A Lebanese Web site sharing stories from the nation's people during the war and criticisms of Hizb'allah will shut down in the next few days. Lebanon's Voices will close due to its organizers' fear of possible future threats, according to Seth Eisenberg who has been in contact with them.
Eisenberg was a key member in establishing Israel Voice's, a Web site sharing stories from citizens in the North to the rest of the world. When an article appeared about the site, he was contacted by an interested Lebanese man in the US.
"He wanted to know if we were affiliated with the government," Eisenberg said. "I told him we are simply sharing stories with no political agenda. They wanted to get a site up on their own."
The site has written, audio and video accounts from Lebanese in the areas affected by the war. The welcoming paragraph describing the site's purpose reads: "Held hostage in their own nation against their will. A state within a state dictating its terms on a sovereign government unwilling and unable to protect its own citizens."
One of the accounts tells how a man and his family had packed to flee Tyre once the war started. As they prepared to leave, local Hizb'allah members told them to unpack and stay. The man had a gun pointed at him and was ordered to return home. He wrote he wants Hizbullah to leave and if not, to fight in another city.
Hizbullah's television station Al-Manar ran a series of stories on the Web site calling its organizers "collaborators with Israel."
Eisenberg said in a conversation with one of the founders he was told the site hadn't had any problems until the series started running and they were told their criticism of Hizbullah and cooperation with Israeli media crossed a line.
"They felt compelled to close the site to avoid any threats to their families or themselves," he said.
The site currently states it is under construction and will have more information available shortly.
Jerusalem Post
09.12.2006
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
Monday, September 11, 2006
A Year After Gaza Pullout, Israelis Question Benefit
A year after their landmark pullout from Gaza, Israelis feel less secure than they have in decades. Islamic Hamas has taken control of the evacuated areas and the Israeli government's main mission -- staging a similar withdrawal from the West Bank -- has been indefinitely shelved.
But the pullout has defused a demographic time bomb by prolonging a Jewish majority in lands Israel controls, and proved that Israel could dismantle settlements without disintegrating into civil war, analysts say.
The Jewish state has found itself embroiled in recent wars against both Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon -- underscoring the nation's deep disappointment with what was supposed to be a new era of peacemaking following the Gaza pullout.
The withdrawal was unilateral, meaning it was done in only minimal coordination with the Palestinians, and that strategy, said political analyst Yossi Alpher, has been discredited by what quickly followed. In less than two weeks, Palestinians militants were firing homemade rockets at nearby Israeli villages, and Israel made good on vows to strike back hard against any attack from Gaza.
But the benefit of the withdrawal, Alpher said, was that "we began to detach ourselves, to pull away from the interlock that the settlements had created between the two populations, which jeopardizes Israel's future as a Jewish and democratic state."
The last Israeli soldier left Gaza, locking a border gate behind him, on Sept. 12, 2005 -- after Israeli police and soldiers forcibly removed 9,000 settlers from Gaza and four small communities in the northern West Bank. It was the first time Israel had ever quit territory Palestinians claim for a future state, and the operation went ahead far faster, and more peacefully, than expected.
The international community lauded Ariel Sharon, the architect of the pullback, and hopes for political dividends flourished as Muslim states began talking of peace prospects.
But the dreams quickly evaporated with the Palestinian rocket fire and, in return, Israeli artillery fire into Gaza, and later air strikes.
Then came success in Palestinian elections by Hamas, which is committed to Israel's destruction. And, for the past two months, a military strike against Gaza militants set off by the capture of a still-missing soldier. All this has only deepened pessimism among Israelis.
"What succeeded, for our part, is the fact that the country was able to decide to vacate settlements, and the sky didn't fall," said Yariv Oppenheimer, the top official at the Israeli group Peace Now.
"A negative outcome is the public sentiment over the continued violence and Qassam rockets," Oppenheimer said. "Instead of achieving security and calm, we as a society still face a terror threat. That is definitely one of the negative consequences of the disengagement."
Settlers, who opposed the pullout from the outset, say the attacks from Gaza and Lebanon have vindicated their resistance.
"We knew that the kind of crisis that we have witnessed in the last weeks with Hezbollah would happen," said former Gaza settler Hanna Picard, referring to Israel's 34-day war against Lebanese guerrillas. "It's obvious that Arabs were heartened by the withdrawal...They got what they wanted without doing anything. Why would they have stopped?"
The swift and heavy attacks from Gaza have shown that "getting out of territories is not necessarily conducive to greater security," said Efraim Inbar, a professor of political studies at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv.
In fact, the withdrawal of the estimated 20,000 soldiers and the 8,500 settlers they protected have, in fact, coincided with a sharp drop in Israel's Gaza-area casualties.
In the five years before the evacuation, 144 soldiers and civilians were killed and 782 were wounded in the Gaza area, according to military figures. Since the withdrawal, two Israeli soldiers were killed, one soldier was kidnapped and 19 people were injured in attacks from Gaza.
In the last eight months before the withdrawal, 15 Israelis were killed in militant attacks from Gaza, compared to two during the same period this year.
Still, the withdrawal inevitably gave the Palestinian rocket squads more room for maneuver, and their homemade missiles have been falling closer to Ashqelon, the main Israeli city near Gaza, and its power station. The sense of insecurity was compounded this summer by the action of Hezbollah militants in Lebanon -- firing an uninterrupted stream of more than 4,000 rockets into Israel and fighting the mightiest army in the Middle East to a virtual draw.
A key argument for the Gaza withdrawal was the fear that 3.9 million Palestinians and 1.4 million Israeli Arabs would soon outnumber 5.6 million Jews and threaten to destroy either Israel's Jewish character or its democracy.
Grant equal rights, the argument goes, and Israel will be democratic but not Jewish, because of the large Arab population; maintain Jewish control by withholding equal rights, and Israel won't be a democracy.
When Prime Minister Ehud Olmert ran for election, his key platform was pulling Israel out of large chunks of the West Bank -- unilaterally, if necessary.
But Hezbollah and Hamas have left Israel reluctant to make one-sided territorial concessions.
Asked where Israel's second planned pullback was heading, Olmert acknowledged this week it was going nowhere: "What I advocated several months ago has changed," he said.
Israel Insider
09.11.2006
But the pullout has defused a demographic time bomb by prolonging a Jewish majority in lands Israel controls, and proved that Israel could dismantle settlements without disintegrating into civil war, analysts say.
The Jewish state has found itself embroiled in recent wars against both Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon -- underscoring the nation's deep disappointment with what was supposed to be a new era of peacemaking following the Gaza pullout.
The withdrawal was unilateral, meaning it was done in only minimal coordination with the Palestinians, and that strategy, said political analyst Yossi Alpher, has been discredited by what quickly followed. In less than two weeks, Palestinians militants were firing homemade rockets at nearby Israeli villages, and Israel made good on vows to strike back hard against any attack from Gaza.
But the benefit of the withdrawal, Alpher said, was that "we began to detach ourselves, to pull away from the interlock that the settlements had created between the two populations, which jeopardizes Israel's future as a Jewish and democratic state."
The last Israeli soldier left Gaza, locking a border gate behind him, on Sept. 12, 2005 -- after Israeli police and soldiers forcibly removed 9,000 settlers from Gaza and four small communities in the northern West Bank. It was the first time Israel had ever quit territory Palestinians claim for a future state, and the operation went ahead far faster, and more peacefully, than expected.
The international community lauded Ariel Sharon, the architect of the pullback, and hopes for political dividends flourished as Muslim states began talking of peace prospects.
But the dreams quickly evaporated with the Palestinian rocket fire and, in return, Israeli artillery fire into Gaza, and later air strikes.
Then came success in Palestinian elections by Hamas, which is committed to Israel's destruction. And, for the past two months, a military strike against Gaza militants set off by the capture of a still-missing soldier. All this has only deepened pessimism among Israelis.
"What succeeded, for our part, is the fact that the country was able to decide to vacate settlements, and the sky didn't fall," said Yariv Oppenheimer, the top official at the Israeli group Peace Now.
"A negative outcome is the public sentiment over the continued violence and Qassam rockets," Oppenheimer said. "Instead of achieving security and calm, we as a society still face a terror threat. That is definitely one of the negative consequences of the disengagement."
Settlers, who opposed the pullout from the outset, say the attacks from Gaza and Lebanon have vindicated their resistance.
"We knew that the kind of crisis that we have witnessed in the last weeks with Hezbollah would happen," said former Gaza settler Hanna Picard, referring to Israel's 34-day war against Lebanese guerrillas. "It's obvious that Arabs were heartened by the withdrawal...They got what they wanted without doing anything. Why would they have stopped?"
The swift and heavy attacks from Gaza have shown that "getting out of territories is not necessarily conducive to greater security," said Efraim Inbar, a professor of political studies at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv.
In fact, the withdrawal of the estimated 20,000 soldiers and the 8,500 settlers they protected have, in fact, coincided with a sharp drop in Israel's Gaza-area casualties.
In the five years before the evacuation, 144 soldiers and civilians were killed and 782 were wounded in the Gaza area, according to military figures. Since the withdrawal, two Israeli soldiers were killed, one soldier was kidnapped and 19 people were injured in attacks from Gaza.
In the last eight months before the withdrawal, 15 Israelis were killed in militant attacks from Gaza, compared to two during the same period this year.
Still, the withdrawal inevitably gave the Palestinian rocket squads more room for maneuver, and their homemade missiles have been falling closer to Ashqelon, the main Israeli city near Gaza, and its power station. The sense of insecurity was compounded this summer by the action of Hezbollah militants in Lebanon -- firing an uninterrupted stream of more than 4,000 rockets into Israel and fighting the mightiest army in the Middle East to a virtual draw.
A key argument for the Gaza withdrawal was the fear that 3.9 million Palestinians and 1.4 million Israeli Arabs would soon outnumber 5.6 million Jews and threaten to destroy either Israel's Jewish character or its democracy.
Grant equal rights, the argument goes, and Israel will be democratic but not Jewish, because of the large Arab population; maintain Jewish control by withholding equal rights, and Israel won't be a democracy.
When Prime Minister Ehud Olmert ran for election, his key platform was pulling Israel out of large chunks of the West Bank -- unilaterally, if necessary.
But Hezbollah and Hamas have left Israel reluctant to make one-sided territorial concessions.
Asked where Israel's second planned pullback was heading, Olmert acknowledged this week it was going nowhere: "What I advocated several months ago has changed," he said.
Israel Insider
09.11.2006
Sunday, September 10, 2006
Iran Resumed Weapons Airlift To Hizb'allah Friday
Iran’s first post-blockade arms flight departed Dubai Friday, Sept. 8, to test the ground at Beirut international airport for Israeli air force or UN reactions. DEBKAfile’s military sources report that the forbidden goods were unloaded and sailed through the airport unhindered. Tehran therefore determined to send two further bulk consignments in the next 48 hours aboard commercial flights from the Persian Gulf.
Our sources report the arms crates listed were on the documents as “computer equipment. Handle with care.” They were offloaded onto trucks which drove in convoy to Hizb'allah headquarters in Baalbek.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, determined to end Israel’s air blockade on Lebanon, promised solemnly that UN monitors would control incoming passengers and goods at Beirut airport. But he failed to make the Siniora government follow through on this pledge. The Lebanese prime minister immediately barred the airport to UN inspections.
The five German air monitors agreed on were only allowed to establish a checkpoint for controlling arms smuggling at a distance of one kilometer from the international airport. DEBKAfile reports they are standing idle because the trucks carrying forbidden cargoes are able leave the airfield and bypass their checkpoint by alternative routes.
At the same time, DEBKAfile’s diplomatic sources report the Israeli government and the UN are colluding to present the expanded UNIFIL project as a big success and a satisfactory formula for enabling Israeli troops to quit Lebanon and fully implementing UN resolution 1701.
In actual fact, the UN deployment by land and sea does nothing to curtail Hizballah’s recovery and rearming. Its only achievement thus far is the acceleration of Israel’s disengagement from the Lebanon scene empty-handed.
Our military sources disclose that Iran is sending Hizb'allah fresh supplies of anti-tank weapons and for the first time a large quantity of anti-air missiles. The war materiel is coming in by land, sea and air.
The promised Italian, French and Greek rival presence, on the strength of which Israel lifted its air blockade, has been pushed by the Lebanese government out to sea and restricted to a 12-km radius from the coast. The European warships can keep an eye on big freighters approaching Lebanese ports, but cannot keep track of the small vessels reaching Lebanon ports from the northern Syrian ports of Tartus and Latakia.
That is where Iranian cargo vessels have been unloading large quantities of arms for Hizb'allah outside the European fleets’ limits in the last two weeks. Furthermore, Friday, as soon as Israel was persuaded to lift its sea blockade, three Lebanese and Syrian ships crammed with arms for Hizballah departed the northern Lebanese port of Tripoli and after a short voyage hugging the Lebanese coast put into the southern Lebanese port of Sidon, where willing Hizb'allah hands unloaded their cargo.
On land, the Lebanese-Syrian border is wide open. Three or four arms truck convoys cross into Lebanon every day.
Debka
09.10.2006
Our sources report the arms crates listed were on the documents as “computer equipment. Handle with care.” They were offloaded onto trucks which drove in convoy to Hizb'allah headquarters in Baalbek.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, determined to end Israel’s air blockade on Lebanon, promised solemnly that UN monitors would control incoming passengers and goods at Beirut airport. But he failed to make the Siniora government follow through on this pledge. The Lebanese prime minister immediately barred the airport to UN inspections.
The five German air monitors agreed on were only allowed to establish a checkpoint for controlling arms smuggling at a distance of one kilometer from the international airport. DEBKAfile reports they are standing idle because the trucks carrying forbidden cargoes are able leave the airfield and bypass their checkpoint by alternative routes.
At the same time, DEBKAfile’s diplomatic sources report the Israeli government and the UN are colluding to present the expanded UNIFIL project as a big success and a satisfactory formula for enabling Israeli troops to quit Lebanon and fully implementing UN resolution 1701.
In actual fact, the UN deployment by land and sea does nothing to curtail Hizballah’s recovery and rearming. Its only achievement thus far is the acceleration of Israel’s disengagement from the Lebanon scene empty-handed.
Our military sources disclose that Iran is sending Hizb'allah fresh supplies of anti-tank weapons and for the first time a large quantity of anti-air missiles. The war materiel is coming in by land, sea and air.
The promised Italian, French and Greek rival presence, on the strength of which Israel lifted its air blockade, has been pushed by the Lebanese government out to sea and restricted to a 12-km radius from the coast. The European warships can keep an eye on big freighters approaching Lebanese ports, but cannot keep track of the small vessels reaching Lebanon ports from the northern Syrian ports of Tartus and Latakia.
That is where Iranian cargo vessels have been unloading large quantities of arms for Hizb'allah outside the European fleets’ limits in the last two weeks. Furthermore, Friday, as soon as Israel was persuaded to lift its sea blockade, three Lebanese and Syrian ships crammed with arms for Hizballah departed the northern Lebanese port of Tripoli and after a short voyage hugging the Lebanese coast put into the southern Lebanese port of Sidon, where willing Hizb'allah hands unloaded their cargo.
On land, the Lebanese-Syrian border is wide open. Three or four arms truck convoys cross into Lebanon every day.
Debka
09.10.2006
Saturday, September 09, 2006
King Kofi the Worst
Even though the UN Security Council passed a binding resolution ordering Iran to give up its nuclear program, Kofi Annan says the best course of action is to do nothing. Has Kofi found a new income source for his retirement to replace his Oil for Food slush fund?
In an interview published Tuesday, Kofi says the world should NOT isolate Iran by imposing sanctions. How is that again? The UN Security Council passed a binding resolution that gave Iran's Ahmadinejad until August 31st to give up its nuclear enrichment program or face sanctions. But after visiting Iran, Kofi told the Madrid daily El Pais, "The international community should not isolate Iran.”
I'm confused. What does “international sanctions” actually mean? If they mean a visit from the UN Secretary General, followed by his public endorsement, then every dictator in the world should stand in line to have the Security Council pass a resolution against them.
Annan told the paper that confrontation with the Security Council "will not be in Iran's favor or that of the region." Did somebody elect Kofi Annan King of the World? What is the purpose of the Security Council, if Annan can simply overrule it unilaterally? Iran insists its nuclear work is peaceful, intended only to produce fuel for nuclear reactors that generate electricity.
That is so lame as to be laughable. Iran is awash in oil. It exports far more oil than it can use itself. Why would an energy independent nation like Iran require nuclear energy for peaceful purposes? It makes as much sense as buying a million dollar Formula One race car and explaining it by saying one needs it to take the kids to school. In short, it makes no sense at all.
How does Kofi Annan see it? In his interview following his meeting with Ahmadinejad, Kofi said, “The world should count on Iran, not isolate it.” Count on it for what? The only promise that Iran has made that bears even a hint of sincerity its its promise to wipe Israel from the map of the Middle East.
Kofi Annan's interference in the multiple Middle East crises is wrong on so many levels it is hard to know where to start.
A good place to start is with his anti-Israeli perspective. Unlike most legitimate international figures, Kofi Annan doesn't even pretend to disguise his hatred for the Jewish state.
Kofi paid lip service to Israel by gently reminding Ahmadinejad, (according to published news reports) "I think the tragedy of the Holocaust is an undeniable historical fact, and we should really accept that fact and teach people what happened in World War II and ensure it is never repeated.”
The next day, while Annan was still in Tehran, Iran said it would host a conference to examine what it called exaggerations about the Holocaust. Did Kofi storm out in protest? No. Did he even MENTION it again? No.
When asked why Iran should not face sanctions, Kofi muttered something about Iran's pledge to rebuild Lebanon as one good reason. He said that instead that Ahmadinejad "reaffirmed his country's support for the implementation of resolution 1701.
OF COURSE he did. Resolution 1701 prevented Israel from destroying Hezbollah. Hezbollah is a puppet of the Iranian government. Iran was BEHIND the war that caused the destruction that now needs rebuilding. Kofi Annan is aware of this. It is not possible that he is not.
Hezbollah was created by Iran in 1983. All of the rockets that were fired into Israel came from Iran. Iran's Revolutionary Guard has openly maintained a military base in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley for twenty-three years.
Kofi Annan wasn't elected king of the world. He simply ascended to the throne on his own. And with the entire Islamic world backing him, he dares anyone to attempt to dethrone him. If there were any hope that America might rise up against its new king, it was dashed by Secretary of State Rice when she endorsed the completely one-sided Resolution 1701.
King Kofi the Worst has spoken. Let all his subjects bow in submission. All hail the King! By Hal Lindsey - 9.09.2006
In an interview published Tuesday, Kofi says the world should NOT isolate Iran by imposing sanctions. How is that again? The UN Security Council passed a binding resolution that gave Iran's Ahmadinejad until August 31st to give up its nuclear enrichment program or face sanctions. But after visiting Iran, Kofi told the Madrid daily El Pais, "The international community should not isolate Iran.”
I'm confused. What does “international sanctions” actually mean? If they mean a visit from the UN Secretary General, followed by his public endorsement, then every dictator in the world should stand in line to have the Security Council pass a resolution against them.
Annan told the paper that confrontation with the Security Council "will not be in Iran's favor or that of the region." Did somebody elect Kofi Annan King of the World? What is the purpose of the Security Council, if Annan can simply overrule it unilaterally? Iran insists its nuclear work is peaceful, intended only to produce fuel for nuclear reactors that generate electricity.
That is so lame as to be laughable. Iran is awash in oil. It exports far more oil than it can use itself. Why would an energy independent nation like Iran require nuclear energy for peaceful purposes? It makes as much sense as buying a million dollar Formula One race car and explaining it by saying one needs it to take the kids to school. In short, it makes no sense at all.
How does Kofi Annan see it? In his interview following his meeting with Ahmadinejad, Kofi said, “The world should count on Iran, not isolate it.” Count on it for what? The only promise that Iran has made that bears even a hint of sincerity its its promise to wipe Israel from the map of the Middle East.
Kofi Annan's interference in the multiple Middle East crises is wrong on so many levels it is hard to know where to start.
A good place to start is with his anti-Israeli perspective. Unlike most legitimate international figures, Kofi Annan doesn't even pretend to disguise his hatred for the Jewish state.
Kofi paid lip service to Israel by gently reminding Ahmadinejad, (according to published news reports) "I think the tragedy of the Holocaust is an undeniable historical fact, and we should really accept that fact and teach people what happened in World War II and ensure it is never repeated.”
The next day, while Annan was still in Tehran, Iran said it would host a conference to examine what it called exaggerations about the Holocaust. Did Kofi storm out in protest? No. Did he even MENTION it again? No.
When asked why Iran should not face sanctions, Kofi muttered something about Iran's pledge to rebuild Lebanon as one good reason. He said that instead that Ahmadinejad "reaffirmed his country's support for the implementation of resolution 1701.
OF COURSE he did. Resolution 1701 prevented Israel from destroying Hezbollah. Hezbollah is a puppet of the Iranian government. Iran was BEHIND the war that caused the destruction that now needs rebuilding. Kofi Annan is aware of this. It is not possible that he is not.
Hezbollah was created by Iran in 1983. All of the rockets that were fired into Israel came from Iran. Iran's Revolutionary Guard has openly maintained a military base in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley for twenty-three years.
