Apparently, Hamas leaders aren’t really interested in becoming martyrs for the cause. And the campaign of, well, killing terrorists before they can kill Israelis is working. Gee. Whoda thunk it?

Palestinian armed factions signalled on Friday that they may stop rocket salvoes from Gaza into Israel if Israel stops military action in the territory, softening earlier truce terms, a source said.

The source, a Palestinian official familiar with truce talks between the factions and representatives of moderate President Mahmoud Abbas, said the militants gave 48 hours in which to persuade Israel to accept the proposed Gaza ceasefire. (Reuters)

Not that I believe it. But it’s good to know they’re running scared again.

Keep up the attack. Put the leadership in your sights again, please. My personal wishlist: Haniyeh, Meshaal, and al-Zahar (better known as Monkey Boy). Geez, go get Nasrallah while you’re at it and put him out of Israel and Lebanon’s misery.

There’s been a new link on the main gmail inbox page for the last day or two that’s giving me an impression that I don’t think Google was really trying for.

Right next to my name is the following, in red text: “New! Bigger attachments.”

And it makes me think of all of the spam I get regarding improving the size of a certain male appendage.

I really don’t think that’s what the Google marketing staff had in mind.

While looking around on the Pew research site for background on another post, I found this very interesting fact from a previous survey:

The American public is not unaware that U.S. policies in the Middle East have strengthened anti-American feelings around the world in recent years. In a November 2005 poll, about four-in-ten (39%) of the U.S. public said that U.S. support for Israel is a major reason that people around the world are unhappy with the U.S. (though far more fingered U.S. wealth and power and the war on terrorism as major reasons). Another 39% saw it as a minor reason. Opinion leaders, questioned in the same survey, were more emphatic on this point. Fully 78% of members of the news media and 72% of security experts and military leaders interviewed saw U.S. support for Israel as a “major reason why there is discontent with the U.S. around the world.” Only the Iraq war was designated by higher percentages of the experts and leaders as a major source of global discomfort with the U.S.

In other words, twice as many members of the media, government, and military leadership than average Americans think that Israel is one of the main reasons for America-hatred.

Well. That certainly explains the news media bias, the State Department, the FBI investigations of AIPAC, Walt & Mearsheimer, and Jimmy Carter. Our media, political, and military elites are twice as likely to blame Israel for America’s bad images, whereas the average American is smart enough to blame the people who blame Israel.

Someone at the Houston Chronicle editorial desk doesn’t like Israel. You could possibly get more biased than this headline. But I don’t see how.

Israel’s retaliatory airstrike in Gaza kills 2

Can’t find that headline anywhere else in Google News, so it’s not AP’s headline. This is AP’s headline. The stories are pretty much identical.

Israeli Airstrikes Kill Two Militants
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Israeli planes fired on a car traveling in Gaza City, killing two militants today in one of a series of airstrikes that began before midnight with a hit on the refugee camp that is home to the Palestinian prime minister.

The army confirmed that it had targeted militants traveling in the vehicle. Hamas said its men were in the car that was hit.

An earlier airstrike had hit a Hamas training center south of Gaza City, destroying the compound and lightly injuring at least three, witnesses said.

More than 40 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli raids over the past 10 days, and an Israeli woman was killed by a rocket on Monday in a Palestinian rocket barrage — one of many that have severely disrupted life in the area near Gaza and forced thousands to flee.

That’s your hometown paper, Lair. What’s going on?

While we’re on the subject of media bias, let’s take a look at the IHT, a New York Times newspaper, and what they represent as the beginning of the Israeli campaign against Hamas:

The Israeli military campaign began May 17, soon after Hamas said it would resume its rocket attacks on Israel from Gaza, ending a fragile six-month cease-fire. Smaller Palestinian factions had consistently violated the cease-fire, firing a trickle of rockets throughout. But the number of rocket launchings rose sharply in mid-May, and about 220 rockets have been fired toward Israel since then, according to the Israeli Army.

