InLightPress is now reporting that Mahmoud Abbas recently ordered the arrest of Joseph Shayeb, a journalist for Al-Ghad.

According to InLightPress, Shayeb was arrested after publishing an article about the expulsion of Samir Mashharawi from Fatah, something I also covered. Shayeb reportedly wrote in his report that the expulsion was ordered by Abbas and was “in violation of Fatah’s regulatory framework.”

Fortunately, Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad intervened on Tuesday evening and ordered the release of Shayeb.

In related news, PalTimes reports that Rami Samara, a journalist, was arrested by Palestinian Authority security forces on Tuesday evening after posting comments that were critical of the PLO on his Facebook page.

Update: The Associated Press has picked up on this story.

Rami Samara, an editor at the official Palestinian news agency Wafa, said plainclothes security agents took him from his office to Abbas’ headquarters on Tuesday and held him for four hours. “They showed me about 100 pages of comments I made on Facebook, mostly criticizing the Palestinian Authority and the PLO,” he said.

He said he was told he would be released if he signed a confession that he organized an anti-government demonstration on behalf of a small PLO faction critical of Abbas. Samara said he refused, but he was eventually released.

“Before this detention, I thought that we, the Palestinian people, enjoy wide freedom, but after what I saw, I think I’m being followed by the intelligence in every step of my life,” he said.

….In another case, journalist Yousef Shayeb, who writes for the Jordanian newspaper al-Ghad, said he was held for eight hours at a Palestinian intelligence office Tuesday. He said he was questioned about stories in which he alleged a Palestinian diplomatic mission abroad was riddled by corruption. Shayeb said interrogators demanded that he reveal his sources, which he said he refused to do.

After a few days of being offline the site has returned and has unleashed a scathing press release that confirms my claim.

InLightPress says that the attack on its website was “treacherous barbarism.” In addition, it states the the attack on the site’s servers was done by professionals. Further, InLightPress says that the attack was a “blatant attack on freedom of opinion and expression.”

In addition, they say that they believe that “the attack came from the Palestinian Authority with the approval of President Abbas.” InLightPress says that they have learned from sources in Ramallah that Mahmoud Abbas set up a “crisis cell” headed by Sabri Saydam, former Palestinian minister for technology, to carry out the attack.

According to InLightPress, the Palestinian Authority has denied that it was involved in the attack. However, InLightPress says that it plans to collect evidence and launch a formal suit.

Despite being blacklisted since, in recent months, Jordan has tried rapprochement with Hamas. In November 2011, Jordan’s Prime Minister Awn Khasawneh said that the expulsion of Hamas was “a legal error.”

A few days after this announcement Jonathan Schanzer in The Weekly Standard wrote:

Khasawneh’s rapprochement with the Palestinian terrorist group is an attempt to woo the Islamic Action Front (IAF), Jordan’s arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, into a government coalition. The IAF is a powerful force in Jordan. Khasawneh understands that appeasing the Islamist group may help preserve the Hashemite Kingdom.

…[the] announcement of the Jordanian outreach to Hamas was a jarring change in tone and policy. The regime is now yielding on ideology because it cannot deliver on real political change, which would weaken its ability to maintain control of this fragile country.

But these populist appeasements will only last so long. Last month, Abdullah promised his people (yet again) that Jordan would move toward a more representative parliament.  If and when Jordan becomes truly representative, the rise of Islamist forces is a foregone conclusion.

Since November, there have been a number of reports suggesting that Hamas officials would visit Jordan on an official trip, however, none have taken place. Nonetheless, in December, Al-Hayat reported that senior Hamas official Mousa Abu Marzouk had visited Jordan to potentially relocate his family. However, it now appears that Marzouk’s family ended up in Cairo, while some of Khaled Meshal’s family left Syria for Jordan.

Two weeks ago, Jordan’s Prime Minister told TIME’s Karl Vick:

The idea is not to bring them [Hamas] back as a launching pad for jihad against Israel or whatever. But as individuals they should be allowed to come back. I thought from the very beginning that their expulsion was unconstitutional and it was the wrong move from the point of view that it stands to reason that if you have many alternatives for as long as possible, it’s the good sign of effective diplomacy.

In addition, he said that “We don’t want them to establish another organization here.”

Today most of the major news outlets are reporting that Hamas’s Khaled Meshal will visit Jordan on Sunday and meet with King Abdullah.

Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal will head to Jordan on Sunday for the first official talks since a crackdown by Amman on the group more than a decade ago, Jordanian officials said on Tuesday.

They said the trip arranged with Qatari mediation reflected Jordan’s desire to normalize ties with the main Palestinian opposition group but not a shift away from stalwart support for the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority under President Mahmoud Abbas.

Despite the new reports, don’t be surprised if this visit is cancelled at the last minute. Either way it seems that Jordan is undergoing a slow motion demise.

Update: The Jordan Times reports:

According to the source, who preferred to remain unnamed, Mishaal and the delegation are expected to request permission for a “permanent presence” in Jordan, stopping short of whether the Palestinian movement will seek to reopen its political office in Amman.

The source stressed that Hamas’ intentions to establish a presence in the Kingdom comes as part of the movement’s desire to “expand” its diplomatic reach and not a sign that the Palestinian movement is abandoning its Damascus headquarters.

“The internal situation in Syria has no influence whatsoever on our request to establish a branch in Jordan or our desire to improve relations with Jordanian authorities,” the source said in a telephone interview yesterday.

Majali stressed that the reopening of Hamas’ political office is “not on the current agenda” of discussions.

Click to enlarge

Yesterday Brian of London and Israellycool Dave met, in person, for an Israellycool board meeting and inaugural Israellycool Executive Branch Three Michelin Star gourmet lunch.

Upon further investigation we discovered that the Israellycool Pay Pal account couldn’t stretch to that so we had to pay for our own food: an Apartheid burger at Burger Ranch in the Apartheid town of Occupied Ra’anana. You can see from the very lousy attached photo how much Apartheid was going on at lunch time as you could barely move in the place without bumping into some more Apartheid.

And just to top it off, here is a rather tedious and dull article: West Bank settlement to apply Israeli law to Palestinian workers – Haaretz Daily Newspaper.

The Ma’aleh Adumim municipality came to a precedent-setting agreement with its Palestinian employees last week, whereby it agreed to recognize their rights in accordance with Israeli labor laws. Until now it was the Jordanian Labor Law from 1965 that was applied to the labor arrangements in this Jewish settlement beyond the Green Line, based on the local authority’s legal argument that it is that law that applies in the territories.

Essentially what it means is that people who don’t want to be Israelis, and some of whom actually want to kill Israelis, do want the protection and benefits of Israeli law because the old Jordanian law they were being ruled by isn’t a patch on what those evil Jews have come up with.

