, Secretary General of the European Union, in November to discuss this and related issues.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center is voicing its outrage directly to European Commission President Romano Prodi and we ask you to do the same:

PLEASE ACT NOW BY CLICKING HERE TO SIGN THIS URGENT ACTION PETITION!

* * * * *
According to the IHT article linked above, "In a survey conducted last year for the Pew Research Center for the People the Press and the International Herald Tribune, British, Italian, French and German respondents said they sympathized more with the Palestinians than Israelis.
and
"In the parts of the survey made public Monday, 80 percent said they wanted Europe to be more involved in the Middle East peace process."

Selective Sensitivity: Ignoring Jewish Humanity

by Bruce S. Ticker

On Saturday, I learned of the Israeli soldiers who were murdered in their sleep in Gaza where they were stationed to protect their fellow Jews.

Two of them were 19-year-old women and the other a 20-year-old man. I saw a photo of one victim and thought how cute she was. If she lived in America, she probably would have been sleeping in her college dorm room. On a given Saturday night, she might be dating her future husband and father of her children instead of going to war.

None of this will happen now, of course.

This is one of those moments when the struggle in Israel strikes home. These are my people dying and those three Israeli soldiers were barely adults when they died.

Later Saturday I watched much of the demonstration against the war in Iraq. Of course, the subject of Israel was raised a number of times. None of it was positive. Just the other week, Malaysia Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad accused the Jewish people of running the world.

Conveniently left out of both these talks was any word of Israeli deaths. This is how insensitive these people are. They are such so-called advocates for the Palestinians that they ignore the human costs for Jews.

Frankly, I'm not sure who scares me more - the Malaysian prime minister or the speakers at Saturday's rally.

His words are old news by now - "Today the Jews rule the world by proxy: They get others to fight and die for them."

Yeah, right. Tell that to the families of the three dead Israeli soldiers.

Read it all at Israel Insider.

What's new, caterpillar?

The giant Caterpillar bulldozer, used by the Israeli military to destroy Palestinian homes in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, now comes with a controversial new feature: remote control.

I kid you not. Read it at JPost.

Don't miss Roger L. Simon: Confessions of a War Monger

"Now if you say this is not a War of Civilizations, please tell me what it is. I wish the situation were simpler, accessible to some kind of “make nice” patching, but something tells me that it isn’t. Something tells me we are engaged in conflict that will be with us for the rest of our natural lives and sometime beyond. Get used to it."

at Amazon.com

Bret Stephens: Our Enemies Have Won

The controversy of Israel 's borders is upon us

Eye on the Media

It is the obligation of the people who rule polite society – academics, editors, teachers, TV producers and so on – to enforce the norms when government will not. Fail to do so, and you take the lid off the gutter and let the sewage run in the streets.

This is what is happening now with Israel. It does not really matter what Judt thinks about the dummy's ventriloquist. It matters that his views are being published in prestige magazines. It matters that his views are on this side of acceptable discourse.

It matters that his views are a matter of controversy, not disrepute.

It will be said that I am trying to quash debate. That is exactly what I would have done, were it still possible. It no longer is. The controversy of Israel's borders is over. Our enemies have won. The controversy of Israel is now upon us.

AFP "Top Photos"

go figure

L to R: Islamic Jihad, Slovak children lighting candles on All Saints Day, and . . . tennis.


But this is my big fave:

French President Jacques Chirac, right, shakes hands with Israel's Labor Party leader Shimon
Peres at the Elysee Palace, Thursday, Oct. 30, 2003 in Paris. (AP Photo/Laurent Emmanuel)

AFP: Israel split over how to end violence - - "Current Labour leader and former premier Shimon Peres said after talks with French President Jaques Chirac in Paris that while he was "not against" the [Geneva] initiative, more energy should be invested in the internationally backed peace roadmap launched earlier this year.

That blueprint, which envisages a Palestinian state by 2005, has been stalled by the continuing violence."

"One Mideast State May Be Future of Israel"

Associated Press "feature article"

By RAVI NESSMAN, Associated Press Writer

RAMALLAH, West Bank - Ramallah, the bustling heart of Palestinian life in the West Bank, is rapidly becoming surrounded by Israeli settlements, from the trailer homes of hilltop outposts to the cookie-cutter apartment buildings on the nearby outskirts of Jerusalem.

It's a familiar picture throughout the West Bank, and as the Jewish and Palestinian populations become more entangled, the internationally backed solution of separating them into two states is looking increasingly difficult.

With settlement-building continuing and peace efforts stalled, Israelis in growing numbers are worrying that a partition may soon become impossible — and some Palestinians have concluded that a single state for both peoples is in their interest.

"The conflict is not far from the point where it will no longer be possible to carry out a two-state solution," said Yossi Alpher, a leading Israeli political analyst.

It has become a matter of intense discussion on talk shows and editorial pages, supplying ammunition to Israeli peace campaigners who say a pullout from the West Bank and Gaza should be framed not as a compromise but as a necessity. The alternative, they say, will be an Israel swamped by Arabs, torn between giving them the vote and losing Jewish dominion over the country, or denying them the vote and standing accused of emulating apartheid South Africa.

That concern spurred at least two efforts by moderate politicians to negotiate unofficial peace deals with the Palestinians. The most recent plan, known as the Geneva Agreement, foresees Israel giving the Palestinians nearly all the territories it captured in 1967 and dismantling most settlements.

That agreement has no legal standing and has been vehemently condemned by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

And on playing the Palestinian population card:

According to Hermi Shalev, in Friday's Maariv [newspaper], Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon fears that Palestinian leaders who favor a two-state solution are losing ground, and that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat himself is willing to sit back and wait for Israel to buckle under the weight of a growing Palestinian population.

"Down the road you have to deal with a binational state coming your way," Palestinian political analyst Ali Jerbawi said. "It might take another 50 years, 70 years. Whatever."

Jerbawi says Israel should be given an ultimatum — agree on a Palestinian state in six months or the Palestinians will dump the idea and switch to seeking Israeli annexation. Israel would surely object to giving its new Palestinian citizens the vote, but eventually would have to yield, he said.

More . . .

JPOST: Over 100,000 show up for Rabin ceremony

At the ceremony Saturday night, Labor Party Chairman Shimon Peres blamed the extreme right for once again promoting incitement and irresponsibile declarations.

Peres said at the ceremony that Rabin had led Israel on a "long and correct path." Yitzhak was right. His way was right. The inciters against him were wrong. His murderers - criminals." Peres vowed to continue on Rabin's path. "Even on the right, they are starting to understand that it is better to have two nations who can hope to live in peace, rather than one nation in a constant struggle with it's neighbors," Peres said, using the memorial event as a platform to sharply criticize the Sharon government.

Touting the slogan he used at a Knesset speech two weeks ago, Peres declared: "There is someone to talk to, there is something to talk about," referring to the Palestinian Authority under Abu Ala (Ahmed Qurei).

AFP headline: Israeli peace camp commemorates Rabin, buoyed by Geneva initiative

"I am sure Rabin would have supported Geneva, because it's a logical continuation of the Oslo accords," said Israel Dresner, a rabbi from New Jersey visiting Israel. Ain't that the truth?

Voice of Judea: Attendance figures grossly inflated according to police

In spite of Rabin Memorial organizers claim that 150,000 people attended Saturday nights Tel Aviv event, police say organizers grossly inflated figures and that 40,000 people showed.

Peres said that the right has now adopted Rabins platform, Those that condemned Rabin now support his way. Even the right now supports the formation of a Palestinian state.

Likud and Labor leaders attacked the person/people behind the anti-Rabin graffitti that was sprayed on the Rabin memorial in Tel Aviv and that is turning up across the country over the past 48 hours

Voice of Judea Commentary: Police say they had 1500 officers there. And thousands of Arabs participated. This was the best publicized event of the year that advertised special speakers and performers. Every left-wing political party brought every staff member and Knesset member and invested huge resources to bring people to the event that they tried to turn into an anti-government festival. How many ordinary Jews attended this fiasco?

Israeli Left Wing To Target Arutz-7 Online?

"Real goal" the total silencing of the nationalist and traditionalist camp in Israel

MK Gal'on has asked Attorney-General Elyakim Rubenstein to open a criminal investigation into the operators of Arutz-7's internet site on suspicion of "incitement to murder and racism."

Gal'on honed in on a sentence in an op-ed on Arutz-7's Hebrew site, written by Gil Ronen, a resident of pre-1967 Israel, near Hadera. Gal'on says that his article is a call to "murder hundreds of thousands of Palestinians." Though Arutz-7 does not endorse the opinions it publishes in its op-ed section, it should be noted that the sentence in question was taken out of context, and does not incite to murder. In fact, Ronen writes in the article, "no one will have to take the law into his own hands."

The article's basic assumption is that as there is no chance for reaching peace with the Arabs of Yesha, there is therefore no alternative but to "remove this 'nation' from our midst." Ronen wrote that he does not support transfer, as "the Palestinians are not European Jews, and we are not Germans." Instead, he suggests a "gradual deterioration" in which the war against terrorists expands, including more targeted killings, more house demolitions, and more air raids.

"No one will have to take the law into his own hands," Ronen writes. "It's enough that officers and soldiers interpret their instructions as broadly as possible and employ maximum force." The sentence quoted by MK Gal'on reads, "The only ones who will die will be Palestinians, and whoever doesn't want to die, will be forced to run away."

As is well-known, Ronen is not the first one to have called for a "stronger arm" against the Arabs of Yesha since the onset of the Oslo War over three years ago. Following a wave of Palestinian terrorism in Dec. 2001, for instance, MK Eliezer Cohen (Yisrael Beiteinu) said, "This is war, not just terrorism, and we must fight back accordingly. They are fighting us with all of their resources and weaponry, and we must do the same. Our army knows exactly what to do, and it is time to do it."

Baruch Gordon, manager of Arutz-7's internet department, responded today, "According to the warped definition of democracy professed by the extreme left, nationalist-camp opinions are simply wrong and therefore illegitimate... What MK Gal'on is doing is proof that the left-wing's actions to shut down Arutz-7 Radio because of minor legal technicalities are merely stepping-stones along its ruthless path towards its real goal: the total silencing of the nationalist and traditional camp in Israel."

Please consider signing Arutz-7's own petition to renew their broadcasts, calling on the government to pass a law which would establish true pluralism on Israel's airwaves. The petition has been worded in such a way that "even Arutz Sheva´s political adversaries can enthusiastically add their names":

We the undersigned view Arutz Sheva Israel Radio an important voice which has proven its popularity and appeal to a large segment of the Israeli population. The recent legal proceedings which silenced this mouthpiece of the "national camp" constitute a threat to the very democratic values that the judicial system purports to uphold. In order to protect Israeli democracy, we call upon the government to expedite the passing of legislation which will enable Arutz Sheva and other private groups/entrepreneurs to operate licensed national radio stations.

Shavua tov

What was this woman doing with a belt of explosives in her house?

A Palestinian woman expresses her anger after Israeli Defence Forces detonated an explosive belt they found in her house, destroying the ground and first floor of the building, in the village of Hizmeh near Jerusalem(AFP/Atta Hussein)

Good Shabbos

Yasher Koach (literally, may your strength be firm) to Joe McCain, brother of Senator McCain, who apparently wrote this back in the spring:

There is a lot of worry popping up in the media just now -- "Can Israel Survive?" Don't worry about it. It relates to something that Palestinians, the Arabs, and perhaps most Americans don't realize -- the Jews are never going quietly again. Never. And if the world doesn't come to understand that, then millions of Arabs are going to die. It's as simple as that. Throughout the history of the world, the most abused, kicked-around race of people have been the Jews. Not just during the holocaust of World War II, but for thousands of years. They have truly been "The Chosen People" in a terrible and tragic sense.

