The Iranian Foreign Minister has called Israel a “crazy country run by crazy people.”
Iranian Foreign Minister Manchour Mottaki declared Monday that Israel was now weaker than ever before, adding that it was a “crazy country run by crazy people.”
Mottaki told the Al-Jazeera news agency that Israel was in no position to embark on another military conflict, due to its internal political crisis and its losses over recent years in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.
“Israel is a crazy nation run by crazy people,” Mottaki declares. “Therefore, we must prepare for the chance that Israel will do something crazy against everyone in the region ? the Syrians, the Lebanese and the Palestinians.”
Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)
11:10PM: More glorification of violence on a palestinian children’s show (hat tip: PMW).
Notice how the child host objects to the caller saying “son of a bitch” – not the content of the song.
8:35PM: Earlier this week, Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren was heckled while trying to deliver an address at the University of California, Irvine
Eleven people were arrested as Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren was repeatedly interrupted while trying to deliver an address Monday night at the University of California, Irvine.
Oren was speaking about US-Israeli relations and was interrupted nearly a dozen times.
A young man began with the first outburst, yelling, “Michael Oren! Propagating murder is not an expression of free speech!” The man’s yelling was followed by both heavy applause and objections.
The outburst closely resembled part of a statement released by the university’s Muslim Student Union (MSU) prior to and against Oren’s appearance, which said, “As people of conscience, we oppose Michael Oren’s invitation to our campus. Propagating murder is not a responsible expression of free speech.”
It was not clear whether those disturbing the speech were members of the MSU.
After the fourth protester began heckling him, Oren left the podium, surrounded by security. He returned but was repeatedly harassed by students.
Oren took the stage again to complete his address and eventually a large number of those in the audience stood and exited, disrupting him for a final time. They then held demonstrations outside the arena, chanting, “Michael Oren you will see, Palestine will be free.”
The MSU said in its statement, “We strongly condemn the university for cosponsoring, and therefore, inadvertently supporting the ambassador of a state that is condemned by more UN Human Rights Council resolutions than all other countries in the world combined.”
The statement said Israel “massacred” 1,400 people, including 700 women and children.
The MSU further said that “Oren took part in a culture that has no qualms with terrorizing the innocent, killing civilians, demolishing their homes, and illegally occupying their land. Oren is an outspoken supporter of the recent war on Gaza and stands in the way of international law by refusing to cooperate with the United Nation’s Goldstone Report – a fact-finding mission endorsed by the UN Human Rights Council.”
Director of the University’s Political Science department, Professor Mark P. Petracca, chastised the protesters, telling them, “This is beyond embarrassing…this is no way for our undergraduate students to behave. We have an opportunity to hear from a policy maker relevant to one of the most important issues facing this planet and you are preventing not only yourself from hearing him but hundreds of other people in this room and hundreds of other people in an overflow room. Shame on you! This is not an example of free speech.”
Here’s the video.
The hecklers and those applauding them sure looked Muslim to me.
6:28PM: According to the IDF, ISMers such as Bridget Chappell have been disrupting and interfering with IDF operations.
Approximately 50 foreign nationals are currently residing in the West Bank and working together with Palestinian groups to disrupt and interfere with IDF operations, military sources said on Monday.
The High Court of Justice on Monday released two women from Spain and Australia who had been arrested in Ramallah for involvement in the International Solidarity Movement (ISM). Troops raided their apartment on Sunday on the grounds that the women had overstayed their tourist visa and were involved in violent anti-Israel protests.
Overnight Monday, IDF troops raided the Ramallah offices of an organization called ‘Stop the Wall,’ which protests the construction of the West Bank security barrier. According to the organization, some 40 of its activists are currently being held by authorities. In January, another ISM activist from the Czech Republic was arrested in the West Bank and deported from Israel.
Defense officials confirmed that the IDF’s Central Command and Judea and Samaria Police, together with the Interior Ministry, have begun cracking down on foreigners engaged in violent anti-Israel activity in recent weeks.
“We do not have a problem with differences of opinions,” one officer said. “But we are forced to act when these activists and nationals participate in protests that are extremely violent and put peoples’ lives at risk.”
According to security officials, ISM has recently increased its activities against the construction of the security barrier and over the summer issued a call to its activists to come to Israel to participate in the protests.
According to the officials, the IDF has noted a growing presence of foreign nationals at the weekly demonstrations in Bil’in, Ni’lin and near the settlement of Neveh Tzuf (Halamish), where a top Palestinian government official was also spotted several weeks ago.
