Israel Commentary

Gingrich and Arafat – Anatomy of a Smear

By Daniel Greenfield

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2647

21 Jan 2012

Two photos are being circulated of Gingrich shaking hands with Arafat, one from 1993 and one from 1998, with the context stripped away, to imply that Newt was formerly friendly with Arafat and then “changed” his position.The 1998 photo is the easiest to address because it is the most amply documented. That photo was taken during Gingrich’s trip to Israel and I will let the news stories from the time speak for themselves.

After days of angering Palestinians by publicly siding with Israel, House Speaker Newt Gingrich was upbeat about his talks yesterday with Yasser Arafat and insisted he was just trying to help move the peace process forward. Later, the Georgia Republican alluded to his outspoken speech Tuesday to Israel’s parliament, when, veering from U.S. policy, he declared Jerusalem “the united and eternal capital of Israel.” Yesterday, Gingrich said it was his guess that Arafat himself knew Jerusalem would always be the capital of Israel.

The first fracas erupted Sunday when Rep. Gingrich accused chief Palestinian peace negotiator Saeb Erekat of fomenting violence and demanding that Mr. Erekat not attend the meeting with Mr. Arafat. At issue was a planned Gingrich visit to a proposed site for the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem. Palestinians vehemently oppose any formal recognition of Israel’s claim to all of the city, and Mr. Erekat warned there would be body bags if the visit went ahead. Mr. Gingrich was greeted in Israel with unusual honors, including long hours spent with Mr. Netanyahu and an address to the Parliament. His appearance there on Tuesday prompted heckling and a walkout by Arab legislators. ”You are anti-Arab!” screamed Abdulwahab Darawshe, leader of the Democratic Arab Party.

So any notion that this was an enthusiastic embrace of Arafat doesn’t fly with the news stories of the day. Gingrich was reasonably friendly with the Palestinian Arab side, he welcomed visits by PA officials to the United States and suggested more fact finding missions. He was supportive of a peace process, but he also took a clear and unambiguously pro-Israel line.

“No Palestinian official should talk about or threaten bloodshed, but yet it is a routine pattern in this region for the Palestinian Authority to in effect, incite violence. I think it is totally wrong, and the United States frankly should condemn it routinely and point out to the world who it is who is suggesting violence,” Gingrich said on CNN’s “Late Edition.”

None of these statements are altogether extraordinary, a number of Republicans have said similar things, but in the late nineties the peace process had clearly broken down, Netanyahu’s victory was a sign that Israelis were tired of the surrender process under Rabin and Peres. They wanted some measure of security, even while the Clinton Administration was doing everything possible to get Netanyahu out. Something they even succeeded in doing. The peace process was still a mantra then, more so than it is today. Gingrich already had larger ambitions and along with a bipartisan delegation of Republicans and Democrats he met with Arafat in order to play the statesman, but he took the side of Netanyahu over Clinton. Considering that history is repeating itself under Obama, that should be considered significant.

Gingrich’s position on Israel has been fairly consistent over the years. And he’s expressed himself far more directly in ways that few Republican national leaders have. The following is from a year earlier in 1997. Gingrich said it’s dangerous “to confuse the terrorist and the democracy … It is extraordinarily dangerous to always impose the burden on those who are your friends because you’re too timid to tell the truth to those who are your enemies.” The speaker suggested the Clinton Administration is undermining Israel’s security by equating Palestinian violence with new Israeli housing in east Jerusalem. The latest round of violence between Palestinian youths and Israeli troops flared after the Israeli government broke ground on a new housing project in the area.

Gingrich also said the U.S. should adopt “principles that say, ‘If you’re a terrorist, you should not expect to live very long,’” and make a commitment “to pre-emptive strikes when we deem them appropriate.” The same year of his visit, Gingrich was even more blunt when it came to the Clinton-Arafat troika. ”It’s become the Clinton Administration and Arafat against Israel,” Mr. Gingrich said at a news conference. ”The Clinton Administration says: ‘Happy birthday. Let us blackmail you on behalf of Arafat.

In 2002, Gingrich was still saying blasting Arafat and suggesting that he should be expelled from Israel. He was also doing it seven years earlier in 1995.Gingrich said: “I’m told that if we were to move the embassy there tomorrow, that this would cause enormous unrest among those neighbors that would like to destroy Israel. Well, I’m frankly not sympathetic to that. And part of my reaction is: They ought to grow up.

As early as 1990, Gingrich was taking on even Senator Dole over Israel. He’s been consistent on the issue for nearly two decades. You can read him saying similar things twenty years ago. Has he been perfect on the issue?

In 1993 he seemed to have a friendly meeting with Arafat and laid out some suggestions for a viable state. That’s the source of the first photo. Sometime around then he appears to have questioned moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, something that he has otherwise supported for seventeen years. Both these events were obscure enough that there are hardly any news items about them. They also occurred during a period when most people, even those who should have known better, did begin to believe that peace might be possible.

As with any politician there is no telling what he might do with executive power, but Gingrich has one of the best pro-Israel records of anyone in Congress running for the White House right now. He certainly has the longest such record. It’s not implausible to think that he does mean it. Newt’s lifelong support of Jews and the state of Israel. Yes, as Newt stated weeks ago, the “Palestinians” are an invented people

The Democrat’s pathetic attempt to discredit Newt gathers steam as they realize Obama now has a formidable opponent.  The release of the photo is a transparent smear by the wildly Anti-Israel Sam Stein, who has moved on to plying his wares at the Huffington Post. Redistributing the photo without a larger context is misleading. As is relying on a story from a source of Sam Stein’s. Gingrich met with Arafat twice. Both times within the context of congressional events. He has also repeatedly spoken the hard truths about Arafat and the PLO, even comparing them to Nazis.

