Yes, that’s Hitler Mein Kampf being advertised to Virgin’s Arabic customers. And in case you think the photo (source here) is photoshopped, here is a Bahraini blogger speaking of the same phenomenom in the Virgin Megastore in Bahrain.

Now apparently I’m really late to the party, because this issue was brought to Richard Branson’s attention at least as early as April. And while I am not sure when the above photo was taken, I have not seen any evidence of Branson acknowledging the issue nor acting on it, certainly not on his blog.

If you want to add to the chorus of voices asking Branson to do something about it (or at least let us know if something has already been done), here are a few places to start:

Richard Branson Twitter page

Virgin Megastore Middle East Twitter page

Virgin Megastore Facebook page

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia repeatedly exhorted the United States to “cut off the head of the snake” by launching military strikes to destroy Iran’s nuclear program, according to leaked U.S. diplomatic cables.

A copy of the cable dated April 20, 2008, was published in the New York Times website on Sunday after being released by the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks. The classified communication between the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh and Washington showed the Saudis feared Shi’ite Iran’s rising influence in the region, particularly in neighboring Iraq.

The United States has repeatedly said that the military option is on the table, but at the same time U.S. military chiefs have made clear they view it as a last resort, fearing it could ignite wider conflict in the Middle East.

The April 2008 cable detailed a meeting between General David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in the Middle East, and then U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, and King Abdullah and other Saudi princes.

At the meeting, the Saudi ambassador to the United States, Adel al-Jubeir “recalled the King’s frequent exhortations to the U.S. to attack Iran and so put an end to its nuclear weapons program,” the cable said.

“He told you to cut off the head of the snake,” Jubeir was reported to have said.

—-

Britain’s Guardian newspaper, one of a number of publications to have had access to the leaked diplomatic cables, said the communications also showed that other Arab allies have secretly agitated for action against Tehran over its disputed nuclear program.

The Guardian quotes documents that show officials in Jordan and Bahrain “openly calling for Iran’s nuclear program to be stopped by any means, including military.” The British daily also says leaders in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt called Iran “evil,” and an “existential threat” which “is going to take us to war.”

Another cable, sent from the U.S. Embassy in Manama, Bahrain, on Nov. 4, 2009, detailed a meeting between Petraeus and King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, whose kingdom is the headquarters of the U.S. Navy’s Fifth fleet. Like Saudi Arabia it is a Sunni Muslim-ruled kingdom.

King Hamad argued “forcefully for taking action to terminate (Iran’s) nuclear program, by whatever means necessary,” the cable said.

“That program must be stopped,” he was quoted as saying. “The danger of letting it go on is greater than the danger of stopping it.”

This confirms what Israeli officials have been saying all along: a nuclear Iran is not just a threat to the Jewish state but is a threat to the entire region.

Meanwhile, I would like to remind you that you can view a summary of all Israel-related cables here.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

6:10PM: Sprung!

There were never any actual consultations between us and the Israelis before the Gaza war, a top aid to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said on Monday, refuting a WikiLeaks cable that claimed otherwise.

One of the documents included in the over 250,000 diplomatic cables between the United States and its allies which were leaked on Sunday said that Israel tried to coordinate Operation Cast Lead with both Fatah and Egypt.

—-

Top Abbas aid Saeb Erekat denied that Israel had notified the Palestinian Authority of the war before it happened.

“We knew about the war because the Israelis were saying there was going to be a war,” Erekat said.

Several months before the fighting broke out, Abaas asked Israel’s then-prime minister, Ehud Olmert, not to go to war, Erekat said. Abbas told him “he would not go to Gaza on an Israeli tank,” Erekat added.

He said the exchange took place in a face-to-face meeting that he himself attended.

Aussie Dave’s Rules of the Middle East Conflict #77:  If Saeb Erekat is moving his lips, he’s lying.

5:40PM: Separated at birth?

4:30PM: Photo of the day:

If you think this is a photo of a group of bearded Jews at the Western Wall, think again.

Background:

Representatives of the Amish community from the United States and Switzerland paid a visit to the Western Wall on Saturday night, where they asked the Jewish people’s forgiveness for their group’s silence during the Nazi extermination of Jews in the Holocaust.

Part of what made the visit special was that the Amish, a sect of the Mennonite Church that largely rejects modern technology, do not normally use contemporary forms of transportation such as the aircraft on which they made the journey to the Holy Land.

But according to an announcement issued by the office of Western Wall Rabbi Shmuel Rabinovitch, with whom the group met, the Amish delegates saw great importance in coming to Israel and expressing their contrition, as well as declaring their unreserved support of the Jewish people and the State of Israel.

