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06/30/2007

I. Ben Busy

Filed under: Life — Meryl Yourish @ 10:59 pm

That was my name for today.

This weekend was the last service led by my congregation’s rabbi, who was essentially forced out (although some would say he quit, I don’t believe it). He and the rebbetzin—especially the rebbetzin—are the ones who brought me into teaching. I made sure not to miss services this weekend, and today was especially sad. The kiddush afterward was very long, and nobody really wanted to leave, but eventually, we all did. The rabbi and his wife are on the road to Columbus to visit her family now, and will ultimately settle down in Florida.

There was only one good note for the day: The rebbetzin told me she is encouraging her husband (strongly) to take a job that is not a congregational job, and if that happens, they will come back for my bat mitzvah. Now that I would like very, very much. The interim rabbi is a nice man and all that, but he hasn’t been my rabbi for five years. It won’t be the same with him officiating. So now, I have a little bit of hope.

Yesterday, Joseph G., one of her most difficult students, came of his own volition. She was deeply touched and honored. Joseph doesn’t do anything he doesn’t want to do. I admit I was shocked to see him there. Pleased, but shocked.

Anyway. Then home, then a nap, as I had some kind of stomach thing from last night, then on to Heidi’s for dinner-and. Just got home a little while ago.

There was no posting today, because I was out having a life. Rather enjoyable, albeit a bit sad.

06/29/2007

What the bomb could have done

Filed under: Terrorism — Meryl Yourish @ 2:30 pm

The Times asks experts how large the explosion would have been:

The “patio gas” bomb defused in Haymarket would have generated a fireball the size of a house and a shock wave spreading out over a diameter of at least 400 yards, explosives experts said today.

The propane cylinders and petrol used in the device would have triggered a huge conflagration, as well as causing shrapnel and blast injuries from the exploding car chassis and the nails packed around the bomb, according to Hans Michels, Professor of Safety Engineering at Imperial College, London.

Just one 13kg propane canister — the type sold by Calor under the brand name “Patio Gas” — would release a highly flammable cloud of vapour that would spread over an area of 50 to 60 cubic metres before igniting into a still larger fireball, he said.

“The vapour cloud from one cylinder would fill the order of a big room, and when it ignited the effect would be even bigger,” Professor Michels said. “In addition to the power of the explosion and the shrapnel, you would get a fireball the size of a small house.”

But there’s one huge piece of good news: Expect arrests.

The recovery of the intact bomb will also help forensic scientists to trace the bomb-makers, Professor Michels said. Propane cylinders carry a serial number which can be used to find the point of sale, and isotopic analysis could be used to trace any flour used in the main explosive charge.

Sure, they may have filed off the serial numbers. But maybe not. These guys have proven to be not the sharpest knives in the drawers.

Major British terror attack thwarted

Filed under: Terrorism — Meryl Yourish @ 11:00 am

Sheer luck prevented a car bomb from killiing and wounding hundreds of Londoners today.

Officers inspecting the car found 60 litres of petrol on the back seat, gas cylinders and containers holding nails inside, which could have caused “significant injury or loss of life”. The bomb was defused.

One witness said that door staff at the nightclub alerted police after the car was driven into bins last night and the driver ran off.

The witness said the large silver saloon car was being driven “erratically” before the minor crash and that the driver then ran off.

Mr Clarke said that some aspects of today’s bomb attempt “resonated with previous plots” and mentioned nightclubs as a potential target.

But he also said detectives are keeping “an entirely open mind” as to who is responsible and called on the public to remain vigilant.

Yeah, let’s think. Who would want to murder hundreds of people in the nightclub district? Hm. Wait, wait, let me think about it a minute….

LONDON — A judge sentenced five men to life in prison Monday for plotting to attack targets in London, including a popular nightclub, power plants and shopping mall, with bombs made from a half-ton stockpile of fertilizer.

The trial for the first time exposed connections between the defendants and the deadly 2005 al-Qaida-linked attack on the city’s transit system.

That’s right. Keep an “open mind,” because it’s obvious that it could have been the IRA. Or maybe those legendary Jewish terrorists, mad about the way their coreligionists are being treated in England.

What’s that? There are no Jewish terrorists? Well, then it must be one of those Christian terrorists. What? There aren’t any Christian terrorists, either?

Why then, who could it be?

An ICM poll last year indicated that a fifth of Muslims had sympathy with the “feelings and motives” of the suicide bombers in the July 7 2005 attack, although 99% thought they were wrong to carry out the attack.

Of course. It’s that tiny minority of extremists!

Sheer luck stopped the murder of many Brits today. Not MI5. Not the police investigations. Not all of Britain’s work at preventing another major bombing. Luck, and only luck.

They will not be able to rely on luck as a means to prevent more attacks.

Update: Three car bombs have been found so far. There will most likely be a fourth. Classic Al Qaeda methodology.

Update 2: No, only two so far. But really, really dangerous, if they’d been made correctly.

06/28/2007

Hey, look at that! A bomb factory!

Filed under: Israel, Terrorism — Meryl Yourish @ 10:10 pm

So, that ending of terror that Mahmoud Abbas is supposed to be doing?

Yeah, not so much.

A number of IDF troops were wounded during an operation in Nablus Thursday which exposed a large explosives laboratory.

Three prepared explosive devices, each weighing roughly five kilograms, were found in the laboratory, along with numerous weapons, magazines and materials used to manufacture bombs.

Israeli army forces entered Nablus Wednesday to operate against terrorist infrastructure and locate illegal weapons caches. The large-scale operation was launched after intelligence information indicated that terrorists in the city were planning a number of attacks in Israeli territory.

Wednesday afternoon soldiers discovered another weapons cache containing a pipe bomb, a Kalashnikov rifle, a hand gun and two grenades. At another location in Nablus troops found an M-16 rifle and a telescopic sight. The weapons were confiscated and the grenades were detonated in controlled explosions.

Our pal Mahmoud? Well, he outlawed all illegal weapons and bombs. No, really. You can stop laughing now.

Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on Tuesday outlawed all armed Palestinian groups except for the official PA security services.

[...] “On the basis of the declaration of a state of emergency in the Palestinian territories, and by virtue of my authority, all armed militias, groups and brigades that do not belong in practice to the security services shall be treated as illegal organizations,” read the first order.

The order forbade such groups to conduct any activity, whether secret or public, and said that criminal investigations would be opened against anyone caught participating in such activity.

“The government must halt the phenomenon of armed groups, prevent the bearing of arms and confiscate guns, explosives and any type of weaponry purchased illegally, since they endanger the public order,” the decree continued.

And it went over really well.