We can have one Jewish state and a whole load of people with permanent residence but no right to vote in general elections. Ask any German living in the UK if he has a problem with that status. As long as they cling to the hope of destroying the Jewish state they should never enjoy ALL the benefits of full citizenship.

And please, take your Apartheid accusations and shove them in the deep fat fryer of another Burger Ranch.

Fifteen years after “Trekkie” King Abdullah II briefly appeared in an episode of Star Trek, Jordan is planning to construct a $1.5-billion-dollar park themed on the cult American science fiction series.

The “Red Sea Astrarium” will be built in the country’s sole port ofAqaba, 350 kilometres (217 miles) south of Amman, spanning 184 acres (74.4 hectares), and will include a Star Trek-themed centre.

“Revolving around ancient history with Nabatean, Babylonian, British and Roman influences,” the park is scheduled for opening in 2014, according to Jordan’s Rubicon Group Holding (RGH), which announced the plan.

Bordering Israel, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, Aqaba is a popular tourist centre and close to the ancient rose-red Nabatean city of Petra and Wadi Rum in the desert.

RGH said in a statement the park would include “technologically advanced attractions, five-star accommodation, captivating theatrical productions,” and night-time spectacles.

It said RGH, CBS Consumer Products and Paramount Recreation will create the Star Trek centre, which “will deliver a variety of multi-sensory 23rd-century experiences, culminating with a state-of-the art space-flight adventure.”

According to RGH, the astrarium “will be the world’s only place where there is a Star Trek attraction,” after a similar facility in Las Vegas closed.

King Abdullah is an acknowledged fan of the Star Trek phenomenon.

In 1996, while he was still a prince, 34-year-old Abdullah made a non-speaking appearance in the Star Trek: Voyager episode “Investigations.”

Wearing a black suit with green shoulder strap in episode 36, he is seen standing with USS Voyager operations officer Harry S. L. Kim, who tells the smiling prince: “See you later.”

It is unclear how the theme park project will be funded, but the King Abdullah II Fund for Development (KAFD) has been approached to help finance it.

“We have not made a decision. We are in the evaluation phase and the project is currently under review by the board,” KAFD Executive Director Tarik Awad told AFP.

The park will include four hotels, generate 500 jobs and “serve as a model for green energy,” RGH said.

“The project, a milestone in the development of tourism in Jordan, will provide a progressive and entertaining celebration of the region’s culture and heritage,” it added.

Senior Palestinian Authority and Fatah officials, including President Mahmoud Abbas and his two sons, have been given Jordanian citizenship, a top Jordanian politician disclosed on Tuesday.

The Palestinian leaders were given Jordanian citizenship despite the fact that the authorities in Amman have been revoking the Jordanian citizenship of thousands of Palestinians.

Atef Tarawneh, deputy speaker of the Jordanian parliament, denounced the decision to revoke the citizenship of thousands of Jordanians of Palestinian origin.

Tarawneh said that the decision was “harmful” to national unity and the constitution in Jordan.

He added that he recently met with King Abdullah II and warned him against the repercussions of revoking the citizenships. He said that the decision has harmed investment in the kingdom because dozens of Jordanian-Palestinian businessmen living abroad were afraid to return home out of fear that the authorities would confiscate their passports.

According to the Londonbased Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper, a significant number of PA leaders are registered as full Jordanian citizens.

The paper pointed out that the leaders applied for Jordanian citizenship at a time when they were urging the Jordanian authorities to stop giving Palestinians Jordanian citizenship, in order to “consolidate their Palestinian identity.” The Jordanian government had justified its decision to strip Palestinians of their citizenship by using the same argument.

However, the Jordanians have long seen the Palestinian majority in the kingdom as a demographic threat.

The decision to rescind the citizenship of tens of thousands of Palestinians is seen in the context of this fear.

Al-Quds Al-Arabi quoted sources in Amman as saying that Abbas and his entire family carry Jordanian passports.

Other PA leaders who carry Jordanian passports include former PA prime minister Ahmed Qurei, Abbas’s spokesman Nabil Abu Rudaineh and Fatah’s Muhammad Dahlan.

The paper did not say when the Palestinian officials were given Jordanian citizenship. PA spokesmen in Ramallah refused to comment on the report.

A Fatah official, however, said that he was not surprised to hear that Palestinian leaders were carrying Jordanian passports. He said he believed most of the PA leaders had applied for and received Jordanian passports in the past 15 years.

In an editorial, Al-Quds Al- Arabi criticized the Palestinian leaders who applied for Jordanian citizenship.

“This is shameful for them because they and their families should be proud of their Palestinian citizenship,” the paper wrote. “If they don’t believe in their own citizenship and are not proud of it, this means that they are not loyal to the Palestinian Authority and don’t deserve to speak on its behalf.”

The paper noted that it was the PA leaders who had asked for Jordanian citizenship, and not the Jordanians who had offered it.

“They were the ones who applied for it, and perhaps they had embarrassed senior Jordanian government officials with the requests,” it wrote.

The Jordanians were unable to reject the applications “out of courtesy and generosity,” the paper said.

I have to admit that the idea of palestinians getting Jordanian citizenship makes a lot of sense.

In other Jordan-palestinian news, Jordanian tribal figures have lashed out against King Abudullah’s palestinian wife, Queen Rania, accusing her of stealing from the country and manipulating and interfering in national politics. Who does she think she is? Suha Piggyfat?

The Obama administration on Tuesday strongly condemned a Palestinian official’s claim that the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem has no religious significance for Jews and is actually Muslim property. 

The State Department said the US rejects the claim as “factually incorrect, insensitive and highly provocative.” Spokesman P.J. Crowley said statements of that kind damage US efforts to revive stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and could incite violence. 

“We have repeatedly raised with the Palestinian Authority leadership the need to consistently combat all forms of de-legitimization of Israel, including denying historic Jewish connections to the land,” he told reporters. 

“As the United States has long maintained, the status of Jerusalem must be resolved in final status negotiations between the parties,” Crowley said. “We recognize that Jerusalem is a deeply important issue to Israelis and Palestinians, to Jews, to Muslims and to Christians everywhere.” 

Crowley stressed that neither side should do anything to prejudice the negotiations, including unilateral acts in Jerusalem. When pressed, he noted that the United States had also frequently expressed its concerns to Israel about the construction of Jewish housing in traditionally Arab east Jerusalem, which the Palestinians claim as their future capital. 

“They both have responsibilities here,” he said. “Both have to take the responsibility to create conditions for negotiations to resume.” 

While I welcome this statement, I do have a number of questions: 

• When Crowley says “statements of that kind..could incite violence,” from which side does he believe the violence may come?
• If the US has “repeatedly raised with the Palestinian Authority leadership the need to consistently combat all forms of de-legitimization of Israel,” how come all we hear about is the huge impediment that “settlement” building represents?