He’s not the only pro-Israel candidate in the race. Santorum knows the issues and is pro-Israel. For anyone looking for a pro-Israel candidate, either man is a good choice.More significantly the out of context release of this photo is typical of the smears we’re seeing in the race. And we are going to be seeing lots more of the same. That’s why I thought it worthwhile to run this piece which is not a traditional article, but a hasty clarification of a photo that is making its rounds in the blogsphere.

Root Causes of Anti-US Islamic Terrorism

By Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger,

“Second Thought”
“Israel Hayom” newsletter, January 11, 2012

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2576

A spike has recently occurred in Muslim-American terrorism in the USA. For example, on January 9, 2012, a US-naturalized Kosovar Muslim terrorist was arrested in Florida, while plotting to bomb night clubs in Tampa – a hotbed of Muslim Brotherhood activities and organizations. In December, 2011, the DEA arrested 30 Tampa used-car dealers involved in a Hezbollah drug money laundering. Tampa is the home base of the US Central Command, located at nearby MacDill Air Force Base. In November, 2011, an Al-Qaeda American sympathizer was arrested, in New York, for conspiring to bomb police stations and post offices. This wave of terrorism follows the June, 2010 arrest of eight Muslim terrorists in North Carolina, the May, 2010 foiled Times Square car bombing, the November, 2009 massacre of thirteen soldiers at Ft. Hood, etc.

It has been suggested that Islamic rage and terrorism is triggered by US policies toward Muslim nations. However, The surge in anti-US Islamic terrorism, and the proliferation of Islamic terrorist sleeper cells and training camps in the US and Canada, occur in spite of the US-led bombing of Serbia, which yielded independence to the Muslim-dominated Bosnia and Kosovo, and despite the mega-billion dollar US assistance to the Mujahideen, which ended Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Moreover, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who opposed the war in Iraq and supported Palestinian demands, was inaugurated in June 2007, and was greeted by three Muslim terrorists-engineered car bombs in London and Glasgow.  

Notwithstanding the generous US foreign aid to Arab countries and to the Palestinian Authority, and irrespective of President Carter’s betrayal of the Shah of Iran which facilitated the rise to power of Khomeini, the US is increasingly referred to as “the enemy of Allah” and “a modern day Crusader.” According to the leading historian of Islam, Prof. Bernard Lewis, Islam stipulates that “the duty of God’s soldiers is to dispatch God’s enemies as quickly as possible to the place where God will chastise them—that is to say, the afterlife.”

The most-frequently mentioned (supposed) cause of anti-US Islamic terrorism is the US support of Israel and the US policy towards the Palestinians.  Nevertheless:

9/11 was planned while President Clinton and Prime Minister Barak offered the Palestinians the entire store;

The October 12, 2000 murder of seventeen sailors on the USS Cole happened when Israel and the US offered unprecedented concessions to the Palestinians at Camp David;

The August 27, 1998 blowing up of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania took place (257 murdered and over 4,000 injured) while President Clinton was brutally pressuring Prime Minister Netanyahu;

The 1995/6 murder of 19 US soldiers in Riyadh and Khobar Towers, were carried out while Prime Minister Peres implemented unprecedented concessions;

The February 1993 Twin Towers bombing (6 murdered and over 1,000 injured) transpired while Israel conducted the pre-Oslo talks with the PLO;

The December 21, 1988 PanAm-103 (270 murdered) terrorism took place a few months following the groundbreaking recognition of the PLO by the US;

The April/October 1983 murder of 300 Marines and 58 French soldiers, in the car-bombings of the US Embassy and Marines and French military headquarters in  Beirut, occurred while the US military confronted Israeli tanks in Lebanon and the US Administration blasted Israel for its war against the PLO.

Terrorists bite the hand that feeds them.

Irrespective of the Arab-Israeli conflict, the Palestinian issue, the US-Israel friendship, Israel’s policies or existence, Islamic terrorism has afflicted the Middle East and the entire globe – including North, Central and South America – for fourteen centuries, long before the eruption of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Islamic rogue regimes view the US as their key moral and strategic adversary. US-style freedom of religion, expression, markets and association constitutes a lethal threat to all Islamic regimes. Their territorial imperialism has suffered a severe setback by the US military, economic and diplomatic dominance.  They abhor the dominance of “the infidel” over the “true believer,” which they consider morally blasphemous and strategically wrong. They are determined to push the US out of the Persian Gulf, the Mideast, the Indian Ocean and Africa, in order to advance their megalomaniac aspirations. Humiliating a Super Power – preferably on its own soil – would be critical to the resurrection of Islamic grandeur. Therefore, no US pressure on Israel would spare Washington the wrath of rogue Islamic regimes; it could, however, transform Israel from a strategic asset to a strategic liability.

While most Moslems are not terrorists, most terrorists are Muslims, supported by Muslim states. Other than Turkey, all Islamic regimes ascended to – and maintained – power through violence. They believe in total submission to God and to them who rule, supposedly, by divine prescription. They terrorize those whom they cannot integrate domestically and externally.