The Al-Aksa Martyrs Brigade, which is linked to Abbas’s Fatah, was among those to announce an intention to keep their weapons. Zacharia Zubeidi, the group’s head in Jenin, said, “Abu Mazen [a/k/a Abbas] meant the illegal weapons owned by criminal organizations, but our weapons are legitimate—the weapons of the resistance organizations.” Another wanted terrorist, Abu Aziz, called Abbas’s proclamation “irresponsible,” but said he would consider turning in his weapons if Israel would guarantee his safety.

More at Jihad Watch.

The perils of working from home

Filed under: The Hulk, Work — Meryl Yourish @ 2:30 pm

This week a series of annoyances managed to all roll out one after another, forcing me to bring out my inner Hulk—albeit, the kinder, gentler Hulk.

About two weeks ago, I got new neighbors: A young couple with two young children, an infant and a four-year-old. They also have a cat with three kittens, and they’re trying to push the orange one on me. (Not gonna happen. Tig and Gracie hate other cats, and at the age of ten, I think it’s unfair to them to bring a stranger in the house.) But here’s the thing: Their four-year-old has been bothering me incessantly. She knocks on my patio door to tell me Tig wants to come in. Meantime, he was sound asleep on the patio until she came by to bother him, whereupon he woke up and frantically tried to get inside to get away from her. She knocks on my patio door to tell me she’s wearing a new shirt. She waves at me through the kitchen window while I’m preparing dinner, because my window looks out on my patio and she is in my backyard area, because she is not, apparently, being watched very carefully by her mother. And to top it all off, her mother knocks on my front door to tell me Tig wants to come in, and I have to explain to her that no, he doesn’t, he wants to sit on my porch and not be bothered, and that he knows how to let me know when he wants in. If he can’t get me to hear him scratching on the door, he will either yowl until I hear him, or come around to the patio door and get my attention that way. Really. I’ve been living here for five years, and my cats are thoroughly adapted to their environment.

Then, for the past week or so, we have the added annoyance of my cats misbehaving. Tig kept waking me up at 5 a.m. by yowling at me to get up and pay attention to him. This happened night after night until I finally woke up enough to start throwing shoes at him. I never hit him. I throw them in his general direction, and he gets the message. So it took two nights of throwing my slippers—no, three nights. He finally stopped waking me up. Now it’s Gracie’s turn. She’s discovered that I work from home now, so that means I can pay attention to her 24/7. Well, uh, no. She’s been yowling at me to come pet her upstairs. She’s been doing this every couple of hours. Two days ago, I got fed up with all of her noise and went to the foot of the stairs and had words with her. She sat on landing at the top of the stairs, eyes growing wide, and listened. She also got the message. I heard a yowl just now as I was writing this post, and yelled, “Gracie!” in super-stern voice, and she stopped.

Finally, yesterday, neighbor child knocks on my patio door—the blinds are closed—in midafternoon. Tig is asleep in the corner, ignoring her. She grabs her shirt and tells me that she’s wearing her new teddy bear shirt.

“What did I tell you about bothering me while I’m working?” I asked.
“But I’m wearing my new teddy bear shirt!”
“Briana, GO!” I said. I pointed. I never point. But she was really pissing me off.
She took off running.

I have not been bothered since.

Ahhhh. That sound you hear is the sound of me getting my privacy and control back.

This time next year, I hope to be working from my own townhouse. I’m going to install a fence.

A big one.

Update: She crossed the line. She squirted Tig with a water bottle. And in order to do this, she had to sneak onto my patio—all the way onto my patio—and get him while he slept in the corner near the door. She did. But I saw the tail end of it. I went next door and told her mother to keep that child away from me, my patio, and my cat. I was not nice. I was not patient. And I wasn’t accepting excuses.

I do not want that brat anywhere near me or mine again.

The upcoming Hezbullah war

Filed under: Lebanon — Meryl Yourish @ 1:00 pm

Hezbullah has been re-arming since the end of last year’s war.

Since a UN-brokered cease-fire came into force last August 14, the group has been steadily gearing itself up for the next round, with the same determination and secrecy that have made its reputation, the experts say.

“Immediately after last summer’s war Hizbullah began refortifying its positions and working on new ones,” said Judith Palmer Harik, author of the book “Hizbullah: The Changing Face of Terrorism.”

“They are rearming … In fact, there has been no interruption in their receiving of more arms,” she told AFP.

Make no mistake about it, Hezbullah has been energized by the Hamas takeover of Gaza. Michael Young points out that even if they didn’t set off the bomb that murdered six UN peacekeepers, they allowed it to happen.

There were probably two principal reasons, aside from the kill factor, for the car-bomb attack against the soldiers. The first was to make UNIFIL more timorous in its patrolling of the border area, in such a way that, with the removal of Lebanese Army units to fight in Nahr al-Bared, more room would be cleared up for Hizbullah to rebuild its military infrastructure south of the Litani River. That’s not to say that Hizbullah detonated the device that killed the UN soldiers, but it’s very difficult to accept that the party was unaware of what was about to take place. Hizbullah, for all its declarations of sympathy for UNIFIL, views the international force and the Lebanese Army as grave obstacles to the pursuit of “resistance” in the South. For an organization that could not survive without armed struggle, that recently saw its Hamas comrades establish an autonomous territory alongside Israel in Gaza, now is the time to act, in collaboration with Iran and Syria, to again make of South Lebanon a front line against Israel.

[...] Perhaps most disquieting is that if the UNIFIL mandate begins breaking apart, it will be Israel that looks for ways around Resolution 1701 to defend its northern border. This would suit Hizbullah and its Iranian and Syrian patrons just fine, since it’s the Israelis who would take the blame for returning South Lebanon to where it was before the summer 2006 war.

The question, I think, is when–not if.

Mahmoud Abbas’ empty promises

Filed under: Israel — Meryl Yourish @ 9:00 am

So, Mahmoud Abbas is going to stop terror in the West Bank.

Really. Because seven IDF soldiers were wounded during operations in Nablus.

An IDF officer was severely injured, three soldiers were moderately hurt and another three sustained light wounds as Palestinians hurled four explosive devices at a force operating in the West Bank city of Nablus on Wednesday night.

An officer who was moderately injured in one of the explosions was evacuated via helicopter to the Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer, where his condition deteriorated and is now defined serious. Another three soldiers were evacuated by ambulance to the Rabin Medical Center in Petah Tikva.

[...] The IDF reported that military activity against terror infrastructure in the West Bank continued early Thursday morning, and the forces entered Nablus for the purpose of arresting wanted Palestinians.

According to the IDF Spokesperson’s Office, once the forces entered the city, some 50 Palestinians opened fire on them in two separate incidents. In both cases, no one was injured.

Two explosive devices were also hurled at the IDF forces, and no soldiers were injured. A third device was thrown at the soldiers shortly afterwards, leaving one IDF officer moderately injured from shrapnel.

Why, exactly, was the IDF in Nablus? Oh, that’s right. Because Nablus is a safe haven for terrorists. And because Mahmoud Abbas is not Israel’s partner. He is her enemy.

