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Astaro Blocking MR - Day 2

No response yet from Astaro, the security company providing schools with web filtering software that is blocking Mere Rhetoric. So obviously we left another ticket through their form, since we're patient that way (also because they promise in really big letters to respond to all requests within one business day, but we must have slipped through the cracks).
We've been categorized under "Political Extremism / Hate / Discrimination", and we're not even sure which one they're blocking us for. But we sure hope it's political extremism - "hate" and "discrimination" are so 1990s. In the meantime, we're hoping to start a kind of running list of sites that are, according to Astaro, less politically extreme / hateful / discriminatory than Mere Rhetoric. Today's site: the Democratic Underground, where the phrase "Bush Family Evil Empire" is used so often that it is routinely written by regulars as BFEE. Astaro's judgement: less extreme than Mere Rhetoric.
We're still all but sure that this is a result of their text parsing algorithm not understanding that blogs sometimes copy and paste quotes that they don't endorse. In the meantime, if you want to have some fun finding sites that Astaro considers less extreme than MR, you can use this frontend to their database. If you'd like to urge them to get back to us, their contact form is here.
Omri | |

SF Chron Declines To Print Reports of Confessed Terrorist Motives. Loads Up "Mental Instability" Template Instead.

When Smooth Stone predicted this morning that the MSM would find ways not to mention that San Fran hit and run driver Omeed Aziz Popal is a self-declared terrorist, he probably wasn't counting on Drudge to roll in with "VIDEO: Witness says driver declared himself a 'terrorist'..." (which is actually the same link that Smooth Stone posts).
Let's review: we have a crime that involves an attack on Jews. Many if not most of the elements of the crime are similar to the essential aspects of past crimes generally acknowledged to be domestic terrorism. And we have reports from local witnesses that the criminal explicitly declared himself to be a terrorist. Now, let's acknowledge that not all attacks on American Jews by Muslims are terrorism, that crimes can look like terrorism without being terrorism, and that the witnesses may be wrong - in other words, there's always the chance that there will turn out to be alternative explanations for the multiple indications that this was terrorism. Fair enough. But how do you justify - if, say, you're the SF Chron - not even printing the suspect's religion. What was the chain of logic that justified including "[a]t Frankie's Bohemian Cafe at Divisadero and Pine, a man named William, who asked that his last name not be used, said he had been walking south on Divisadero when "we heard the thump, turned around, saw bodies flying''" instead of the fact that this suspect shares a characteristic with the last few people who committed crimes just like this one.
Instead, we get the increasingly eye roll-inducing "history of mental problems" template. We've now gone through this routine enough times to describe with some confidence what will happen in the day or two after an attack like this, where a lone Muslim man in the United States attacks multiple Jews: (a) local and federal authorities will clarify that, despite the act resembling terrorism in every way, improbably it turns out that terrorism was not in fact committed (b) the vast majority of journalists will neglect to inform readers of the shooter's religion or ethnicity - they probably just figure that it would add nothing to the context of the story, since presumably no one has managed to pick out any similarities between all the Muslim men who have committed mass attacks on American Jews in the last few months (c) the vast majority of journalists will also neglect to print certain things that might, at first glance, seem helpful to readers who want to figure out the suspects' likely motives - things like the suspects' declarations at the scene where they state that they were committing terrorism or fighting against Jews (d) the suspect will be declared mentally unstable.
And so, as we've had to do every other time (because this pattern really has happened every other time), let's go over how sentences and logic work. In English, the operator "and" is available to language users seeking to create complex sentences. For any two well formed statements, there exists a world in which the complex sentence created by linking them with "and" is true. In other words, we can take the two statements "the Muslim man who shot the pregnant Jewish woman is mentally unstable" and "the Muslim man who shot the pregnant woman is a terrorist" and combine them. The combined statement is "the Muslim man who shot the pregnant Jewish woman is mentally unstable and is a terrorist" (or, more conversationally, "the Muslim man who shot the pregnant Jewish woman is a mentally unstable terrorist"). So when journalists inform us that an attempted mass murderer is mentally shaky, that's both a painfully obvious and an almost certainly incomplete presentation of what they know. "Mental instability" is a definition of a mass murder, not journalism - so filling up the "give the suspect's background" part of a news article by printing information about their mental health is really just a way of avoiding having to convey things that the journalist may find uncomfortable. And since it's almost definitionally true that a terrorist will have some degree of mental damage, the journalist has a built-in way not to have to describe things like family, religion, national background, etc. That a religiously-inspired mass murderer has psychological problems is the perfect journalistic go-to - true and therefore professionally safe, but totally unhelpful. Which is why we've seen volumes of that kind of journalism after each of these incidents.
It just so happens that in this particular case, the guy isn't even mentally ill in any significant sense (oh wait... but the family says diagrees!) So not only did outlets like the SF Chron pull the predictable and usually reliable where they printed "news" of mental instability as a substitute for information about the suspect's background... this time they had a run of bad luck and they don't even have their usual excuse that what they're saying is technically true. No wonder these news cycles are getting so predictable - the journalists don't even bother to check if their apologist narrative fits the facts on the ground. They just get the suspects name, the number of victims, and the time of the attack. Then they insert them into their available, crafted-to-never-ever-ever-ever-mention-religion template, and take the rest of the day off to go brainstorm bumper stickers about how much smarter they are then President Bush.
(nb. We don't really have any evidence to justify the statement that MSM journalists spend significant amounts of time brainstorming bumper sticker slogans. The stuff about how journalists are writing about these attacks using a prefabbed, ideologically designed journalistic narrative meant to obfuscate or exclude clear evidence of terrorism... if that wasn't obvious before, the fact that they automatically used it even though the suspect wasn't clinically insane is a symptomatic slip too far)

UPDATE: We don't think we took sufficient time during the original post to sit back and contemplate the brilliance of the SF Chron mental health article. Imagine you're the journalist covering this. On one hand, you're supposed to be using your paper's carefully designed "mental problems" template (because there certain facts that would just needlessly confuse the public, so why print them anyway?). On the other hand, you can't honestly see a way around printing that "those involved in the investigation... discount any mental illness, saying the 29-year-old Afghanistan native seemed coherent, unrepentant and claimed that he repeatedly drove at pedestrians because he "just wanted to."" Solution? Headline with a technically true statement that reinforces your mental instability frame: "DRIVER'S RAMPAGE THE HUMAN TOLL SUSPECT: Family cites history of mental problems". This way, the 90% or so of people who never really get past the lede of a story can put down the paper, reassured that they don't have to worry about radical Muslims attacking Jews - but maybe feeling a little bit sad about all the recent violent attacks

UPDATE 2: It seems like half of Allahpundit's life nowadays is spent preventing prominent conservative blogs from devolving into swamps of bad conspiracy theorizing. And he's right to be as careful as he's being: it's well worth missing a Reuters hoax if it means that the Left gets to keep their near monopoly on the inane, self-reinforcing cycle of "look at this seemingly irrelevant detail which is the key to a massive conspiracy" / "good job - we're so powerful - don't listen to the people presenting contrary evidence, they're just doing that because they know we're on to them. And so here's his post making the case for this guy is just a regular, non-jihadi lunatic, complete with links to a history of mental problems. Those links don't really surprise us - in proper conspiracy theory fashion, we're well prepared to integrate the fact that the SF Chron is pumping out article after article shoring up their no-terrorism-here framing of the story. The actual fact that Popal had been in a clinic is a little more problematic, but listen - our entire point is that all jihadis are to one degree or another mentally disturbed. The question is why mental instability in some Muslim-American men has expressed itself in violence against Jews, while mental instability in men of other backgrounds doesn't seem to consistently display this kind of symptom.

UPDATE 3: And if all else fails, there's still the psychoanalytic point - just because the press's terrorist-apologizing "mental instability" narrative is coincidentally accurate this time doesn't mean that that's why they choose to report the story that way (if push us a little on this argument and we'll probably give it up... maybe)
Omri | |

American Judaism Slowly Discovering That Believing in Things Matters

MR, 2/13/05:

[R]evitalizing Jewish communities by emphasizing Jewish values... doesn't go far enough to solve the suffocating fog that is young Jews' apathy towards their heritage... fom the moment they can be shipped off to Hebrew school, American Jewish children are provided with an almost limitless number of ways to be "connected" to Judaism. And yet somehow prepackaged life cycles, canned trips to Israel, and lessons on counting in Hebrew have all failed to ignite a commitment to Judaism. In the meantime, Islam and Christianity is growing throughout the United States. College and high school students shout their devotions in gigantic stadiums... because their religious leaders tell their followers that they have the truth ... Of course the young flock to that kind of message. Christian evangelicals, for instance, tell young Christians that their religion is true, that Christians are blessed, and that the rest of the world is wrong. In response, young Jews are told that they can believe whatever they want and that the sum total of their religious obligation involves bringing some canned goods from home around the High Holidays.

Slate's Samantha Shapiro, 8/28/06, describing the graduation speech of outgoing Jewish Theological Seminary chancellor Ismar Schorsch:

I grew up in the Conservative movement, and my religious ideals line up with it in many ways. Yet I agree that it often misses the mark and suffers, as Schorsch said, from "a failure of nerve." As the world is growing increasingly religious, the faithful are not growing more interested in reconciling modernity and tradition. They are becoming more orthodox. It's somehow liberating (if not encouraging) to see the leader of a religious movement whose goal is to hold the middle ground forcefully wrestle with his sense of failure. In his speech, Schorsch described the Conservative religious ideal as one that maintains a fragile balance between two poles, truth and faith. He said that during the heyday of the JTS, this tension was sustained by reverent, but critical, scholarship that analyzed the historical context surrounding Jewish texts, rather than viewing them only as a message delivered by God at Mt. Sinai... Liberal denominations of any faith tend to make a religion out of tolerance and humanistic values. But this misses some of the point of faith. There is a sweetness, intensity, and pleasure that comes from religious practice that isn't wholly rational.

The fact that this is something that has to be explained and debated is very, very worrisome.< br>
[Full disclosure: our personal views on the content of the Reform vs. Conservative vs. Orthodox debates have nothing to do with the blinding empirical reality that you can't make a religion grow by letting people pick and choose what parts of dogma they want to believe. Now, the greatest scholars who argue with precision may justify their violations of Jewish law as still within Judaism, but the rest of us have to either do Jewish by following their example of concede that what we're doing is not a part of Judaism. Which may be fine - but the Reform impulse to turn everything their congregants want to do into a Jewish act seems untenable. Generally, the relationship between dogma and adherent flows the other way. Of all the major religions, Judaism is the farthest from acknowledging a personal relationship with a personal God - it is a collective practice in dialogue with particular, collective historical texts that set constraints on behavior. You can't do what you like and then insist that it's 'your way of being Jewish']
Omri | |

We're Not So Sure It's Stockholm Syndrome

We're very glad that the Fox News reporters got out with their lives ("no matter what one’s politics, all Americans are held hostage when one of us falls into the hands of these thugs" - quite so). We're less glad that the Hamas government has decided against pursuing the kidnappers. But since we kind of suspect that Hamas and this "previously unknown group" of total clowns were working together, we're not really surprised (come on - this was the most amateurish operation ever... forced conversions... seriously?)
It would also have significantly brightened our day if the freed hostages hadn't gone out of their way to celebrate the people who had been trying to kill them:

During the brief press conference held almost immediately after their release, both men preferred to focus on the plight of the kind and benevolent denizens of Gaza. Momentarily acknowledging the coercive nature of their "conversion", Centanni admitted off camera, "We were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint". But he felt compelled to add this bizarre disclaimer, "Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it", before concluding candidly "... it was something we felt we had to do because they had the guns, and we didn't know what the hell was going on." Centanni expressed his primary concern to the reporters gathered at the Gaza City Beach Hotel press conference as follows: "I hope that this never scares a single journalist away from coming to Gaza to cover the story because the Palestinian people are very beautiful and kind-hearted... The world needs to know more about them. Don't be discouraged." Wiig reiterated these sentiments: "My biggest concern really is that as a result of what happened to us foreign journalists will be discouraged from coming to tell the story and that would be a great tragedy for the people of Palestine... You guys need us on the streets, and you need people to be aware of the story." And Wiig’s wife thanked unnamed "Palestinian women" from Gaza for their "solidarity".

Here's the thing: we don't think that this is Stockholm Syndrome. These are phrases that are practiced, vaguely echoing communities that are not exactly right-wing ("very beautiful and kind-hearted" is hackneyed, but thanking people for their solidarity is not generally a hallmark of the right). We could be totally wrong about this - and we fervently hope that we are - but isn't it more likely that this is a Jill Carroll situation? Sympathetic Westerners visit the homes of terrorists and discover that apologizing for terrorism has done nothing to decrease their status as "target". We don't know if anyone's done the work on this yet, but surely there's evidence one way or another what these reporters thought of Hamas, et al before their kidnapping.
Either way, now that everyone's more or less safe and sound, can we go back to openly belittling anyone who would be dumb enough to suggest that Americans will like the Palestinians more if they learn what people in Gaza really think about the West? "You need people to be aware of the story" - for crying out loud.
Omri | |

Hey UN, Shove It

Kofi Annan has just finished up the hard work of spectacularly failing to meet any of the promises that he and the UN made to Israel under 1701. No stronger UNIFIL mandate, no disarmed Hezbollah, and certainly no kidnapped soldiers back. So upon his entrance into Israel, he acted in the natural way that anyone in his position would act - he imperiously issued demands and condescendingly lectured Israeli officials. After he was done with that part of his routine, he really tied his performance together by insisting that Israel should make massive security concessions to Hamas and Hezbollah. Of course he did:

Earlier, Annan met with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Jerusalem. Annan noted in a press conference in Ramallah that he made his opinion clear during his meetings in Israel. Beyond maintaining life a way of life must also be maintained, he said, adding that the blockade on Gaza must be lifted and the crossings must be opened. Israel must not only allow goods in, but also allow Palestinians to export, he said. He made it clear that he has been exerting many efforts in a bid to halt the Israeli blockade on the PA, open the crossings and suspend the military operation in the Strip, but he also called on Palestinians to halt the firing of Qassam rockets and release kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit.

We link how he keeps returning to the idea that Israel needs to allow a wave of free movement in and out of the Gaza Strip. That way - if they really, really need to - the Palestinians will be able to smuggle one or two things out of the Gaza Strip. And if one of those things happens to have a vaguely kidnapped-IDF-soldier shape, well, certainly the Secretary General can't be blamed for that. After all, he did politely request that Hamas let him go. This is really genius: ask the kidnappers to return their hostage, and then take away any incentive they might have to do so. But let's not rush to judgment about Annan's motives or competence - maybe he's counting on Hamas's well-known sense of fair play when it comes to their treatment of Israelis.
Here's our suggestion: if the Palestinians want the Israelis to stop targeting them in counter-terrorism operations, they should stop planning and trying to execute terrorism:

The IDF and the Shin Bet thwarted a terrorist attack that Palestinians had planned to carry out via a terror tunnel, it was revealed on Wednesday. IDF troops discovered an underground tunnel earlier this week that had been dug by terror operatives on the outskirts of the Shajaiyeh neighborhood in Gaza City.
The opening of the 13-meter-deep, 150-meter-long tunnel was found inside a building at least one kilometer away from the Gaza security fence. It was believed that the target of the attack was the nearby Karni Crossing.