The delegation members stressed that they were neither seeking any kind of gesture from the Jewish people nor looking to proselytize – only to support Israel for the simple reason that in the past they hadn’t.

Rabinovitch was presented with various tokens at a ceremony in the Hasmonean chamber, including a parchment with a request for forgiveness in the name of the entire Amish community, along with a commitment that from now on, it would loudly voice its support of the Jewish people, especially in the wake of the expressions of hatred by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his extensions.

 The photo reminds me of this scene from the Frisco Kid:

2:54PM: Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan isn’t a mere jerk.

He’s a terrorist supporter.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Monday that “nobody can think that Hizbullah has a connection to the assassination of [former Lebanese prime minister] Rafik Hariri” Lebanese daily A-Safir reported Monday.

In a conversation with reporters on his way back to Turkey after his last visit to Lebanon he addressed his meeting with the Hizbullah and the issue of the International Court and said that “Hizbullah says that it is the spirit of resistance in Lebanon and even goes as far as to use the term ‘martyr al-Hariri.”

“No one can think that Hibullah has a connection to the murder. The organization even supports a Syria-Saudi Arabia initiative to ease the tension. “

Yet another reason why I’m a huge fan of this horse.

1:45PM: Is the Jerusalem Post trying to tell us something about who they wish was Israel’s PM?

Naa. They probably just screwed up again.

1:40PM: According to former ambassador, Itamar Rabinovich, the US spied on the Israeli embassy in Washington.

The United States broke an Israeli code and tapped the secure phone line in the Israeli Embassy in Washington without Jerusalem’s knowledge.

That revelation about Israeli-American relations did not come from WikiLeaks, but rather from former ambassador to Washington Itamar Rabinovich, in a radio interview yesterday. 

Rabinovich did not say exactly when the code was broken and when Israel found out about it, but it was understood from his remarks that the tap started after his 1993-1996 tenure in the U.S. capital and was discovered only years later.

The former envoy said that every staffer at the Israeli Embassy in Washington is warned about possible leaks of conversations held in the building and on ordinary phone lines, but also on the secure phone line.

After the Americans broke the code, Israel’s deepest policy secrets were apparently exposed.

“Every ‘juicy’ telegram was in danger of being leaked,” Rabinovich told Army Radio’s Razi Barkai. “We sent very few of them. Sometimes I came to Israel to deliver reports orally. The Americans were certainly tapping the regular phone lines, and it became clear that in later years they were also listening to the secure line.”

Wiretapping, code-breaking and intercepting of messages is the province of the National Security Agency. It is no secret that despite intelligence cooperation and an understanding between the two countries that they will not spy on each other, both Israel and the United States have been involved in such actions.

—-

As far as is known, American spies have not been caught by Israel’s intelligence services, although there have been instances when U.S. intelligence operatives contacted Israeli citizens and explored the possibility of recruiting them.

The Americans have also used their military attaches to gather information.

1:34PM: Mike Huckabee speaking to Danny Danon, Deputy Speaker of the Knesset, about Obama and airport security.

10:18AM: Iran’s Press TV (otherwise known as the employer of George Galloway and Lauren Booth) has discovered the ‘T’ word:

An Iranian academic has been killed and another university professor and his wife wounded in two separate car explosions in Tehran.

Yet unknown terrorists exploded the cars of Doctor Majid Shahriari and Professor Fereydoun Abbasi in separate places on Monday morning, IRNA reported.

10:15AM: Two Iranian university professors have reportedly been targeted in identical bomb attacks this morning, with one being killed, and the fate of the second one still unknown.

As you probably already guessed, they did not teach English Literature.

Two Iranian university professors were targeted by assassins in separate but identical bomb attacks in Tehran on Monday, killing at least one of them, according to local press reports.

An Iranian state TV’s website said one victim, a nuclear scientist, was killed, while there were conflicting reports of the fate of the second man.

The Fars television service said bombs were attached to both victims’ cars by assassins on motorcycles. No further details were given on the identities of the attackers.

Fars accused agents of the United States and Israel of being behind the killings.

State broadcaster ISNA further named the two victims as Majid Shahriari and Fereydoun Abbasi, both professors at Tehran’s Shahid Beheshti university.

Shahriari was killed, while Abbasi and his wife were injured and hospitalized, ISNA said.

In January, another Iranian nuclear scientist, Professor Massoud Ali-Mohammadi was also killed.

State media said at the time that Ali-Mohammadi was killed by a remote controlled bomb strapped to a motorcycle.