You can view Crowley’s statement here (from 04:10): 

You can also read the full transcript here. 

Notice what one of the reporters says to Crowley regarding the lack of “equivalence” between the PA’s denial of Jewish history and “settlement” construction: 

Well, you’re right. There’s absolutely no equivalence between some guy mouthing off and giving his opinion, whether you agree with it or not, and actual bricks and mortar going up in an area that’s disputed. I mean, the equivalent – you come out and denounce this statement, which is mere – simply words, and it took a question from a reporter to get you to say anything about the actual, physical, on-the-ground construction there. So I don’t understand the equivalence that you’re – your idea of equivalence here. One seems to be much more serious than another. 

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top) 

6:45PM: Head Hamashole Ismail Haniyeh says Hamas would accept the agreement of a Palestinian referendum on peace with Israel; has used car he wants to sell.

6:35PM: Weird site of the day (hat tip: Guillermo).

2:22PM: The PA has removed from its website the report claiming that Jerusalem’s Western Wall isn’t holy to Jews.

1:58PM: A Jordanian restaurant owner has kicked out of her restaurant a group of tourists.

For the crime of being Israeli (hat tip: Jason)

A Jordanian woman gained tremendous fame after refusing to receive a group of Israeli tourists at her restaurant in protest of the crimes of the Jewish state against the Palestinian people. 

Several professional associations and rights organizations praised the action taken by Salwa al-Barghouti when she decided to kick Israeli tourists out of her restaurant in the coastal city of al-Aqaba, 370 kilometers off the capital Amman.

Jordanian restaurant owner Salwa al-Barghouti Barghouti represents all the Jordanian people in their rejection of the Zionist state, said Maysara Malas, head of the Higher Executive Committee for Anti-Normalization.

“Many Jordanians take similar actions, yet nobody knows about them because the media doesn’t know what they do,” he added.

News of Barghouti’s stance spread all over Jordan and shortly after, she made headlines and several media outlets vied for posting her statements.

“I heard customers entering the restaurants speak Hebrew,” she told the press. “I felt extremely angry and remembered all the crimes Israel is committing against Palestinians, so I asked them to leave.”

Barghouti said she does not approve of the strong attention that was given to her action by the media.

“I am against dealing with Zionists in any possible way and I see this as very normal.”

The Israeli tourists who were kicked out, Barghouti added, filed a complaint against her and she was summoned by state security.

“They asked me to sign a document pledging not to mistreat tourists or kick them out of my restaurant again, but I refused.”

Barghouti insisted on her stance and stressed that she will act in the same way if a similar situation takes places.

“My position will never change and I will never allow Israelis into my restaurant,” she concluded.

Could you imagine the uproar if this happened in Israel to a group of Arabs?

Of course, it wouldn’t happen here, and if it did, the restaurant owner would feel the full brunt of the law.

12:05PM: Oh, to have been a fly on the wall. 

Who’s the boss? Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad received a slap in the face from Revolutionary Guards Commander, General Mohammad Ali Jafari, during a national security council meeting in Tehran, an Azerbaijani source told American diplomats. 

According to a document published by WikiLeaks, Jafari began arguing with Ahmadinjead over his “support for freedom of the press.”  Jafari, who was infuriated by Ahmadinejad’s stance, confronted the president and slapped him in the face, the report claimed.  

10:04AM: Photo of the day: 

Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas (L) stands with Germany's President Christian Wulff (2nd R) as he looks at a model of a German financed police stationto be built in the West Bank, during their meeting in the West Bank town of Bethlehem. The Palestinians will explore alternative ways to gain international recognition if US efforts to advance peace talks with Israel fail, Abbas said (AFP/POOL/Darren Whiteside)

"Firing rockets at innocent people makes me feel like a real man! Plus, they're Jews, so it's a win-win."

Residents of the western Negev woke up to yet another day of rocker fire Monday, as the Color Red alert sounded in Sha’ar Hanegev Regional Council in the early hours of the morning.

Two explosions soon followed, as two rockets landed in the council’s open areas. No injuries or damage were reported.

The rockets landed in a relatively remote area of the council, unaccustomed to rocket fire. Security forces are canvassing the area in search of the rockets, but have yet to locate them.

Monday morning’s rocket fire followed a similar rude awakening the area’s residents received on Sunday, as two rockets were fired from northern Gaza at Israel’s south.

Still, the Color Red system failed to operate Sunday. Luckily, those rockets landed in open areas as well, causing no harm.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

9:32PM: According to Lebanon’s Naharnet:

Tensions were high on Monday at the Mahmoudieh region in southern Lebanon after the Lebanese army went on alert when an Israeli bulldozer started digging a water duct into Lebanese territory from the Israeli side of the border.

A patrol from the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) soon arrived on the scene and stopped the bulldozer’s activity.

Contacts are underway to determine the full details behind the incident.

I have seen no mention of this in the Israeli or international media.

8:55PM: Today’s must-read: Who Are the Palestinians?

Prime Minister Netanyahu  has called upon Palestinian leaders to recognize the right of the Jewish people to national self-determination – “two states for two nations.” But are Palestinian Arabs a nation, or a people? What is “Palestinian national identity” based on? Although taken for granted today, Palestinianism has neither a long, nor distinguished history, which may explain why the peace process between Israel and the Arabs has failed and will continue to fail

Palestinianism, inherently meant only one thing: the rejection of a Jewish state in any form. A few elite Arab intellectuals did talk about Palestinianism, but it was not widely accepted. As Columbia University Professor Rashid Khalidi shows in his book on the subject, not until Zionists began settlements did local Arabs seek an alternative.

Focused on opposition to Zionists, rather than a positive self-definition, “Palestinian identity” then, as now, was negative. Palestinian leaders, like the mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husayni, an ardent supporter of the Nazis, and arch-terrorist Yasser Arafat – “fathers” of Palestinianism – rejected Zionism and promoted terrorism.

Anti-colonial and anti-Zionist uprisings against British rule were not directed towards another independent Palestinian state. Nor were Arab riots and pogroms, like those in 1929, 1936, for example, nationalistic. There were no calls for a Palestinian state; the battle cry was, “Kill the Jews.”

Arab leaders like Auni Bey Abdul-Hadi told the Peel Commission in 1937: “There is no such country as ‘Palestine’; ‘Palestine’ is a term the Zionists invented!”

During the 1930s, anti-British and anti-Jewish riots were enflamed by the newly created “Arab – not Palestinian – Higher Committee,” the central political organ of the Arab community of Mandate Palestine.

In 1946, Arab historian Philip Hitti testified before the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry that “there is no such thing as Palestine in history.” In 1947, Arab leaders protesting the UN partition plan argued that Palestine was part of Syria and “politically, the Arabs of Palestine (were) not (an) independent separate … political entity.”

