30 January 2008 @ 9:15AM >> “The international media hasn’t been reporting it prominently, so you may or may not know that rockets have been raining down on southern Israel regularly over the past few months — as many as fifty a day.”

8 October 2007 @ 8:58AM >> For years, journalists at the France 2 television network have been refusing to release raw footage in a very important case. Mohammed al-Dura was apparently shot to death by Israeli soldiers in an incident used by Palestinians as a propaganda tool during the wave of terror attacks called the Second Intifada. But France 2 employed a Palestinian cameraman whose reliability was called into question after additional investigation revealed inconsistencies in the way the story was portrayed. Did he tape a staged murder intended to be used in a propaganda campaign? Or was al-Dura really killed by Israeli soldiers?

The answer may lie in France 2’s raw footage from that day, which the network has been fighting to keep secret all these years:

It has been seven years since France 2 Television broadcast the excruciating footage of Mohammed [al-Dura] and his father, Jamal, crouching in terror behind a barrel in Gaza’s Netzarim Junction while, according to the report, under relentless fire from [Israeli Defense Forces] soldiers. The 59-second clip, which ends with the boy apparently shot dead, was presented around the world as an unambiguous case of Israeli savagery.

The tape fanned the flames of what became known as the second intifada. The boy Mohammed was the iconic martyr, his name and face gracing streets, parks and postage stamps across the Arab world. His memory was invoked by Osama bin Laden in a jihadist screed against America, and in the ghastly video of the beheading of American Jewish journalist, Daniel Pearl.

Shortly following the al-Dura incident, however, a series of inquiries cast grave doubt on the accuracy of the original France 2 report. The official IDF investigation concluded that, based on the position of IDF forces vis-a-vis the Duras, it was highly improbable, if not impossible, that an Israeli bullet hit the boy. Research by The Atlantic Monthly, The New Republic and Commentary magazine concurred. Then a German documentary revealed inconsistencies and probable manipulations in the account of France 2’s lone journalist on the scene that day, Palestinian cameraman Talal Abu Rahmeh.

And yet France 2 refused to release Abu Rahmeh’s full 27 minutes of raw footage. It did, however, agree to let three prominent French journalists view the footage. All three concluded that it comprised blatantly staged scenes of Palestinians being shot by Israeli forces, and that France 2’s Jerusalem Bureau Chief Charles Enderlin had lied to conceal that fact.

Regardless of what’s on that tape, it is distressing that a television station will not release it. Call me naive, but I thought the purpose of the media was to show what happened, not to hide it.

17 September 2007 @ 10:16AM >> Did nuclear material make it from North Korea to Syria, destined for detonation in Israel?

An article published in London’s Sunday Times yesterday makes it seem like a distinct possibility:

IT was just after midnight when the 69th Squadron of Israeli F15Is crossed the Syrian coast-line. On the ground, Syria’s formidable air defences went dead. An audacious raid on a Syrian target 50 miles from the Iraqi border was under way.

At a rendezvous point on the ground, a Shaldag air force commando team was waiting to direct their laser beams at the target for the approaching jets. The team had arrived a day earlier, taking up position near a large underground depot. Soon the bunkers were in flames.

Ten days after the jets reached home, their mission was the focus of intense speculation this weekend amid claims that Israel believed it had destroyed a cache of nuclear materials from North Korea.

[...]

“This was supposed to be a devastating Syrian surprise for Israel,” said an Israeli source. “We’ve known for a long time that Syria has deadly chemical warheads on its Scuds, but Israel can’t live with a nuclear warhead.”

An expert on the Middle East, who has spoken to Israeli participants in the raid, told yesterday’s Washington Post that the timing of the raid on September 6 appeared to be linked to the arrival three days earlier of a ship carrying North Korean material labelled as cement but suspected of concealing nuclear equipment.

The target was identified as a northern Syrian facility that purported to be an agricultural research centre on the Euphrates river. Israel had been monitoring it for some time, concerned that it was being used to extract uranium from phosphates.

[...]

Washington was rife with speculation last week about the precise nature of the operation. One source said the air strikes were a diversion for a daring Israeli commando raid, in which nuclear materials were intercepted en route to Iran and hauled to Israel. Others claimed they were destroyed in the attack.