Then too, Iran accused Israel and the West of the attack on a “committed and revolutionary” scientist.

But an opposition website, Jaras, said Ali Mohhamadi was an opposition supporter who backed moderate candidate Mirhossein Mousavi in a disputed election, which plunged Iran into turmoil in mid-2009. 

Of course, like many things here in Israel, the announcement caused controversy.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

11:30PM: While people like Richard Gere’s friend Hanan Ashrawi claim it’s Binyamin Netanyahu and the Israeli government who do not want peace, it is the PA who are showing us their true intentions.

7:55PM: Quote of the day:

“The American leaders still act like cowboys and like heroes in Western movies. Whenever there is a problem, they use their guns.”

“Obama seems to be just a new face but with the same intentions, which is deceiving world nations.”

“We advise Mr. Obama to be careful and not follow the path of his predecessor as he would have the same fate as Bush, and we are not interested in this to happen.”

- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad showing Obama where all that appeasement has gotten him

6:05PM: Excerpt from the Bank of Israel Report which will be published in April:

• The number of Palestinians working in Israel increased markedly in the years 2002–08. This contributed to the improvement of employment in the Palestinian economy, and in 2008 yielded an income of $649 million, more than 10 percent of the Palestinian GDP.
• The number of Palestinians resident in Judea and Samaria working in Israel’s economy reached 44,000 in 2008––about 25,000 of them with work permits and 16,000 without––constituting about 2 percent of the number of employees in Israel’s business sector.

5:08PM: What happens when you plagiarize: This Turkish columnist opines that Israel may well be training Kurds in Iraq.

Problem is, he has inadvertently copied chunks from a pro-Israel columnist.

Is Israel training Kurds?

Any people baffled by the weight and frequency of events involving or surrounding their country will inevitably rely on conspiracy theories. And Turkey is saturated with an abundance of them. Contaminated with the poison of “internal enemies,” besides external ones, what one sees may be quite the opposite.

Peaceful rhetoric may be a cover for an ongoing covert war waged against us. A friend may be an enemy in disguise. Although we cannot really answer why we have so many enemies or why so many people have made us their enemies, we are on constant alert.

This state of mind was once again provoked with reports suggesting that Israeli military and intelligence agents are currently engaged in covert operations in the Kurdish section of Iraq. They are reported to be training Kurdish commandos in guerrilla warfare and anti-terror tactics. Under normal circumstances, this information is not newsworthy. Every armed force has an elite special operations unit. However, the intention behind this training is poisonous: Kurds feel that their country is being invaded from all directions by states like Turkey, Syria, Iran and Iraq, and they are getting ready to end the occupation of these “imperialist” forces! That is why they are accepting Israeli assistance in their struggle for reunification and full independence.

Al-Qaeda in Iraq sniffed something in the air to this effect, but Kurdish leaders and Israeli officials denied cooperation between Iraqi Kurds and Tel Aviv. Both of them refused to make any comments on the issue.

But the American press picked up the scent of blood. The New Yorker in particular pressed on, but got no positive answers from the Israelis. Yet the reporters of the magazine found out that Israel’s presence in northern Iraq was widely acknowledged within the US intelligence community. American intelligence officials told The New Yorker that when asked why they were in the Kurdish region, the Israelis answered “because we should be here.” Not convinced of this answer, CIA officials at the time thought of exposing Israel’s assistance to the Kurds. This is what The New Yorker wrote in 2004, adding that besides rumors of Israel training Kurdish commandos, Israeli-Kurdish relations have expanded considerably starting in 2003. In July 2003, the Israeli government lifted its embargo on Iraq, allowing trade between the two peoples. But it seems this decision was driven with the aim of exporting Israeli military material to the Kurds.

Jews feel that they are threatened by the Arabs and Iran, and Kurds are neither Arab nor Persian. So if Israel supports the Kurds’ claim for independence, it will have a natural ally plus a functional watchtower to see what is going on in Iran, Syria and Iraq. Needless to say, such cooperation will draw the wrath of all three states as well as Turkey, and the Kurds themselves will suffer most from the backlash.

Israeli-trained Kurdish commandos have also been reported to accompany Israeli operatives across the Iraq-Iran border in recent years to install sensory devices meant to monitor suspected Iranian nuclear facilities.

