U.K. discovers anti-Semitism is a crime against Jews

Posted on 08/01/2007 by Meryl Yourish

Okay, I’m really not sure about the whole hate crime thing, but one thing that I have said in the past is that if you’re going to have hate crimes laws, then a hate crime is a hate crime. Except in the U.K., that is, where anti-Semitic attacks were not pursued as hate crimes—in the nation where the state-owned media refuses to use the word “terrorist.”

But they’ve finally figured out that maybe anti-Semitism should be included in the hate crimes tabulation, because, gee, picking on someone because they’re Jewish might be, you know, hateful.

British police will begin recording anti-Semitic crimes as racist attacks starting next year. The government also pledged additional funds to monitor anti-Semitic incidents in the country.

“Anti-Semitism has not been taken as seriously as other forms of hatred in some parts of our society,” Iain Wright, the parliamentary under secretary of state for communities and local government, said during a July 19 discussion of Britain’s All Party Inquiry into Anti-Semitism.

Yeah, maybe that’s why anti-Semitic attacks in Britain are at their highest in years. Because the perpetrators know the Brits aren’t all that big on stopping them. Not when the BBC allows anti-Semitic comments while taking down other racist slurs.

About those comment Nazis. That’s why I have moderated comments, and the No-Israel Bashing rule. That’s the way this place will stay.

Posted in Anti-Semitism | Comments Off on U.K. discovers anti-Semitism is a crime against Jews

Ethnic cleansing acceptable to the world

Posted on 08/01/2007 by Meryl Yourish

This is an example of ethnic cleansing that the world never really objects to much:

Baghdad was once one of the great cradles of Jewish culture and wisdom, but now, according to the Christian priest who has been looking after them, there are only eight Jews left in the Iraqi capital, and their situation is “more than desperate.” The Rev. Canon Andrew White, the Anglican chaplain to Iraq, says that the small group is in considerable danger. However, the community has been unable to agree to emigrate as a whole. Some of its members, without identifying themselves as Jews, have attempted to leave individually, but have been turned down. White says that only one of the Jews, a woman, still regularly goes to a Baghdad synagogue, though he will give no details.

White provides the group with food and money once a month, some of which they give to local Muslims, he says. “Not because they are forced to,” he says, “but because they care about them. These are wonderful people.” He notes that the Iraqi Jews constituted one of the world’s oldest Jewish communities, and that the country contains numerous important Jewish sites, such as the graves of the prophets Ezra and Ezekiel. The flourishing Jewish community in Baghdad also produced one version of Judaism’s second-holiest book, the Talmud, in about 550 A.D.

Yeah, you also don’t hear so much about the generosity of Jews. The world is far too busy passing along lies and stereotypes instead. Although this is one stereotype that is true: If you have two Jews, you have three opinions. Eight Jews? A very long argument.

The Baghdad Jews have not been able to agree to make an application to go to Israel together, says White. For people who have “spent [their] life in Iraq hearing awful things about Israel,” he says, such hesitation would be natural.

Clearly, this priest does not know how Jews operate. All kidding aside, he’s probably right. But it’s far more dangerous for them to stay in Baghdad.

Both Gaer and White point out that the plight of the remaining Jews is not very different from the hardships faced in Iraq by other religious minorities such as Christians, Mandeans (a gnostic group to whom John the Baptist is a central figure) and Yazidis (whose faith draws from Zoroastrianism, Islam, Judaism and Christianity and other sources). However, the priest says that the Jews have not able to get any material aid from the Iraqi government, and have been advised by officials “to say that they are Christians or to become Christians, because it’s a lot safer.”

White says the Iraqi government is “scared about admitting that there are Jews there,” for fear of Muslim response in the region. For similar reasons, he says that no Jewish organization could provide them with direct aid, although indirect help through a non-Jewish agent might be possible.

There were 150,000 Jews in Iraq in 1948.

Posted in Anti-Semitism | 2 Comments

Harry Potter: More reading material

Posted on 07/31/2007 by Meryl Yourish

Sarah has finished book 7, and I said a few days ago that I’d wait until she finished the book before posting about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I guess I should wait for Larry to finish it, though, seeing as how he reads this site every day too.