Kofi Annan wasn't elected king of the world. He simply ascended to the throne on his own. And with the entire Islamic world backing him, he dares anyone to attempt to dethrone him. If there were any hope that America might rise up against its new king, it was dashed by Secretary of State Rice when she endorsed the completely one-sided Resolution 1701.
King Kofi the Worst has spoken. Let all his subjects bow in submission. All hail the King! By Hal Lindsey - 9.09.2006
Friday, September 08, 2006
Iran's Leader Declares Intent To Speak At U.N.
Diplomats at the United Nations were sent into disarray yesterday when President Ahmadinejad of Iran declared that he intended to attend the General Assembly of the world body on September 19 and to debate his country's nuclear program with President Bush, who is due to address the Assembly that day.
However, it was far from clear whether the Iranian president was serious in his suggestion or whether he was merely tweaking the nose of his American opponents. His intention to visit New York was reported by the Islamic Republic News Agency, which quoted the Presidential Office Media Department reporting him as saying, "We are ready for a debate with the Americans at the U.N. General Assembly" and that "the American side can even take part in the debate side by side with his advisors, and as a full team, if they wish so." Mr. Ahmadinejad last visited the United Nations last year.
The speculation, however, was enough to prompt sharp questions from reporters to the press spokesman of Secretary-General Annan about whether a precedent existed for America denying a visa to a president visiting the General Assembly. The spokesman replied that he knew of no such precedent.
The prospect of Mr. Ahmadinejad striding the world stage and voicing his well-known anti-Semitic views and his belief that Israel should be destroyed in the General Assembly was enough to cause a member of the Israeli parliament, M.K. Dan Naveh, to ask the Israeli government to demand that Mr. Ahmadinejad be prevented from attending the Assembly.
New York Sun
09.08.2006
However, it was far from clear whether the Iranian president was serious in his suggestion or whether he was merely tweaking the nose of his American opponents. His intention to visit New York was reported by the Islamic Republic News Agency, which quoted the Presidential Office Media Department reporting him as saying, "We are ready for a debate with the Americans at the U.N. General Assembly" and that "the American side can even take part in the debate side by side with his advisors, and as a full team, if they wish so." Mr. Ahmadinejad last visited the United Nations last year.
The speculation, however, was enough to prompt sharp questions from reporters to the press spokesman of Secretary-General Annan about whether a precedent existed for America denying a visa to a president visiting the General Assembly. The spokesman replied that he knew of no such precedent.
The prospect of Mr. Ahmadinejad striding the world stage and voicing his well-known anti-Semitic views and his belief that Israel should be destroyed in the General Assembly was enough to cause a member of the Israeli parliament, M.K. Dan Naveh, to ask the Israeli government to demand that Mr. Ahmadinejad be prevented from attending the Assembly.
New York Sun
09.08.2006
Thursday, September 07, 2006
Anti-Semitic Hate Wave Across Britain & Australia
The month of July was one of the worst, in terms of anti-Semitism, in both England and Australia. In Canada, as well, Jewish leaders are concerned.
TheAge.com in Australia reports that anti-Semitism is on the rise across university campuses in the country. Grahame Leonard, the president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, says July had the most anti-Semitic incidents - no fewer than 141 - since records began in 1945. Never before had there been more than some 90. The July attacks included phone calls, hate e-mails and graffiti, as well as violent incidents - with the big jump being on campuses in Victoria.
Recent incidents include:
* An enraged Monash University lecturer gushed expletives upon an Australasian Union of Jewish Students representative for his pro-Israel stance.
* A Young Liberal member in Monash staffing an Israel stall was grabbed by the throat and threatened, and the table was kicked over.
* Jewish students were pushed to the ground and spat upon in Sydney.
* Israel's Ambassador to Australia recently visited Melbourne University, but Socialist Alternative members disrupted the meeting and were asked to leave by, of all people, the Lebanese Students' society.
* Also at Melbourne University, security staff intervened to keep apart left-wing students and another group of students waving Israeli flags.
"There's a real feeling of threat," Deon Kamien, Victorian president of the Union of Jewish Students, was quoted as saying. "It's not something I can put in words. A lot of students who would feel very comfortable wearing a kippah or T-shirt with Hebrew words on it now feel they are being targeted as Jews - not supporters of Israel, but Jews."
In Britain, as well, The Times of London reports that attacks on Jews have soared, and that even the national government has taken notice. On Thursday, an all-party parliamentary inquiry will state that anti-Semitic violence has become endemic in Britain, both on the streets and university campuses. The report will call for urgent action from the Government, the police and educational establishments.
The Times attributes the hate wave to the war in Lebanon. "Synagogues have been daubed with graffiti," the paper writes, "Jewish leaders have had hate-mail, and ordinary people have been subjected to insults and vandalism."
Mark Gardner, of the Community Security Trust, said, "In July, when the conflict in Lebanon began, we received reports of 92 incidents, which was the third-worst month since records began in 1984." In 2000, the monthly average was between 10 and 30 incidents. He said the incidents in July were "more dispersed than usual" and "were very widespread across the country."
There have been several attacks in various Jewish neighborhoods in London of late. In one incident last month, a Jewish restaurant in Golders Green was targeted by two young men who threw chairs, punched workers and threatened to kill the owner, Ruth Cohen, with a knife. In Hampstead Garden Suburb, swastikas and the words "Allah" and "Kill all Jews" were daubed on the house and car of a local Jewish doctor.
More recently, a 12-year-old Jewish girl was stomped upon and brutally kicked on a public bus in London. Accosted and asked if she was Jewish, she replied, "I'm English." Unimpressed, four girls, accompanied by three boys, then pushed her to the floor, stomped on her face and repeatedly kicked her.
In Canada, as well, fear of increased anti-Semitism are on the rise. The Toldos Yakov Yosef-Skver Orthodox Boys School in Montreal was targeted with a Molotov cocktail this past Sabbath morning, causing 150,000 Canadian dollars' worth of damage. Local Jewish leaders said they are concerned that further violence will be directed at the community, in light of the recent war in Lebanon.
Rabbi Reuben Poupko, a member of the city's Jewish community security council, told The Hamilton Spectator, "It's a fair question to wonder whether or not the [recent] gathering of 15,000 Quebecers under the flag of Hizbullah -unfortunately further legitimized by the presence of politicians - whether that creates an atmosphere where fanatics draw the conclusion that violence against Jews is somehow acceptable."
On September 1, a Hassidic man was removed from an Air Canada Jazz flight from Montreal to New York when he began to pray. CBC Montreal reported that the plane was heading toward the runway for takeoff when he began to pray. Swaying back and forth, he attracted the attention of at least one flight attendant, who told him that his praying was making other passengers nervous. A witness later said, "The attendant actually recognized out loud that he wasn't a Muslim and that she was sorry for the situation, but they had to ask him to leave." Air Canada Jazz later said it received more than one complaint about the man's behavior, and that "the crew had to act in the interest of the majority of passengers."
Jewish leaders in Montreal criticized the move as insensitive, saying the flight attendants should have explained to the other passengers that the man was simply praying and doing no harm. B'nai Brith Canada offered to help give Air Canada crews sensitivity training, CBC reported.
Arutz Sheva
09.07.2006
TheAge.com in Australia reports that anti-Semitism is on the rise across university campuses in the country. Grahame Leonard, the president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, says July had the most anti-Semitic incidents - no fewer than 141 - since records began in 1945. Never before had there been more than some 90. The July attacks included phone calls, hate e-mails and graffiti, as well as violent incidents - with the big jump being on campuses in Victoria.
Recent incidents include:
* An enraged Monash University lecturer gushed expletives upon an Australasian Union of Jewish Students representative for his pro-Israel stance.
* A Young Liberal member in Monash staffing an Israel stall was grabbed by the throat and threatened, and the table was kicked over.
* Jewish students were pushed to the ground and spat upon in Sydney.
* Israel's Ambassador to Australia recently visited Melbourne University, but Socialist Alternative members disrupted the meeting and were asked to leave by, of all people, the Lebanese Students' society.
* Also at Melbourne University, security staff intervened to keep apart left-wing students and another group of students waving Israeli flags.
"There's a real feeling of threat," Deon Kamien, Victorian president of the Union of Jewish Students, was quoted as saying. "It's not something I can put in words. A lot of students who would feel very comfortable wearing a kippah or T-shirt with Hebrew words on it now feel they are being targeted as Jews - not supporters of Israel, but Jews."
In Britain, as well, The Times of London reports that attacks on Jews have soared, and that even the national government has taken notice. On Thursday, an all-party parliamentary inquiry will state that anti-Semitic violence has become endemic in Britain, both on the streets and university campuses. The report will call for urgent action from the Government, the police and educational establishments.
The Times attributes the hate wave to the war in Lebanon. "Synagogues have been daubed with graffiti," the paper writes, "Jewish leaders have had hate-mail, and ordinary people have been subjected to insults and vandalism."
Mark Gardner, of the Community Security Trust, said, "In July, when the conflict in Lebanon began, we received reports of 92 incidents, which was the third-worst month since records began in 1984." In 2000, the monthly average was between 10 and 30 incidents. He said the incidents in July were "more dispersed than usual" and "were very widespread across the country."
There have been several attacks in various Jewish neighborhoods in London of late. In one incident last month, a Jewish restaurant in Golders Green was targeted by two young men who threw chairs, punched workers and threatened to kill the owner, Ruth Cohen, with a knife. In Hampstead Garden Suburb, swastikas and the words "Allah" and "Kill all Jews" were daubed on the house and car of a local Jewish doctor.
More recently, a 12-year-old Jewish girl was stomped upon and brutally kicked on a public bus in London. Accosted and asked if she was Jewish, she replied, "I'm English." Unimpressed, four girls, accompanied by three boys, then pushed her to the floor, stomped on her face and repeatedly kicked her.
In Canada, as well, fear of increased anti-Semitism are on the rise. The Toldos Yakov Yosef-Skver Orthodox Boys School in Montreal was targeted with a Molotov cocktail this past Sabbath morning, causing 150,000 Canadian dollars' worth of damage. Local Jewish leaders said they are concerned that further violence will be directed at the community, in light of the recent war in Lebanon.
Rabbi Reuben Poupko, a member of the city's Jewish community security council, told The Hamilton Spectator, "It's a fair question to wonder whether or not the [recent] gathering of 15,000 Quebecers under the flag of Hizbullah -unfortunately further legitimized by the presence of politicians - whether that creates an atmosphere where fanatics draw the conclusion that violence against Jews is somehow acceptable."
On September 1, a Hassidic man was removed from an Air Canada Jazz flight from Montreal to New York when he began to pray. CBC Montreal reported that the plane was heading toward the runway for takeoff when he began to pray. Swaying back and forth, he attracted the attention of at least one flight attendant, who told him that his praying was making other passengers nervous. A witness later said, "The attendant actually recognized out loud that he wasn't a Muslim and that she was sorry for the situation, but they had to ask him to leave." Air Canada Jazz later said it received more than one complaint about the man's behavior, and that "the crew had to act in the interest of the majority of passengers."
Jewish leaders in Montreal criticized the move as insensitive, saying the flight attendants should have explained to the other passengers that the man was simply praying and doing no harm. B'nai Brith Canada offered to help give Air Canada crews sensitivity training, CBC reported.
Arutz Sheva
09.07.2006
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
God of Jacob, God of Israel - Part Two
Last month we noted that the only true God, the Creator of the universe and all things therein-the God of the Bible-has linked His name with and tied His integrity to Israel. Yet many evangelicals, including well-known leaders, insist that Israel is of no significance to God any longer, having been cut off for rejecting Christ and now having been replaced by the church.
There are even groups (not only among white supremacists or cults such as Herbert W. Armstrong's die-hard followers today) who persist in the ridiculous theory that the "Ten Lost Tribes" of Israel migrated to the British Isles and that therefore all those of British descent are the true Jews today. Some go so far as to say that all of the "white races" are the true Jews-as though not only England but all of Europe and Russia was uninhabited wasteland until these remnants of the "Ten Lost Tribes" settled there.
We have proved that the ten tribes taken to Assyria (2 Ki 17:6-23) were not "lost" but make up most of those called Jews today (see 2 Chr 34,35; Q&A Nov '92, May '96). Far from Israel being cut off, hundreds of prophecies foretell Israel's importance in world affairs in the last days, the attack of all the world against her at Armageddon, her rescue by the Messiah, and her glorious final restoration in the Millennial Kingdom. Nor is there ever a reference to Israel anywhere in Scripture that could possibly be interpreted as meaning the British Isles or the British people, much less the "white races!"
Most of the more than 2,000 references to Israel or Israelites in the Bible and the thousands of prophecies (already fulfilled or yet to be fulfilled) pertain to the historical land of Israel in the Middle East, whose boundaries are clearly described (Gn 15:18-21), or to the people who lived there for nearly 2,300 years, were cast out under God's judgment, and will be brought back by God so that not one ethnic Jew will be left outside Israel (Ezk 39:27-29).
We know who the Jews are today by DNA testing. The Israeli Immigrant Liaison Bureau requires DNA tests where there is some question as to the authenticity of claimed Jewish ancestry. Such tests would draw a complete blank if applied to the average person of British descent, and prove British-Israelism to be utter folly. No other ethnic group without its own land and scattered around the world for more than 2,000 years has or could maintain its DNA identity as have the Jews.
It is not important to know who is an American, German, Arab, Greek, et al. In contrast, it is vital to know who is a Jew. Why? About 70 percent of the pages of Scripture are taken up in recounting Israel's history and prophesying her future: her continued and unrepentant rebellion against God, His reluctant and long-delayed but finally severe discipline (the worst of which is yet to come), the Jews' worldwide dispersion, their re-gathering from all over the world back into their own land in the Last Days, hundreds of prophecies concerning Israel's present key role in world affairs, of her greatest trial just ahead (Jer 30:7) when two-thirds of all Jews on earth will be killed (Zec 13:8,9), and of her final restoration under the Messiah (Zec 12-14). Unquestionably, Israel is the major subject of God's Holy Word. To be wrong about Israel is therefore to be wrong on almost everything in the Bible.
The One whom the Bible 203 times calls "the God of Israel" has sworn by an everlasting covenant that Israel (three times called the "apple" of His eye-Dt 32:10; Lam 3:18; Zec 2:8) will never cease to exist as a nation: "Therefore fear thou not...O Israel...though I make a full end of all nations whither I have scattered thee, yet will I not make a full end of thee: but I...will not leave thee altogether unpunished" (Jer 30:10,11). "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the city [Jerusalem] shall be built...it shall not be plucked up, nor thrown down any more for ever" (Jer 31:38-40). The language could not be clearer here and throughout God's Holy Word.
These and hundreds of other promises from God to Israel recorded in Scripture are a sharp rebuke to those such as Hank Hanegraaff, D. James Kennedy, R.C. Sproul, et al., who teach that the church has replaced Israel. "Thus saith the Lord, which giveth the sun for a light by day...moon...and...stars by night...if those ordinances depart from before me...then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before me or ever..." (Jer:31:35,36);
"While the earth remaineth...day and night shall not cease" (Gn 8:22); "Behold, I will gather them out of all countries, whither I have driven them in mine anger...and I will bring them again unto this place [Israel], and I will cause them to dwell safely: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God...so will I bring upon them all the good that I have promised them" (Jer 32:37-42).
Israel has failed to fulfill her calling to be an example to the world of holiness in dedication to God (Lv 20:20-24, 26; Dt 6:4,5; 7:6, etc.). While there are many believing Israelis, some even within the military, Israel today as a whole remains as wicked and godless as America and the rest of the nations. God's "chosen people," living once again in the Promised Land in fulfillment of many specific biblical prophecies, refuse to honor in their daily lives the God of their fathers who has brought them there. Even in the present distress related to Gaza and Lebanon, the vast majority of Israelis trust in their own arms and determination instead of trusting the only One who can protect them and has promised to do so.
The triumph of tiny Israel in every war and against impossible odds is admitted by many in the IDF as defying ordinary explanation. Military officers giving pep talks to new recruits often tell of amazing events they have witnessed in past wars, but rarely is God's intervention hinted at, even when no other explanation would be possible. Israel as a whole has not yet been humbled to the point of acknowledging what the Psalmist prophesied: "If it had not been the Lord who was on our side, now may Israel say...when men rose up against us: then they had swallowed us up quick.... Blessed be the Lord, who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth....Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth" (Ps 124:1,2,6,8). At Armageddon, however, this prophecy will become a reality to all who survive.
In contrast, Britain, along with America, will be among those "all nations" that God will gather and destroy at Armageddon (Jer 30:11; Jl 3:2; Zec 12:9, 14:2, etc.) for their mistreatment of Israel, and especially for dividing His land. In fact, Britain played a key role in robbing Israel of its land and giving most of it to the Arabs for oil. Both Britain and America have betrayed Israel many times, and the U.S. State Department and British Foreign Service have opposed Israel from the beginning, as we document in Judgment Day. Those facts alone prove the lie of British Israelism.
So why would God faithfully help faithless Israel? He makes it clear to Israel from the very beginning, "...because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out...from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt..." (Dt 7:8). As we noted last month, referring to her ultimate restoration and blessing (which He has promised through the Messiah), the God of Israel declares:
"Thus saith the Lord God; I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name's sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen...be ashamed and confounded for your ways, O house of Israel...I the Lord have spoken it, and I will do it" (Ezk 36:22,32,36, etc.). In spite of Israel's present disregard of Him, "the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob" (Ex 3:15,16 and ten other places in the Bible) is fulfilling His promises to those patriarchs through their descendants-and the day is coming when all Israel who survive Armageddon will believe.
Most Jews worldwide await the Messiah's first coming, unaware that He already came and was rejected and crucified. Jesus warned the Jews, "I am come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive" (Jn 5:43). Tragically, it will take Armageddon for the surviving Jews to repent, turn to the God of Israel, and embrace the One who comes in His Father's name. In that greatest distress ever faced by Israel, God declares that the one-third whom He will bring alive "through the fire...refine[d] as silver is refined...as gold is tried [shall] call on my name, and I will hear them" (Zec 13:8,9).
When they see with their own eyes the Messiah come to rescue them, and discover to their shame who He is, "...they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him...a great mourning in Jerusalem..." (Zec 12:10-14). Why such extreme sorrow at being rescued by the Messiah? The God of Israel declares: "they shall look upon me whom they have pierced!" (12:10)
At Armageddon, when Yahweh comes to the rescue, He reveals Himself as the One whom Israel has pierced! Pierced?! When and how could Israel pierce the One who told Moses, "there shall no man see me, and live" (Ex 33:20)? God, "a Spirit" (Jn 4:24), cannot be pierced-but the Messiah coming as a man could be. Jesus, who fulfilled every Messianic prophecy, was pierced on the cross. Why was He crucified? For claiming to be God (Jn 10:30-33)!
Yahweh is speaking in the first person, yet two persons seem to be involved: "...they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him...." This him seems to be another person-and yet He must have been pierced because they mourn for Him-so he must also be Yahweh! Is Yahweh two persons? In fact, He declares Himself to be three in one! Consider this: "I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time that it was, there am I..." (Is 48:16). Surely the one speaking must be God because He has been speaking from the very beginning. Yet He adds, "The Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me" (Is 48:16). Here we encounter God, the Lord God, and the Spirit of God.
Could this be what the Holy Spirit inspired the Apostle John to write, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God"? Surely this One called the "Word," who already existed at the beginning and is God, must be the same God to whom Isaiah refers who speaks from the beginning.
But the similarities in these two verses don't end there. Both raise almost identical questions. In Isaiah, how can God be sent by God; and in John, how can God be with God? There is only one solution: the Messiah must be God. When Jesus said, "I and my Father are one" (Jn 10:30), the Jews accused Him of blasphemy. When they picked up stones, Jesus asked why they wanted to kill Him. Their instant reply was, "for blasphemy...thou, being a man, makest thyself God" (vv. 31-33). For the Messiah to declare His deity was the ultimate heresy, worthy of death? No!
According to the Hebrew prophets, the Messiah had to be God and, at the same time, the Son of God. If God has a Son, who Himself is God and one with His Father, that would dissolve the rabbis' objections. We encounter God's Son a number of times in the Hebrew Scriptures. Speaking prophetically, the Psalmist presents God as declaring of one who is to come, "Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee" (Ps 2:7).
Jehovah's Witnesses and others who deny Christ's deity take this as referring to Christ's birth on earth as the beginning of His existence. That cannot be the case, however, because God speaks of His Son as already existing and warns a God-defying world, "Kiss the Son, lest he be angry....Blessed are all they that put their trust in him" (v. 12).
That the Son of God already existed before His incarnation is clear from a number of other statements by the Hebrew prophets. Solomon quotes the prophet Agur asking this question: "Who hath ascended up into heaven, or descended? Who hath gathered the wind in his fists? Who hath bound the waters in a garment?"
The obvious answer is "God." Then he asks, "what is his son's name..." (Prv 30:4), proving that the Son of God already existed at that time. Shadrack, Meshach, and Abednego were cast into a huge furnace so hot that the flames killed those who threw them into it. Nebuchadnezzar, astonished to see these three Hebrews walking alive in the flames, observes another with them and in wonder exclaims, "the fourth is like the Son of God" (Dn 3:25)!