Recently, a Hamas leader, Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, was assassinated in Dubai by alleged Israeli agents. The Hamas organization seriously suspects Israeli agents operating out of Iraqi Kurdistan. Iraqi Kurdish officials and their Israeli counterparts do not utter a word, but rumors are circulating that Israel is training the Kurds to be anti-terrorist commandos. In return for their training, Israelis are anticipating Kurdish commandos will gather intelligence about Iran and Syria for Israel. It is claimed that the Kurds monitor Iranian nuclear facilities.

These rumors, needless to say, are heard by Turkish intelligence circles, too. Could it be that recently this information has seriously contributed to Turkey’s coldness to Israel and distancing itself from the Jewish state? Especially when the Turks heard that Israelis are telling the Kurds or sharing with them the statement that “the Kurds, whose country is currently occupied by Iraq, Turkey, Iran and Syria, are aided by Israel in their fight for independence, as they were many years ago.”

The source of this information is (http://www.israelnationalnews.com/, 2/5).

The Kurds fought for independence from Iraq, Iran and Turkey. Some Kurds committed terrorism against Turkey. It is going too far to call their “country” “occupied.” What country? It would be sufficient to suggest that the 40 million Kurds are a separate nationality for whom a case can be made for self-determination. This is in contrast with the Palestinian Arabs, who are not a separate nationality and for whom no case has been made for self-determination, only asserted, and who in any case have a state of their own in Palestine, called Jordan.

Winston Mideast Analysis & Commentary has a general admonition about Western training of Muslim allies. If not careful about who is recruited, the West will train people who turn on them, as did the Mujahideen of Afghanistan. The next likely candidates to make trouble are the Palestinian Authority troops trained by the US and others.

4:36PM: Here is a Nigerian doctor expressing his views about the Apartheid state of Israel.

4:26PM: Bahraini MPs want to cancel a soccer friendly between Bahrain and “Palestine” because..well, you read the reason.

A call to cancel plans to have the Bahrain national football team play a friendly match against Palestine next month went out from MPs yesterday.

The friendly match between Bahrain and Palestine, which is set to take place in the West Bank, has drawn criticism from individual MPs, civil society groups and some of the players who say it was a step towards normalisation of relations with Israel.

They claimed that Bahraini players and team delegates will have to be approved and have their passports stamped by the Israeli authorities, who control the West Bank’s entry and exit points.

Egyptian officials indefinitely postponed a similar match last month.

MP Ibrahim Busandal said that having Bahraini passports stamped with Israelis authorisation was a clear normalisation with the Zionist enemy.

“We don’t acknowledge Israel and having Bahraini players and delegates go through Israeli procedures and get approval from them means that we accept their existence, while we don’t,” he said.

Does this sound like people who would tolerate a Jewish state alongside a palestinian one?

4:22PM: Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has called Israel “the principal threat to regional peace,” and demonstrated why Richard Goldstone has been so useful to haters of Israel.

“Goldstone is a Jew and his report is clear,” the Turkish leader told reporters invited to meet him at the Paris Ritz.

4:20PM: Iranian Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi has called Israel “too weak to start a war with Iran,” followed by the mandatory threat of destruction.

Asked about Iran’s response to any possible aggression by Israel, he underlined, “We have given their response before and if something like that happens, nothing will likely be left of the illegitimate Zionist regime.”

2:35PM: Ma’an reports that the mortar shells fired this morning (referred to as “homemade projectiles”) , and which landed in palestinian territory, injured 5 palestinians.

Medical sources at the Beit Hanoun Hospital said the injured were from the Al-Amoudi and Abu Uda families, who were all hospitalized at 10:00pm sustaining varied wounds from shrapnel and a small fire that broke out in one of the homes. Medics said four of the victims suffered light to moderate injuries, while a fifth was seriously injured, sustaining fractures in his feet. He was transferred to the Ash-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, they said.

Needless to say, there are palestinians not happy about this.

Commenting on the incident, senior leader of the Palestinian People’s Party (PPP) Walid Awad, called on armed Palestinian groups to stop firing homemade projectiles from the Gaza Strip immediately.

“These projectiles do not harm the occupation and pose a threat to Palestinian citizens,” he said, adding that projectile fire was used as an excuse by Israel to continue launching airstrikes on Gaza, to invade the West Bank, to continue building settlements and to finalize plans for a new invasion of Gaza.

Awad reiterated the call of the 2006 Prisoners Document for a Palestinian national agreement, saying there must be a united front against Israel, that did not include the launch of projectiles at this time.

But perhaps at a later time, no doubt.

12:25PM: An Australian real estate agent has been threatened by someone who took issue with its public support of Israel.

A Melbourne real estate agent was accused of “supporting 62 years of terror” last week after erecting a sign backing Israel ahead of Yom Ha’atzmaut.