The Bible story of Egypt's enslavement of the Jews is not just a story, it is history, if festooned with theological legend and heroic epics. In 70 A.D. the Romans, which had for a long time tolerated the Jews --even admired them as 'superior' to other vassals -- tired of their truculent demands for independence and decided on an early "Solution" to the Jewish problem. Jerusalem was sacked and reduced to near rubble, Jewish resistance was pursued and crushed by the implacable Roman War Machine -- see 'Masada'. And thus began The Diaspora, the dispersal of Jews throughout the rest of the world.

Their homeland destroyed, their culture crushed, they looked desperately for the few niches in a hostile world where they could be safe. That safety was fragile, and often subject to the whims of moody hosts. The words 'pogrom', 'ghetto', and 'anti-Semitism' come from this treatment of the first mono-theistic people. Throughout Europe, changing times meant sometimes tolerance, sometimes even warmth for the Jews, but eventually it meant hostility, then malevolence. There is not a country in Europe or Western Asia that at one time or another has not decided to lash out against the children of Moses, sometimes by whim, sometimes by manipulation.

Winston Churchill calls Edward I one of England's very greatest kings. It was under his rule in the late 1200's that Wales and Cornwall were hammered into the British crown, and Scotland and Ireland were invaded and occupied. He was also the first European monarch to set up a really effective administrative bureaucracy, surveyed and censused his kingdom, established laws and political divisions. But he also embraced the Jews. Actually Edward didn't embrace Jews so much as he embraced their money. For the English Jews had acquired wealth -- understandable, because this people that could not own land or office, could not join most of the trades and professions, soon found out that money was a very good thing to accumulate. Much harder to take away than land or a store, was a hidden sock of gold and silver coins. Ever resourceful, Edward found a way -- he borrowed money from the Jews to finance imperial ambitions in Europe, especially France. The loans were almost certainly not made gladly, but how do you refuse your King? Especially when he is 'Edward the Hammer'. Then, rather than pay back the debt, Edward simply expelled the Jews. Edward was especially inventive -- he did this twice. After a time, he invited the Jews back to their English homeland, borrowed more money, then expelled them again.

Most people do not know that Spain was one of the early entrants into The Renaissance. People from all over the world came to Spain in the late medieval period. All were welcome -- Arabs, Jews, other Europeans. The University of Salamanca was one of the great centers of learning in the world -- scholars of all nations, all fields came to Salamanca to share their knowledge and their ideas. But in 1492, Ferdinand and Isabella, having driven the last of Moors from the Spanish Shield, were persuaded by the righteous fundamentalists of the time to announce "The Act of Purification." A series of steps were taken in which all Jews and Arabs and other non-Christians were expelled from the country, or would face the tools and the torches of The Inquisition. From this 'cleansing' come the Sephardic Jews -- as opposed to the Ashkenazis of Eastern Europe. In Eastern Europe, the sporadic violence and brutality against Jews are common
knowledge. 'Fiddler' without the music and the folksy humor. At times of fury, no accommodation by the Jew was good enough, no profile low enough, no village poor enough or distant enough.

From these come the near-steady flow of Jews to the United States. And despite the disdain of the Jews by most 'American' Americans, they came to grab the American Dream with both hands, and contributed everything from new ideas of enterprise in retail and entertainment to becoming some of our finest physicians and lawyers. The modern United States, in spite of itself, IS The United States in part because of its Jewish blood.

Then the Nazi Holocaust -- the corralling, sorting, orderly eradication of millions of the people of Moses. Not something that other realms in other times didn't try to do, by the way, the Germans were just more organized and had better murder technology.

I stood in the center of Dachau for an entire day, about 15 years ago, trying to comprehend how this could have happened. I had gone there on a side trip from Munich, vaguely curious about this Dachau. I soon became engulfed in the enormity of what had occurred there nestled in this middle and working class neighborhood.

How could human beings do this to other human beings, hear their cries, their pleas, their terror, their pain, and continue without apparently even wincing? I no longer wonder. At some times, some places, ANY sect of the
human race is capable of horrors against their fellow man, whether a member of the Waffen SS, a Serbian sniper, a Turkish policeman in 1920's Armenia, a Mississippi Klansman. Because even in the United States not all was a
Rose Garden. For a long time Jews had quotas in our universities and graduate schools. Only so many Jews could be in a medical or law school at one time. Jews were disparaged widely. I remember as a kid Jewish jokes told without a wince - "Why do Jews have such big noses?"

Well, now the Jews have a homeland again. A place that is theirs. And that's the point. It doesn't matter how many times the United States and European powers try to rein in Israel, if it comes down to survival of its nation, its people, they will fight like no lioness has ever fought to save her cubs. They will fight with a ferocity, a determination, and a skill,
that will astound us.

And many will die, mostly their attackers, I believe. If there were a macabre historical betting parlor, my money would be on the Israelis to be standing at the end. As we killed the kamikazes and the Wehrmacht soldaten of World War II, so will the Israelis kill their suicidal attackers, until there are not enough to torment them.

The irony goes unnoticed -- while we are hammering away to punish those who brought the horrors of last September here, we restrain the Israelis from the same retaliation. Not the same thing, of course -- We are We, They are They. While we mourn and seethe at September 11th, we don't notice that Israel has a September 11th sometimes every day.

We may not notice, but it doesn't make any difference.

And it doesn't make any difference whether you are pro-Israeli or you think Israel is the bully of the Middle East. If it comes to where a new holocaust looms -- with or without the concurrence of the United States and Europe -- Israel will lash out without pause or restraint at those who would try to annihilate their country.

The Jews will not go quietly again.

Joe McCain

The Jewish response to terror

Remembering Dr. Applebaum by bringing 10 doctors to Israel

Arutz Sheva:

Nefesh B'Nefesh and "Friends of Dr. David Applebaum" have announced the formation of the Applebaum Fellowship, which will sponsor the Aliyah of ten physicians to Israel during the summer of 2004.

Nefesh B'Nefesh- Jewish Souls United - is an organization dedicated to revitalizing North American Aliyah (immigration to Israel), while "Friends of Dr. David Applebaum" was formed after the murder of Dr. Applebaum and his daughter Naava in the Cafe Hillel terrorist attack in Jerusalem on September 9, 2003.

Dr. Applebaum was the director of Emergency Services at Shaarei Tzedek Hospital in Jerusalem and the founder of TEREM, a successful emergency medical care system that he both initiated and developed throughout Israel. His daughter Naava, who worked with cancer patients as part of her National Service, was talking with her father at Cafe Hillel the day before she was to be married.

The fellowship will involve a dollar-for-dollar matching sponsorship of over $180,000, which will be used to provide grants to subsidize the permanent move of ten doctors to Israel. Preference will be given to doctors with expertise in the field of emergency medicine. Partners of Israel Seed, a venture capital firm in Jerusalem, initiated the Applebaum Fellowship. United Israel Appeal - Canada has also been instrumental in facilitating the fellowship.

Dead Jews Again: Stories from Cafe Hillel by Harvey Tannenbaum

David Daniel Abizdris, 51, told his wife Hadas that he would like to take her out to the new Cafe Hillel on Emek Refaim. Their eldest son had just passed his IDF officer's course successfully. David and Hadas' twin boys, 11, were doing very well in their first week of school. The couple ate, drank, and paid the bill. Hadas was outside the restaurant, when her husband, David decided to add to his tip and go back in the restaurant. The terrorist had just run in to blow himself up. Hadas was unhurt and David was killed instantly inside Cafe Hillel. David had just completed the building of their new home in Mevaseeret with his own hands and crew for the last 9months. David is survived by his wife, Hadas, his mother, the twins, and his officer son in the IDF.

Gila Moshe, 40, warned her children on Sunday not to go to the Malcha Malls for fear of terrorist attacks on the malls. Gila and her best friend went to see Boaz Sharabi in concert at the Jerusalem Theater on Tuesday night. As would most people around the world, after a theater show, one would stop at a cafe for coffee and cake. Boaz Moshe, her husband, was home doing homework with their two children, aged 12 and 14 who had been 'forbidden' to go to malls. Gila Moshe, on a ladies' night out, was killed in Cafe Hillel by the terrorist's bomb which he made during Camp Hudna.

Amil Tobol, 52, was widowed 12years ago. Amil raised his three children as a proud father under the conditions of a widower who was also working 8hours a day as a kablan(contractor). Amil met Osnat two years ago and remarried her. Amil and Osnat became parents only last year. Amil went to Cafe Hillel to meet his brother for a coffe and dessert. Amil's brother could not make it at the last minute, so he drank his coffee and ordered take out for his wife. Amil was murdered while waiting for the takeout food for his wife. Today Osnat is a widow to raise Amil's three children and their new baby son.

Shafik Karem, 27, an eldest son of a Roman Catholic Jerusalem family from Beit Hanina began working as a waiter in Cafe Hillel last month. Tomorrow Shafik was to have brought home his first paycheck. Shafik had become good friends with Alon Mizrahi, the security guard at Cafe Hillel last year. Alon had recommended this devout Catholic to work in Cafe Hillel. Shafik, a Catholic, was murdered at work by an Arab Muslim(sic)

Alon Mizrahi, 22, was discharged from the IAF three months ago. Alon began to work at Cafe Hillel as a security guard. Alon was raised amongst 6brothers in Geula. Alon was the guard who blocked the terrorist from full entry into Cafe Hillel. The police told his father that the other 30 patrons inside the Cafe were saved by Alon Mizrahi who stopped the terrorist from his full attack. Alon was buried yesterday not too far from Dr. David Appelbaum and daughter, Nava's burial sites. This hero who saved 30 lives of the Cafe as a guard is near the heroes of chesed who saved lives every day in their duties.

NPR drives me crazy

I'm not very knowledgeable about economic matters, but yesterday the big economic story was that during the third quarter, our economy grew at an annualized rate of 7.2% , described by CNBC as "a simply stellar number."

The NPR reporter I heard said simply "this is good news for the Bush administration." Isn't it good news for the entire country? Instead of welcoming favorable economic news, NPR seems to mourn it! They would rather see the economy, and maybe even the the country, go down the toilet -- just to vindicate their Bush-hatred. Now, how sick is that?

It worries me for this country, and it worries me for Israel.

Aaron's got a minyan

Internet Haganah is up and running at at least 12 online locations

Check it out, lend a hand. You'll feel better.

Get on the List: PROUD FRIENDS OF ISRAEL

"Israel and its citizens need to know their friends and supporters are standing by them at these harsh times!"

Get yourself and your website on Lorien's list - and peruse the five page listing of Israel-friendly people and sites, from all over the world. Any friend of Israel is a friend of mine.