In 1947, the UN proposed a “Jewish” State and an “Arab” – not Palestinian – State. Efforts to organize a political leadership in 1948, in response to the establishment of Israel, soon collapsed.

The womb of Palestinianism was war, the Nakba (catastrophe) in the Arab narrative, the establishment of the State of Israel. Five well-armed Arab countries invaded the nascent state, joining local Arab gangs and militias in a genocidal war to exterminate the Jews. This was not seen as a war for Palestinian nationalism, however; it was a genocidal war against Jews and Zionism itself.

‘Palestinians’ used to be Jews

Arab gangs that attacked Jews in 1947/8 were called the “Arab – not Palestinian – Army of Liberation.” The reason is that prior to Israel’s establishment, the notion of a “Palestinian people” was irrelevant, since Arab affiliations are primarily familial and tribal – not national. And also because “Palestinian” meant something else back then.

Before 1948, those who were called (and called themselves) “Palestinians” were Jews, not Arabs, although both carried the same British passports. In fact, only after Jews in Palestine called themselves Israelis, in 1948, could Arabs adopt “Palestinian” as theirs exclusively. Indeed, the central organ of the pre-Israel Jewish community was called “The Palestine Post” – later changed to the Jerusalem Post.

The establishment of UNRWA in 1949 to provide for Arab refugees provided the institutional structure to build and preserve the idea of an “Arab Palestinian people” – and their “right of return.” Today, in 58 camps, with an annual budget of nearly a billion dollars, the residents are indoctrinated with hatred and Israel’s eventual destruction. Except in Jordan, which granted most citizenship, the residents of these UNRWA towns are severely restricted and denied basic human and civil rights.

Were it not for UNRWA, there would probably be no “Palestinian refugee” problem today. The problem is UNRWA’s controversial definition of “Arab refugee,” which includes anyone who claimed residence in Palestine since 1946, regardless of their origin; this date is important because it marks the high point of a massive influx of Arabs from the region into Palestine, primarily due to employment opportunities and a higher standard of living.

This category of “refugees” was different from all others in that it included not only those who applied in 1949, but all of their descendents, forever, with full rights and privileges; the total population is expected to reach seven or eight million next year, and keeps growing. This is one of the core issues preventing any resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict. UNRWA’s existence, therefore, perpetuates the conflict, prevents Israel’s acceptance, and breeds violence and terrorism.

Palestinianism was defined in 1964, in the PLO Covenant, when Jordan occupied “the West Bank,” a Jordanian reference from 1950 to distinguish the area from the East Bank of the Jordan River, and Egypt held the Gaza Strip. On behalf of the “Palestinian Arab people,” the Covenant declared their goal: a “holy war” (Jihad) to “liberate Palestine,” i.e. destroy Israel. There was no mention of Arabs living in “the West Bank” and Gaza Strip, since that would have threatened Arab rulers. Arab “refugees” were convenient proxies in the war against Israel; Palestinianism became a replacement nationalism for Zionism, a call to arms against Jews.

Solution is regional

This balancing act was no longer necessary after 1967, when Israel acquired areas that had been originally assigned to a Jewish State by the League of Nations and British Mandate – Judea, Samaria, eastern Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip – and the Golan Heights, all rich in Jewish history and archeology. A year later, the PLO Covenant was amended to cover both “occupations” – in 1948 and 1967.

Dedicated to armed struggle, its goal has never changed; unable to defeat Israel militarily, however, the Arab strategy is to demonize and delegitimize, creating yet another Arab Palestinian state, in addition to Jordan. In order to accomplish this, it concocted a narrative, an identity and ethos to compete with Zionism and Jewish history: Palestinianism.

Presented in the PLO Covenant and Hamas Charter (1988), the purpose of Palestinianism is to “liberate Palestine” and destroy Israel; neither reflect any redeeming social or cultural values.

“Palestinianism” lacks the basic requirements of legitimate national identity: a separate, unique linguistic, cultural, ethnic, or religious basis; it is nothing more than a political-military construct, currently led by Fatah and Hamas terrorist organizations. However, it became legitimized by the UN.

Despite mega-terrorist attacks and, backed by the Arab League, Muslim and “non-aligned” countries, the PLO was accepted by the United Nations in 1974. The following year, the UN passed its infamous “Zionism is Racism” resolution, sanctioning Israel’s demonization, and setting the UN on a course of Israel’s destruction.

The myth of Palestinianism worked because the media accepted Arab and PLO claims and their cause. Nearly all media, for example, use the term “Palestinian,” or “Israeli-occupied West Bank,” reinforcing Palestinian claims, rather than the authentic designation which appears on earlier maps, Judea and Samaria, referring to its Jewish history. The term “West Bank” is a political, not geographic statement.

By the early 1990s, some Israeli politicians, Left-dominated media, academia, cultural elite and some jurists accepted “Palestinianism as a way of expressing their opposition to “settlements,” and hoping for some sort of mutual recognition with the PLO. Their efforts culminated in the Oslo Accords (1993), which gave official Israeli sanction to Palestinianism.

Anti-Israel academics around the world promote “Palestinian” archeology, society and culture as a brand name, and a political message. Advertising works; every time someone uses the term “Palestinian,” it acknowledges and reinforces this myth. Palestinianism, however, regardless of its lack of historical, cultural and societal roots, is now well-established as a political identity that demands sovereign rights and a territorial base. The question seems to be not if, but where.

The solution is regional. Arab Palestinians are entitled to civil and human rights in their host countries where they have lived for generations. A second Arab Palestinian state, in addition to Jordan, which was carved out of Palestine in 1922 – whose population is two-thirds “Palestinian” – will not resolve any core issue at the heart of the conflict. The conflict is not territorial, but existential; recognition of a Jewish state is anathema. That explains why Palestinian Arab leaders refuse to accept it in any form.

The problem, for Palestinianism, is not “the occupation” in 1967, but Israel’s existence; seen as an exclusively Arab homeland, Palestine is an integral part of the Arab world, completely under Arab sovereignty. This is axiomatic; there are no exceptions and no compromises.

Promoted in media, mosques and schools, anti-Jewish incitement, denial of the Holocaust and Jewish history, and rejection of the right of Jewish national self-determination, by definition, Palestinianism is the greatest obstacle to peace.

I am sure some of you will not agree with this, but I challenge you to show where it is inaccurate.

6:15PM: Photo of the day:

Passengers wait for their luggage in the arrivals hall at Israel's Ben-Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv September 13, 2010. Ground staff began an indefinite strike at Tel Aviv's Ben-Gurion airport on Monday, initially halting all outgoing flights, an airport spokeswoman said. REUTERS/Nir Elias

More here.

6:08PM: What an evil plan!