Don't blame the Gazans though - it's the Israeli Occupation of Gaza that makes them feel depressed and violent.
Omri | |

Astaro Web Filtering Software Categorizes Mere Rhetoric As A Hate Site, Blocks Student Access

A senior from a Colorado high school emailed us this morning to tell us that his school's web filtering software is blocking Mere Rhetoric:

Hey Omri... Apparently some think that your blog constitutes some form of political extremism. When I tried to access it through my school's network, I was amazed to find it blocked.... you might find it of interest that the huffington post is not as of yet blocked.

Screencap:



Just as an intellectual exercise, here is a very brief list of arguably relevant differences between Mere Rhetoric and the Huffington Post:

(1) The Huffington Post recently published a photo of a US Senator that was photoshopped to paint blackface on him. In sharp contrast, Mere Rhetoric has consistently declined to publish racist photos.
(2) The Huffington Post recently featured a cartoon focusing on stereotypically-drawn Jewish figures who eagerly plan to "kill everything that breathes". In sharp contrast, Mere Rhetoric has consistently declined to feature either cartoons with hateful drawings or accusations involving ancient, shadowy, genocide-planning global cabals. Our posts about Hamas's and Hezbollah's and Iran's genocidal intentions don't count - copying and pasting their press releases isn't an "accusation".
(3) The Huffington Post recently hosted a disturbingly enthusiastic thought experiment describing the electoral advantages that the Democrats could gain from another terrorist attack on the US. In sharp contrast, Mere Rhetoric has consistently declined to brainstorm GOTV strategies that rely on the mass murder of civilians.
(4) The Huffington Post recently provided space for a conversation that began as just your typical Leftist collection of lurid and wide-eyed anti-Israel conspiracy theories - but that then somehow devolved into dark suggestions about an Israeli "master plan". In sharp contrast, Mere Rhetoric has consistently declined to deploy rhetoric that is historically implicated in the construction, legitimization, and justification of the Nazi Final Solution.

And that's before we get to the HP's consistent cheerleading for Mearsheimer's increasingly creepy fascination with the Jewish State... Listen, snark aside - this is kind of absurd. Mere Rhetoric is most reasonably somewhere between center-right and right on the political spectrum. We support a two-state solution and the prosecution of genuine war crimes. We supported disengagement when it was happening and we supported Kadima's realignment plan back when there were actually people advocating it. That there are also posts describing the geopolitical, cultural, and moral justifications for a secure Jewish homeland cannot be a justification for accusations of political extremism or hate speech. Quite the opposite - the right of a UN member to continue existing in peace is almost the definition of a centrist position, regardless of whether that member is Israel or not. We understand that there are people on the Left who can't distinguish between our positions and the positions of genuine extremists – if you're looking at Earth from light years away, Los Angeles looks like Tokyo. But we also don't think that those people should be determining what students get to see.

We've written Astaro to request a description of what triggered the "hate" site categorization. Their form promises a response within one business day, so hopefully we'll have more information soon. We're inclined to believe that there's a perfectly innocent explanation for this (no sarcasm intended - these tasks are automated, and we use many of the same words as genuine hate sites... and that's without considering quotes). But the alternative - a politicized attempt to move acceptable discourse far leftwards - is not entirely beyond the realm of possibility.

UPDATE: There is at least one innocent explanation for this fiasco. It could be that Astaro's text-parsing algorithms can't understand sarcasm. In which case they should under no circumstances let them loose anywhere near the blogosphere.

UPDATE 2: Chances of deliberate agenda-pushing growing dimmer. Astaro's filters don't seem to have any problem with LGF, Powerline, Hugh Hewitt, Hot Air, of PJM. Our best guess is that one of these three things pissed off their spider:
(1) we were criticizing a hate site, and copied and pasted a block of text from it as an example
(2) we were criticizing a hate site, and we inserted a hyperlink to the site so that readers could see it for themselves
(3) we were in the middle of a really bitter diatribe and wrote something that was meant to be taken as sarcasm - a rhetorical device potentially lost on Astaro's robot
Anyway, we can't do much about this situation until they give us some sort of response. We're going to stop our speculation until we get a little more data.
Omri | |

In a World of Broad Islamist Support for Suicide Bombings, British MK Blames Blair for Cheapening Value of Life

In what a neutral media outlet is describing as a "stinging attack on Mr. Blair", Labour MP Kitty Ussher unleashed the following coherent and well-reasoned assertions:

This month Kitty Ussher, the moderate Labour MP for Burnley, made a stinging attack on Mr Blair. She wrote in the New Statesman that “(the) only conclusion any right-minded person can draw is that the Prime Minister thought it was OK for Muslims to keep dying”.
She said that the Muslim community in Burnley was asking why its blood seemed cheaper than that of Jews and Christians, and that much of the work done since Iraq to persuade Muslims that they were not being persecuted had been wasted.

Well first, there's at least one other conclusion that any right-minded person can draw: that the Prime Minister thought that it wasn't OK that Israelis should have to keep dying. But if that didn't occur as an option to the right honorable madame, we'll let it slide.
Now, it's trite to point out that sectarian violence in the Muslim world far surpasses what Jews and Christians do, and while that's technically true we won't belabor the point. But there are two points we do want to make:
(1) Cultures that celebrate suicide bombing don't get to talk about the sanctity of life. Full stop.
(2) Muslim blood seems cheap to other Muslims even in non-sectarian contexts:

A German news agency has reported that Hizballah men have executed 18 Lebanese accused of spying for Israel. Lebanon has a judicial process, but it was not involved. Hizballah alone directed and carried out the process of putting these 18 to death. I have no idea if any of them were spies for Israel, but it seems most unlikely. Eighteen? All caught at work in the short time-frame of the fighting?

Of course, it's quite reasonable to point out that many of the Lebanese civilians who suffered because Hezbollah choose to start a war don't support suicide bombings (although it's not reasonable to blame Israel for their suffering). And in that specific context, certainly the very terse and glib arguments we're offering about who is determining the relative "cheapness" of Muslim blood is unpersuasive. But to speak grandiously about the Muslim world in general and to imply that Jews and Christians are responsible for Bin Laden saying that Muslims love death - that seems a little unfair.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

MSM: It's Israel's Fault We Made Things Up

They're hopeless:

A number of journalists claimed during a convention in Jerusalem Monday evening that Israel and the IDF were mostly to blame for the way the foreign media covered the Lebanon war. The panel of journalists, largely from the international media, convened to discuss their coverage of the war, at a conference arranged by the Media Line agency's Mideast Press Club... "We are very disappointed that the IDF didn't give us more opportunities," he added.

Poor babies. But then again, why do you need a battlefield when you can just create on in Photoshop? Also, they did have access:

Wood's claims of restricted battlefield access seemed undermined, however, by the London Times' Stephen Farrell, who said: "I spent most of the war within five miles of the border… you have to get up and put your face right up against the glass, and if you can, to put your head through the glass."

How reflexive is the media's instinct to blame Israel? Even when the media makes up things to blame Israel for, it's Israel's fault.
Omri | |

Hey Gals, Check This Out - Islamists Want To Set Your Wardrobe. This is Because They Are Fascists (Bonus Ahmadinejad Material Inside)

* Way back in 1981, the first President of theocratic Iran explained why the regime was in the process of passing a law that would make wearing the humiliating hijab mandatory for all girls above six. He explained - and we're quoting now - that "scientific research has shown that women's hair emitted rays that drove men insane". Why this meant that all women had to be covered from head to toe was not for Iranian women to question. In the last 10 years, women have been growing progressively more bold and walking around with their faces uncovered. No more:

Police in Tehran have been ordering Iranian women to cover up, stopping those they perceive as "badly veiled." The crackdown followed the 2005 election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. "We are certainly seeing a return to behavior we haven't seen for 10 years," Hadi Ghaemi of Human Rights Watch told The Telegraph. "Generally, the imposition of strict Islamic codes has been increasing under Ahmadinejad."... Just as women in recent years had pushed the boundaries by wearing head scarves that revealed more than they hid.

Direct state control over the body - the essence of fascism.

* We have a close friend and, being the committed progressives that we are, we sometimes try to show her evidence of how reactionary political Islam is. Invariably (and without irony) she says "well of course [insert Hezbollah TV / Iran / Saudi Arabi / etc] is bad, but that doesn't mean..." So in this case, it'd be something like "well of course Iran is bad, but that doesn't mean that..." Perhaps not. But there does appear to be something of this unseemly urge to control women that follows political Islam across international borders:

A Melbourne Muslim girl condemned by Islamic leaders for entering a beauty pageant has defied protests to be shortlisted for the Victorian final. Ayten Ahmet, 16, advanced to the top 26 of Miss Teen Australia yesterday despite an outcry from some of Victoria's senior Muslims... A spokesman for Melbourne cleric Sheik Mohammed Omran this week branded the competition, which involves swimsuit parades, as a "slur on Islam". And Victorian Islamic leader Yasser Soliman said the contest did not conform with the teachings of the Koran.

Good for the girl and her parents for standing up to these pathetic control freaks.

* A pathological patient is one who, because of a mental disturbance, exhibits behavior that is maladaptive. Like not letting in female aid workers after a natural disaster:

Conservative Muslim clerics made it clear this week that they do not want female aid workers helping those still in refugee camps after a massive earthquake last year left more than 73,000 dead. The clerics warned that if aid agencies continue to employ female workers, they will organize violent protests and cause damage to local property.

Why do they have to always be violent protests? We're not being entirely sarcastic here. They have culture. They have a written language. They have a postal system, as it is. Why can't they just organize a letter writing campaign or something? Just once.

* All of this pathological "not being able to tolerate even the sight of women" thing makes Ahmadinejad's flattery of German Chancellor Merkel's ovaries seem disingenuous. And to be honest, it's not like his letter to her was a model of women's liberation to begin with:

If it had not been for the advantages that are limited to women, such as stronger human sentiments and certain manifestations of the divine compassion and kindness, specially in the position of a mother and being at the service of the people.

The country that Merkel leads is, among other things, a member of the most powerful and successful military alliance in the history of the entire known universe. It is the world's 3rd largest economy (almost 30 slots ahead of Iran). But Mr. 12th century over here thinks that the Chancellor will be all flattered and get flustered if he compliments her for her "sentiments" and her ability to be a mother. And that wasn't even the part that Merkel found most unsettling. She was reportedly troubled by this passage even more, where Ahmadinejad implies that the Allies made up the Holocaust in order to punish Germany with "guilt":

I have no intention of arguing about the Holocaust. But, does it not stand to reason that some victorious countries of World War II intended to create an alibi on the basis of which they could continue keeping the defeated nations of World War II indebted to them. Their purpose has been to weaken their morale and their inspiration in order to obstruct their progress and power... But just imagine where Germany would be today in terms of its eminence among the freedom-loving nations, Muslims of the world and peoples of Europe, if such a situation did not exist and the governments in power in Germany had said no to the extortions by the Zionists and had not supported the greatest enemy of mankind.

Pssst... by "Zionists", he means "Jews".

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

Politically Active Filmmakers Find a Religion-Based Summer Camp They Feel Safe Criticizing

Not long ago, the intellectual Left realized that there are places in this country where children are encouraged to aggressively defend their religious beliefs. And just as they were getting over their shock at discovering that these "church" things are allowed to exist, along came even more bad news: there are actually summer camps where the exact same things happen. So disturbed were they that two of them - directors Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing - went out and made an expose about it. The film is called Jesus Camp, and it debuts on September 7:

A growing number of Evangelical Christians believe there is a revival underway in America that requires Christian youth to assume leadership roles in advocating the causes of their religious movement. Jesus Camp, directed by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady, directors of the critically acclaimed The Boys of Baraka, follows Levi, Rachael, and Tory to Pastor Becky Fischer's "Kids on Fire" summer camp in Devil's Lake, North Dakota, where kids as young as 6 years-old are taught to become dedicated Christian soldiers in "God's army." The film follows these children at camp as they hone their "prophetic gifts" and are schooled in how to "take back America for Christ." The film is a first-ever look into an intense training ground that recruits born-again Christian children to become an active part of America's political future.

Oh, it's horrible. Just horrible. If we don't do something about these camps soon, an entire generation of devoted Christian Americans will be put on the track to becoming an active part of America's political future. There's a good chance that one or two might even become lawyers!
Listen, it's not like we support these things. They actually sound like a kind of crappy thing to do to your kid: "Mommy, how come Janey gets to play in the lake but I have to read about the United Nations and the Beast of Babylon?" But who cares? So two decades from now there'll be a couple more lawyers trying to overturn the separation of Church and State. It's not like they're going to get on the Court - you know that Ted Kennedy will still be alive, and you know that he'll have himself wheeled to the podium so he can filibuster.
On the other hand, what would be nice is if we could get talented American filmmakers to make audiences aware that the Palestinians have religion-based summer camps too. Like the Christian camps, the Palestinian camps also teach children to be "soldiers in 'God's army'". Unlike the Christian camps, they mean 'army' in a very literal way:

"Summer camp, where children traditionally participate in sing-alongs and color wars, has been warped by the Palestinians into a sickening display of hatred and intolerance," said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director. "We are extremely concerned by these reports, particularly since they detail that some of these camps were funded by UNICEF, an organization that has traditionally sought to improve the welfare of children. Therefore, it is imperative that UNICEF scrutinize the camps it sponsors and immediately withdraw funding from those whose only service is to provide an education in terror." At the summer camps, children were encouraged to learn how to play a role in terrorist attacks, learn how to shoot guns and were given instruction in how to blow up Israeli buses and settlements. Suicide bombers were also glorified with a number of camp groups being named for them.

We understand why filmmakers aren't talking about this though - it's impossible for anyone to track both Palestinian and Christian summer camps. Choices have to be made and resources have to be allocated. And filmmakers seem to have decided that they're going to make a real difference by exposing the Christian camps. So instead of powerfully conveying how Palestinian children are being taught that their highest goal should be to die in a particularly violent and horrific way, American filmmakers are on the front lines alerting us to the coming tidal wave of over-eager prepubescent Christians. Good thing too, because now we'll know what's going on when we see kids going door to door in our neighborhood, asking people to make "donations" so that African children can "eat".

UPDATE: Oh, this movie is obviously going to be not at all smug or condescending::

"I think they captured the beautiful concepts of what we represent," [camp director] Fischer told indieWIRE... when asked about a particularly inflammatory scene that involves a life-size standup photo of President George W. Bush and a large American flag in the background - with the crowd raising their hands towards the Bush effigy in prayer - she added, "I didn't realize how the secular world viewed what we were doing... When we took out [an] image of Bush, it turned political, but to us, it's not political - it's Biblical."