There is no doubt, however, that North Korea is accused of nuclear cooperation with Syria, helped by AQ Khan’s network. John Bolton, who was undersecretary for arms control at the State Department, told the United Nations in 2004 the Pakistani nuclear scientist had “several other” customers besides Iran, Libya and North Korea.

Some of his evidence came from the CIA, which had reported to Congress that it viewed “Syrian nuclear intentions with growing concern”.

“I’ve been worried for some time about North Korea and Iran outsourcing their nuclear programmes,” Bolton said last week. Syria, he added, was a member of a “junior axis of evil”, with a well-established ambition to develop weapons of mass destruction.

The links between Syria and North Korea date back to the rule of Kim Il-sung and President Hafez al-Assad in the last century. In recent months, their sons have quietly ordered an increase in military and technical cooperation.

4 April 2007 @ 8:59AM >> Just last year, Yale University was engaged in what it portrayed as a valiant fight against discrimination. You see, the school wanted to receive federal tax dollars, but it did not want the federal government’s military recruiters to have the same access to graduating students that private companies have.

Their rationale was that the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy enacted by the Clinton Administration voilated the school’s non-discrimination policy by preventing gays from serving openly in the military. But rather than stand on principle and reject the federal funding, the school wanted to take the money and to tell the military to take a hike at the same time. So Yale fought the government all the way up to the Supreme Court (and lost).

Still, let’s give Yale the benefit of the doubt and assume that they really are concerned with discrimination. If that’s the case, then why is Yale thinking of opening up a satellite campus in the United Arab Emirates? Not only is it a country that won’t even allow Israeli citizens to set foot within its borders, but it bans homosexuality by law. In the U.A.E., gays are arrested, imprisoned, subject to therapy and even hormone treatments.

Certainly, that’s quite a bit more discriminatory than the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, but standing on principle against the U.A.E. is apparently not nearly as satisfying to the folks running Yale as grandstanding against the U.S. military. Hence the school’s evasive explanation for why it is proceeding with its plan. The Yale Daily News reports:

Other universities have been wary of dealing with the United Arab Emirates. The University of Connecticut’s plans to open a satellite campus in Dubai were set aside recently because of concerns about discrimination against Israeli citizens.

[Deputy Provost Barbara] Shailor said Yale is taking these concerns seriously, but that they have not stopped the University from moving forward with its talks with Abu Dhabi’s government.

“There are lots of issues,” Shailor said. “Certainly if you think about our interactions with China or with India, one could express some more concerns across the board. So what one would do is to look at all of these concerns, see exactly to what extent they seem to be justified, and then to weigh the positive aspects of having a relationship and building a relationship with not having a relationship.”

Well, at least now we know the truth: Yale doesn’t give a damn about discrimination. They just wanted an excuse to give the middle finger to our military.

16 January 2007 @ 11:19AM >> As president in the late 1970s, Jimmy Carter was a leader of legendary impotence. For the last 444 days of his presidency, Islamic revolutionaries in Iran held Americans hostage in the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. According to the hostages, one of those terrorists was a man named Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Today, Ahmadinejad is the president of Iran. And Jimmy Carter is an apologist for terrorists. In his new book, which compares the state of Israel to the segregationist apartheid regime that once ruled South Africa, Carter writes:

It is imperative that the general Arab community and all significant Palestinian groups make it clear that they will end the suicide bombings and other acts of terrorism when international laws and the ultimate goals of the Roadmap for Peace are accepted by Israel.

In other words, keep those attacks coming until Israel does what is demanded by “the general Arab community and all significant Palestinian groups.”

I can only imagine that by venturing into the territory of pure wingnuttery, Carter’s book is part of some elaborate scheme to make the foreign policy of his administration seem sensible by comparison.

19 October 2006 @ 8:22AM >> Reporters often spout noble-sounding platitudes when defending decisions to publish sensitive national security information, but at the BBC, “the public’s right to know” is apparently not absolute:

The BBC has spent thousands of pounds of licence payers’ money trying to block the release of a report which is believed to be highly critical of its Middle East coverage.

The corporation is mounting a landmark High Court action to prevent the release of The Balen Report under the Freedom of Information Act, despite the fact that BBC reporters often use the Act to pursue their journalism.

The action will increase suspicions that the report, which is believed to run to 20,000 words, includes evidence of anti-Israeli bias in news programming.

The court case will have far reaching implications for the future working of the Act and the BBC. If the corporation loses, it will have to release thousands of pages of other documents that have been held back.