Stupid UN moment of the day

Filed under: Holocaust — Meryl Yourish @ 7:00 am

As a result of objections by Poland, Auschwitz has been renamed. Because the Poles were oh-so-very-good to the Jews during and after WWII, right?

On July 4, 1946, townspeople and security officers, spurred by a false rumor that Jews living at 7 Planty St., had kidnapped a Christian boy, attacked Jewish Holocaust survivors living in the building. They killed 42 people, almost all Jews, over several hours, and about 30 more were killed in a violent frenzy that spread across the area.

So now Polish feelings are more important than the reality sixty years ago.

UNESCO has officially renamed the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland to make clear it was established and run by occupying German Nazi forces, a World Heritage Committee spokesman said Thursday.

The camp will now be known as “Auschwitz-Birkenau. German Nazi Concentration and Extermination Camp (1940-1945),” said Roni Amelan, a spokesman for UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee.

The committee agreed to change the name from “Auschwitz Concentration Camp” at a meeting in New Zealand following a request from Poland, and the change is effective immediately, Amelan said.

Pardon me while I roll my eyes at yet another useless move by the UN.

06/27/2007

PETA worker fails dognapping 101

Filed under: EATAPETA — Meryl Yourish @ 4:30 pm

A PETA worker is going to be tried for felony theft for stealing a foxhound. She says she was rescuing a stray. Except, well, she took a tracking collar off the dog, and also ignored the fact that the dog’s name and owner’s phone number were on the other collar.

Courtland, VA – An animal rights advocate who said she was rescuing a stray will be prosecuted on a felony theft charge for loading a deputy sheriff’s hunting dog into a van and driving away.

A judge on Tuesday allowed the case to proceed against Andrea Florence Benoit, 25, who contends she was worried about the dog’s welfare and only wanted to return it to its owner.

The Chesapeake woman picked up the fox hound while working in Southampton County for Norfolk’s People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Prosecutors dropped charges against another PETA worker in the van.

A motorist who saw the women pick up the dog called Southampton County Deputy Sheriff J.T. Cooke Jr., an animal control officer for the county. Cooke found the van a few minutes later and discovered his Walker hound in the back.

Cooke testified that he had let out several of his hounds the night before to chase foxes, and one failed to return. The dog carried dye markings of numbers on its side and “JT” on its hip and wore a neon yellow collar bearing Cooke’s name and cell phone number, the deputy said.

The animal also had been outfitted with an orange collar fitted with an antenna that could track the animal for three to four miles.

The tracking collar was found near the side of the road where the dog was picked up.

Oops. Apparently, though, she was following PETA policy. Yes, that’s right, PETA tells its workers to steal animals and not contact their owners directly.

The women were following PETA policy by not directly trying to contact the dog’s owner through the phone number on the other collar, Benoit’s lawyer, Stephen D. Benjamin, said. They intended to call their office so PETA could reach Cooke, he said.

While General District Judge Robert B. Edwards said he had no doubt that Benoit believed she was doing the right thing, “the right thing in this case was a felony.”

I like that judge. Of course, it’s going to be plea-bargained down to a misdemeanor, just as the case of the PETA workers taking animals from vets, killing them, and throwing them into a dumpster was.

Mahmoud Abbas, Olmert’s new peace partner

Filed under: Israel, palestinian politics — Meryl Yourish @ 1:00 pm

It’s good to know that Olmert thinks he can make peace with Abbas. Because it’s obvious that Abbas has changed and is totally ready to crack down on terrorism and work towards a two-state solution.

You can tell by the statement he released in response to the IDF’s operations in Gaza earlier today.

“The crimes that were committed in the Gaza Strip by the Israeli occupation must be strongly condemned,” read a statement released by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s office Wednesday.

The statement continued: “This bloody escalation, which was initiated by the Israeli government, is a distinct violation of the tahadiyeh, and will lead to a chain of retaliations and the prolongation of violence.”

The PA chairman’s office went on to say that “this aggression comes only a single day after the Sharm e-Sheikh summit and calls into question whether Israel really intends to seal an agreement and negotiate to end the occupation.

Yep. Sounds to me like a man Israel can work with. Uh-huh. Sure.

The media bias, part the next

Filed under: AP Media Bias, Media Bias — Meryl Yourish @ 12:00 pm

Hey, kids. If it’s a day that ends with a “y,” it’s time for the AP anti-Israel media bias. Let’s start, as always, with the headline.

Israeli Troops Kill 10 Palestinians

No doubt there what happened. But please note that the word “militants” is nowhere to be found in the headline. Just for comparison’s sake, let’s check out this story from a few days ago, about the Lebanese army killing Palestinian “militants.”

10 die as clashes move to Tripoli

Isn’t that fascinating? When Israel isn’t killing the “militants,” they simply “die.” Or they “die in clashes.” Or sometimes, the passive “are killed” is used. But when it comes to Israel killing terrorists, the active voice is always, always used. Palesitinians—rarely “militants”—are killed by Israelis, or the army, or the IDF, in the headline. And the lede.

Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday killed 10 Palestinians, including a 12-year-old boy, Palestinians said, the bloodiest fighting in the area since the Hamas militant group violently seized control two weeks ago.

Wow. Strong stuff. Let’s check out that story on the Lebanese Army going after Palestinian terrorists.

TRIPOLI, Lebanon (AP) — Lebanese troops raided a house suspected of containing al-Qaeda-inspired militants in the northern port city of Tripoli early Sunday, sparking a gunbattle that left 10 people dead, including a soldier and six gunmen, security officials said.

Notice the passive “left 10 people dead.” You also have to travel down several paragraphs to have it spelled out for you that civilians were killed—note the lack of civilian casualties in the lede graf, except as an implied number subtracted from the “10 die” total. Here’s the graf where they are described:

An army soldier, a policeman and two family members were killed in Sunday’s confrontation, which began with troops laying siege to a building where the gunmen had taken refugee after nighttime clashes in the area, the security officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

The names and ages of the civilians are not in evidence. This graf was buried very deeply within the story, as opposed to in the first few paragraphs, where they’d be if it was a story about the IDF. But you can find them, surprisingly, in this Reuters article in Ha’aretz.

The militants killed a policeman, his two daughters, aged 4 and 8, and his father-in-law after using them as human shields in an apartment, sparking the siege.

A police statement said the policeman and his daughters were visiting the father-in-law who lived in the building when the militants stormed their flat and seized them, then later killed them.

However, that news is in paragraphs four and five of a story with this passive headline, and there is no civilian death count in the lede:

Twelve die in Lebanese army raid on militant hideout in apartment

Interestingly, Reuters doesn’t think the total number of civilians killed by the Lebanese Army and Fatah al-Islam in their “gunbattles” is worth mentioning. The deaths are all lumped together in a single total, something that has never, ever been done in stories about Israel versus, well, anyone.