The insistence on engaging – and not on confronting – rogue regimes; denying the existence of global Islamic terrorism; contending that Jihad is a process which purifies the soul; assuming that Islamic terrorists represent a Muslim minority; and deluding oneself that the Palestinian issue is a root cause of anti-US Islamic terrorism, undermines moral clarity, and therefore impairs operational clarity. It yields headwind to Western democracies and tailwind to terrorists. 

Hard to believe but …  Is the Israeli government, with Netanyahu, really stupid enough to repeat this awful tragedy? Will they now, in a sick effort to pacify Israel’s enemies, withdraw from Judea and Samaria? Such an action,  G-d Forbid, can only result in the self-destruction, once again, of the Jewish state?

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2630

Shades of the Jewish self destruction  to the Romans in 70 AD and 135 AD that has resulted in the centuries of persecution experienced by the Jews ever since. ( jsk)

 A Haunting Visit To The Gush Katif Museum

Redacted from article 

By Devora Spitzer

The Jewish Press, January 13, 2012

The Gush Katif (beautiful area on northern coast of Gaze, where Israeli towns and agriculture were reborn) Museum in Jerusalem was established by Rabbi Shalom Dov Wolpo, head of the Rambam Hashalem Torah Institute, centered in the town of Beitar Illit. Rabbi Wolpo has authored many highly regarded works of Halacha (Standard for orthodox religious observance) including two that research the halachic prohibition of forfeiting territories of the Holy Land to non-Jews.

At the time of the Gaza disengagement, he and his colleagues invested tremendous effort in attempting to derail the Israeli government forced expulsion of nearly 10,000 Jews. As the disengagement was implemented and while the fires were still burning, they resolved to establish this museum. It took three years to come to fruition. The museum’s early visitors, back in 2008, were mostly from the national religious segment of Israel’s population. But gradually, this changed. Both haredim and secular leftists had remained largely ignorant of what actually happened to Gush Katif’s residents. As they heard about the museum,  more and more  started visiting and were deeply affected by the exhibits.

“The people of Israel have been experiencing disillusionment,” says Rabbi Wolpo. “The Kassam rocket attacks, the Hamas ascent to power, the revolutionary changes in surrounding Arab nations, the enormous danger from terror organizations based in the Sinai desert – all these have brought Israelis, including many who once supported the expulsion, to re-think their positions. Now they’re opposed to further expulsions of Jews from Judah and Samaria, God forbid. I’m sure the museum has played an important role in this, because when people visit, they start to understand what really happened there.”

We pass through the rooms. Pictures document the history of Gush Katif, revealing that ever since the time of the Hasmoneans, of Chanukah story fame, there was a continuous Jewish presence in Gaza and its environs. This continued until the terrible 1929 Arab pogroms. Only after the 1967 Six-Day War did Jews return. They built thriving communities, never dreaming that one day they would be cruelly uprooted by their own government.

In February 2001, the first rocket was fired at Gush Katif. At the time, the news was widely featured in the Israeli and international media. But later, if news accounts of rocket attacks appeared at all, they were relegated to the back pages. … More than 5,000 rockets fell on Gush Katif. Those attacks, along with so many other terror acts and shootings, claimed the lives of dozens of Jews; hundreds more were injured. The dead were buried in the sand of Gush Katif, but even they were dragged out of their repose when the Israeli government carried out the disengagement.

“Despite all the attacks,” says Rabbi Gefen, “the idealism of the residents would not let them leave. The terror could not convince them to give in, because you don’t give in when this concerns the Holy Land. They always insisted that if they wouldn’t be located there, the rockets would be fired at the population centers in the heart of Israel.” And, this forecast proved devastatingly true.

The Israeli Government, under the once acclaimed general and then PM Ariel Sharon, forced out the 10,000 dedicated Israelis of Gaza, abandoning the fertile area to the Arabs. Their houses destroyed, the families expelled, their lives shattered, the thousands of wretched families were cruelly plucked from their communities and land, and thrown into mobile homes until today – without livelihood, homes, or the wherewithal to support their families as they had until this cruel expulsion.”

“Many of the expelled families have already used up all the compensation received from the government,” Rabbi Wolpo stated. “They’re paying the bank a mortgage for their destroyed home in Gush Katif, together with high rent for their present leaky mobile homes in Nitzan or Yad Binyamin. Many simply don’t have money to buy bread.

… “Whoever observes the results of the previous withdrawals and considers the present revolutionary upsets in the Arab world, yet still speaks of further expulsions from Judah and Samaria and the establishment of a terrorist state in the heart of this land – is either insane or is an agent of our enemies,” Rabbi Wolpo tells me.

Devora Spitzer lives with her husband and six children in the settlement of Mata, in the Eila Valley. She is a sixth-generation resident of Israel, descended from Jews born in Hebron. Many of her family members were murdered in the 1929 Arab pogrom.

By Jerome S. Kaufman

Thorsten Wagner, Professor and lecturer from Copenhagen, Denmark was hosted by Temple Beth El in West Palm Beach Florida, January 14, 2012.  His invitation was evidently based upon the fact that his grandfather was a Nazi sympathizer and Thorsten grew up in a disputed area of Denmark on the German border.  He now speaks as a historian supposedly empathetic to the tribulations of the Jews of Nazi Germany.