In the meantime, if you have already read the book (spoilers at most of the links), you’ll enjoy this WSJ review. It discusses religion in Harry’s world, and contains absolutely big-time spoilers. If you haven’t read the book, don’t click the link.

There’s also this MSNBC article from Rowling’s appearance on the Today show last Friday. Yes, it contains some major spoilers, so don’t whine to me if you haven’t finished the book and click on that link.

MSNBC was on a roll with the Rowling stories. This one has spoilers, but it also reveals which character got a reprieve from death after having been scheduled to die in the series. I was surprised, but pleased to find that one out.

And last, but not least, Rowling talks about her plans to write the Harry Potter encyclopedia, and spills the beans about what happens after the book ends, as well as why she changed the last word of the final book (which was originally supposed to read “scar.”) Here there also be spoilers.

Posted in The Catmage Chronicles | 5 Comments

Sometimes, you just get lucky with the camera

Posted on 07/31/2007 by Meryl Yourish

So you think this one can get on lolcats?

Tig after a hard day's nap

“I can sings oppra?”

Posted in Cats | 4 Comments

No way this doesn’t end badly

Posted on 07/31/2007 by Meryl Yourish

President Bush is proposing a multibillion dollar arms sale to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and other Gulf States. The sales include JDAMs and other advanced weaponry that can seriously harm Israel’s current advantage against the Muslim world.

Other salves to Israel in light of the proposed deal include asking the Saudis to accept restrictions on the range, size and location of the satellite-guided bombs, the Times said. The Pentagon is also asking for a commitment not to store the weapons at air bases close to Israeli territory, it added.

There’s no way that these sophisticated weapons could possibly end up in the hands of people wishing Israel and America ill, is there?

Now Condoleeza Rice says really, it’s okay, it’s all in our best interests and to prevent Iran from taking over the Gulf.

The Bush administration said Monday that its plan to provide billions of dollars in advanced weapons to Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Israel over the next 10 years was intended in part to serve as a bulwark against Iran’s growing influence in the Middle East.

[…] Ms. Rice took pains to dispute the notion that the Bush administration was trying to buy Saudi cooperation on American policy initiatives in Iraq and Israel in exchange for the military package. Three times during a briefing with reporters aboard her plane en route to the Middle East, she said no quid pro quo was involved in the arms sale.

“We are working with these states to give a chance to the forces of moderation and reform,” she said on an overnight flight before a refueling stop in Shannon, Ireland.

Many members of Congress are not happy.

But signaling a possible battle between the White House and Congress, Mr. Lantos said lawmakers wanted assurances that the weapons package “include only defensive systems,” not weaponry that could be used by Arab states to attack Israel’s military.

[…] R. Nicholas Burns, under secretary of state for political affairs, said Monday that a majority of the weapons systems intended for the Gulf states were defensive.

But some defense experts said any battle between Congress and the White House over the definition of “defensive” versus “offensive” weapons systems might be futile because the terms can be malleable.

And Olmert is a fool.

Let’s take a look at another arms deal that was made to prop up Fatah over the years, and what happened to it in only the last couple of months.

When the Islamist group Hamas conquered the Gaza Strip in June it seized an intelligence-and-military infrastructure created with U.S. help by the security chiefs of the Palestinian territory’s former ruler.

According to current and former Israeli intelligence officials, former U.S. intelligence personnel and Palestinian officials, Hamas has increased its inventory of arms since the takeover of Gaza and picked up technical expertise — such as espionage techniques — that could assist the group in its fight against Israel or Washington’s Palestinian allies, the Fatah movement founded by Yasser Arafat.

Hamas leaders say they acquired thousands of paper files, computer records, videos, photographs and audio recordings containing valuable and potentially embarrassing intelligence information gathered by Fatah. For more than a decade, Fatah operated a vast intelligence network in Gaza established under the tutelage of the Central Intelligence Agency.