See you there >>>>>

13th Yahrzeit of Rabbi Meir Kahane ZT”L, HY”D

Sunday, November 23th 2003

28th of Cheshvan 5764

At Noon

Kol Hamacabee

The Center for Religious Zionism

will hold its

Annual Memorial Ceremony at

Chabad of Boulder
4900 Sioux Drive
Boulder, Colorado


For information and directions
Moshe (Matt) Finberg
303-442-1276


Dallas
18 Cheshvan 5764, Wed. 12 November 2003
8pm to 9:30pm
Silent Vigil
Holocaust Memorial Fountain
Jewish Community Center
7900 Northaven
l-david@excite.com


Baltimore
November 16, 2003, Sunday
6:00 pm.
Shmuel Sackett (Manhigut) will be speaking.
for information and R.S.V.P call 410-764-0293
or email sonenthal@aol.com


Toronto, Canada
Thursday November 20
8:00 pm
at The Chabad Center on Chabad Gate
in Thornhill
8:00pm.for information 416-667-8468
or email defense@vif.com


Los Angeles
Thursday Nov. 20, 2003
For information and R.S.V.P call 310-877-1482


New York
Sunday November 23rd (28th Cheshvan)
2:00 PM at Cong Pri Eitz Chaim
2600 Ocean Avenue (between Avenues U & V)
Brooklyn, NY
For information and directions, call 718 670 3771


Jerusalem
Thursday November 20
8:00 pm
Shifra Hoffman will be speaking on the Kahane Legacy
at the Israel Center

Zell Miller Endorses Bush

by Fred Barnes in the Weekly Standard

SENATOR ZELL MILLER OF GEORGIA, the nation's most prominent conservative Democrat, said today he will endorse President Bush for re-election in 2004 and campaign for him if Bush wishes him to. Miller said Bush is "the right man at the right time" to govern the country.

The next five years "will determine the kind of world my children and grandchildren will live in," Miller said in an interview. And he wouldn't "trust" any of the nine Democratic presidential candidates with governing during "that crucial period," he said. "This Democrat will vote for President Bush in 2004."

I'm with Miller. Thinking about a bumper sticker: Democrat for Bush. It would go over big in Boulder.

Googling for "democrats for bush" I got 1,790,000 hits:

Democrats doubt Bush's credibility . . . Democrats challenge Bush's credibility . . . Democrats attack Bush record . . . lash Bush 'lunacy'. . . hammer Bush on Iraq . . .rap Bush's postwar planning . . . boycott Bush's nominee . . . slam Bush . . . bash Bush . . . charge Bush . . . blocking Bush . . . rip Bush . . . target Bush . . . hit Bush . . . blast Bush . . . criticize Bush . . . grill Bush . . . welcome Bush's fall in polls . . . call Bush a liar . . . lambaste Bush . . .

By page 6, it becomes repetitious. No "Democrats for Bush." Not yet.

FEEDBACK:This from Reid Bader:

I wouldn't recommend putting a "Democrat for Bush" bumper sticker on your car in Boulder. Your car will be vandalized. I have personally experienced the "tolerance" of the "progressives" in Boulder. I had a letter to the editor published in the Daily Camera praising President Bush before 9/11. It was in reaction to numerous letters bashing Bush. That evening my car was vandalized. My car didn't have any bumper stickers. The vandals had to look up my address and go out their way.

My apartment building had the apartment numbers on the parking spots. When I first moved in I told the owner that it is a security risk to use apartment numbers on the parking spaces. The owner laughed and said "This is Boulder. You're a paranoid New Yorker".

Lecture at RUTGERS finds a "common ground . . . beyond politics and ideology"

Headline at the Rutgers Daily Targum: Israeli expert discusses Middle East politics.

"What could this be?" I thought. The first paragraph was astonishing:

It may be uncommon to see pro-Israelis and pro-Palestinians sit in the same room and discuss issues on which they agree. But the two groups defied that image Tuesday when they came together for "The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Road Map to Where?" - a lecture featuring an Israeli politics expert who discussed where Israeli-Palestinian relations stand and where they are headed.

The two sides came together? via a Road Map?

The lecture - co-sponsored by the Center for the Critical Analysis of Contemporary Culture, the Center for Security and Democracy, the Center for the Study of Jewish Life, Rutgers Society of Arab Students and the Rutgers Hillel - was given by Yoav Peled, who holds that the major differences between Israelis and Palestinians are the result of the Oslo Accords (I would go back a little further, but okay, so far):

Israeli settlers were opposed to the accords because they would have to retract from settlements. On the Palestinian side, Peled said, refugees were not in favor of the accords because they would not be able to return to the land.

The current situation involves achieving peace through military victory, which Peled said would not work because it would "break the will of the Palestinian people to resist" and break up territories where Palestinians live. It would also ensure more curfews and checkpoints to make movement into Israel more difficult.

Oh, now I get it! The Arab students came together because they could've written this script themselves, and Hillel? Well, the expert was Israeli . . . Read more if you want -- The fence is bigger than the Berlin Wall, and what we really need is peace, "not through violence but through dialogue."

These guys look like they'd want to dialogue. Put the tea kettle on, and invite them over. Start with singing Kumbaya, and end with a group hug.


As children watch, masked gunmen from the radical Palestinian group Al Aqsa Martyres Brigade fire into the air, during a rally in Balata refugee camp, in the West Bank town of Nablus, Thursday, Oct. 30, 2003. The group is responsible for dozens of bombing attacks against Israeli civilians. (AP Photo/Nasser Ishtayeh)


C'mon, Hillel, get real.

POLL: Palestinians believe terrorist campaign serves their interests

The first and last sentences of this will suffice:

The general Palestinian public views the violent terrorist campaign against Israel as an effective tool for obtaining the goal of statehood, according to the results of a new opinion poll.

The results strongly back right-wing assessments that the ultimate goal of the PLO and the Arab world at large remains the utter elimination of the Jewish state. Read it all at Jerusalem Newswire.



Palestinian youth shout anti-Israeli slogans during Mohammed Awad's, 26, funeral in Gaza City.
(AFP/Mohammed Abed)

The media never says what these "anti-Israeli slogans" are.

Something along these lines maybe?


No, sorry, that's from last weekend's antiwar protest in Washington, D.C. (via LittleGreenFootballs).

See the Belligerent Bunny Blog for more photos from the supposed peace march - you'll see Saddam's flag flying, President Bush's head on a spike, signs calling for the destruction of the United States, the usual peaceful sorts of things. Good job, you belligerent bunny, you!

Great piece at WSJ by Bernard Lewis and James Woolsey

King and Country: The Hasemite Solution for Iraq

This fascinating article calls for the re-institution of the Iraqi constitution from 1925, which would establish a constitutional monarchy:

Selecting the right monarch for the transitional government would be vitally important. Conveniently, the 1925 constitution provides that the people of Iraq are deemed to have "confided . . . a trust" to "King Faisal, son of Hussain, and to his heirs . . . ." If the allies who liberated Iraq recognized an heir of this Hashemite line as its constitutional monarch, and this monarch agreed to help bring about a modern democracy under the rule of law, such a structure could well be the framework for a much smoother transition to democracy than now seems at hand. The Sunni Hashemites, being able to claim direct descent from the Prophet Mohammed, have historically been respected by the Shiites, who constitute a majority of the people of Iraq, although the latter recognize a different branch of the family. It is the Wahhabis of Saudi Arabia, not the Hashemites, who have been the Shiites' persecutors.

I highly recommend that you read it all.

See also "Truth be told" (#15) at ISRAPUNDIT and this background piece at the Smithsonian Magazine (todah, Rachel).

Mahathir didn't mean ALL Jews

"just the Zionist movement and Jewish activists who support Israel"

Whew, don't you feel better already? This from Al Bawaba (I'm not kidding) at http://www.albawaba.com/news/index.php3?sid=261601&lang=e&dir=news:

The Muslim intellectual Kamel al Sharif supports Mahathir’s comments but he said they were misinterpreted. He called the Malaysian PM to issue an explanation that he meant just to the Zionist movement and Jewish activists who support Israel and not to all the Jewish people as Muslims respect this religion.

“What Dr. Mahathir said depicts facts…we feel that despite the small numbers of Jews in the US and Europe, they have big and direct influence on politics in these countries and lead big powers to take actions that are inconsistent with justice, logic or religion,” al Sharif told Albawaba.

The Jordanian intellectual added, “the US, for example, has put itself on the side of Israel despite the fact it is the only superpower with everybody admitting that. The US saves no effort to just please a few Jews because they control the financial and media markets in the US and what applies to the U applies to the western countries too.”

Taking this into account, Sharif sees that Mahathir has not gone beyond facts when he said that few people are controlling the world. Additionally, Sharif sees that the Malaysian Premier meant to the Zionist movement and activists in the US and Europe who support Israel. “He meant the Zionism. According to Islam, Judaism is a heavenly religion and Quran praises the Old Testament and prophet Moses, God has peace upon him, and considers him a great prophet. The Jews lived always in the Islamic countries as a respected minority but the emergence of Zionism and the Israeli hatred for Muslims has overturned the equation,” added Sharif.

buy the t-shirt

This year's poster for National Jewish Book Month features a 12 layered papercut by Archie Granot.

Just received this, about a "nasty anti-Israel program in America"

Anglican Archbishop of Jerusalem to tour America "spreading garbage" about Israel

Dear Anne,

I received your name and email by sending out a request to CoHaV members for contacts that may be helpful in combating a nasty anti-Israel program in America.

Below is an email I received which explains how anti-Israel propaganda is brought to churches around North America. This needs some kind of coordinated counteraction by people who can reach the churches and follow the actions of groups like these to stop/discredit them.

We are limited what we can do from here in Israel, we really need Friends of Israel groups in the US to contact each other an coordinate a campaign.

Please reply directly to Aviva at Bwspring@aol.com, as she is the one who has sent out the original request, and let me know if there is anything we can do to help you. I also paste below some information about CoHaV, an international umbrella for volunteer Israel advocacy groups. If you feel that you or your organisation should also be a member of CoHaV please contact me at hasbara@bezeqint.net

Kind Regards
Candy Shinaar
Council of Hasbara Volunteers (COHAV)
Israeli Citizens Action Network (I.CAN)
Email: hasbara@bezeqint.net

Subject: PR campaign

I have an idea I want to explore with you. Please take the time to read this and tell me what you think. About 12 days ago I was stopped at a local Starbucks by three nicely dressed retired gentlemen who were told by the staff at Starbucks that I'd lived in Israel recently. They had attended a 2 hour presentation by the Anglican Archbishop of Jerusalem at their local church. Said archbishop spent two hours trying to persuade the audience that the Israelis are out to dominate and rule the world. These men asked me questions and listened to my answers for over an hour. At the end, I felt that I had reached them but what about all the other attendees? More unsettling was the fact that this ARCHBISHOP was going to tour north American and continue spreading that garbage.

My mother told me about a lecture she went to on Friday in Cleveland, OH. Sponsored by a group called "pathways to peace" the group had one Muslim Israeli, one Christian Israeli and one Jewish Israeli. My mother had drifted to the left of reality but even she was appalled with how one sided it was. The Jewish woman was so appalling and didn't even try to represent Israel fairly (I can almost imagine you saying 'OF COURSE...WHAT DID YOU EXPECT?"). This group had no plans for speaking in any Jewish venues: their entire itinerary focused on churches and civic groups (including the very prestigious Civic Club which means their presentations will be on Public RADIO).

What bothers me about this stuff requires a detailed list:

1. I'm angry at the Israeli Jewish woman for granting credibility to this kind of forum.

2. I'm really worried about the effects this kind of sub-radar public relations campaign will have on Christian support for Israel. The staunchest supporters of Israel have been the Christian communities. Christian communities have been more vocally pro-Israel than the Jewish community and quite frankly they are larger that the Jewish community.
Their VOICE MATTERS. This is the perfect kind of campaign to corrode that
support.

