|
MEDIA
EUROPEAN UNION REPORT ON RISING
ANTI-SEMITISM
|
Islam's Coming Crusade
->
by
Martin Kramer
(Jerusalem Report/Washington Institute for Near East Policy)
Lebanon's Aftermath
- Editorial, October 27,
2006
Two months after the end of the Middle East's summer war the
good news is that the Israeli-Lebanese border is quiet and looks
as if it may remain so for some time. The bad news is that
neither the small nor the large factors that triggered the
fighting - the abduction of Israeli soldiers by Hamas and
Hizballah, and Iran's new drive for power in the region - have
been alleviated.
Judging from what Israeli raids have been uncovering in
Gaza, Palestinian militants are eager to imitate what they
perceive as Hizballah's success in standing up to the Israeli
army in the villages of southern Lebanon - and Iran's agents are
just as eager to help them. Entering the border zone between
Gaza and Egypt last week for the first time in months, Israeli
forces found some 15 tunnels that they say were being used to
smuggle sophisticated weapons, such as Russian-made Concourse
anti-tank missiles, 122-millimeter Grad rockets, and more than
15 tons of TNT. Firings of Kassam rockets from Gaza at nearby
Israeli towns have continued, along with Israeli raids to
capture or kill the militants behind them.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad continues to harbor one of
the architects of the war, Hamas leader Khaled Meshal, who
ordered the June raid inside Israel that began the fighting.
Now, from his perch in Damascus, he torpedoes attempts by Egypt
and other Arab governments to broker accords to release the
Israeli captive in Gaza and create a more moderate Palestinian
government. (Washington Post)
Eitam: Israel Must Say the Truth, Transfer is Only Way
->
by Ezra
HaLevi
Sep
21, '06 / 28 Elul 5766
"MK Effie Eitam (National Union-NRP) has repeated his call for
the State of Israel to consider the transfer of hostile Arabs
from Judea and Samaria."
The Palestinians' True Agenda
-> by Charles Krauthammer (TIME)
- Just about every story you'll see will characterize
Israel's invasion of Gaza as a continuation of the cycle of
violence. This is as false as calling American attacks on
Taliban remnants in Afghanistan part of a cycle of violence
between the U.S. and al-Qaeda.
- The origin of the current wave of violence in Gaza is
very contemporary. It occurred less than one year ago.
Before the eyes of the whole world, Israel left Gaza. Every
Jew, every soldier, every military installation, every
remnant of Israeli occupation was uprooted and taken away.
- What have the Palestinians done with Gaza, the first
Palestinian territory in history to be independent? On the
very day of Israel's final pullout, the Palestinians began
firing rockets out of Gaza into Israeli towns on the other
side of the border, on civilians in the pre-1967 Israel that
the international community recognizes. A thousand rockets
have fallen since.
- Before the withdrawal, attacks across the border could
have been rationalized with the usual Palestinian mantra of
occupation, settlements, and so on. But what can one say
after the withdrawal?
- The logic for those continued attacks is to be found in
the so-called phased plan adopted in 1974 by the Palestine
National Council in Cairo. Realizing that they would never
be able to destroy Israel in one fell swoop, the
Palestinians adopted a graduated plan to wipe out Israel by
accepting any territory given to them and then using that
sanctuary to wage war until Israel is destroyed.
- Gaza is free of occupation, yet Gaza wages war. Why?
Because this war is not about occupation, but about Israel's
very existence.
"Targeted Killing" of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi
-> by Alan Dershowitz
The long overdue killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was brought
about by a "targeted killing." This is the same technique that
has been repeatedly condemned by the international community
when Israel has employed it against terrorists who have murdered
innocent Jews. When Israel targeted the two previous heads of
Hamas, the British foreign secretary said: "targeted killings of
this kind are unlawful and unjustified." Now Great Britain is
applauding the targeted killing of a terrorist who endangered
its soldiers and citizens. There is no real difference between
Zarqawi and terrorist leaders from Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
When the U.S. and British forces have engaged in targeted
killings of terrorists, there have often been collateral deaths
of non-terrorists. Collateral deaths are inevitable when
terrorists hide among civilians and use them as shields. Both
Israel and the U.S. make great efforts to reduce the number of
collateral deaths and injuries but they do not always succeed.
