Ok, I’m paraphrasing but you hopefully get my point.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

1:26PM: Lebanon’s ambassador to the United Nations has warned that Israel is planning to attack his country.

Presumably after we stop planning to attack our own.

7:25AM: A number of US senators visiting Israel seem to understand the insanity that is the Goldstone Report.

In the wake of the Goldstone Report and amid the nuclear threat from Iran, 10 state senators, through the American-Israel Friendship League and the National Conference of State Legislatures, are on a study tour of Israel.

With a jam-packed itinerary, the NCSL delegation is meeting with officials such as Ron Dermer, senior adviser to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, and Daniel Taub, director-general of the Foreign Ministry’s Law Division.

No. 1 on the meeting agenda? Goldstone.

According to Georgia State Sen. Don Balfour, president of the NCSL, the Goldstone document is misunderstood in the United States.

“Yesterday we had a meeting about the Goldstone Report. The average American says, ‘Hey, war crimes? [with a shocked look on his face],’ but then you read it and you see almost everything we [US] do is a war crime.

“Sometimes there are civilian casualties, which is horrible. But is that a war crime? If so, that changes the way we define war,” he said.

If indeed the IDF is accused of war crimes, “Every soldier is going to be a war criminal. If you bomb an al-Qaida terrorist and one of their family members dies, that would be a war crime,” Balfour said.

(Indeed John Bolton, a former American ambassador to the UN, has argued that the Goldstone Report has strong implications for the future of the US and warfare. “In the UN, Israel frequently serves as a surrogate target in lieu of the US, particularly concerning the use of military force preemptively or in self-defense,” Bolton wrote in an October 19 Wall Street Journal op-ed. “Accordingly, UN decisions on ostensibly Israel-specific issues can lay a predicate for subsequent action against, or efforts to constrain, the US. Mr. Goldstone’s recommendation to convoke the International Criminal Court is like putting a loaded pistol to Israel’s head – or, in the future, to America’s.”).

On September 29, 32 US senators signed a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urging the Obama administration to block any punitive measures against Israel at the UN on account of the report.

Sponsored by Johnny Isakson (R-Georgia) and Kristen Gillbrand (D-New York), the letter focuses on Israel’s right to protect itself after years of rocket attacks from Gaza.

The US State Department has criticized the “one-sided mandate” of the Goldstone Report and cited “serious flaws” in the investigation.

Balfour said he agreed with the US government’s disapproval of the Goldstone Report, saying, “I wouldn’t even say that the report is one-sided. It is perverted and it changes the game of war.”

Meetings with Israeli politicians have been eye opening for the state senators, who have learned about Israel’s past, present and future pressing issues, he added.

During a meeting at the Knesset on Wednesday, the senators heard an MK describe the battle of Jenin in 2002. In the midst of the second intifada, the IDF entered a refugee camp that had served as the launching site for many terrorist attacks. Rumors circulated that the ensuing battle had been a “massacre” against the Palestinian people.

The Knesset member explained, however, that the army went door-to-door looking for terrorists rather than immediately bombing a suspected house. The IDF put soldiers at risk to save Palestinian bystanders. This was the kind of information that slipped through many media reports, Balfour said.

He added that during the Second Lebanon War in 2006, “People will read an article and say, ‘Israel bombed Lebanon?!’ What they do not know, however, is Lebanon sent 10,000 bombs [to Israel],” he said, referring to mortar shells and Katyusha rockets.

If Mexico were to fire rockets into the United States, Balfour said, the US would probably react after one or two rockets hit. Americans simply do not realize that thousands of rockets have been launched into Israel, prompting a reaction.

In the case of Goldstone, many Americans are also not aware that the IDF warned civilians to leave areas where gunmen were operating. Balfour praised the army for dropping leaflets and urging civilians to evacuate. “People don’t do that kind of thing historically,” he said.

Moving forward, the problem facing politicians worldwide was how exactly to define a war crime, he went on. Balfour suggested a definition, one from Operation Cast Lead itself.

“When they set up terror missiles next to a school, on top of a hospital, in front of a kindergarten, that ought to be a war crime,” he said. “When they set up missiles on schools and hospitals, you eventually have to take those missiles out.”

Meetings with Israeli officials have enhanced the senators’ understanding not only of the Goldstone Report, but of how it directly impacts the Israeli people and government, he said. The delegation is focusing on education and cooperation, and meetings have been informational, without political pressure of any sort.

The state senators will not only go home with a greater knowledge of Israel, but a greater knowledge of America, he said. “The goal of the trip is to become familiar with Israel – the issues and the country,” Balfour said. “Israel gives us perspective on how to solve our problems. We will go back wondering and thinking how we can work similarly.”