[…] But a number of former U.S. intelligence officials, including some who have worked closely with the Palestinians, said there was ample reason to worry that Hamas has acquired access to important spying technology as well as intelligence information that could be helpful to Hamas in countering Israeli and U.S. efforts against the group.

Close ties between Hamas and the governments of Iran and Syria also mean that intelligence-and-spying techniques could be shared with the main Middle East rivals of the Bush administration. As the White House prepares to lead an international effort to bolster Fatah’s security apparatus in the West Bank, the losses in Gaza stand as an example of how efforts to help Fatah can backfire.

[…] “The United States invested a lot of effort in setting up this system in Gaza — construction, equipment, training… filings, the logistics, the transportation. It was a big operation, and it’s now in the hands of the other side,” said Efraim Halevy, who formerly headed both the Mossad, which is Israel’s foreign-intelligence agency, and Israel’s National Security Council. Mr. Halevy said, however, that he didn’t want to overemphasize the value of Hamas’s potential intelligence gains.

And now let’s look at the sales of advanced equipment to the Saudis in another way: How close are the Islamists to the security services of the countries that will be receiving the JDAMs? How many members of the army are affiliated with al Qaeda and its network of terrorist groups, salivating over the chance to get the most sophisticated missiles available? What will JDAMs be used for in the hands of terrorists? Gee, let’s think.

There is simply no way this ends well. We are arming our enemies, and with our own weapons, no less.

Posted in Hamas, Iran, Israel | 6 Comments

The Iranian proxy war continues

Posted on 07/31/2007 by Meryl Yourish

So, why exactly would the Iranians need Hebrew speakers? Because they’re recruiting Palestinians who can speak and read Hebrew.

The Iranian regime needs Hebrew speakers to work as translators, intelligence agents and as part of its propaganda machine against Israel. The main source of Hebrew speakers is Palestinian students studying abroad or Palestinian terrorists sent for military training in Iran and Lebanon.

One of the most prominent centers for Hebrew studies is located at Iran’s embassy in Beirut, where Hizbullah members learn Hebrew at the Islamic Culture and Education Center.

The embassy owns a vast library of Hebrew newspapers and books, including even children’s’ books. It was there that Hizbullah had trained, with the aid of Palestinians, a large group of fighters who were placed in charge of tapping Israeli communication systems, in a bid to collect intelligence on the “Zionist enemy” before and during the Second Lebanon War.

According to the Shin Bet, Israeli Arab students studying out of the country are an attractive target for Hizbullah, because it is easier for the organization to recruit and train them abroad.

However, turnabout is fair play:

Meanwhile, in Israel, the Mossad has recently published an ad in the newspaper inviting Farsi speakers to apply for “an interesting, challenging position,” which apparently includes listening in on Iranian transmissions and translating materials published in Iran.

There are a lot of Farsi speakers in Israel. That’s because of the exodus of Iranian Jews since the Islamic revolution in 1979. I think the Mossad will easily meet its goals.

The war is coming.

Posted in Iran | 4 Comments

The Mighty Heart controversy

Posted on 07/31/2007 by SnoopyTheGoon

For me it started with the article by Debbie Schlussel in the FrontPage magazine. Let’s not mince the words – the article is a hatchet job, and a very thorough one to boot. Debbie has definitely gone overboard, trying to judge the movie as if it were financed by the Israeli Tourism ministry and should have been focused solely on the Jewish motives. That bit of criticism really cracked me up:

And don’t forget Wall Street Journal reporter Steve Levine, played by Gary Wilmes, the most stereotypically Jewish-looking actor they could cast – a living embodiment of the angst-ridden, sweaty big-nosed, glasses-wearing Jew you’d find in “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” picture book for kids.

I have even taken the trouble to look up the poor guy’s picture. I am not sure that Gary Wilmes is that living embodiment mentioned above, but it is clear that he will have to consider an investment in some major plastic surgery now.

But after looking up some stuff on Debbie’s site, I think I have caught the drift. It seems that Debbie is sometimes slightly overexcited (all for the good cause, no doubt), like in this case, for instance:

Then, there is this BS:

In Palestine, Jewish terrorist attacks finally persuaded the British to pull out.