All decent people must insist on a single standard of judging
tactics such as targeted killing. It is nothing short of bigotry
to approve this tactic when used by the U.S. and Great Britain
but to condemn it when it is used by Israel. (Yahoo News)
West Bank Terrorist State: The folly of Israeli
disengagement -
BY R. JAMES WOOLSEY
(former director of CIA)
"What does one say to a good ally who seems determined to
reinforce failure? That the U.S. will pay for the undertaking?
Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was in Washington last
week, where he asked for advice and assistance in financing the
withdrawal of 50,000 to 100,000 Israeli settlers from 90% to 95%
of the West Bank and major portions of Jerusalem, and for the
Israel Defense Forces to be repositioned largely near the
security barrier Israel is constructing. Most Americans are
inclined to believe that such disengagement may be a reasonable
step toward a two-state solution, even if some territorial
disputes remain to be negotiated. It is also widely assumed that
Palestinian hostility to Israel is fueled by despair that can
only be reduced by Israeli concessions. Both assumptions,
however, may be fundamentally flawed...." Monday, May 29,
2006 12:01 a.m. EDT
Palestine on the Brink ->
b
Mortimer B. Zuckerman (New York Daily News)
- Should the West any longer have an interest in
establishing an independent state of Palestine now that
Hamas has virtually transformed Palestine into a terrorist
state that now threatens Jordan and Egypt, as well as
Israel?
- Hamas is not just another nationalist political party.
It is a radical Islamist terrorist group with a totalitarian
DNA. Its leaders continue to support suicide-bombing
terrorism. They describe the random murder of innocent
civilians as a legitimate form of "self-defense."
- According to the Arab newspaper Al Hayat, their
leading terrorist, Mohammed Deif, is even holding
discussions with al-Qaeda. Hamas supported the Popular
Resistance Committee, a terrorist group in Gaza, and
appointed its leader, Jamal Abu Samhadana, as the head of a
new Hamas security force, despite the fact that the PRC
killed three Americans in the Gaza Strip in 2003 - not to
mention dozens of Israelis.
- Hamas is not a democratic government. Yes, it won an
election, but a democracy is defined in practice by
nonviolence, by respect for the rule of law, for minorities,
and for individual rights, by an independent media and
judiciary, and by a reasonable respect for agreements made
by predecessor governments.
- No one who knows the Hamas leaders expects them to
mellow in office. They cannot accept a lasting peace with
Israel because they cannot accept Israel.
- The surprise plan proposed last week by Abbas, giving
Hamas ten days to endorse the establishment of a Palestinian
state alongside Israel, is not to be taken seriously. We
must not allow ourselves to be distracted by Abbas' pathetic
eleventh-hour gambit.
The Gathering Storm over Iran
-> by Nile Gardiner and Joseph Loconte (Boston Globe)
- In October 1938, in the heat of the crisis over German
intervention in Czechoslovakia, Winston Churchill asked:
''Does anyone pretend that preparation for resistance to
aggression is unleashing war?...I declare it to be the sole
guarantee of peace."
- The Allies were not prepared to resist German aggression
at that crucial moment. The result was a policy of
appeasement - the infamous Munich Agreement - which
abandoned Czechoslovakia into Nazi hands.
- In the current standoff with Iran, the West is
approaching what can fairly be described as another Munich
moment. An Islamo-fascist regime is apparently determined to
acquire nuclear weapons, destroy Israel, and extend its
radical ideology.
- What should the U.S. do to avoid another Munich? If the
Security Council fails to confront the Iranian threat,
America must form an international coalition to disarm the
regime, enforcing a range of targeted political and economic
sanctions. It must place the potential use of force squarely
on the table.