A similar raid on a Tripoli flat on May 20 sparked the fighting in Nahr al-Bared, where 176 people have been killed in Lebanon’s worst internal violence since the 1975-90 civil war.

And there you have it. The wire service media bias against Israel. Only in evidence on days that end with a “y.”

Sgt. Mom’s fundraiser

Filed under: Books — Meryl Yourish @ 11:12 am

Sgt. Mom wrote a book. So far, she hasn’t gotten a publisher, but that’s not stopping her. Now she’s going to try to self-publish, but that’s not inexpensive, either.

So go check out Sgt. Mom’s post where she tells you about her book, the rejections, Plans B, C, D, and E, and if you have a few extra bucks, hit her tipjar. It’s all my fault, you see. I liked her writing so much when she was a plain old blogger, that I told her she should turn her words into a book. So she did.

So, maybe if only 5% of the manuscripts floating into agents’ offices, and publisher’s submissions sub-sub-sub contractors are good for anything other than landfill. Everyone thinks they have a book in them, and the fact that in most cases it should have stayed right there is beside the point. The OK to Pretty Damned Good stuff is still an absolutely unmanageable quantity. All the competent and ethical agents seem to have about all they can do to look at hundreds of similar OK to Pretty Damned Good submissions clamoring for their attention and time and make a snap decision on accepting and managing the tiny percentage that will pay off with the least amount of effort on their part.

Yeah, they kept sending me these letters admitting that they just didn’t feel the passion for my book that they felt was necessary to represent me adequately. So, apparently no one feels sufficiently passionate about “To Truckee’s Trail” except for me, and about a dozen people who have read the entire thing and loved it passionately as well.

Unfortunately, all those people were just readers and other writers… so, here goes Plan B.; a fund drive to do a POD version, to buy advertising, and put review copies where they will do the most good. I think I can promise an autographed copy of “To Truckee’s Trail” to anyone who contributes over a certain amount.

Hey, conservative readers: give her the money you were going to give the RNC before the Republicans jumped ship on the amnesty bill. And then send a letter to the RNC telling them. Two birds with one stone!

Liberal readers: Well, geez, she’s an underdog. And a writer. And a woman. Pick a cause.

Centrist readers: We just like her. And we support the military.

Anarchist readers: Oh, like I have any of those that come here to do more than leave an offensive comment for me to delete.

A man of heart

Filed under: Israel, Terrorism — Meryl Yourish @ 11:00 am

He may not have much wisdom, but he has heart. The father of a woman killed by terrorists says he would agree to her murderers’ release from prison in exchange for Gilad Shalit.

The MK said he had sent Prime Minister Ehud Olmert a letter that read, “There is only one way in which the release of Palestinian prisoners would be acceptable, and that is to remove them from Israel and the West Bank and deport them to another Arab country.

“I propose that the release of any prisoner be conditioned on his or her leaving the country and the Palestinian territories,” Levy said in the letter.

He added that he would agree to the release of prisoners “with blood on their hands” if it would bring Israel’s captive soldiers back home.

“We can release these prisoners as long as they do not return to Gaza or the West Bank,” the MK said. “It is clear that if they return to these areas they will continue with their terror activity.

“I am not driven by vengeance, and Gilad’s return home is more important than holding any Palestinian prisoner,” Levy said.

The problem here is that they wouldn’t stay in whatever country they are transferred to. But it’s a noble gesture, one which I don’t think I would be able to make if I were in his place.

The other problem is that Hamas won’t agree to a reasonable exchange. They want a 1,000-1 exchange. And last, but certainly not least—you are once again proving to the terrorists that kidnapping works. So there will be more.

Proving that stupid politicians are an international problem

Filed under: Israel, Politics — Meryl Yourish @ 10:00 am

You think American politicians are stupid? Well, so are the politicians of the rest of the world. This one is PETA’s best bud:

MK Ahmad Tibi (United Arab List-Ta’al) proposed Tuesday that the Knesset ban MKs from wearing leather garments within its walls.

Tibi proposed the act as part of the new code of ethics the Knesset wishes to issue its members.

“This is a moral act that carries with it an important public message,” said Tibi at the meeting held by the code of ethics committee, which discussed the proper dress code for MKs.

“If my motion is carried, MKs would not be able to come to the Knesset wearing leather coats or shoes, or sporting clothes with fur.

I’m sorry, but are there men’s dress shoes that aren’t leather? And why exactly would this be an important issue?

Yep. Politicians are stupid all over.

AP notices Gaza’s Christians are in danger, does not blame Israel

Filed under: Gaza, Religion — Meryl Yourish @ 8:00 am

It’s a watershed moment. Not a single word in the article points to blaming anyone but Muslims.

The ransacking of a Catholic convent and an adjacent Rosary Sisters school during Hamas’ sweep to power broke more than wood and plaster. It signaled the end of a relatively peaceful, if sometimes uneasy, relationship between Gaza’s 1.4 million Muslims and 3,000 Christians.

Despite promises of protection by Hamas leaders, Christians fear more attacks, and some say they want to leave. Gaza’s flock already has been hit hard by emigration in recent years, and a new exodus could remove what is left of one of the Arab world’s oldest Christian communities.

“We don’t trust them. Our time is coming,” said a Greek Orthodox Christian, who in the current climate of fear asked not to be identified.

No one has claimed responsibility for damaging the convent and school, and Hamas vehemently denied involvement.

However, signs point to Muslim extremists rather than ordinary vandals. A statue and picture of the Virgin Mary – who is held in high esteem by Muslims – were left untouched.

[...] Missak suggested the vandals were acting on their own. “They were ignorant people. They don’t represent all Muslims,” he said.

Other Christians blame Hamas – at the least for not preventing the destruction. One woman said only Hamas militants could enter the convent during the fighting, when Gaza’s civilians were pinned down in their homes.

The attack marked a watershed for Gaza’s Christians, crushing the belief that a shared Palestinian identity would override Muslim-Christian differences.

Bernard Sabella, a researcher who has conducted surveys among Palestinian Christians, said the problem needs to be dealt with urgently because it tears at the fabric of Palestinian society. “People think seriously about migrating after such sectarian acts,” he said.

Oh, there’s where I got the word “watershed” from. Actually, it’s not a watershed moment for Gaza’s Christians. They’ve known about their dhimmi status for decades. It’s the AP that’s finally discovering the discrimination against Christians in the Muslim world. Whoops, sorry, there is no discrimination of Christians. It’s the Religion of Tolerance.™

I guarantee you will not hear from PC-USA about this, nor will you hear from any other major Christian group about the discrimination and terror tactics used against the Christian minority. Because they can’t blame Israel for it. Yet.

UNIFIL tells UN that its impotent

Filed under: Israel, Lebanon — Meryl Yourish @ 6:00 am

Yes, we already knew that UNIFIL had no teeth, but tell me again, what, exactly, are they there for? Because it can’t possibly be to stop the re-arming of Hezbullah.