While promising salvation through the coming Messiah, Yahweh repeatedly declared that He himself was the only Savior: "I, even I, am the Lord; and beside me there is no savior" (Is 43:11); "Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else" (Is 45:22). And yet this salvation goes to "the ends of the earth" by another who must Himself be God and the Messiah: "I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth" (Is 49:6). Of whom does God speak?
Unquestionably, the Hebrew prophets all agree that God exists as a tri-unity: three persons (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) but one God-and that in the Messiah He becomes man without ceasing to be God. Christ's claims that He was God and man, and one with His Father, agree with the prophets. Isaiah declared: "For unto us a child is born..." (Is 9:6). This refers to His humanity, derived, as foretold, from His virgin mother, Mary: the "seed" of the woman (Gn 3:15). But Isaiah adds, "unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder....Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David..." (9:6,7). Surely the Son given must be the already-existing Son of God-and He must be the Messiah, because He will rule on David's throne.
But Isaiah declares that the Messiah is God! His name is "Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God." And He is also "The everlasting Father." Here is the same mystery: God is both Father and Son, and He alone is the Messiah! Most Jews still refuse to recognize this identity of the "God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob." This is one place where they agree with their bitterest enemies, the Muslims. The Qur'an condemns to hell anyone who believes in the Trinity (Sur 5:72-74)!
So the fact that Yahweh has come as a man who was pierced to the death, resurrected, and has returned to rescue Israel at Armageddon is in perfect agreement with the Hebrew prophets. When Israel sees her God in this form coming to her rescue, it will be painfully clear that He has been to earth before, where He was rejected and pierced to the death. So Jesus was only echoing the prophets when He said to the inhabitants of Jerusalem as He was being "brought as a lamb to the slaughter" (Is 53:7) on the way to the Cross: "Ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord" (Mt 23:39). At last they will understand "the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob"-and "all Israel shall be saved" (Rom 11:26)!
By Dave Hunt - The Berean Call - September 2006
There are even groups (not only among white supremacists or cults such as Herbert W. Armstrong's die-hard followers today) who persist in the ridiculous theory that the "Ten Lost Tribes" of Israel migrated to the British Isles and that therefore all those of British descent are the true Jews today. Some go so far as to say that all of the "white races" are the true Jews-as though not only England but all of Europe and Russia was uninhabited wasteland until these remnants of the "Ten Lost Tribes" settled there.
We have proved that the ten tribes taken to Assyria (2 Ki 17:6-23) were not "lost" but make up most of those called Jews today (see 2 Chr 34,35; Q&A Nov '92, May '96). Far from Israel being cut off, hundreds of prophecies foretell Israel's importance in world affairs in the last days, the attack of all the world against her at Armageddon, her rescue by the Messiah, and her glorious final restoration in the Millennial Kingdom. Nor is there ever a reference to Israel anywhere in Scripture that could possibly be interpreted as meaning the British Isles or the British people, much less the "white races!"
Most of the more than 2,000 references to Israel or Israelites in the Bible and the thousands of prophecies (already fulfilled or yet to be fulfilled) pertain to the historical land of Israel in the Middle East, whose boundaries are clearly described (Gn 15:18-21), or to the people who lived there for nearly 2,300 years, were cast out under God's judgment, and will be brought back by God so that not one ethnic Jew will be left outside Israel (Ezk 39:27-29).
We know who the Jews are today by DNA testing. The Israeli Immigrant Liaison Bureau requires DNA tests where there is some question as to the authenticity of claimed Jewish ancestry. Such tests would draw a complete blank if applied to the average person of British descent, and prove British-Israelism to be utter folly. No other ethnic group without its own land and scattered around the world for more than 2,000 years has or could maintain its DNA identity as have the Jews.
It is not important to know who is an American, German, Arab, Greek, et al. In contrast, it is vital to know who is a Jew. Why? About 70 percent of the pages of Scripture are taken up in recounting Israel's history and prophesying her future: her continued and unrepentant rebellion against God, His reluctant and long-delayed but finally severe discipline (the worst of which is yet to come), the Jews' worldwide dispersion, their re-gathering from all over the world back into their own land in the Last Days, hundreds of prophecies concerning Israel's present key role in world affairs, of her greatest trial just ahead (Jer 30:7) when two-thirds of all Jews on earth will be killed (Zec 13:8,9), and of her final restoration under the Messiah (Zec 12-14). Unquestionably, Israel is the major subject of God's Holy Word. To be wrong about Israel is therefore to be wrong on almost everything in the Bible.
The One whom the Bible 203 times calls "the God of Israel" has sworn by an everlasting covenant that Israel (three times called the "apple" of His eye-Dt 32:10; Lam 3:18; Zec 2:8) will never cease to exist as a nation: "Therefore fear thou not...O Israel...though I make a full end of all nations whither I have scattered thee, yet will I not make a full end of thee: but I...will not leave thee altogether unpunished" (Jer 30:10,11). "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the city [Jerusalem] shall be built...it shall not be plucked up, nor thrown down any more for ever" (Jer 31:38-40). The language could not be clearer here and throughout God's Holy Word.
These and hundreds of other promises from God to Israel recorded in Scripture are a sharp rebuke to those such as Hank Hanegraaff, D. James Kennedy, R.C. Sproul, et al., who teach that the church has replaced Israel. "Thus saith the Lord, which giveth the sun for a light by day...moon...and...stars by night...if those ordinances depart from before me...then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before me or ever..." (Jer:31:35,36);
"While the earth remaineth...day and night shall not cease" (Gn 8:22); "Behold, I will gather them out of all countries, whither I have driven them in mine anger...and I will bring them again unto this place [Israel], and I will cause them to dwell safely: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God...so will I bring upon them all the good that I have promised them" (Jer 32:37-42).
Israel has failed to fulfill her calling to be an example to the world of holiness in dedication to God (Lv 20:20-24, 26; Dt 6:4,5; 7:6, etc.). While there are many believing Israelis, some even within the military, Israel today as a whole remains as wicked and godless as America and the rest of the nations. God's "chosen people," living once again in the Promised Land in fulfillment of many specific biblical prophecies, refuse to honor in their daily lives the God of their fathers who has brought them there. Even in the present distress related to Gaza and Lebanon, the vast majority of Israelis trust in their own arms and determination instead of trusting the only One who can protect them and has promised to do so.
The triumph of tiny Israel in every war and against impossible odds is admitted by many in the IDF as defying ordinary explanation. Military officers giving pep talks to new recruits often tell of amazing events they have witnessed in past wars, but rarely is God's intervention hinted at, even when no other explanation would be possible. Israel as a whole has not yet been humbled to the point of acknowledging what the Psalmist prophesied: "If it had not been the Lord who was on our side, now may Israel say...when men rose up against us: then they had swallowed us up quick.... Blessed be the Lord, who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth....Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth" (Ps 124:1,2,6,8). At Armageddon, however, this prophecy will become a reality to all who survive.
In contrast, Britain, along with America, will be among those "all nations" that God will gather and destroy at Armageddon (Jer 30:11; Jl 3:2; Zec 12:9, 14:2, etc.) for their mistreatment of Israel, and especially for dividing His land. In fact, Britain played a key role in robbing Israel of its land and giving most of it to the Arabs for oil. Both Britain and America have betrayed Israel many times, and the U.S. State Department and British Foreign Service have opposed Israel from the beginning, as we document in Judgment Day. Those facts alone prove the lie of British Israelism.
So why would God faithfully help faithless Israel? He makes it clear to Israel from the very beginning, "...because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out...from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt..." (Dt 7:8). As we noted last month, referring to her ultimate restoration and blessing (which He has promised through the Messiah), the God of Israel declares:
"Thus saith the Lord God; I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name's sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen...be ashamed and confounded for your ways, O house of Israel...I the Lord have spoken it, and I will do it" (Ezk 36:22,32,36, etc.). In spite of Israel's present disregard of Him, "the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob" (Ex 3:15,16 and ten other places in the Bible) is fulfilling His promises to those patriarchs through their descendants-and the day is coming when all Israel who survive Armageddon will believe.
Most Jews worldwide await the Messiah's first coming, unaware that He already came and was rejected and crucified. Jesus warned the Jews, "I am come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive" (Jn 5:43). Tragically, it will take Armageddon for the surviving Jews to repent, turn to the God of Israel, and embrace the One who comes in His Father's name. In that greatest distress ever faced by Israel, God declares that the one-third whom He will bring alive "through the fire...refine[d] as silver is refined...as gold is tried [shall] call on my name, and I will hear them" (Zec 13:8,9).
When they see with their own eyes the Messiah come to rescue them, and discover to their shame who He is, "...they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him...a great mourning in Jerusalem..." (Zec 12:10-14). Why such extreme sorrow at being rescued by the Messiah? The God of Israel declares: "they shall look upon me whom they have pierced!" (12:10)
At Armageddon, when Yahweh comes to the rescue, He reveals Himself as the One whom Israel has pierced! Pierced?! When and how could Israel pierce the One who told Moses, "there shall no man see me, and live" (Ex 33:20)? God, "a Spirit" (Jn 4:24), cannot be pierced-but the Messiah coming as a man could be. Jesus, who fulfilled every Messianic prophecy, was pierced on the cross. Why was He crucified? For claiming to be God (Jn 10:30-33)!
Yahweh is speaking in the first person, yet two persons seem to be involved: "...they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him...." This him seems to be another person-and yet He must have been pierced because they mourn for Him-so he must also be Yahweh! Is Yahweh two persons? In fact, He declares Himself to be three in one! Consider this: "I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time that it was, there am I..." (Is 48:16). Surely the one speaking must be God because He has been speaking from the very beginning. Yet He adds, "The Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me" (Is 48:16). Here we encounter God, the Lord God, and the Spirit of God.
Could this be what the Holy Spirit inspired the Apostle John to write, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God"? Surely this One called the "Word," who already existed at the beginning and is God, must be the same God to whom Isaiah refers who speaks from the beginning.
But the similarities in these two verses don't end there. Both raise almost identical questions. In Isaiah, how can God be sent by God; and in John, how can God be with God? There is only one solution: the Messiah must be God. When Jesus said, "I and my Father are one" (Jn 10:30), the Jews accused Him of blasphemy. When they picked up stones, Jesus asked why they wanted to kill Him. Their instant reply was, "for blasphemy...thou, being a man, makest thyself God" (vv. 31-33). For the Messiah to declare His deity was the ultimate heresy, worthy of death? No!
According to the Hebrew prophets, the Messiah had to be God and, at the same time, the Son of God. If God has a Son, who Himself is God and one with His Father, that would dissolve the rabbis' objections. We encounter God's Son a number of times in the Hebrew Scriptures. Speaking prophetically, the Psalmist presents God as declaring of one who is to come, "Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee" (Ps 2:7).
Jehovah's Witnesses and others who deny Christ's deity take this as referring to Christ's birth on earth as the beginning of His existence. That cannot be the case, however, because God speaks of His Son as already existing and warns a God-defying world, "Kiss the Son, lest he be angry....Blessed are all they that put their trust in him" (v. 12).
That the Son of God already existed before His incarnation is clear from a number of other statements by the Hebrew prophets. Solomon quotes the prophet Agur asking this question: "Who hath ascended up into heaven, or descended? Who hath gathered the wind in his fists? Who hath bound the waters in a garment?"
The obvious answer is "God." Then he asks, "what is his son's name..." (Prv 30:4), proving that the Son of God already existed at that time. Shadrack, Meshach, and Abednego were cast into a huge furnace so hot that the flames killed those who threw them into it. Nebuchadnezzar, astonished to see these three Hebrews walking alive in the flames, observes another with them and in wonder exclaims, "the fourth is like the Son of God" (Dn 3:25)!
While promising salvation through the coming Messiah, Yahweh repeatedly declared that He himself was the only Savior: "I, even I, am the Lord; and beside me there is no savior" (Is 43:11); "Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else" (Is 45:22). And yet this salvation goes to "the ends of the earth" by another who must Himself be God and the Messiah: "I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth" (Is 49:6). Of whom does God speak?
Unquestionably, the Hebrew prophets all agree that God exists as a tri-unity: three persons (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) but one God-and that in the Messiah He becomes man without ceasing to be God. Christ's claims that He was God and man, and one with His Father, agree with the prophets. Isaiah declared: "For unto us a child is born..." (Is 9:6). This refers to His humanity, derived, as foretold, from His virgin mother, Mary: the "seed" of the woman (Gn 3:15). But Isaiah adds, "unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder....Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David..." (9:6,7). Surely the Son given must be the already-existing Son of God-and He must be the Messiah, because He will rule on David's throne.
But Isaiah declares that the Messiah is God! His name is "Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God." And He is also "The everlasting Father." Here is the same mystery: God is both Father and Son, and He alone is the Messiah! Most Jews still refuse to recognize this identity of the "God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob." This is one place where they agree with their bitterest enemies, the Muslims. The Qur'an condemns to hell anyone who believes in the Trinity (Sur 5:72-74)!
So the fact that Yahweh has come as a man who was pierced to the death, resurrected, and has returned to rescue Israel at Armageddon is in perfect agreement with the Hebrew prophets. When Israel sees her God in this form coming to her rescue, it will be painfully clear that He has been to earth before, where He was rejected and pierced to the death. So Jesus was only echoing the prophets when He said to the inhabitants of Jerusalem as He was being "brought as a lamb to the slaughter" (Is 53:7) on the way to the Cross: "Ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord" (Mt 23:39). At last they will understand "the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob"-and "all Israel shall be saved" (Rom 11:26)!
By Dave Hunt - The Berean Call - September 2006
God of Jacob, God of Israel - Part One
According to the latest Fox News polls updated June 26, 2006 (other polls basically agree), “fully 92 percent of Americans say they believe in God”; only 5 percent say they don’t, while the remaining 3 percent are not sure. In How We Believe, Michael Shermer, director of the Skeptics Society and publisher of Skeptic magazine, claims that “Never in history have so many, and such a high percentage of the [American] population, believed in God. Not only is God not dead as Nietzche proclaimed, but he has never been more alive.”
This statistic, however, is not as encouraging as it sounds. When we ask what respondents mean by “god,” very few believe in—much less know—the God of the Bible. Yet belief in a false god is no better and could be even worse than believing in no God. For many, “God” is simply a “higher power.” Higher than what? Power? What kind? And how could a “power” of any kind have the infinite intelligence (or any intelligence) to design the atom, the universe, imprint the written instructions in a coded language on DNA for constructing and operating every cell, and create intelligent, personal beings with a moral conscience and a passion for purpose?
The very thought of a “power” creating anything is ridiculous! Then why is belief in a “power” so appealing? Did the Star Wars slogan, “May the Force be with you,” have that much influence? It went a long way toward changing movie fans’ thinking, especially among American youth. Of course, this has always been a popular idea because a power/force can’t impose moral laws, demand obedience, or judge and punish anyone—instead, it can be used for one’s own ends. Clearly, the true God who created us for a purpose holds mankind responsible for creation’s witness to His existence and for obedience to the moral laws He has implanted in every conscience (Rom 1:18-25; 2:14-16). He will not be used.
Furthermore, just as human beings are jealous of their individual identities, obviously the true God would insist on being properly identified. He will neither reveal Himself to, nor enter into a relationship with, anyone who will not acknowledge Him as He truly is. Nor will He look with broad-minded favor on those who call Him a “higher power.” To do so is an insult to the true God! The God of the Bible (whose existence we have infallibly proved in prior articles) declares to wayward Israel, “And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart” (Jer 29:13). Those who hope to find a god that suits their imagination will not find the true God.
It is common sense that the true God would only reveal Himself to sincere and earnest seekers who want to know Him in truth in order to obey Him. The first prerequisite to knowing God is the willingness—indeed, the passion—to know Him as He really is, not as one imagines or would like Him to be. It is no less idolatry to create an imaginary god in one’s mind than to make one out of clay, wood, or stone. So, who is the true God who proves Himself by unfailingly foretelling the future in the Bible?
As we have seen in past articles, the Bible identifies Him as “the God of Israel” 203 times, “the God of Jacob” 28 times, “the God of Abraham” 17 times, and “the God of Isaac” 13 times. Never is He called the “God of any other ethnic group.” These designations are foundational to everything the Bible teaches, including the very character of God. To profess to believe in God and at the same time to hold a prejudice against God’s chosen people, the Jews, or against Israel, which turns these clear biblical identifications into meaningless titles, casts doubt upon whether one really knows the true God.
In His refutation of the Sadducees’ denial of the resurrection, Christ’s primary argument was based upon God’s statement to Moses: “I AM...the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob...this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations” (Ex 3:14,15). Clearly, this was the identity of the true God then; it is now and will be forever. God never changes.
Notice Christ’s reasoning: “Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God....[H]ave ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Mt 22:29-32). Christ is saying that if Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob will not live eternally through a resurrection, then it would be a mockery for God to be identified with them eternally. He would be the God of, and have identified Himself with, beings of limited existence—scarcely a blip in eternity. To be called the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, if they no
longer existed, would demean God.
If the nation of Israel is dead, or has been replaced by the church and does not have an eternal future, then the very term “God of Israel” would not be to God’s glory but a slur upon His character in view of His many promises that Israel would never cease to exist. Yet that is the position taken by those who say that Israel has been replaced by the church. In The Last Disciple (p. 88), Hank Hanegraaff has a key character say, “The covenant between God and Israel was broken with the rejection of His Son.”
Hank gives no explanation how an “everlasting covenant” could ever be broken, nor how Israel’s rejection of Christ could break a covenant that was not conditional upon her accepting Him, for which there were never any conditions Israel had to fulfill, and which God said He would bring to completion in the last days.
Indeed, at the same time that God promises eternal blessings to Israel in a full restoration in the last days, He also recites her unfaithfulness to Him without a hint that the many sins of Israel and the Jewish people would be any deterrent to His fulfilling all of His promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob:
...the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give unto them and to their seed after them...the land that I gave to your fathers, for ever and ever....I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name’s sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen...be ashamed and confounded for your own ways, O house of Israel...in the day that I shall have cleansed you from all your iniquities....For I will...gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land...and will do better unto you than at your beginnings: and ye shall know that I am the LORD....I the LORD have spoken it, and I will do it. (Dt 1:8; Jer 7:7; Ezk 36:11, 22-26, 32-36)
Here again, as elsewhere (as we have said), it is quite clear that there are no conditions for Israel to fulfill, but God will, for the integrity of His name, fulfill every promise in spite of Israel’s rebellion against Him. Furthermore, the prophets foretold that the Messiah would be rejected by Israel and crucified, yet in all of those prophecies there is never a suggestion that because of this rejection God would break His everlasting covenant with Israel. The covenant was made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—not with their descendants (Gn 12:1-3; 15:7, 18-21; 17:7-8, 19, 21; 26; 28:13; 1 Ch 16:14-18, etc.); it was never conditioned upon the obedience of their descendants, and therefore could not possibly be broken by anything those descendants did or failed to do. It is a slap in the eternal God’s face to say that Israel has been replaced!
Scripture records literally hundreds of promises from God that Israel as a nation would never cease to exist (Jer 31:35-37, etc.). These cannot be annulled even by God himself. To do so would make Him a liar. Nor can they be spiritualized away as though the land of Canaan, which became the land of Israel, could simply mean the heavenly inheritance of the church.
It is irrefutable that Israel once possessed a physical, historical land that was given to her by God’s eternal decree. It is equally an historical fact that she was expelled from this land by God himself for her rebellion. And it is no less an historical fact that Israel became a nation once again, May 14, 1948, and that millions of Jews have since returned to that Promised Land from more than 100 countries, just as Scripture foretold. This can be nothing less than the beginnings of God’s promised restoration of Israel so that her latter end would be better than her beginning. A very few of God’s many promises follow:
Unto thy seed will I give this land...forever...from the river of Egypt unto the...river Euphrates....I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee...for an everlasting covenant.... And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed...all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession...for unto thee [Isaac], and unto thy seed, I will give all these countries, and I will perform the oath which I sware unto Abraham thy father...the land whereon thou liest, to thee [Jacob] will I give it, and to thy seed.
Be ye mindful always of his covenant...which he made with Abraham, and of his oath unto Isaac; and hath confirmed the same to Jacob for a law, and to Israel for an everlasting covenant....Unto thee will I give the land of Canaan, the lot of your inheritance....(Gn 12:7; 13:15; 15:18; 17:7,8; 26:3; 28:13; 1 Ch 16:14-18).
Citing the hatred of Israel’s neighbors at that time, Psalm 83:3,4 foretells the Muslims’ openly and oft-stated plan to wipe Israel off the map: “They have taken crafty counsel against thy people....Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation....” In the same effort to destroy her, Christian denominations have initiated a boycott against companies that do business with Israel. Replacement theologians such as D. James Kennedy, R.C. Sproul, and many others allied with them have rejected modern Israel as of any significance in the fulfillment of God’s promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. In “An Open Letter to Evangelicals and Other Interested Parties: The People of God, the Land of Israel, and the Impartiality of the Gospel,” they declare:
The inheritance promises that God gave to Abraham...do not apply to any particular ethnic group, but to the church of Jesus Christ, the true Israel....The entitlement of any one ethnic or religious group to territory in the Middle East called the “Holy Land” cannot be supported by Scripture. In fact, the land promises specific to Israel in the Old Testament were fulfilled under Joshua. [See Judgment Day, pp. 276-77]
An everlasting covenant fulfilled under Joshua, who only lived 110 years?! Hundreds of “promises specific to Israel in the Old Testament” had not even been foretold by Israel’s prophets until centuries after Joshua died! Even the prophecies made by Moses during the lifetime of Joshua that Israel would sin and be cast out of the land were not
fulfilled “under Joshua.” This declaration by Kennedy, Sproul, et al., is such a defiance of the God of Israel that one finds it unbelievable coming from biblical “scholars”! Here is the Word of the Lord:
Therefore, behold, the days come saith the LORD, that they shall no more say, the LORD liveth which brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt [in Joshua’s day]; But, the LORD liveth, which brought up and which led the seed of the house of Israel out of the north country [Russia et al.], and from all countries whither I had driven them....(Jer 23:7,8)
This is being fulfilled in our day. When God told Moses that He would destroy Israel and make of him a great nation, Moses reasoned with God that He would be going back on His Word if He did that, and His critics would say that He was not able to keep His promises. If even one failed, it would reflect on all His other promises. (Ex 32:9-14). Yet today, growing numbers of those who claim to be Christians are declaring that God’s eternal covenant with Israel has been annulled!