We're not from that side of the religious aisle so we're only guessing, but without seeing the movie we're willing to bet that the camp members were asking God to give President Bush insight and strength. In other words they were not praying to Bush's cutout as this article, through omission, comes dangerously close to de facto asserting. As opposed to praying to Bush, the campers were almost certainly doing something that (we're given to understand) is pretty common among Christians: they were praying for him.
But listen, this scene by scene analysis is largely beside the point. Maybe this movie is spectacularly balanced, split right down the middle. Maybe these are two of the very few filmmakers on the planet who, when they say they want to start an open discussion, actually do want to start an open discussion (we'll ignore how the suggestion that there is something of concern that evangelicals and secularists need discuss already stacks the deck). But let's play the thought experiment out: maybe these two filmmakers really see a need for public deliberation about religious encroachment into secular life. The question then remains exactly the same: how can a reasonably informed, reasonably logical person look around and pick out American evangelicalism as the most pressing and dangerous theocratic trend?
Rather than being concerned about American evangelicalism, secularists ought to be focusing their energies on opening up discussions about the growing influence of political Islam. Within whole orders of magnitude, there's simply nothing that's even close to as great a threat to progressivism. It is a threat both because of its explicit anti-woman and anti-gay commitments (we can hear it now: 'so are Christians'... hold on) - it's a threat both because of its explicit anti-woman and anti-gay commitments and because many of its adherents have demonstrated a remarkably low threshold for committing acts of violence when they're offended by non-Muslims around them. Already in this country, CAIR is regularly making not very veiled threats when it finds the work of certain artists to be offensive.
A brave filmmaker genuinely concerned about creeping (and creepy) theocracy could start a national dialogue about the tactics used to indoctrinate Palestinian children into Islamism. There would be a film about a kind of religious fanaticism that is dangerous in the near-term both in its intents and in its capabilities. A filmmaker who produced something about Islamist brainwashing in Palestinian summer camps would be well-placed to turn the movie into an index to all kinds of local and global reactionary Muslim movements.
The downside is these filmmakers need to be able to make small-talk when they go to their Manhattan cocktail parties. And in that sense, it's much easier to get everyone laughing and smirking about 'that one scene' where 'those people' were 'praying to the cardboard Bush'. And so it goes.
Omri | |

Early Morning Blog Roundup - 2006-08-30

* Dave Bender just uploaded a ton of pics to his Flickr pool. Many were taken in the last few weeks across the north of Israel, during the war. There are some very well-shot photos of local kids playing on the walls of Akko (at least we think that's Akko). And for those of you not into looking at crumbling Crusader fortifications, there are lots of pictures of really big tanks and guns.

* Michael Totten, guest blogging for Andrew Sullivan, has a link to a film that originally hit to the blogosphere on the site of Israeli blogger Lisa Goldman. The 25 minute film was shot by Israeli video journalist Itai Anghel, who accompanied regiment 931 of the Nahal on a night raid into an Hezbollah-controlled village. The film itself is riveting - the bravery and loyalty of the soldiers is awe-inspiring.
That said, the film also documents a genuine outrage on the part of Hezbollah's - a violation of very, very basic laws of war. Some people who've linked to the film have chosen to let you find out what it is yourself, while others have chosen to spare you the suspense. We're going spoil it for you, because there's a .001% chance that your computer will crash in the next half hour - and this is something you should know about. After the Nahal troops encountered the representatives from Iran's proxy army, they learned that the Hezbollah fighters were wearing IDF uniforms. The IDF troops had to react accordingly to avoid confusion, and they ended up degrading their uniforms and gear. The frustration in watching this scene is at least two-fold: first, you have to watch these 20 year olds remove safety equipment because the other side can't be bothered not to commit war crimes. Then, it slowly dawns on you that the Israeli troops are in no way shocked at their enemy's crimes.

* Rantings of a Sandmonkey has pictures and personal thoughts from last week's massive effort to move the Ramses II statue out of Cairo. The statue had been perhaps the city's most prominent landmark it was brought there by Nasser in the 1950s as a symbol of indigenous Egyptian greatness. It had since become an emotionally charged, cherished part of the city - one of the last remaining visible markers of what had once been a powerful, secular pan-Arab movement. In its time, Arab armies under the pan-Arab banner came very close to destroying Israel - but today that movement is as absent from daily Egyptian life as the Ramses statue now is. When he gets to the part of the post where he discusses the Islamists who feel no connection to the statue or what it represents, Sandmonkey seems to lose something in the way of subtlety.

* In the last few days, there have been so many anti-American and anti-Semitic anti-Zionist slurs thrown around on MoveOn.org that Bill Levinson actually had to start a new blog just so we wouldn't run out of server space over at IsraPundit.
Omri | |

Liberal Who Doesn't Really Understand Anything About Religion Is Condescending In His Ignorance

We've apparently been unfortunate enough to recieve the attention of Len from esoterically.net. Len lives in Dallas and would like everyone to know that he is a liberal Democrat. He awarded us his "stuck on stupid award"(actually, we had to share it with Scott from Power Line... sigh). Anyway, he's not pleased with our little diatribe against the NYT:

Omri wins for this blog entry in which he attacks The New York Times for having the audacity to claim that FOX News employees Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig were released by the kidnappers in Gaza unharmed despite the fact that they were forced at gunpoint to “convert” to Islam. Omri maintains that this forced conversion did Centanni and Wiig irreparable harm and that the folks at the Times were “blistering idiots” for claiming that they were released without harm... Does Mr. Ceren sincerely believe that Centanni and Wiig “converted” to Islam and will now become practitioners of that faith? Is not conversion a matter of the soul? Do you really convert to another religion simply by being forced to speak some words by someone holding a gun to your head?

Actually, as a matter of fact, no it's not just a "matter of the soul". Faith has never been divorced from physical actions and utterances in this world, either metaphorically or theologically. This has been true for everyone from the most sparkling Protestant thinkers (CS Lewis: a physical weight was removed) to Catholic theologians (Pascal: kneel and you will believe) to Jewish and Christian martyrs in the Bible who died rather than utter blasphemy. The entire tradition of Judeo-Christianity emphasizes the productive intertwining and tension between material corporeality and immaterial substance. The physical movements that congregants enact and the words that they utter mediate their relationship with the eternal. That's why there are readings and recitations in shul and church. That's why Christians cross themselves instead of just imagining themselves crossing themselves. This isn't even a debate. Of course Judeo-Christianity holds that "speaking some words" matters - that's why literally millions of people have been tortured to death rather than verbally deny their faith. How could anyone who doesn't realize that ever be confident enough to engage anyone in any debate about theology - let alone to be as insufferable as Len the liberal Democrat is when doing it.
We know this might be difficult for Len the liberal Democrat to understand: words matter. No, no don't argue. They really do. There's this impulse in some activist circles to pretend that they don't - to pretend that 'what you really believe' is more important than either what you say or what you accomplish. And if our social projects were as routinely disastrous as theirs, we'd hold on to that impulse just for the sake of sanity. But the great religions have been around far too long and have had far too many theological debates for that absurd abdication of responsibility to seem reasonable.
You know what really bothers us? It's not the pathetically self-important stunt of naming an award and then ironically handing it out. It's this insufferable liberal conceit that (1) presumes to walk into a discussion the contours of which one doesn't understand, (2) substitutes feel-good mantras for rigorous thought ('it's a matter of the soul, man'), and (3) is actually sarcastic and arrogant despite being hopelessly out of depth. You see it across the board, from vexing economic problems to brewing international crises to complicated moral questions. There's this unblinking and shameless overconfidence that presumes that people who have been talking about these things for decades and centuries have simply missed a very obvious (coincidentally liberal) platitude that solves everything. As if millions of martyrs and the best theological minds in history simply missed Len's insight that saying you're converting isn't the same thing as converting. It's so obvious, he even asks it in the form of a condescending rhetorical question. It's like you have to be an idiot not to realize that, right? Too bad he hasn't been around through the ages to comfort all those martyrs with his theological brilliance: words don't count.
"Is not conversion a matter of the soul?" What an tool.
Omri | |

Jews for Jesus Pisses Off One of the Most Jewish Men Alive

Jackie Mason, cofounder of One Jerusalem and among Judaism's most cherished treasures, has improbably managed to increase his tribe-street cred even more by going after Jews for Jesus:

Saying he's "as Jewish as a matzo ball or kosher salami," Jackie Mason filed a lawsuit against Jews for Jesus for using his name and likeness in a pamphlet. The $2 million lawsuit seeks the immediate destruction of the pamphlet, which members of the missionary group have been handing out at various points around New York City. "While I have the utmost respect for people who practice the Christian faith, the fact is, as everyone knows, I am as Jewish as a matzo ball or kosher salami," the 75-year-old comedian said in documents filed in state Supreme Court in Manhattan.
Founded in the 1970s, Jews for Jesus practices Judaism but regards Jesus as the Messiah. The pamphlets feature an image of Mason next to the words "Jackie Mason ... A Jew for Jesus!?" with information inside that outlines the similarities between Jews and Christians.

As always, we're of two minds about New York-based activity by Jews for Jesus missionaries. On one hand, it's obviously annoying to have your religion hijacked by theological newcomers who have zero familiarity with theoretical exegesis - but who feel really, really passionately about their beliefs (they're kind of like religious versions of many liberal academics). On the other hand, there's always a chance that some liberal New York Jewish hipster will be passing by, overhear a conversation, and actually learn something about the Old Testament.
Omri | |

Kofi Annan Is Starting to Get Predictable

Sigh. Obviously:

In a departure from language used by the U.N. Security Council, Secretary-General Annan yesterday linked the issue of releasing Israeli soldiers to freeing Lebanese terrorists held by Israel. Hezbollah demanded a prisoner swap when it kidnapped the two soldiers on July 12, launching a month-long war... He then dropped a key provision in Security Council resolution 1701 that called for the immediate release of the two Israelis - whose kidnapping was the cause for the month-long war between Israel and Hezbollah - without reference to an immediate release of any other prisoners. At America's insistence, under the terms of the resolution, the release must be "unconditional." The document also deals with the fates of the two Israelis and the prisoners in Israeli jails separately.

As always, the frustrating thing isn't the perennial anti-Israel bait-and-switch - where Israel gets baited with something decent, like peace, and then there's a switch to something that's the opposite, like war (or the bait is getting soldiers back, and then the switch is to not getting the soldiers back). The frustrating thing is that everybody always knew that the UN and the Europeans and Israel's Arab enemies would back out of their commitments - and yet negotiations were conducted as if that wasn't common knowledge. If we were an Arab entity negotiating with Israel, we would offer enormous promises of normalization and peace in order to get massive concessions - because we'd be very secure that we could always back out of what we promised, whereas the Israelis would be forced to live up to their deal. Like the Oslo Accords. Or Israel's withdrawal from Lebanon. Or the Wye Agreements. Or... hey!
Omri | |

We Think Ahmadinejad Might Actually Be Crazy

There are days when we manage to convince ourselves that Ahmadinejad knows what he's doing. During those times, we end up believing that while he's pathological and evil, he has a decent grip on reality. So he knows that the Holocaust happened, for instance, but he's engaging in a deliberate rhetorical strategy to delegimitize Israel for theological reasons. But actually, he's just crazy:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has told German Chancellor Angela Merkel that the Holocaust may have been invented by the victorious Allied powers in World War II to embarrass Germany, the semi-official news agency Mehr has reported. Ahmadinejad's remarks came in a letter sent to Merkel in July whose contents have not been disclosed until now. "Is it not a reasonable possibility that some countries that had won the war made up this excuse to constantly embarrass the defeated people ... to bar their progress," Ahmadinejad wrote. "The question is if these countries, especially Britain, felt responsible for the Holocaust survivors, why they did not settle them in their own countries?"

No wonder Merkel heaped scorn on the letter.
But the greater problem is this: for any diplomatic strategy to work - any at all - the people talking at least have to live in the same reality. They don't have to agree on everything - in this case, people can disagree about the extent of the Holocaust and still engage in something we'd call communication with each other - but there has to be some sort of common basis. Ahmadinejad really seems to believe that the Holocaust didn't happen. Why else would he make this claim to an actual German, except with the belief that secretly she knows it too and is just looking for the political backing to say it out loud? If he's really that far gone, there's a very real sense in which he doesn't live in the same world that the rest of us do. The great events that have shaped our lives and our sensibilities simply don't register with him. He is that far gone.

UPDATE: The German press has a hold of this story now. Ahmadinejad's attempt to make them feel better by convincing them that the Holocaust was a cruel joke played on them by the Allies doesn't seem to be going well. The picture of Merkel that they're running must be her unhappy face, and the photo is captioned "Merkel was not amused by the letter from Iran"
Omri | |

Indonesia Illustrates Muslim Definition of Tolerance

This is really just too perfect:

Former MK and Haaretz journalist Yossi Sarid has declined an official offer from the Norwegian government to grant him citizenship so he can attend an international conference on freedom of expression and tolerance in Bali, Indonesia. His invitation was rescinded because he is Israeli. Three months ago, Sarid was invited by the Norwegian foreign ministry to attend the Global Inter-Media Dialog in Bali, which is being co-sponsored by the prime minister of Norway and the president of Indonesia. Sarid was among 60 journalists invited to take part in the conference, whose stated goal is "bridging gaps between different religions, cultures and peoples."
However, three weeks ago the Norwegian embassy in Israel informed Sarid that Indonesia refuses to grant him a visa "in the existing circumstances." According to Sarid, the Norwegian foreign ministry assured him that a solution would be found since Norway considers it "a matter of principle." On Friday the Norwegians offered their solution: Sarid could travel to Indonesia on a Norwegian passport. Sarid rejected the offer in a letter yesterday addressed to the Indonesian president and Norwegian prime minister. "No self-respecting person in the world, no person who respects his nationality, would accept such a skewed proposal," Sarid wrote, and called on other conference invitees to boycott the meeting in protest.

(1) Sarid's "invitation was rescinded because he is Israeli... the conference... goal is 'bridging gaps between different... peoples'". Ponder that for a little while.
(2) Norway considers not letting intolerant Muslims reject Israeli and Jewish participants - a principle they hold so dear that they urged Sarid to stop being Israeli so that he could go. Why not just offer him a baptism and get it over with? Good to know exactly how much European principles are worth in the face of Muslim Jew-hatred.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

We're Considering the Possibility that Walt and Mearsheimer Might Not Be Faking Their Ignorance

We're quite convinced that Walt and Mearsheimer aren't anti-Semites. How they came up with the preposterous idea that American foreign policy is oriented toward securing Israel's interests is anyone's guess. We're not ready to dismiss a life-long commitment to piss-poor social science as a possible explanation, but there are also more subtle possibilities. Perhaps out of confusion and frustration at their declining influence, they reached out unconsciously for the least controversial position in the American academy: pro-Israel neocons have taken over the Bush administration. But there's one possibility that hasn't been given serious consideration - and it's one that, given their deserved stature in international relations, we're loathe to introduce. But after their stunt today with CAIR, we think that this possibility should at least be in the realm of consideration: they might just not know anything about the US's actual Middle East policy.
Their original paper was embarrassing in its oversights and misstatements:

Mearsheimer and Walt present the situation as one where the Jewish tail wags the American dog... If the Jewish stranglehold on policy has been so absolute since the days of Harry Truman, then what was Gen. Eisenhower thinking when, on the eve of an election 50 years ago, he peremptorily ordered Ben Gurion out of Sinai and Gaza on pain of canceling the sale of Israeli bonds... If it is Israel that decides on the deployment of American force, it seems odd that the first President Bush had to order them to stay out of the coalition to free Kuwait, and it is even more odd that the first order of neocon business has not been an attack on Iran, as Israeli hawks have been urging. Mearsheimer and Walt are especially weak on this point: They speak darkly about neocon and Israeli maneuvers in respect to Tehran today, but they entirely fail to explain why the main initiative against the mullahs has come from the European Union and the International Atomic Energy Authority, two organizations where the voice of the Jewish lobby is, to say the least, distinctly muted.