Like all public bodies, the BBC is obliged to release information about itself under the Act. However, along with Channel 4, Britain’s other public service broadcaster, it is allowed to hold back material that deals with the production of its art, entertainment and journalism.

In Britain, anyone with a television must pay an involuntary tax—the “license fee”—in order to fund the BBC and other outlets. It’s too bad the BBC doesn’t think those taxpayers have a right to know how their money is being spent.

18 October 2006 >> Several months after Reuters cameraman Adnan Hajj was caught doctoring photos to make an Israeli air strike look broader than it actually was, another Reuters cameraman has been arrested for apparently inciting Arab rioters to attack Israeli vehicles:

The cameraman, Imad Muhammad Intisar Boghnat, was arrested and charged as a result of violent riots in the Arab village of Bil’in, in the Modi’in region, on October 6, 2006. A videotape that the prosecution presented to the judge shows Boghnat encouraging and directing rioters in Bil’in to throw large chunks of rock at Israeli vehicles in such a way as to cause maximum damage. The accused is heard shouting, “Throw, throw!” and later, “Throw towards the little window!”

Boghnat is a resident of Bil’in, so it can be assumed that he either sympathized with the rioters or was attempting to stage the event for maximum visual impact, a tactic that isn’t a new phenomenon among the establishment media.

Either way, Reuters needs to take a serious look at the people it hires to cover events in the Middle East.

28 August 2006 @ 2:02PM >> Item 1: Despite the fact that a previous U.N. resolution ordered the disarmament of all non-governmental militias in Lebanon, Secretary General Kofi Annan says that the U.N. will not disarm Hizbollah. “Troops are not going in there to disarm — let’s be clear,” the U.N. leader said. Lebanon’s army is expected to disarm Hizbollah, the U.N. says, even though Lebanon’s own president says that his government will do no such thing. So, in other words, Israel settled for a cease-fire in which the U.N. gives Hizbollah more leeway than it had before the war. Talk about snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

Item 2: A United Nations group called UNIFIL, the same group whose positions were used by Hizbollah to launch rockets into Israel, broadcast real-time Israeli troop and armaments movements during the recent war. Oddly, the U.N. group offered no such level of detail about Hizbollah’s operations, even though Hizbollah has a history of operating within several yards of UNIFIL. Anyone with an Internet connection could find this treasure-trove of military intelligence, but the information was really only valuable to people interested in fighting the Israeli army. Who wants to bet that UNIFIL is in Hizbollah’s bookmarks folder?

Long ago, the United Nations passed the point of being a joke. Now it’s a tragedy.

27 August 2006 @ 11:37AM >> Here’s what you’ll find at the Holocaust International Cartoon Contest exhibition currently being held in the Iranian capital:

There is [...] a drawing of a Jew with a very large nose, a nose so large, in fact, that it obscures his entire head. Across his chest is the word “Holocaust.” Another drawing shows a vampire, wearing a big Star of David, drinking the blood of Palestinians. A third shows Ariel Sharon dressed in a Nazi uniform, emblazoned not with swastikas, but with the Star of David.

The show’s curator is quoted as saying, “It is not that we are against a specific religion...”

Of course you’re not.

16 August 2006 >> Think there aren’t any supporters of terrorism right here in the United States? Think again.

Unfortunately, this scene is quite familiar to me.

7 August 2006 @ 4:03PM >> Congratulations to Little Green Footballs and the blogosphere in general for once again exposing fraud in the establishment media.

Over the weekend, the Reuters news service—the one that wouldn’t allow the term terrorist to be used when describing the perpetrators of the September 11th attacks—was caught running a doctored photo that tried to make Israeli airstrikes on Hizbollah look broader and more devastating than they actually were.

In one picture, Reuters photographer Adnan Hajj used image manipulation software to make a plume of smoke look much larger. The fake smoke covered nearly the entire frame of the picture, making it appear as if a wider attack had taken place.

The obvious manipulation of that picture led bloggers to start checking other Reuters photos that carried Hajj’s byline. It turns out, this guy’s been busy. Another suspicious photo shows an Israeli military plane launching what are labeled as “missiles.” Three such missiles are shown, although evidence suggests that (1) they are simply flares designed to confuse Hizbollah’s anti-aircraft weaponry, and (2) there was only one such flare in the photograph, but it was replicated twice to make the image look more menacing.