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2604

Curious with what this gentleman might have to say, I attended his lecture at the Temple and am still not sure the purpose or direction of his talk. The fact that he was a tall, handsome, apparently friendly man and totally effective in charming the receptive Jewish Temple audience was undeniable. What he was doing there, other than the obvious speaking engagement fee? I am not at all sure. Was he there to assuage the guilt of his grandfather, perhaps his inadvertent own or that of the other of Daniel Jonah Goldhagen’s, Hitler’s Willing Executioners? I doubt that.

The synagogue rabbi did present a clue in an incidental aside concerning Wagner’s address Friday night. Wagner had admonished the Jewish audience not to get hung up blaming the Muslims for the rejuvenated anti-Semitism in Europe and Islam’s virtual invasion of European nations and attempt to establish Sharia law in these nations. Did not the Jews remember when they too were labeled and despised as new immigrants?

Huh?  How dare he make such a preposterous comparison and how clever of him to mine the endless caverns of Jewish guilt. Never mind that the Jews have spent generations attempting to meld into American society and at an immense cost to their own religious observance. Is that the case with Muslims?

At the question and answer session I was able to pose this question to Wagner. How could he state that the Muslims were a minor factor in Europe, a very small percentage of the population and just another group of harmless refugees attempting to establish a foothold in a new society, just like everyone else?

Wagner declared that he based his conclusions on the Pew Report. I then went to the Internet and read two articles on the Pew Report and was convinced that there must be two different Pew Reports. Not So! There is only one report – that compiled by the Pew Research Center Forum on Religion and Public Life itself plus several commentaries from other sources.

Professor Wagner evidently read the one by Tom Heneghan on his web site, FaithWorld. The opening remarks of this report are:

“One of the most wrong-headed arguments in the debate about Muslims in Europe is the shrill “Eurabia” claim that high birth rates and immigration will make Muslims the majority on the continent within a few decades. Based on  sleight-of-hand statistics, this scaremongering (as The Economist called it back in 2006) paints a picture of a triumphant Islam dominating a Europe that has lost its Christian roots and is blind to its looming cultural demise . The Egyptian-born British writer Bat Ye’or popularized the term with her 2005 book “Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis” and this argument has become the background music to much exaggerated talk about Muslims in Europe. (The article continued in a similar vein.)

Heneghan’s above interpretation of the Pew Report (and consequently Thorston Wagner’s) stands in stark contrast to the Executive Summary coming right off of the pages of the Pew Forum report itself, dated January 27, 2011 and shown below:

The Future of the Global Muslim Population

Projections for 2010-2030, ANALYSIS January 27, 2011

“The world’s Muslim population is expected to increase by about 35% in the next 20 years, rising from 1.6 billion in 2010 to 2.2 billion by 2030, according to new population projections by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life.

Globally, the Muslim population is forecast to grow at about twice the rate of the non-Muslim population over the next two decades – an average annual growth rate of 1.5% for Muslims, compared with 0.7% for non-Muslims. If current trends continue, Muslims will make up 26.4% of the world’s total projected population of 8.3 billion in 2030, up from 23.4% of the estimated 2010 world population of 6.9 billion.

Muslims will remain relatively small minorities in Europe and the Americas but they are expected to constitute a growing share of the total populations of these regions.”

Unfortunately, unlike other immigrants to these countries, Muslims have shown no desire or inclination to become part of the greater cultures. Quite the contrary, there is an outspoken declaration and action to make the greater culture conform to Sharia law via  intimidating school systems, legislatures, the court system and the present administration itself, which already abounds with intrinsic Muslim support, empathy and identification.

But where does all this place American Jews. Despite Wagner’s scholarship of the Holocaust and its virtual annihilation of the Jews of Europe, he admonishes Jewish audiences to not be frightened by the lethal verbiage and action against them by Islamists. Jews are to ignore Islam’s declared intention to annihilate the Jews and Christians and turn the world into a giant Caliphate. ( And … it is painfully obvious, they are doing exactly that all over the world, including the US, at this very moment!).

Do not those actions sound a whole lot like those of Adolph Hitler and now Ahmadinejad? Are Jews then to conform to the recommendations of Thorston Wagner and hide their heads in the sand as they have done on so many other existential occasions? I think not.  Furthermore, I would never allow Wagner to appear before another Jewish audience. I don’t trust him!

I  Magen David Adom and the Red Cross. By Yehudit Tayar

II “What Magen David Adom Victory? By Jerome S.  Kaufman

(Written June 30, 2006 after this disgraceful compromise was allowed by the Israelis)

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2587

I Magen David Adom and the Red Cross

By Yehudit Tayar

January 9,  2012

The Red Star of David, or as we know it here in Israel, Magen David Adom signed an agreement in 2005 with the Red Cross that MDA will work only within the ” internationally recognized borders of Israel” and thereby will cease the medical assistance in the Old City of Jerusalem, Gilo, Pisgat Ze’ev, Ramat Eshkol, French Hill, Ramot,  (to name a few neighborhoods of Jerusalem that are affected by this agreement ), Judea, Samaria, the Jordan Valley, and the Dead Sea Region.  In other words MDA agreed to cease rescue services outside of the pre-1967 borders.

Already the first implementation of this agreement has been the removal of the symbol of MDA from our ambulances in Judea and Samaria. 