I think ignoring this kind of PR campaign is dangerous and stupid. What I'd like to do is to find a way to create a more balanced representation of the situation there and get this group in front of the same kinds of communities. For example, Newsweek had an article recently about the Christian community in Bethlehem wanting to switch over to the Israeli side because of the constant harassment and property confiscation's perpetrated on them by the Muslims (all with PA sanction).

What do you think? I'm not saying I should be the one to lead this if someone else wants to do it but I think it must be done. I'd be happy to do whatever I can for this kind of effort. Do you think others in Israel would be willing to help me with this (or conversely, if others in Israel want to do this, I would be happy to help them).

Let me know.

Aviva
Bwspring@aol.com

Here is an introduction to CoHaV, Council of Hasbara Volunteers:

CoHaV is a newly formed, umbrella organization for volunteer Israel advocacy groups and individuals. The organization promotes cooperation and networking between group members, and provides the means to coordinate international campaigns and projects for combating false propaganda about Israel. CoHaV believes in the dissemination of honest and accurate information, and is neither associated with, nor subscribes to, the platform of any political party

The strength of Cohav is that even though the various hasbara groups are working together, each individual participating organization remains fully independent. CoHaV works more like a central exchange for all the associate groups, where help and assistance flows between members, as well as providing representation for world wide volunteer Israel advocacy. Membership already reaches the UK, USA, Europe, Canada, South Africa, Australia and of course Israel.

Through electronic communication, members, who are in the main managers of individual hasbara groups, discuss and brainstorm campaigns, projects, and biased material in the media which deserve concerted responses.

Each member, nevertheless, remains fully independent, deciding on the action best suited to local circumstances, and in keeping with the niche the individual group was developed to fulfill. This is how CoHaV helps each group to reach their full potential.

Apart from media response, which is the prime activity of CoHaV members, we also have groups who's activities involve public speaking, producing film videos, compiling research reports, organizing public events, and making personal contact with foreign journalists and dignitaries etc. Our combined membership of several thousand activists covers the different countries, languages, mediums, target audiences, and specialized fields. For further information about joining CoHaV send an email to Candy Shinaar at hasbara@bezeqint.net.

Anatomy of an antisemite by David Kupelian

at WorldNetDaily:

Leftists and liberals today, from the UK and Europe to America's college campuses – as if in the grip of a bizarre trance – look at tiny, democratic Israel defending itself against almost daily terror attacks, but can see only a brutal, Nazi-like "apartheid" state. They witness Palestinians dancing and celebrating in the streets on Sept. 11, 2001, they see Yasser Arafat turn down (at Clinton's Camp David) the very Palestinian state he claimed for years he wanted, they behold Palestinian parents, teachers and clerics molding innocent children into murderers and terrorists. But despite this, all they can see are the long-suffering, freedom-loving Palestinian people and their noble but beleaguered leadership.

Your taxes for PLO Propaganda

From FrontPageMagazine via LittleGreenFootballs:

This week, in response to a question from our news agency, the U.S. government has finally acknowledged that the U.S. Aid For International Development (USAID) indeed funds the Palestine Academic Society For the Study of Academic Affairs (PASSIA), the PLO lobby group in Jerusalem which trains PLO media professionals in the art of transforming the image of the Arab-Israeli struggle into an Arab David against an Israeli Goliath.

USAID reports directly to the White House, which makes that allocation of particular significance to U.S. taxpayers. This funding arrangement was made possible back in 1997, under an agreement reached between the PLO and the man who was then the U.S. Consul in Jerusalem, Mr. Edward Abington. Immediately upon leaving his position as consul in Jerusalem in 1997, an employee of the U.S. State Department, Abington was hired by the PLO to be their paid lobbyist and official foreign agent in Washington, D.C., where Abington continues to lobby for the PLO under the framework of Bannerman and Associates. There's nothing like paying back a friend who helps you out.

From 1997-2004, USAID has given (or is scheduled to give) the PASSIA lobby a total of $1.7 million. According to the report sent by USAID, which appears at: http://www.usaid.gov/wbg/partners.htm, USAID funds are used in the following way:

"PASSIA conducts two activities under this agreement. In a series of training seminars, PASSIA provides skills and capacity to young Palestinian professionals in areas such as fund-raising, strategic planning, advocacy, and training of trainers." Such “trainers” may even be exported to the U.S. to teach pro-Palestinian “activists” at the Third National Palestine Solidarity Conference “Hate Fest” at Ohio State in early November - all on the American taxpayer’s dime.

Al Aqsa Terrorists shoot 2 Israelis, march in Gaza

Armed members of the military wing of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's mainstream Fatah movement, Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, march throught the streets of Gaza City(AFP/Mohammed Abed)

Arutz Sheva:

Palestinian terrorists fired at an Israeli car shortly after 2 PM today, wounding two passengers - one of whom is in serious condition. Medical personnel treated a third passenger for shock.

The attack occurred on the road leading to the northern Shomron communities of Ganim and Kadim, just south of Jenin and approximately 15 kilometers from Afula. Large IDF forces are searching for the attackers, who apparently escaped into one of the nearby Arab villages. Fatah's Al-Aqsa Brigade, which has committed many terrorist shootings in the area, took responsibility for today's attack.

Jerusalem Post:

Valerie and Nelly Weissbrot of Kadim were wounded Wednesday afternoon when shots were fired at their car on a road in the Jenin environs near the Jalame Checkpoint and Kadim Junction.

An army doctor treated Valerie Weissbrot, who suffered a gunshot wound to his head. His wife Nelly was wounded lightly. Valerie was airlifted to Rambam Hospital in Haifa; Nelly was taken to Haemek Hospital in Afula.

Seven bullets hit their car, and security forces are still searching for the terrorists. Fatah's Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade claimed responsibility for the attack.

The Weissbrots have lived in Kadim for a number of years. They have a married daughter and a grandson. Both are doctors working in Haemek hospital.

Meanwhile, "the IDF is instituting a series of measures to make life easier for the Arabs in Judea, Samaria and Gaza" -

Beginning this morning, 4,000 workers and traders are allowed to cross into pre-1967 Israel, and another 1,500 are permitted to return to work in the Atarot industrial zone in northern Jerusalem. Public transportation in PA-controlled Yesha will run on a limited basis.

Free Trip to Israel!

Notice from Raz Telchai,
Director of the Jewish Identity Center of Boulder:

The Jewish Identity Center has teamed up
with Kenes Tlalim - IsraelOutdoors!

to provide free trips to Israel for Jews ages 18-26.

10 DAYS: Rappelling -- Hiking -- Biking

Trips leaving December - January - February

Time and Space are running out!




For more information, contact Raz at raz@israeloutdoors

In response to the Sukkah Burning in Boulder (see story below, yesterday)

I am glad to present . . .

Affordable Klutz-Proof Sukkah Kits
link to website

SOME SEASON HIGHLIGHTS: --We finally sent a kit to Hawaii, the last of the 50 states to receive a Sukkah Project Klutz-Proof kit. We also sent a kit to a staff member at the American Embassy in Managua, Nicaragua. And learned that in Nicaragua, "2x4" lumber is really 2 inches by 4 inches (so the braces didn't fit!).

--Two great newspaper stories featured the Sukkah Project: The (Bergen County, NJ) Record and the Washington Post.

The other story is no longer online, but we can email it to you if you are interested (write to stevehen@sukkot.com):

--The biggest-ever Sukkah Project sukkah was built this year by Rutgers University Hillel-- a 115x80 Tubular design built on the roof of a New Brunswick, NJ hotel. This is not likely to become a standard design for us, but it does demonstrate the possibilities offered by our modular construction.

PRODUCT RECALL:
We've received a couple of reports that one of the Sukkah Banners sold this year (Ushpizot, by Galia Goodman) may contain some unstable ink that runs slightly when the banner gets wet. If you have purchased this banner and find this to be the case, please let us know and we will provide you with another copy that is fully weather resistant. Our printer is looking into the cause of this problem and will remedy it.

DEPT. OF HALACHA:
As you may be aware, the Bamboo Mats we sell for schach (sukkah roof covering) are certified by Star-K. Rabbi Moshe Heinemann, Rabbinical Supervisor of Star-K has written an informative essay on the halachot of schach, including an explanation of why the bamboo mats made with monofilament line are kosher.

20% off CLEARANCE SALE:

If you'd like to expand or upgrade your sukkah for next year, now is a good time to pick up what you'll need. Or if you have a wedding or housewarming present to give, a sukkah kit or a banner makes a wonderful gift.

And you will NEVER find a better price on bamboo mats than $.80/sq.ft!

We have all sizes of family-sized and congregational wood-frame kits available, as well as bamboo mats in sizes 5x10, 6x10, 8x8 and 8x12. Also some boxes of Fruits&Veggies, all sizes of SukkahScreen, and a number of Sukkah Banners (including the one pictured here).

To take advantage of these special prices please call or email us with your order (919-489-7325; stevehen@sukkot.com) as soon as possible.

SPECIAL DEAL ON A 16X16:
Buy your school or shul a 16x16ft BigSukkah with SukkahScreen and bamboo s'chach (four 8x8 mats) and we'll throw in FREE SHIPPING on the whole order. Total savings: $160! This is the Sukkah we use at our local Synagogue, Beth El in Durham, NC. Steve set it up by himself this year, bottom to top, in about 2 hours--it's a great kit.



Sukkah Banner by Flora Rosefsky, 24"x44"

Peace Movement or War on the Jews?

By Greg Yardley

FrontPageMagazine.com | October 28, 2003

AP photo

On Saturday, October 25th, several thousand people protested in San Francisco, the largest demonstration in the Bay Area since April 12th. It was a sister demonstration to one occurring that same day in Washington, D.C.

While the protest was purportedly against the presence of American troops in Iraq, those stumbling onto the protest by accident might be forgiven for thinking it was really against Israel.






The Palestinian flags scattered liberally among the crowd, the keffiyehs on many of the organizers, the plethora of speakers from pro-Palestinian organizations - all the evidence indicates the protest organizers want the Jews out of Israel as badly as they want the Americans out of Iraq. The comparison is hardly fair; unlike our troops, the Israelis have nowhere to return to.

That didn’t stop the marchers from chanting as they marched - “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!” The slogan belongs to the terrorist group Hamas.





When I arrived at San Francisco’s Civic Center, a small group of folk singers were trying to stir up an anemic crowd with a few protest songs - as one put it, ‘the only solution’s a new revolution.’ People did not seem particularly enthusiastic about that revolution’s potential. They milled about between the literature tables of various communist groups, and bought t-shirts from vendors not willing to let anti-Americanism get in the way of making a buck. One man in a fez wandered through the crowd waving a large North Korean flag; every attendee with a Che Guevara t-shirt picked that day to wear it. American flags were flown, too - all either defaced in some manner, or hung upside down. But the most common flag was the Palestinian one. The International Solidarity Movement, well known for defending the homes of Palestinian suicide bombers.





The march was organized by two of the largest of this spring’s anti-war coalitions: the communist Workers World Party-controlled International ANSWER, and long-time Communist Party activist Leslie Cagan’s United for Peace and Justice. However, the latter group was barely visible. Two representatives, Andrea Buffa and Samina Fahim, addressed the crowd; a few small United for Peace and Justice banners were carried in the protest march. International ANSWER was clearly running the show. The banner at the front of the rally belonged to them. The banners strung behind the stage belonged to them. All but a few speakers were drawn from International ANSWER’s friends and allies. And the anti-Israel stance was unmistakably theirs.