The hyping of Israeli “atrocities” that aren’t seems to be a bit of a pattern in the media. Hizbollah’s propaganda machine is quite effective at getting its message out through the supposedly skeptical editors of the Western media. Hizbollah agents parade dead bodies in front of eager cameramen for the likes of Reuters, and the Western media laps it up and broadcasts it around the world without question.

It’s bad enough that an outfit like Reuters can’t even recognize terrorism for what it is, but it is shameful that Reuters allows itself to be used by terrorists as they try to win the propaganda war. I hope the Western media are simply dupes. To think that they are willing accomplices is simply too depressing.

3 August 2006 @ 5:05PM >> One might even say it’s the final solution:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Thursday the solution to the Middle East crisis is to destroy Israel. In a speech during an emergency meeting of Muslim leaders, Ahmadinejad also called for an immediate halt to fighting in Lebanon between Israel and the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah.

“Although the main solution is for the elimination of the Zionist regime, at this stage an immediate cease-fire must be implemented,” he said.

So, in other words, the purpose of a cease-fire is just to buy time until “the Zionist regime” can be eliminated. Iran would annihilate Israel today if it could, but it takes time to build a nuke. So the only purpose of a cease-fire would be to protect what remains of Hizbollah; after all, Iran might need them again in the future.

Ahmadinejad, who has drawn international condemnation with previous calls for Israel to be wiped off the map, said the Middle East would be better off “without the existence of the Zionist regime.”

Actually, the Middle East would be much better off if there were more countries like Israel, the region’s only stable, functioning democracy where Jews and Muslims are even allowed to serve side-by-side in the legislature.

Ahmadinejad disagrees. To him, the world simply needs more jihad.

---

Note: A point in this post has been clarified since it was initially written.

1 August 2006 >> Apparently, Israel’s vigorous war against Hizbollah has weakened Iran’s ability to act in the region. At least that’s what some in Tehran think, according to The New York Times:

In the past, Iran believed that Israel might pause before attacking it because they would assume Hezbollah would assault the northern border. If Hezbollah emerges weaker, or restrained militarily because of domestic politics, Iran feels it may be more vulnerable.

“This was God’s gift to Israel,” said Nasser Hadian, a political science professor at Tehran University and an expert in Iranian foreign policy. “Hezbollah gave them the golden opportunity to attack.”

He said that Iran does not have the military ability at home to fight an aggressive offensive war against Israel from so far away. He said its only offensive tool would be a missile, which he said would be of limited effect and accuracy.

My first reaction is: good.

My second reaction is, an Iranian missile today might only be “of limited effect and accuracy.” But an Iranian missile in a few years, tipped with nuclear material, would be a different story. With a nuke, the missiles don’t have to be terribly accurate to have the intended effect, and that effect would most certainly not be “limited.”

31 July 2006 @ 11:52AM >> Apropos of this post from last week, here are pictures showing how Hizbollah uses residential areas to launch attacks:

The images, obtained exclusively by the Sunday Herald Sun, show Hezbollah using high-density residential areas as launch pads for rockets and heavy-calibre weapons.

Dressed in civilian clothing so they can quickly disappear, the militants carrying automatic assault rifles and ride in on trucks mounted with cannon.

The photographs, from the Christian area of Wadi Chahrour in the east of Beirut, were taken by a visiting journalist and smuggled out by a friend.

[...]

The images include one of a group of men and youths preparing to fire an anti-aircraft gun metres from an apartment block with sheets hanging out on a balcony to dry.

Others show a militant with AK47 rifle guarding no-go zones after Israeli blitzes.

Another depicts the remnants of a Hezbollah Katyusha rocket in the middle of a residential block blown up in an Israeli air attack.

The Melbourne man who smuggled the shots out of Beirut and did not wish to be named said he was less than 400m from the block when it was obliterated.

“Hezbollah came in to launch their rockets, then within minutes the area was blasted by Israeli jets,” he said.

“Until the Hezbollah fighters arrived, it had not been touched by the Israelis. Then it was totally devastated.

“It was carnage. Two innocent people died in that incident, but it was so lucky it was not more.”

The release of the images comes as Hezbollah faces criticism for allegedly using innocent civilians as “human shields”.