We, the volunteers on the ambulance are still called out by MDA to try and save lives.  We get the calls from MDA with the old number that was removed from the ambulance and not the new one that was placed recently as a part of the signed agreement with the Red Cross.  We are on call 24/7 and yet MDA never even told us volunteers that they basically agreed that we are no longer an accepted part of our own country.

We, the heads of Yesha along with MK Uri Ariel and MK Arieh Eldad are planning to push forward in the Knesset a bill demanding the MDA to cancel this agreement, and as the official medical organization of Israel to protect Israeli interests, citizens and Land no matter where they live. The Minister of Internal Security has already passed a new resolution in the Knesset that MDA will no longer be the exclusive rescue organization of the State of Israel.

Not a word was said to any of us – hundreds of volunteers – regarding this vile agreement that MDA signed until the word leaked out.  When I asked the heads of MDA what this meant, I was told that the symbols would be removed from the ambulances and then after the inspection we could replace them.  Talk about duplicity….

These ambulances were leased for the immediate medical response to emergencies in Israel, and the donors who gave their money in order to save lives now rightfully, as we volunteers do, feel betrayed.

Any organization representing Israel must respect the lives of all the citizens of Israel and not draw their own new borders because of monetary greed.  MDA surreptitiously signed an agreement, never mentioned the implications of this agreement with the Red Cross, and thus betrayed not only the Israeli citizens, the volunteers in our ambulances but also the donors who gave their money with the understanding that MDA also serviced our communities.

MDA must retract this agreement immediately and if not it is not acceptable that they remain the medical organization for the State of Israel.

Yehudit Tayar was on the steering committee of the Yesha Council to bring MDA ambulances into Yesha (since previously it was MDA policy not to have ambulances in Judea, Samaria and Gaza), and serves as a volunteer emergency medic, as well as one of the veteran spokespeople for the Jewish pioneers who live in Yesha. 

II From Israel Commentary:

June 30, 2006

What Magen David Adom “Victory?”

By Jerome S. Kaufman

Once again Jews, especially Israelis, are advised that the Emperor is fully clothed when in fact he has no clothes, except for those viewers who prefer to live in their own self-delusion. The latest fiasco is the heralding as a great “Victory” the fact that the International Red Cross has finally condescended to allow one of the finest humanitarian emergency units in the world – Magen David Adom of Israel – to become a  part of the organization. The news is trumpeted by reporter Rachel Silverman in her Jewish Telegraphic Agency article as a “Magen David Adom Victory” which “reflects 58 years of aggressive sustained lobbying and a last-minute push.

But at what cost and what was the “last minute push (now six months in the making) dependent upon? Not much -  just that the Jewish organization hide its identity by changing its insignia – no more Jewish star on their ambulances in locations where the nation receiving Jewish aid and Jewish blood objected!  Evidently having the Jewish star on the ambulances would be too embarrassing and give the Jews and particularly the Israelis, too much credit. How could the sight of Jews and Israelis in such a favorable light be explained to the masses of population that had been taught so diligently to hate Jews?

Of course, these restrictions do not apply to the nations of the rest of the world. They will continue proudly to exhibit their Red Cross, the Muslims their Red Crescent and by the way, the Palestinian Authority will also be admitted, although no such nation yet exists, and will, of course, have a Red Crescent – no unidentifiable red square like the Jews!

So the “Jewish Problem” was again solved.  The Jews simply re-assumed their shtetl mentality, that they have never, in fact, lost – speak quietly, hide in your cellars at the time of another pogrom and try, at all costs, to not irritate your non-Jewish assailants.

The JTA article concludes:  “After the ruling, Rabbi Danny Allen of the American Friends of Magen David Adom called it a “vote for humanitarian over sectarian politics.” How noble, how very Jewish! Only in this case,  the very existence of Jews and the State of Israel, are the “sectarian politics’ at stake.

Once more, as Jews, as Israelis,  we take no pride in our own existence, our glorious history, our remarkable G-d-given achievements, and his return to us, after 2000 years, of our nationhood.  How then can we possibly expect more from those that surround us?

South Sudan, Israel’s New Ally

“Without you, we would not have arisen”

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2531

By Daniel Pipes
The Washington Times
January 3, 2012

It’s not every day that the leader of a brand-new country makes his maiden foreign voyage to Jerusalem, capital of the most besieged country in the world, but Salva Kiir, president of South Sudan, accompanied by his foreign and defense ministers, did just that in late December. Israel’s President Shimon Peres hailed his visit as a “moving and historic moment.” The visit spurred talk of South Sudan locating its embassy in Jerusalem, making it the only government anywhere in the world to do so.

This unusual development results from an unusual story.

Today’s Sudan took shape in the nineteenth century when the Ottoman Empire controlled its northern regions and tried to conquer the southern ones. The British, ruling out of Cairo, established the outlines of the modern state in 1898 and for the next fifty years ruled separately the Muslim north and Christian-animist south. In 1948, however, succumbing to northern pressure, the British merged the two administrations in Khartoum under northern control, making Muslims dominant in Sudan and Arabic its official language.

Accordingly, independence in 1956 brought civil war, as southerners battled to fend off Muslim hegemony. Fortunately for them, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion’s “periphery strategy” translated into Israeli support for non-Arabs in the Middle East, including the southern Sudanese. The government of Israel served through the first Sudanese civil war, lasting until 1972, as their primary source of moral backing, diplomatic help, and armaments.