If the everlasting covenant that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob swore to these patriarchs of Israel is not kept, then God has denied Himself. The same holds true for the literally hundreds of promises God has made that He would restore Israel fully to her land. If just one fails, then God has denied Himself and is not worthy of our trust. Here are a few of the many that could be cited:
As a shepherd seeketh out his flock...so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all the places where they have been scattered...and gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land, and feed them upon the mountains of Israel...in a good pasture....I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away...therefore, will I save my flock, and they shall no more be a prey....I will set up one shepherd over them...even my servant David [i.e., the Messiah]....
And I the LORD will be their God...there shall be showers of
blessing...they shall be safe in their land...no more be a prey to the heathen...none shall make them afraid...And...I will...do better unto you than at your beginnings: and ye shall know that I am the LORD...neither shalt thou bear the reproach of the people any more...for I will...gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land...that I have given unto Jacob...and I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes...and will set my sanctuary in the midst of them for evermore....(Ezk 34:12-16, 22-28; 36:11, 15, 24, 27; 37:25-28)
If “everlasting,” concerning Israel, doesn’t mean everlasting, then how can we trust the promise in John 3:16 of everlasting life to those who believe on Christ? The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of Israel, is the only true God. The Messiah promised to Israel by Jewish prophets of God came 2,000 years ago. He is the Savior of all who believe on Him as the one who, in fulfillment of what the Hebrew prophets foretold, died for the sins of the world, rose from the dead, and ascended to the Father’s right hand. He is coming in power and glory to punish the world for its abuse of His people Israel and to rule the world
from David’s throne in Jerusalem. Let us stand firm on the truth of Scripture and preach the true gospel of God, to the Jew first, then to the Gentile.
By Dave Hunt - The Berean Call - August 2006
This statistic, however, is not as encouraging as it sounds. When we ask what respondents mean by “god,” very few believe in—much less know—the God of the Bible. Yet belief in a false god is no better and could be even worse than believing in no God. For many, “God” is simply a “higher power.” Higher than what? Power? What kind? And how could a “power” of any kind have the infinite intelligence (or any intelligence) to design the atom, the universe, imprint the written instructions in a coded language on DNA for constructing and operating every cell, and create intelligent, personal beings with a moral conscience and a passion for purpose?
The very thought of a “power” creating anything is ridiculous! Then why is belief in a “power” so appealing? Did the Star Wars slogan, “May the Force be with you,” have that much influence? It went a long way toward changing movie fans’ thinking, especially among American youth. Of course, this has always been a popular idea because a power/force can’t impose moral laws, demand obedience, or judge and punish anyone—instead, it can be used for one’s own ends. Clearly, the true God who created us for a purpose holds mankind responsible for creation’s witness to His existence and for obedience to the moral laws He has implanted in every conscience (Rom 1:18-25; 2:14-16). He will not be used.
Furthermore, just as human beings are jealous of their individual identities, obviously the true God would insist on being properly identified. He will neither reveal Himself to, nor enter into a relationship with, anyone who will not acknowledge Him as He truly is. Nor will He look with broad-minded favor on those who call Him a “higher power.” To do so is an insult to the true God! The God of the Bible (whose existence we have infallibly proved in prior articles) declares to wayward Israel, “And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart” (Jer 29:13). Those who hope to find a god that suits their imagination will not find the true God.
It is common sense that the true God would only reveal Himself to sincere and earnest seekers who want to know Him in truth in order to obey Him. The first prerequisite to knowing God is the willingness—indeed, the passion—to know Him as He really is, not as one imagines or would like Him to be. It is no less idolatry to create an imaginary god in one’s mind than to make one out of clay, wood, or stone. So, who is the true God who proves Himself by unfailingly foretelling the future in the Bible?
As we have seen in past articles, the Bible identifies Him as “the God of Israel” 203 times, “the God of Jacob” 28 times, “the God of Abraham” 17 times, and “the God of Isaac” 13 times. Never is He called the “God of any other ethnic group.” These designations are foundational to everything the Bible teaches, including the very character of God. To profess to believe in God and at the same time to hold a prejudice against God’s chosen people, the Jews, or against Israel, which turns these clear biblical identifications into meaningless titles, casts doubt upon whether one really knows the true God.
In His refutation of the Sadducees’ denial of the resurrection, Christ’s primary argument was based upon God’s statement to Moses: “I AM...the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob...this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations” (Ex 3:14,15). Clearly, this was the identity of the true God then; it is now and will be forever. God never changes.
Notice Christ’s reasoning: “Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God....[H]ave ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Mt 22:29-32). Christ is saying that if Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob will not live eternally through a resurrection, then it would be a mockery for God to be identified with them eternally. He would be the God of, and have identified Himself with, beings of limited existence—scarcely a blip in eternity. To be called the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, if they no
longer existed, would demean God.
If the nation of Israel is dead, or has been replaced by the church and does not have an eternal future, then the very term “God of Israel” would not be to God’s glory but a slur upon His character in view of His many promises that Israel would never cease to exist. Yet that is the position taken by those who say that Israel has been replaced by the church. In The Last Disciple (p. 88), Hank Hanegraaff has a key character say, “The covenant between God and Israel was broken with the rejection of His Son.”
Hank gives no explanation how an “everlasting covenant” could ever be broken, nor how Israel’s rejection of Christ could break a covenant that was not conditional upon her accepting Him, for which there were never any conditions Israel had to fulfill, and which God said He would bring to completion in the last days.
Indeed, at the same time that God promises eternal blessings to Israel in a full restoration in the last days, He also recites her unfaithfulness to Him without a hint that the many sins of Israel and the Jewish people would be any deterrent to His fulfilling all of His promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob:
...the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give unto them and to their seed after them...the land that I gave to your fathers, for ever and ever....I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name’s sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen...be ashamed and confounded for your own ways, O house of Israel...in the day that I shall have cleansed you from all your iniquities....For I will...gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land...and will do better unto you than at your beginnings: and ye shall know that I am the LORD....I the LORD have spoken it, and I will do it. (Dt 1:8; Jer 7:7; Ezk 36:11, 22-26, 32-36)
Here again, as elsewhere (as we have said), it is quite clear that there are no conditions for Israel to fulfill, but God will, for the integrity of His name, fulfill every promise in spite of Israel’s rebellion against Him. Furthermore, the prophets foretold that the Messiah would be rejected by Israel and crucified, yet in all of those prophecies there is never a suggestion that because of this rejection God would break His everlasting covenant with Israel. The covenant was made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—not with their descendants (Gn 12:1-3; 15:7, 18-21; 17:7-8, 19, 21; 26; 28:13; 1 Ch 16:14-18, etc.); it was never conditioned upon the obedience of their descendants, and therefore could not possibly be broken by anything those descendants did or failed to do. It is a slap in the eternal God’s face to say that Israel has been replaced!
Scripture records literally hundreds of promises from God that Israel as a nation would never cease to exist (Jer 31:35-37, etc.). These cannot be annulled even by God himself. To do so would make Him a liar. Nor can they be spiritualized away as though the land of Canaan, which became the land of Israel, could simply mean the heavenly inheritance of the church.
It is irrefutable that Israel once possessed a physical, historical land that was given to her by God’s eternal decree. It is equally an historical fact that she was expelled from this land by God himself for her rebellion. And it is no less an historical fact that Israel became a nation once again, May 14, 1948, and that millions of Jews have since returned to that Promised Land from more than 100 countries, just as Scripture foretold. This can be nothing less than the beginnings of God’s promised restoration of Israel so that her latter end would be better than her beginning. A very few of God’s many promises follow:
Unto thy seed will I give this land...forever...from the river of Egypt unto the...river Euphrates....I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee...for an everlasting covenant.... And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed...all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession...for unto thee [Isaac], and unto thy seed, I will give all these countries, and I will perform the oath which I sware unto Abraham thy father...the land whereon thou liest, to thee [Jacob] will I give it, and to thy seed.
Be ye mindful always of his covenant...which he made with Abraham, and of his oath unto Isaac; and hath confirmed the same to Jacob for a law, and to Israel for an everlasting covenant....Unto thee will I give the land of Canaan, the lot of your inheritance....(Gn 12:7; 13:15; 15:18; 17:7,8; 26:3; 28:13; 1 Ch 16:14-18).
Citing the hatred of Israel’s neighbors at that time, Psalm 83:3,4 foretells the Muslims’ openly and oft-stated plan to wipe Israel off the map: “They have taken crafty counsel against thy people....Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation....” In the same effort to destroy her, Christian denominations have initiated a boycott against companies that do business with Israel. Replacement theologians such as D. James Kennedy, R.C. Sproul, and many others allied with them have rejected modern Israel as of any significance in the fulfillment of God’s promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. In “An Open Letter to Evangelicals and Other Interested Parties: The People of God, the Land of Israel, and the Impartiality of the Gospel,” they declare:
The inheritance promises that God gave to Abraham...do not apply to any particular ethnic group, but to the church of Jesus Christ, the true Israel....The entitlement of any one ethnic or religious group to territory in the Middle East called the “Holy Land” cannot be supported by Scripture. In fact, the land promises specific to Israel in the Old Testament were fulfilled under Joshua. [See Judgment Day, pp. 276-77]
An everlasting covenant fulfilled under Joshua, who only lived 110 years?! Hundreds of “promises specific to Israel in the Old Testament” had not even been foretold by Israel’s prophets until centuries after Joshua died! Even the prophecies made by Moses during the lifetime of Joshua that Israel would sin and be cast out of the land were not
fulfilled “under Joshua.” This declaration by Kennedy, Sproul, et al., is such a defiance of the God of Israel that one finds it unbelievable coming from biblical “scholars”! Here is the Word of the Lord:
Therefore, behold, the days come saith the LORD, that they shall no more say, the LORD liveth which brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt [in Joshua’s day]; But, the LORD liveth, which brought up and which led the seed of the house of Israel out of the north country [Russia et al.], and from all countries whither I had driven them....(Jer 23:7,8)
This is being fulfilled in our day. When God told Moses that He would destroy Israel and make of him a great nation, Moses reasoned with God that He would be going back on His Word if He did that, and His critics would say that He was not able to keep His promises. If even one failed, it would reflect on all His other promises. (Ex 32:9-14). Yet today, growing numbers of those who claim to be Christians are declaring that God’s eternal covenant with Israel has been annulled!
If the everlasting covenant that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob swore to these patriarchs of Israel is not kept, then God has denied Himself. The same holds true for the literally hundreds of promises God has made that He would restore Israel fully to her land. If just one fails, then God has denied Himself and is not worthy of our trust. Here are a few of the many that could be cited:
As a shepherd seeketh out his flock...so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all the places where they have been scattered...and gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land, and feed them upon the mountains of Israel...in a good pasture....I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away...therefore, will I save my flock, and they shall no more be a prey....I will set up one shepherd over them...even my servant David [i.e., the Messiah]....
And I the LORD will be their God...there shall be showers of
blessing...they shall be safe in their land...no more be a prey to the heathen...none shall make them afraid...And...I will...do better unto you than at your beginnings: and ye shall know that I am the LORD...neither shalt thou bear the reproach of the people any more...for I will...gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land...that I have given unto Jacob...and I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes...and will set my sanctuary in the midst of them for evermore....(Ezk 34:12-16, 22-28; 36:11, 15, 24, 27; 37:25-28)
If “everlasting,” concerning Israel, doesn’t mean everlasting, then how can we trust the promise in John 3:16 of everlasting life to those who believe on Christ? The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of Israel, is the only true God. The Messiah promised to Israel by Jewish prophets of God came 2,000 years ago. He is the Savior of all who believe on Him as the one who, in fulfillment of what the Hebrew prophets foretold, died for the sins of the world, rose from the dead, and ascended to the Father’s right hand. He is coming in power and glory to punish the world for its abuse of His people Israel and to rule the world
from David’s throne in Jerusalem. Let us stand firm on the truth of Scripture and preach the true gospel of God, to the Jew first, then to the Gentile.
By Dave Hunt - The Berean Call - August 2006
Skyshield Air Defense Being Considered
With Hizb'allah still in possession of more than 10,000 short-range Katyusha rockets, the Defense Ministry has contacted Lockheed Martin - one of the world's largest defense contractors - and asked it to run tests and make adjustments to a high-powered, rapid-fire cannon built by the company to intercept incoming aerial targets.
The Skyshield 35 Air Defense System is a cannon that fires a unique 35-mm. AHEAD (Advanced Hit Efficiency And Destruction) shell that destroys incoming targets. It ejects 152 sub-projectiles that are released just ahead of the incoming target up to distances of close to 10 kilometers.
The projectiles create a cloud ahead of the incoming rocket and penetrate it, inflicting enough damage to prevent it from striking its target. The system was developed by the Switzerland-based Oerlikon Contraves Corporation.
Initially developed to intercept incoming aircraft, and specifically unmanned drones, Lockheed Martin has been testing the system for the past few weeks to see if it is also suitable to intercept and destroy Katyusha rockets fired by Hizbullah. Before the war, the Defense Ministry had asked Lockheed to run tests to see if the system would be effective against the Palestinian homemade Kassam rocket.
The main changes that need to be made to the system are with the ammunition used to intercept the rockets.
According to officials close to the project, the quality and amount of explosives inside the shells need to be increased for the system to accurately intercept primitive rockets such as Katyushas and Kassams. The testing is expected to be completed in the coming weeks. Israeli defense officials have visited the US test site to watch the system's performance.
Hizb'allah fired close to 4,000 rockets and missiles at northern Israel during the war.
Defense Minister Amir Peretz convened a meeting last week with senior defense officials and appointed Defense Ministry Director-General Gabi Ashkenazi to coordinate the defense establishment's efforts to find a quick answer to counter the Katyusha rockets.
But while Peretz has pointed specifically to Northrop Grumman's Skyguard land-based, air-defense system - also known as the Nautilus - as a possible answer, high-ranking defense officials have told The Jerusalem Post the system would not be chosen.
Some 10 years ago, Israel invested several hundred million dollars in the development of the system with the Hizbullah threat in mind, but the project was ditched after the defense establishment decided it was not suitable for Israel's needs.
Another possible answer to the Katyusha threat is the Vulcan Phalanx cannon, already installed on Navy missile ships and used to intercept incoming anti-ship missiles. Similar to the Skyshield, the Vulcan Phalanx cannon hones in on an incoming missile and shoots dozens of shells in a rapid-fire sequence.
The defense establishment is also considering using the Rafael-developed Barak antimissile system, which is used by the Navy.
Jerusalem Post
09.05.2006
The Skyshield 35 Air Defense System is a cannon that fires a unique 35-mm. AHEAD (Advanced Hit Efficiency And Destruction) shell that destroys incoming targets. It ejects 152 sub-projectiles that are released just ahead of the incoming target up to distances of close to 10 kilometers.
The projectiles create a cloud ahead of the incoming rocket and penetrate it, inflicting enough damage to prevent it from striking its target. The system was developed by the Switzerland-based Oerlikon Contraves Corporation.
Initially developed to intercept incoming aircraft, and specifically unmanned drones, Lockheed Martin has been testing the system for the past few weeks to see if it is also suitable to intercept and destroy Katyusha rockets fired by Hizbullah. Before the war, the Defense Ministry had asked Lockheed to run tests to see if the system would be effective against the Palestinian homemade Kassam rocket.
The main changes that need to be made to the system are with the ammunition used to intercept the rockets.
According to officials close to the project, the quality and amount of explosives inside the shells need to be increased for the system to accurately intercept primitive rockets such as Katyushas and Kassams. The testing is expected to be completed in the coming weeks. Israeli defense officials have visited the US test site to watch the system's performance.
Hizb'allah fired close to 4,000 rockets and missiles at northern Israel during the war.
Defense Minister Amir Peretz convened a meeting last week with senior defense officials and appointed Defense Ministry Director-General Gabi Ashkenazi to coordinate the defense establishment's efforts to find a quick answer to counter the Katyusha rockets.
But while Peretz has pointed specifically to Northrop Grumman's Skyguard land-based, air-defense system - also known as the Nautilus - as a possible answer, high-ranking defense officials have told The Jerusalem Post the system would not be chosen.
Some 10 years ago, Israel invested several hundred million dollars in the development of the system with the Hizbullah threat in mind, but the project was ditched after the defense establishment decided it was not suitable for Israel's needs.
Another possible answer to the Katyusha threat is the Vulcan Phalanx cannon, already installed on Navy missile ships and used to intercept incoming anti-ship missiles. Similar to the Skyshield, the Vulcan Phalanx cannon hones in on an incoming missile and shoots dozens of shells in a rapid-fire sequence.
The defense establishment is also considering using the Rafael-developed Barak antimissile system, which is used by the Navy.
Jerusalem Post
09.05.2006
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
Marked For Death?
It's not easy to be shocked by jihad these days, five years and numberless atrocities after the Twin Towers imploded on almost 3,000 fellow citizens. That said, I admit my own jihad-fatigue was broken — shattered, really — by the "conversion" to Islam of Fox journalists Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig videotaped during their two-week ordeal as captives of Palestinians in Gaza.
Why? Andrew G. Bostom, writing at Frontpage mag. tells us forced conversions to Islam "have been the norm, across three continents — Asia, Africa and Europe — for over 13 centuries," and cites contemporary examples in the jihad campaigns of Sudan and Indonesia. Even so, religious coercion, let alone "jihad campaigns," still seems appallingly new to us — if by "us" I can still make myself understood to mean, generally, Western peoples in modern times. Indeed, I can't think of another hostage to jihad forced into Islam — not even Daniel Pearl or Nicolas Berg, and not the U.S. Embassy hostages in Tehran a quarter century ago.
Is this incident a tip-off to a new level of unabashed religious abuse of traditionally (once upon a time) inviolate Westerners? In the "conversion" video, we see such abuse as the American and the New Zealander sit, costumed in Arabic robes, "forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," as Centanni later revealed. Holding up a symbolic first finger, they read their lines in both Arabic and English, proclaiming their "new" faith, declaring their "new" names — Khaled and Ya'aqob — and calling on President Bush and Prime Minister Blair to do likewise. I didn't see the videotape on television (more on that below), but rather on Internet, where, like high-tech specters, "Khaled" and "Ya'aqob" will haunt their freed selves into cyber-eternity.
Or will they? Whether this "conversion" is legit probably depends on the eye or, rather, the religion of the beholder. The Koran says "there is no compulsion in religion" — as did, absurdly, the video — but, as Robert Spencer writes at Frontpage mag., traditional Islamic teachings about Muhammad, which reveal that the Islamic prophet's invitation to Islam was accompanied by "an inescapable threat" of subjugation and war, have left Islam with a different interpretation of "compulsion" from the West. That is, given accounts of Muhammad's own example, Islam doesn't really see forcible conversion in commonly understood terms of "compulsion."
So, what if Centanni and Wiig "revert" to their non-Muslim identities? Would such "apostasy" sentence them to death? (Leaving Islam is a capital crime under Islamic law.) Shocking thought. Of course, there's something even more shocking to the story than the religious charade itself.
No, it isn't the bizarre disclaimer Centanni felt compelled to append to his account of the shotgun-conversion — "Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it." While it's more than strange to hear a person who has been forced to choose between death and Islam flack for Islam as he resumes his life, there's something else. And it isn't praise for the "beautiful and kind-hearted" Palestinian people Centanni slathered around the microphone at his Gaza City press conference before, as Bostom noted, high-tailing it to safety in infidel-Israel.
The most shocking thing about the Centanni-Wiig "conversion" is the silence that has followed. First, there is silence from Islam. Shouldn't Muslim religious leaders, and particularly "beautiful and kind-hearted" Palestinian Muslim religious leaders, vehemently condemn the forced conversions? As Bostom put it, "Will such Muslim authorities at least recognize the acute predicament of Centanni and Wiig by issuing a fatwa stating that their 'conversion,' being under duress, was not bona fide, condemning in advance any Muslim who might now attack these journalists for 'apostasy' from Islam?"
Yes, of course, they should — at least according to any Western understanding of compulsion and morality — but don't hold your breath. Meanwhile, holding their breath is exactly what Western media are doing when it comes to covering (not covering) the story. Even Fox's Greta van Susteren, a tabloidesque host who never met a bodily fluid she couldn't elaborate on, went delicate on us the other night, failing, in a one-hour "exclusive" interview with the two men, to ask a single question about their religious ordeal — presumably at their request.