28 July 2006 @ 8:54AM >> Earlier this week, four U.N. officials were killed in Lebanon by an apparent Israeli airstrike. Within hours of the event, U.N. Secretary Kofi Annan announced his belief that Israel had deliberately targeted the U.N. personnel. Annan demanded that “any further attack on U.N. positions and personnel must stop.”

Yesterday, strong evidence came to light suggesting that Hizbollah was effectively using the U.N. position as a shield, conducting attacks against Israel, knowing that any Israeli response was likely to hit the U.N. post. The New York Sun reports that one of the U.N. officials killed in the attack had earlier sent e-mails saying that Hizbollah was “all over” his position. The recipient of those e-mails, a former major-general in the Canadian military named Lewis MacKenzie, described their contents:

“What he was telling us was Hezbollah fighters were all over his position and the IDF were targeting them, and that’s a favorite trick by people who don’t have representation in the U.N. They use the U.N. as shields knowing that they cannot be punished for it.”

To Hizbollah, civilians and U.N. positions are strategic assets. The terrorist group routinely launches attacks from residential areas and near U.N. posts. Hizbollah knows that this puts Israel in a bind: if Israel decides to respond, that response will provide a tear-jerking scene for the evening news where the headline will be “Israeli Bomb Kills Civilians,” or “U.N. Officials Killed in Israeli Airstrike.” But if Israel backs down out of a fear of how the media will report the story, then Hizbollah gets a safe haven where they can launch attacks with impunity. Hizbollah wins either way, with a propaganda victory or a military one.

Of course, to any fair-minded person, it is obvious that Hizbollah bears the responsibility for the deaths of those U.N. officials. It’s too bad the U.N. doesn’t have a leader who understands that.

24 July 2006 @ 12:45PM >> If John Kerry were president, peace would magically descend on the Middle East:

U.S. Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., who was in town Sunday [...], took time to take a jab at the Bush administration for its lack of leadership in the Israeli-Lebanon conflict.

“If I was president, this wouldn’t have happened,” said Kerry [...]

Sure. Simply by being inside the Oval Office for an extended period of time, the mere presence of John Kerry’s superior intellect would bring about a peace that had eluded the region for generations.

I’m surprised Kerry’s ego hasn’t yet acquired enough mass to become visible to the naked eye.

22 May 2006 @ 7:31PM >> A few links worthy of reading:

• The website TimesWatch says that New York Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger apologized to graduates of SUNY New Paltz for failing to stop the Iraq war. (And here I was naively thinking that the purpose of a newspaper was to report the news, not to prevent the implementation of American foreign policy.)
• German magazine Der Spiegel reports that Latin America is becoming increasingly dominated by organized crime.
• According to this report from ABC News, the Palestinian Territories may be on the verge of civil war.
• The London Times reports that al Qaeda is specifically targeting Christian children for kidnapping. The children are then sold into domestic slavery and the sex trade, with al Qaeda pocketing the profits.
• As the Mexican government threatens to sue the United States for enforcing immigration laws, it is banning non-Mexicans from being employed within the country.
• Meanwhile, nearly 15% of the Mexico’s labor force is now working within the United States.

20 April 2006 @ 10:40AM >> Blogger Meryl Yourish takes an extensive look at the innards of the bombs used by Palestinian suicide bombers. She quotes one article that discusses x-rays of suicide bombing victims:

[Dr. Michael] Messing said one of the victims he saw while in Jerusalem had around 300 individual metallic fragments within his body. The metal fragments, measuring from millimeters to centimeters, were imbedded in the young man literally from head to toe, he said.

“Several of the fragments penetrated into his vital organs. He sustained a punctured colon, a collapsed lung, and a lacerated liver and kidney. I could actually feel the nails under his skin where they had burrowed and lodged,” Messing recalls.

Yourish cites the recent Palestinian suicide bombing in Israel, which killed nine and injured many dozens.

Shrapnel is what killed Phillip Balhasan, who stayed alive long enough to realize his children had survived, and to hug them tightly before he collapsed.

But even this is not enough for the terrorists. They also soak the shrapnel in rat poison, because it causes hemorrhaging — victims may bleed to death before they can get to the hospital.

The new Palestinian government, run by the terrorist group Hamas, actually endorsed the recent suicide bombing, thereby making it clear that terrorism is an official state policy of the Palestinians, something I predicted would happen shortly after the election of the Hamas government. (Terrorism has been an unofficial tactic of Palestinian leaders for years, but for purposes of plausible deniability, the old government of Yassir Arafat never stated it publicly. That’s what kept the aid money coming in.)