Mr. Kiir acknowledged this contribution in Jerusalem, noting that “Israel has always supported the South Sudanese people. Without you, we would not have arisen. You struggled alongside us in order to allow the establishment of South Sudan.” In reply, Mr.Peres recalled his presence in the early 1960s in Paris, when then-Prime Minister Levi Eshkol and he initiated Israel’s first-ever link with southern Sudanese leaders.

Sudan’s civil war continued intermittently from 1956 until 2005. Over time, Muslim northerners became increasingly vicious toward their southern co-nationals, culminating in the 1980-90s with massacres, chattel slavery, and genocide. Given Africa’s many tragedies, such problems might not have made an impression on compassion-weary Westerners except for an extraordinary effort led by two modern-day American abolitionists.

Starting in the mid-1990s, John Eibner of Christian Solidarity International redeemed tens of thousands of slaves in Sudan while Charles Jacobs of the American Anti-Slavery Group led a “Sudan Campaign” in the United States that brought together a wide coalition of organizations. As all Americans abhor slavery, the abolitionists formed a unique alliance of Left and Right, including Barney Frank and Sam Brownback, the Congressional Black Caucus and Pat Robertson, black pastors and white Evangelicals. In contrast, Louis Farrakhan was exposed and embarrassed by his attempts to deny slavery’s existence in Sudan.

Israel’s long-term investment has paid off. South Sudan fits into a renewed periphery strategy that includes Cyprus, Kurds, Berbers, and, perhaps one day, a post-Islamist Iran. South Sudan offers access to natural resources, especially oil. Its role inNile River water negotiations offers leverage vis-à-vis Egypt. Beyond practical benefits, the new republic represents an inspiring example of a non-Muslim population resisting Islamic imperialism through its integrity, persistence, and dedication. In this sense, the birth of South Sudan echoes that of Israel.The abolitionist effort culminated in 2005 when the George W. Bush administration pressured Khartoum in 2005 to sign the Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended the war and gave southerners a chance to vote for independence. They enthusiastically did so in January 2011, when 98 percent voted for secession from Sudan, leading to the formation of the Republic of South Sudan six months later, an event hailed by Mr. Peres as “a milestone in the history of the Middle East.”.

If Kiir’s Jerusalem visit is truly to mark a milestone, South Sudan must travel the long path from dirt-poor, international protectorate with feeble institutions to modernity and genuine independence. This path requires the leadership not to exploit the new state’s resources nor dream of creating a “New Sudan” by conquering Khartoum, but to lay the foundations for successful statehood.

For the Israelis and other Westerners, this means both helping with agriculture, health, and education and urging Juba to stay focused on defense and development while avoiding wars of choice. A successful South Sudan could eventually become a regional power and a stalwart ally not just of Israel but of the West.

Mr. Pipes is president of the Middle East Forum and Taube distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University.

Dear Dr. Kaufman:  Thank you, Israel and Dr. Pipes for remembering those of us in South Sudan.  The struggle in 1972 prevented my wife and I leaving Uganda to go down(south) the Nile to Egypt and Israel. Today you have cleared that ancient river from the baneful governance of Islam and opened it in part to black south Sudanese Africans.  Neither Elijah Muhammad nor Louis Farrakhan would understand but Malcom ‘X’ might. Best, Dan Corbett

Muslim Brotherhood Realities New and Old

Redacted from article by Steven Emerson

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2542

Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT) News
January 5, 2012

The votes still aren’t fully counted in Egypt, but the Obama administration has seen enough to reverse long-standing and well-rooted policies to shun the theocratic, global Caliphate-minded Muslim Brotherhood, whose philosophy spawned terrorist movements from Hamas to al-Qaida.

High level meetings between American and Brotherhood officials reflect a “new political reality here [in Egypt], and indeed around the region,” the New York Times reported in a front page article Wednesday, “as Islamist groups come to power.”

What is astounding and dangerous about the new U.S. recognition is the fact that Brotherhood leaders became more openly radical and militant once Mubarak was thrown out, issuing incendiary speeches calling for “martyrdom” operations against Israel and aligning with Hamas and other terrorist groups. Yet as the New York Times wrote, the Obama administration accepts as truthful “the Brotherhood’s repeated assurances that its lawmakers want to build a modern democracy that will respect individual freedoms, free markets and international commitments, including Egypt’s treaty with Israel,” the Times reported.

But there’s another reality that seems overlooked. And that’s the Brotherhood’s history of deception and duplicity, policies that reflect its modus operandi in gaining legitimacy in Egypt and around the world but still promoting a militant agenda. While some MB officials may tell American officials they will respect individual liberties and honor Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel, it’s not hard to find massive evidence that paints a different and more disturbing picture.

As we reported last week, the Brotherhood is poised to dominate the next Egyptian government after vowing last spring that it sought no such power. The group’s deputy chief says the Brotherhood “will not recognize Israel under any circumstances” and may place the peace treaty before voters in a referendum.

Brotherhood members must see their electoral success as a huge step in the direction of creating “the rightly guided caliphate.” The United States would be foolish to differ. It also would be foolish to overlook the Brotherhood’s record.

After American commandos killed Osama bin Laden, the Brotherhood told English language audiences ”one of the reasons for which violence has been practiced in the world has been removed,” Reuters reported. In Arabic, however, they referred to the mass-murdering al-Qaida founder with the honorary term of Sheikh and called him a shaheed, or martyr. The statement also criticized the American attack as an assassination.

