Mahmoud Abbas (the terrorist formerly known as Abu Mazen) is in London.

Can anyone forget the greatest “Palestinian” Olympic achievement and the heights of their athletic prowess in Munich? Here’s a photo of the permanent reminder we built in Israel to “Palestinian” Olympic achievement.

Maybe he’s in London to help out the 2012 organisers.

Iran has protested against the already controversial logo of the 2012 Olympic Games, saying the emblem is racist and spells the word “Zion,” the ILNA news agency reported on Monday.

The jagged, multi-colored emblem, which reportedly cost 400,000 pounds (nearly $650,000) features four bold numerals representing 2012, with the signature Olympic Rings emblazoned within the digit zero.
 
 But Mohammad Aliabadi, head of the National Olympic Committee in the Islamic Republic, said the logo was undermining the event and accused the British organizers of indulging in “racism,” ILNA reported.

“Unfortunately, we all are witnessing that the upcoming Olympics … faces a serious challenge, definitely spawned out of some people’s racist spirit,” Aliabadi said in a letter to International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Jacques Rogge.

“The use of the word Zion by the designer of Olympics logo ….in the emblem of the Olympics Games 2012 is a very revolting act,” he added, warning that if Rogge did not act the logo would “affect the participation of several countries, especially like Iran which insists on following principles and values.”

I am surprised the Iranians failed to mention that the logo also operates as a potentially lethal Zionist weapon.

Meanwhile, wait until they see the Olympic mascot.

Turkish foreign ministry officials denied reports that Ankara had agreed to Iranian requests to transfer missiles and other weaponry to the Lebanese terror group Hizbullah, Army Radio reported on Saturday.

“The claims mentioned are without basis,” said a senior foreign ministry official

Rumors were circulating that Turkey and Iran are helping Hizbullah obtain new weapons, Italian daily Corriere Della Sera reported on Wednesday evening.

Sources told Corriere Della Sera that Turkey will “send sophisticated weapons, rockets and guns to Syria, that will end up in Lebanon,” where the Iranian Army will ensure the weapons are transferred to Hizbullah.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guards “will facilitate the transition, ensure safety, watch loads on the routes, and provide support to the border,” the report said.

The Iranians reportedly want to build a weapons network similar to that in the Sudan, and hope to help Hamas as well.

The Italian newspaper reported that Western intelligence sources “view the Turkish-Iranian plot with concern, as they are obvious risks to safety.”

Of course, Turkey has also denied using chemical weapons against Kurds (hat tip: Carl).

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

7:50PM: What’s the secret behind Israeli innovation?

7:44PM: Iran’s national sport: forfeiting.

4:55PM: 1500 West Australians, including over 100 Federal and State Parliamentarians and community leaders, recently attended the launch of the Friends of Israel (Western Australia).

I believe the organization is part of this initiative. According to the site:

The organization has been established to enable Western Australians to express their support for Israel.

All over the world, people are joining together to take a stand for democratic values and freedoms.

They know that to take such a stand also means to support Israel, her right to defend her citizens, and to live in peace and security, free from threats of terrorism.

They know that Israel is the best ally of the free nations – a champion of democratic values in the Middle East; and a dynamic and open society that has contributed abundantly to culture, science and technology.

They know that Israel is in the front lines of the global battle between those who love life and those who glorify death.

They know that if Israel falls, we all fall.

By joining Friends of Israel WA, you can join with this groundswell of global support for Israel, for democracy and for freedom.

4:36PM: The Simon Wiesenthal Center has criticized Israeli President Shimon Peres for paying tribute to Romania for “rescuing 400,000 Jews” during World War II.

The Jerusalem-based center voiced its “surprise and strong disappointment” at Peres who failed to mention “the central role played by the regime of Romanian dictator Marshal Ion Antonescu in the mass murder of an estimated 280,000 to 380,000 Romanian and Ukrainian Jews during the Holocaust.”

During a press conference with Romanian counterpart Traian Basescu Thursday, the visiting Israeli president said: “We shall never forget that in the darkest days in Europe under the Nazis Romania stood up and saved the life of many of the Jewish people here and that 400,000 of them went to Israel and they were the builders of Israel.”