Yourish concludes:

Remember all of this, when you hear the world tell Israel to “use restraint” in responding to this attack. [...]

Remember all of this, when Israel is the nation that is demonized by the blind, hateful people who wear checked kaffiyehs at anti-war protests, and call Israel an “apartheid state” for building a separation barrier — to keep out the monsters who would use bombs like I have just described.

Remember this, when you look at the pictures of the results of the bombing, and notice the thousands of dents in the metal surrounding the bombing area — the mark of the ball-bearings and other metal shrapnel.

These are the people with whom the world sympathizes: Those who create and set off the bombs. Not the victims. The bombers.

And that’s the worst evil of all.

I would just correct Ms. Yourish that not all the world sympathizes with Palestinian terrorists. The United Nations does, much of the European Union does, the American left does. But not everyone. There’s still some hope left.

15 April 2006 @ 1:52PM >> I don’t know any other way to interpret these statements, other than to say that Iran will attack Israel with nuclear weapons at the earliest possibility (emphasis added):

The president of Iran again lashed out at Israel on Friday and said it was “heading toward annihilation,” just days after Tehran raised fears about its nuclear activities by saying it successfully enriched uranium for the first time.

[...]

“Like it or not, the Zionist regime is heading toward annihilation,” [Iranian president Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad said at the opening of a conference in support of the Palestinians. “The Zionist regime is a rotten, dried tree that will be eliminated by one storm.”

Ahmadinejad provoked a world outcry in October when he said Israel should be “wiped off the map.”

[...]

On Tuesday, Ahmadinejad announced that Iran had successfully enriched uranium using a battery of 164 centrifuges, a significant step toward the large-scale production of enriched uranium required for either fueling nuclear reactors or making nuclear weapons.

For the last few years, peace-at-all-costs advocates have argued that there is no justification for pre-emptive war. They claim that talk and diplomacy can solve all world crises, and that we should put our trust in the United Nations to do just that.

If ever there were a time for the U.N. worshippers to prove that their cherished institution is of any use at all, this is it. Put up or shut up. Solve this problem. The world needs it.

26 January 2006 @ 9:45AM >> It looks like the terrorist group Hamas has won a majority in yesterday’s parliamentary elections in the Palestinian territories.

While it is obviously not good that terrorism is now the official policy of the Palestinian Authority, in a way, this simplifies Israel’s task of dealing with the Palestinians. After spending most of his life as a unapologetic terrorist, former Palestinian leader Yassir Arafat started renouncing the tactic publicly while still enabling and encouraging it privately. He even won a Nobel Peace Prize for signing a peace agreement that he never actually implemented and probably never intended to. All the while, his Palestinian Authority funneled money to terrorist groups and encouraged attacks on Israel. Such duplicity complicated matters for Israel, because the rest of the world insisted that the Israelis cut deals with a man who never lived up to any of them.

At least now, it’s plain for everyone to see where the Palestinians stand on the issue of terrorism. They’ve embraced it publicly and wholeheartedly. It just became a lot more difficult for the rest of the world to insist that Israel give away more land and security in the hopes of achieving a peace that the Palestinian Authority now, as a matter of official policy, has no intention of granting.

A low-insensity war has persisted for years, and it continues because the Palestinian side is too weak to achieve total victory and the Israelis have been held back by the rest of the world. If the Hamas victory leads to an upturn in violence—and it’s hard to imagine that it won’t—then the world will have no more excuses for trying to prevent Israel from fighting back vigorously. This election means that the world’s handcuffs are now off Israel.

The question is, now that Hamas is the establishment, will they be willing to sacrifice their newfound power and the luxuries that come with it in order to wage a war they’re not likely to win?

12 December 2005 @ 10:40AM >> The governing body of the Palestinian territories has authorized a plan to encourage terrorism by making routine payments to the families of suicide bombers.

Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas recently signed the new law:

Under the new law, the terrorist’s family will be paid a base sum of $250 per month. The law takes into account extended family arrangements commonplace in Arab societies. The families of married terrorists are entitled to an additional $50 per month, and $15 are added for each child, $25 for each parent, and $15 for each brother who lived with the terrorist prior to his death.