Stand
Up for Denmark -
Christopher Hitchens (Slate)
- A small democratic country with an open society, a
system of confessional pluralism, and a free press has been
subjected to a fantastic, incredible, organized campaign of
lies and hatred and violence. And nobody in authority can be
found to state the obvious and the necessary - that we stand
with the Danes against this defamation and blackmail and
sabotage.
- Instead, all compassion and concern is apparently to be
expended upon those who lit the powder trail, and who yell
and scream for joy as the embassies of democracies are put
to the torch in the capital cities of miserable, fly-blown
dictatorships. Let's be sure we haven't hurt the vandals'
feelings.
- Various Islamist groups and regimes have dug deep into
their sense of wit and irony and proposed a trade-off. You
make fun of "our" prophet and we will deny "your" Holocaust.
Only a moral cretin thinks that anti-Semitism is a threat
only to Jews. The memory of the Third Reich is very vivid in
Europe precisely because a racist German regime also
succeeded in slaughtering millions of non-Jews, including
countless Germans, under the demented pretext of extirpating
a nonexistent Jewish conspiracy.
- Not a dollar of Wahhabi money should be allowed to be
spent on opening madrasahs in this country, or in
distributing fundamentalist revisions of the Koran in our
prison system. Not until, at the very least, churches and
synagogues and free-thought libraries are permitted in every
country whose ambassador has bullied the Danes.
Spielberg's Munich - by Gabriel Schoenfeld (900K PDF file)
Copyright 2006 Commentary (February 2006)
Spielberg's film analysis that allows the reader to have some
historic and realistic prospective on the events themselves and
Spielberg's failed attempt to "objectively" depict "true
complexity" of 1972 Olympic Games massacre by palestinian
criminals and its aftermath. Chinese proverb says: "It is hard
to find black cat in the dark room especially when there is no
cat" - Spielberg should have remember that next time and stick
to what he does so well - dinosaurs, ETs, and other
extra-terrestrial encounters. Because hear on our sinful Earth a
murderer is a murderer and people who are hunting such murderers
down and punish them should care less what was in the minds of
such murderers and why they committed their crimes. Especially
"when there is no cat" because it does not matter why...
Don't Repeat the Same Mistakes
"Despite the bitter loss of so many innocent lives in recent
years, there is a feeling of deja vu as our leaders recycle the
same blunders of the past.
We always attain peaks of popularity whenever we make unilateral
concessions. So it was not surprising that Israel was showered
with praise after the Gaza withdrawal. But regrettably,
President Bush was simultaneously elevating Mahmoud Abbas to the
category of a "decent" and "peace-loving" man despite his
determination not to dismantle the terror infrastructure and his
ongoing statements publicly sanctifying suicide bombers as
"martyrs".