Israel has found a unique way to retaliate against Iraq for firing Scud missiles on it nearly 20 years ago; it has decided to sell Iraq Israel’s used cars.

Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz said he has approved a new plan to export tens of thousands of used cars to Jordan and Iraq. The move aims to thin out the glut of second hand cars on the market and pave the way for boosting new car sales, which would put millions of shekels into the government’s pockets in taxes.

According to a statement from the ministry, about 50,000 cars could be sold to Jordan and Iraq annually, which constitutes about 10 percent of the used car market.

The decision was made after a study that showed such a move would make the average age of cars newer, safer and pollute less. What it didn’t mention was that it would also likely increase the price of used cars, which are now already about double similar cars elsewhere in the world due to heavy taxation.

The new plan still must get final approval from the Israeli Ministry of Finance since it would require giving tax breaks for selling a used car.

“We welcome the decision,” said Uri Digmi, the chairman of the Israeli Used Car Dealers Association. “This would bring about a situation where the average car was newer, greener, safer and more efficient and also reduce the number of old cars on the road.”

Each year, Israelis buy about 200,000 new cars. About 600,000 used cars change hands annually. The first eight months of this year saw about 140,000 new cars sold, which is reportedly a 27 percent increase over last year.

Israel charges an exorbitant 113 percent new car tax, which more than doubles the price of cars. This is the main reason used cars cost twice as much in Israel compared to the rest of the world.

The deal would require the state to give the seller of a used car a tax break, or even a voucher toward a tax reduction for the purchase of a new car, in order to make it competitive for dealers to sell used cars abroad.

“Israel right now is like an island, an isolated land where the cars come in and never leave. It’s not like Germany or Switzerland where you can resell them to neighboring countries,” Digmi told The Media Line.

The Transportation Ministry issued a report that found that the move would lower the average age of cars and boost new car sales, which would have a beneficial impact on road safety and engine emissions.

Digmi said the average age of cars in Israel was about five years and in an average lifetime it would be sold half a dozen times until it is eventually crushed in a junkyard. They are never taxed again so the state doesn’t gain anything.

“The state has to encourage the export of used cars abroad in order to improve the local market,” said Digmi. “The moment it comes here it remains until it dies. We have to change that. There’s plenty of market opportunities in our neighboring countries.”

According to Digmi, shiploads of used cars dock in the Israeli port of Haifa where they are unloaded and transported by lorry to Jordan and resold in Iraq.

“There’s plenty of room for the Israeli cars to enter this niche,” he says.

In Amman, Jordan, used car dealer Amer Salman was looking to unload his fleet of used cars. While he had no reservations in principle with the idea of selling Israeli cars on his lot, he was skeptical it would work.

“We have no problem doing business with Israel, but to be honest, we don’t need any more used cars in Jordan,” Salman told The Media Line.

“We have a huge surplus here,” said Salman, a salesman from the Amman dealership of Marwan Eneibsy.

One of the reasons for this was the kingdom’s decision to give huge incentives to Jordanians buying hybrid cars. Taxes were dropped from 80 percent to just 5 percent, which created a glut.

The main beneficiaries in Israel of this new plan would likely be the large car leasing companies in Israel who purchase about 60 to 80 percent of all new cars in Israel. They sell them after some three years into what is a limited market.

In 1991, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein fired 39 Scud surface-to-surface rockets at Israel in an attempt to draw the Jewish state into the war against Iraq by a coalition of Arab countries and their Western allies. Under enormous diplomatic pressure from the United States, Israel did not retaliate, thus preserving the allied coalition.

Bwaaaaaa!!

5:54PM: This story brought a tear to my eye.

4:40PM: Introducing a new Hamas video depicting a Hamas takeover of Israel, replete with and bad acting and scenes of palestinian wishful thinking.

More here.

3:48PM: Do you remember after the flotilla incident, the Jewish teen who marched alone, with an Israeli flag, in front of a pro-palestinian demonstration?

Here’s a reminder:

Well, the teen has just emigrated to Israel.

Last week, Pereg realized a lifelong dream and made aliyah.

“I bought a one-way ticket. My heart is here,” he said with a spark in his eye. “I intend to join the IDF and serve the country as much as I can.”

Ever since his daring appearance, Pereg has become a sort of mini-celebrity in Los Angeles and Israel, receiving hundreds of support letters and even some checks.

“I speak at all sorts of eventד; especially fundraisers for Israel. I’ve become an unofficial ambassador,” he said.

“Many Knesset members have been calling me; today MK Anastassia Michaeli (Yisrael Beiteinu) called to invite me to her son’s bar mitzvah. Sometimes, it’s a little embarrassing,” Pereg said.

His moment of famewas completely spontaneous, Peres said, adding he felt teh need to face the pro-Arab protestors while holding up an Israeli flag.

“At first the police asked me to step away, but I ignored them. Only when the protesters shouted slurs at me, the officers said they would be unable to protect me, and so I walked away,” he said, adding that friends told him they feared for him.

“However, I felt a rush of adrenalin and wasn’t scared at all,” he said.

Pereg landed in Israel last week, accompanied by his mother. He was in fact born in the Jewish state 16 and-a-half years ago, but his parents immigrated to the United States when he was still an infant.

Pereg said he always felt the passion of Zionsim burning inside him, and thought of himself as an Israeli temporarily visiting abroad.

The young teen’s dream is to join the IDF Intelligence Corps: “I am half Persian, and speak the language. My intention is not necessarily to fight, but use my skills to contribute as much as I can.”

After he completes his military service, Pereg’s ambition is to become a Knesset member, although he hasn’t decided yet which party to join. He also said he would like to live in Judea and Samaria, “where people do on a daily basis what I did for 20 minutes.”

2:50PM: Regarding the three palestinians reportedly killed yesterday when an “IDF unit spotted suspicious figures attempting to fire anti-tank missiles, at which point the soldiers returned fire,” the palestinians have claimed they were innocent civilians.

The thing is, their ages are being reported differently, suggesting palestinian sources cannot get their “facts” straight.

CNN:

Three people, including a teenager, were killed Sunday and two others were injured when an Israeli tank shell landed east of the Beit Hanoun neighborhood in northern Gaza, according to Palestinian medical and security officials.

The number of dead was initially two, but a 13-year-old boy died from injuries sustained in the incident, the officials said. The other fatalities were a 61-year-old man, the teenager’s grandfather, and another youth, 21.

BBC:

Medical staff and witnesses said Israel fired shots across the border near the town of Beit Hanoun in Gaza.

One report said the two of those killed were a 91-year-old man and his 33-year-old grandson.

AP:

Palestinian mourners pray next to the bodies of Ibrahim Abdullah Abu Said, 70, and Hussam Abu Said, 16, during their funeral in Jebaliya refugee camp, northern Gaza Strip, Monday, Sept. 13, 2010

I smell a rat.