The center said in a statement that Peres “sought to emphasize a positive element of the history of Romanian Jewry …”
But “his failure to condemn the horrific crimes of the Antonescu regime against the Jewish people is likely to have very dire consequences, especially in Romania and elsewhere in Eastern Europe, where there is a growing tendency … to deny or minimize the highly-significant role played by local Nazi collaborators in the annihilation of the Jews.”.

The group called on Peres to “correct and fully clarify his unfortunate remarks.”

Romania had long denied its participation in the Holocaust, triggering criticism from Israel and Jewish organizations.

An international commission of historians set up in 2003 established that some 270.000 Romanian and Ukrainian Jews died between 1940 and 1944, during marshal Ion Antonescu’s pro-Nazi regime, while some 25,000 Gypsies were deported, half of whom died.

2:00PM: According to the IDF, Hizbullah has changed its tactics in anticipation of the next war, coming soon to a theater near us.

These tactics involve hiding behind even more civilians, including handicapped children.

Israel’s military says Hezbollah has changed strategy since the last war, moving most of its fighters and weapons from wooded rural areas into villages. It says the aim is to avoid detection and use to civilians for cover if war erupts.

The military says all of this exists under the nose of 12,000 international peacekeepers who, by their own count, conduct up to 340 patrols a day in south Lebanon but are hobbled by a hostile population and rules preventing them from searching private property.

In an interview with The Associated Press on Mount Adir, a hill overlooking the border, an officer from the military’s Northern Command pointed through the summer haze at the village of Aita al-Shaab.

One of its southernmost buildings, a white structure housing mentally handicapped children, is a Hezbollah lookout post, the officer said. Several guerrilla command posts are in civilian buildings in the center of Aita al-Shaab, she said, with several dozen fighters able to move among houses through underground tunnels. The military would not allow her name to be used because of the sensitivity of her job.

The village also houses a network of warehouses holding arms trucked in from Iran via Syria, she said, some in stand-alone structures and some in smaller stashes in garages, basements and buried under backyards.

The officer said the guerrillas now have 5,000 fighters operating in the buffer zone between the border and the Litani River _ a strip ranging from 5 kilometers to 30 kilometers (3 miles to 18 miles) wide _ which is supposed to be free of militant activity under the 2006 cease-fire. In late 2009, Nasrallah said Hezbollah’s rocket arsenal stood at 30,000. Israel says it’s now about 40,000.

Israel’s intelligence probably comes from surveillance flights over Lebanese territory, spy satellites and Lebanese agents. But the military provides no proof of its claims, saying that could compromise its sources, and the peacekeeping force says it sees no evidence of new military infrastructure. Hezbollah officials did not respond to requests for comment on Israel’s accusations.

It’s difficult to independently confirm the allegations on the ground. The south Lebanese, mostly Shiite like Hezbollah, tend to support the movement and rarely criticize it publicly or volunteer information. Hezbollah members or supporters often attach themselves to journalists entering villages, shadowing them and discouraging photography.

South Lebanon is festooned with posters of the bearded, turbaned Nasrallah, but the only visible hint of Hezbollah fighters are the bearded men in civilian clothes who travel on motorbikes or in cars and occasionally approach reporters working in the area.

In July, looking to build its case that Hezbollah is digging in among civilians, the military released maps, photographs and a 3-D simulation of the streets and houses of another Lebanese town, Khiam.

The simulation shows one arms storeroom, a squat, freestanding building colored red, located 130 meters (150 yards) from a school, colored blue. A map on the military’s Web site purports to pinpoint 12 arms storerooms and three command posts in the town.

The Israeli implication is clear: If another war erupts, many civilians will die.

Regarding the handicapped children, don’t be shocked. It won’t be the first time Hizbullah has resorted to such heinous tactics.

Remember Qana 4 years ago?

“We have it from a credible source that Hizbullah, alarmed by Siniora’s plan, has concocted an incident that would help thwart the negotiations.

Knowing full well that Israel will not hesitate to bombard civilian targets, Hizbullah gunmen placed a rocket launcher on the roof in Qana and brought disabled children inside, in a bid to provoke a response by the Israeli Air Force. In this way, they were planning to take advantage of the death of innocents and curtail the negotiation initiative,” the site stated

12:58PM: Surprise, surprise: A show presented by anti-Israel journalist Lauren Booth has been found to have broken broadcasting code rules on impartiality.