The border between Syria and Lebanon is porous, claims a UN report submitted Tuesday to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. According to the report, checkpoints set up by the Lebanese Army to monitor the border were failing to prevent the smuggling of arms and other goods.

According to the report, “the present state of border security is insufficient to prevent smuggling, in particular smuggling of arms, to any significant extent.” The assessment team stated that “not a single on-border or near-border seizure of smuggled arms has been documented.”

“The procedures used to control arriving vehicles are inadequate,” the report stated. “Lack of such standards and the absence of risk analysis/profiling serves to limit the ability of customs officials to target potential smugglers and prevent the smuggling of weapons and explosives or other dangerous items.”

This is why Israel should never, ever trust the UN to protect her borders. Because every time she has, Israel ha been screwed.

On May 15, Israel’s Independence Day, Egyptian troops began moving into the Sinai and massing near the Israeli border. By May 18, Syrian troops were prepared for battle along the Golan Heights.

Nasser ordered the UN Emergency Force (UNEF), stationed in the Sinai since 1956 as a buffer between Israeli and Egyptian forces after Israel’s withdrawal following the Sinai Campaign, to withdraw on May 16. Without bringing the matter to the attention of the General Assembly (as his predecessor had promised), Secretary-General U Thant complied with the demand. After the withdrawal of the UNEF, the Voice of the Arabs radio station proclaimed on May 18, 1967:

As of today, there no longer exists an international emergency force to protect Israel. We shall exercise patience no more. We shall not complain any more to the UN about Israel. The sole method we shall apply against Israel is total war, which will result in the extermination of Zionist existence.(6)

An enthusiastic echo was heard May 20 from Syrian Defense Minister Hafez Assad:

Our forces are now entirely ready not only to repulse the aggression, but to initiate the act of liberation itself, and to explode the Zionist presence in the Arab homeland. The Syrian army, with its finger on the trigger, is united….I, as a military man, believe that the time has come to enter into a battle of annihilation.(7)

And now, the UNIFIL forces are right there, acting as a buffer for Hezbullah, and is anyone out there stupid enough to take a bet with me that when Hezbullah finally attacks, the UN manages to interfere with Israel?

Yeah, I didn’t think so.

Okay, less than 60 seconds after writing and saving the above as this post, I found proof that it’s a sucker bet.

UNIFIL officials have slammed the IDF for refusing to set up a hot line that could connect senior military commanders and, according to the peacekeeping force, allow them to quickly deal with misunderstandings and border incidents that could spark conflict.

[...] Senior UNIFIL officers told The Jerusalem Post recently that they had established a hot line with the Lebanese army and that it was used often to quickly connect senior officers to calm situations that had the potential of escalating.

The IDF, the UN officers claimed, had refused to set up the hot line since it did not want to be committed to talking with senior officers like Graziano in the middle of an incident, instead preferring to take its time in making real-time decisions.

[...] Senior Israeli defense officials said UNIFIL was turning an unimportant issue into a “big deal” that could have negative repercussions for Israel, which is already being blamed for not completely implementing Security Council Resolution 1701 by continuing overflights in Lebanon and by not withdrawing from the northern part of Ghajar, a village that has been cut in two by the UN-delimited Blue Line border between Israel and Lebanon, and has been used by Hizbullah to launch attacks.

Right. UNIFIL can’t stop Syria from sending a constant stream of Iranian-purchased weapons over the border, and what are they bitching about? That the IDF won’t set up a Bat-phone with Commissioner Gordon so he can send out a bat-signal when the big, bad terrorists attack UNIFIL. Like, say, last week. When they murdered half a dozen peacekeepers and have, to date, suffered no ill effects whatsoever. Oh, wait. I forgot. The UNSC issued a resolution condemning the bombing.

UNIFIL, landfill. I can’t seem to tell the difference. Sorry. That was my inner Lair Simon striking out.

06/26/2007

Home buying lessons

Filed under: Life — Meryl Yourish @ 6:48 pm

So, how many of my readers are well-versed in the art of home buying?

There’s a townhouse development going up near me that I’m very interested in, and I’d like to do a lot of research about mortgages and buying a home and that sort of thing.

It comes with a garage. Wow. HUGE selling point for me. I’d be able to keep my Jeep topless most of the year.

Shire Network News, at long last

Filed under: Podcasts — Meryl Yourish @ 1:30 pm

The slightly-delayed version of SNN is now up. Yours truly discusses the death of Kurt Waldheim, the former head of the UN and Nazi officer. Hogan’s Heroes are invoked.

I may post the essay. No, wait. Can’t post the ones with audio clips in them. They won’t work. Sorry, you’ll have to go listen.

SNN is now 5 away from our 100th episode. Any suggestions on what you’d like me to discuss for that one?

How do you say “home run” in Hebrew?

Filed under: Israel — Meryl Yourish @ 1:00 pm

Baseball comes to Israel, and the sportscasters are wondering how to translate the game lingo into Hebrew.

Puzzled broadcasters calling the first professional baseball game in Israeli history struggled with rendering baseball lingo into the holy tongue of Hebrew.

After a valiant effort at translating some of the terms, they gave up — lacing their broadcast with Hebrew-accented versions of ball, strike, out, majors, pitcher and base hit.

And of course, the AP gets it wrong.

There were no peanuts, no Cracker Jack, no “Star-Spangled Banner.” Three thousand fans cheered Sunday as the Modi’in Miracles beat the Petah Tikva Pioneers, 9-1.

Really?

When fans stood for the ‘National Anthem’, they didn’t take off their hats, as they do in the US, because this was Hatikva, not the Star Spangled Banner. But no matter the song, fans are always hungry. They bellied up to the concession stands to buy food, and there was plenty: chicken wings, onion rings, French fries, salads, chicken nuggets and of course hot dogs and hamburgers. There was potato chips and caramel pop corn too, as well as Israeli favorites like Bamba, a peanut-flavored snack.

This is my favorite quote:

To develop local talent, Baras hired Dan Duquette, the former general manager of the Boston Red Sox, to be the league’s director of player development.

“It’s a proud day for Israel because this is the first professional game in 5,000 years,” Duquette said before the game.

Yeah, after forty years of wandering in the desert, the ancient Hebrews just weren’t in the mood for a nice little pick-up game once they found the Promised Land. But hey, with the many thousands of American expats, it’s time.

Most of the fans, over 90 percent, were either Americans who moved to Israel and became Israeli, or were children of American-Israelis. Many have lived here a long time, but have never given up their love of the sport.

“It’s great to see baseball in Israel, something I was waiting for for a long time – 15 years,” said Paul Stark, who came from Ma’aleh Adumim, east of Jerusalem, to take in the game. “You used to have to listen to short wave radios, now we can see it live. It’s probably around class A level, maybe a little below it – but it’s better than nothing!”