He might also have mentioned their intellectual dishonesty in complaining about US aid to Israel (aid that Israel was promised so that Jimmy Carter could get a Noble Prize by getting Israel to give up critical land - and security - to Egypt, which the realists supported because it moved Egypt out of the Soviet orbit) and in leaving out the part where Bush Sr. almost cut off aid to Shamir because of Israeli settlements.
All of these oversights might be understood - if not excused - as attempts to put together a coherent and consistent hit-piece. And we're far more willing to entertain the possibility that two professors are being dishonest before we consider the possibility that these two IR giants are just flat ignorant. And yet, Rick Richman's very concise decimation of their CAIR conference makes this twice that they've been egregiously mistaken about the history of Middle East policy:

Their analysis was exemplified by Walt’s assertion that the United States ended up with Hamas because -- beholden to Israel -- the U.S. gave Mahmoud Abbas "nothing." That’s what the man said, "nothing." Neither of them mentioned the fact that George W. Bush formally endorsed a Palestinian state (assuming the Palestinians built a “practicing democracy” with leaders “not compromised by terror”), nor the fact that the U.S. -- while waiting in vain for Abbas to meet his initial Road Map obligation of "sustained, targeted, and effective operations aimed at confronting all those engaged in terror and dismantlement of terrorist capabilities and infrastructure" -- nevertheless (a) pressured Israel into releasing 900 prisoners to help Abbas (a step not required in the Road Map); (b) supported Sharon's plan to simply give Abbas all of Gaza (under the mistaken assumption it would generate popular support for Abbas); (c) supported Abbas financially with tens of millions of dollars in handouts, and with pledges of billions more; (d) watched without protest as Abbas took the money and padded the public payroll with "security forces," instead of building schools or hospitals or houses for refugees; and nevertheless (e) continually supported Abbas as a "man of peace."

More dramatically, Bush basically treated Sharon like the leader of a client state when he turned to him during the meeting the two had with Abbas and said "you're going to help this man". We don't know what Walt and Mearsheimer are up to, and we're increasingly of the opinion that they don't know either.

UPDATE: They don't know anything about domestic politics either:

University of Chicago political scientist John Mearsheimer was in town yesterday to elaborate on his view that American Jewish groups are responsible for the war in Iraq, the destruction of Lebanon's infrastructure and many other bad things. As evidence, he cited the influence pro-Israel groups have on "John Boner, the House majority leader." Actually, Professor, it's "BAY-ner." But Mearsheimer quickly dispensed with Boehner (R-Ohio) and moved on to Jewish groups' nefarious sway over Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), who Mearsheimer called "Von Hollen."

This actually makes things much easier. The reason that Walt and Mearsheimer are wrong about the way Washington works is because they don't know anything about Washington. Done and done.

UPDATE 2: Don't miss this part from the Milbank article:

Mearsheimer made no such distinctions as he used "Jewish activists," "major Jewish organizations" and the "Israel lobby" interchangeably. Clenching the lectern so tightly his knuckles whitened, Mearsheimer accused Israel of using the kidnapping of its soldiers by Hezbollah as a convenient excuse to attack Lebanon... As evidence that the American public does not agree with the Israel lobby, the political scientist cited a USA Today-Gallup poll showing that 38 percent of Americans disapproved of Israel's military campaign. He neglected to mention that 50 percent approved, and that Americans blamed Hezbollah, Iran, Syria and Lebanon far more than Israel for the conflict.

This is an oversight no social scientist of Mearsheimer's stature could possibly make unintentionally. Seriously, we're not being sarcastic here. Mearsheimer will embarrass each and every reader of this blog with his ability to manipulate data on an Excel sheet - this omission crosses into just sheer dishonesty on his part. Deliberate dishonesty, in turn, is not done without a purpose.
Omri | |

Dumbest Diplomacy Headline Ever... Today

Iran threatens to pull out of nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It's not like Iran being in the NPT is doing anyone any good. The NPT allows inspectors to check out nuclear facilities to make sure they're not being misused - and Iran is already turning away these inspectors. But big picture: Iran might pull out of the NPT? Oh no! Then they might do something really crazy - like putting a Heavy Water Reactor online or ramping up their nuclear program.
Omri | |

Shameless Plug Time

Go read our friend Chris McIntosh's sports blog New Fool In Town. Chris is a PhD student in the University of Chicago's IR department. While you're there, feel free to ask him why John Mearsheimer keeps saying anti-Semitic things. He'll find it funny, trust us.
Omri | |

Walt and Mearsheimer's Best Defense For Their Anti-Semitic-ish Accusations Is In Trouble

One of the basic questions in science ethics classes involves to what extent a scientist is responsible for what people do with her work. If someone discovers a new polymer and someone uses it to create a toxic gas, is she to be held accountable because she should have anticipated that use? More basically: if someone tells the truth, are they responsible if telling that truth has uncomfortable consequences. Now, Walt and Mearsheimer didn't tell the truth in their dual-loyalty-esque diatribe against the 'Jews and their friends' who supposedly control US foreign policy, but their defense is that they actually believe their piss-poor social science. So when unsavory characters hop on the Walt and Mearsheimer bandwagon, the claim of these two academics is that that it's not their fault if other people agree with their conclusions for different reasons.
So when David Duke triumphantly announces (about Eliot Cohen) that "Leading Neocon Jumps into the fray against Harvard paper and me!", we can imagine that Walt and Mearsheimer would say that it's not their fault that they're feeding racist fantasies because they disagree with the racist's reasoning. They agree with him that the Israel lobby has disproportionate influence on American foreign policy, but not for the reasons that he offers. One would expect them to at a minimum disassociate themselves from such reasoning at length (given that that's the obvious normative danger of their position), but let's not ask too much.
Here's the thing though - Solomonia reported earlier this weekend that Walt and Mearsheimer are teaming up with two CAIR officials to talk about how why the US acted the way it did during Lebanon II. Now we assume - in fact, we're quite confident - that CAIR's reasoning for why they oppose US actions is far, far different from what Walt and Mearsheimer tell themselves their reason for opposing AIPAC is. To that extent, it's fair to ask where they draw their line on proper and improper reasons to fear the Israel Lobby. They'll rub elbows with some people who agree with their conclusions for non-social science reasons (say, a distaste for Jews on the part of some CAIR members) but not with others (say, a distaste for Jews on the part of some of David Duke's supporters).
We don't think that Walt and Mearsheimer are anti-Semites. We just think that they're among the most stereotypical of the once-venerated academic realists: seething with resentment about the precipitous loss of influence they have experienced since 9/11 and very, very pissed off about US policy in the Middle East. For the better part of half a decade, they've been insisting that the Bush Administration's policy of democratization and regime change are undermining global stability - they have all but insisted that if only everyone would heed their advice and go back to propping up Arab dictators, this whole "Muslims want to conquer the world" thing would go away. But they have a problem: the palpable failure of decades of realism in the Middle East - as evidenced by things like global jihadism beginning in the 1990s - has made them sound kind of silly. Their "we should support tyrants" refrain hasn't really caught on. Having literati like Christopher Hitchens evicerate them in print might have been discomforting, but it must have been downright embarrassing when the Secretary of State - herself once a leading light of Sovietology and realism - publicly declared them to be irrelevant. And so a new strategy was needed. Even self-absorbed academics eventually notice when their pretentious tirades about how everyone is naive are becoming pathetic. Their solution: publish a rambling diatribe in a highbrow outlet. Fill the diatribe with the same old complaints about how turning away from realism will doom the US, but this time make a sensational accusation so that you can be sure you'll get attention: scandalously scapegoat someone that opponents of the Iraq War from across the political spectrum can unite in vilifying. Old realist line: "Arabs aren't good at democracy." New realist line: "Arabs are just like us. It's the Jews' fault that we're fighting them". Out of sheer frustration and confusion, Walt and Mearsheimer latched on to the most readily available foreign policy meme in academy: neo-cons control the Bush administration.
Our point is that they should have to be a little more honest in their backtracking. Refusing to endorse people who agree with their conclusions for hateful reasons was a coherent - if unpersuasive - start. But now they've proven that they're so desperate that they're willing to sit down with people who will agree with their conclusions for far more unsavory reasons. So they're back to sounding like anti-Semites, associating with anti-Semites, and having to claim that they're not anti-Semites. At this point, we think we're doing a better job arguing why they're not anti-Semites than they were.

UPDATE: This post has been changed since its original posting. No content has been changed, but numerous typos and outright linguistic errors have been corrected. Thanks to Lynn-B for the gentle email alerting us to these errors, an email that despite its gentleness used school-teacher red to indicate errors. Which was scary. But effective.
But scary.
Omri | |

Some Things You Didn't Know About Hezbollah and Syria (Hint: Syria Has Lebanese Prisoners, Hezbollah Openly Committed To Destroying Israel)

From the description at the bottom of this article, Magdi Khalil is a political analyst, researcher, author and Executive Editor of the Egyptian weekly Watani International. He is also a syndicated columnist for several Arabic language newspapers, and a frequent contributor to Middle East broadcast news TV. In an article about Lebanon II, he asks Nasrallah several questions. Three caught our eye:

10. Why hasn’t Hezbollah put pressure over Syria to release the hundreds of Lebanese captives which have been held for long years in Syrian prisons and who are in much worse condition then the Lebanese held in Israeli prisons?
11. Can Hezbollah compel Syria to delineate its frontiers with Lebanon under UN supervision, and what does Hezbollah exactly think about the frontiers issue?

The situation is thus as follows: Even granting Hezbollah's pretexts about the Shebaa Farms being Lebanese lands (which we don't believe and are granting only for the sake of argument)... if even granting those pretexts, it is still the case that Syria is in occupation of more Lebanese land than Israel and it is holding Lebanese prisoners in far worse conditions than Israel is. As recently as this weekend, Hezbollah had been explicit on these conditions:

Hizbullah has said that it would not surrender its weapons as long as Israel holds Lebanese prisoners, occupies the Shaba Farms and IAF planes fly in Lebanese airspace.

That being the case, if Hezbollah was interested in the Lebanese cause, they would be attacking Syria at least as often as they're attacking Israel. They're not because their real goal is to wipe out the Jews in Israel:

8. Mr. Hassan Nasrallah has publicly announced, more than once, that they are set to liberate Jerusalem once the Shab’aa farms is free, so will it be possible for Hezbollah to let go of the "liberating Jerusalem" theme, and restrict its speeches and its focus strictly on Lebanon?

On July 26th, after Hezbollah had committed their act of war by crossing the Blue Line and attacking Israel, the United States pressured Israel to put the Farms back on the negotiating table, ostensibly because this would sufficiently appease Hezbollah. Maybe they didn't hear the speeches that Khalil is referring to.
Omri | |

Visual Demonstration That the Media Lies

Israel got four Hamas terrorists in Gaza with a missile. All well and good, that's not what we're posting about. Instead, we'd like to put on a little demonstration. The first picture below of the car that the terrorists were riding in. This is a vehicle that has been hit by an Israeli missile:


This is the top of the press van that Reuters claimed was hit by a missile. Unlike the car above, it is not a vehicle that has been hit by an Israeli missile:


This another angle of the van. It is still not a vehicle that has been hit by an Israeli missile:


Here's the thing about the anti-Israel media: they lie.
Omri | |

NYT: Just Because You Were Forced at Gunpoint to Convert To Islam Doesn't Mean You Were Harmed In Any Way

UPDATE: Some of you are arriving here from posts that are not very friendly. We've tried to address some of those criticisms.

We know we said we were done for today, but really, these people have just lost it:

Two journalists kidnapped in Gaza were released unharmed today after being forced at gunpoint to say on a videotape that they had converted to Islam. The two journalists from Fox News - Steve Centanni, 60, an American reporter based in Washington, and Olaf Wiig, 36, a freelance cameraman from New Zealand - were held for 13 days in an abandoned garage in the Gaza Strip as hostages of a previously unknown group calling itself the Holy Jihad Brigades.

You idiot! You total blistering idiot! Being forced to convert is a harm. It might be the oldest harm short of death - being forced to renounce your faith and your god. Millions of people - literally millions - have died rather than deign to utter words that would force them to give up their faith. No wonder liberal journalists are utterly baffled by fully half of the United States - they don't think having to give up your religion is harmful. We are beyond certain that if Muslim prisoners at Gitmo were forced to convert away from Islam as a condition of their release, the New York Times would not be putting the phrase "released unharmed" into their lede. Way beyond certain.
There's a deeper explanation for how paragraphs like this can get written. It's not really bias, as much as it is the blind spots imposed by any ideology. And within that dynamic are questions about the degree of myopia and the room for self-reflection that particular ideologies allow. But don't worry about that right now. Just bask in the beauty of the phrase "released unharmed... after being forced at gunpoint to say... that they had converted to Islam"
Omri | |

MR Is Too Confused to Continue

We give up.
PA government spokesman Dr. Ghazi Hamad:

Dr Ghazi Hamad, the spokesperson of the Palestinian government, waged scathing criticism against the Palestinian public on Sunday, blaming the Palestinians for turning the Gaza Strip into a lawless and violent place. "Have mercy on Gaza," he wrote in an op-ed published on Sunday.
"After the withdrawal from Gaza, we hoped for a bright future, we thought that this year we will reap the fruits of our sacrifices. But I ask myself today – why did the occupation return to Gaza. The occupation – wise men and commentators will say – is responsible. I am not defending the occupation, but I want to stop at our mistakes, which we are accustomed to blame on others... Anarchy, wanton killing, land steeling, thuggery … is the occupation responsible for all?," he asked, saying that the Palestinians should stop espousing conspiracy theories which "limit our thinking."