Why? Who or what is served by shutting up? Only forces of coercion — a word which, after all, implies the nullification of individual will. Which means this is one case where silence isn't golden and ignorance isn't bliss. They are dangerous and dumb.
Jewish World review
09.05.2006
Why? Andrew G. Bostom, writing at Frontpage mag. tells us forced conversions to Islam "have been the norm, across three continents — Asia, Africa and Europe — for over 13 centuries," and cites contemporary examples in the jihad campaigns of Sudan and Indonesia. Even so, religious coercion, let alone "jihad campaigns," still seems appallingly new to us — if by "us" I can still make myself understood to mean, generally, Western peoples in modern times. Indeed, I can't think of another hostage to jihad forced into Islam — not even Daniel Pearl or Nicolas Berg, and not the U.S. Embassy hostages in Tehran a quarter century ago.
Is this incident a tip-off to a new level of unabashed religious abuse of traditionally (once upon a time) inviolate Westerners? In the "conversion" video, we see such abuse as the American and the New Zealander sit, costumed in Arabic robes, "forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," as Centanni later revealed. Holding up a symbolic first finger, they read their lines in both Arabic and English, proclaiming their "new" faith, declaring their "new" names — Khaled and Ya'aqob — and calling on President Bush and Prime Minister Blair to do likewise. I didn't see the videotape on television (more on that below), but rather on Internet, where, like high-tech specters, "Khaled" and "Ya'aqob" will haunt their freed selves into cyber-eternity.
Or will they? Whether this "conversion" is legit probably depends on the eye or, rather, the religion of the beholder. The Koran says "there is no compulsion in religion" — as did, absurdly, the video — but, as Robert Spencer writes at Frontpage mag., traditional Islamic teachings about Muhammad, which reveal that the Islamic prophet's invitation to Islam was accompanied by "an inescapable threat" of subjugation and war, have left Islam with a different interpretation of "compulsion" from the West. That is, given accounts of Muhammad's own example, Islam doesn't really see forcible conversion in commonly understood terms of "compulsion."
So, what if Centanni and Wiig "revert" to their non-Muslim identities? Would such "apostasy" sentence them to death? (Leaving Islam is a capital crime under Islamic law.) Shocking thought. Of course, there's something even more shocking to the story than the religious charade itself.
No, it isn't the bizarre disclaimer Centanni felt compelled to append to his account of the shotgun-conversion — "Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it." While it's more than strange to hear a person who has been forced to choose between death and Islam flack for Islam as he resumes his life, there's something else. And it isn't praise for the "beautiful and kind-hearted" Palestinian people Centanni slathered around the microphone at his Gaza City press conference before, as Bostom noted, high-tailing it to safety in infidel-Israel.
The most shocking thing about the Centanni-Wiig "conversion" is the silence that has followed. First, there is silence from Islam. Shouldn't Muslim religious leaders, and particularly "beautiful and kind-hearted" Palestinian Muslim religious leaders, vehemently condemn the forced conversions? As Bostom put it, "Will such Muslim authorities at least recognize the acute predicament of Centanni and Wiig by issuing a fatwa stating that their 'conversion,' being under duress, was not bona fide, condemning in advance any Muslim who might now attack these journalists for 'apostasy' from Islam?"
Yes, of course, they should — at least according to any Western understanding of compulsion and morality — but don't hold your breath. Meanwhile, holding their breath is exactly what Western media are doing when it comes to covering (not covering) the story. Even Fox's Greta van Susteren, a tabloidesque host who never met a bodily fluid she couldn't elaborate on, went delicate on us the other night, failing, in a one-hour "exclusive" interview with the two men, to ask a single question about their religious ordeal — presumably at their request.
Why? Who or what is served by shutting up? Only forces of coercion — a word which, after all, implies the nullification of individual will. Which means this is one case where silence isn't golden and ignorance isn't bliss. They are dangerous and dumb.
Jewish World review
09.05.2006
Monday, September 04, 2006
If Israel Had Only A Year To Live
If you knew that Israel had just a year to live, would you see it differently? If, as a Muslim, you knew that Iran, in the name of Islam, was about to turn the Jews of the Holy Land into ash, how would it influence your outlook, your beliefs, your actions?
If as a Diaspora Jew, you knew that you were about to be all that was left of the Jewish people, would that affect your observance, your identification, the direction of your social conscience?
These days, the questions are more than merely theoretical, a point which grass-roots reactions to the recent war drove home with telling effect. Certainly never before was this newspaper, a clearinghouse and meeting place for passionate opinions on both sides, so swamped with messages haunted by the prospect of - or explicitly advocating - genocide.
Iran's certainly thought about it. They've calculated that since Iran's land mass is some 86 times that of Israel, they could take a nuclear first or second strike and still reduce the Jewish state to Alamogordo glass.
So how would it work, if those who would have Israel disappear got their way?
Some of it we know. Some of it we've already seen. We know that there would be jubilation in Arab capitals, as well as broad swaths of Malaysia, Indonesia, Detroit, San Francisco, London and Paris.
There are also millions upon millions of Muslims which the annihilation of Israel would give serious pause. Perhaps a reconsideration of the wisdom of having granted jihadists a broad measure of respect in avenging Israel's killing of Muslim civilians - and avenging the very existence of Israel - by killing Jewish civilians.
Perhaps, as well, a reconsideration of having given so public a stage to radical Islam, and of having remained on the sidelines - or voicing roundabout but heartfelt justifications - as murders were committed in the name of justice, in the name of defending the Prophet, in the name of restoring Muslim honor, in the name of fighting Bush, in the name of Allah.
What we don't know, is how the Jews of North America would respond. Not the minority that is active in Jewish or Israel-oriented organizations, not the minority that takes active part in synagogue or Jewish community life.
What about the others? The majority.
There's no question that for many American Jews, Israel has already ceased to exist. It is a dot on a map, an unfamiliar, perhaps dead-end branch on a fading family tree.
It only makes sense. Some are alienated by the character of North American Judaism. The liturgy doesn't speak to them. The culture doesn't speak to them. Their interests lie elsewhere, in social action, in making a living, in making a lifestyle, in getting through the day.
For many of the generation of Jews now in their 20s and 30s, it appears, Israel is simply not relevant. Life is too short. Life is too full. Life is too promising, to have it be dragged down by that bummer of a distant Promised Land.
It's the wrong promise.
There's too much to answer for. Jews - heirs to what we prefer to recall as the Old Testament prophets' social vision of Judaism as exponent of equality, generosity, humanity, Swords to Plowshares - don't want to be thrown into the First Samuel reality of swords, swords, and swords.
Maybe, in the end, all of this is a healthy thing. Maybe North American Jewry should begin to think about a future without a state of Israel.
Maybe it's time for the Jewish world's largest Diaspora to start acting like it.
Maybe it's time that a healthy, unselfconscious, reduced-neurosis authentic American Jewish culture emerged.
Not because Israel is about to be erased.
Rather, to make sure that in the future, American Judaism is not.
Haaretz
09.03.2006
If as a Diaspora Jew, you knew that you were about to be all that was left of the Jewish people, would that affect your observance, your identification, the direction of your social conscience?
These days, the questions are more than merely theoretical, a point which grass-roots reactions to the recent war drove home with telling effect. Certainly never before was this newspaper, a clearinghouse and meeting place for passionate opinions on both sides, so swamped with messages haunted by the prospect of - or explicitly advocating - genocide.
Iran's certainly thought about it. They've calculated that since Iran's land mass is some 86 times that of Israel, they could take a nuclear first or second strike and still reduce the Jewish state to Alamogordo glass.
So how would it work, if those who would have Israel disappear got their way?
Some of it we know. Some of it we've already seen. We know that there would be jubilation in Arab capitals, as well as broad swaths of Malaysia, Indonesia, Detroit, San Francisco, London and Paris.
There are also millions upon millions of Muslims which the annihilation of Israel would give serious pause. Perhaps a reconsideration of the wisdom of having granted jihadists a broad measure of respect in avenging Israel's killing of Muslim civilians - and avenging the very existence of Israel - by killing Jewish civilians.
Perhaps, as well, a reconsideration of having given so public a stage to radical Islam, and of having remained on the sidelines - or voicing roundabout but heartfelt justifications - as murders were committed in the name of justice, in the name of defending the Prophet, in the name of restoring Muslim honor, in the name of fighting Bush, in the name of Allah.
What we don't know, is how the Jews of North America would respond. Not the minority that is active in Jewish or Israel-oriented organizations, not the minority that takes active part in synagogue or Jewish community life.
What about the others? The majority.
There's no question that for many American Jews, Israel has already ceased to exist. It is a dot on a map, an unfamiliar, perhaps dead-end branch on a fading family tree.
It only makes sense. Some are alienated by the character of North American Judaism. The liturgy doesn't speak to them. The culture doesn't speak to them. Their interests lie elsewhere, in social action, in making a living, in making a lifestyle, in getting through the day.
For many of the generation of Jews now in their 20s and 30s, it appears, Israel is simply not relevant. Life is too short. Life is too full. Life is too promising, to have it be dragged down by that bummer of a distant Promised Land.
It's the wrong promise.
There's too much to answer for. Jews - heirs to what we prefer to recall as the Old Testament prophets' social vision of Judaism as exponent of equality, generosity, humanity, Swords to Plowshares - don't want to be thrown into the First Samuel reality of swords, swords, and swords.
Maybe, in the end, all of this is a healthy thing. Maybe North American Jewry should begin to think about a future without a state of Israel.
Maybe it's time for the Jewish world's largest Diaspora to start acting like it.
Maybe it's time that a healthy, unselfconscious, reduced-neurosis authentic American Jewish culture emerged.
Not because Israel is about to be erased.
Rather, to make sure that in the future, American Judaism is not.
Haaretz
09.03.2006
Sunday, September 03, 2006
'Americans, Convert To Islam'
Al-Qaeda called on non-Muslims especially in the United States to convert to Islam and abandon their ‘misguided’ ways or else suffer, according to a video tape posted on a Web site on Saturday.
The speaker was identified as Azzam the American, also known as Adam Yahiye Gadahn—an Islamic convert from California wanted for questions by the FBI and who US authorities believe to be involved in a propaganda campaign for al-Qaeda.
“To Americans and the rest of Christendom we say, either repent (your) misguided ways and enter into the light of truth or keep your poison to yourself and suffer the consequences in this world and the next,” Gadahn said in English.
He appeared in the video dressed in a white turban and seated in front of a computer and books.
“But whatever you do don’t attempt to spread you misery and misguidance to our lands,” he said.
'Muslims don’t need democracy'
Al-Qaeda’s second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahri made a brief statement at the beginning of the tape - dated Sept. 2006 - urging viewers to listen carefully to the message, entitled: “An Invitation to Islam.”
Zawahri and Gadahn appeared to be speaking from different places, as Zawahri spoke in front of a black background.
Gadahn recited verses from the Muslim holy book the Koran in Arabic, then translated them into English and said Muslims needed to boost their faith to expel their countries’ rulers.
“Muslims don’t need democracy to rid themselves of their home grown despots and tyrants. What they do need is their Islamic faith, the sprit of jihad and the lifting of foreign troops and interference from their necks,” he said, adding that God did not recognize a separation of religion and state.
Zawahri last appeared in a video in August in which he said that some leaders of Egypt’s Gama’a Islamiya have joined al Qaeda. Gama’a Islamiya later denied his statement.
Y Net News
09.03.2006
The speaker was identified as Azzam the American, also known as Adam Yahiye Gadahn—an Islamic convert from California wanted for questions by the FBI and who US authorities believe to be involved in a propaganda campaign for al-Qaeda.
“To Americans and the rest of Christendom we say, either repent (your) misguided ways and enter into the light of truth or keep your poison to yourself and suffer the consequences in this world and the next,” Gadahn said in English.
He appeared in the video dressed in a white turban and seated in front of a computer and books.
“But whatever you do don’t attempt to spread you misery and misguidance to our lands,” he said.
'Muslims don’t need democracy'
Al-Qaeda’s second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahri made a brief statement at the beginning of the tape - dated Sept. 2006 - urging viewers to listen carefully to the message, entitled: “An Invitation to Islam.”
Zawahri and Gadahn appeared to be speaking from different places, as Zawahri spoke in front of a black background.
Gadahn recited verses from the Muslim holy book the Koran in Arabic, then translated them into English and said Muslims needed to boost their faith to expel their countries’ rulers.
“Muslims don’t need democracy to rid themselves of their home grown despots and tyrants. What they do need is their Islamic faith, the sprit of jihad and the lifting of foreign troops and interference from their necks,” he said, adding that God did not recognize a separation of religion and state.
Zawahri last appeared in a video in August in which he said that some leaders of Egypt’s Gama’a Islamiya have joined al Qaeda. Gama’a Islamiya later denied his statement.
Y Net News
09.03.2006
Saturday, September 02, 2006
Facing Up To The Challenge Of Reality In Gaza
The Qassam rockets that slammed into Sderot today along with the huge tunnel discovered near the Karni crossing served as bleak reminders that the Gaza
challenge cannot be ignored.
A challenge that is growing by leaps and bounds as weapons and military know-how pour in from Egypt while the various militias compete to build an extensive network of tunnels and other facilities for the war against Israel.
The Gaza threat is hardly a "local" nuisance. The capabilities being developed will put a considerable part of Israel within striking distance - this when major strategic facilities are already within range of weapons systems that have already be operated from Gaza. And while a painfully escalating ongoing war of attrition, in-and-of-itself, would be detrimental to the Jewish State, this pales in comparison to the danger the Gaza threat poses should Palestinian attacks take place within the framework of a regional clash.
What, then, is the solution?
Give Egypt a more active role? They haven't taken seriously their
obligation to control the flood of weapons from Egypt into Gaza and their chief interest so far has appeared to be preserving the strength of the various illegal militias.
International inspectors? They've been a farce at the Rafah Crossing. How about negotiating a "hudna"? But all "hudna" means is that the Palestinians can focus their resources on preparing for battle as they don't have to fear Israeli strikes on their facilities.
How about going to final status talks? In the best of realistic scenarios it means ultimately facing the very same threat but with the added complication that Gaza is an internationally recognized sovereign entity.
So what's left?
Retaking overall control of Gaza would hardly be a picnic. But it is still very doable. And at a cost that's a bargain as compared to the cost of postponing the inevitable.
EU Begins Paying Aid To Palestinians
The European Union said Friday it has begun paying "social allowances" to 625,000 Palestinians left unpaid and impoverished because of the financial crisis besetting the Hamas-led Palestinian government.
The funds - made through a program overseen by the World Bank - bypass the Palestinian Authority government and benefit "those who have suffered a significant loss of income" when much foreign aid and some of the Palestinians' own revenues dried up after Hamas came to power earlier this year.
Besides direct cash payments of about US$347 to each person, EU money will finance Palestinian health services and utilities, notably fuel to run generators.
Among the 625,000 Palestinians now receiving direct financial support are 11,500 health workers who are no longer being paid, said EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner.
The EU is funneling some US$771,000 a month through the program, launched in July for a three-month period. Ferrero-Waldner said she hoped a review this month would result in its continuation.
In all, the EU has put aside $135 million to be disbursed through the aid plan. The 25 EU states are contributing another €35 million $45 million.
"We have kept our promise to help relieve the suffering of the Palestinian people during the current crisis," she told reporters before the start of a two-day meeting of EU foreign ministers who considered ways to revive the Middle East peace process after the Israel-Hezbollah war.
Ferrero-Waldner said that, to date, the EU special funding program has paid for, among other things, medical supplies to 413 primary health care centers and 22 hospitals, and the purchase of 1.5 million liters of fuel to run air conditioning and generators at hospitals and water facilities, after the Gaza power plant was knocked out by Israel in July.
Also Friday, the EU pledged $64 million in humanitarian aid to Palestinians at a donors' conference in Sweden. UN humanitarian chief Jan Egeland said several other "impressive new pledges" were made at the meeting that focused on the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip.
"I believe today we will take a big step forward toward raising more than $200 million for an EU emergency appeal to help Palestinians," he said in Stockholm.
Jerusalem Post
09.02.2006
challenge cannot be ignored.
A challenge that is growing by leaps and bounds as weapons and military know-how pour in from Egypt while the various militias compete to build an extensive network of tunnels and other facilities for the war against Israel.
The Gaza threat is hardly a "local" nuisance. The capabilities being developed will put a considerable part of Israel within striking distance - this when major strategic facilities are already within range of weapons systems that have already be operated from Gaza. And while a painfully escalating ongoing war of attrition, in-and-of-itself, would be detrimental to the Jewish State, this pales in comparison to the danger the Gaza threat poses should Palestinian attacks take place within the framework of a regional clash.
What, then, is the solution?
Give Egypt a more active role? They haven't taken seriously their
obligation to control the flood of weapons from Egypt into Gaza and their chief interest so far has appeared to be preserving the strength of the various illegal militias.
International inspectors? They've been a farce at the Rafah Crossing. How about negotiating a "hudna"? But all "hudna" means is that the Palestinians can focus their resources on preparing for battle as they don't have to fear Israeli strikes on their facilities.
How about going to final status talks? In the best of realistic scenarios it means ultimately facing the very same threat but with the added complication that Gaza is an internationally recognized sovereign entity.
So what's left?
Retaking overall control of Gaza would hardly be a picnic. But it is still very doable. And at a cost that's a bargain as compared to the cost of postponing the inevitable.
EU Begins Paying Aid To Palestinians
The European Union said Friday it has begun paying "social allowances" to 625,000 Palestinians left unpaid and impoverished because of the financial crisis besetting the Hamas-led Palestinian government.
The funds - made through a program overseen by the World Bank - bypass the Palestinian Authority government and benefit "those who have suffered a significant loss of income" when much foreign aid and some of the Palestinians' own revenues dried up after Hamas came to power earlier this year.
Besides direct cash payments of about US$347 to each person, EU money will finance Palestinian health services and utilities, notably fuel to run generators.
Among the 625,000 Palestinians now receiving direct financial support are 11,500 health workers who are no longer being paid, said EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner.
The EU is funneling some US$771,000 a month through the program, launched in July for a three-month period. Ferrero-Waldner said she hoped a review this month would result in its continuation.
In all, the EU has put aside $135 million to be disbursed through the aid plan. The 25 EU states are contributing another €35 million $45 million.
"We have kept our promise to help relieve the suffering of the Palestinian people during the current crisis," she told reporters before the start of a two-day meeting of EU foreign ministers who considered ways to revive the Middle East peace process after the Israel-Hezbollah war.
Ferrero-Waldner said that, to date, the EU special funding program has paid for, among other things, medical supplies to 413 primary health care centers and 22 hospitals, and the purchase of 1.5 million liters of fuel to run air conditioning and generators at hospitals and water facilities, after the Gaza power plant was knocked out by Israel in July.
Also Friday, the EU pledged $64 million in humanitarian aid to Palestinians at a donors' conference in Sweden. UN humanitarian chief Jan Egeland said several other "impressive new pledges" were made at the meeting that focused on the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip.
"I believe today we will take a big step forward toward raising more than $200 million for an EU emergency appeal to help Palestinians," he said in Stockholm.
Jerusalem Post
09.02.2006
Friday, September 01, 2006
Thousands Rally In Support Of Kidnapped Soldiers
Thousands Rally In Support Of Kidnapped Soldiers
A mass rally calling for the release of the three kidnapped IDF soldiers, Gilad Shalit, Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser attracted thousands to Tel Aviv Rabin's Square Thursday evening.
Yarkon Subdistrict Chief Lt.-Cmdr. Haggai Dotan told The Jerusalem Post that tens of thousands of people were at the rally, and not 100,000 as organizers had claimed.
Tel Aviv's Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau opened the rally with a prayer for the soldiers' well-being, as he quoted Jeremiah 31: 17, "thy children shall come again to their own border."
Among those in attendance were several dozen youths enrolled in a pre-military course for leadership development. Wearing t-shirts that read "aharai" - an unofficial slogan of the IDF which means "follow me," the youths sat in the middle of the square, where they had set up three army stretchers - symbolizing the three kidnapped soldiers - in the shape of a triangle.
One of the rally's organizers, Maj.-Gen. (res.) Uzi Dayan said, "We are coming to the square out of solidarity and a sense of duty. It is both own responsibility and the government's that we do no return to the situation of Ron Arad."
Dayan added that all efforts needed to be made to secure the release of the soldiers. "I have been in the army for many years and I always knew that there was an unwritten agreement between a soldier and his family, and the state and society, and when someone goes out to defend his home, we are all committed to bring him back," Dayan said.
Dayan, a former army deputy chief of staff, called on the government not to lift the air and blockade told The Jerusalem Post that "there is a grave danger that if Israel lifts the air and sea blockade of Lebanon, soldiers will be smuggled out of Lebanon." He called on the government not to lift the blockade. "Time is against us. Every day that passes they [Goldwasser and Regev] become more and more Ron Arad." Dayan added that Lebanon should not receive financial assistance until Goldwasser and Regev are released.
Miki Goldwassar, Ehud's mother, urged everyone who planned to join the rally not to come with protest signs and to avoid expressions of a political nature.
"We just want the boys to return home, we don't have any political agenda," said Goldwasser.