What is even more disconcerting is that despite this brief
interlude when the world is not demonizing us, we continue to
undermine our credibility by shooting from the hip, making idle
threats and proclaiming policies which are routinely retracted
under pressure..." -> By Isi Leibler November 21, 2005
The first word:
Stop whispering
"Anglo-Jewry can take pride in its exemplary contribution to
world Jewry and Zionism. From Moses Montefiore's interventions
during the Damascus blood libel, to the Balfour Declaration,
through to the Soviet Jewry protest movement, British Jews
played an important role. The contribution of British immigrants
to Israeli society also sheds luster on Anglo-Jewry... " ->
by Isi Leibler, THE JERUSALEM POST Oct. 19, 2005
Descent into madness
The destruction of Jewish holy places by Arab mobs has
recurred time and again. In September 1996, Palestinian rioters
destroyed a synagogue at Joseph's Tomb in Nablus. In October
2000, Joseph's Tomb burnt down after the Israeli garrison
guarding it was temporarily withdrawn during Palestinian
attacks. It has since been rebuilt by the Palestinian Authority
as a mosque. In October 2000, the ancient synagogue in Jericho
was deliberately torched and completely destroyed, while another
historic synagogue in the city, with an ancient mosaic floor,
was damaged and now lies derelict. Since 1996, Rachel's Tomb
near Bethlehem has been attacked numerous times by Arab snipers,
bombs and Molotov cocktails. When Jerusalem and Hebron were
under illegal Jordanian occupation between 1948 and 1967, Jews
were barred from praying at Judaism's holiest site, Jerusalem's
Western Wall. Jordan also demolished all 58 synagogues in
Jerusalem's Old City and Jewish grave stones were broken and
used to pave roads and Jordanian army latrines..." -> by Melanie
Phillips, September 14, 2005
Can Democracy Stop Terrorism? - F. Gregory Gause
III
Even if democracy were achieved in the Middle East, what kind of
governments would it produce? Based on public opinion surveys
and recent elections in the Arab world, the advent of democracy
there seems likely to produce new Islamist governments that
would be much less willing to cooperate with the United States
than are the current authoritarian rulers. Indeed, there is no
evidence that democracy reduces terrorism. The writer is
Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of
Vermont and Director of its Middle East Studies Program. (Foreign
Affairs)
Preface: "America is no different..." - Lubavitcher Rebbe in
blessed memory, 1940.
Alone at the Dance -
Mortimer B. Zuckerman (U.S. News)
- The Middle East's old diplomatic game of make-believe is
back. The peace process is hopelessly deadlocked, but the
key players pretend otherwise, hoping that wishing will make
it so.
- The Palestinian Authority and its leader, Mahmoud Abbas,
have, once and for all, given in to the gunmen. Abbas
pledged to establish "one authority, one law, and one gun."
He has failed on all counts.
- When radicals threatened to break the cease-fire several
weeks ago, he caved, freeing nine of their jailed gunmen. He
caved again when the radicals threatened to kill Fatah
supporters unless he released another terrorist who had been
firing rockets in Gaza. When Israel gave the PA the names of
militants involved in a February suicide bombing in a Tel
Aviv nightclub, he caved yet again, arresting several, then
releasing them.
- Instead of living up to his promise to keep tabs on a
"Most Wanted" list of 495 terrorists, he tried to slip many
of them in as employees of the Palestinian security forces,
to legitimize and launder their possession of arms so they
could attack again. When Israel provided the names of weapon
smugglers, Abbas's security chiefs tipped them off that the
Israelis were on their trail.
- The incitement of hatred is also still going on. In
print and on broadcast media controlled by the PA - and
subsidized by Europe and the U.S. - Israelis and Jews
continue to be demonized, their murders blatantly
encouraged. Palestinian kids save terrorist cards the way
American kids save baseball cards.
- Israelis rightly ask: What's the point of strengthening
a leader whose popularity is plummeting, who cannot or will
not exert control over terrorists, and who has proved
incapable of carrying out his promises?
- How sad that there is no leader on the other side with a
vision of what a Palestinian state might be and with the
courage to save the PA from being a fig leaf for an
increasingly anarchic terrorist state.
Why Terrorism Works -> Alan
M. Dershowitz (FrontPageMagazine)
- Within a day of the horrific multiple bombings in
London, the G8 announced a $3B grant to the Palestinian
Authority. The symbolism of this connection may be lost on
some Westerners, but it clearly sent a powerful message to
terrorists and potential terrorists: namely, that terrorism
works.
- There were no grants announced to the Tibetans, who have
been occupied more brutally and for a longer period of time
than the Palestinians. The Tibetans, however, have never
resorted to terrorism.
- The PA and its leaders are the godfathers of
international terrorism. Were it not for their employment of
terrorism, the Palestinian cause would today be regarded as
the fifth-rate human rights issue that it rightfully is. But
because the Palestinian leadership has always used terrorism
(from the 1920s on) as the tactic of first resort, their
cause has received worldwide recognition.