Hezbollah head terrorist Sheik Hassan Nasrallah:

Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said in a TV interview aired Sunday that he would not have ordered the capture of two Israeli soldiers if he had known it would lead to such a war... "We did not think, even 1 percent, that the capture would lead to a war at this time and of this magnitude. You ask me, if I had known on July 11 ... that the operation would lead to such a war, would I do it? I say no, absolutely not," he said in an interview with Lebanon's New TV station.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (actually, we think that this one is kind of a fib):

Ahmadinejad's defiant stance comes days ahead of a United Nations deadline for Iran to halt uranium enrichment work. "No one can deprive a nation of its rights based on its capabilities," he said in a speech to inaugurate a new phase of a heavy-water reactor project southwest of Tehran. "Iran is not a threat to anybody, not even to the Zionist regime," he said, using the Islamic Republic's term for arch-enemy Israel, which it does not recognize.

This is getting too weird. We're taking the rest of the day off
Omri | |

Will the Press Finally Find a Scandal They Can Pin On Israel?

At the risk of being dull in our repetition, the IDF doesn't intentionally target media vehicle. They don't intentionally target UN infrastructure (unless you count roads built for Hezbollah by the UN). They don't intentionally target Red Cross ambulances. For some reason - assiduous neutrality - the press seems to be searching for an anti-Israel story to run (the last seven or eight really good scandals all turned out to be hoaxes). So last night, they announced that a clearly marked Reuters van had been hit by an Israeli missile. Except this morning it turns out that there's no way a missile hit that van and that there were no clear markings - because, among other things, the van was in a combat zone... at night!
Omri | |

Prisoner Ploy is So Transparent It's Sick

We'll let others debate out the theoretical and moral merits of converting to Islam in order to save your life. On another register, we're finding it very hard to disagree with this analysis from DEBKA:

Shortly after Centanni and Wiig were snatched by masked gunmen in Gaza on Aug. 14, the various intelligence agencies operating in Gaza knew who the kidnapper was: the Palestinian warlord Zakaria Dughmush, who had been hired by the same Hamas group which on June 25 kidnapped and - is still holding - the Israeli soldier Gilead Shalit... In the final reckoning, the Palestinians were granted a face-saver – the Hamas prime minister in particular, who is using the release of the American and the New Zealander to whitewash his organization, without freeing the Israeli soldier.

This isn't normal DEBKA "we looked into our crystal ball and this is what it told us" stream of consciousness. The Palestinians have admitted that they knew where the reporters were being held all along - and now the media is treating the PA like heros for getting them released. And you remember how rightwing bloggers mocked the media's parroting of the "previously unknown terror group" phrase (because of the known Palestinian tactic of making up new organizations so that their master organizations - Hamas, Fatah, etc - don't get blamed)? That turned out to be true:

PA security officials said they knew the identity of the kidnappers from day one, but refused to elaborate. They said the kidnappers belonged to one of the local militias in the Gaza Strip that used the name Holy Jihad Brigades as a cover- up.

It's like they're not even trying any more. They know they can be as shameless as they want and the West will still pretend not to know what's going on - because if anyone actually said out loud that most Palestinian groups were working together most of the time, then it would be much harder to appease the groups one by one.
Omri | |

BREAKING: Comprehensive Prisoner Exchange Deal Imminent?

About 20 minutes ago, Walla (Hebrew) passed on a report from the newspaper Ma'ariv. We can't find this report on Ma'arive's website, so we assume that they're talking about the print edition which just hit newsstands. Apparently, the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram, quoting reliable sources, says that German mediators have worked out a prisoner exchange deal. This deal is not finalized, but the expectation is that within 2 to 3 weeks Israel will release a still unspecified number of prisoners in exchange for the three soldiers kidnapped by Hamas and Hezbollah. More updates as we get them.
Omri | |

Ahmadinejad Says That Nukes Not a Threat to Israel

This guy runs a regime that refers to Israel as a two-bomb country. He's said that every resource of his country is devoted to confronting the West, and he considers the destruction of Israel to be the first stage of that confrontation. But he wants you to know that - in contrast to every single other thing he does - his country's nuclear program is actually not a threat to Israel:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Saturday that his country poses no threat to Israel, and that no one can deprive Iran of its right to nuclear technology. Ahmadinejad's defiant stance comes days ahead of a United Nations deadline for Iran to halt uranium enrichment work. "No one can deprive a nation of its rights based on its capabilities," he said in a speech to inaugurate a new phase of a heavy-water reactor project southwest of Tehran. "Iran is not a threat to anybody, not even to the Zionist regime," he said, using the Islamic Republic's term for arch-enemy Israel, which it does not recognize.

That's weird, because less than a week ago he was saying that Iran would lead the fight to destroy "the Zionist regime". So forgive us for not exactly finding his reassurance as comforting as liberals might.
Omri | |

IDF Hits Reuters Vehicle - Countdown to Lunacy Begins

Slow news day:

Two journalists were wounded by an Israeli air strike that hit a Reuters vehicle near Gaza City on Saturday, doctors and residents said. One of the journalists, who worked for a local media organisation, was seriously wounded. A cameraman working for Reuters was lightly wounded in the air strike, the doctors said.

If they wanted to do real damage, they would have called Adobe to have Reuters's Photoshop license revoked.

Witnesses said the missile struck the Reuters armored car despite the fact it was clearly labeled as a media vehicle, with signs on all sides, including the roof. Sabbah Hmaida, who works for a local news Web site, was seriously wounded in the legs... The airstrike came as Israeli soldiers backed by two dozen tanks, two bulldozers, helicopters and drone planes moved into an area just inside the Gaza Strip near the Karni crossing, witnesses and Palestinian security officials said. The IDF said the troops were searching for explosives planted by Palestinian militants alongside the border fence.

In a village that Israel has to raid in order to kill local terrorists, we wouldn't trust "local witnesses" to tell us if it's daylight or nighttime. Here's the thing: we think that it's plausible that they have an incentive to lie in order to make Israel look worse. Now, in the past, we obviously would believe witnesses if their descriptions were confirmed by journalists' observations. Not so much any more.
We don't really think that this is complicated: these people lie in order to demonize Israel. They lie a lot. They lie shamelessly. And a lot of people have always suspected that they lie, but this time enough smart people took enough time to conclusively demonstrate it.
Listen, you shmucks, the IDF doesn't intentionally target media vehicle. They don't intentionally target UN infrastructure (unless you count roads built for Hezbollah by the UN). They don't intentionally target Red Cross ambulances. No Israel commander wakes up and says "let's go ahead and commit a human rights atrocity", and no Israeli soldier targets assets outside the scope of their mission just for fun. Your dark fantasies of evil Jews aside, it's just not the way it works.
Omri | |

Sure, Why Not Let People Who Want To Kill Jews Guard Israel?

Nebraska has a legal problem, and this is the problem: they fired a KKK member because there was a greater than even chance that he wasn't going out of his way to protect black people. Now he's suing to be reinstated. We're not sure about the legal niceties of the dispute, but as a matter of common sense this debate isn't even close: the reason we don't let people like that work those kinds of jobs is because we just don't trust them to put aside their personal views in order to discharge their professional duties... which is probably a great reason not to let troops from Muslim countries defend Israel:

The Israeli government said Saturday it is asking friendly Muslim countries to contribute troops to the U.N. force that is to help police the cease-fire in southern Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah. The U.N. wants Muslim troops included to lend credibility in the region to what so far is a mostly European force, and the predominantly Islamic nations of Indonesia, Bangladesh and Malaysia have offered to participate. But none of those recognize Israel, which says it would be reluctant to share intelligence with a force that included Muslim nations it doesn't have relations with. While Israel does not have any veto, its opposition to a country could influence which troops are included.

Awesome. Just awesome.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

UNIFIL: Doing the Spying on Israel When Hezbollah Can't

Sometimes, members of Iran's Hezbollah proxy army had to run and hide from the IDF. During those times, we're sure they were happy to know that UNIFIL was doing their reconnaissance work for them:

UNIFIL... is officially neutral. Yet, throughout the recent war, it posted on its website for all to see precise information about the movements of Israeli Defense Forces soldiers and the nature of their weaponry and materiel, even specifying the placement of IDF safety structures within hours of their construction. New information was sometimes only 30 minutes old when it was posted, and never more than 24 hours old. Meanwhile, UNIFIL posted not a single item of specific intelligence regarding Hezbollah forces... the specific military intelligence UNIFIL posted could not be had from any non-U.N. source. The Israeli press--always eager to push the envelope--did not publish the details of troop movements and logistics. Neither the European press nor the rest of the world media, though hardly bastions of concern for the safety of Israeli troops, provided the IDF intelligence details that UNIFIL did.

And now there are thousands more of them on the ground!
Omri | |

Saturday Entertainment

Pamela vlogs about US mendacity and the Arab-Israeli conflict from the beach. In a bikini. The woman is a riot - arguably insane, sure, but a total riot.
Phish bowl does the obvious with the bikini vlog, and to be honest, the choreography looks amazingly well-planned. Like Pink Floyd - Wizard of Oz amazing.
When you're done with those two, Chris Hitchens was on Bill Maher's show, and took exception to the pretentious, insular, and self-congratulatory shallowness that passes for New York liberal anti-Bush sentiment.
Omri | |

British Auction House: Give Us Your Nazi Memorabilia, We'll Happily Sell It

Just in time for Iran's "we're going nuclear" festivities, comes this charming story:

Twenty-one watercolors and sketches attributed to Adolf Hitler are to be sold by a British auction house Sept. 26, officials said Friday. Ian Morris, auctioneer at Jefferys Auctioneers at Lostwithiel in Cornwall, southwest England, said the pictures were made when Hitler was a soldier serving in Flanders during World War I. The pictures, mostly pallid landscapes, are not regarded as adept, but the auctioneers say some could sell for up to $8,000 apiece.

Official endorsement of Nazi memorabilia. You know, we're beginning to think that Europe is getting a little too comfortable with their relationship to the Holocaust. Guilt unto the n-th generation is obviously unreasonable, but memory is not too much to ask.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

Iran Speeding Ahead Toward Bomb - Has Heavy Water Reactor

Unless we missed something in how-to-hide-your-nuke-program class, declaring you have an HWR - which is useful only for heavy element enrichment - isn't really something you're supposed to do (at least not until you already have a bomb). Iran isn't even trying to hide their intentions any more:


Good job Europe!

UPDATE: Hold on. Stop worrying - diplomats say Iran isn't going to use the heavy water for military purposes:

A Western diplomat confirmed that the heavy water project is not being used for military purposes, but added that such an announcement, at a time when the crisis between Iran and the west regarding the nuclear issue is at its peak, is a catastrophic step. Last Tuesday, Iran responded to the 'carrot and stick' offer of financial and diplomatic incentives, proposed by the five members of the UN Security Council and Germany, which was intended to goad Iran in halting its nuclear development without resorting to the use of sanctions. Despite the fact that the proposal was extended in June, sources in Tehran refused to respond, causing the six nations to issue an ultimatum to Iran to stop enriching Uranium by August 31.


UPDATE 2: We were a little glib in the original post. Obviously, HWR's can produce electricity like LWRs. But since Iran is already being offered light water reactors basically for free, the only reason they can be insisting on HWRs it is for plutonium enrichment.
Omri | |

How Appropriate

Details are in on the totally useless force Europe will contribute:

Europe pledged up to 6,900 additional troops to the expanded United Nations peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, European and UN officials said here Friday. But, they cautioned, the force will not be used to disarm Hezbollah.

6,900 is about the right number, given how totally and completely this deployment is going to blow.
It's Friday, we're done for the day unless something major happens. Shabbat Shalom.
Omri | |

Why Would Anyone Smart Say Hezbollah Achieved a Military Victory?

Amir Taheri makes a compelling case that Western journalists and academics who claim that Hezbollah achieved a great victory against are pushing an anti-Israel and anti-American line that has nothing to do with Hezbollah's very real plummeting popularity in Lebanon. As a contrast, last week Western academic and public diplomacy expert Marc Lynch wrote a short post about the conflict using the phrase "Hezbollah's victory" or some variant thereof five or so times - although he cited many of the same people that Taheri did. The critical turn comes with this line:

Similarly, Ragheda Dergham argues that the war clearly hasn't ended yet and all premature declarations of victory should be discounted (she is also one of the few to declare Hezbollah as much a loser as Israel, since - in her view - it weakened its claims to independence from Syria and Iran, while showing Lebanese that it would sacrifice their lives and land to its political goals).

That last part is not exactly accurate:

Hezbollah had to declare victory for a simple reason: It had to pretend that the death and desolation it had provoked had been worth it. A claim of victory was Hezbollah's shield against criticism of a strategy that had led Lebanon into war without the knowledge of its government and people... The tactic worked for a day or two. However, it did not silence the critics, who have become louder in recent days. The leaders of the March 14 movement, which has a majority in the Lebanese Parliament and government, have demanded an investigation into the circumstances that led to the war, a roundabout way of accusing Hezbollah of having provoked the tragedy. Prime Minister Fuad Siniora has made it clear that he would not allow Hezbollah to continue as a state within the state. Even Michel Aoun, a maverick Christian leader and tactical ally of Hezbollah, has called for the Shiite militia to disband...
The list of names of those who never endorsed Hezbollah, or who broke with it after its Iranian connections became too apparent, reads like a Who's Who of Lebanese Shiism. It includes, apart from the al-Amins, families such as the al-As'ad, the Osseiran, the al-Khalil, the Hamadah, the Murtadha, the Sharafeddin, the Fadhlallah, the Mussawis, the Hussainis, the Shamsuddin and the Ata'allahs.

The claim of a military victory - being unthinkingly parroted now by ignorant journalists as well as respected academics - is Hezbollah's primary rhetorical tactic for silencing critics. If survival is victory, then Hezbollah won. But if victory means not having your side on the wrong side of a 10-1 casualty ratio and not having your 5-year-in-development stock of weapons depleted, then no, Hezbollah did not achieve a victory.
Which is not to say that the Israeli government wasn't negligent to the point of political suicide for not coming at Hezbollah harder and winning sooner. It's just that claiming Hezbollah objectively won on the battlefield is (a) wrong and (b) Hezbollah propaganda.
Omri | |

France to Lead UNIFIL

From the country that brought you the Dreyfus Affair, synagogue arsonists, and a total lack of commitment to prosecute same:

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on Friday European nations would provide the backbone of a 15,000-strong United Nations peace force for Lebanon and he had asked France to lead it. Long-awaited clarification over the leadership of the force came after Annan held emergency talks with European foreign ministers to overcome EU members' reluctance to send soldiers on what is seen as a risky mission.

Strictly from a military perspective, we think this is a bad idea. The French have no experience guarding a wall that genocidal Jew haters can't just drive around.

UPDATE: Awww... that's just so precious:

Signor Prodi offered to take the lead in the force and won backing from other Western capitals. Yesterday he said that President Bush had taken a “positive” view of Italy’s offer to lead the force. But Italy’s stance has ruffled feathers in France, the former colonial power that sees itself as the natural leader of the international community in Lebanon. Philippe Douste-Blazy, the French Foreign Minister, said this week that France retained command of the UN force under existing arrangements until February.