WRONG again. The Brits pulled out, if anything, because they were tired of Islamic/Arab violence (there was no Jewish violence against the Brits) against British soldiers, and because eventually the land was carved up into Israel, Jordan, etc.

Ah well, as I said, it is all for the good cause, and anyway history these days is a flexible science…

But… Saying all this, there is more to Debbie’s article than meets the eye. Of course, there is no place to criticize Winterbottom, Julie and Pitt for focusing on Mariane Pearl and the chief of Pakistan’s counterterrorism unit. After all, it is their movie and their license.

But blaming the barbaric execution of Daniel Pearl on the misdeeds of US in Guantanamo is pure unadulterated bullshit. The list of kidnappers/murderers demands includes the one re Gitmo prisoners indeed, but read it in its entirety:

We still demand the following:

  • The immediate release of U.S. held prisoners in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
  • The return of Pakistani prisoners to Pakistan.
  • The immediate end of U.S. presence in Pakistan.
  • The delivery of F-16 planes that Pakistan had paid for and never received.

We assure Americans that they shall never be safe on the Muslim Land of Pakistan.
And if our demands are not met this scene shall be repeated again and again…

It is quite clear that the absurd list was never intended as a base for negotiations and that its sole purpose was to increase the publicity for the planned act of murder. The fact that Winterbottom, Julie and Pitt made Gitmo a focal point of the movie is telling.

Another salient point in the article – disregard of the fact that Daniel Pearl is Jewish. As noticed here:

…something could have been inserted about Daniel Pearl, a man from a family with deep Israeli roots — scenes and sentiments that would make him a real person who once lived, loved, and later died a horrible death, publicly.

It is not certain that Daniel’s fate was sealed by the fact of his Jewishness, but it is certain that the fact did not escape the attention of his murderers and they obviously enjoyed it. The title of the execution clip – “The Slaughter of the Spy-Journalist, the Jew Daniel Pearl” is sufficient testimony.

The royal pair of Hollywood is definitely way above their heads into politics. Not that it makes them outstanding, many other Hollywood stars and mega-stars have discovered the politicking as a new and glamorous pastime. But the mix of the mega-star popularity, naivety, good will and ability to dumb down any complex issue to a set of childish slogans has a definite impact on general population. Here is one example of a rave review by a groupie:

…without apology, it is simultaneously an unabashedly political vehicle that does not fall victim to sloganeering or jingoism, as well as an effective and gripping re-telling of a story that is still fresh in the minds of the audience. I know a lot of people are criticizing the movie.. but the best thing about this movie was it does not points finger on anyone.

Yep. An unabashedly political vehicle that does not “points finger on anyone”, indeed…

But the best expression of the above mentioned Hollywood mix is provided by the royal pair:

The hero of this movie is a Muslim Pakistani Captain . . . . Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, Jewish–they all came together, all of them becoming great friends.

Why, indeed, can’t we all get along and be friends? I really don’t know. Maybe because there are too many gently smiling folks like this one:

I really recommend this clip as a mandatory viewing. Notice that the person that appears in it is an American resident and knows his rights exceedingly well. It is also worth your while to visit his site at _http://www.al-buruj.com/_ to get an in-depth understanding of the creature. And the ideology that moves him and his ilk, making it kinda difficult to make friends with him.

But don’t tell Brangelina about it – it may distress them, possibly on a shooting day, and then the damage to the world will be immeasurable …

Hat tip to Bagel Blogger.

Cross-posted on SimplyJews.

Posted in Jews, Movies, Politics, Terrorism | 7 Comments

Why some people shouldn’t write internet stories

Posted on 07/30/2007 by Meryl Yourish

This one is making the rounds of YouTube, and it is effing hilarious. Watch out! There are hordes of gangs roaming the internet, and they want to steal your passwords!

Posted in Humor, Juvenile Scorn | 1 Comment

Reasons to keep checkpoints

Posted on 07/30/2007 by Meryl Yourish

I thought Mahmoud Abbas’ party was cracking down on this:

An armed Palestinian was arrested at the Hawara Checkpoint on Sunday night, Army Radio reported.