The monies, to be paid out of the general budget of the Palestinian Authority, are significant sums for average Arab families living in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza.

No word yet on when the Palestinian Authority plans of make similar payments to the families of victims of those suicide bombers.

This scheme reminds me of Saddam Hussein’s old policy of making lump-sum payments of $25,000 to the families of suicide bombers who strike outside Iraq. Of course, as we all know now, Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with terrorism.

The article also notes that “[t]he budget of the Palestinian Authority is largely subsidized by grants from European nations and the United States.” So, in effect, American and European taxpayers are rewarding terrorism by ensuring that the families of suicide bombers are well taken care of. Yet another example of government money well-spent!

8 December 2005 @ 9:31AM >> According to this map, on prominent display during the UN’s “Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People,” Israel does not (or is that should not?) exist.

I look forward to seeing what kind of maps the UN will be displaying at the “Day of Solidarity with the Israeli People.” Oh wait, there is no such thing...

5 December 2005 @ 1:03PM >> Mohammed ElBaradai, the chairman of the UN’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, warned that Iran may now be several months away from developing a nuclear weapon. As if to underscore that point, Iran is starting the process of building two new nuclear reactors. Although oil-rich Iran maintains that it needs nuclear energy to power the country, the byproduct of the reactors also happens to be useful for constructing nuclear weapons.

A nuclear Iran is rather worrisome considering the recent statements of new Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad:

“And God willing, with the force of God behind it, we shall soon experience a world without the United States and Zionism.”

[T]he “new wave of confrontations generated in Palestine and the growing turmoil in the Islamic world would in no time wipe Israel away.”

“[Any country that] recognizes Israel will burn in the fire of the Islamic nation’s fury.”

Since we all know that military action is not justified until a threat becomes full and immediate, I’m looking forward to seeing how the brilliant minds at the UN negotiate their way out of this mess. A chance to say, “See, I told you so!” won’t feel nearly as satisfying if I’m doing it from the inside of a mushroom cloud.

16 November 2005 @ 7:40AM >> Daniel Pipes notes a shift in attitude after the recent terrorist attack in Amman, Jordan:

A suicide bombing in Hadera, Israel, on October 26 that killed five people inspired the usual Palestinian joy: some 3,000 people took to the streets in celebration, chanting Allahu Akbar, calling for more suicide attacks against Israelis, and congratulating the “martyr’s” family on the success of the attack.

But Palestinian Arabs were uncharacteristically morose after three explosions went off on November 9, killing 57 persons and injuring hundreds, in Amman, Jordan. That’s because, for the very first time, they found themselves the main victim of those same Islamist “martyrs.”

The massacre at a wedding in the Radisson SAS hotel ballroom took the lives of 17 family members attending the nuptials of what the London Times called a Palestinian “golden couple, beloved of their prominent Palestinian families and friends.” The bombing also killed four Palestinian Authority officials, notably Bashir Nafeh, head of military intelligence on the West Bank.

After two decades of doling out this horror against Israelis, some of whom were also attending festive events (a Passover dinner, a Bar Mitzvah), Palestinians, who form a majority of the Jordanian population, unexpectedly found themselves at the receiving end.

And, guess what: They did not like it.

The brother of a woman injured in the attack told a reporter, “My sister, I love her. I love her to death, and if something happened to her, I’d be really...” Choked, he stopped speaking and cried. Another relative called the terrorists “vicious criminals.” A third cried out, “Oh my God, oh my God. Is it possible that Arabs are killing Arabs, Muslims killing Muslims?”

I extend my deepest sympathy to the family. I also hope that Palestinian Arabs, who have established a worldwide reputation not just for relying heavily on suicide murder but for doing so enthusiastically, will benefit from this unique learning opportunity.

15 September 2005 >> Pallywood is a short documentary, available online, that shows how freelance Palestinian cameramen are funneling staged “war footage” through major media outlets into homes throughout the world. Naturally, these staged shots are engineered for the highest emotional propaganda value, intended to get the viewer to sympathize with the Palestinian cause.

SecondDraft.org exposes how broadcast media are duped—perhaps unwittingly, perhaps not—into becoming unpaid assistants of the Palestinian media effort.

Update: This article in Commentary magazine, sent in by reader Bill Walsh, indicates that what you see in Pallywood is just the tip of the iceberg.