- The primary cause of terrorism is not occupation,
humiliation, or desperation. If it were, the Tibetans would
be the greatest terrorists.
- The primary cause of terrorism is that it works.
Terrorism will continue as long as potential terrorists
believe they will benefit from using that tactic.
Defeating Arafat's War: The IDF's Success Against Asymmetric
Warfare - Gerald M.
Steinberg (Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies/Bar-Ilan
University)
- The successful Israeli responses to Palestinian
strategic use of terror and asymmetric warfare are already
being studied by the armed forces of the world's other
democracies.
- At its height, in March 2002, the terror campaign killed
over 140 Israelis in a month, and severely wounded hundreds
more. Palestinian leaders who viewed Israeli society as too
weak to respond with the necessary force, mistakenly assumed
that this carnage would escalate, and Israel would be forced
to retreat and eventually surrender. Instead, by 2004,
terror casualties were reduced to about 100 deaths for the
entire year, and over 80% of attacks were aborted en route,
essentially marking Arafat's defeat.
- This accomplishment can be credited to five key
dimensions, acting together:
- Highly advanced intelligence capabilities;
- Precision-guided weapons for preventive targeted
attacks against terrorists;
- Isolation of the political leaders (Arafat);
- Extensive perimeter defense;
- A motivated and resilient civilian population, which
continues to identify closely with the IDF.
- After generations of Palestinian incitement, violence,
and rejection of any "Zionist" historical rights, the hope
that restrained Israeli responses to war and terror would
lead to political compromise and mutual acceptance remains a
messianic dream.
- When Arafat and his colleagues returned to terrorism to
achieve their goals, they had good reason to believe that
Israeli society was too weak to defend its independence and
core interests. Terror appeared to be the most effective
means of gaining Israeli concessions through international
intervention, and without the need for Palestinian
acceptance of the rights of the Jewish people to sovereign
equality and independence.
- Four years later, the terror groups are in disarray,
Palestinian economic gains achieved under the Oslo framework
are gone, and the political achievements that Arafat
rejected in 2000 are no longer within reach.
Beware the Results of Arab Democracy
- "Nobody wants to confront the obvious about what
long-denied Arab electorates will choose if given the
opportunity to vote. While we should all hail the fact that
people are voting, the tendency in Washington is to ignore
what they're actually voting for.
- Hizballah is the single largest party in Lebanon's
parliament, representing the bulk of a Shi'ite community
that constitutes nearly one-half of Lebanon's population,
and its overwhelming priority is to stop Pax Americana
replacing Pax Syriana.
- In Iraq, the U.S.-backed candidate, Iyad Allawi, won
only 14% of the seats in the National Assembly. A 53%
majority of seats went to Shi'ite Islamists with historic
ties to Iran, and some 42% of the eligible electorate stayed
away from the polls.
- Mubarak's greatest challenge, if Egypt were a genuine
democracy, wouldn't come from the liberal democrats of the
Ayman Nour variety, but from the outlawed Muslim
Brotherhood. The same is probably true in Syria.
- It's highly likely that after July's legislative
elections, Abbas will be answerable to a legislature in
which the combination of Hamas and the more militant element
of Fatah are a majority.
- The idea that democracy will produce an Arab leadership
more in tune with American foreign policy than those
currently in power is a self-serving fantasy. It's not out
of a desire to follow the U.S. example, but because of the
desire to repudiate it and the self-serving local elites it
has long sustained, that much of the Arab world is now
demanding its democratic rights..." -> by - Tony Karon (Ha'aretz)
The writer is a senior editor for TIME.com.
A Tear that is Not Mended: Thoughts of
Mourning - by Rabbi Yisrael Rozen
"A War between Brothers"
Where are we, at the end of seven days of
mourning for the destruction of the land? At
the time that I write this article, the
houses have not yet been destroyed, and
there are no pictures yet of mounds of
rubble from different angles. It can be
assumed that by the time you read this you
will have seen pictures of the "Hiroshima"
type, of overnight destruction, stopping
time in its tracks and turning Zionist
history backwards. I have noted in the past
that in this column I will not dwell on the
personal and family tragedies, which are
being described by the press. My approach is
to look at the community of Yisrael as a
whole, the nation and the society. How have
these events affected us? And what will they
do to us in the future?