Ofcom has ruled that a current affairs TV show discussing the ill-fated Gaza flotilla, which was presented by Cherie Blair’s sister Lauren Booth, has broken broadcasting code rules on impartiality.

Booth presents a regular programme on Press TV, the news network controlled by the Iranian government that has a bureau in west London, called Remember Palestine.

On 5 June Booth presented an edition that discussed the events during and following the interception by Israeli military forces of a pro-Palestinian aid convoy in the Mediterranean on 31 May, which resulted in nine deaths.

The show, which started with a pro-Palestinian song and anti-Israeli imagery, featured a range of pre-recorded and live interviews that included comments such as “massacre” and “barbarous attack”, according to Ofcom.

Ofcom said that the content “could be interpreted as being highly critical of the actions of the Israeli government and its military forces in this case”.

The media regulator received a complaint that the show failed to air alternative views.

Press TV maintained that it had complied with the due impartiality requirements of the broadcasting code. The broadcaster said that the “intensity of the descriptions in the programme merely reflected the general atmosphere around the world”.

The media regulator said that while the programme included a number of viewpoints all of them were portrayed as critical of the Israeli state’s policies.

“In summary the programme accused the Israeli government of a massacre and of breaking international law and human rights,” said Ofcom. “We considered the broadcaster did not provide sufficient evidence of alternative views within the programme. Overall the programme gave a one-sided view on this matter of political controversy.”

Meanwhile, here is Booth sprouting her venom against Israel, which she refers to as a “pariah state.”

Regarding the flotilla, notice how she dismisses completely the notion that people on board were carrying weapons (from 1:32), and right after calling Israel “liars” (1:46), she claims 19 innocent people were killed (leaving aside their “innocence”, there were 9 fatalities).

This woman has no business being a journalist.

9:06AM: Here is a  Sky News report on some Gazan swimmers trying to make the Olympics, which besides showing more images contradicting the Gaza concentration camp/prison camp narrative (swimming pools/riding horses at the beach) also has the distinction of not once blaming Israel for their plight.

6:24AM: Either we have another JPost headline blunder, or the US is taking the Iranian threat even less seriously than previously thought.

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Unfortunately my friend’s relative was found dead in his apartment on Monday morning and suicide is the most likely reason.

While I was at the cemetery today I noticed a row of graves next to the path. Each had Olympic rings on the top and when I looked carefully at the names (I can just about read Hebrew now) I recognised them.

Welcome to the quiet, understated and desperately sad world of Palestinian “Olympic achievement”.

Nader Al-Masri, a Palestinian athlete from Gaza, finished 13th and last in his heat of the 5000 meters in the Olympic games in Beijing on Wednesday.

The 28-year-old’s performance was not a surprise as he hails from the teeming, impoverished and besieged ribbon of land that is the Gaza Strip (sports reporting at its finest -ed).

“I only managed to leave Gaza in April when I trained in Amman for one month, and then one month in China as part of the Olympic solidarity program,” Al-Masri told AFP.

The last time Al-Masri competed was at the Asian Games in Qatar in December 2006.

Al-Masri finished 38th out of the 39 competitors in the 5km in a time of 14min 41.10sec more than a minute off the fastest time.

“When you’re away and out of competition like this, you can’t compete against the champions,” he said.

“I am proud to represent Palestine but it’s not enough,” he added.

Al-Masri was one of four Palestinian athlehes to compete in the 2008 summer games.

You know, I grew up in Perth, Australia. Kind of a small city. I’m sure had I lived in a bigger city such as Sydney, I would have had access to the facilities necessary to turn me into a swimming superstar. Mark Spitz should be congratulating me, dammit!

By the way, in case you were wondering, the runner who performed worse than Al-Masri was Soe Min Thu of Myanmar. Damn cyclone!

Also not performing so well were Bahrain’s Rashid Ramzi (drugged by police), and Hasan Mahboob (never stood a chance with that name).

Israeli sailor Shahar Tzuberi won an Olympic bronze medal Wednesday, after finishing his 10th RS:X windsurfing sail at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games in the third place overall.

Tzuberi, who had several stormy sails, began the race just outside medals’ reach, ranking fourth overall. The 19-year-old surfer from Eilat was considered one of the Israeli Olympic team’s best hopes for a medal.