1:34PM: Via MEMRI comes excerpts from a speech delivered by Hamas PLC Speaker Ahmad Bahr, which aired on Al-Aqsa TV on September 5, 2010.

It is said that ‘Omar [Ibn Al-Khattab] wished to become a martyr. It is said that one day, ‘Omar addressed the people: “In the Garden of Eden, there is a palace – hear me well, brothers – with 500 gates. At every gate, there are 5,000 black-eyed virgins.” Brothers, 500 multiplied by 5,000 is 2.5 million.

And I thought 72 was a lot.

Ibn Hajar explicated a hadith, saying: When a man is having sex with his wife, he should be praying for a son who would wage Jihad for the sake of Allah.

How romantic. Can you imagine the Hamas pick-up line?

“Wanna help me create a son who will wage Jihad for the sake of Allah?”

With so many female Muslim virgins, I am surprised there aren’t more male ones.

1:20PM: Here is a story I missed when I was offline during Rosh Hashanah.

A CNN investigative report aired Thursday slammed the treatment of Palestinian children by IDF soldiers.

The report included uncorroborated charges of sexual abuse against Palestinian youngsters while in IDF custody.

The CNN report featured an unidentified Palestinian boy claiming that IDF forces attempted to insert an object into his rectum after he was arrested. The unidentified youngster said a dozen officers were standing around and laughing while he was being interrogated, stopping only when their commander stepped into the room.

The IDF could not offer a response to the charge because the youngster’s name was not provided. The army did say that a complaint should be filed if such cases ever happened.

“Any claim regarding improper conduct by soldiers or police officers will be thoroughly examined by the relevant officials,” the army said. “We cannot address general claims on the subject in the absence of a specific complaint.”

According to human rights group Defense of Children International, cited in the CNN report, five Palestinian children said they were sexually abused by the Israeli army. No evidence or further information was provided.

According to the report, which did not seem to include any hard evidence of IDF wrongdoing, Palestinian youngsters detained over such offences as stone-throwing are being held in contravention of the law. It cited charges that some boys underwent torture at the hand of Israeli forces.

Needless to say, antisemitic websites and other scum and villainy have latched on to this story.

This is CNN.

12:25PM: PA negotiator Saeb Erekat has threatened that peace talks will fail if Israel resumes building in “West Bank settlements.”

Apparently, continued rocket fire and refusing to recognize Israel as a Jewish state are not showstoppers, while a Jew adding on an extra room to their house is.

9:15AM: It is just uncanny how many times the foreign press photographers choose to portray Gazans as “caged in”, no matter where in Gaza they are.

Here’s today’s example.

Palestinian boys stand outside the hospital where the bodies of Palestinians killed by an Israeli shelling were brought in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip September 12, 2010. Israeli shelling killed three Palestinians in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, medical workers and witnesses said, after militants in the Hamas-ruled territory fired rockets across the border.An Israeli military spokesman said soldiers in the area shot at a group trying to fire a rocket-propelled grenade at them, "who were apparently hit." REUTERS/Mohammed Salem

9:08AM: Luckily, when Aussie Dave is out of action, you guys step up and send him some good news tips.

For instance, Shy Guy noticed these headlines yesterday:

JPost: IDF foils attempted terror attack at Gaza border fence

INN: IDF Kills Two in Firefight with Gaza Terror Infiltrators

AP: Hamas: Israeli strike in Gaza kills 3 Palestinians

What media bias?

9:04AM: Sorry for the relative lack of posting yesterday, but it was a combination of having too much work and too much of no working internet at home.

Those bloggers who manage to churn out 5 plus posts a day, while maintaining a day job and family life, please email me. I want to know your secret.

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"This peace initiative is making me sick!"

In its latest campaign under the slogan “I am your partner. Are you my partner?” the Geneva Initiative, which promotes a model agreement as the basis for peace between Israel and the Palestians, has featured a number of senior Palestinians – but it turns out that the two most senior officials, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, did not give their permission for the use of their likenesses.

Furthermore, in the past several days, through an intermediary, Fayyad has asked that his picture be removed from the Geneva Initiative’s campaign. Abbas, who has been in Washington and North Africa over the past week, has not asked that the campaign stop using his likeness and has not withdrawn his participation in the campaign, but Fayyad, who was in the West Bank at the time, has sought to have his picture removed.

Palestinian sources said Fayyad views the campaign as “too Israeli” and tilted in favor of Israel, but they made it clear that it wasn’t a case of Fayyad not wanting to be a peace partner, but rather that in his view the campaign presented the Palestinians as responsible for the fact that there was no peace, something Fayyad said was not the case. The Palestinian prime minister’s view, according to the sources, was that the absence of peace is the Israeli government’s doing.

Yep. This Geneva Initiative certainly does serve as the model for peace with the palestinians.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

9:12PM: Appropriately named billionaire George Soros has announced he is donating – wait for it – $100 million – to the anti-Israel Human Rights Watch.

"One hundred million dollars"

Billionaire financier and philanthropist George Soros on Tuesday announced that he would donate $100 million spread out over 10 years to Human Rights Watch, on condition that the funding be matched by other philanthropic grants to the organization.

The grant, from the Soros-founded Open Society Foundations is slated to be used to expand Human Rights Watch’s operations around the globe. The expansion will require Human Rights Watch operating budget to grow from $48 million to $80 million per year within five years.

“Human Rights Watch is one of the most effective organizations I support. Human rights underpin our greatest aspirations: they’re at the heart of open societies,” said Soros, chairman of the Open Society Foundations.

Human Rights Watch was founded in 1978 with the goal of investigating and helping to root out human rights violations around the globe. The organization currently maintains a staff of almost 300 to address human rights conditions in nearly 90 countries. Human Rights Watch also publishes around 100 reports on human rights abuses in different countries across the globe.

The new grant will be used to expand the organization’s reporting network and research staff to cover more countries and issues in greater depth.

“In an increasingly multipolar world, we must ensure that Human Rights Watch’s message resonates in the most influential capitals around the globe, said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “Ending serious abuses requires generating pressure from any goverment with clout, including emerging powers.”

Roth added, “We hope that George Soros’s example will help the human rights movement worldwide by encouraging philanthropists to invest in the ideals of human rights.”

$100 million can buy a heck of a lot of Nazi memorabilia.

6:25PM: Hizbullah has denied its members removed long-range rockets from a suspected arms depot in Lebanon and transferred them to other locations after several blasts and a fire in the three-storey building last week.

Their explanation? Well, they don’t really have one.

Hizbullah “does not comment on Israeli lies,” the sources told pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat in remarks published Tuesday.

That’s it? No far-fetched excuse like “Those were golf clubs”?