Stark said the game has evolved beyond the borders of America, and will help Israelis learn about that broader world.

Actually, it would help Israelis learn more about Americans. Most of the rest of the world doesn’t care about baseball. Except Japan and Cuba.

And here’s my second favorite quote:

“How do you say ‘Go Modi’in’ in Hebrew?” one Israeli teenage girl asked her friend.

“Go Modi’in,” was the reply.

Yep. Lots to learn.

Virginia readers: Send a message to Jim Webb

Filed under: Politics — Meryl Yourish @ 10:06 am

Update 2: Bastard voted for cloture. See? That’s why I ran against him. I would have voted against.

Update: Finally got through, and his staffer said that Senator Webb has not declared how he intends to vote.

I just got off the phone from trying to call one my senators to tell him to vote no on the amnesty bill. Senator Webb’s Washington voicemail is full. The line is busy. The Richmond number is free, and staff members are answering. 804-771-2221 if you’d like to talk to a person and tell them to tell Senator Webb to vote NO on the Amnesty bill.

My grandparents and great-grandparents all entered this country legally. So should the 12 million illegals currently breaking the laws in our nation. Amnesty? No. Legal immigration? Yes.

Here are all of Webb’s contact numbers. Call him to make sure he votes no on the amnesty bill.

Hampton Roads
222 Central Park Ave.
Suite 120
Virginia Beach, VA 23462
Phone: 757-518-1674
Fax: 757-518-1679

Richmond Office
507 East Franklin Street
Richmond, VA 23219
Phone: 804-771-2221
Fax: 804-771-8313

Roanoke Office
3140 Chaparral Drive
Building C, Suite 101
Roanoke, VA 24018
Phone: 540-772-4236
Fax: 540-772-6870

Washington, D.C.
144 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: (202) 224-4024
Fax: 202-228-6363

Second verse, same as the first

Filed under: Gaza, Israel, palestinian politics — Meryl Yourish @ 9:30 am

I should just rerun my previous posts.

Abbas is making many demands of Israel, and once again is not promising anything of substance in return. Is he going to stop Al Aqsa from trying to murder Israelis at every opportunity (including sending kassams from Gaza)? Is he going to give up Zacharia Zubedei, one of the most-wanted terrorists in the West Bank, and the man who hoisted Abbas on his shoulders when Abbas ran for president? Is he going to shut down the bomb shops in the West Bank?

No. But here are his demands:

Al-Hayat, the London based newspaper, reported that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas demanded of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to release, inter alia, Marwan Barghouti, former Secretary-General of Fatah in the West Bank.

According to these sources, Abbas hoped that Barghouti’s release would restore Fatah’s popularity among the Palestinian public and give the movement a boost in the West Bank.

Abbas had other demands for Olmert at the summit. Sources said that he asked Olmert to drastically reduce IDF presence in West Bank cities, remove major roadblocks near cities and start lifting limitations on Palestinians’ movement in the West Bank.

He also demanded that the Israeli government transfer the tax money it was holding, as agreed.

And with all of this, does he at least have an idea on how to shut down Hamas in Gaza? Does he concur with Israel on denying aid to Gaza?

No.

Mahmoud Abbas told al-Hayat reporters that he did not agree to the financial boycott on the Gaza Strip. This differs from the opinion, commonly held in Jerusalem, that Fatah wanted Israel to crack down even further on the Strip, thereby damaging Hamas.

In other words, nothing has changed. Abbas, the weakling, is going to hold onto his power at all costs, and is also—as he has always been—part of the group that wants to destroy Israel and put a Palestinian state in her place.

Yaakov Kirschen has what I think is the perfect analysis of the current leadership of Israel:

In assessing our situation we need to remember that our main enemy at this point in history is Iran (Persia). Let’s not forget that the Persians invented the game of chess. They now control Gaza on our south and they’ve got another piece (Hizbullah) on our north.This deadly game requires our best and our brightest.

And that is just not Ehud Olmert.

Who are Israel’s best and brightest? Because she needs them, and fast.

Reading list

Filed under: Gaza, Israel — Meryl Yourish @ 6:00 am

Read this one in full: Noam Shalit is interviewed by Hamas, and shoves their propaganda right down their throats.

In response to the host’s claim that the demand made by the groups holding Gilad that Israel release long-time male prisoners, female prisoners and prisoners who are still minors is a legitimate demand, Shalit said: “These organizations have not yet decided their position on which prisoners they want released and the list was submitted to Egypt only last month.”

Shalit said that no negotiations were made regarding the list of the prisoners despite Israel’s demand to receive an updated manifest. Israel, said Shalit, has no objection to freeing sick and elderly prisoners, but Hamas is not interested in these prisoners, only those still tied up with the organization and those serving lengthy sentences.

Read the lede: Hamas spokesliar says the release of the Gilad Shalit tape is an act of “goodwill,” like they’re supposed to get a reward for finally showing some evidence that Shalit may still be alive. No quotes. Can’t stomach them on my blog.

Make up your own mind: Olmert says the tape is just another example of Hamas’ cruelty. As an example of “In your face, Hamas!” Olmert promises to release 250 Palestinian prisoners, none of whom will have “blood on their hands” (e.g., have been charged with killing or trying to kill Israelis). But they’re going to sign a document saying they won’t hurt Israelis, so that’s all right, then. [insert eye roll here]

Read-in-full: Hamas is planning more terror attacks. Well, yeah.

Last-but-not-least: Al Qaeda calls on Muslims to support Hamas. Well, gee. Let’s get that Islamic caliphate started already, boys! We lost Afghanistan, but we picked up Gaza! At least, for now.

06/25/2007

Doing my part to hurt the haters

Filed under: Anti-Semitism, Israel — Meryl Yourish @ 4:50 pm

Ami Iseroff wants us to get the haters off the Google Zionism search links. One of the top searches is to your typical anti-Semitic loonie site.

Zionism (Jewish Virtual Library)

Zionism (Mideast Web)

Zionism Israeli Foreign Ministry

Zionism & Israel

What is Zionism?

Zionism and Israel On The Web

There. I’ve done my part. Click the links, and if you’ve got a blog, put ‘em up on your site. Copy and paste them from here.

The judge is an ass

Filed under: Miscellaneous — Meryl Yourish @ 12:30 pm

A judge in Washington tried to bully a family-owned dry cleaning shop by suing the owners for $54 million in damages because they lost his pants. He lost the case. Score one for the common man against a jerk who tried to abuse the legal system because he didn’t have to pay for a lawyer.

WASHINGTON—A judge ruled Monday in favor of a dry cleaner that was sued for $54 million over a missing pair of pants.

The owners of Custom Cleaners did not violate the city’s consumer protection law by failing to live up to Roy L. Pearson’s expectations of the “Satisfaction Guaranteed” sign once displayed in the store window, District of Columbia Superior Court Judge Judith Bartnoff ruled.