The gunman was carrying a pistol and a magazine when security forces caught him at the checkpoint, located south of Nablus.

And this:

Palestinians threw rocks at an Israeli car driving near Tekoa, south of Bethlehem, on Sunday night.

No casualties or damages were reported.

And this:

An Israeli was lightly wounded Sunday night after Palestinians threw rocks at his car while he was driving near Halhoul, north of Hebron.

No? So let us review: Hamas now controls the Gaza Strip. Abbas has his thugs sign a piece of paper that says they won’t attack Israelis anymore. In return, Olmert releases hundreds of Palestinian terrorists and hundreds of millions of dollars, allows Jordan to supply the PA with rifles, and is discussing having the Jordanian army help police the West Bank. And Abbas has his Prime Minister say that resistance against Israel is legitimate, but leave out the words “armed struggle.”

Wow. I’m underwhelmed with the results that Israel is getting from Abbas, and starting to wonder if the people who think the whole Hamas/Fatah war was a setup aren’t wrong.

Okay, no, not really. I’m not into the conspiracy theory mindset. But I do know that terrorists are opportunists, and Abbas has seized this opportunity with both hands and feet, and seemingly only one Israeli politician can get it right.

And oh yeah—the daily rocket bombardment continues. Not that the world cares, any more than they care that the Lebanese army has been bombarding Palestinian “refugee” camps for the past few weeks, killing civilians indiscriminately. The AP is covering up the casualty count, something they would never do were it Israel shelling the camps. But that’s a story for another post.

Posted in Israel, palestinian politics | 2 Comments

The IDF finally gets on the media bandwagon

Posted on 07/30/2007 by Meryl Yourish

It looks like the Israelis have finally figured out that they’ve lost the media war for decades. They’re working to change the information battlefield.

A year after the Kafr Kana bombing during the Second Lebanon War and the IDF’s failure to speedily produce video footage justifying its attack, the IDF Spokesman’s Office has implemented a number of lessons aimed at preventing future operational failures from having detrimental diplomatic consequences.

[…] The Kafr Kana bombing has not been forgotten by the IDF and serves today as a key case study for the IDF Spokesman’s Office during training for field commanders on the importance of correctly utilizing the media.

According to a number of senior IDF officers interviewed by The Jerusalem Post, the failure to quickly release the rocket-fire footage was due to a misconception and under-awareness by the Israel Air Force of the event’s far-reaching consequences.

According to a high-ranking military source, shortly after the bombing an IAF general dismissed a number of requests by IDF Spokeswoman Brig.-Gen. Miri Regev to receive the footage, claiming that it was classified and could not be released to the public.

Yes, that’s the bad news. Now the good news:

Since the war, the IDF Spokesman’s Office under Regev has worked hard at training field commanders to better interact with the media. Last week, she laid the cornerstone for a military media school next to the National Defense College at Glilot that will provide compulsory classes on the media to high-ranking officers.

“The most important lesson learned from the Kafr Kana incident was that there needs to be better awareness throughout the IDF about the importance of cooperating with the Spokesman’s Office and to keep it in the operational loop,” a senior IDF officer said Sunday.

The lack of media awareness was not limited to IDF officers but was also seen in government officials, including a senior politician, involved in the decision-making process throughout the war, who said there was no point in releasing the footage earlier in the day since, according to him, the networks would broadcast it.

To improve this, the IDF Spokesman’s Office provides regular lectures teaching field commanders the importance of releasing footage and information about operations as quickly as possible. In addition, the IDF has recently made technological upgrades to some of its systems that allow for quicker collection, retrieval and release of media-worthy material.

The IDF Spokesman’s Office has also been working to train its reserve officers, particularly those from the Foreign Press Section, to better recognize events that could have diplomatic consequences and to more assertively state their case before field commanders.