Earlier this year, United for Peace and Justice hesitated to ally themselves with ANSWER, because they disagreed with some of ANSWER’s platform; in particular, the way many within ANSWER did not recognize Israel’s right to exist. By doing so, United for Peace and Justice attempted to portray itself as more ‘moderate’ than the other anti-war groups. They caved on this and allied with ANSWER in recent months; now, thanks to their alliance with ANSWER, all of their claims to be moderate are void.





Speaker after speaker stood up to denounce the President, denounce America, and denounce Israel. Ban al-Wardi of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee stood up to proclaim that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and America’s presence in Iraq were closely linked. He triumphantly declared that both America and Israel were paying a heavy price, and that the Palestinians and Iraqis had a legitimate right to ‘resist’. That they do so through terrorism didn’t seem to bother him a bit. He also claimed the Israelis were ‘ethnically cleansing’ the Palestinians, and that here in America, the Attorney General was engaged in the ‘Israelization’ of the justice system. One would think that’d be a good thing, thanks to Israel’s vigorous struggle against terrorism, but al-Wardi was staunchly opposed to this fight.

Speakers from the Bay Area Iranians for Peace and Justice and the Free Palestinian Alliance echoed his message - the Palestinians, like the Iraqis, could oppose Americans and Israelis by any means necessary. While none of them mentioned suicide bombings or other acts of terrorism, the implication was clear.

Other speakers went even further in their anti-Jewish rhetoric. Zulma Oliveras, a radical Puerto Rican activist and a member of the Committee of 98 for a Free Puerto Rico, openly denigrated the importance of the Holocaust. ‘We must stop the lie that only one holocaust has happened,’ she announced - as if the situation of the indigenous people in North America or the situation of Palestinians in Israel was remotely like the systematic Nazi genocide.

Supporters of the Revolutionary Communist Party-controlled Not In Our Name project made America sound like the monster, leading the crowd in a pledge - “we will not stop until all of us are free from your bloodthirsty domination.”

Continue reading.


P.S. Banagor gives them hell in "The Illusion of a Community." Also read "Waiting for Outrage". Fabulous blogger! Thanks so much to Rachel for the tip.

Pigs have a great sense of smell, can be trained to identify weapons, and have other deterrent qualities

This from a FoxNews story via a comment at LGF by "JG":

And in the West Bank, Israeli settlers announced a new tactic for protecting their homes from Palestinian militants: pigs. The Gdud Haivri organization, which supplies guard dogs to West Bank settlements, said it plans on using pigs as well.

The group's chief, Yekutiel Ben-Yaakov, told Israeli media that pigs have a great sense of smell and can be trained to identify weapons. He also noted that pigs might be a deterrent because they are impure under Islamic law.

Jewish religious law also considers the animals impure and forbids raising them in Israel. However, local rabbinical authorities approved the initiative because it would save Jewish lives.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry never heard of weblogs?! Oy vey.

From Allison Kaplan Sommer via LittleGreenFootballs:

Pow-Wow at the Israeli Foreign Ministry

"If blogging has been light over the past few days, it's because I've been in Jerusalem most of the time attending this:

The Foreign Minister is currently hosting a three-day seminar to coordinate public relations efforts with heads of three privately funded Israel advocacy groups.

Gideon Meir, the ministry's deputy director-general for Public Affairs, said that "taking into consideration that the public relations budget is continuously on the decline, the fact that groups have sprouted up to help Israel advocacy in the US, and provide services worth a great deal of money, is something very welcomed by the Israeli government."

Among those attending the seminar are Jennifer Laszlo-Mizrahi, head of the Israel Project, which conducts polling and focus group studies, helping the government craft its messages abroad; Mark Waldman and Andy Adelson, form Access Middle East, an organization providing information on Israel and the Middle East to journalists; and Larry Weinberg from Israel 21C, a group that places stories about Israel dealing with matters other than the conflict in the media.

I am sad to report that the Israeli government officials I am meeting with have never even HEARD of a blog. Sort of kills the theories about the Israelis paying off people like Charles and Michael.

Seriously, I have been trying to make some of them understand that there are these amazing people out there called bloggers who are advocating for Israel for FREE on their own time -- and many of them aren't Jewish OR fundamentalist Christians.

The officials, exhausted from arguing Israel's case 24/7 to an increasingly hostile world, find this hard to believe and too good to be true.

I think it's important that bloggers who support Israel remain independent voices and that the Israeli government should NOT try to coopt them in any way -- much as I'm tempted to try to think of a way for resources to be shared and help the Israeli officials tap the energy and intelligence and savvy of the blogosphere.

The fact that I could go on and on with links to bloggers who are supportive of Israel, including the big-timers, proves my point that blogs are an incredible resource for advocates of Israel (I'm NOT talking about advocates of any particular political position, I'm talking about the right of Israel and Israelis to exist, live and breathe.)

Gee, wouldn't everything be simpler if there actually WAS an international Jewish conspiracy?

Advocating for Israel has not been at the top of the American Jewish agenda in recent years -- for understandable reasons. I understand that community needs come first and that the responsibility of any institution or community is first and foremost, to perpetuate itself. But articles such as this one are a warning signal that attention must be paid."

Posted by aksommer at October 28, 2003 10:40 AM | TrackBack



from the Comments:

Don't forget Lorien's "Proud Friends of Israel" project, where she has almost 600 names on her list supporting Israel, many of them bloggers. (myself included. :-)

Posted by: celestial blue at October 28, 2003 03:55 PM

Sukkah burned in Boulder

. . . and I didn't even know about it!

I've got to get my head out of the Jerusalem Post and pay more attention to the immediate neighborhood! I was just reading a copy of the Intermountain Jewish News (their most recent issue in not yet online; when it is, I'll provide a link), and on page 16, I see the headline: "A burning sukkah in Boulder" - I flipped. It was the sukkah of a friend of mine . I don't know which is worse, that it happened, or that nobody's mentioned it to me. I've been at the Jewish community center several times in the last week, have talked to lots of people, and nobody has said a word. Is it because people don't know, or they don't think it's a big deal?

I've made some calls out to the community to find out more, but for the time being I know nothing more than what's in this article. Rather than type it all out, I'll just give you some highlights:

"Although it's still early in the investigation, Boulder police do not feel the person or persons who burned a sukkah in North Boulder Oct. 18 were motivated by hate. [Well, that's a relief, eh?] . . . as of press time, no one had been apprehended in connection with the incident . . . Douglas (Feivel) Ettelson had erected the sukkah in the backyard area of his apartment complex. He constructed it with plywood and branches that were nearby, and also used a carseat that was in the area as a bench . . .

"I came back to my place Saturday afternoon [Shabbos]" he told IJN. "I wanted to go to the sukkah before going to shul, but instead I found the sukkah burnt to the ground."

On Monday, Ettelson spoke with the Boulder police, the Boulder Fire Dept. and the FBI and explained about the holiday of Sukkot and the sukkah. He also contacted the ADL.

He says he decorated his sukkah, which was "very small," "just big enough for one person," with a map of Israel and portions of the Torah in Hebrew and English, and Jewish art. "It was pretty clear this was a Jewish thing," he says.

Ettelson syas tht when he saw the burned sukkah, his first reaction was shock and disbelief [no kidding]. Then he thought it might have been accidental. "Someone could have left a cigarette burning."

Even if the fire was a hate crime, Ettelson expressed more disappointment than anger. "I hope that person would get help and is able to realize what he did."

I hope we are all able to find out why this was done, and indeed, realize it. I'll keep you posted.

UPDATE on Wilkie

TEL AVIV (Reuters):

Nuffield Professor of Pathology Andrew Wilkie was suspended for two months without pay on Monday after an investigation by the university into an email in which he refused to consider accepting Amit Duvshani, an Israeli military veteran, into his research group.

The Israeli student has welcomed the suspension of an Oxford University professor who rejected his application for graduate studies in a protest against the Jewish state's treatment of Palestinians.

"I am satisfied that a decision has been made to take action against him," Duvshani, a researcher in Tel Aviv University's department of cellular and developmental biology, told Reuters on Tuesday.

"This is not a matter of personal vendetta, but of exposing academic boycotts against Israel as part of anti-Semitic trends in the world and specifically Europe," said Duvshani, 27.

Duvshani said he had decided "for reasons including this episode" not to pursue studies in Europe.

Full statement from Oxford

27 October 2003

A University spokesperson said: "The Vice-Chancellor has accepted the recommendation of the Visitatorial Board that Professor Wilkie should be suspended from his academic duties within the University, without pay, for two months. Suspension is the most serious penalty that the University can impose, short of dismissal or removal from office. The decision follows an investigation by the Board of matters surrounding an email which Professor Wilkie sent in response to an enquiry from an Israeli student regarding the possibility of graduate study in his research group. The Board has made other recommendations, including that Professor Wilkie is required to undergo further equal opportunities training.

"This ruling reflects that there can be no place for any form of discrimination within the University of Oxford other than on the grounds of merit. Professor Wilkie fully accepts the gravity of the situation and is determined to make full use of training to ensure that his actions and those of his staff reflect best practice in future. He particularly wishes to make it clear that he greatly values the diverse backgrounds of the staff and students with whom he works and looks forward to applications from able candidates, whatever their background.

"The University runs a comprehensive staff training programme which includes a number of programmes covering equality and diversity issues. It is also the University's practice to include a statement on equal opportunities with all contracts of employment and to circulate the University's policies and guidance. We will now be looking at the recommendations of the Visitatorial Board to see whether processes and training in this area can be further improved."

Notes to editors:

Statement issued by Pembroke College announcing the Resignation of Professor Wilkie

The proceedings of Visitatorial Boards are usually confidential. The text of this statement has been agreed by both parties and no further comment will be made.

Under the statutes of the University, the Vice-Chancellor is empowered to reduce penalties recommended by the Board, but cannot increase them. In this case, he has adopted the recommendations as made by the Board, and Professor Wilkie has been informed accordingly.

Professor Andrew Wilkie was appointed Nuffield Professor of Pathology in May 2003. Professor Wilkie has been instrumental in developing the Oxford Craniofacial Unit into a world-class centre for genetic research into craniofacial disorders and hopes to develop this approach to cover other facets of plastic surgery.

The University of Oxford began a thorough investigation as soon as it became aware of the correspondence between Professor Wilkie and Amit Duvshani. Based on the information that was collected during this process, and in the light of all the circumstances, particularly the importance attached by the University to fair processes of selection, the Vice-Chancellor, Sir Colin Lucas, took the view that this matter should be referred for consideration by the University's disciplinary panel for academic staff, known as the Visitatorial Board.

Visitatorial Boards are convened to consider charges against a member of the University's academic staff when the Vice-Chancellor considers that the alleged conduct or performance of that person may constitute good cause for dismissal or otherwise give grounds for some other disciplinary sanction. Each Board has five members – an external chair and four members who are selected randomly from an existing panel.

Boulder Events

Stage production of "NO WAY OUT"
Sunday evening, November 2nd
7 pm
Boulder High School Auditorium

This professional stage production of "one family's powerful story . . . letters, love and loss" was recently presented at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington. It will feature a performance by Tamara Braun ("Carly" on ABC's General Hospital), is directed by Jim Carver and is based on an original stageplay by Boulder's Susan Prinz Shear.