Itzik Orbach, a friend of Ron Arad from flight school, said "we [the friends of Ron Arad] will make sure the government doesn't fail in efforts to bring about release of the three soldiers, like it failed with Ron Arad." Orbach added that "if Ron were here, he would be speaking here at this rally, and he would have told you that all of Israel are beholden one to another. He would have told you that Israel would do everything to get its soldiers back, because we all grew up with the IDF ethic that you do not leave a comrade behind on the battlefield."
Orbach urged Gilad Shalit's father, Noam, to meet with Ron Arad's family, because they were the only people who could tell him how to tackle the situation and how to approach dealing with government.
In an emotional meeting, Gilad Shalit's army company arrived at the rally, straight from duty in Gaza, where they took part in IDF operations Thursday morning in the Sajaiyeh district of Gaza City.
One soldier, Tomer Shtarker, wearing dark sunglasses because he had been wounded in the operation and could not see well, said "We came to be with Gilad. It's hard, but we're optimistic. We feel that he is alive and we hope that he comes back."
One soldier said the feeling in the company was "very bad" since Gilad's abduction. "He's part of our company, he's part of us," he told The Jerusalem Post. The soldiers gathered around Gilad's father, handed out chocolate wafers and talked for few minutes, then sat in silence. After the rally the soldiers will go straight back to duty with their armor unit.
Noam Shalit told The Jerusalem Post that he was concerned that the government did not plan to negotiate for all three soldiers as part of one deal. The latest assessment among officials, he said, is that the government would hold separate negotiations with Hamas and Hizbullah. Shalit said that he hopes "Hizbullah and Hamas are not coordinated on this issue. They may have been coordinated on the issue of the wider war, but we do not believe they are on the soldiers."
Ran Cohen (Meretz), who was one of only two Knesset members at the rally, said he was not there in a political capacity but as a member of a Knesset lobby group that meets with the parents and political officials to work for the return of the soldiers.
"I'm not sure everything is being done in the way of negotiations," Cohen said. "I'm in favor of negotiations without any conditions, and I'm not sure everything is being done in this respect."
Cohen added, "I'm glad tens of thousands of people came out here," adding that "if this issue doesn't unite the nation, then this nation has no hope."
Jerusalem Post
09.01.2006
A mass rally calling for the release of the three kidnapped IDF soldiers, Gilad Shalit, Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser attracted thousands to Tel Aviv Rabin's Square Thursday evening.
Yarkon Subdistrict Chief Lt.-Cmdr. Haggai Dotan told The Jerusalem Post that tens of thousands of people were at the rally, and not 100,000 as organizers had claimed.
Tel Aviv's Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau opened the rally with a prayer for the soldiers' well-being, as he quoted Jeremiah 31: 17, "thy children shall come again to their own border."
Among those in attendance were several dozen youths enrolled in a pre-military course for leadership development. Wearing t-shirts that read "aharai" - an unofficial slogan of the IDF which means "follow me," the youths sat in the middle of the square, where they had set up three army stretchers - symbolizing the three kidnapped soldiers - in the shape of a triangle.
One of the rally's organizers, Maj.-Gen. (res.) Uzi Dayan said, "We are coming to the square out of solidarity and a sense of duty. It is both own responsibility and the government's that we do no return to the situation of Ron Arad."
Dayan added that all efforts needed to be made to secure the release of the soldiers. "I have been in the army for many years and I always knew that there was an unwritten agreement between a soldier and his family, and the state and society, and when someone goes out to defend his home, we are all committed to bring him back," Dayan said.
Dayan, a former army deputy chief of staff, called on the government not to lift the air and blockade told The Jerusalem Post that "there is a grave danger that if Israel lifts the air and sea blockade of Lebanon, soldiers will be smuggled out of Lebanon." He called on the government not to lift the blockade. "Time is against us. Every day that passes they [Goldwasser and Regev] become more and more Ron Arad." Dayan added that Lebanon should not receive financial assistance until Goldwasser and Regev are released.
Miki Goldwassar, Ehud's mother, urged everyone who planned to join the rally not to come with protest signs and to avoid expressions of a political nature.
"We just want the boys to return home, we don't have any political agenda," said Goldwasser.
Itzik Orbach, a friend of Ron Arad from flight school, said "we [the friends of Ron Arad] will make sure the government doesn't fail in efforts to bring about release of the three soldiers, like it failed with Ron Arad." Orbach added that "if Ron were here, he would be speaking here at this rally, and he would have told you that all of Israel are beholden one to another. He would have told you that Israel would do everything to get its soldiers back, because we all grew up with the IDF ethic that you do not leave a comrade behind on the battlefield."
Orbach urged Gilad Shalit's father, Noam, to meet with Ron Arad's family, because they were the only people who could tell him how to tackle the situation and how to approach dealing with government.
In an emotional meeting, Gilad Shalit's army company arrived at the rally, straight from duty in Gaza, where they took part in IDF operations Thursday morning in the Sajaiyeh district of Gaza City.
One soldier, Tomer Shtarker, wearing dark sunglasses because he had been wounded in the operation and could not see well, said "We came to be with Gilad. It's hard, but we're optimistic. We feel that he is alive and we hope that he comes back."
One soldier said the feeling in the company was "very bad" since Gilad's abduction. "He's part of our company, he's part of us," he told The Jerusalem Post. The soldiers gathered around Gilad's father, handed out chocolate wafers and talked for few minutes, then sat in silence. After the rally the soldiers will go straight back to duty with their armor unit.
Noam Shalit told The Jerusalem Post that he was concerned that the government did not plan to negotiate for all three soldiers as part of one deal. The latest assessment among officials, he said, is that the government would hold separate negotiations with Hamas and Hizbullah. Shalit said that he hopes "Hizbullah and Hamas are not coordinated on this issue. They may have been coordinated on the issue of the wider war, but we do not believe they are on the soldiers."
Ran Cohen (Meretz), who was one of only two Knesset members at the rally, said he was not there in a political capacity but as a member of a Knesset lobby group that meets with the parents and political officials to work for the return of the soldiers.
"I'm not sure everything is being done in the way of negotiations," Cohen said. "I'm in favor of negotiations without any conditions, and I'm not sure everything is being done in this respect."
Cohen added, "I'm glad tens of thousands of people came out here," adding that "if this issue doesn't unite the nation, then this nation has no hope."
Jerusalem Post
09.01.2006
Thursday, August 31, 2006
'Iran, Syria See Eye to Eye'
Syrian President Bashar Assad received a letter from his Iranian counterpart Mahmoud Ahmadinejad concerning the latest developments in Lebanon and the region, Syria's official news agency reported.
Iran's deputy foreign minister, Mahammad Rida Baqeri, was visiting Syria and delivered the letter, SANA reported. Its contents were not disclosed.
Baqeri also held talks with Syrian Vice President Farouk al-Sharaa about the "repercussions of the latest Israeli aggression in Lebanon," SANA said. "The (two politicians') views were identical over the importance of maintaining coordination and consultation between Syria and Iran to bring about stability in the region," it reported.
A reporter for the Iranian news agency IRNA in Damascus reported that during the meeting between Assad and Baqeri, the Iranian official briefed the Syrian president on the latest developments in his country's nuclear program, and on Iran's response to the UN's "carrot and stick" proposal, which was delivered earlier in the week.
The meeting was held at the Syrian presidential palace in the presence of the Iranian ambassador to Damascus, Mohammad Hassan Akhtari. It was earlier reported that the Iranian delegation had visited in Egypt and delivered a letter from Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, addressed to his Cairo counterpart, Ahmed Aboul Gheit. The contents of the letter have not been disclosed as well.
Y Net News
08.30.2006
Iran's deputy foreign minister, Mahammad Rida Baqeri, was visiting Syria and delivered the letter, SANA reported. Its contents were not disclosed.
Baqeri also held talks with Syrian Vice President Farouk al-Sharaa about the "repercussions of the latest Israeli aggression in Lebanon," SANA said. "The (two politicians') views were identical over the importance of maintaining coordination and consultation between Syria and Iran to bring about stability in the region," it reported.
A reporter for the Iranian news agency IRNA in Damascus reported that during the meeting between Assad and Baqeri, the Iranian official briefed the Syrian president on the latest developments in his country's nuclear program, and on Iran's response to the UN's "carrot and stick" proposal, which was delivered earlier in the week.
The meeting was held at the Syrian presidential palace in the presence of the Iranian ambassador to Damascus, Mohammad Hassan Akhtari. It was earlier reported that the Iranian delegation had visited in Egypt and delivered a letter from Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, addressed to his Cairo counterpart, Ahmed Aboul Gheit. The contents of the letter have not been disclosed as well.
Y Net News
08.30.2006
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Just A Reminder
Last year at UCLA, I debated a professor who argued that Israel and the Palestinians were moral equivalents. He is not alone (especially on college campuses) in his lack of understanding of the immoral nature of the Islamic enemies of America and Israel.
Thus it is important to remind people once again about the moral world inhabited by the people we are fighting, whom President George W. Bush calls the Islamic Fascists. Societal examples:
The Islamic Republic of Sudan, in its attempt to force Arab/Muslim rule on the largely non-Arab and non-Muslim population of southern Sudan, has led to the killing of well above 1 million Christians and animists and black (i.e., non-Arab) Muslims, in addition to the widespread enslavement, rape and torture of those people.
No major international Arab or Muslim organization has condemned the Sudanese government's mass murders that border on genocide.
The leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran has repeatedly denied the Holocaust and repeatedly called for the annihilation of Israel. As the 6 million Jews of Israel do not plan a mass exodus from their ancient and modern homeland, such annihilation would in fact mean another Holocaust.
The holy center of Islam, the Muslim country where the holiest Muslim sites are situated, is Saudi Arabia. That country bans the practice of any religion other than Islam, amputates hands of thieves, does not allow women to drive a car, mandates what women wear outside of their homes and is the only country in the world to feature a weapon on its national flag. Women were treated considerably better and had more civil rights in ancient Rome, not to mention ancient Israel, than women living in the holiest cities of Islam today.
Virtually every Islam-based country decrees the death penalty for any Muslim who converts to another religion.
In other words, every country that calls itself "Islamic" is morally inferior to just about every country in North America, South America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, almost every Asian country and many African countries.
No Muslim country treats non-Muslims and their religions anywhere nearly as decently as any Western non-Muslim country (including Israel) treats Muslims. That is why tens of millions of Muslims immigrate to non-Muslim societies and virtually no non-Muslim immigrates to any Muslim society. In every Muslim country, non-Muslims are either systematically persecuted at worst or treated as inferiors at best.
Individual examples (in just the last five months):
"A German court sentenced a Turkish man to more than nine years in jail yesterday for the 'honour killing' of his sister. . . . The murder of Hatun Surucu, 23, who was shot several times at a bus stop in a Berlin suburb last year, shocked Germany. . . . Forced to marry a cousin in Turkey as a young girl, Ms. Surucu later broke with her Turkish-Kurdish family in Berlin and was living independently with her 5-year-old son, to the intense disapproval of her relatives. . . . Public outrage at the murder was exacerbated when some teenage boys at a school with many pupils from immigrant families . . . reportedly openly applauded the killing, condemning the victim for having lived 'like a German.'" (The Guardian, UK, April 14, 2006)
"Men using machetes attacked worshipers in three Coptic [Christian] churches in the port city of Alexandria [Egypt] on Friday morning, killing an 80-year-old man and wounding at least six other people, the police there said." (International Herald Tribune, April 15, 2006)
"An Egyptian state-controlled newspaper praised Monday's suicide attack in Tel Aviv, which killed nine people and wounded dozens, calling it an act of sacrifice and martyrdom." (Jerusalem Post, April 18, 2006)
In Britain, Abdula Ahmed Ali, 25, and his wife Cossor, 23, were arrested in connection with the plot to blow up airplanes flying across the Atlantic. According to Scotland Yard, the Muslim couple planned to take their 6-month-old baby on the suicide mission, using their baby's bottle to hide a liquid bomb. (Daily Telegraph, UK, Aug. 14, 2006)
"We've got Hezbollah fighters running around in our positions, taking our positions here and then using us for shields and then engaging the [Israelis]." — words of a Canadian UN observer written days before he was killed by Israeli bombs (Ottawa Citizen, July 27, 2006)
"Canadian authorities rounded up a group of 17 Muslim men and boys suspected of plotting to bomb major buildings in the Toronto area . . . " (CNN, June 5, 2006)
In Australia, "[Islamist] propaganda has convinced many residents their suburbs are being overrun by Islamic extremists. . . .The Saturday Daily Telegraph revealed an escalation of anti-Semitic behaviour. . . . Jewish university students were targeted and forced to hide their traditional skullcaps beneath baseball caps to avoid abuse, while attacks on synagogues have increased." (Daily Telegraph, Australia, Aug. 26, 2006)
"A third suspect detained in a failed attempt to blow up two German trains is a Syrian national . . . German and Lebanese authorities are each holding one of two young Lebanese men accused of carrying the suitcase bombs onto trains in Cologne station on July 31. . . . Officials say they could have caused many casualties and set the trains on fire." (Newsday, Aug. 26, 2006)
Does all this suggest that we are fighting a billion Muslims? Of course not.
Does all this suggest that all or even most Muslims are bad people? Of course not.
It does suggest, however, that the dominant forces within Islam are bad at this time; that Muslims who see this evil in their midst have not mobilized any counterforce either out of fear for their lives or for some other reason; and that decent men and women around the world — Hindu, Christian, Jewish, atheist, Buddhist and Muslim — are threatened by this powerful, death-loving force.
Muslims who do not acknowledge the threat to civilization from within the Muslim world at least have two excuses — fear for their lives or group solidarity. What excuses do non-Muslims have who deny this threat?
Jewish World review
08.30.2006
Thus it is important to remind people once again about the moral world inhabited by the people we are fighting, whom President George W. Bush calls the Islamic Fascists. Societal examples:
The Islamic Republic of Sudan, in its attempt to force Arab/Muslim rule on the largely non-Arab and non-Muslim population of southern Sudan, has led to the killing of well above 1 million Christians and animists and black (i.e., non-Arab) Muslims, in addition to the widespread enslavement, rape and torture of those people.
No major international Arab or Muslim organization has condemned the Sudanese government's mass murders that border on genocide.
The leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran has repeatedly denied the Holocaust and repeatedly called for the annihilation of Israel. As the 6 million Jews of Israel do not plan a mass exodus from their ancient and modern homeland, such annihilation would in fact mean another Holocaust.
The holy center of Islam, the Muslim country where the holiest Muslim sites are situated, is Saudi Arabia. That country bans the practice of any religion other than Islam, amputates hands of thieves, does not allow women to drive a car, mandates what women wear outside of their homes and is the only country in the world to feature a weapon on its national flag. Women were treated considerably better and had more civil rights in ancient Rome, not to mention ancient Israel, than women living in the holiest cities of Islam today.
Virtually every Islam-based country decrees the death penalty for any Muslim who converts to another religion.
In other words, every country that calls itself "Islamic" is morally inferior to just about every country in North America, South America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, almost every Asian country and many African countries.
No Muslim country treats non-Muslims and their religions anywhere nearly as decently as any Western non-Muslim country (including Israel) treats Muslims. That is why tens of millions of Muslims immigrate to non-Muslim societies and virtually no non-Muslim immigrates to any Muslim society. In every Muslim country, non-Muslims are either systematically persecuted at worst or treated as inferiors at best.
Individual examples (in just the last five months):
"A German court sentenced a Turkish man to more than nine years in jail yesterday for the 'honour killing' of his sister. . . . The murder of Hatun Surucu, 23, who was shot several times at a bus stop in a Berlin suburb last year, shocked Germany. . . . Forced to marry a cousin in Turkey as a young girl, Ms. Surucu later broke with her Turkish-Kurdish family in Berlin and was living independently with her 5-year-old son, to the intense disapproval of her relatives. . . . Public outrage at the murder was exacerbated when some teenage boys at a school with many pupils from immigrant families . . . reportedly openly applauded the killing, condemning the victim for having lived 'like a German.'" (The Guardian, UK, April 14, 2006)
"Men using machetes attacked worshipers in three Coptic [Christian] churches in the port city of Alexandria [Egypt] on Friday morning, killing an 80-year-old man and wounding at least six other people, the police there said." (International Herald Tribune, April 15, 2006)
"An Egyptian state-controlled newspaper praised Monday's suicide attack in Tel Aviv, which killed nine people and wounded dozens, calling it an act of sacrifice and martyrdom." (Jerusalem Post, April 18, 2006)
In Britain, Abdula Ahmed Ali, 25, and his wife Cossor, 23, were arrested in connection with the plot to blow up airplanes flying across the Atlantic. According to Scotland Yard, the Muslim couple planned to take their 6-month-old baby on the suicide mission, using their baby's bottle to hide a liquid bomb. (Daily Telegraph, UK, Aug. 14, 2006)
"We've got Hezbollah fighters running around in our positions, taking our positions here and then using us for shields and then engaging the [Israelis]." — words of a Canadian UN observer written days before he was killed by Israeli bombs (Ottawa Citizen, July 27, 2006)
"Canadian authorities rounded up a group of 17 Muslim men and boys suspected of plotting to bomb major buildings in the Toronto area . . . " (CNN, June 5, 2006)
In Australia, "[Islamist] propaganda has convinced many residents their suburbs are being overrun by Islamic extremists. . . .The Saturday Daily Telegraph revealed an escalation of anti-Semitic behaviour. . . . Jewish university students were targeted and forced to hide their traditional skullcaps beneath baseball caps to avoid abuse, while attacks on synagogues have increased." (Daily Telegraph, Australia, Aug. 26, 2006)
"A third suspect detained in a failed attempt to blow up two German trains is a Syrian national . . . German and Lebanese authorities are each holding one of two young Lebanese men accused of carrying the suitcase bombs onto trains in Cologne station on July 31. . . . Officials say they could have caused many casualties and set the trains on fire." (Newsday, Aug. 26, 2006)
Does all this suggest that we are fighting a billion Muslims? Of course not.
Does all this suggest that all or even most Muslims are bad people? Of course not.
It does suggest, however, that the dominant forces within Islam are bad at this time; that Muslims who see this evil in their midst have not mobilized any counterforce either out of fear for their lives or for some other reason; and that decent men and women around the world — Hindu, Christian, Jewish, atheist, Buddhist and Muslim — are threatened by this powerful, death-loving force.
Muslims who do not acknowledge the threat to civilization from within the Muslim world at least have two excuses — fear for their lives or group solidarity. What excuses do non-Muslims have who deny this threat?
Jewish World review
08.30.2006
Tuesday, August 29, 2006
"Sorry, I Thought He Was A Jew..,”
An Italian named Angelo Frammartino, 25, espoused the typical anti-Israel views of a far-leftist, as he expressed in a letter to a newspaper in 2006:
We must face the fact that a situation of no violence is a luxury in many parts of the world, but we do not seek to avoid legitimate acts of defense. … I never dreamed of condemning resistance, the blood of the Vietnamese, the blood of the people who were under colonialist occupation or the blood of the young Palestinians from the first intifada.
Actively to forward his beliefs, Frammartino went to Israel in early August 2006 to serve as a volunteer with ARCI, a far-leftist NGO, working with Palestinian children at the Burj al-Luqluq community center in eastern Jerusalem.
But on August 10, he was stabbed in a terrorist assault at Sultan Suleiman Street, near Herod’s Gate in Jerusalem, twice in the back and once in the neck. He died shortly after, only two days before his planned return to Italy. The killer, soon identified as Ashraf Hanaisha, 24, turned out to be a Palestinian affiliated with Palestinian Islamic Jihad. A resident of the village of Qabatiya in the Jenin area, Hanaisha apparently planned to attack a Jewish Israeli but made a mistake.
Damage control soon followed. The Palestinian Authority’s news agency, WAFA, carried a statement by the Burj al Luqluq community center condemning the murder in no uncertain terms: “Nothing could describe our emotions for what happened. Our thoughts are with the family and friends of Angelo, they have our deepest sympathy.” Several Palestinian NGOs then organized a vigil in Frammartino’s memory. For her part, Hanaisha’s mother launched an appeal, via the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, for the forgiveness of her son.
In response to this outpouring, Frammartino’s parents did forgive Hanaisha. From the family home in Monterotondo, the father, Michelangelo, said that “he welcomes and appreciates, despite the undeletable sorrow, the plea for forgiveness made by the murderer’s mother” and he expressed a hope that the parents’ gesture “will bring to an end this extremely sad story.” The father went further, telling the Corriere della Sera newspaper that he felt no hatred toward his son’s murderer:
Angelo was working to promote peace. The message he sought to convey is greater than anything else…[T]he circumstances confirm that Angelo was a victim of the war, of the injustice in the world. When we are talking about a situation of tension, absence of common sense dominates. I do not feel hatred because Angelo’s thought, the principles that always motivated him, were definitely not of hatred or revenge.
Comments:
(1) These signals from Qabatiya to Monterotondo and back amounted to a curious and despicable pas de deux, with each side remorsefully implying things would be just fine if only Hanaisha had killed his intended victim: “Sorry, I thought he was a Jew,” reads the headline in La Stampa. The Palestinians conveyed a message of “Excuse us, we did not mean to kill your son,” while the family replied with a “Understood, we accept that you made a mistake.”