You know what, we take back what we said earlier. Without a stronger mandate, UNIFIL's role is to basically to give radical Muslims a chance to rearm and, if necessary, to fight a losing battle with their backs agianst the wall. The French are perfect.
Omri | |

US Congressmen Discover that Palestinian Terrorists Not Interested in Capturing Other Palestinian Terrorists

Via Vital Perspectives (via our newly reconfigured RSS reader), we find out that Sens. Lugar and Biden are less than pleased with the Palestinian Authority:

In an email alert from The Hill, we learn that Sen. Richard Luger (R-IN), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE), the panel’s ranking Democrat, are trying to pressure Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to do more to win the freedom of Fox News journalists Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig. Abbas and Palestinian PM Ismail Haniyeh intervened in the hostage situation, according to an AP report, but Luger and Biden are unsatisfied with those efforts. "We urge you to redouble your efforts to peacefully resolve this situation, securing the release of the two hostages unharmed, and bringing to justice those responsible for this unprovoked act," Luger and Biden wrote in a letter made public Thursday.

Here's where we'd usually outline past Palestinian foot-dragging when it comes to investigating crimes against Americans committed by Palestinians (shocking, we know). But you know what, screw it. If Luger and Biden were serious about making the Palestinians do something, they'd have the State Department leverage US aid. It'd be just like the statements that the State Department sends to Israel, except instead of "Israel" they'd put in "the Palestinian Authority" and instead of "stop defending yourself" they'd put in "free the journalists that you captured".
But they won't.
PS - sorry for the bitterness, but it was either that or the line "redoubling zero is still zero". And we respect you too much to do that to you.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

Blog Roundup - 2006-08-25

* Is this really true? Smooth Stone has been on this "Palestinians* are about to declare an Islamic caliphate in Gaza" kick, and now it might actually happen.

* Benjamin from Kesher Talk takes time out of his busy schedule to dismantle Peace Now claims piece by piece.

* A week ago Pamela posted part one of a letter from Diane West describing how the Bush administration should deal with the existential threats faced by the West. Part II is now up.

* Neo-neocon decodes what hte French mean when they describe Iran's nuclear posture as "unsatisfactory". Turns out, it's not simply "obviously eventually we're going to let you screw us with our pants on, but since we're French we're going to strut around for a while first". There's actually more to it... who knew? You learn knew things every day.

* The American Thinker passes on evidence that courts of sound competence have taken to openly mocking Val Plame's and Joe Wilson's delusions of super-secret granduer.

UPDATE: The original version of this post stated that Hamas was about to declare a caliphate. This was incorrect. It appears that the group thta is ostensibly about to do this is "more extreme" than Hamas. Wrap your mind around that.
Omri | |

MR Has Questions About New Israeli Polls

New numbers are in:

Recent polls reveal that the public deems Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert unfit to continue serving his post. According to a poll published Friday in the Israeli daily newspaper Yediot Ahronot, 71 percent of the public believes Olmert is no longer competent to lead the country. Sixty-three percent of Israelis believe that Olmert failed in managing the war in Lebanon, and should consequently resign.

Could we please be introduced to the 37% of Israelis who don't think that Olmert failed in managing the war? We've always wanted to see comatose people actually talk and move around and stuff. Fortunately for Olmert, Amir Peretz is even less popular than he is - which means that to find a replacement Israelis have to turn to either Benjamin "my wife is kind of a lunatic" Netanyahu or Avigdor "I am kind of a lunatic" Leiberman. Unfortunately for Olmert, it looks like the Israeli public is more than willing to take that turn.
Omri | |

News Roundup - 2006-08-25 (Go Back to Bed - The News Sucks Edition)

Nothing but wall-to-wall depressing news this morning. Sorry.

* Former security national security adviser Giora Eiland (back when that meant something) gives an in-depth description of Ahmadinejad's motives, concluding that he would sacrifice half of Iran for the sake of eliminating Israel. This interview coincides with the news that Iran has acquired the sophisticated P-2 centrifuges that will allow them to speed up uranium enrichment. Not that they really need to speed up enrichment, points out another JPost investigation, since Russia still won't consider sanctions against them and the State Department has all but ensured that the US won't attack them. Halutz, for his part, is preparing Israel for a military confrontation with Iran. Hopefully, he won't be a total failure like he was last time.

* Remember how when 1701 was passed, everybody knew that the UN would never really try to disarm Hezbollah. Yet the resolution as if that was something Israel would get in exchange for stopping their response to Hezbollah's act of war? Yeah well, it turns out that Hezbollah is not going to be disarmed after all. Which is a surprise, really, given that Israel's Arab enemies are so well known for living up to their commitments (which they make in exchange for tangible Israeli concessions like land).

* Remember how when the US and the EU gave Mahmoud Abbas a ton of money to "help the Palestinian people", it was done with the promise that he wouldn't endorce Hamas until Hamas lived up to the Palestinian Authorities previous commitment (given in exchange for tangible land) to recognize Israel? Yeah, turns out Abbas will join Hamas even though Hamas is still committed to wiping out all the Jews in Israel.

* Don't say that Europeans lack ambition: not content to protect just Hezbollah in the north, the Italians are contemplating deploying human shields a peacekeeping force to Gaza too. Seriously, if Europeans put half as much energy into rooting out terrorists as they do to screwing Israel, they wouldn't be 20 years away from having Islamic law imposed on them by their own unassimilated immigrants.

* And finally, the US is investigating whether Israel violated secret arms treaties when it used US-supplied cluster bombs in Lebanon. What, exactly, would this treaty say? "Here are some weapons, but if you get attacked by the army of a party that helps to run a neighboring state, you're not allowed to use them. Good luck".
Omri | |

"Muslim Division" Meme: Not Wrong, Just Stupid

The media's best sophisticates have put their discerning minds to the Palestinian kidnapping of Fox News journalists and come up with the true explanation - Palestinians don't hate Jews or Westerners after all:

Despite their demand for a prisoner release exchange, the previously unknown Gaza captors may well be more interested in striking a blow against Palestinian leaders than Israel or the U.S. As vague as it was, the demand put forth Wednesday by a previously unknown Palestinian militant group calling itself the Holy Jihad Brigades who claimed to be behind the August 14 capture of two Fox News crewmen in Gaza appeared to be just part of yet another anti-Western kidnapping. In a videotape showing the two journalists - Steve Centanni, 60, a U.S. citizen, and Olaf Wiig, 36, a New Zealand cameraman - their captors demanded that in return for their release the U.S. should free an unspecified number of Muslim prisoners from its jails. But Palestinian security sources tell TIME that the conditions presented Wednesday are little more than a stall tactic, and that the seizure of the two men has much more to do with internal Palestinian and Islamic militant politics than with striking a blow against Israel and the U.S.

This kind of 'analysis' (and we use the term generally - it's actually ideologically overdetermined terrorist apologism qua cocktail party sophistication) is just a flavor of a much more common journalistic frame used to describe Arab and Muslim terrorism: the obvious motive (prisoner releases and jihadist terrorism) is actually not what's going on at all - what's going on is a more complicated, very Western-style dynamic (in this case, factional power struggle) that really has nothing to do with terrorism. You see the same kind of informed reasoning in the context of Hamas / Fatah conflicts - journalists what might look like terrorism (because Israeli civilians got blown up) is actually a sideshow in a power struggle between Arab factions.
We'd like to congratulate these sophisticated journalists - they've discovered that terrorism can accomplish multiple things for terrorists. Yes, these kidnappers might be engaging in a power struggle... but they're doing it through terrorism! Isn't that obvious? Yes, Fatah and Hamas may be struggle for power - but they're doing it by killing Jews and Westerners! This is not some sort of complex analysis - it's a description of a tactic.
And so the question must be asked: why focus on the motive instead of the tactic? We have no problems with power struggles as such (other than the fact that every month or so Fatah and Hamas tease us with a Palestinian civil war, and then always end up disappointing...) The problem is terrorism itself, and its legitimacy in the Arab and Muslim world. In a strange way, the observation that Palestinian terrorism is just a tactic in internal power struggles is even more damning than straight-forward terrorism: it unmasks their ideology as one in which non-Arab and non-Muslim lives are worth so little that they can be sacrificed on the altar of embarrassing other Palestinian groups.
That's the real problem with this kind of journalism: they've come across something that's obvious to even the crudest thinker (that you can accomplish multiple things with the same act), and turned that into a story that somehow seems to make terrorist motives disappear. Memo to TIME: even if they're terrorists interested only in internal struggles, they're still terrorists. Keep your eyes on the ball, and give up on the urge to excuse viciousness on the hope of out-New-York-Times'ing the New York Times.
Omri | |

Mark Steyn Is Funny

We're supposed to be locked down doing tonight's HateWatch, but one quick one from Mark Steyn:

There's a hoary old joke from a few years back in which the Secretary-General proposes that, in the interests of global peace and harmony, the world's soccer players should come together and form one United Nations global soccer team.
"Great idea," says his deputy. "Er, but who would we play?"
"Israel, of course."

Done and done.
Omri | |

Fifth Column Watch (They Really Do Support Hezbollah Edition)

These people are Israeli citizens who get money from the state and vote for Knesset members:

A majority of the Jewish Israeli public believes Israeli Arabs supported Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah during the war in Lebanon, according to a Dahaf poll conducted by Mina Tzemach. Some 18% of Israeli Arabs polled said they supported Hezbollah during the month-long war in the north. Some 15% of Jewish Israelis polled said all Israeli Arabs supported Nasrallah, while 40% claimed that most Israeli Arabs supported him. Some 21% of the respondents said that half of Israeli Arabs supported Nasrallah, and 21% believe that only a small minority of Israeli Arabs supported the Hezbollah leader.

This does help to explain why about one out of every five MKs from Arab parties seem to be outright traitors.
Also, memo to Olmert's staff: this would seem like an unfortunate time for you to be pushlishing pictures of your boss making nice Arab-Israeli leaders. Just a thought.
Omri | |

Blog Roundup - 2006-08-24

* Head Heeb Jonathan is a sometimes little too liberal for his own good - he got knocked around in the comments pretty badly on the night that Hamas won the Palestinian election, when he was trying to justify why the results didn't demonstrate Palestinian support for terrorism. Nonetheless, he genuinely without peer - at least in the Jewish blogosphere (and can we please get a name for this... jblogosphere? Jblogsphere? Jogosphere? Yeah - what jogosphere?) - when he's writing about Africa. Recently, he's been focusing heavily on what's happening in the DRC. The lack of interest that this gets in the West is unconscionable - if that many European countries were involved in that many conflicts for that long, we'd be calling it a World War. Jonathan has now posted a backgrounder on Congolese history that it would behoove you to read. And just as we finish writing this, he's put up a link-filled post about instability in Somalia.

* Is there a macro out there for making "All Your Base Are Belong to Us" mashups? There's the All You Snakes Are Belong To Us, which we think may be the canonical mashup. But now Reuters-least-favorite-person-of-the-year Rusty Shackleford has the downright outstanding All Your Fakes Are Belong To Us, a little piece of justified blog triumphalism. It even incorporates the probably fake Red Cross Ambulance Incident, that ZombieTime took piece by piece apart last night.

* AK Sommer wants men to keep it in their pants. KesherTalk wants more or less the opposite. Esther at Jewlicious giggles at the word titular and links to VH1's Random Facts about Jews (according to Mel Gibson) ("Jews are to blame for all those stupid Adam Sandler songs" - probably and unfortunately true... "Jews don't enjoy rainbows" - probably not true). Esther also welcomes Shawn Green to New York, which has nothing to do with sex, but we really like Shawn Green.
Omri | |

UNIFIL Force Begins to Take Shape

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni met with French and Belgian officials yesterday, and came home with a promise for more European troops. Italy had already announced an additional 3,000 troops, and if we read this right then Vital Perspective has Chirac promising about 2,000 more troops. In other news, Hezbollah leaders are said to be locked in meetings trying to figure out the best way to use the the 5,000 new human shields that they've just been promised... especially since UNIFIL has announced that they won't be doing anything useful like actually disarming Hezbollah.
Omri | |

Palestinian Terrorists Are Stupid

Oh for crying out loud:

About 50 masked Palestinian militants set off a landmine Thursday near the concrete wall marking the Gaza-Egypt border, Palestinian security officials said. The explosion caused little damage to the wall, the officials said.

No wonder the IDF was so unprepared to face Hezbollah. They've spent the last five years honing their tactics to deal with complete idiots.

UPDATE: Now that we think about it, this was Ze'ev Schiff's analysis about how policing in Gaza blunted the IDF's fighting abilities (of course, he's a genius and we're just trying to make a cheap joke). David Gertsman took exception to Schiff's article as marked by ideology, but it does seem at least plausible that fighting incompetent Palestinians left the IDF unprepared to fight the best trained, best armed, and most entrenched Arab foe that Israel ever had to face on the battlefield.
Omri | |

Canadian Islamic Association Wants to Remove Hamas and Hezbollah from Canada's Terrorism List. MR Agrees!

Judeoscope has a story up about the ongoing efforts by the Canadian Islamic Association (last seen organizing a Quebec rally where marchers swore oaths of loyalty - to death - to Nasrallah) to get Hamas and Hezbollah removed form Canada's list of terrorist organizations. And really, what has Hamas or Hezbollah done in the last couple of months that would justify those labels... other than kidnapping journalists and murdering civilians in order to advance political agendas?
Judeoscope also picks up on the not so subtle Jew baiting going on: "the CIC claims the listing of the two Islamic terrorist groups was ‘dictated by special interest groups’... opposed to ‘peace with justice’" It's must be the Canadian version of the Israel Lobby! Quick - somebody put Walt and Mearsheimer on the scent.
Listen, we'll take the stand that we always take when these efforts come up: we fully support removing Hamas and Hezbollah from the list of terrorist organizations, since we consider them (as the leaders of the Palestinian Authority and as members of the Lebanese government) to be state entities for the purpose of international law. That would make their cross-border raids not terrorism, but acts of war committed in the name of the people they represent.
Omri | |

Kidnapping of Reporters by Palestinians Proves that Palestinians Love Peace! Brilliant!