Tickets are available at Boulder Bookstore, Copy Express and The Middle Fish.
For information and group rates, call the ADL 303.830.7177 or 303.443.2723

Rabbi Bronstein
Tuesday, Nov. 4th
7 - 9 pm
Boulder Jewish Community Center

Join Menorah as they kick off their fall semester. Rabbi Deborah Bronstein, of Congregation HarHaShem, will be speaking on "Looking to Hope in Times of Chaos." Using midrash and folklore, she will teach how Jewish tradition always points away from chaos and toward meaning and hope. Admission is $10 / $8 for BJCC members. Register at MenorahRSVP@BoulderJCC.org or call 303.998.1900, ext. 9. The Boulder JCC is at 3800 Kalmia.

David Olesker, well-known pro-Israel Advocacy Trainer
"How I learned to stop worrying and become an effective Israel advocate"
Monday, Nov. 10th
12 noon until 1:30 pm
Boulder JCC

Presented by the Colorado AIPAC Council, Denver and Boulder ActionIsrael and the Boulder JCC, this program comes highly recommended by a friend of mine who has heard David speak and has participated in a training video with him. And, hey, a lunch of bagels and lox will be provided.

RSVP to JRubinstein@sprintmail.com so they can know how many lunches to have on hand.

ADL Program on Antisemitism
Tuesday evenings
Nov. 11 - Dec. 16
7 - 8 pm

Menorah - Boulder Center for Adult Jewish Education presents a program by the Anti-Defamation League.

This program, led by the staff of the Mountain States Office of the ADL, will include discussions of antisemitism in historic and current contexts, church/state issues and a workshop on confronting antisemitism. During the six sessions you will learn about the contemporary rise of antisemitism in the Islamic world, Europe and the U.S.; how to deal with antisemitic situations; hate groups active in the U.S.; and issues surrounding the preservations of religious liberty. Instructors will include Bruce DeBoskey, Evan Zuckerman, Joyce Rubin and Nina Sundell from the Denver office.

VOICE OF JIHAD:
"We should employ all efforts until we wipe them out"

An Israeli settler girl plays on a swing, at a park in Netzarim settlement, inside the Gaza Strip, Sunday, Oct. 26, 2003. Moderates in Israel's Cabinet on Sunday called for the evacuation of this Jewish settlement in the heart of Gaza, which relies on an entire army battalion for protection, after three soldiers were killed there by militants. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley)

October 27, 2003

An editorial in Al-Qa'ida's new magazine 'THE VOICE OF JIHAD' stated:

'Our biggest enemies are the Jews and Christians [and not the Saudi Security Forces]. We should employ all efforts until we wipe them out . . . because they are the main obstacle in the way of the establishment of the State of Islam.'

HTTP://WWW.CYBCITY.COM/SUONDMAG2/INDEX.HTM, 10/27/03, via MEMRI.

President Bush to hold press conference

11:15 am EST, 9:15 am in Colorado

BUY THIS BOOK

Empires of the Sand: The Struggle for Mastery in the Middle East 1789-1923
by Efraim Karsh

Naomi Ragen recommends it thus:

". . . a book that should be required reading for every college student, every journalist, and every Jew and every lover of truth who thinks he/she knows what's going on in the Middle East. . . a really, really important book. . . beautifully written and it's got all the facts about Arafat's systematic use of the peace process to murder Israelis. . . Professor Karsh, who is at Harvard this year, is head of the Mediterranean Studies Program at Kings College, University of London. . .

Get people to read, review, purchase, quote, pay attention to, and translate this book. . . get Professor Karsh down to lecture about it or get him on television or radio programs( efraim.karsh@kcl.ac.uk) . . . get bookstores to stock it and put it in their windows. . . Whatever you can do would be a mitzva and a wonderful thing for Israel's PR. And a wonderful thing for the truth."

Amazon link to buy this book

Don't be

I'm reading from the depths i call by Lea Fuchs Chayen.

From her introduction:

"In writing this book, I was trying to do my minimal duty as a survivor, to the past, present, and future generations of my nation. . . I am writing my own personal story and that of those who were near me. As I write, I relive everything. I am there again, feeling the cold and desperation - even the smell of Birkenau is with with me every now and then. I try to describe things as accurately as I can."

I've only read a chapter so far, but two things have struck me deeply. One is in the details of Chayen's family: there were her four older sisters, then a brother, then her. That's the exact same pattern as my family, and I too was that youngest girl.

In recounting the march from ghetto to cattlecar, Chayen passes along the street named after her grandfather:

"I thought how strange it was that I had always felt that I didn't belong to this place, always knew that I was an unwelcome outsider. We were constantly told, 'You stinking Jew, go to Palestine.' "

That's pretty bitterly funny, isn't it. Now they they want us out of Palestine. Illustrious American publications print declarations that Israel is a failed experiment, that it came too late, that there is no place in this world for Jews to be both Jewish and safe. The Jew among nations is condemned, not only from the halls of the United Nations to Malaysia, but at Oxford and in the New York Times.

It's hard to believe that we're living through this - all the while going to work and the grocery store, celebrating birthdays, living a normalish life. My friend asked me the other day if I thought this was how it was for the German Jews, if they knew it, but were just too busy with their lives to do anything much about it. I don't know, but I hate this feeling of watching my self live, and wondering from what point, what place, what condition, will I look back on this. I know what it looks like now, going into it, but what will it look like from the other side looking back? What - from now- will sustain us - then?


UPDATE: Mortime Zuckerman's "Graffiti on History's Walls" is the cover story of the new issue of usnews. (It covers much of the current controvery of anti-Zionism, so might be a good item to print out for future reference.) In conclusion he says,

The insight of Amos Oz, the liberal Israeli writer, is pertinent. He is haunted, he said, by the observation that before the Holocaust, European graffiti read, "Jews to Palestine," while today it has been changed, to "Jews out of Palestine." The message to Jews, Oz says, is simple: "Don't be here, and don't be there. That is, don't be."

Didn't I just have that same haunting observation? Must be going around.

BFD: Oxford suspends Wilkie for two months

Andrew Wilkie, the Oxford University professor who refused to hire an Israeli grad student because of Israel's treatment of the Palestinians, has been suspended without pay for two months, the university said Monday.

In a statement, the university said the suspension of Nuffield Professor of Pathology Andrew Wilkie "reflects that there can be no place for any form of discrimination within the University of Oxford other than on the grounds of merit."

Oxford's Pembroke College said that in light of the suspension, Wilkie had resigned as a Fellow of the college and a member of its governing body.

In June, Wilkie rejected an application from Amit Duvshani, a graduate student at Tel Aviv university, for a post in his laboratory. In an e-mail to the student, Wilkie said he had a "huge problem" with Israel's treatment of the Palestinians.

"I am sure that you are perfectly nice on a personal level, but no way would I take on somebody who had served in the Israeli army," Wilkie wrote. Military service is compulsory in Israel.

Oxford University said at the time it would investigate whether Wilkie had breached the university's anti-discrimination rules. On Monday, it said Wilkie had agreed to undergo
equal-opportunities training.

Days after he wrote to Duvshani, Wilkie apologized for "the wholly inappropriate expression of my personal opinions" in the e-mail.

The day this news comes in would be the day I have to share my computer with my son. It's okay, though, because I don't know what to say, anyway, except that we never win one.

We're in trouble - our "last line of defense" is Hillel

Students for Jihad by Lee Kaplan

from FrontPage Magazine:

Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, is set to host the Third National Palestine Solidarity Conference November 9-12. If this year's conference is anything like the last two conferences - and judging by its leadership and sponsors it will be - its participants should be treated to another anti-Semitic and anti-U.S. "hate fest." Reports of last year's exhortations to "kill the Jews" by organizers like UC Berkeley professor Hatem Bazian and featured guest of honor, Sami Al-Arian, currently in federal prison as a leading fundraiser for Islamic Jihad, have not slowed this event down a bit.

According to the conference organizers this will be an event to analyze tactics and develop strategies, skills and knowledge with educational workshops and activist training sessions (with trainers flown in from the Middle East yet) to once again push the ideas of "divestment and apartheid" and "peace with justice in Palestine."

The conference is also to be a forum to work "against Zionism and imperialism"; that is, to agitate for the destruction of the State of Israel and the defeat of Americans in Iraq.

According to Arafat and Hamas in Arabic media, "peace" and "justice" will only occur when Israel ceases to exist and becomes another Arab Islamic state. "Zionism" means the existence of Jews in "Arab" lands (including 1948 Israel), and "imperialism" means any U.S. presence in the area necessitated by the War On Terror. Nothing new. But this year there is a new twist: an emphasis on the so-called "Right of Return." . . .

What will be new this year is the focus on the "Right of Return" of Palestinian refugees (and their second, third or even fourth generation children who have never trod the streets of Israel). A look at this year's key organizers and fundraisers shows this will be a major part of this year' s conference. Steve Sosebee of the Palestine Right To Return Coalition (PRRC), also known as Al Awda ("the return" in Arabic), is a key organizer.

Sosebee also heads another "charity" called the Palestine Children's Relief Fund (PCRF). Sosebee's "charity" used to run a website out of Texas that glorified suicide bombers. A tour of the Al Awda website repeats the Hamas position that there can be no valid negotiations regarding the "return" of every "Palestinian" to what is now Israel - even those from succeeding generations never born there - Israel must simply accept its national suicide. [Editor's note: Never mentioned are the 950,000 Jews who were forced into exile from Arab States that they and their ancestors knew as home.]

Under former PA Prime Minister Mohammed Abbas, the Right of Return was to be discussed in terms of compensation after a two-state solution. The U.S. has now refused to recognize Israel's objection to the Right of Return in the Road Map and the Palestinians smell blood. In fact, the organizers of this conference even have a section on their registration form asking attendees if they endorse the Right of Return to distinguish from those who might accept a two-state solution.

Look for that to be the condition pushed by the Palestinians through their future terror attacks, as their supporters here, freshly trained in media techniques at this conference, fight the PR war on our nation's campuses.

Al Awda met in Toronto last July 3rd to reenergize the Right of Return Movement in North America. And they will have plenty of Saudi money to do that with: other sponsors include CAIR, the Saudi front group linked to Hamas whose leaders seem to keep getting arrested for complicity in terrorism and the Muslim Students Association, another Saudi front group on our nation's campuses. The Saudis, naturally, are the main donors to Hamas.

The conference promises a number of seminars such as "Organizing for Divestment on a Small Campus," "Using Campus Newspapers" and "Deconstructing Zionist Strategies on Your Campus."

To deflect charges of anti-Semitism, the organizers have found another Jewish frontperson to make the media overlook the mountain of evidence that the last two conferences called for murdering Jews. Adam Shapiro filled this role in recent years; now Ora Weiss will take over as the jihadists' token Jew. Ms. Weiss will no doubt be the perfect quisling to attest that the organizers only intend to kill Israeli Jews.

From Bernard Shapiro, editor of the Freemanlist, through which this article was recommended:

Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, is set to host the Third National Palestine Solidarity Conference November 9-12. Efforts to remove the conference entirely or marginalize it have thus failed though a great deal of pressure from Jewish Organizations and individual donors to OSU have failed as President Karen A. Holbrook clings to the idea that to spew hatred and support terrorism fall fairly within the constitutional protection of the right to Free Speech.

The last line of defense will be will be the OSU campus HILLEL. If you want to help, contact Robert Katz, Hillel director - rkatz@hillel.org

ISRAEL: What's not to like?

Israel is the 100th smallest country with less than 1/1000th of the world's population.

So, nu?