(2) Writing in the Jerusalem Post, Barbara Sofer suggests an excellent way to honor the memory of Angelo Frammartino, by having his family join in solidarity with another high-profile victim of Palestinian violence. She notes that the Koby Mandell Foundation, named for another young man brutally murdered by Palestinian terrorists, “provides therapeutic camping experiences for terror survivors or the families of those murdered by terrorists.
It's non-political, hosts Jews and non-Jews, and works on building character.” Sofer suggests that those who want to honor Frammartino's memory “might want to support this camp that works to mitigate the evil brought by those who duped and killed their son.”
(3) Even if he was a political extremist, all accounts portray Frammartino as a gentle soul. If so, that only confirms how much out of depth he was in Jerusalem. As Calev Ben-David points out, also in the Jerusalem Post, his death is a reminder “that outsiders who come to this region, even with the best of intentions, should first understand that they, no less than Israelis - or, for that matter, those in the Arab world who truly want peace – can just as easily fall victim to those here who have only the worst of intentions.”
(4) Put more cruelly, given Frammartino’s idiotic views (“I never dreamed of condemning resistance”), had he survived his knifing, perhaps surviving in a state of total bodily paralysis, would he have seen the attack on him as terrorism? Or would he have learned nothing and still considered it an act of legitimate self-defense?
Front Page Mag
08.29.2006
We must face the fact that a situation of no violence is a luxury in many parts of the world, but we do not seek to avoid legitimate acts of defense. … I never dreamed of condemning resistance, the blood of the Vietnamese, the blood of the people who were under colonialist occupation or the blood of the young Palestinians from the first intifada.
Actively to forward his beliefs, Frammartino went to Israel in early August 2006 to serve as a volunteer with ARCI, a far-leftist NGO, working with Palestinian children at the Burj al-Luqluq community center in eastern Jerusalem.
But on August 10, he was stabbed in a terrorist assault at Sultan Suleiman Street, near Herod’s Gate in Jerusalem, twice in the back and once in the neck. He died shortly after, only two days before his planned return to Italy. The killer, soon identified as Ashraf Hanaisha, 24, turned out to be a Palestinian affiliated with Palestinian Islamic Jihad. A resident of the village of Qabatiya in the Jenin area, Hanaisha apparently planned to attack a Jewish Israeli but made a mistake.
Damage control soon followed. The Palestinian Authority’s news agency, WAFA, carried a statement by the Burj al Luqluq community center condemning the murder in no uncertain terms: “Nothing could describe our emotions for what happened. Our thoughts are with the family and friends of Angelo, they have our deepest sympathy.” Several Palestinian NGOs then organized a vigil in Frammartino’s memory. For her part, Hanaisha’s mother launched an appeal, via the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, for the forgiveness of her son.
In response to this outpouring, Frammartino’s parents did forgive Hanaisha. From the family home in Monterotondo, the father, Michelangelo, said that “he welcomes and appreciates, despite the undeletable sorrow, the plea for forgiveness made by the murderer’s mother” and he expressed a hope that the parents’ gesture “will bring to an end this extremely sad story.” The father went further, telling the Corriere della Sera newspaper that he felt no hatred toward his son’s murderer:
Angelo was working to promote peace. The message he sought to convey is greater than anything else…[T]he circumstances confirm that Angelo was a victim of the war, of the injustice in the world. When we are talking about a situation of tension, absence of common sense dominates. I do not feel hatred because Angelo’s thought, the principles that always motivated him, were definitely not of hatred or revenge.
Comments:
(1) These signals from Qabatiya to Monterotondo and back amounted to a curious and despicable pas de deux, with each side remorsefully implying things would be just fine if only Hanaisha had killed his intended victim: “Sorry, I thought he was a Jew,” reads the headline in La Stampa. The Palestinians conveyed a message of “Excuse us, we did not mean to kill your son,” while the family replied with a “Understood, we accept that you made a mistake.”
(2) Writing in the Jerusalem Post, Barbara Sofer suggests an excellent way to honor the memory of Angelo Frammartino, by having his family join in solidarity with another high-profile victim of Palestinian violence. She notes that the Koby Mandell Foundation, named for another young man brutally murdered by Palestinian terrorists, “provides therapeutic camping experiences for terror survivors or the families of those murdered by terrorists.
It's non-political, hosts Jews and non-Jews, and works on building character.” Sofer suggests that those who want to honor Frammartino's memory “might want to support this camp that works to mitigate the evil brought by those who duped and killed their son.”
(3) Even if he was a political extremist, all accounts portray Frammartino as a gentle soul. If so, that only confirms how much out of depth he was in Jerusalem. As Calev Ben-David points out, also in the Jerusalem Post, his death is a reminder “that outsiders who come to this region, even with the best of intentions, should first understand that they, no less than Israelis - or, for that matter, those in the Arab world who truly want peace – can just as easily fall victim to those here who have only the worst of intentions.”
(4) Put more cruelly, given Frammartino’s idiotic views (“I never dreamed of condemning resistance”), had he survived his knifing, perhaps surviving in a state of total bodily paralysis, would he have seen the attack on him as terrorism? Or would he have learned nothing and still considered it an act of legitimate self-defense?
Front Page Mag
08.29.2006
Monday, August 28, 2006
Prozac And Extra-Thick Tinfoil Hats
Sometimes sorting through the news of the day, one gets that same vague sense of unease one gets when one realizes he has just struck up a conversation with a stranger whose elevator doesn't go all the way to the top floor.
If you live in a big city, you probably have experienced it on a bus, or on a street corner, in an encounter with a homeless person, or some similar situation.
At first, everything seems ok, but then, as it dawns on you the person you are talking to isn't completely in touch with reality, the hairs stand up on the back of your neck a little.
You wonder just how nuts the person is . . . will they suddenly start shouting in your face, maybe even turn violent? It's usually just a fleeting feeling, but it is disconcerting, to say the least.
I've been getting that same feeling of late as I analyze current events . . . a vague, discomfiting sense that everybody is on Prozac but me, and I am bumping into them just as their meds are starting to wear off.
I don't know. You tell me.
When the Israeli-Hezbollah conflict was at its zenith, as bombs and rockets were raining down on both sides, France stepped up to the plate with a plan to create a buffer force that would patrol the Israeli-Lebanese border as part of the UN's overall cease-fire plan.
The French pressed the UN ceasefire plan by promising to take the lead in providing troops, making an initial commitment of at least four thousand, together with a promise to head up the overall peacekeeping effort. Then, suddenly, they backtracked, saying they'd only contribute 200 men to what was supposed to be a 15,000 man force.
It was like Paris collectively took another Prozac. A few days later, as the Prozac reached its half-life, Paris doubled its offer, to 400.
Then, as the last dose of medication started to wear off, they upped their commitment to 2,000. It makes one wonder if, when Paris takes its next happy pill, they'll suddenly forget what they were doing and order their forces to join the Hezbollah side and invade Israel or something.
Then there is the UN's Kofi Annan. Hezbollah invades Israel and kidnaps Israeli soldiers to hold as hostages, and Kofi Annan puts on HIS tinfoil hat to protect him from Israeli thought-control beams before blaming Israel for putting its soldiers too close to Hezbollah's reach.
Then he accuses Israel of war crimes for retaliating against a Hezbollah action that, according to the UN's own international conventions, IS a war crime.
He takes another Prozac and says Hezbollah started it.
When THAT dose wears off, he rethinks his statement. Kofi suddenly realizes that Lebanon is really an innocent victim of Israeli aggression -- as if Hezbollah and Lebanon were two entirely different entities on opposite sides of the planet.
Kofi speaks into existence a 15,000 man peacekeeping force and then rushes Israel into withdrawing, as if the force was already there. And, even when the force is in place, Kofi says they have no UN mandate to disarm Hezbollah. How's that again?
Without any troops, with no defined mission, no logistical system and no idea who will be in charge, Kofi starts demanding Israel provide a timetable for withdrawal, saying in advance that Israel's unspoken timetable is unsatisfactory.
All the while citing existing UN resolutions requiring the disarmament of Hezbollah as the justification for demanding an Israeli withdrawal as if, somehow, Israel was violating it by trying to disarm Hezbollah.
Another Prozac -- and now Israel is in hot water for trying too hard.
As the warm, Prozac-induced fuzziness takes hold, Annan explains that Israel has violated the 'principle of proportionality' and then he pretends that such a principle is a globally understood principle of warfare.
The rest of the members of the Security Council put on their tinfoil hats and claim the United States is under the influence of Israeli thought control beams.
To rectify this problem, John Bolton is immediately ordered by Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice to put on his tinfoil hat, and presto!
"Shazzam," says Bolton. "I must confer with the UN's Human Rights Council."
Bolton wears his winter model, made of extra-thick tinfoil that prevents him from being affected by the June 20 Human Rights Council declaration that makes reviewing Israeli human-rights violations a PERMANENT feature of every Human Rights Council session.
Bolton's special tinfoil hat enables him to look past the fact that Israel's permanent referral is the ONLY mandate that has no year of expiration.
After conferring with Russia, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and Pakistan -- bastions of human rights and champions of human dignities all -- double-hatted John Bolton concludes:
"Israel has violated the internationally recognized principle of proportionality in warfare. Something must be done!"
Now that 'something' has been done -- a phantom UN peacekeeping force consisting of nobody and designed to protect Hezbollah from the UN's resolution ordering its disarmament, it is time to tackle the other nagging, but clearly less important problem of the day.
What to do about a mad nuclear-armed dictator that sees the destruction of Israel as his religious obligation?
The Russians (who don't need tinfoil hats) who voted in favor of the UN's legally-binding deadline of August 31 for Iran to either give up their nuclear weapons program or face sanctions, declared that they will reject whatever sanctions the UN imposes, despite Iran's refusal to give up their Russian-supplied nuclear materials.
Moscow explains that the best way to prevent Mahmoud Imadinnerjacket from pursuing his lifelong goal of bringing about the Islamic messiah by starting a nuclear war is to continue the path of negotiations until Iran tests its first working nuclear weapon.
The Security Council expressed surprise that such a bastion of human rights and global cooperation as Moscow would reverse itself so abruptly.
Why would Moscow, who built Iran's nuclear reactors -- over global objections -- and with billions of dollars to lose if Iran gives them up -- not want to put pressure on Iran to get Tehran to cut loose Moscow's cash cow?
Why? Why? And what to do now?
There is only one thing they CAN do. And thankfully, the Security Council is up to the task. It directs Kofi Annan to ask John Bolton to recommend his hat-maker.
Kofi then instructs everyone else to double their Prozac until the extra-thick tinfoil hats can be constructed by contented Chinese concentration camp inmates who joyfully leap at the opportunity to help out.
In the meantime, Cuba and Saudi Arabia will monitor Israel to make sure they don't violate Palestinian human rights by interfering with Hamas when they fire their home-made rockets into Israeli day care centers.
Now everybody is on the same page except Israel.
Somehow -- and I don't know how they did it yet -- Hezbollah managed to sneak into Jerusalem, kidnap Ehud Olmert and his entire cabinet, and surgically implant tinfoil hats on each of them before sneaking them back into the country, each equipped with a flesh colored intravenous Prozac drip prescribed by that humanitarian pediatrician, Doctor Ayman al Zawahiri.
So equipped, the Israeli cabinet voted to withdraw Israeli forces before things get out of hand and they accidently disarmed Hezbollah or killed all the innocent Lebanese Hezbollah fighters dedicated to Israel's destruction.
THAT would give Israel nothing to do tomorrow.
The rest of Israel's citizens, unable to get their tinfoil hats on over the helmets they wear to protect themselves from incoming Hezbollah rockets, head back to their bomb shelters to see if the Tooth Fairy left any Prozac under their pillows.
Alas, there is now a global shortage of Prozac, but the UN offers to send in enough RU-486 for everybody except the Israeli Arabs.
Makes sense to me.
"Hey, you got any more Prozac? I'm not Jewish."
By Jack Kinsella - Omega Letter Editor
If you live in a big city, you probably have experienced it on a bus, or on a street corner, in an encounter with a homeless person, or some similar situation.
At first, everything seems ok, but then, as it dawns on you the person you are talking to isn't completely in touch with reality, the hairs stand up on the back of your neck a little.
You wonder just how nuts the person is . . . will they suddenly start shouting in your face, maybe even turn violent? It's usually just a fleeting feeling, but it is disconcerting, to say the least.
I've been getting that same feeling of late as I analyze current events . . . a vague, discomfiting sense that everybody is on Prozac but me, and I am bumping into them just as their meds are starting to wear off.
I don't know. You tell me.
When the Israeli-Hezbollah conflict was at its zenith, as bombs and rockets were raining down on both sides, France stepped up to the plate with a plan to create a buffer force that would patrol the Israeli-Lebanese border as part of the UN's overall cease-fire plan.
The French pressed the UN ceasefire plan by promising to take the lead in providing troops, making an initial commitment of at least four thousand, together with a promise to head up the overall peacekeeping effort. Then, suddenly, they backtracked, saying they'd only contribute 200 men to what was supposed to be a 15,000 man force.
It was like Paris collectively took another Prozac. A few days later, as the Prozac reached its half-life, Paris doubled its offer, to 400.
Then, as the last dose of medication started to wear off, they upped their commitment to 2,000. It makes one wonder if, when Paris takes its next happy pill, they'll suddenly forget what they were doing and order their forces to join the Hezbollah side and invade Israel or something.
Then there is the UN's Kofi Annan. Hezbollah invades Israel and kidnaps Israeli soldiers to hold as hostages, and Kofi Annan puts on HIS tinfoil hat to protect him from Israeli thought-control beams before blaming Israel for putting its soldiers too close to Hezbollah's reach.
Then he accuses Israel of war crimes for retaliating against a Hezbollah action that, according to the UN's own international conventions, IS a war crime.
He takes another Prozac and says Hezbollah started it.
When THAT dose wears off, he rethinks his statement. Kofi suddenly realizes that Lebanon is really an innocent victim of Israeli aggression -- as if Hezbollah and Lebanon were two entirely different entities on opposite sides of the planet.
Kofi speaks into existence a 15,000 man peacekeeping force and then rushes Israel into withdrawing, as if the force was already there. And, even when the force is in place, Kofi says they have no UN mandate to disarm Hezbollah. How's that again?
Without any troops, with no defined mission, no logistical system and no idea who will be in charge, Kofi starts demanding Israel provide a timetable for withdrawal, saying in advance that Israel's unspoken timetable is unsatisfactory.
All the while citing existing UN resolutions requiring the disarmament of Hezbollah as the justification for demanding an Israeli withdrawal as if, somehow, Israel was violating it by trying to disarm Hezbollah.
Another Prozac -- and now Israel is in hot water for trying too hard.
As the warm, Prozac-induced fuzziness takes hold, Annan explains that Israel has violated the 'principle of proportionality' and then he pretends that such a principle is a globally understood principle of warfare.
The rest of the members of the Security Council put on their tinfoil hats and claim the United States is under the influence of Israeli thought control beams.
To rectify this problem, John Bolton is immediately ordered by Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice to put on his tinfoil hat, and presto!
"Shazzam," says Bolton. "I must confer with the UN's Human Rights Council."
Bolton wears his winter model, made of extra-thick tinfoil that prevents him from being affected by the June 20 Human Rights Council declaration that makes reviewing Israeli human-rights violations a PERMANENT feature of every Human Rights Council session.
Bolton's special tinfoil hat enables him to look past the fact that Israel's permanent referral is the ONLY mandate that has no year of expiration.
After conferring with Russia, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and Pakistan -- bastions of human rights and champions of human dignities all -- double-hatted John Bolton concludes:
"Israel has violated the internationally recognized principle of proportionality in warfare. Something must be done!"
Now that 'something' has been done -- a phantom UN peacekeeping force consisting of nobody and designed to protect Hezbollah from the UN's resolution ordering its disarmament, it is time to tackle the other nagging, but clearly less important problem of the day.
What to do about a mad nuclear-armed dictator that sees the destruction of Israel as his religious obligation?
The Russians (who don't need tinfoil hats) who voted in favor of the UN's legally-binding deadline of August 31 for Iran to either give up their nuclear weapons program or face sanctions, declared that they will reject whatever sanctions the UN imposes, despite Iran's refusal to give up their Russian-supplied nuclear materials.
Moscow explains that the best way to prevent Mahmoud Imadinnerjacket from pursuing his lifelong goal of bringing about the Islamic messiah by starting a nuclear war is to continue the path of negotiations until Iran tests its first working nuclear weapon.
The Security Council expressed surprise that such a bastion of human rights and global cooperation as Moscow would reverse itself so abruptly.
Why would Moscow, who built Iran's nuclear reactors -- over global objections -- and with billions of dollars to lose if Iran gives them up -- not want to put pressure on Iran to get Tehran to cut loose Moscow's cash cow?
Why? Why? And what to do now?
There is only one thing they CAN do. And thankfully, the Security Council is up to the task. It directs Kofi Annan to ask John Bolton to recommend his hat-maker.
Kofi then instructs everyone else to double their Prozac until the extra-thick tinfoil hats can be constructed by contented Chinese concentration camp inmates who joyfully leap at the opportunity to help out.
In the meantime, Cuba and Saudi Arabia will monitor Israel to make sure they don't violate Palestinian human rights by interfering with Hamas when they fire their home-made rockets into Israeli day care centers.
Now everybody is on the same page except Israel.
Somehow -- and I don't know how they did it yet -- Hezbollah managed to sneak into Jerusalem, kidnap Ehud Olmert and his entire cabinet, and surgically implant tinfoil hats on each of them before sneaking them back into the country, each equipped with a flesh colored intravenous Prozac drip prescribed by that humanitarian pediatrician, Doctor Ayman al Zawahiri.
So equipped, the Israeli cabinet voted to withdraw Israeli forces before things get out of hand and they accidently disarmed Hezbollah or killed all the innocent Lebanese Hezbollah fighters dedicated to Israel's destruction.
THAT would give Israel nothing to do tomorrow.
The rest of Israel's citizens, unable to get their tinfoil hats on over the helmets they wear to protect themselves from incoming Hezbollah rockets, head back to their bomb shelters to see if the Tooth Fairy left any Prozac under their pillows.
Alas, there is now a global shortage of Prozac, but the UN offers to send in enough RU-486 for everybody except the Israeli Arabs.
Makes sense to me.
"Hey, you got any more Prozac? I'm not Jewish."
By Jack Kinsella - Omega Letter Editor
Sunday, August 27, 2006
PA: Kidnappers To Fee Fox Newsmen
The kidnappers of the two Fox News journalists abducted in Gaza City on August 14 have promised to release them unharmed, Palestinian Authority officials said on Saturday night.
According to the officials, the PA has managed to establish contact with the kidnappers, who promised to resolve the affair peacefully.
PA Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh said he had personally received assurances from the kidnappers that the two, reporter Steve Centanni, from the US, and cameraman Olaf Wiig, from New Zealand, would be released unharmed and unconditionally.
PA Interior Minister Said Siam, who is in charge of part of the PA security forces, announced that significant progress had been achieved in efforts to secure the release of the men.
"There are encouraging indications that the two will be released soon," he said, refusing to elaborate.
Ghazi Hamad, a spokesman for the Hamas-controlled PA government, also said that he was "very encouraged" that the two would be released soon. "I believe they will be released soon because of a breakthrough in the negotiations with the kidnappers," he said.
A previously unknown group calling itself the Holy Jihad Brigades claimed responsibility last week for the abduction and issued a three-day ultimatum to the US to release all Muslim prisoners held in America.
However, Hamas officials told The Jerusalem Post that the kidnappers belonged to one of the armed wings of PA President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah party.
The deadline set by the kidnappers passed midday Saturday.
Haniyeh was quoted shortly afterward as voicing optimism on the issue. "There is progress regarding the case of the kidnapped journalists," he said. "There are also promises that they won't be harmed."
Jerusalem Post
08.27.2006
According to the officials, the PA has managed to establish contact with the kidnappers, who promised to resolve the affair peacefully.
PA Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh said he had personally received assurances from the kidnappers that the two, reporter Steve Centanni, from the US, and cameraman Olaf Wiig, from New Zealand, would be released unharmed and unconditionally.
PA Interior Minister Said Siam, who is in charge of part of the PA security forces, announced that significant progress had been achieved in efforts to secure the release of the men.
"There are encouraging indications that the two will be released soon," he said, refusing to elaborate.
Ghazi Hamad, a spokesman for the Hamas-controlled PA government, also said that he was "very encouraged" that the two would be released soon. "I believe they will be released soon because of a breakthrough in the negotiations with the kidnappers," he said.
A previously unknown group calling itself the Holy Jihad Brigades claimed responsibility last week for the abduction and issued a three-day ultimatum to the US to release all Muslim prisoners held in America.
However, Hamas officials told The Jerusalem Post that the kidnappers belonged to one of the armed wings of PA President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah party.
The deadline set by the kidnappers passed midday Saturday.
Haniyeh was quoted shortly afterward as voicing optimism on the issue. "There is progress regarding the case of the kidnapped journalists," he said. "There are also promises that they won't be harmed."
Jerusalem Post
08.27.2006
Saturday, August 26, 2006
In Search Of A Happy Ending...
I understand that the movie 'Old Yeller' is available for sale on DVD. I saw 'Old Yeller' as a kid and it made me cry when Tommy Kirk's character shot Old Yeller at the end. (I thought it was Tim Considine, but was deluged by readers correcting my gaffe)
I think I'll buy it and watch it again. Maybe THIS time, it will have a happy ending. If not, I'll go buy another copy from a different story and try watching that one. Maybe he won't shoot the dog.