Color me disappointed.

6:15PM: It looks like the palestinians are not just using living people as human shields.

Egyptian security forces have discovered weapons caches in 11 different locations in the Sinai peninsula, an Egyptian source revealed Tuesday.

Egypt has bolstered security along the border in order to keep weapons and explosives from being smuggled into the Gaza Strip.

Officers patrolling the border between the Gaza Strip and Sinai found anti-aircraft missiles, a quarter ton of TNT, and other weaponry hidden in villages and cemeteries near Rafah, the source said.

I guess they won’t have to worry too much about the impact of work accidents.

5:48PM: Prime Minister Netanyahu’s Rosh Hashana greetings in English:

Notice how he makes a point of saying “Jerusalem, the united capital of Israel,” followed by some interesting body language.

3:30PM: Seriously, what is there to talk about with the PA?

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas rejected Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s talk about an “historic compromise” and said there would be no compromises on core issues such as Jerusalem and borders.

Abbas also reiterated his rejection of Netanyahu’s demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state. “We’re not talking about a Jewish state and we won’t talk about one,” Abbas said in an interview with the semi-official Al-Quds newspaper. “For us, there is the state of Israel and we won’t recognize Israel as a Jewish state.”

Had the world rejected palestinian terrorism outright, the palestinians would not feel so emboldened as to demand everything without giving anything in return.

1:16PM: Do you recall the news story from weeks ago about the Arab man convicted of “rape by deception” after having intercourse with a Jewish woman while pretending to be a Jew, for which Israel was heavily criticized?

Well, surprise surprise, there’s more to it.

A few weeks ago, Israeli newspapers reported that an Arab man had been convicted of “rape by deception” after having intercourse with a Jewish woman while pretending to be a Jew.

Various blogs ran with the story. The more sober blogs noted that the crime of rape by deception was established as a crime in Israel in a context having nothing to do with inter-ethnic/religious sex, and various law professors noted the interesting hypotheticals that could arise under this crime.

The more hysterical anti-Israel blogs (do I even need to mention Juan Cole?), by contrast, found that the case reflected a deep illness in Israeli society. For example, Andrew Sullivan:

But it’s the visceral emotional core of this that is so offensive. It’s about racism, religion and the risk of miscegenation. It’s about the deep disgust of some Israeli Jews toward Arabs, upheld by the courts. It’s a variant of the racial sexual panics of the Jim Crow South.

Gideon Levy, an Israeli whose vitriol for his own country puts Sullivan to shame, added:

It was no coincidence that this verdict attracted the attention of foreign correspondents in Israel, temporary visitors who see every blemish. Yes, in German or Afrikaans this disgraceful verdict would have sounded much worse.

It turns out, however, that the victim actually accused the perpetrator of “simple” violent, forcible rape, and the charge of “rape by deception” was a plea bargain (original Hebrew, but here’s an English translation) agreed to by the defendant to avoid trial on the real charge, and agreed to by the prosecutor because the victim, a past victim of significant sexual violence, would have been traumatized by pursuing the case.

11:26AM: Photo of the day:

A Palestinian girl touches a glass tube during a special prayer following Lailat al Qadr at a mosque in the West Bank city of Nablus September 6, 2010. Some local Muslims believe the tube contains a hair from the beard of the Prophet Mohammad. REUTERS/Abed Omar Qusini

Touch? Looks like she is sniffing it. Which I guess is kind of gross, but would be even grosser if the hair belonged to Yasser Arafat.

Meanwhile, it looks like the palestinians have been sold another lie.

11:16AM: As blogged a few days ago, the IDF Spokespersons office released more footage from the aftermath of last week’s explosion of a Hezbollah Weapons cache that occurred in a heavily occupied civilian area of south Lebanon.

What I didn’t mention was this: Amongst the many violations of UN Security Council resolution 1701 (remember those are the strict ones that are supposed to carry severe consequences when violated) it would appear that the IDF is burrying the lead:

Hezbollah operatives can be seen emptying the storage facility and moving the contents to a new location–a mosque in a nearby village.

Another day, another terrorist atrocity in the making.

(Originally a new post by Brian of London but moved as an update to this post since I largely dealt with the footage already)

9:42AM: Here is a wonderful speech by Former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar to the World Jewish Congress in Jerusalem last week.

Transcript:

First of all, I would like to thank the World Jewish Congress for your kind invitation. It is a pleasure indeed to be with all of you here in the Holy city of Jerusalem. Even more today. I want to start by firmly condemning the ruthless terrorist attack that yesterday killed four Israelis, one of them pregnant, outside a Jewish settlement near Hebron.

I want to emphasize , once again, my clear conviction that nobody should talk, neither deal, nor yield to terrorists. The only fate for terrorism is to be fought and defeated. Today, understandably, all our eyes are on Washington DC, where hosted by President Obama, Primer Minister Netanyahu and the President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahamoud Abbas, are going to enter direct talks after so many months of impasse.

Though I’m not sure about the possibility to achieve a “historic agreement” given the circumstances on the Palestinian side, we must be optimistic. At least the world will see that it is not the Israeli government that is the one that is not willing to talk and is not ready to deliver.

We should be optimistic but also prudent. Expectations are too high, and as a politician I know that big expectations tend to produce bigger frustrations. Last time the leaders from Israel and the Palestinian Authority met in order to produce a peaceful and lasting agreement, the outcome of the meeting was precisely the opposite: a second Intifada far more lethal than the first one.

But let us dream for a while and believe that a final status agreement between Israel and a Palestinian State were to be reached soon. It would not only change the dynamics here, it would show to the entire world how wrong they have been in blaming Israel for all the wrongdoings in the region, or the lack of an Israeli-Palestinian agreement as the source of all violence stretching from Morocco to the Hindu Kush.

The world would see that a Palestinian State would neither tame the Islamic radicals and jihadists whose goal is to establish a fundamentalist theocracy, nor would it diminish the nuclear and revolutionary ambitions of the Iranian regime, the real two main drivers of the future of the region and the world.

In any case we should be looking to Washington DC not only for the talks going on there today, but for deeper reasons. The US has been the cornerstone of the Western world, expanding our core values of freedom, prosperity and human dignity, and protecting our security vis a vis our enemies. The United States has played a vital role and our way of life depends on her playing that central role in the future. Something that is not guaranteed. Revealing his Arab mind, Bin Laden said when he and some of his fellows were celebrating the destruction of the Twin Towers, that if someone has to choose between a strong horse and a weak horse, he will invariable choose the strong one.