An Israeli company has unveiled a blood test that via the telephone diagnoses heart attacks.

The Israeli-developed Ex-Press shunt is providing relief for American glaucoma sufferers.

An Israeli research team has found that the combination of electrical stimulation and chemotherapy makes cancerous metastases disappear.

Israel has designed the first flight system to protect passenger and freighter aircraft against missile attack.

Israel produces one of the highest percapita rates of patents filed.

In proportion to its population, Israel has the largest number of startup companies in the world. In absolute terms, Israel has the largest number of startup companies than any other country in the world, except the US.

On a per capita basis, Israel has the largest number of biotech start-ups.

Israel has the highest rate in the world of entrepreneurship among women and people over 55.

Relative to its population, Israel is the largest immigrant-absorbing nation on earth.

According to industry officials, Israel designed the airline industry's most impenetrable flight security.

Israel has the world's second highest per capita of new books.

In response to serious water shortages, Israeli engineers and agriculturalists developed a revolutionary drip irrigation system to minimize the amount of water used to grow crops.

Israel is the only country in the world that entered the 21st century with a net gain in its number of trees.

Israel has more museums per capita than any other country.

Israeli scientists developed the first fully computerized, no-radiation, diagnostic instrumentation for breast cancer.

An Israeli company developed a computerized system for ensuring proper administration of medications, thus removing human error from medical treatment.

Israel's Given Imaging developed the first ingestible video camera, so small it fits inside a pill.

Researchers in Israel developed a new device that directly helps the heart pump blood, an innovation with the potential to save lives among those with congestive heart failure. The new device is synchronized with the heart's mechanical operations through a sophisticated system of sensors.

Israel leads the world in the number of scientists and technicians in the workforce, with 145 per 10,000, as compared to 85 in the U.S

Most of the Windows NT operating system was developed by Microsoft-Israel.

The Pentium MMX Chip technology was designed in Israel at Intel.

The technology for AOL Instant Messenger was developed in 1996 by four young Israelis.

An Israeli company was the first to develop and install a large-scale solar-powered and fully functional electricity generating plant, in southern California's Mojave desert.

The first PC anti-virus software was developed in Israel in 1979.

The cell phone was developed in Israel by Motorola, which has its largest development center in Israel.

Voice mail technology was developed in Israel. (Well, maybe that's not so good.)

Boycotting Israeli / Jewish products can be dangerous to your health

April 20, 2002

To La Voz de Aztlan
Attention Hector Carreon

Dear Mr. Carreon et al:

I noticed that in your web page in which you urge the boycott of Israeli products, that you also list labels of companies that are Jewish owned or run, but are not Israeli companies.

To strengthen your boycott efforts, I thought of an idea for you. You don't have to like Jews, but if you DON'T, I suggest that you boycott certain other Jewish products, like...

The Wasserman Test for syphilis discovered by Dr August Von Wasserman, a Jew.

The first effective drug to fight syphilis developed by Paul Ehrlich, a Jew.

Digitalis, discovered by Doctor Nuslin, a Jew.

Insulin which gave life to diabetics, discovered by Doctor Oskar Minkowski, a Jew.

The diagnostic skin test for diphtheria known as the Schick test, developed by Bela Schick, a Jew.

Vitamins, discovered by Doctor Funk, a Jew.

The antibiotic Streptomycin, discovered by Doctor Woronan, a Jew.

The Polio Pill known as Sabin Vaccine by Doctor Sabin, a Jew.

Another Polio Vaccine known as Salk Vaccine, by Doctor Jonas Salk. a Jew.

Hepatitis vaccine discovered by Baruch Blumberg, a Jew.

Crohn disease identified by Burrill Crohn, a Jew.

Alfred Hess, a Jew, discovered that vitamin C could cure scurvy.

Casimir Funk, a Jew, was the first to use vitamin B to treat beriberi.


Go on, boycott!

Humanitarianism requires that Jews offer these gifts to all the people of the world, regardless of race, color or creed -- even bigots like you. If you do not want to accept these gifts, you can go ahead and turn them down, but I am warning you: You are not going to feel so good.

Fanatic consistency requires that bigots like you accept Syphilis, Diabetes, Convulsions, Malnutrition, Infantile Paralysis and Tuberculosis . . . as a matter of principal.

You want to be mad at Jews? Be mad! But I'm telling you, you ain't going to feel so good.


Hal Netkin, a Jew.

In today's news, see Nigerian Islamic Clerics stall critical drive to eradicate polio in Africa.

Arab terrorist bombings in Baghdad first day of Ramadan

At least 34 dead, over 200 wounded in suicide bombing attacks on Red Cross office and police stations

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Suicide bombers have struck four times in Baghdad's morning rush hour, killing 34 people and wounding 224 near the Red Cross offices and police stations, in the city's bloodiest day since Saddam Hussein's overthrow.

Apparently coordinated blasts shook the city after three U.S. soldiers were killed in separate attacks overnight. An ambulance bomb was used in the Red Cross attack.

Iraq's police chief Ahmad Ibrahim, who is also deputy interior minister, told a news conference 26 of the 34 dead were civilians and eight police. Sixty-five [Iraqi] police and 159 [Iraqi] civilians were wounded. He did not say if foreigners were killed.

The explosions, sirens and smoke plunged Baghdad into fear and chaos at the outset of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. The onslaught "is not only criminal, it's sacrilegious", U.S. Brigadier General Mark Hertling told reporters.

Speaking later at the news conference, Hertling said all the Monday morning attacks were suicide bombings, while a fifth had been foiled by Iraqi police. A suspect was seized alive in that attack and was believed to be a Syrian national, he said.

The bombings bring a new urgency to the struggle by embattled U.S.-led forces to control Iraq. On Sunday, rockets hit a fortified Baghdad hotel where U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Paul Wolfowitz was staying, killing a U.S. soldier and wounding 17 people. Wolfowitz was unhurt.

Not to worry - Democrats have plans

FoxNews provides a transcript of last night's debate in Detroit among Democrat presidential candidates:

Kucinich: "I think that we have to have a commitment to work with the nations of the world to make war archaic so we won't need to send our men and women abroad in search of wars or to fight wars that they never should have had to fight in the first place."

Gephardt: "We need peace in the world, not terrorism."

Kerry: "This president has done it wrong every step of the way."

Sharpton: ". . . we need to show that we really love the troops by bringing the troops home. Why can't we bring them home now? "

Edwards: "I will never give George Bush a blank check."

Moseley Braun: "We blew the place up; we have to fix it back. "

Clark: "I think the best form of welfare for the troops is a winning strategy. And I think we ought to call on our commander in chief to produce it."

Dean: "I would submit to you that my foreign-policy experience might be more valuable in the White House today than the foreign-policy experience of many of the people who supported the Iraq war."

Lieberman: "Would I negotiate with Hamas and other terrorist groups? Not while they're terrorists. "

Part II of the transcript covers domestic affairs.

Caught between an Arab Islamist enemy and the Arab-Muslim vote?

Arab Muslims make up one quarter of the population of Dearborn, Michigan.
- Daniel Pipes in Militant Islam Reaches America, page 25.

NPR Special Report: Muslims in America: Nov. 5, 2001 -- More than a quarter of a million people of Arab descent live in southeastern Michigan, making the area the second-largest Arab community outside the Middle East (after Paris, France).

Each year the Michigan community gets bigger: Annually, about 5,000 Arab immigrants enter the United States through Detroit. And many of them are Muslims, a religion in the spotlight since the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

If there is a center to Michigan’s Arab-American community, it is in Dearborn, west of Detroit.

Meryl Yourish researches "Israel vs. the world"

Take a look at her report: from 1946-present, fully 15% of UN resolutions were in reference to Israel.

Israel doesn't have 15% of the world's land mass; that would be 8.5 million square miles. Israel has only 8,000. That's too small for my calculator to figure the percentage.

Israel doesn't have 15% of the world's population; that would be 975 million. Israel's population is only 6.3 million.

Israel doesn't have 15% of the world's natural resources; in fact, it has next to none.

So what does Israel have? nearly 40% of the world's Jews. That is, about 5 million Jews living in Israel, out of 13 million in the world (NB: that's down from 16.7 million in 1939). That's why the UN concentrates so much of its attention on Israel: it's because of the Joooooos!



Israeli settler Yossi Krakover walks carrying his sleeping daughter Maayan, 4, with his son Matanya, 12, in Netzarim settlement, inside the Gaza Strip, Sunday, Oct. 26, 2003. 'God promised this area to Israel,' said Yossi, 35, who has lived there for 12 years. Moderates in Israel's Cabinet on Sunday called for the evacuation of this Jewish settlement in the heart of Gaza, which relies on an entire army battalion for protection, after three soldiers were killed there by militants. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley)

Schijveschuurder Orphans Fund

See Thursday's story below, "Palestinian woman sentenced to 320 years for bombing" for reference

I found this at Machon Daniel Institutions, but I haven't checked it out and can't vouch for its legitimacy.

Ben-Tzion, Meir, Shmuel, Lea and Chaya Schijveschuurder were orphaned when their parents and 3 siblings were killed in the Sbarro bombing in Jerusalem. A bank account has been set up so that people can more easily give them much needed financial support.

The bank details are:

Keren Motti ve'Tzira*
Bank Leumi, Bayit Vegan Branch, (Branch #766) Jerusalem
Account no. 3303002074

This fund is run by two treasurers who are not family members. Further information about this fund can be obtained by calling 972-2-641-6147.

All donations are welcome

*the fund is named after the orphans' late parents, Motti and Tzira Schijveschuurder

Tax-deductible donations can be sent in the U.S.A. to:

Rabbi Eliezer Goldstein,
NCYI Benevolence Fund,
3 West 16th Street,
New York, N.Y. 10011
(mark the envelope: Lea and Chaya).

Checks should be made out to the NCYI Benevolence Fund

You may also donate with your credit card using PayPal (at the link above). Machon Daniel Institutions will promptly transfer this money to the Keren Motti ve'Tzira account.

Dear Yidden, please wake up

Arabs sign guest book at Holocaust exhibit

Dr. Mordechai Kedar Sunday, October 26, 2003 via IMRA.

The SNP Museum in the Slovak town Banska Bystrica recently hosted a traveling exhibit of photographs of women, Jewish and non-Jewish, maltreated in Auschwitz and elsewhere during the Holocaust period.

Here is the translation of a page of the guest book, containing the entries of four Arab visitors dated September 7, 2003 (copy of original page available):


1. This exhibit testifies to the quality of organization and handling [of the mission]. From a historical perspective, what Hitler did to the Jews is exactly what they deserve. Still, we would have wished that he could have finished incinerating all the Jews in the world, but time ran out on him and therefore Allah's curse be on him and on them.
(-) Khaled al-Zahraya from Saudi Arabia, 07.09.03

2. This is a museum showing a restaurant [specializing in] Jewish meat, which is what they deserve. Sons of apes and pigs. The day after the attempt to murder Ahmad Yasin.
'Umar al-Da'm, Yemen 07.09.03

3. Ibrahim al-'Arimi, Sultanate of Oman
The most beautiful sights of Jews.
(-) 07. 09.03

4. I say what they all say, and will just add that they [Jews] are cursed in this world and the next.
Madih, Yemen. 07.09.2003

I am personally offended by the Syrian president

UPDATE: Israeli MK meets Assad
from Voice of Judea:

More than 2 years since his indictment for his trip to Damascus Bashara has met again with Assad - this time in Qatar. MK Bashara said "I came to offer solidarity with Syria in wake of the recent Israeli attack".