“A reasonable consumer would not interpret ‘Satisfaction Guaranteed’ to mean that a merchant is required to satisfy a customer’s unreasonable demands” or to agree to demands that the merchant would have reasonable grounds for disputing, the judge wrote.

Bartnoff ordered Pearson to pay the court costs of defendants Soo Chung, Jin Nam Chung and Ki Y. Chung.

Pearson, an administrative law judge, originally sought $67 million from the Chungs, claiming they lost a pair of trousers from a blue and maroon suit, then tried to give him a pair a pair of charcoal gray pants that he said were not his. He arrived at the amount by adding up years of alleged law violations and almost $2 million in common law fraud claims.

He still managed to cost the family thousands of dollars.

The court costs amount to just over $1,000 for photocopying, filing and similar expenses, according to the Chungs’ attorney. A motion to recover the Chungs’ tens of thousands of dollars in attorney fees will be considered later.

But there’s good news ahead. The jerk judge may lose his job over this.

The Washington Examiner reports D.C.’s chief administrative judge has written to the three-person commission that will decide whether Roy Pearson is reappointed — and said Pearson does not deserve another 10-year term. That reverses his earlier recommendation in favor of Pearson.

A D.C. government source tells the paper: “My sense is that the commission will not reappoint him.”

Pearson’s job as an administrative law judge pays more than $100,000 a year

Here’s hoping he does lose his job. While there are many, many decent judges out there who wouldn’t dream of misusing the system to screw the little guy, this judge deserves to be put out to pasture. I’m thinking he’s already there… reports of the trial had him literally breaking into tears while describing his missing pair of pants. Uh-huh. Sure. (Back away from the nut.)

If I were those dry cleaners, I’d get an order of protection from this nut.

AP bias surge

Filed under: AP Media Bias — Meryl Yourish @ 10:00 am

The AP sent out a story with this despicable headline, which some headline writer presumably thought was a clever turn of phrase:

Iraq: Surge Of Suicide Blasts Kills 27

Get it? U.S. surge of troops, terrorist surge of suicide bombings. Get it? Are you laughing yet? Catch the irony?

Me neither.

And then there’s the lede:

(AP) A suicide bomber who penetrated layers of security blew himself up in the busy lobby of a leading Baghdad hotel on Monday, killing at least 12 people, including a U.S.-allied tribal sheik, police reported.

The attack, in which 21 others were wounded, was just one in a surge of five suicide and other bombings Monday that killed at least 32 people across Iraq.

The story has since been updated with a different headline and angle:

Iraq Bomber Strikes U.S.-Allied Sheiks

But the “surge” comparison remains in the lede, in the third paragraph—where it will stay firmly within the average daily newspaper’s “International” section, which prints only the first three to five paragraphs of a story.

BAGHDAD (AP) – A suicide bomber apparently targeting a meeting of U.S.-allied Sunni sheiks penetrated layers of security and blew himself up in a hotel lobby on Monday, killing four tribal leaders and at least eight others, police reported.

The sheiks were associated with the Anbar Salvation Council, which had taken up arms to help drive extremists of al-Qaida in Iraq from the western province of Anbar.

The attack was among a surge of five suicide and other bombings Monday that killed at least 45 people across Iraq. In an unrelated incident, the U.S. command reported a U.S. soldier shot to death Monday in south Baghdad or its outskirts.

Just to be clear, this is a deliberate attempt by the AP to use the imagery of the U.S. Army fighting terrorists—to save civilians from bombing attacks—when describing those same terrorists responding to the Army’s attempt to stop them.

Despicable.

I know I headlined this post a “surge” in AP bias, but frankly, it is not. It’s simply the status quo.

Proof of life from Gilad Shalit

Filed under: Hamas, Israel, Media Bias — Meryl Yourish @ 9:30 am

Color me shocked. I thought he was dead, and frankly, still think he may be. I don’t trust Hamas at all. But Hamas released a tape by Gilad Shalit.

An Israeli soldier captured a year ago by militants from Gaza asked for medical treatment and urged Israel to release Palestinian prisoners, in an audio tape posted on the Internet on Monday.

Except for a handwritten letter to his parents in September, there had been no sign of life from Gilad Shalit since the tank gunner was spirited into the Gaza Strip by gunmen who tunneled across the border into Israel on June 25, 2006.

“I have been in prison for an entire year and my health is deteriorating. I need lengthy hospitalization,” Shalit, speaking in Hebrew, said on the tape.

“I regret the lack of interest of the Israeli government and military in my case and their failure to meet the demands.”

Shalit’s father, speaking to Israeli television, confirmed the voice was that of his son, a conscript now aged 20. He was promoted to sergeant from corporal while in captivity.

Hamas, one of three militant groups that claimed responsibility for the joint operation in which Shalit was seized, said earlier it would release the tape to mark the first anniversary of his capture.

And let us point out once again that Hamas is the supposed democratically-elected government of the Palestinians, and so the democratically-elected government of the Palestinians, with whom former president Jimmy Carter thinks the world should negotiate, are acting like the band of criminals and murderers they are, trying to extort concessions from Israel, instead of trying to, say, negotiate in good faith, like real governments do. But Hamas has never been a real government. Real governments don’t murder the opposition party.

By the way, the above is from Reuters, who call the attackon Shalit “a cross-border raid.” So does the AP.

Shalit was captured on June 25, 2006, in a cross-border raid by militants from Hamas and two allied groups who tunneled into Israel from the Gaza Strip. Negotiations for his release, mediated by Egypt, have repeatedly broken down and been complicated since Hamas took control of Gaza two weeks ago.

Let’s take a look at what the AP wrote a year ago about that “cross-border raid.”

KIBBUTZ KEREM SHALOM, Israel Jun 25, 2006 (AP)— Palestinian militants from the Gaza Strip infiltrated Israel through a tunnel early Sunday, lobbing grenades and bombs at a military outpost and killing two Israeli soldiers and seizing a third.

The ruling Hamas group said its fighters participated in the attack, calling it an act of revenge for Israel’s recent killing of militant leaders and civilians. Militants said three of their fighters were killed in a gunbattle with soldiers.

[…] Militants crossed under Israel’s border fence with Gaza through a tunnel and lobbed bombs and grenades at an Israeli tank and an armored personnel carrier at the border post, the military said. Simultaneously, anti-tank missiles were fired at both vehicles from inside Gaza, the army said.

Two other militants, meanwhile, attacked a 25-yard high observation post with assault rifles, touching off a gunbattle with soldiers in which several militants were killed, the military said.

Some little raid, huh?

And in a man-bites-dog angle, B’tselem has accused someone other than Israel of war crimes:

Meanwhile, the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem accused the militants holding Shalit of war crimes.