My unequivocal answer is that we are in the
midst of a war between brothers! The battle
may have been won in the synagogues of Gush
Katif, but the "war" did not end there. That
is where it started and became stronger.
This is not a war between us – people true
to the settlement of Eretz Yisrael – and the
soldiers and police who wept while they
performed their duties. We are in the midst
of a national cultural war, harsh and
bitter, in an attempt to establish the image
of the country. It is a war between
nationalistic faith and the religion of
liberal democracy, between faith in eternity
and short-sighted gains.
We have described this as a "war of
brothers." Are we really "brothers?"
During the expulsion from the area of Azza
the word "brothers" was used quite often, as
a way of showing how close the two sides
are. However, I want to declare loudly to
the one(s) who make(s) the decisions and all
of his/their advisors, and to all of those
who supported the disengagement and the way
it was forced on the nation: "We are not
brothers!" When one part of the nation
skewers the others on the sword of
democracy, when the leader refuses to appear
before those he expels and look them
straight in the eye (he would not even look
at the reporters when he read a prepared
speech in a stilted way), when a lawyer who
gives bad advice refuses to give details –
and certainly refuses to open a discussion –
about what we will gain from this brutality,
when the political left is willing to
overlook every conceivable kind of
corruption to advance the "holy objective,"
when not a single one of these people finds
it necessary to apologize to the pioneers of
our generation – when this is a picture of
the current situation, I cannot feel any
brotherly love, at least not for the time
being.
We are experiencing a deep national chasm
which was caused not by the rabbis (who were
the group that remained calmest as the
situation developed) but by the process of
reaching the decisions and by the alienated
way that process was carried out. This chasm
is worthy of rending our garments for each
of the twenty-two settlements that was
destroyed. "These are the types of tear that
are never mended... (one who sees) cities of
Yehuda that have been destroyed" [Moed Katan
26a]. Note that the area of Azza is part of
the heritage of Yehuda! A tear that is not
to be mended is a symbol of deep sorrow, a
chasm. In the past, we have been told with
respect to the "Kara'im" that the phrase "einam
mit'achim" – not to be mended – is related
to the word "achim" and means that the sides
do become brothers again.
"Drag the Statue"
I point all of my arrows at one man, who
spoke only in the singular: "I have
decided... I have reached the conclusion...
Believe me... I see what you do not see."
This megalomania must fail! It must and will
collapse, as we have been taught, "falsehood
will not last" [Shabbat 104a]. The lie has
been expressed under a wrapper of
"democracy" for this specific decree,
written and sealed by the king in his
courtyard, with nobody present but his
advisors. I fully expect the Prime Minister
to lose his government by one vote, as a way
of fulfilling the principle of punishment,
"measure for measure."
Many times I have had a dream at night where
a multitude of people have dragged down a
statue of the Prime Minister, pulling it
from its high perch with ropes. The statue
is pulled from the right to the left,
sometimes in one smooth operation and
sometimes in a stop and start process. The
solid statue starts to rock, and it then
falls to the ground accompanied by a roar of
triumph, similar to what happened in Baghdad
two years ago. The chasm that has been
opened in the nation is the deep pit where
the "leader" will fall, as has been written
by the wisest of all men: "One who digs a
hole will fall there, and if one rolls away
a stone it will return" [Mishlei 26:27].
I have no doubt at all that the political
end of the Prime Minister will be at some
faraway outpost, such as "Sedei Boker," as
happened to those who preceded him. I have
no doubt that the images of "Hiroshima" that
he caused with his own hands will pursue him
for the rest of his life, without the need
for any imagined "Pulsa D'Nura" curses. The
flames of the "Nura" are the lava that pours
out of the cracks in the national fracture
that he caused. This is the fire that
swallowed up "their houses... and all the
property" [Bamidbar 16:32, in the Torah
portion of Korach]. It is the fire of
disagreement in the nation, it is the flame
which Nero started in Rome, while his face
remained cold and immovable.