File this under: About frakkin’ time. Years ago, the Israeli ambassador to Washington spoke at my synagogue. Afterwards, one of the congregants and I were discussing with the ambassador Israel’s negative image in the media. We tried to explain to him that Israel was getting hammered by the Palestinian representatives. He kept telling us, over and over again, that Americans supported Israel. Not the point, we told him, and tried to explain that you can’t keep getting hammered in the world media without seeing your image suffer. He absolutely refused to hear us, and we left feeling very frustrated. That was Israeli policy—and still is, in far too many quarters—toward the Palestinian media blitz that’s had decades to dig itself in. I can’t find the article, but I do recall reading that Arafat sent his media people to top PR classes and learned from the Soviets how to get his message across.

It’s about damned time that Israel finally started facing its crappy relations with the media and began fighting back with the same tools. If there’s video footage available, the networks will use it. That Qana video would have gone a long way towards proving that Hezbollah lied about stationing missiles in civilian areas. They should make these tapes available on YouTube, as well. Viral marketing isn’t only for commercial products.

Israel needs to get her side of the story out on a regular basis, and stop letting the terrorists frame the narrative. Hezbollah did that par excellence last summer.

Posted in Israel, Media | 3 Comments

The difference between us and them

Posted on 07/30/2007 by Meryl Yourish

When Israel launches an investigation into the failings of the Second Lebanon War, the investigation actually, well, investigates. When the Palestinians launch an investigation into the debacle that was the Gaza war with Hamas, they launch a kangaroo court.

“A week prior to the outbreak of the fighting with Hamas,” says Samir Masharawi, a Fatah leader from the Gaza Strip, “Abu Mazen [Abbas] called a meeting of the central committee of Fatah the leadership of the organizations. He asked seven of them to travel to the Gaza Strip and lead the organization, in view of the deterioration of Mohammed Dahlan, who was undergoing medical treatment, and due to the fact that Abu Mazen was busy with other issues. He gave them all the authority and explained, ‘You are authorized to do whatever you consider necessary to bolster Fatah. You claim that Dahlan is the problem. Now Dahlan is not there, take care of the problem.'”

Masharawi adds that, “Two of the committee members, Tayeb Abd al-Rahim and Ruhi Fatah (Abu Mazen’s adviser) agreed to travel to Gaza immediately. The other five found all sorts of excuses not to do so. In the end, none of the seven came to Gaza. How is it that a committee investigating the failure of Fatah and of the security organizations in the confrontation with Hamas, did not find them responsible? Where is the responsibility of the political leadership?”

“Does your Winograd Committee blame only the army officers or also the politicians? Like you [Israelis] say: ‘Blame the guard at the gate.’ Those really responsible have to surface,” the Fatah leader said.

Yeah, this is why I’m not too enthusiastic about the so-called “new” Fatah under Mahmoud Abbas. Until we see new leadership that isn’t made up of terrorists and terror-supporters, nothing will change. Here’s a question: Have the Palestinians stopped the incitement in their Friday sermons yet? Have they ordered new textbooks for the upcoming school year that actually show Israel on the map?

When both those questions can be answered in the affirmative, I will believe that change is coming.

Posted in palestinian politics | Comments Off on The difference between us and them

The AP reads my blog

Posted on 07/29/2007 by Meryl Yourish

Check out this change in the story about Palestinians entering Israel. From yesterday’s story:

Hamas, which wrested control of the Gaza Strip last month, denounced the deal since it allowed Israel to decide who could enter Gaza. Hamas officials and supporters would presumably not be allowed to enter through Israel.

And now, today’s:

Hamas has criticized the plan to transfer the stranded Palestinians through the Al-Oja and Erez crossings, saying it increases Israel’s control over Gaza. Hamas officials and supporters would presumably not be allowed to enter through Israel.

I should check my server logs. But I think someone at the AP reads my blog.

Good.

Posted in AP Media Bias | 1 Comment

Other people’s writing

Posted on 07/29/2007 by Meryl Yourish

A Rahel fundraiser: You folks helped me out big-time last year when Gracie was sick, and now we need to help Rahel. The vet bills were high, but Lady has recovered from her diabetes and is happy and healthy and no longer a stray. Paypal won’t send money to Israel (I don’t know why; I’m working on that). So I think we’re going to have to send checks. Or international money orders.