Lynn's out in front of a concern we've been playing around with for a couple of days: when did the kidnapping of journalists by unrepentent Palestinian terrorists become an occassion for the celebration of "Palestinian culture"? These fanatics kidnap Westerners and demand that their terrorist bretheren be released from prison, and in response people push each other out of the way in their rush to sing odes to the Palestinian people and their culture. That would be the kind of culture that David Horowitz, in the wake of the Hamas election, described as that of the world's First Terrorist People.
As far as the families of the hostages are concerned, by all means, they should have no shame about flattering the terrorists. But Lynn also points to journalism that actually seems to be buying into the adulation that the families are heaping upon the presumably-beatific "Palestinian culture". Listen, no statement by a wife or brother is too fawning if uttering it might get a loved one free. But let's not pretend that Palestinian culture isn't very deeply marked by an adoration for suicide terrorism and the organizations that fund it.
Palestinians kidnap journalists in the name of Palestinian people and culture - and this becomes proof that Palestinian people and culture are overwhelmingly peaceful. This is only slightly less stupid than Westerners explaining to some of the best-read Muslim scholars on the planet - scholars believed by literally millions of followers - that they just haven't gotten the memo that Islam is a Religion of Peace. Hopefully, there will come a point where terrorist apologists will have to at least consider the possibility that Muslim fanatics know more about Islam than they do - and that Palestinian civilians know more about who really speaks for Palestinian culture than they do.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

Liberal New York Jews and the Liberal New York Jews Who Can't Stand Them

The liberal New York Jews at Gawker (we're not alwyas fans) are making fun of the very-much more liberal New York Jews that we totally can't stand. How's a not very religious Jewish blogger to choose:

Yesterday in Penn Plaza, a group of Jews held a die-in -- yes, a die-in, like a sit-in but with fake dying -- to protest Israel's "brutal" attacks on Lebanon ... Not only did they throw themselves on the ground to convey their "protest death," but they coordinated the die-in with other die-ins in Philadelphia, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Actually, we just made our choice. If you're a Jew that thinks that attacking people who advocate wiping out the five million plus Jews in Israel is a good idea, have the good decency to just shut the hell up. [they claim that they don't like Hezbollah but that Israel's attack was disproportionate -- ed yeah, because there's a single one of these insufferable moralists that understand a single thing about warfare - they would have opposed any Israeli action... besides, it's not like the things they say make sense - they're just parroting conspiracy theories about "neo-cons" that they got from Chomsky's latest ZNet rant]
Omri | |

OneJerusalem.org Interviews Reservists Protesting the Government

OneJerusalem.org has exclusive interviews with a couple of reservists who fought in Lebanon. The first is with Elisha Dickman, a reserve sergeant in the paratroopers, and the second is with Boaz Torfstein, who in his normal life is a Jewish Agency employee. Dickman is quite willing to give specific examples of incompetence, while Torfstein is probably more properly circumspect in describing the battlefield. You should also pay attention to Torfstein's genuine pain about losing colleagues to the IDF's ultra-humane battlefield tactics. Someone should give Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch the memo.
Anyway, long story short: morale started off high, but the government screwed up by not letting the IDF. Quite well and good. Although what worries us about both interviews is that there's a very real element of kol mamzer melech in these interviews. No, we're not going to explain - go ask a friend. Oh - and students criticizing this government for being too leftwing - give us a break.
That said, OneJerusalem.org has been doing a fantastic of a job lately getting a hold of really interesting interviews. If they're not on your RSS feeder, they should be.
Omri | |

Hollywood Outrage Update

Tom Cruise says that Ritalin isn't good for kids and Paramount breaks off a 14 year relationship. But Mel Gibson makes a movie fixating on the single moment in one of the four Gospels that damns all Jews for all generations, declines to distance himself his dad's Holocaust denying lunacy, and is all around a raging anti-Semite - and waves of industry flack rush to protect him. Personally, we blame the Jews. No, seriously, we do.

UPDATE: Some of you have pointed out that Tom Cruise's brand of crazy extends beyond just saying that Ritalin is bad for kids. Fair enough. He also believes that space aliens are whispering advice to him - but that just makes him qualified to be President of Iran. Why aren't Russia and China rushing to protect him?

UPDATE 2: Actually, on second thought, all that Mel Gibson did was imply that Jews control the world - which also qualifies him to be President of Iran.
Omri | |

Abbas Can't Even Implement Fake Ceasefire To Lock In Hamas's Victory

Yeah, so that's not really a surprise:

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was forced earlier this week to call off plans to deploy PA security personnel in the northern Gaza Strip when several armed groups, including militias from his own Fatah movement, threatened to attack these forces, PA officials here told The Jerusalem Post on Monday. Abbas had planned to deploy several hundred PA policemen and security officers in an attempt to stop the armed organizations from firing rockets at Israel, the officials said, noting that the proposed move had won the backing of the US and Israel.

We want to be very clear - our problem isn't with his failure to achieve a ceasefire. It's with the concept of a ceasefire itself. A ceasefire in Gaza right now would lock in a victory for Hamas exactly the way a ceasefire in Lebanon locked in a victory for Hezbollah. No one seems to remember that it was Hamas that ignited hostilities in Gaza by crossing an internationally recognized border into Israel to kill and kidnap Israeli soldiers. They still have one of those soldiers, and declaring a ceasefire allows them to keep him... allows them to profit from their act of war as the elected, recognized government of the Palestinians.
This is like if we invaded your house, killed one of your children, and then kidnapped another one. And then we ran with your child back to our house.
Then you run after us. But we meet you at our door and say: "no no no - how about we both agree to stop fighting".
To which you reply: "OK, seems reasonable - but first you have to give me back my child"
But instead of doing that, we threaten to take more of your children. And not only that, but we get some our mutual neighbors - many of whom are ostensibly your friends - and they take our side and start telling you things like "why can't you be reasonable and just stop fighting?"
And of course you say "we're more than willing to do that - just give me back my kid"
And then we get Amnesty International and the New York Times to say that you're standing in the way of peace.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

As Opposed to Israel, Hezbollah Actually Did Commit War Crimes

In a world where demonizing Israel was anything less than a badge of Leftist authenticity, groups like Amnesty International might be a little more circumspect in becoming pathetic and predictable caricatures of themselves. As international activists and Arab countries everywhere continue their campaign to demonize Israel for precision weapons that went awry, Hezbollah's use of Iranian-supplied Katyushas seems to have escaped the notice of our much-vaunted global humanitarian organizations. This energy can't be so one-sided because Hezbollah is not a state actor - it was Iran that supplied the missiles to their proxy army. So that's a bad excuse. And what hat makes the obvious bias more infuriating is that, while Israel's bombs are designed to take out installations (and while Israel drops leaflets instructing civilians to evacuate those installations), Hezbollah's rockets are designed specifically to commit the war crime of intentionally targeting - and hitting - civilians. They are in this sense weapons of terror in the most precise sense - they are designed to kill and maim civilians. Like the belts of suicide bombers, they are loaded with shrapnel set explode they detonate. That shrapnel, of course, won't do much damage to concrete structures - that's not what it's supposed to do. It's supposed to rip through flesh.

A while ago, we were emailed a PowerPoint presentation by blogger Smooth Stone, who in turn got it from his reader Lenny M. We've extracted some pictures out of the presentation (which, in its original form, is much more extensive) to demonstrate the utter depravity of Hezbollah's arsenal. This is an arsenal designed for the sole purpose of destroying the lives of Israeli civilians. Shrapnel from a Katyusha ripping through a metal sign...


... and steel and concrete...




... and trees. Hundreds of these rockets were sent raining the playgrounds of Israel, and there were Israeli kids playing in streets who were torn to shreds by this shrapnel:


So if Iranian-supplied and Hezbollah-launched rockets were designed to kill and maim civilians in the most grotesque ways possible - and they were in fact aimed at civilians... and if Israel's bombs were designed to take out military installations in the most bloodless ways possible - and they were in fact aimed at military installations... What could be driving the obsessive, entirely one-sided international condemnations of Israel?

Actually, don't think about this too long. It will just make you angry.
Omri | |

MR Begs Israeli Health Officials: Don't Just Think About the Kids

Ha'aretz links to this article off the frontpage with the statement "PTSD in schools: Some 22,500 children from Haifa and across the north will require therapy after the war". Sure, that's bad - but can you imagine the years of drugs and therapy that poor Dan Gillerman is gonna need when all this is over [you're really comfortable making jokes about kids who got bombed and need therapy -- ed not really, no - but seriously, can you imagine what it has to take to be Israel's ambassador to the UN?]
Omri | |

Liberals Find a Jew Hater They Feel Safe Criticizing

Holocaust denial that liberals care about:

Disturbing new details about Mel Gibson's past are emerging in the wake of his recent anti-Semitic tirade. The beleaguered star attended an event a few years back run by an Australian group notorious for denying the Holocaust, according to a June 2004 article in On Target, the newsletter of the Australian League of Rights - which claims to promote "loyalty to the Christian concept of God" but which has long held anti-Semitic views. Its national director, Don Autherlonie, didn't deny Gibson's attendance when contacted last week.

Holocaust denial that liberals defend as free speech:

On June 21, 2006, Lebanon's New TV aired an interview with U.S. author Norman Finkelstein, who wrote the book The Holocaust Industry. In the introduction to the interview, the New TV narrator asserted, "Never has there been an issue subject to as many contradictions, lies, and exaggerations regarding the number of victims as the issue of the Jewish Holocaust."

The other way we could have written this post is: "why is Hollywood so pissed off about the totally meaningless actor who denied the Holocaust but so totally ready to blame Bush when the former Pakistan Intelligence Chief quotes said actor?
Obviously, Mel Gibson is a shmuck of an anti-Semite. But in a world where what he says about Jews is actually believed by billions of people - some of whom have access to nukes... well, we're more concerned about the people who ignore those billions of anti-Semites than the one guy in Hollywood who they agree with. We'll be precise: we think the liberal outrage being directed at Mel Gibson is a pathetic way of deflecting attention from the fact that many liberals won't call out genuinely dangerous anti-Semites. These are people who are literally - in every sense of the word - more concerned about what Mel Gibson says than what Hezbollah TV says.
Omri | |

Ways That the UN Has No Credibility

* On the ground:

Hizbollah mourners on a funeral parade shoved aside anti-tank barriers at a United Nations base in Lebanon yesterday in a demonstration of their new political strength. The party had been told it would be allowed to bury three "martyrs" at the Naqoura town cemetery inside the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil) compound, but only if there was no flag-waving or political sloganising. When the chanting procession, several hundred strong, reached the gates, it found the way barred by cruci-form steel tank traps. Mourners argued with the French guards, but failed to gain entry. A mob of young men then dragged the barriers away and the UN opened the gates. "They will eat us alive," said a middle-aged official as the throng surged in.

* In the abstact:

US President George W. Bush said Monday he hoped the international community moved quickly to impose sanctions against Iran in case it decides to go ahead with its nuclear project. "There must be consequences if people thumb their nose at the United Nations Security Council," he said at a White House press conference. "We will work with people on the Security Council to achieve that objective."

Yeah, like if you don't enforce a resolution - say, 1559 - for years, then there will be consequences. Because if there aren't any consequences, then it will prove that Muslim radicals can thumb their nose at the UN indefinitely. Which is what happened.
Omri | |

MR Reacts to Bloggers' Conference Call With Israeli Ambassador Uri Lubrani - Public Diplomacy Probably Won't Work, and Counting On It Is Probably a Bad Idea

Last Thursday we were privileged to sit in on the most recent OneJerusalem.org newsmaker conference call, with the guest being Israeli Ambassador Uri Lubrani (link goes to page with audio file). The Ambassador has headed Israel’s Mission to Iran, served as Government Coordinator for Lebanese Affairs, Coordinator of the Rescue of Ethiopian Jews, chief negotiator for the release of Israeli hostages, and Israel's ambassador to Ethiopia and Uganda. There were a ton of people popping in and out of the call, but some of the people we recognized included Lynn-B from In Context, Anne from Boker Tov, Boulder, David Goder from One Jerusalem, Jerry from IsraPundit (where we've also been known to write from time to time), and Dr. Judith Klinghoffer from if-you-don't-know-where-what-the-hell-are-you-doing-reading-this.

Ambassador Lubrani, among the other things that we assume he's doing, is working with analysts in Jerusalem to analyze textbooks from the Arab world. In a few weeks time, this team will release a report that includes an evaluation of the Iranian curriculum. That analysis will demonstrate what even the most myopic Leftist apologist for Islamofascism ought to have recognized by now: the Iranian regime is gearing up for a protracted global conflict and a possible nuclear war. The target is not Israel but the US-led West - and it is not being driven exclusively by religious hatred, but is also influence by geopolitical considerations. The Ambassador repeatedly emphasized the tenor and significance of Iranian educational indoctrination: from the age of 6 until the end of secondary school, every Iranian schoolchild is taught that the United States is the very "incarnation of evil". This insistence on the need for Americans to recognize that Iran is coming after them (and not just after Israel) was also emphasized by former Prime Minister Netanyahu in the bloggers' conference call that occured last week.

Ambassador Lubroni's solution is to to speak directly to Iranians over the Iranian regime. He proposes what is essentially a public diplomacy effort of unprecedented size and scope - a commitment comparable to the one that the JFK made to beating the Soviets in Space Race. The Ambassador's reasoning rests on the following, presumably exhaustive, list of options that the West has in their confrontation with Iran:
(1) engaging the Iranian regime won't work - because AHMENIJAB is a lunatic who thinks that the 12th Imam sits on his shoulder and whispers advice to him)
(2) military options are unacceptable - because they'll start big wars in which lots of people will die (and also because, to be honest, the Ambassador seems like kind of a peacenik)
(3) encouraging the Iranian public to overthrow the theocratic regime might work - because they're sophisticated and will find ways to access Western sources of information

Now in the past, we have opined (perhaps overly glibly, perhaps not) that public diplomacy is intellectualized terrorist-apologism. Actually, we were a little less generous: the phrase was "barely-disguised terrorist apologism". Had we been in a fairer mood, though, we would probably could have been talked into conceding that public diplomacy is indeed intellectualized - making it intellectualized, barely-disguised terrorist apologism. Fair's fair, after all.

Public diplomacy, remember, is government-to-public communication. In the context of the Global War on Terror, the idea is that if we explain ourselves to the Muslim public and counteract the lunatic things published in their newspapers, they'll stop supporting people who are trying to wipe us out. What we don't understand is what the basis for that hope is - where did we get the idea that explaining our way of life to Muslim extremists will make them like us more? It seems that the opposite is more likely to be the case - if they really hate us because of our freedoms, then pedantically telling them about those freedoms is only going to make them hate us more. But even if you're an academic sophisticate who rolls your eyes at the phraes "they hate us for our freedoms" (maybe because you're practicing for a future State Department job), it's not that unreasonable to believe the following: since Muslim extremists really hate gay people, they will like us less when they learn that we let gay people march through the streets and express pride in their identity. Now we could explain ourselves to the Muslim world in a way that minimizes those kinds of freedoms: but defending our way of life by denying that it exists kind of misses the point, no?

But it gets worse - it's not only that public diplomacy doesn't work. It's that there might be harm in even trying. When Karen Hughes goes on "listening tours" through the Muslim world and sits down with Saudi tyrants, they tell her that the reason that there is so much anger in the Muslim world is because of Israel... or because of Iraq... or because of McDonalds. This, with due respect, is not true. Not in that "it is a lie" kind of not true, but more in that "it is an excuse designed to disguise the real cause - a mixture of religious fanaticism and cultural resentment bordering on violent pathology". And again, having Karen Hughes lied to by fanatics wouldn't matter - except that she's then inclined to try to influence American policy because she seems to believe those pretexts are genuine motives.

Listen - does anyone believe that the people who embrace cartoons of hooked-nosed IDF soldiers stabbing babies and who believe by 60 point margins in international banking conspiracies - does anyone really believe that they'll stop hating Jews if Israel stays out of Lebanon? Seriously? And of course, the answer is that maybe they'll hate Jews slightly less. Fair enough - but not less enough that they can be counted on to help Israel more than the destruction of a single Katyusha missile launcher. So why should Israel not destroy that launcher on the hope-against-hope that a single Indonesian civilian will hate the US just a little bit less - when the US clearly has an overwhelming interest in Israel's security?