Despite their reputations among some in the West as supposed moderates, Brotherhood officials routinely endorse terrorism. Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group in control of Gaza, declares itself to be the Brotherhood’s Palestinian branch. Its peaceful intent includes recent re-iterations of its commitment to violent jihad and its vow never to accept the state of Israel’s right to exist.

But the Brotherhood’s threat of violence is not limited to actions against Israel. Influential Brotherhood theologian Yusuf al Qaradawi endorsed kidnapping and killing American civilians in Iraq in 2004 as an “obligation so as to cause them to leave Iraq immediately.”

More recently, Qaradawi has called on Muslims to acquire nuclear weapons “to terrorize their enemies” and sanctioned killing Israeli women because they serve in the army. He has prayed to be martyred while killing a Jew.

Incredibly, there has been no American confirmation or denial of an Indian newspaper report last week which indicated Qaradawi is helping broker peace talks between the United States and the Taliban, which itself is scandalous.

But this is the same administration whose Director of National Intelligence called the Brotherhood ”a very heterogeneous group, largely secular, which has eschewed violence,” during a February congressional hearing. James Clapper tried to walk this back in subsequent statements, but his assessment flew in the face of all the Brotherhood has said about itself since its founding in 1928, beginning with its motto:

“God is our goal, the Quran is our Constitution, the Prophet is our leader, jihad is our way, and death in the service of God is the loftiest of our wishes.”

Deception is part of the Brotherhood’s modus operandi in America as well. Evidence in the largest terror-financing trial in U.S. history shows the Muslim Brotherhood created a network of Hamas-support organizations here, operating as the “Palestine Committee.”

Unfortunately, the Obama administration’s embrace of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt parallels its embrace of Muslim Brotherhood American branches and front groups whose officials say nice things on American television, yet continue to covertly spread the ideology of, and in many cases funded, Islamic militancy and terrorism. Throughout its history, Brotherhood groups and leaders around the world starting with al-Banna, its founder, in Egypt, have spread the incendiary conspiratorial doctrine that the West, Christians, Jews and infidels have secretly conspired to suppress Islam since 1095, the year of the first Crusade.  Brotherhood leaders blamed Israel, Jews and the United States for the 9/11 attacks. Nearly every Islamic terrorist arrest in the United States has been described by Islamist leaders as evidence of a “war against Islam.”

The Muslim Brotherhood, where ever it is around the world, from Cairo to Chicago, seeks to gain legitimacy thru a campaign of deception and penetration of western regimes and institutions. It defies common sense to grant unilateral legitimacy to the Brotherhood without demanding concrete actions to openly disavow its support for Islamic terrorist groups or stopping the spread of its mass incendiary message that there is a war against Islam.

Wittingly or unwittingly, the United States has now become a de facto enabler of a militant ideology that ultimately seeks the destruction of our own way of life.

Lessons never learned

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2519

Today’s defense cuts are recreating conditions that led to Pearl Harbor

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2463

Yes, I guess I am trying to be funny in a desperate, tragic, resigned kind of way.  That mood was generated right after reading the following Gallup Poll result and then the Moshe Feiglin wishful thinking article. (jsk)

I “From the Tea Party to Occupy Wall Street, Americans raised their fists this year to express frustration towards their elected officials and “the system.” Nonetheless, President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have topped the 2011 USA Today/Gallup poll for Most Admired Woman and Most Admired Man living today in any part of the world. Clinton wins the award for a record 16th time and Obama has now been named the Most Admired Man four years in a row.” (Can you not gag?)

Their heros! A sad commentary on the judging ability  of the American people -  How the hell are we going to get him out of office and save our country from his deliberate, well planned  destruction of it if this is the prevailing opinion? OMG!

II Moshe Feiglin Looks Forward to Crucial Head-to-Head Election versus Benjamin Netanyahu on January 31, 2012

December 28, 2011

On January 31, 2012, the Likud Party will be holding its election for Party Chairman. The winner of this primary will be the candidate who will run for Prime Minister of Israel from the Likud at the next general election. If the challenger – Moshe Feiglin – defeats current Prime Minister Netanyahu, the government coalition will most likely fall and the general election will be held within a few months.

As all current polls show overwhelmingly that the Likud will win the next election, in essence, this vote is to determine who will be the next Prime Minister of the State of Israel. There are only two candidates vying for this position – Moshe Feiglin and Benjamin Netanyahu, and they have wildly differing viewpoints.

Mr. Feiglin, President of Manhigut Yehudit – the largest faction of the Likud party – wishes to create a strong, proud Jewish State by ending the fraudulent Oslo Process, ending the taking of all foreign aid, and re-attaching Israelis to their Jewish roots.

Feiglin, who won 24% of the vote at the last election, and about whom former Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg said last week is the ‘most important man today in Israeli political discourse, wishes for Israel to be a Light Unto the Nations, as opposed to Mr. Netanyahu’s stated desire to find Israel’s Place Among the Nations. Mr. Feiglin feels that when Israel’s decisions are made taking into account that Israel should be run according to Jewish values – as opposed to being run according to secular, socialist or globalist values – then Israel will make better decisions and will be on course toward a brighter future.

On the other hand, Mr. Netanyahu is actively trying to create a Jew-free state of ‘palestine’ inside the biblical heartland of Israel. He pursues this policy even though earlier in his career he stated that the ‘palestinians’ already had a state called Jordan and that they had no right to have another one at Israel’s expense. At that time, Mr. Netanyahu also agreed with Newt Gingrich’s recent comments about the ‘palestinians’ being a modern invention created solely to oppose the state of Israel.