The slur was made in an anonymous letter sent to LJ Hooker Elsternwick.

The letter also called the agents “traitors” and included the threat, “take that board down or your business will suffer”.

Director of the family run company Alex Flamm, who together with his sons, Oren and Golan, are the faces of the agency, said the company has never been targeted like that before.

“[I feel] absolutely ropeable, angry and infuriated by the ignorance of the idiot that sent it,” he said. “The person who sent the letter is voicing his patriotism the only way they know how and that is by threats, while at the same time accuse the Jewish people of having achieved statehood by using “terror”.”

Flamm said he is not “paranoid” about anti-Semitism, rather, he is proud of his Jewish heritage and disappointed about the “few morons” who “are capable of writing hate mail filled with their version of terrorism and threats under the guise of their patriotism”.

Flamm has reported the letter to the police and Community Security Group.

While the anonymous nature of the threat makes it difficult for the police to act on, Senior Constable Deryn Boote from Caulfield Police Station has referred the matter to the Divisional Intelligence Unit based at Moorabbin Police Station.

That unit was set up in recent years to gather information on anti-Semitic and Israel-related offences in Victoria.
 The sign, which was situated on Glen Eira Road, was still visible early this week, but Flamm said it would be removed to protect his business.

LJ Hooker is one of a handful of real estate agents who are active in supporting the local Jewish community and Israel.

Ahh yes. Opponents of Israel are such a tolerant bunch, aren’t they?

8:25AM: A few days after Hamas said they were trying to curb the rocket fire into Israel and Islamic Jihad announced it would cease firing rockets into Israel, 6 mortar shells have been fired at Israel, but landed in palestinian territory.

Looks like they’ve found a loophole.

6:06AM: It’s not every day you see a headline like this on Lebanon’s The Daily Star.

Israel allows clothes into Gaza as another rocket fired

6:04AM: Watch British charity War On Want trash the Waitrose, Barbican, London branch on 30 March in another “boycott Israel” endeavor.

As Jonathan Hoffman writes:

Please remember this when it comes to the BBC’s “Red Nose Day Appeal”, “Comic Relief”, “Sport Relief”. War On Want is a major beneficiary of these appeals.

http://www.comicrelief.com/files/cr09/files/imce/all-grants-africa-grant…

http://www.comicrelief.com/files/cr09/files/imce/uk-grant-approvals-2006…

if you want to donate to Comic Relief etc, just look at the list of charities in the above links, strike out War On Want, then pick and mix the Charities of your choice and donate

And do not let your children be sucked into appeals at their schools which include War On Want.

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MPs are threatening to take action unless Israel’s name is removed from Gulf Air’s website among a list of countries under its frequent flyers services.

The parliamentary Palestinian Support Committee plans to send a letter to the airline on Sunday demanding answers.

Under the scheme, passengers from any nationality can apply for frequent flyers membership stating their country of origin.

Committee chairman Nasser Al Fadhala said that the airline had been alerted previously on the issue, but they never responded.

“We don’t normalise ties in any possible way with Israel and the inclusion of Israel as one of the countries, in which its citizens are allowed to benefit from the scheme, implies the opposite,” he said.

“Bahrain is a country that refuses to accept any normalisation with Israel, especially with the Palestinians being evicted from their homes, tortured and killed.”

“Gulf Air and officials behind it will pay the price heavily if they insist on not having Israel’s name removed,” he said.

“We plan to start using our monitoring tools, which will certainly enable us to reach the bottom of this issue.

“The minister is not responding, but maybe if we take a tougher approach, he will take action, or else we will force him to do so.”

A Gulf Air spokesman said the reference to Israel on the website was merely in a dropdown menu so passengers registering for the frequent flyers offer could enter where they live.

“In fact, we have a number Israel-based Arabs in our programme already and it would be a pity to deny future passengers the opportunity to join our programme,” he said.

In the end, the people who they are hurting are the Arabs who have the audacity of living in Israel. You know…. the very “Palestinians” whom they claim they are doing this for.

Here is the outrageous webpage that is causing members of Bahrain’s parliament to spend hours of their time seething, with a visual aid so you can find the problem yourself. Israel is listed in the drop-down menu along with some 200 other countries:

Just in case anyone is still wondering how much the Arab world really cares about “Palestinian” rights, as opposed to destroying Israel, here’s a little clue:

“Palestine” is not mentioned in Gulf Air’s list of countries for “nationality.” But the MPs are not complaining about the absence of “Palestine” on the website, but the existence of “Israel.“