Them’s fighting words: I want this t-shirt. I REALLY want this t-shirt.

Can’t drive in Saudi Arabia, but she can drive in Israel (that racist, apartheid state): A Muslim woman taxi driver in Jerusalem, and the BBC notices. (And they don’t seem to be able to hit Israel with anything for it, either.) Seriously? There’s only one woman cab driver in Jerusalem? You know, come to think of it, I never had a woman cab driver in NYC. Not once.

Sending your children off to war: The left can pretend that the world is really a peaceful place, but it isn’t. Lady-Light writes about her daughter’s choice of unit for her IDF service.

Haveil Havalim: I forgot last week’s, which was at Reb Chaim HaQoton’s. Complete with commentary. Well, what’d you expect, with a name like Reb Chaim? (Oh, so that’s where Sabba Hillel got the post about the cost of building the First Temple. Billions and billions, folks.)

Never too late for Tisha b’Av: Judith Weiss’ annual Tisha b’Av post. Read it, and weep. Really.

Posted in Linkfests | 4 Comments

Nasrallah taunts Israel from secure, undisclosed location

Posted on 07/29/2007 by Meryl Yourish

The great, brave leader of Hezbollah, who was hiding in some underground bunker somewhere, afraid to show his face, told Israel that she had achieved none of her objectives during last year’s war. Proof again that the Arab/Muslim world seems utterly immune to irony.

But Hezbollah, backed by Syria and Iran, said the U.S. vision aimed at reinforcing Israel.

“There is no new Middle East,” Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah told a mass rally in the southern town of Bint Jbeil, one of the towns hardest hit by the war. “It’s gone with the wind.”

Nasrallah did not personally attend the rally to mark the first anniversary of the war which Hezbollah calls “a divine victory. His speech was relayed to the crowd on a giant screen set up in the main square of Bint Jbeil.

Yes, brave man, addressing the rally from somewhere else for fear of an IDF Hellfire salute to Nasrallah.

There is, of course, the obligatory AP anti-Israel bias:

The offensive killed more than 1,000 Lebanese, most of them civilians, according to tallies by the Lebanese government, human rights groups, and The Associated Press. Hezbollah launched nearly 4,000 rockets at Israel during the war, which killed 119 Israeli soldiers and 39 civilians

The IDF reckons that more than half the Lebanese killed were members of Hezbollah. These figures are never cited as an alternative, however.

Israel identified 440 dead guerrillas by name and address, and experience shows that Israeli figures are half to two-thirds of the enemy’s real casualties. Therefore, Amidror estimated, Hezbollah’s death toll might be as high as 700.

There’s also word out today that one of the two kidnapped soldiers is dead. But we’re not going to know unless there is a deal made with Hezbollah, and so far, that shows no sign of happening.

Posted in AP Media Bias, Lebanon | Comments Off on Nasrallah taunts Israel from secure, undisclosed location

Bibi watch: Countdown to furious denial

Posted on 07/28/2007 by Meryl Yourish

How long you figure it will take Bibi Netanyahu to deny this article? I say the moment Shabbat ends, he holds a press conference or sends out his statement to the press.

Egyptian FM: Bibi not opposed to Arab initiative

[…] Abul Gheit said opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu told him during talks in Jerusalem earlier this week that he was not opposed to the initiative. Netanyahu was said to be opposed to the Arab peace plan because he redeemed it dangerous to Israel’s security.

“We presented to him the Arab position. Netanyahu focused on the importance of economic cooperation between Israel and the Palestinians to benefit the Palestinians. We also spoke about the need to revive the peace process,” Gheit told al-Ahram.

“In general I can say that Netanyahu does not express opposition to the Arab initiative although he wanted to check some points, especially in relation to the Palestinian refugees. He wanted to know the principles of the initiative. In a general manner he did not rule out the initiative,” he added.

Yeah, countdown to the denial in one, two….

Posted in Israel, palestinian politics | 4 Comments