The false peace of Oslo has brought nothing but death, destruction and the loss of belief in our own cause to Israel and to Jews worldwide. Israeli withdrawals and statements like the recent one from Mr. Netanyahu that he will “be creative when it comes to [dividing] Jerusalem” only serve to raise the confidence of anti-Semites and terrorists around the globe. It is time for Israel to reverse course before it fades away.

In little more than a month, on January 31, nothing less than the fate of the state of Israel may be decided. (And, less than one year after that, so will the fate of the once great United States of America) jsk

Moshe Feiglin is the president of Manhigut Yehudit and a candidate for Chairman of the Likud party. He led the Zo Artzeinu  non-violent civil disobedience struggle against the Oslo Accords.  Moshe graduated from Or Etzion yeshiva, served as a captain in an IDF combat unit,  and is the author of the books Where There Are No Men and War of Dreams. Moshe and his family live in Karnei Shomron, Israel. 

Moshe Feiglin Campaign headquarters 1 Manhigut Blvd., Ginot Shomron 44853

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2476

This Shabbat’s Haftorah for the Torah Portion VAYIGASH

(Ezekiel 37:15-28)

37.15 Then God’s word came to me, saying:

16 “And And you, son of man, take a (piece of) wood and write on it, For Yehudah and his fellow Israelites,’ and take another stick and write on it, ‘For Yosef—a stick for (his son) Efrayim and (the other tribes) the whole house of Israel with him.”

17 “Bring them close to one another, so they (resemble) one stick and they will (miraculously) join in your hands to be one.”

18 “When your people say to you, ‘Tell us what these mean to you.”

19 “Say to them, ‘Almighty God says, “Observe! I am taking the stick of Yosef which is in Efrayim’s hand, and the tribes of Israel with him; and I am placing the stick of Yehudah on it. I will make them one stick, and they will join in My hand.”

20 “The sticks on which you have written should be (in your hands) before their eyes.”

21 “(While you are holding the sticks) tell them, ‘This is what Almighty God said: “I will take the Jews from  among the nations where they have gone. I will gather them from (all) around and bring them to their Land.”

22 “I will make them one nation in the Land, in the hills of Israel, and. all of them will have one king. They will no longer be two nations (of Yehudah and the other tribes), and they will no longer be divided into two kingdoms.”

23 They will no longer be defiled by their idols, their abominations and all their sins. I will save them (from where they are lost) in all the communities where they sinned, and I will purify them (from their sins). They will be My people (who believe in Me and observe My mitzvos), and I will be their God (to save them and help them).”

24 “My servant (Mashiach, a descendant of) David, will be  king over them and they will all have one shepherd. They will follow My laws and guard My statutes (in their hearts), and fulfill them.”

25 “They will settle in the Land that I gave to My servant Ya’akov, the Land where their ancestors lived. They and their children and their grandchildren will live there forever, and David my servant will be their leader forever.”

26 “I will make a covenant of peace with them, and it will be an eternal covenant with them. I will establish them (there forever) and cause them to multiply, and I will place My Sanctuary among them (so it stands) forever.”

27 “My Divine Presence will be among them. I will be their God (to help them and save them), and they will be My people (to believe in Me and keep My mitzvos).”

 28 “The nations will know that I am God, Who sanctifies Israel, since My Sanctuary will be among them forever.”

http://israel-commentary.org/?p=2470

How America’s Largest Labor Unions serve as ground troops for the Radical Left

The November issue of Whistleblower 

A Litany of Labor Unions abusing the American taxpayer and the American consumer – all under the favoring eye of the Obama administration.

A partial listing of the Table of Contents:

Page 4  James P. Hoffa | International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT).

 “President Obama, this is your army. We are ready to march. Let’s take these (Tea Party} sons of bitches out.”

Page 6  Obama offers Perks to College Kids to join his Army. 

Demand Congress forgive the hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt the “students” have gleefully accumulated on their credit cards. Let the American taxpayer pay for it when you vote for Barack Obama. Sounds like the example set by Obama’s Federal government

Page 8  Unions preparing for street chaos at major events in election year. Rahm Emanuel, former Obama Chief of Staff and now Mayor of Chicago to host likely target events in May, 2012  International NATO and G-8 nations summit. 

Page 13  Union thugs welding baseball bats and crowbars in labor dispute, storm and destroy grain terminal at  Port of Longview, Washington state.

Page 14  Wall Street Occupiers promoted by far Left radicals like Service Employee International Union organizer Stephen Lerner who calls on his followers to “go on the offense.”

Page 17 How Public Employee Unions Really Work to taxpayer’s detriment

A simple primer on corrupt and fraudulent collective bargaining.

Page 19 Public Sector Unions Choke Taxpayers – by John Stossel 

Page 20 Union Gangsters – Richard Trumka, Stephen Lerner, Craig Becker - To name just a few of the infamous leaders

And, that’s only half the magazine! Please buy a copy and read and decide if you want the current administration to stay in office and continue to destroy our economy and with it, our world standing and thus fulfill Obama’s desire to eliminate American “Exceptionalism.”   jsk

Whistleblower is published by World Net Daily (WND.com) , Grant Pass, OR 97526

Joseph Farah, Publisher and CEO