“International humanitarian law absolutely prohibits taking and holding a person by force in order to compel the enemy to meet certain demands, while threatening to harm or kill the person if the demands are not met,” the group said. “Furthermore, hostage-taking is considered a war crime.”

Someone check the sky for flying pigs.

06/24/2007

The AP difference

Filed under: AP Media Bias, Israel — Meryl Yourish @ 9:53 pm

The difference betwen editorial shifts is obvious. Check out these passages in an AP story written by Amy Teibel, and edited by God knows who—they’re actually telling the truth about terrorists for a change.

Deposed Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas, speaking in Gaza, called hopes for the summit “illusions” and a “mirage.” He said, “the Americans won’t give anything. Israel won’t give us anything. Our land, our nation will not come back to us except with steadfastness and resistance,” a code word for attacks against Israel.

The Israeli military, meanwhile, said that one of its aircraft had targeted a car carrying an Islamic Jihad rocket squad on its way to an attack in Gaza City in the first such attack since Hamas overran the Gaza Strip this month.

One person was killed and two wounded, hospital officials said.

Islamic Jihad said the vehicle was carrying its members on a “holy mission,” code for an attack on Israel. Hamas TV footage showed the burned car, which contained at least one rocket.

Watch this story as it gets updated, and see if the above passages get edited out.

Hey! There’s a new Babylon 5 DVD coming out!

Filed under: Television — Meryl Yourish @ 10:45 am

A new B5 story. Did you know this? I did not know this.

I am so out of the loop.

Times change. Dangers remain. 10 years after he became President of the Interstellar Alliance, Sheridan prepares for a fateful Babylon 5 reunion that could prevent Earth’s impending doom…if he will also compromise his core principles. Meanwhile, commander Lochley confronts an unexpected interloper on the way station – a being whose presence makes the B5 freeport the crossroads between heaven and hell. In Voices in the Dark, Series creator J. Michael Straczynski reunites with stars Bruce Boxleitner and Tracy Scoggins in two richly imagined stories set after the events of the original series. Richly imagined, too, is Straczynski’s vision of the 23rd century (including a dazzling New York City) – a vision made more spectacular via filmmaking technology unavailable during the original series.

Okay. This, Heroes, and maybe I’ll be getting Battlestar Galactica as well. My SF itch has been well-scratched this year.

Another day, another rocket attack on Israel

Filed under: Gaza, Israel — Meryl Yourish @ 10:34 am

Three crude, homemade kassam rockets landed in the backyard of a Sderot home, spreading metal shards and shrapnel all around, and injuring three of the residents of that home.

But Israel should not launch “retaliatory” attacks because they would be “disproportionate.”

Three people were lightly injured when a Qassam rocket launched from the northern Gaza Strip landed in the backyard of a Sderot home Sunday morning.

The “Color Red” alert system was activated in the southern town, and several residents suffered from shock.

The al-Quds Brigades, the Islamic Jihad’s military wing, claimed responsibility.

The rocket caused damage to the home, which was also hit by a Qassam in May. The three residents who were injured in Sunday morning’s attack were taken to the Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon.

Another rocket landed just outside the town earlier in the day. No injuries or damages were reported.

This is on top of the five rockets that landed on Wednesday, injuring three other civilians.

And on top of the mortar attack on the Karni crossing.

Palestinian terrorists fired 11 mortars towards Israel Sunday afternoon, hitting an area near the Karni crossing.

That is the same crossing that various groups are demanding Israel reopen.

Adala, the legal center for Arab minority rights in Israel petitioned the High Court of Justice Sunday demanding that the Karni crossing between Israel and Gaza be opened immediately.

The petition, filed by Adala’s attorney Fatima al-Aju, said the closed crossing is a “vital route which can allow hundreds of tons of supplies through a day.”

It is absolutely obvious that Hamas has no intention whatsoever of stopping these attacks on Israel. So the question remains, why open the crossings?

Oh, right. The traditional, “The Palestinians are going to starve to death!” cries have begun.

“The situation in Gaza is worsening by the minute. Humanitarian disaster has been imminent for years but something has to be done now and very quickly,” Eyad Nasser, spokesman for the Red Cross in Gaza, told Ynet Saturday.

The Red Cross had sent several teams into the Strip over the last few days, becoming the dominant relief organization in the area.

“This is a medical emergency and we are doing everything in our power to see that the hospitals’ needs are met,” said Nasser.

Funny how the UN, the EU, and various NGOs are always saying how the Gazans are going to starve to death, run out of medicine, wither in the heat, or whatever, and yet—this never happens. I’m at a loss to understand this.

One thing that’s new: People are now openly calling for Israel to completely “disengage” from Gaza: Stop supplying them with anything at all. Let them figure things out on their own, or get them from Egypt.

The idea is based on an article by Dr. Robert Satloff, the executive director for the Washington Institute for Near East policy, who wrote that Israel failed to follow through on all political, economic, and security aspects of the 2005 disengagement, thus “denying itself the consequent diplomatic benefits” of the withdrawal.

“The United States should urge Israel to complete the process of disengagement that it began in 2005… which would include the following: severing the custom’s union; announcing that Israel will, after a certain defined period, cease to serve as the entry point for all goods, people, and services into Gaza; and terminating the “Philadelphia Road” security agreement which has only become a trap for Israeli security,” Satloff wrote.

“Effectively, this would leave Egypt as Gaza’s outlet to the world, with food, water, electricity, and other humanitarian goods flowing over the Gaza-Egypt border.

According to Satloff, “Israel paid the cost of disengagement but never received the benefits. In the eyes of the world, only Israel remained an occupying power after it ended its occupation.

“Israel is alone in the world as being the only country responsible for providing food, water, and electricity to a political entity that daily lobs missiles against its citizens. This is madness,” he added.

I’m with Satloff. Give the Pals a deadline for full Israeli withdrawal of all services, then let them sit in the dark and whine about how much better things were when Israel was running them.

Hypocrisy on Aisle Two

Filed under: Israel, Television — Meryl Yourish @ 8:00 am

Take a look at this YouTube video, which Omri was kind enough to post for me.

I haven’t quite figured out what I think about the Maxim Israeli Soldier Swimsuit Issue. On the one hand, good publicity for Israel is good publicity. On the other hand, y’know, using half-naked women to get attention for Israel is just not cool to a feminist. But I have to say, does anyone else see the utter hypocrisy in this CNN clip, where Wolf Blitzer goes to a drop-dead gorgeous female reporter, who then says in her opening line of the report: “They’re drop-dead gorgeous, and military trained!”

Um. CNN is using sex to sell the news. And this is a report on Israel using sex to sell Israeli tourism.

Is there a single woman on CNN who is only plain? Average? I’m thinking not. I mean, really. Do they not see the hypocrisy in this report in the least?

A lot of religious Israelis are pretty upset with the Maxim article. I’m on the fence.

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