Really? On May 17th, the IDF just decided to go after Hamas because it “said it would resume its rocket attacks on Israel”? That’s why?

No. Because something happened in the days before Israel went after Hamas. Something called rocket attacks on Israel’s civilians. Unprovoked rocket attacks, I might add. Hamas didn’t just say they were resuming rocket launches. They did it. Amazing how the IHT can spin this. From a Ynet article dated May 15 (that would be the “mid-May” the IHT is talking about):

On a day plagued with Israeli casualties, Qassam rockets did not stop raining on Sderot and the vicinity. Late Tuesday night, eight Qassams landed in the region, in three separate salvos, with two more rockets landing just after midnight Wednesday.

No one was injured in the latest barrages, but earlier rockets wreaked havoc. Tuesday evening, a Sderot resident was seriously wounded after a Qassam rocket launched from Gaza slammed into her house. Her young son was moderately wounded.

Thirteen rockets landed in the vicinity of Sderot during this attack, causing no other injuries but substantial damage to an elementary school.

Less than an hour after the first attack terror groups launched five additional rockets from Gaza, directly hitting a second house in the city. The house was damaged but no injuries were reported. A third rocket landed in the city’s commercial center and damaged several stores.

An additional Qassam hit a low-voltage powerline, causing a temporary black-out. Residents said the barrage was one of the worst in a long time.

Later in the evening Palestinians also fired two mortar shells at a kibbutz in the western Negev, no injuries or damage were reported and officials said the shells landed in an open field.

So it seems that Hamas didn’t just say it would resume rocket attacks on May 17th. By that time, it had already fired dozens of kassams, and wounded Israelis in Sderot.

Not that the readers of the IHT are going to learn that. Not from this article, anyway.

And the anti-Israel media bias marches on.

Four Israelis were “lightly wounded” by kassam shrapnel.

Two Qassam rockets were fired at Sderot Friday evening. One of the rockets landed near a house in town. Four people were lightly injured by shrapnel, and 10 other residents suffered from shock.

At least five Qassam rockets were fired at the western Negev on Friday morning. The rockets landed in open areas near the southern town of Sderot and south of Ashkelon.

Hamas continues the kassam launches because they think they can scare Israel into a “cease-fire” for the West Bank—in other words, carte blanche for Hamas to keep trying to build up weapons and cells in the West Bank, and launch suicide attacks. Like the ones that were prevented by catching the transport of explosives through a Nablus checkpoint.

The other Qassam fell in the town’s industrial area and damaged some equipment.

Three terrorists were blown to pieces by a direct Hellfire hit.

An Israeli airstrike hit a car traveling in Gaza City, killing three and wounding at least five, Palestinian security and medical officials said.

The army confirmed that it had targeted militants traveling in the vehicle. Hamas said its men were in the car that was hit.

An earlier airstrike had hit a Hamas training center south of Gaza City, destroying the compound and lightly injuring at least three, witnesses said.

If you ask me, the IAF should lie low for a day or two, wait until Hamas has one of those soccer-stadium rallies with thousands of hooded terrorists, and blow up the main stage. That would take out the leadership in one swift blow, and get quite a few martyr-wannabees while they’re at it.

But of course, we won’t see that happen. I don’t really understand why world opinion would be against Israel killing Hamas terrorists at a Hamas rally where they carry weapons and chant “Death to Israel,” but there you have it: It would cause yet another UN resolution condemning Israel.

Then again, it’s not like that would be anything different from the usual.

Reut Cohen is doing her utmost to stop the anti-Semites at UC Irvine. She has an uphill battle.