If not, there are other stores . . . I know it sounds silly, but if I do it often enough, and talk about how often I do it, I may be offered a job as a UN diplomat.
It sounds like a fun job. Lots of travel, a big expense account, and I understand that the more meaningless your efforts are, the further you can advance up the ladder.
Who knows? If my work is irrelevant enough, I might even get elected Secretary-General where I can help the down-trodden and victimized of this world by rewarding the victimizers and blaming the victims and be the recipient of global accolades for my far-reaching irrelevance.
If not, there's always Disneyland. I hear they have a whole section called Fantasy Land that is evidently dedicated to training UN Secretary-General wannabes.
Or maybe I can enroll in the Mahmoud Ahmadinejad School of Genocidal Cultural Sensitivity. Or the Yasser Arafat Memorial School For Jewish Advancement.
I just want to make the world a better place, and the most expedient method is evidently by helping the Jews make the transition from this Jerusalem to the Big Jerusalem In the Sky.
At the very least, I might get a job offer from Hezbollah or Hamas. Or a nice 'thank you' card from the Big Kahuna himself, Osama bin Laden. . . .
In 1948, the combined forces of the Arab world converged on Israel following her declaration of statehood, vowing to annihilate the infant state while still in its crib.
The UN remained silent, fully expecting the Arab war machine to overrun the unarmed and unorganized Jewish state and put an end to the Jewish Question without having to endure another Adolf Hitler or another world war in order to accomplish it, while keeping a clear conscience in the meantime.
After all, the Germans were Europeans and Europe was much too cultured to countenance another Holocaust on its soil. On the other hand, the attacking forces in this case were all Arab Muslims. And killing Jews is what Arab Muslims do.
Nobody can blame them for that, anymore than one can blame a cat for killing mice. So the UN accepted Israel's declaration, granted it admission to the UN, and sat back to enjoy the fireworks.
To the UN's surprise, the ragtag Israeli Defense Forces beat back the combined armies of Transjordan, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Saudi Arabia and acquired an extra 2000 square miles of territory beyond that granted by the 1947 Partition Plan.
This forced the United Nations to impose a cease-fire on Israel, before the Israelis took over the whole durned Islamic Middle East.
In 1956, a new war between Israel and Egypt's Gamal Abdul Nasser broke out after the armies of Jordan, Egypt and Syria were consolidated under Egyptian leadership in a second effort to eradicate the Jewish State.
Israel's Operation Kadesh, commanded by Moshe Dayan, lasted less than a week; its forces reached the eastern bank of the Suez Canal in about 100 hours, seizing the Gaza Strip and nearly all the Sinai Peninsula.
Panicked, the UN General Assembly imposed a cease fire against Israel, forcing the Jewish State to give back all the territory it had gained during the second war of annihilation against the Jews in the space of eight years.
The hard-headed Israelis refused to surrender to the UN at first. It took several more resolutions and pressure from the United States before Israel withdrew in 1957 to its original, indefensible borders to wait for the next invasion.
Even then, the Jews wouldn't withdraw without security guarantees, so the UN established a United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) to stand between Israel and the Arab world.
It took ten years before the Arab world sufficiently recovered to mount a third attempt to annihilate the Jews.
In June, 1967, when the Arab forces were fully prepared and Cairo has massed sufficient troops along Israel's border, UNEF pulled out and let Jordan, Syria and Egypt have another go at them.
Six days later, Israel had destroyed the Arab Legion's air force, kicked Syria off the Golan Heights, took back all of Jerusalem, threw Jordan out of the West Bank and took the Gaza Strip away from Egypt.
Israel's annexation of Sinai, Gaza, Arab East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Golan Heights, shortened its land frontiers with Egypt and Jordan, removed the most heavily populated Jewish areas from direct Arab artillery range, and temporarily increased its strategic advantages.
Aghast, the United Nations imposed another ceasefire on Israel [Resolution 242] before the Islamic world's war-making abilities were completely destroyed.
In 1973, Egypt tried again, supported by Syria and financed by Saudi Arabia. The sneak attack was scheduled for October 6, as Israeli forces were at home with their families celebrating Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement.
The UN's major powers, including the US, Russians, French and the UK all knew of the attack several days in advance, but, in the spirit of fair play, let Israel discover it when Egyptian and Syrian tanks began rolling over Israel's border cities.
When it became clear that, instead of being finally destroyed, the Israelis had started to win [again] the UN forced another ceasefire and stationed another UN force between Israel and the Arabs to oversee Israeli compliance. [Resolution 338]
The Arab governments finally realized that they couldn't defeat Israel by conventional means, so they went underground, offering material support and training to Islamic terror groups, including Yasser Arafat's al Fatah and later, to Hezbollah.
In the thirty years since, the UN has passed more resolutions 'condemning' Israel, 'deploring' Israel, 'strongly condemning' Israel, imposing conditions on Israel and subsequently 'deeply regretting' Israel for ignoring them than it has against the rest of the world combined.
Twenty-six percent of all UN resolutions passed by the General Assembly since 1948 expressly condemn Israel. Of the 175 resolutions passed between 1948 and 1991, 97 – more than half – were aimed at Israel. Four were against an Arab state.
A month ago, Hamas infiltrated Israeli territory, killing several Israeli soldiers and kidnapping one young Israeli corporal to hold hostage, demanding the release of 1200 Palestinian terrorists held in Israeli jails as ransom.
The following week, Hezbollah invaded from the north, killed eight Israeli soldiers and kidnapped two more, announcing its intention to ransom its hostages for terrorist prisoners held by Israel.
The United Nations approved a document entitled “International Convention Against the Taking of Hostages” in December, 1979. Article 1 of this document defines the crime:
“Any person who seizes or detains and threatens to kill, to injure or to continue to detain another person (hereinafter referred to as the "hostage") in order to compel a third party, namely, a State, an international intergovernmental organization, a natural or juridical person, or a group of persons, to do or abstain from doing any act as an explicit or implicit condition for the release of the hostage commits the offence of taking of hostages ("hostage-taking") within the meaning of this Convention.”
Article 3 expressly gives the state whose citizen was taken hostage carte blanche to do what is necessary to recover such hostages.
“The State Party in the territory of which the hostage is held by the offender shall take all measures it considers appropriate to ease the situation of the hostage, in particular, to secure his release and, after his release, to facilitate, when relevant, his departure.”
Since the UN has not invoked [or even alluded to] its own conventions on hostage taking, one can only conclude that, under UN rules, 1) an Israeli hostage is not a 'person' and, 2) Israel is not a 'state'.
Therefore, Israeli military efforts aimed at recovering its hostages cannot be permitted. Consequently, UN Resolution 1701 imposing an Israeli ceasefire and withdrawal from Lebanon [without its hostages] passed the UN Security Council unanimously.
Secretary Kofi Annan expressed his deep disappointment in the Security Council [read: the United States] for letting Israel run roughshod over the 'innocent' Lebanese (who supplied Hezbollah with both a base of operations and helped them spirit Israeli hostages out of reach.)
Resolution 1701 'tabled' the fate of the hostages until a later time. [No doubt an endless source of comfort and hope for the Israeli hostages and their families]
To ensure a 'lasting peace' Israel must stop killing Hezbollah fighters. [While there are still some left to rearm and regroup]. UNIFIL's mandate to ensure Lebanon's border security was renewed. UNIFIL has been on Lebanon's border for 28 years. It is worth remembering that UNIFIL witnessed the Hezbollah abductions on July 12, but neither prevented NOR REPORTED it.
In its entire 28 year history, UNIFIL has yet to be cited as having prevented a SINGLE cross border incursion into Israeli territory by Hezbollah terrorists.
However, UNIFIL's value as a neutral deterrent force WAS highlighted in 2000. That was when the UN was forced to release photographic evidence of 'dozens' of UNIFIL troops and official UNIFIL vehicles that were PRESENT when Hezbollah kidnapped three other Israeli soldiers.
In that incident, it turned out that Hezbollah fighters were able to get close enough because they were wearing UNIFIL uniforms supplied by Indian elements of the UNIFIL force [in exchange for bribes amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars).
An Indian soldier attached to that UNIFIL unit later testified, "By this stage, there was a big commotion and dozens of UN soldiers from the Indian brigade came around." He testified that they all knew that the men wearing their uniforms were really Hezbollah in disguise.
He also testified that at least four UN soldiers collaborated with Hezbollah, helping them to reach the ambush site and assisted them in locating their IDF targets. When the story broke, Kofi Annan indignantly denied it and refused to investigate or take any action against the UNIFIL soldiers involved.
When Israel discovered the attack had been videotaped by UNIFIL soldiers, it demanded access to it. Kofi Annan and his Special Envoy denied that any videotape existed. Nine months after the kidnapping, July 6, 2001, the UN admitted that it had the videotape but refused to turn it over to Israel.
Kofi Annan demanded a UN 'investigation', which unsurprisingly concluded that there was no evidence that the UNIFIL forces had been bribed, or that the UN had deliberately misled anyone.
Annan nevertheless continued to refuse to let Israel see the tape until after he was forced to by a US Congressional vote [411-4] that tied compliance with Israeli's request to continued US financial support.
In the end, Kofi relented, kinda, but not before doctoring the tape so the perpetrators could not be identified. He also agreed to give the Israelis some, but not all, of the items which the UN had seized from the getaway cars.
On January 29, 2004, the bodies of the murdered Israelis were returned to Israel by Hezbollah, as part of a prisoner exchange.
So clearly, UNIFIL is the PERFECT choice to continue to protect Israel from Islamic terror. Which is why Kofi praised them so profusely in his UN rant following Resolution 1701's unanimous assage.
Resolution 1701 forbids further deployment of 'foreign forces' [like Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Syrian intelligence, etc.] from Lebanon without the consent of Lebanon's government. It forbids the sales or supply of arms and weapons into Lebanon without authorization from Lebanon's government.
Kofi Annan says that should address Israel's concerns about Hezbollah using the ceasefire to rearm itself. And it requires Lebanon's government to obey previous UN resolutions to disarm Hezbollah.
Has anybody ELSE noticed that Hezbollah is an elected PART of Lebanon's government?
As a parting shot, Resolution 1701 “Stresses the importance of, and the need to achieve, a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East, based on all its relevant resolutions including its resolutions 242 (1967) of 22 November 1967 and 338 (1973) of 22 October 1973.”
Strangely, Resolution 1559 calling for the disarmament of Hezbollah and Hamas wasn't mentioned as relevant to "a just and lasting peace."
I could go on, but its too depressing. So I just put Old Yeller in my DVD player. I could use a happy ending.
Jack Kinsella - Omega Letter Editor
08.26.06
I think I'll buy it and watch it again. Maybe THIS time, it will have a happy ending. If not, I'll go buy another copy from a different story and try watching that one. Maybe he won't shoot the dog.
If not, there are other stores . . . I know it sounds silly, but if I do it often enough, and talk about how often I do it, I may be offered a job as a UN diplomat.
It sounds like a fun job. Lots of travel, a big expense account, and I understand that the more meaningless your efforts are, the further you can advance up the ladder.
Who knows? If my work is irrelevant enough, I might even get elected Secretary-General where I can help the down-trodden and victimized of this world by rewarding the victimizers and blaming the victims and be the recipient of global accolades for my far-reaching irrelevance.
If not, there's always Disneyland. I hear they have a whole section called Fantasy Land that is evidently dedicated to training UN Secretary-General wannabes.
Or maybe I can enroll in the Mahmoud Ahmadinejad School of Genocidal Cultural Sensitivity. Or the Yasser Arafat Memorial School For Jewish Advancement.
I just want to make the world a better place, and the most expedient method is evidently by helping the Jews make the transition from this Jerusalem to the Big Jerusalem In the Sky.
At the very least, I might get a job offer from Hezbollah or Hamas. Or a nice 'thank you' card from the Big Kahuna himself, Osama bin Laden. . . .
In 1948, the combined forces of the Arab world converged on Israel following her declaration of statehood, vowing to annihilate the infant state while still in its crib.
The UN remained silent, fully expecting the Arab war machine to overrun the unarmed and unorganized Jewish state and put an end to the Jewish Question without having to endure another Adolf Hitler or another world war in order to accomplish it, while keeping a clear conscience in the meantime.
After all, the Germans were Europeans and Europe was much too cultured to countenance another Holocaust on its soil. On the other hand, the attacking forces in this case were all Arab Muslims. And killing Jews is what Arab Muslims do.
Nobody can blame them for that, anymore than one can blame a cat for killing mice. So the UN accepted Israel's declaration, granted it admission to the UN, and sat back to enjoy the fireworks.
To the UN's surprise, the ragtag Israeli Defense Forces beat back the combined armies of Transjordan, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Saudi Arabia and acquired an extra 2000 square miles of territory beyond that granted by the 1947 Partition Plan.
This forced the United Nations to impose a cease-fire on Israel, before the Israelis took over the whole durned Islamic Middle East.
In 1956, a new war between Israel and Egypt's Gamal Abdul Nasser broke out after the armies of Jordan, Egypt and Syria were consolidated under Egyptian leadership in a second effort to eradicate the Jewish State.
Israel's Operation Kadesh, commanded by Moshe Dayan, lasted less than a week; its forces reached the eastern bank of the Suez Canal in about 100 hours, seizing the Gaza Strip and nearly all the Sinai Peninsula.
Panicked, the UN General Assembly imposed a cease fire against Israel, forcing the Jewish State to give back all the territory it had gained during the second war of annihilation against the Jews in the space of eight years.
The hard-headed Israelis refused to surrender to the UN at first. It took several more resolutions and pressure from the United States before Israel withdrew in 1957 to its original, indefensible borders to wait for the next invasion.
Even then, the Jews wouldn't withdraw without security guarantees, so the UN established a United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) to stand between Israel and the Arab world.
It took ten years before the Arab world sufficiently recovered to mount a third attempt to annihilate the Jews.
In June, 1967, when the Arab forces were fully prepared and Cairo has massed sufficient troops along Israel's border, UNEF pulled out and let Jordan, Syria and Egypt have another go at them.
Six days later, Israel had destroyed the Arab Legion's air force, kicked Syria off the Golan Heights, took back all of Jerusalem, threw Jordan out of the West Bank and took the Gaza Strip away from Egypt.
Israel's annexation of Sinai, Gaza, Arab East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Golan Heights, shortened its land frontiers with Egypt and Jordan, removed the most heavily populated Jewish areas from direct Arab artillery range, and temporarily increased its strategic advantages.
Aghast, the United Nations imposed another ceasefire on Israel [Resolution 242] before the Islamic world's war-making abilities were completely destroyed.
In 1973, Egypt tried again, supported by Syria and financed by Saudi Arabia. The sneak attack was scheduled for October 6, as Israeli forces were at home with their families celebrating Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement.
The UN's major powers, including the US, Russians, French and the UK all knew of the attack several days in advance, but, in the spirit of fair play, let Israel discover it when Egyptian and Syrian tanks began rolling over Israel's border cities.
When it became clear that, instead of being finally destroyed, the Israelis had started to win [again] the UN forced another ceasefire and stationed another UN force between Israel and the Arabs to oversee Israeli compliance. [Resolution 338]
The Arab governments finally realized that they couldn't defeat Israel by conventional means, so they went underground, offering material support and training to Islamic terror groups, including Yasser Arafat's al Fatah and later, to Hezbollah.
In the thirty years since, the UN has passed more resolutions 'condemning' Israel, 'deploring' Israel, 'strongly condemning' Israel, imposing conditions on Israel and subsequently 'deeply regretting' Israel for ignoring them than it has against the rest of the world combined.
Twenty-six percent of all UN resolutions passed by the General Assembly since 1948 expressly condemn Israel. Of the 175 resolutions passed between 1948 and 1991, 97 – more than half – were aimed at Israel. Four were against an Arab state.
A month ago, Hamas infiltrated Israeli territory, killing several Israeli soldiers and kidnapping one young Israeli corporal to hold hostage, demanding the release of 1200 Palestinian terrorists held in Israeli jails as ransom.
The following week, Hezbollah invaded from the north, killed eight Israeli soldiers and kidnapped two more, announcing its intention to ransom its hostages for terrorist prisoners held by Israel.
The United Nations approved a document entitled “International Convention Against the Taking of Hostages” in December, 1979. Article 1 of this document defines the crime:
“Any person who seizes or detains and threatens to kill, to injure or to continue to detain another person (hereinafter referred to as the "hostage") in order to compel a third party, namely, a State, an international intergovernmental organization, a natural or juridical person, or a group of persons, to do or abstain from doing any act as an explicit or implicit condition for the release of the hostage commits the offence of taking of hostages ("hostage-taking") within the meaning of this Convention.”
Article 3 expressly gives the state whose citizen was taken hostage carte blanche to do what is necessary to recover such hostages.
“The State Party in the territory of which the hostage is held by the offender shall take all measures it considers appropriate to ease the situation of the hostage, in particular, to secure his release and, after his release, to facilitate, when relevant, his departure.”
Since the UN has not invoked [or even alluded to] its own conventions on hostage taking, one can only conclude that, under UN rules, 1) an Israeli hostage is not a 'person' and, 2) Israel is not a 'state'.
Therefore, Israeli military efforts aimed at recovering its hostages cannot be permitted. Consequently, UN Resolution 1701 imposing an Israeli ceasefire and withdrawal from Lebanon [without its hostages] passed the UN Security Council unanimously.
Secretary Kofi Annan expressed his deep disappointment in the Security Council [read: the United States] for letting Israel run roughshod over the 'innocent' Lebanese (who supplied Hezbollah with both a base of operations and helped them spirit Israeli hostages out of reach.)
Resolution 1701 'tabled' the fate of the hostages until a later time. [No doubt an endless source of comfort and hope for the Israeli hostages and their families]
To ensure a 'lasting peace' Israel must stop killing Hezbollah fighters. [While there are still some left to rearm and regroup]. UNIFIL's mandate to ensure Lebanon's border security was renewed. UNIFIL has been on Lebanon's border for 28 years. It is worth remembering that UNIFIL witnessed the Hezbollah abductions on July 12, but neither prevented NOR REPORTED it.
In its entire 28 year history, UNIFIL has yet to be cited as having prevented a SINGLE cross border incursion into Israeli territory by Hezbollah terrorists.
However, UNIFIL's value as a neutral deterrent force WAS highlighted in 2000. That was when the UN was forced to release photographic evidence of 'dozens' of UNIFIL troops and official UNIFIL vehicles that were PRESENT when Hezbollah kidnapped three other Israeli soldiers.
In that incident, it turned out that Hezbollah fighters were able to get close enough because they were wearing UNIFIL uniforms supplied by Indian elements of the UNIFIL force [in exchange for bribes amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars).
An Indian soldier attached to that UNIFIL unit later testified, "By this stage, there was a big commotion and dozens of UN soldiers from the Indian brigade came around." He testified that they all knew that the men wearing their uniforms were really Hezbollah in disguise.
He also testified that at least four UN soldiers collaborated with Hezbollah, helping them to reach the ambush site and assisted them in locating their IDF targets. When the story broke, Kofi Annan indignantly denied it and refused to investigate or take any action against the UNIFIL soldiers involved.
When Israel discovered the attack had been videotaped by UNIFIL soldiers, it demanded access to it. Kofi Annan and his Special Envoy denied that any videotape existed. Nine months after the kidnapping, July 6, 2001, the UN admitted that it had the videotape but refused to turn it over to Israel.
Kofi Annan demanded a UN 'investigation', which unsurprisingly concluded that there was no evidence that the UNIFIL forces had been bribed, or that the UN had deliberately misled anyone.
Annan nevertheless continued to refuse to let Israel see the tape until after he was forced to by a US Congressional vote [411-4] that tied compliance with Israeli's request to continued US financial support.
In the end, Kofi relented, kinda, but not before doctoring the tape so the perpetrators could not be identified. He also agreed to give the Israelis some, but not all, of the items which the UN had seized from the getaway cars.
On January 29, 2004, the bodies of the murdered Israelis were returned to Israel by Hezbollah, as part of a prisoner exchange.
So clearly, UNIFIL is the PERFECT choice to continue to protect Israel from Islamic terror. Which is why Kofi praised them so profusely in his UN rant following Resolution 1701's unanimous assage.
Resolution 1701 forbids further deployment of 'foreign forces' [like Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Syrian intelligence, etc.] from Lebanon without the consent of Lebanon's government. It forbids the sales or supply of arms and weapons into Lebanon without authorization from Lebanon's government.
Kofi Annan says that should address Israel's concerns about Hezbollah using the ceasefire to rearm itself. And it requires Lebanon's government to obey previous UN resolutions to disarm Hezbollah.
Has anybody ELSE noticed that Hezbollah is an elected PART of Lebanon's government?
As a parting shot, Resolution 1701 “Stresses the importance of, and the need to achieve, a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East, based on all its relevant resolutions including its resolutions 242 (1967) of 22 November 1967 and 338 (1973) of 22 October 1973.”
Strangely, Resolution 1559 calling for the disarmament of Hezbollah and Hamas wasn't mentioned as relevant to "a just and lasting peace."
I could go on, but its too depressing. So I just put Old Yeller in my DVD player. I could use a happy ending.
Jack Kinsella - Omega Letter Editor
08.26.06
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