Mazal tov!

“Here is the prepared report: Some athlete, in some field of sports, achieved what representatives from 22 Arab countries did not manage to achieve. However, thank God they are all members of Amr Moussa’s Arab League and maybe that’s their only life achievement, and for this we must be thankful.”

These are the cynical words written by political journalist Nidhal Naisa in an article published on Friday in the London-based Arab internet site, Elaph.

If you thought Israelis were unhappy with the results of their Olympic team, it turns out that the Arab world is sourly accepting their achievements, or lack thereof. Similarly, they too have every excuse in the book prepared in advance.

However, before the excuses and criticisms, let’s look at the achievements: A week has lapsed since the Olympics began and we have not yet reached the end of the track and field finals; Algeria, Morocco and another country or two are capable of winning a medal in these events.

The Arab states have thus far won three medals altogether.

These results have sparked differing responses from the Arab media outlets. There were those who completely ignored the Olympics, there were those who tried to explain the failure and others that responded with venomous sarcasm regarding the ability displayed by the Arab teams.

Nidhal Naisa was part of the last group. In an article titled, “The Arabs and Olympic Alienation,” he wrote “The Arabs in general did not succeed, with Allah’s help, to attain even one wooden or plastic medal; not even so that Arab nationalists and their cardboard parties would be able to boast about them in their election propaganda, on TV and on the radio as ‘an important and huge Arab achievement,’ so that they could convince people that they are ‘like the rest of the world.’

“Yes, in the largest Olympics in the history of humankind, the Arabs, despite their intelligence services and their spies, didn’t achieve a thing,” the journalist wrote.

I fail to see how the Arabs’ “intelligence services” and “spies” would be relevant to achieving Olympic success. After all, spying is not an Olympic event. Unless the writer had some other kind of Olympic “achievement” in mind.

Turning his attention to American swimmer Michael Phelps, Naisa wrote, “God help us, how did he turn into the most decorated athlete in Olympic history? He managed receiving his 11th gold medal and breaking all previous records as all the ‘cursed’ and ‘piggish’ news agencies affiliated with the ‘athiest enemies of Allah’ swarmed around him because they are obviously ‘biased against the Arabs.’

“Despite the fact that this heretic, who should burn in hell, is not part of the best nation (the Arab nation), although he is not married to any of the naked American women, or to minors or girls…look at him!

I wonder how the Arab Press reacted to Mark Spitz, the son of monkeys and pigs, winning 7 gold medals at the 1972 Munich Games. Then again, they were probably too busy celebrating to notice.

In any event, I am really surprised how competitive the Arabs sound. I didn’t think they cared so much about Olympic success.

Despite the differences between their countries, an Iranian and an Israeli shared a hug and a pat on the back Sunday morning after the opener of the Olympic men’s basketball tournament.

Iranian center Hamed Ehadadi and David Blatt share a moment of goodwill after the Blatt-coached Russian team beat Iran in the opening game.

The hug between Russian coach David Blatt, who holds dual Israeli and American citizenship, and Iranian captain Mohammed Nikkhah, came after Nikkhah was questioned by an Israeli journalist about the tensions between the two countries stemming from Iran’s nuclear program, which Israel views as a threat to its existence.

On Saturday, an Iranian swimmer refused to race in a preliminary Olympic heat because an Israeli athlete was competing in the same race.

“We are coming here for playing sport, nothing else,” Nikkhah said. As he exited the postgame interview podium, Blatt stood and embraced him, and Nikkhah returned the gesture.

Blatt and Iran’s coach, Rajko Toroman, who is Serbian, had a similar exchange as Toroman left the podium. Blatt later warmly greeted Iran’s 7-foot-2 center Hamed Ehadadi.

I can’t wait to see how Iran is going to spin this. Zionist Death Hug^TM perhaps?

Update: Ha’aretz describes it as “shaking hands.” They further downplay it by reporting that “it is still unclear whether the Iranian players knew the symbolic significance of their handshake with the Israeli coach, or whether they were unaware of Blatt’s nationality.”

Update: In reporting the basketball game, the Iranians (predictably) omit to mention the close encounter of the Zionist kind.

That’s Zionist Derangement Syndrome for the uninitiated.