Let’s say that there is a country called Christianland where 44 percent of the world’s Christians live, and whose total population is 76 percent Christian (Christians of all sects, from Catholics to Protestants and everyone in between). My club puts on a week of events that I claim aren’t anti-Christian, but I demonize the population and government of Christianland, saying that they don’t have a right to exist as a nation and that they must be destroyed by any means necessary (including, for example, suicide bombers). I doubt that many of you would say that I wasn’t being anti-Christian. Since there are so many Christians worldwide, this seems implausible, but if you substituted Israel for Christianland and Jews for Christians, then it isn’t so implausible. It’s already happened.

Last week, the MSU put on their week of events titled “Israel: Apartheid Resurrected,” and in doing so, proved that they were not being anti-Zionist (Zionism being the movement to create and support the state of Israel), but anti-Semitic. They will tell you otherwise, because they brought a “rabbi,” Dovid Weiss, who represents a group that makes up 0.04 percent of world Jewry. Weiss speaking for the Jewish population is like David Duke speaking for Christians; it just doesn’t make sense to have a radical member on the fringe of a group speak for the group.

But she’s getting results. She got a congressman to come and see the hate.

Put her on your reading list. She’s going on my blogroll.

I suppose he should be thankful they didn’t just tear him apart on the spot, but the Religion of Tolerance™ arrested a man for the crime of: Being Christian.

Saudi officials have arrested a man in Mecca for being a Christian, saying that the city, which Muslims consider to be holy, is off-limits to non-Muslims.

Nirosh Kamanda, a Sri Lankan Christian, was detained by the Saudi Expatriates Monitoring Committee last week after he started to sell goods outside Mecca’s Great Mosque.

After running his fingerprints through a new security system, Saudi police discovered that he was a Christian who had arrived in the country six months earlier to take a job as a truck driver in the city of Dammam. Kamanda had subsequently left his place of work and moved to Mecca.

“The Grand Mosque and the holy city are forbidden to non-Muslims,” Col. Suhail Matrafi, head of the department of Expatriates Affairs in Mecca, told the Saudi daily Arab News. “The new fingerprints system is very helpful and will help us a lot to discover the identity of a lot of criminals,” he said.

Funny how you never hear complaints of intolerance when the Saudis do this. It is, of course, illegal to bring a Bible or any non-Muslim religious symbol into Saudi Arabia. If you’re wearing a cross or a star of David, they will be taken from you and not returned. Neither will your holy books be returned. The Saudis don’t just confiscate; they destroy.

Now that’s tolerance.

Well, no, it’s not, but CAIR would have us believe it is.

Condi Rice thinks that Israel should dismantle checkpoints and allow Palestinians to freely travel between Gaza and the West Bank.

This is why that idea is insane:

A Palestinian man was arrested Friday afternoon at the Hawara checkpoint, located south of Nablus, with three explosives devices concealed in his belongings.

Soldiers manning the crossing uncovered the bombs during the man’s security check. The man was taken for questioning by security forces and sappers have been called in to detonate the explosives in a controlled manner. (Efrat Weiss)

Try not to laugh. Really.

The United Nations plans to send experts to Lebanon to examine reported incidents of illegal weapons smuggling from Syria into Lebanon, Israel Radio reported on Thursday.

The team will rate local security forces’ abilities to prevent the smuggling and will stay in Lebanon for two weeks.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon decided to send the team following a request made by the Security Council.

I love it when the JPost puts these little blurbs in. I find they say more in three paragraphs than many other newspapers say in thirty.

Plus, I get to mock the story. Not the JPost. The content.

Geez, guys, how could you miss?

The IAF fired a missile late Thursday that exploded close to the house of Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh in the Shati refugee camp next to Gaza City, Palestinian security officials said.

They said the missile hit a tin shack where Haniyeh’s guards sleep, but it was empty and no one was hurt.

The IDF said it hit a building used by Hamas in the camp, and the location of Haniyeh’s house was incidental.

What a waste of a missile. Unless, of course, the IDF was, oh, I don’t know, sending a message.

I wonder if they wrote Haniyeh’s name on the missile. Now that would have been a message, indeed.