7:20AM: Yesterday, I posted the Daily Show interview with palestinian politician Mustafa Barghouti and anti-Israel activist Anna Baltzer.

Anyone watching the interview and not familar with Baltzer’s real views may have been under the impression that Baltzer is “pro-peace” rather than “anti-Israel.”

Not so much.

Viewers knowledgeable in Middle Eastern affairs are probably familiar with Barghouti, a moderate member of Fatah and one of the prominent Palestinian signatories of the Geneva Initiative, an unofficial peace plan drafted by Israelis and Palestinians. But the name Baltzer may not ring a bell.

A 29-year-old Columbia grad and Jewish American, Baltzer says on numerous videos posted on YouTube that she became a pro-Palestinian activist after visiting the area and witnessing Palestinian plight.

At one point during the interview, Stewart asked Barghouti and Baltzer whether they believed in Israel’s right to exist.

While the Palestinian Barghouti has publicly supported Israel’s right to exist, Baltzer has said she believes having a Jewish State in the Middle East is unjust.

Here’s what she said in May 2008 at a University of California, Irvine pro-Palestinian rally under the header of “Never again? The Palestinian Holocaust.”

“What Israel is doing is doing to the Palestinian people is not a perversion of what Israel could be or should be,” she said at the UC-Irvine event. “It is an inevitability of having a Jewish state in a place where the majority of the people who have rights to the land are not Jewish.”

During the interview Baltzer evaded Stewart’s question regarding Israel’s right to exist, choosing instead to focus on human rights violations by Israel against Palestinians.

6:10AM: Swedish “journalist” Donald Bostrom, who in August accused IDF soldiers of harvesting organs from palestinians, is scheduled to arrive in Israel for the Dimona Media Conference.

It will be interesting to see if he wakes up drugged and in an ice-filled bathtub.

6:00AM: Former Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans has confirmed that Israeli and Iranian officials did in fact meet at a nuclear non-proliferation conference in September in Cairo, despite Iranian and Israeli denials.

A Perth man will stand trial in the District Court for allegedly uploading an anti-Semitic video YouTube.

Brendon Lee O’Connell, 38, of Maylands, has been charged under racial vilification laws for allegedly positing the anti-Semitic film in which he is seen in front of Perth’s Bell Tower and at a South Perth supermarket.

In May, the State Security Investigation group charged Mr O’Connell, who is accused of making anti-Semitic statements during the video, with carrying out conduct intending to incite racial animosity or harassment.

The maximum penalty for the offence is 14 years’ jail or fines of up to $24,000.

Mr O’Connell today appeared the Perth Magistrates Court and pleaded not guilty during the committal mention hearing. His bail was continued and he will appear before the District Court on November 20.

Mr O’Connell walked out of court video taping the waiting media.

He can’t seem to stop filming, can he?

Then again, no-one ever accused him of being smart, especially after he recently uploaded even more anti-Semitic videos to his new Youtube channel (assuming it was him, and not those Jews hiding in his roof).

Update: Israellycool reader Jan writes:

Just saw Brendon O’Connell on news… Missed some of it…. He was defiant as ever and they even showed the snippet of the YouTube, where he says “the bells toll for you!”  Noticed that he has had some nice blonde streaks put into the front of his hair!!!!!

Those blonde streaks are sure to make him popular in the shower room.

Archbishop of Adelaide Philip Wilson has told his flock they should not tell Jewish jokes.

Archbishop Wilson said Friday that Catholics must be respectful and sensitive towards Jews.

“My sense about this is, we have to be especially careful about the way that we talk about the Jewish people because of the way that they’ve been persecuted and treated for over a thousand years, and especially during the Holocaust in World War II,” he said.

Of course, if they really want to tell Jewish jokes, they can always convert.

Or should that be of “kicking in a door at his own mosque and making a false claim of vandalism” fame (hat tip: Tim Blair).

Australia’s most controversial sheik, Taj Din al-Hilali, has been caught on videotape kicking in a door at his own mosque before calling police to report an act of vandalism.

The head imam at the Lakemba mosque, who caused outrage in 2006 by comparing scantily clad women to uncovered meat, was shown on a CCTV security tape kicking open the door just minutes before reporting the incident.

The Nine Network’s A Current Affair last night broadcast the videotape from March 9, showing the incident, which Sheik Hilali initially denied.

“There is a trick in this camera. There is a trick in this film,” he told ACA.

Zionist Camera of Death perhaps^TM?