In this week's Torah portion, we read, "You
shall know that it is not because of your
righteousness that G-d gives you this good
land as a heritage, for you are a
stiff-necked people" [Devarim 9:6]. The last
phrase, from the context, appears to mean
something like this: "You do not deserve to
inherit the land, for you are stiff-necked
and you angered the Almighty in the desert."
I suggest that the verse can be understood
literally, in a somewhat surprising way. The
Almighty will give us the land, even if it
is against our will, in spite of how
stiff-necked we are. This is our land –
whether we want it or not!
Dangers Awaiting Israel from the Road Map
Process - Interview with Former Mossad Head
Ephraim Halevy
- David Horovitz (Jerusalem Post)
- If Abu Mazen succeeds, with the help
of the Egyptians and others, in bringing
down the level of violence over a period
of time - a period of several months -
it will be very difficult for Israel to
say that this is unacceptable. There
will be pressure on Israel to begin
negotiating within the confines of the
road map - even though, technically
speaking, the steps that were taken in
order to [reduce violence] were not
exactly the steps which were outlined in
the road map.
- I have maintained from the outset
that the road map was an aberration. It
is based not only on UN Resolutions 242
and 338, it also mentions the Saudi
initiative and other resolutions. The
road map itself was approved by the
Security Council....It is not only
accepted by the parties, but is the
official document which is the basis for
the future. And the fact that Israel has
reservations on "14 points" is
immaterial. The 14 points were not
accepted even by the United States.
- The ultimate judgment of whether
Stage A or Stage B [of the road map] has
been obtained is in the hands of the
Quartet, not in the hands of the
parties. This is the beginning of an
imposed solution. The whole structure of
the road map creates an international
forum which sort of adjudicates, it
doesn't just monitor, the situation.
- The concept of the unilateral
disengagement as it was presented was
that unilateral disengagement would
create a new situation which would last
for some time, the assumption being that
the parties were not ripe for final
status negotiations.
EU EXPANSION: implications for Israel
"On 1 May 2004, 10 countries - Latvia,
Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Hungary, the Czech
Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Malta and Cyprus -
joined the European Union.
Inclusion of these countries, many of whom are
former Communist bloc nations, has increased the
EU’s population by 20% to 450 million people and
shifted the Union’s centre of gravity towards
the east. This is the fifth time the EU will
have expanded since Belgium, France, West
Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands
(“The Six”) began the process of European
integration when they placed their coal and
steel production under a single supranational
authority in 1951.
This is by far the largest number of nations to
join the EU at any one time.
The EU expansion has been described by Israeli
Foreign Minister Silvan
Shalom as an “historic event” which may change
EU policy... While EU expansion will
significantly alter the composition of the
Union, the extent to which its policies in the
Middle East and elsewhere will be changed is
unclear.
Though several of the new states have marked
differences in outlook
from the European consensus, the UK, France and
Germany still exert a great amount of influence
on the Union’s policies. In particular, the UK’s
supportive position on Israel, together with the
impact the new states may
have, might bring about a new EU policy towards
Israel. EU Expansion carries the potential for
several positive developments for
Israel in key areas..."
Source:
BICOM, 13
May 2004
AN ANSWER TO THE NEW
ANTI-ZIONISTS: THE
RIGHTS OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE TO A SOVEREIGN STATE
IN THEIR HISTORIC HOMELAND
"Although Israel won its existence more than
fifty years ago, a new and insidious critique
has begun to spread, attacking anew the
legitimacy of Israel's very establishment as a
Jewish state. The new line does not come from
Tehran or Riyadh but, surprisingly from largely
European intellectuals and certain voices on the
fringe American Left, surfacing recently in
The Guardian and The
New York Review of Books. It proposes the
elimination of Israel and is generally
accompanied by calls to establish a bi-national
Palestinian-Jewish state in its place. The new
anti-Zionists invariably start with the claim
that there are no Jewish rights to sovereignty
in Israel, or that, in any case, Jewish
nationalism is inherently unjust.