For decades if not centuries, the strong horse has been the West, clearly. Today, nonetheless, we are facing some competitors. There are some that would like to see a new world order where the western powers have a diminished role and influence, like Russia and China, each one for different reasons. There are some others who would like to have more influence for themselves, like Brazil or, lately, Turkey. And, of course, there are those who would like to destroy our system to impose their vision, like the revolutionary ayatollahs in Iran, or the jihadists led or inspired by Al Qaeda. To add more confusion, we in the West are going through one of the most, if not the most, severe economic crisis in our recent history. And while the crisis is global, affecting the whole planet, some are better prepared to deal with its consequences than others. If the crisis lasts too long, a new distribution of power will be inevitable. There will be winners and losers. Of that there is no doubt.

Furthermore, major parts of the West are suffering a kind of crisis of identity. Europe is a good example. With a declining population, increasing numbers of Muslim immigrants, many of them exposed to radical ideas, multiculturalism has imposed itself as the politically correct way to deal with the challenges of different cultures living together even if some of them do not want to be integrated or do not respect the other.

The problem becomes all the more acute when judeo-christian values are aggressively challenged every day and the 68-generation that dominates our current leadership does nothing to defend them.

Peacenik Europe has been fighting the West for too long, and because of that has been so hypercritical of Israel.

The US provides a different story. At least until very recently. President Obama has put in motion forces that, if unchecked, may redefine the nation and its place in the world in ways that, to me, may cause major problems to all of us.

From his inauguration he has sought a new relationship with the Muslim world even at the cost of undermining America’s best ally in the region, as he has done with Europe in seeking to “press the reset button” in relations with Moscow.

He seems to have devoted more time and energy in organizing today’s meeting in Washington and advancing a new peace plan than in trying to prevent the Iranian regime from building its bomb. He has projected an image of somebody who wants to escape from the problems of the world, from Iraq to Afghanistan, embracing many enemies of America while punishing its traditional allies.

I don’t think the growing attacks against Israel, and the general campaign of deligitimation are unrelated to the crisis of the West, and more particularly, the crisis of confidence that emanates from the White House today. When the strong horse is not perceived to be strong anymore, people tend to act in ways that would have seemed unbelievable just days before.

Our weakness, perceived or real, is the strength of our enemies. We can complain but accept our decline doing nothing, as many seem to prefer, or we can counter attack, defend ourselves and strengthen our values.

I have chosen the second option. Because I believe in the West, what we have been, what we are and what we can be.

And here is where Israel enters the equation. If the major strategic challengers are a potential nuclear Iran on the one hand and jihadism on the other hand, Israel is vital for us, for our nations and societies. Israel is not only an integral part of the West, for all kind of reasons I don’t need to elaborate here, Israel is today essential for us. Even more now than before, not only because you are in the region where the strategic tectonic plates collide, but because you are one of the few nations willing to pay a price for your survival, a nation that will do whatever it takes to defend itself, a nation where our core democratic values are so ingrained that defending the State of Israel is the same as defending our liberal system.

It is vital to understand this, particularly at a time when the historic leader of the West, the United States of America, is going through a period of introspection, exhaustion, and even confusion. If the US keeps fading away as a force for good in the World Israel will be forced to play a growing role in the region, and possibly beyond the region.

Defending Israel is ultimately defending the western roots, the western values that many in Europe, and some in America, seem to have forgotten. They are not obsolete. And the best proof is precisely Israel and its people.

Letting the delegitimation of Israel grow, seems to me the best path to weaken not only the freedom of maneuver of Israel, but to undermine ourselves in front of our enemies, which are the same.

That’s why a few months ago I got together with some personal friends in a new project called the Friends of Israel Initiative. Even when we first heard that Israeli soldiers were intercepting the Flotilla heading to Gaza, and we were caught by the public uproar against Israel, we all believed that it was necessary that somebody should stand up and say: enough is enough, that over-emotive and often irrational modes of discourse about Israel are simply not acceptable, that they should be replaced with reason and decency.

We come from different continents, and from a variety of personal experiences. And the key element, I believe, is that, we are non-Israelis and mainly non-Jews. We are, simply put, concerned citizens, concerned democrats.

Why would we feel inclined to defend Israel knowing that we will automatically be stigmatized?

The answer is very simple, because we live in a world where it is indispensable to defend our moral values, our identity and the faith in our democratic societies, to build a better and safer world.

We are used to seeing on TV, and sometimes at close quarters, the imperatives and consequences of, let me call it, hard-wars. But besides, below or above conflicts like the one being waged in Afghanistan, there is something else going on, let me call it a soft-war. By which I mean an attack on our core values, on our very way of life.

For all the founder members of the Friends of Israel Initiative, Israel is a western democratic country, Furthermore, it is a land of the future, a country of great opportunities.

We decided to start moving with our Initiative because we all shared a sense of urgency. We, as a global group, believed that our best contribution would be to reinforce the international standing of Israel. Because many had come to the conclusion that Israel may be the weakest link. That a criticized Israel may evolve in time into an isolated Israel; and an isolated Israel may become a pariah state. At that point, anything could be possible.

That’s why we believe halting this process of eroding the rights of Israel is not only important, but vital: To Israel, of course, but to all western countries. As I put it in an op-ed in the Times a couple of months ago, “if Israel goes down, we all go down”.

Let me conclude by saying one more thing: Our goal is to be proactive and constructive. We aspire to make the case for Israel as a normal country, with all the virtues and, yes, all of the defects of a normal democratic society. We want to make our case sustainable over time. Israel is usually portrayed in a very negative way. We want, and we need, to open a space to discuss Israel and the wider region in a more rational way.

It will take a lot of effort, and time, as well as money. But we believe we will see results. You don’t win battles by adopting a purely defensive posture. Neither do you win battles by simply focusing on the particular crisis of the moment. Because the world is currently undergoing profound and rapid changes that will have enduring consequences for all of us, we cannot wait to act. We have been in Paris and London, and in two weeks time we will organize a launch of the Initiative in Washington DC. It is important that European voices, mainly non-Jewish, try to bring some reason into the debate there as well.

If we want to prevail over our adversaries we must start reinforcing ourselves, starting with the ideological front and the war of ideas. There is where we should and we can make our best contribution. And with your help, we will.”

Hat tip: Carl, next to whom I sat during the speech.

9:20AM: Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit has said our demand to be recognized as a Jewish state is worrying.

Israel’s demand to be recognized as a Jewish state is worrying, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit told the al-Arabiya television network.

“If the international community defines Israel as a Jewish state – such a decision should be approved by the UN,” Aboul Gheit said.

In the interview, Aboul Gheit equated Israel’s demand to Iran’s decision to call itself the “Islamic Republic of Iran,” saying, “Israel wants to call itself a Jewish or Hebrew state. This is worrying.”

The truly worrying thing here is the fact a so-called peace partner does not recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

Notice I said worrying, not surprising. In the peace treaties we signed with both Egypt and Jordan, there is no mention of recognition of Israel as a Jewish state.

Stupid Jews.

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