But in a letter sent by Sheik Hilali’s lawyers to ACA yesterday, he admitted kicking the door, saying the damage had already been done to the door before he kicked it.

“What he did do was to kick open a door to the mosque that had already been damaged by others in order to gain entry to it,” the letter said.

Worst. Excuse. Ever?

Lebanese Muslim Association president Shawky Kassir said they had called the police “for a little problem, but we have fixed (it) and everything is under control”.

Unless they’ve knocked off Hilali, I would suggest they haven’t fixed the problem.

The footage shows four young men locking the door behind them at 10.28pm.

Nine minutes later, Sheik Hilali checks the lock and pushes on the top of the door, bending it on its hinges. After checking the corridor, he disappears from view before rushing towards it and kicking it open at 10.46pm.

It is understood the name of the suspected culprit was put forward to NSW police, but it is not known if he was interviewed by the authorities.

A NSW Police media spokesperson said they started to investigate the matter but three days later were told by a mosque official that he did not wish to take the matter any further.

“The matter remains under investigation. Further senior members of the local community will be consulted to discuss the incident.”

Update: Here’s the Current Affair treatment of the story, including the offending footage of Hilali practicing his soccer skills on the door.

Update: Of course, this is not the first time Hilali has shown his violent side.

I pray that the ordeal be over soon, with no more life being lost. I also hope they catch the arsonists responsible.

My heart goes out to those who have lost loved ones.

You didn’t think I forgot, did you?

Outspoken Islamic cleric Abu Hamza has branded Australians as boozers who are hooked on gambling and prostitution.

In another sermon broadcast over the internet, the Coburg cleric urged followers to spread the word of Islam to save Australians.

“They think happiness can be achieved by being intoxicated, by going to the casino and blowing your money away, by going from one prostitute to the other,” he said.

“They don’t know what life is all about, that’s why they are on the booze, why they are binge drinking . . . why unfortunately suicide has skyrocketed, murder, anxiety and depression.”

You can see the offending sermon in the Herald Sun report only. That’s because this is what greeted me when I looked in YouTube to find the video:

Change of heart, or threatened with beating by toothbrush?

As for the speech itself, I did not find it nearly as offensive as the first. Sure, he is being judgmental, but I suspect he did not mean that all Australians are prostitute-visiting boozers. I think he was more attacking the idea of a godless society, but he did it in a way guaranteed to offend the very society which affords him the freedom to espouse his views and put his foot in his mouth.

Meanwhile, to those who claimed in the comments to my last post that there was nothing offensive to women in his marriage sermon, some Muslim women disagree.

His comments on the treatment of women have been condemned by the Islamic Women’s Welfare Council of Victoria and Muslim community leaders, including Yasser Soliman.

“To claim this is Islamic, or that the Koran forces wives to do things such as (these) lectures suggest, is quite insulting to most of the Muslim world,” Mr Soliman said.

Update: Yasser Soliman, executive director of Diversity Connect International and a past president of the Islamic Council of Victoria, has repudiated Hamza’s marriage comments, and even continued the damage control by holding a liveblogging session.

Update: The video is now on YouTube.

Apparently, marriage is so important, that the husband can hit his wife and force her to have sex with him.

He’s now claiming he has been taken out of context and that he was being “metaphorical.”

Hmm..why does this all sound so familar?

If anyone has the time, you can view his entire speech here to see if he is telling the truth, or – as I suspect -  full of Sheikh.

A Darwin man woke yesterday to discover dogs had eaten his car.

And he says it’s not the first time it has happened.

Clayton Dwyer, 47, of Millner, thought his girlfriend was kidding when she woke him up and told him his work ute had been gnawed by a pack of savage dogs. But when he walked outside his Beetson Place home he discovered this was no joke.

His front bumper had been ripped from the car and chewed to bits by the dogs. They had even tried to munch on the front panels.

“You can see the teeth marks,” he said.

Asked what he thought when he first saw the damage, Mr Dwyer said: “Doggone it! That’s a bit ruff.”

The landscape gardener said the pack of wild dogs had been lurking around his neighbourhood for months.

“My girlfriend’s car got eaten about three months ago,” he said. “At first we thought it had been attacked with a hammer, but we took it to the panel beaters and he said it was dogs. You could see the teeth marks on it.”

Mr Dwyer said his neighbours had seen the dogs early yesterday and had chased them away by throwing mangoes at them.

He said he was unsure if his insurance company covered dog attacks.

“I hope they do,” he said.

“It’s actually a new bumper. I only bought it a couple of months ago.

“I know it isn’t the prettiest car, but it didn’t deserve that.”

Dogs eating homework is so old school.

Update: Or is it just an excuse?