..." by
Dore Gold and Jeff Helmreich,
Jerusalem Viewpoints, #507, November 16, 2003
The Forgotten
Refugees: Jews Indigenous To The Middle East
And North Africa
"...after the 1947 Partition vote. [h]undreds of
Jews in Arab Countries were massacred in
government-organized rioting, thousands
injured..." "...the Arab governments - most
notably Iraq, Egypt, Libya, and Syria -
confiscated property from the fleeing Jews..."
The Rage, the Pride and the Doubt
- ORIANA FALLACI Speaks Out
"In Europe your enemies are everywhere, Mr.
Bush. What you quietly call "differences of
opinion" are in reality pure hate. Because in
Europe pacifism is synonymous with
anti-Americanism, sir, and accompanied by the
most sinister revival of anti-Semitism the
anti-Americanism triumphs as much as in the
Islamic world. Haven't your ambassadors informed
you? Europe is no longer Europe. It is a
province of Islam, as Spain and Portugal were at
the time of the Moors. It hosts almost 16
million Muslim immigrants and teems with
mullahs, imams, mosques, burqas, chadors. It
lodges thousands of Islamic terrorists whom
governments don't know how to identify and
control. People are afraid, and in waving the
flag of pacifism--pacifism synonymous with
anti-Americanism--they feel protected."
--> From the
WSJ, March 13, 2003
All
The News That's Fit to Print?
"One of the
great myths of modern journalism, particularly
outside the U.S., is that the New York Times
is "pro-Israel." In fact, it would be truer to
say that the opposite is the case.". "If the
Times wanted its readers to gain a better
understanding of what is actually going on in
the Middle East, one could think of other
statistics it could have given. It could have
informed them that 80 percent of Israeli
fatalities have been noncombatants, half of whom
have been female; or that less than 5 percent of
Palestinian fatalities have been female; or that
a much higher proportion of Israeli casualties
than Palestinian casualties have been older
people. All these would be a good indication of
which party is targeting the innocent.". "The chart
itself is fundamentally misleading." "It also
reports suspected Palestinian "collaborators"
killed by their own compatriots as if they had
been killed by Israelis."
--> The New York Times and
Israel by Tom Gross March 14, 2003.
Committee
for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America
(March 6, 2003)
"A pervasive and serious
discrepancy characterizes
the way newspapers describe Palestinian terrorist
attacks against Israeli civilians versus
Israeli
military attacks against terrorists. A review
of headlines
in the Boston Globe, New York Times, USA
Today,
Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Baltimore
Sun,
Los Angeles Times, Boston Herald and the AP
shows
that not one of these headlines identified
the March 5th
Haifa bus bomber as a Palestinian or terrorist,
and that not
one headline communicated that 9 of the dead
were
teenagers or younger, or that the bus was
filled with many
high school and college students. The New York
Times
and Los Angeles Times headlines mention that a
teen was
killed, but only because she was American. The
8 other victims under 18 are given no
attention
in the headlines.
[The victims' names and ages are at the
bottom of the alert.
Go to here for
bios.]
Compare this with the March 6 headlines for
Israel's
military strike against terrorists and their
infrastructure
in Gaza. In newspaper and online article
headlines,
Israel is clearly identified as the
perpetrator in almost
all cases, and the LA Times lists the ages of
Palestinian children killed.
Consistently omitting the words "Palestinian"
and "terrorist" from headlines pertaining to
Palestinian
terrorist attacks, while consistently
including "Israel"
in headlines about Israeli military attacks,
insidiously minimizes Palestinian culpability for
violence and terrorism."
|