13 September 2005 @ 2:04PM >> If mosques were treated in this fashion, the very same people who are now torching these synagogues would likely use it as an excuse to explode a few commuter buses.

And if mosques were burned to the ground by gun-toting mobs of Jews (or Christians), Europe and the U.N. would react as though Mohammed himself had just been flushed down a toilet.

Interesting, then, the worldwide silence after these synagogues are torched. No outrage. No demands for apology. Nobody getting blown up in retribution.

The lesson?

Desecration of religious symbols is acceptable—and sometimes even funded by the government!—as long as certain groups don’t get offended.

If it weren’t for the Israeli army, I suspect these mobs would gleefully set ablaze every single synagogue in Israel. And if that ever happens, will the world be just as silent?

4 June 2004 >> Michelle Malkin writes that U.N. ambulances are being used by Palestinian terrorists for safe passage:

Last week, an Israeli television station aired footage of armed Arab terrorists in southern Gaza using an ambulance owned and operated by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees. Palestinian gunmen used the UNRWA emergency vehicle as getaway transportation after murdering six Israeli soldiers in Gaza City on May 11. The footage shows two ambulances with flashing lights pull onto a street. Shots and shouts ring out during the nighttime raid. A gang of militants piles into one of the supposedly neutral ambulances, clearly marked “U.N.” with the agency’s blue flag flying from the roof, which then speeds away from the scene.

Malkin notes that AccessMiddleEast.org has posted the video [Windows Media file; 2.3MB] shot by a Reuters cameraman, but that “not a single U.S. television news station has expressed interest in showing the footage to American viewers.”

Perhaps the media is silent because the incident points to yet another full-blown U.N. scandal:

The UNRWA has long been suspected of providing aid and comfort to terrorists. Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va., chairman of the Congressional Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare, recently documented how “buildings and warehouses under UNRWA supervision are allegedly being used as storage areas for Palestinian ammunition and counterfeit currency factories.” Cantor’s 2002 report also noted that UNRWA hosts summer camps in martyrdom for young terrorists-in-training. Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., has also lobbied for increased scrutiny of UNRWA funding, which has been used to publish anti-Semitic textbooks and posters in schools that “glorify homicide bombers and the slaughter of innocents.”

So, why is the media carrying water for the U.N.? Well, if the U.N. looks like a corrupt organization that sides with Palestinian terrorists, then the argument that the U.N. must pre-approve America’s foreign policy looks a hell of a lot less convincing. But the media has a lot vested in that argument: for over a year, it’s been one of the main weapons used to bash President Bush. And it is now a key plank in John Kerry’s foreign policy platform.

In the calculus of the election, bad for U.N. equals good for Bush. So, the media downplays the U.N.’s various scandals and instead focuses on controversies that will have the political impact that the media desires.

3 November 2003 >> Mary Lou is an articulate spokeswoman for liberal causes. She is also an example of why so many on the left refer to President Bush’s intellect in derogatory terms: their standards are simply too high. It is unfair and unreasonable to expect that every candidate for elective office demonstrate the level of mental acumen shown in this speech. Watch, and you will see why Mary Lou is my new favorite protester. Video >>

20 October 2003 >> I was now completely encircled. When I tried to escape, the protesters then started smacking the camera with their signs, while others were shoving me from different directions. I started retreating, pushing my way back from the loudspeaker, all the while leaving the camera running and asking the protesters why they weren’t letting me film. Just when the scuffle between me and the protesters seemed like it was about to take a turn for the worse, I remembered that there were some cameras present from a few mainstream media outlets. I started yelling, “Why are you trying to censor me?” The idea was to attract the other cameras, thinking that the protesters would back off if their actions were captured by the news media. The gambit worked: we were soon surrounded by cameras. Video >>

16 October 2003 >> I was now completely encircled. When I tried to escape, the protesters then started smacking the camera with their signs, while others were shoving me from different directions. I started retreating, pushing my way back from the loudspeaker, all the while leaving the camera running and asking the protesters why they weren’t letting me film. Just when the scuffle between me and the protesters seemed like it was about to take a turn for the worse, I remembered that there were some cameras present from a few mainstream media outlets. I started yelling, “Why are you trying to censor me?” The idea was to attract the other cameras, thinking that the protesters would back off if their actions were captured by the news media. The gambit worked: we were soon surrounded by cameras. More >>