While the IDF is not concerned with the possibility of a third intifada “due to the tight grip it has on the Palestinian territory and the effective crackdown by PA security forces on Hamas infrastructure,” there is concern that the new wave of violence could flare up into a new conflict and undermine diplomatic efforts to restart negotiations.
These activities, plus others such as acting as human shields for terrorists, are the reason I refer to these numbskulls as terror enablers, rather than terror supporters.
4:48PM: Egypt’s soccer coach has indicated he may not be interested in coaching the Israeli soccer team.
At least I think that is what he is saying. He’s rather subtle.
Israel’s soccer world has been abuzz with rumors that Egypt’s coach would soon switch camps to train the national side – until Tuesday, that is, when Hassan Shehata put an end to speculation in the bluntest possible terms.
“I’d rather die of hunger than entertain the possibility of coaching Israel,” he told Egyptian daily al-Masry al-Youm.
Shehata came close to losing his post when Egypt failed to qualify for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
But the 60-year-old manager in January regained hero status among Egyptians when his side overcame Ghana to bring home the African Cup of Nations for a record third year running.
“I can understand Israel’s jealousy of the Egyptian team and its successes,” Shehata was quoted as saying. “But it would be impossible from my perspective to visit Israel or train its team – even if Israel were the only country in the world that wanted to hire me.”
He continued: “How can these Zionists think that I would take on the task of coaching a side that includes murderers of children and pensioners? How could I work to help a team that represents a nation of occupiers?”
The veteran trainer, known in Egypt’s press by his nickname “The Teacher”, now looks set to lead his side’s campaign to qualify for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.
“From the moment I was born I have been hearing about the Israel that murders Arabs, that bombs, that levels towns and villages – but this is the first time I have heard that Israel plays soccer,” he said.
Wow. He’d rather die of hunger than entertain the possibility of coaching Israel.
Here’s hoping he gets what he wants.
3:38PM: Yet another example of a palestinian work accident which was really an accident at work…as opposed to an explodation of the premature kind.
A cleaner died on Monday in Qalqiliya after falling and hitting his head on the floor at work, his colleague said.
12:55PM: A group of anti-Israel British academics has asked Elton John to cancel his upcoming concert in Israel.
Dear Elton John:
Like much of the world, we think you’re a good bloke. You came out when it was difficult; you admitted your addictions were stronger than you were; you’ve poured money into AIDS research. Oh, and then there’s the music – not bad at all. But we’re struggling to understand why you’re playing in Israel on June 17. You may say you’re not a political person, but does an army dropping white phosphorus on a school building full of children demand a political response? Does walling a million and a half people up in a ghetto and then pounding that ghetto to rubble require a political response from us, or a human one? We think it needs a human response, and we think that by choosing to play in Tel Aviv you’re denying this. You’re behaving as if playing in Israel is morally neutral – but how can it be? How can the cruelties Israel practises against the Palestinians – fundamentally because the Palestinians are there, on Palestinian land, and Israel wants them to go – be morally neutral?
Okay, you turn up in Ramat Gan, and it gets to that ‘Candle in the Wind’ moment, and thousands of lighters flicker – but there won’t be any Palestinians from the Occupied Territories swaying along with the Israelis – the army won’t let them leave their ghettoes.
Please read what Judge Goldstone said about the onslaught on Gaza; what Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have been saying for decades about the crimes committed against the Palestinians. Of course the Israeli state denies it has a case to answer, though it’s knee-deep in ethnic cleansing and land-theft and the endless daily suffocating of Palestinian lives and hopes. Political or not political, when you stand up on that stage in Tel Aviv, you line yourself up with a racist state. Do you want to give them the satisfaction?
Please don’t go.
Yours sincerely,
Professor Haim Bresheeth
Mike Cushman
Professor Steven Rose
Professor Jonathan RosenheadLondon, February 2010
I simply do not have the time to give this letter the thorough fisking it deserves. Suffice to say that Elton may wish to consider his relative likelihood of survival in Israel and the palestinian “ghettoes,” as an openly gay man.
8:55AM: Here’s another photo of terror enabler Bridgette/Bridget Chappell, who I posted about yesterday.
Australian national Bridgette Chappell, right, and Ariadna Jove Marti from Spain, speak after their release from a prison in Ramle, central Israel, Monday, Feb. 8, 2010. The International Solidarity Movement says the two women have been released on bail and have been prohibited from entering the West Bank until their legal status is clarified.They were arrested by the Israeli military in the Palestinian-ruled West Bank town of Ramallah on Sunday for overstaying their visas, but also alleged involvement in violent protests in the West Bank, according to the Israeli military. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
I am not 100% sure, but that looks like the sketch of a gun on her shirt.