An Iranian swimmer pulled out of the Olympic Games men’s 100m breaststroke heats on Saturday, just minutes before he was due to compete against an Israeli rival.

Mohammad Alirezaei’s lane one was empty when the field left the starting blocks while Israel’s Tom Beeri, starting in lane seven, finished fourth.

—-

During the 2004 Athens Olympics, Iran’s judo world champion Arash Miresmaeili, one of the country’s prominent gold medal hopes, refused to compete against Ehud Vaks of Israel in the first round out of solidarity for the Palestinian cause.

Miresmaeili, twice a winner of the flyweight world title, still received a 5,000-dollar award the Iranian National Olympic Committee had promised to medal winners and he was hailed by former President Mohammad Khatami for his stance.

—-

There had been reports that Iran would compete against Israel at these Olympic Games for the first time since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

The Iranian National Olympic Committee (INOC) had said that as there was “no face-to-face situation” in swimming there would be no problem in attending the competition.

“Alirezaei swims in lane one and the representative of the Zionist regime (Israel) in lane seven, so they will not face each other,” INOC secretary Ali Kafashian told ISNA news agency prior to the race.

According to ISNA, also the country’s sports organisation, which is part of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s government, had confirmed that there would no be boycott in the race.

And the Iranians are keeping up the pretense that there was no boycott. According to them, Alirezaei quite unexpectedly (and coincidentally) came down with some undisclosed serious illness that required medical attention.

Iranian swimmer Mohammad Alirezaei has pulled out of the Olympic Games on Saturday because of illness, MNA reported.

The 100-meter breaststroke swimmer was carried to a hospital in Beijing, according to the Iranian Swimming Federation officials.

Let me guess. He was poisoned by Zionists?

It bears reminding that Iranian swimmer Mohammad Bidarian missed out on the Olympics, after boycotting an event in which he would have to compete against another representative of Little Satan.

Update: This may explain Iran’s lame attempt to claim Alirezaei had an illness:

Iran could face action from the International Olympics Committee if it deliberately pulled out of the Olympic men’s 100m breaststroke heats because an Israeli was also racing, Olympic officials said on Sunday.

Iranian swimmer Mohammad Alirezaei’s lane one was empty when the field left the starting blocks on Saturday as Israel’s Tom Beeri, starting in lane seven, finished fourth.

International Olympic Committee spokeswoman Giselle Davies said she was unaware of the facts, but reiterated IOC policy.

“I wouldn’t specifically comment on this incident,” she said.

“Under the spirit of respect and fairplay, if it is confirmed that he deliberately pulled out then the IOC would take it seriously.”

An animal rights group has tried – and failed – to run a newspaper ad comparing the beheading of a passenger on a Greyhound bus last week to the treatment of animals by the meat industry.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, said on its website it would run the ad in the Portage la Prairie Daily Graphic.

However, city editor Tara Seel said the newspaper had no intention of running the ad, which uses imagery of “an innocent victim’s throat” being cut, in reference to the slaughter of cows, chickens and pigs on factory farms.

“His struggles and cries are ignored … the man with the knife shows no emotion … the victim is slaughtered and his head cut off … his flesh is eaten,” reads the ad, which is posted on the website.

“If this ad leaves a bad taste in your mouth, please give a thought to what sensitive animals think and feel when they come to the end of their frightening journey and see, hear and smell the slaughterhouse.”

Ms. Seel would not specify reasons for why the newspaper was choosing not to run the ad, except to say it wasn’t something they wanted to do. She noted the newspaper had been inundated with calls from other media since the posting to the PETA website.

Vince Weiguang Li, 40, of Edmonton, has been charged with second-degree murder in the death of 22-year-old carnival worker Tim McLean, who was stabbed and decapitated aboard a Greyhound bus on July 30.

Mr. Li has been ordered by a judge to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.

“Like human victims, animals in slaughterhouses experience terror when they are attacked by a knife-wielding assailant,” Lindsay Rajt of PETA said in a news release. “We are challenging everyone who is rightly horrified by this crime to look into their hearts and consider leaving violence off their dinner plates.”

Ms. Rajt said the ad was intended to be shocking and is meant to spur people to think about the terror and pain experienced by animals who are raised and killed for food.

Meanwhile, they continue to treat women like meat.