Voice of Judea Commentary: Arab traitors are allowed to serve in the Israeli Knesset, could you imagine members of the U.S. congress or senate flying to meet Bin Ladin or Saddam Hussein to offer solidarity? Have we gone insane?

Syrian President Bashar Assad, center right, meets with a 70-member Iraqi delegation, headed by Wamidh Jamal Nazmi, center left, in Damascus on Sunday, Oct. 26, 2003. In the meeting Assad accused Israel of causing 'turbulence' in the region and said it was the only country benefiting from the unrest, particularly in Iraq and the Palestinian territories. (AP Photo/Sana)

If I could, I would spit on Assad. Israel causing the turbulence - what, by refusing to vacate the Middle East?

And to claim that Israel in any way benefits from the war against her, is just sick. Assad is an evil bastard. How appalling.



Relatives of Sarit Shneor mourn during her funeral at the cemetery in Ramle near Tel Aviv, October 26, 2003. REUTERS/Nir Elias

G-d help us.

Two near misses for US deputy defense Secretary Wolfowitz

DEBKA analyzes Rumsfeld Memo

Early this morning, guerilla rockets hit the landmark al-Rashid Hotel in Baghdad, presumably targeting Paul Wolfowitz, though he was not injured. Yesterday, a US helicopter was shot down near Tikrit shortly after Wolfowitz left that town. Both times Iraqi guerillas knew where to find the deputy defense secretary, and both times, thank G-d, he had a lucky escape.

One of the key points made by Wolfowitz's boss, Donald Rumsfeld, in a recently leaked memo, was that US intelligence capabilities have been "compromised through spies and through trading of information among rogue nations and terrorist networks."

DEBKA:

This intelligence contest, the most sensitive aspect of the global war on terror, bears directly on the degree of precision manifested by anti-US Iraqi guerrillas – and ultimately in Sunday’s rocket strike against the Baghdad hotel. The point took years to appreciate. It was not immediately accepted that, without hostile spies planted inside America, information trading among terrorist groups and electronic espionage capabilities, the traumatic 9/11 terrorist assault on America could not have been carried out - any more than Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein could have managed to elude American pursuit for so long. Intelligence capabilities are also the key to Yasser Arafat’s sustained long-running terror campaign against Israel.

Read DEBKA's full analysis of this latest twist in the global war on terror.

Two Funerals

Israeli soldiers mourn over the grave of colleague Sarit Shneor during her funeral at the cemetery in Ramle near Tel Aviv, October 26, 2003. Shneor died when Palestinian gunmen killed three Israeli soldiers, including two women, in the Netzarim settlement in the Gaza Strip last Friday REUTERS/Nir Elias



Mourners carry the body of Palestinian Fatah militant Rami Elayan, 20, during his funeral in the Rafah refugee camp, southern Gaza Strip, Sunday, Oct. 26, 2003. Elayan was killed during a clash with Israeli soldiers while trying to infiltrate the Kfar Darom Jewish settlement in the central Gaza Strip Sunday, sources said. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)

Lend a hand to media studies student

Boker tov,

I'm in the media studies program at CU's School of Journalism and Mass Communication, and I'm planning a research paper on Israel's media - its history, structure, trends, regulations/laws/rights, and its roles in contemporary Israeli society.

Could you recommend any resources (books, websites, etc.) on Israel's media? Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Hot topic, eh? what with Arutz Sheva being closed down and all . . . I hope to publish excerpts from his research on this blog in the not-too-distant future. Please respond directly to amicus03@hotmail.com if you can be of assistance.

Sharansky's impression from tour of American colleges: "Nearly 90% of our students are Jews of silence"

Sent by a reader in Israel. Subject line: Get a clue, American Jew

When I got to Rutgers University in New Jersey last month, I almost forgot I was on a college campus. The atmosphere was far from the cool, button-down academic reserve typical of such institutions. It was more reminiscent of a battlefield.

My arrival was greeted by a noisy demonstration of Palestinian and Jewish students holding signs reading "Racist Israel" and "War Criminals," together with black-coated Neturei Karta members calling for the destruction of the blasphemous Zionist entity. Faculty members, predictably led by a former Israeli professor, had sent out e-mails protesting the granting of a platform to a representative of the "Nazi, war-criminal" state. Of course, there was the famous pie incident in which a member of a campus Jewish anti-occupation group made his way past my security guards and plastered me in the face with a cream pie while shouting "End the Occupation."

Opposed to them were hundreds of no less rowdy Jewish students, full of motivation to defend Israel and give the protesters back as good as they got. After the pie incident, when I returned to the hall and mounted the stage, the atmosphere was so electric, so full of adrenalin, that the Palestinians and their supporters who had come to disrupt the event had no choice but to abandon their plans for provocation.

Things were not much calmer at Boston University: An anonymous bomb threat brought swarms of police to the lecture hall and almost forced a cancellation of my appearance. But here, too, some good resulted when the bomb threat caused the lecture to be moved to a larger hall, which was quickly filled with some 600 listeners who were unwilling to accept the violent silencing of pro-Israel views.

These moments — the pie throwing, the bomb threat, the demonstration — as raucous, threatening and contentious as they were, are among the more pleasant memories from my 13-campus tour of the United States. Perhaps it is because at these moments I felt that there was some point to my trip, perhaps because the violent hostility had stirred the students and motivated them to want to fight and win — which I, of course, was delighted to see.

There were other moments during my tour, difficult moments when I felt fear, sadness and worry. During a frank and friendly conversation with a group of Jewish students at Harvard University, one student admitted to me that she was afraid — afraid to express support for Israel, afraid to take part in pro-Israel organizations, afraid to be identified. The mood on campus had turned so anti-Israel that she was afraid that her open identification could cost her, damaging her grades and her academic future. That her professors, who control her final grades, were likely to view such activism unkindly, and that the risk was too great.

Having grown up in the communist Soviet Union, I am very familiar with this fear to express one's opinions, with the need to hold the "correct opinions" in order to get ahead, with the reality that expressing support for Israel is a blot on one's resume. But to find all these things at Harvard Business School?

Read it all at The Forward.

Iranian spies scope out British synagogues for Al Qaida attack

Two "asked to leave the country"

From the Daily Telegraph (UK):

Iranian spies have been photographing synagogues and other Jewish buildings in Britain, seemingly in preparation for terrorist attacks.

MI5, the security service, and Special Branch officers have discovered Iranians photographing such buildings in London and the Home Counties for some time, with an upsurge of activity over the past two months.

Up to 20 Iranians, most studying here legally as students at universities, are involved in the surveillance and two men have been asked to leave the country as a result.

Mike Whine, the security spokesman for the Board of Deputies of British Jews, said that the authorities were taking the threat seriously.

"We have been aware for some time that Iranians are monitoring synagogues and Jewish community buildings," he said. "They have been seen taking photographs and most synagogues are now aware of the threat and keep a look-out.

"We understand from intelligence received that they are photographing them as possible terrorist targets. We don't know for definite but there could be a link with al-Qa'eda."

He said the activities of the Iranians had caused considerable worry to the Jewish community. Among the buildings photographed were synagogues in Finchley, north London, an area that is home to one of Britain's largest Jewish communities.

Sign petition at Simon Wiesenthal Center urging British government to send "unequivocal message" to Tehran.

IDF in Gaza: 3 tall (uninhabitated) buildings and police station demolished

IDF Spokesperson 26 October 2003

As part of the ongoing war against terror and its infrastructure, and in response to the murderous terrorist infiltration that killed three IDF soldiers and wounded two others (October 24, 2003), IDF forces operated overnight in the A-Zahara neighborhood, south of the Israeli community of Netzarim.

During the operation, IDF engineering forces demolished three uninhabited buildings utilized by terrorists to plan hostile activity. Indeed, over the past few weeks, the building was used as a vantage point to observe the Israeli community of Netzarim.



Information accrued in this manner aided the terrorists in planning and carrying out the above-mentioned infiltration.

In addition, IDF forces demolished a Palestinian police station used as a refuge by an Islamic Jihad terrorist involved in the Netzarim infiltration. It should be noted that the terrorist was offered sanctuary by Palestinian police officers - who also helped him escape.

Such action illustrates the blatant involvement of the Palestinian security apparatuses in aiding terrorism.

In an effort to reduce harm to the Palestinian population, IDF forces, in conjunction with DCO officials, temporarily evacuated the residents in close proximity to the location of the IDF operation.

The Palestinian residents of the area were informed that the above-mentioned activity was not meant to harm them, but rather, was directed at buildings used by terrorist organizations to plan and carry out hostile activity.

Upon conclusion of the operation (before morning), Palestinian residents of the neighborhood returned to their houses.

The IDF will continue to use all legal means at its disposal to strike at the Palestinian terrorist infrastructure, their leaders as well as operatives, in order to protect the lives of IDF soldiers and Israeli civilians.

See also coverage at Arutz Sheva:

"These three tall buildings, right next to Netzarim, were not built to improve the living standards of refugees," Gaza Coast Regional Council head Avner Shimoni told Arutz-7 this morning, "but rather to serve as observation points. The buildings have not been occupied since they were built three years ago. We have long requested that the army destroy them, and we are pleased that this has finally happened."

Other IDF activities last night included blowing up the Gaza police station. It had served as refuge for the second terrorist in Friday morning's attack against the three soldiers, and afforded him other aid as well.

And Reuters' captioning:

Three Palestinian apartment buildings are blown up by the Israeli army in the Gaza Strip town of al-Zahrah Oct. 26, 2003. The Israeli army blew up three 13-story Palestinian Authority buildings in the Gaza Strip on Sunday as part of what it said was a military operation. (Stringer/Israel/Reuters)

Those lying Jews, they said it was a "military operation" when really it was . . . what? recreation?

I despise Reuters.

Chutzpah, legally speaking . . .

A man goes to a lawyer and asks:
"How much do you charge for legal advice?"

"A thousand dollars for three questions."

"Wow! Isn’t that kind of expensive?"

"Yes, it is. What’s your third question?"

"Lawsuit, Shawsuit" - originally published in the Yale Law Journal

Searching through the LEXIS legal opinions database reveals that "chutzpah" (sometimes also spelled "chutzpa," "hutzpah," or "hutzpa") has appeared in 231 reported court decisions. Curiously, all but eleven of them have been filed since 1980. There are two possible explanations for this. One is that during the last 21 years there has been a dramatic increase in the actual amount of chutzpah in the United States--or at least in the U.S. legal system. This explanation seems possible, but unlikely.

The more likely explanation is that Yiddish is quickly supplanting Latin as the spice in American legal argot. As recently as 1970, a federal court not only felt the need to define "bagels"; it misdefined them, calling them "hard rolls shaped like doughnuts." All right-thinking people know good bagels are rather soft. (Day-old bagels are rather hard, but right-thinking people do not eat day-olds, even when they are only 10 cents each.) We’ve come a long way since then.

The first reported use of "chutzpah" was in 1972, in an opinion of the Georgia Court of Appeals. We’re happy to say it was quite apt: breaking into a sheriff’s office to steal guns qualifies as chutzpah in our book. The four times "chutzpah" was used in published opinions in 1973, the courts didn’t even bother to give a definition. And, as we said, it’s been used over two hundred times since 1980. During the same period, the word "temerity" (a woefully inadequate substitute) was used only about two hundred sixty times, and "unmitigated gall" a mere thirteen.

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