So all things being equal, we're not overly enamored with Ambassador Lubrani's suggestion that the United States undertake a massive program of public diplomacy - a program equivalent to the commitment JFK made to land on the Moon. Following the Ambassador's logic, however, forces one to consider the possibility that in the case of Iran all things are not equal. His point that the Iranian population is vastly more sophisticated and modern than much of the Arab and Muslim world can be applied to this critique of public diplomacy (although he didn't do that work in the interview). It could be the case that in the sole case of Iran, his advocacy of "speaking over the Iranian regime in an aggressive fashion" might actually work.

This difference in the sophistication of populations, then, would be the only difference that potentially makes a difference in Iran. Most of the other things that the Ambassador discussed (the persecution of women, the abysmal economy, etc) are endemic across the Muslim world - and resentment about those conditions have been so successfully channeled against the United States (and against Jews) that trying to leverage public diplomacy probably lacks any credibility - it just fuels the broad and deep conspiracy theorization. But perhaps in Iran it's different (although if that's the case, why hasn't a broad-based movement developed? The closest they've ever gotten is former President Khatami, who moderately marched through the streets screaming "Death to America, Death to Israel").

Ambassador Lubroni is no fool, and he does not delude himself about the stakes involved in the West's confrontation with Iran: he states unequivocally his belief that this war will be fought, that it ought to be fought on our ground rather than Iran's, and that it might very well be fought in the shadow of a mushroom cloud. But his solution to wait for the Iranian public to get around to overthrowing the theocrats seems risky to the point of recklessness. Events might well overtake his dreams of a peaceful internal change - events that could come literally as soon as today, when we might wake up to find that a war has been forced upon the West by Iran. And if not today, then by the Ambassador's own analysis, by the week after or the month after.

Even if public diplomacy could work in the Iranian context (which is to say, even though it doesn't seem to make sense in the context of any other Muslim country), Israel, the United States, and the rest of the West simply may not have the time or the luxury to risk the very real possibility that it won't. Iran's missiles can reach Paris and London, and their terrorists can reach New York and Washington, DC - to say nothing about the densely populated Jewish State, which Iran refers to as a "two bomb country".
Omri | |

Siniora Asks International Media to Transmit Pictures of Israeli Atrocities. Which Is Kind of Like Asking Us to Keep Making Fun of Carter.

When Lebanese Prime Minister Siniora talks about Israeli crime, we usually just kind of let him get away with being hysterical because he's an impotent and pathetic crybaby whose country is occupied - minimally - by three different armies. But obviously, we can't let this part pass without comment:

"I hope all the international media will transmit this picture to every person in the world so that it shows this criminal act, this crime against humanity that Israel has committed in this area and every region of Lebanon." Siniora was speaking as a fragile UN-brokered truce to end the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah entered its seventh day.

Regardless of what other problems there are in his life, one thing that we think Siniora can rest assured about is that international media can indeed be trusted to transmit anti-Israel pictures (real or not) all over the world. Here we'd say something like "at least someone in Lebanon is on Siniora's side", but everyone knows that obviously Reuters works for Hezbollah, not Siniora. Then again, since Siniora made Hezbollah part of the Lebanese government, maybe in a way Reuters works for him too.
Besides, the last time Siniora accused Israel of crimes, it turned out that he didn't know that the number 40 (as in "forty civilian deaths") is further to the right on the number line the number 1 (as in "Lebanese officials are shameless liars who lied that there was a forty-person massacre when in fact there was only one tragic death"). So forgive us our skepticism about his intellectual or moral credibility.
Omri | |

Shilling for Hezbollah at The Australian

Yeah, OK:

The second reason for Hezbollah's defiance is the reaction of a million people to having been driven from their homes. Thousands streamed back last week to find entire areas flattened and their houses pulverised. Many wept and railed, yet their anger was directed not at Hezbollah for picking the fight with Israel, but at the Israeli forces for wreaking such devastation. The loyalty commanded by the belligerent yet humble Nasrallah constitutes the third reason for Hezbollah's air of resolution. Some fighters cried during a broadcast in which he said he kissed their feet in honour of their bravery on the front lines. Hezbollah's ability not only to withstand the Israeli attacks but to create mayhem in northern Israel has earned Nasrallah stellar status in much of the Arab world.

"Belligerent yet humble" should be reserved as a description for Dickens characters, not for the man who orchestrated a war that cost billions in damage and thousands in lives. We almost get the feeling that there are those elements in the international left who care much more about seeing Israel temporarily humiliated than about the deaths of actual people. And we get that feeling because it seems like there are those in the international left who are quite glad to dismiss all this nastiness about death in order to get to the part where Nasrallah is a hero.
Omri | |

Just a Single Thought About Rebuilding Aid

Relief organizations and not a few number of countries are devoting all of their efforts to rebuilding Lebanon:

The Lebanese government has estimated that the damage from the war will cost $3.6 billion to repair. A donors conference on humanitarian aid is set for August 31 in Stockholm and a second meeting may be held to address Lebanon's shattered infrastructure.

Wouldn't it be more fair for the world to come together and dedicate aid to Israel rather than Lebanon? Since Lebanon is the side that, you know, started the whole war in the first place?
Omri | |

Israel Sets Standards for Peacekeeping: Only Countries that Can Hide All or Some of Their Anti-Semitism Can Be Trusted to Protect the Jewish State

First, the very, very small line in the sand:

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Israel would not accept the presence of peacekeepers in Lebanon from countries that don't have diplomatic relations with the state, officials said on Sunday. The decision complicated efforts by the United Nations to form a 15,000-strong peacekeeping force to help enforce a truce that ended 34 days of fighting between Israel and Hizbullah.

Now the complaining:

France, which commands the existing peacekeeping force, called for a meeting of European Union countries to volunteer troops. Negotiations with other countries hit a snag, however, when Israel announced Sunday that it would reject forces from nations that don't have diplomatic relations with the Jewish state. That condition would rule out Malaysia, Bangladesh and Indonesia - among the few countries that already have volunteered to help enforce the cease-fire along the Lebanese-Israeli border.

We really can't believe that this is an issue. Wait, hear us out - we report about and berate and mock the international community all the time, but seriously, how can this possibly be an issue?
These would be soldiers - armed representatives of their respective governments - ostensibly protecting a country that their governments don't think has a right to exist. Polls show that they are overwhelmingly likely - by more than a 9 to 1 margin for most of their countries - to actively support Hezbollah's genocidal intentions. If these were soldiers from countries with anti-Israel populations but slightly less anti-Israel governments (say, if they were from Europe), then we still might say something like "oh well, they're professionals - they'll place their orders above their personal preferences". But even then we'd be wrong - which is an obvious and demonstrably true fact given the UN's complicity in Hezbollah's crimes against Israel.*
And you just know that these Indonesian and Malaysian and Bangladeshi soldiers would be even less professional than the Indian and French soldiers who have already been supplying Hezbollah with arms and human shields. You just know it - you know that on the ground, given the choice between giving with the Israeli army a heads up about a Hezbollah jeep heading towards the border, they would do nothing. You just know that on the ground, given the ability to tell the truth and explain that Israel was defending itself or lying and accusing Israel of a war crime - you just know that that Israel will end up being accused of a war crime.
The UN's mendacity in the Middle East is now legendary. Kofi Annan stands in front of a map that shows Israel wiped out on Palestinian Solidarity Day, then has the nerve to preach to Israel about not needing to worry about Arab military threats. France calls Iran a stabilizing force in the Middle East, then leads UNIFIL. UNIFIL troops know that Hezbollah is literally using their backyard for firing missiles, but then lie about it to the rest of the world. But pretending that soldiers from countries that hate Jews and governments that want to destroy Israel would protect Israel... that's a whole new level of brazenness.

* The original version of this post read "crimes against humanity" rather than "crimes against Israel". As far as we know, Hezbollah has committed no violations that are clearcut crimes against humanity (albeit not for lack of trying).
Omri | |

Israeli Politics Roundup - 2006-08-21

After more than four months, we're back home in California. No time like the present to get to the politics roundup - because seriously, if we weren't here to tell you that Effie Eitam has a nonzero chance of being Israel's next Prime Minister, how would you sleep at night? Seriously, Benjamin Netanyahu and Eitam are on their way to being the most respected and liked politicians in Israel. Our small contribution while you try to cope with this realization: beer before liquor, never been sicker - liquor before beer, you're in the clear.
In fact, if you read nothing else about Israeli politics for the rest of the month, read Attila Somfalvi's overview of the entire Israeli political spectrum. You already know all the stuff about Olmert and Peretz being totally screwed, but at the very bottom is extended analysis about the rising political tide that is the newly-friendly, rightwing Effie Eitam.

Likud
We actually kind of like the idea of a Netanyahu vs. Eitam vs. Kadima-candidate-to-be-named-who-is-not-Olmert election, because it would make it almost impossible for journalists to write stupid stories like Annette Young's Scotsman piece describing Netanyahu as a "right-wing hardliner". Netanyahu is working to rebuild the Likud by recruiting ex-IDF officers. New poll has Likud at 20 - but Kadima still at 29. Meaning all those votes are coming from Labor voters.

Labor
So you're Defense Amir Peretz. The entire country thinks that you're a Jimmy-Hoffa-turned-bumbling-military-idiot. You have to do something - quick - to restore public confidence in your ability to stare down Arab foes. Obviously, you suggest talks with Syria. Brilliant! But somehow, this actually lost Peretz support, even in his own party:

Senior Labor members are criticizing their party leader, Defense Minister Amir Peretz, for advocating talks with Syria. Peretz called for negotiations with Syria on Wednesday, the day Syrian President Bashar Assad delivered a belligerent speech against Israel. The officials termed Peretz's call "embarrassing," adding that it was politically unwise and seemed like political spin.

Someone needs to explain to Amir Peretz that he can't just settle all political negotiations by having his union friends stuff ballots for him. Negotiating with Syria over the Golan isn't like winning a Labor primary.

Kadima
So you're Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. The entire country thinks that you're potentially the only person who screwed up as much than Olmert or Peretz, but since you weren't important enough to sign military orders about pushing to the Litani, no one has really been able to pin you with "weak on security". And just in case they were trying, Peretz made a grab for the "no really, I'm the weakest person in the government" prize with his suggestion that Israel should give the Golan back to Syria. So what do you do? You suggest that Israel should... wait for it... give the Golan back to Syria:

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni appointed a special "project manager" for possible negotiations with Syria. Yaakov (Yaki) Dayan, who until recently was head of the diplomatic desk in the Foreign Ministry, met last week with Tel Aviv University President Prof. Itamar Rabinovich, who headed the Syrian negotiations team under Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in the mid-1990s.

Sometimes we really don't know why Arab countries even bother trying to destroy Israel. All war does is make Israeli politicians shut up for like 2 weeks, which is 2 weeks before they can go back to trying to wreck the country on their own.
Omri | |

Iran Might Not be a Stabilizing Force in the Middle East After All

Yesterday we passed on an article describing how state of the art night vision equipment went from British companies to UN equipment warehouses to Hezbollah field operatives - who then used them to monitor Israeli movements, kidnap Israeli soldiers, and launch a war of indiscriminate civilian bombing against the Israeli people. Turns out, Iran had a lot to do with it:

Israeli officials say they believe the state-of-the-art equipment, found in Hezbollah command-and-control headquarters in southern Lebanon during the just-concluded war, was part of a British government-approved shipment of 250 pieces of night-vision equipment sent to Iran in 2003... "These are tactical night-vision systems ... given to Hezbollah by Iran. The Iranians are the 100 percent provider of all the materiel, especially intelligence materiel, to Hezbollah," Radowicz said.

And now, let us take you back less than a month ago, to the insanely stupid but ideologically revelatory opinion of the highest ranking French diplomat on the planet:

French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy says Tehran is a significant, respected player in the Middle East – 'a great country, a great people and a great civilization'. Iran is a significant, respected player in the Middle East which is playing a stabilizing role, French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy said on Monday. "It was clear that we could never accept a destabilization of Lebanon, which could lead to a destabilization of the region," Douste-Blazy said in Beirut. "In the region there is of course a country such as Iran – a great country, a great people and a great civilization which is respected and which plays a stabilizing role in the region," he told a news conference.

Apparently, "giving weapons to proxy armies so they can start wars" is now the same thing as "stabilizing". And remember - when we're discussing the makeup of the new UN peacekeeping force, people are actually begging France to add more troops so they can trade off with the Muslim troops from countries that don't even recognize the right of Jews to live in Israel! That's how bad things have gotten: Israel and its allies beg for protection from countries that praise people who are trying to wipe out Israel because the alternative is to beg for protection from the people who are actively trying to wipe out Israel.
Omri | |

The UN - Helping to Destroy Israel in New and Imaginative Ways (Giving Military Equipment to Hezbollah Edition)

Obviously, the UN is great for Hezbollah. When Hezbollah kidnaps Israeli soldiers, the UN hides information from Israel so that Israel has no choice but to bargain with terrorists. When the Israeli army finally makes a decision to push deep into Lebanese territory, the UN steps in to call a ceasefire. But would the world organization give advanced tech to Israel's most intransigent enemies? Of course they would!

Israeli intelligence officials have complained to Britain and the United States that sensitive night-vision equipment recovered from Hezbollah fighters during the war in Lebanon had been exported by Britain to Iran. British officials said the equipment had been intended for use in a U.N. anti-narcotics campaign.

The United Nations is now actively supplying people who start wars against the Jewish state with the weapons to fight those wars more effectively. There is no debate on this question. And yet the liberal press and the international community continues to insist that the UN has the credibility to dictate how Israel should try to defend itself.
Omri | |

Arab Countries Want To Let Weapons, Cash Start Flowing Into Lebanon Again

It's not that they're really bad liars - it's that they just don't care enough to try to be truthful:

The Arab League foreign ministers who met on Sunday evening for an emergency conference in Cairo decided to call on the United Nations Security Council to pressure Israel into lifting the aerial and naval closure on Lebanon. They also called on the council to hold a convention this month on the renewal of the peace process.

Because obviously the best way to renew the peace process is to let Hezbollah have unfettered access to the outside world. And what would Hezbollah use this access for, you ask? Why, it turns out that they would use it to get more weapons:

A U.S. arms control official said it appears that Iran is using Syrian channels in its effort to give Hezbollah weapons it has used in the past, including Chinese-built C-802 radar-guided anti-ship missiles. Military observers said a C-802 was used successfully on an Israeli naval vessel off the coast of Tyre on July 14. The arms control officer and a senior American counterterrorism officer both said the U.S. government is "very concerned" about the "ongoing" effort.

Actually, we're sure that the Arab countries just didn't get this memo and that they want Israel to lift its blockade of Lebanon so that Lebanese civilians can get much-needed food and water. Except that even during the war, Israel was taking unprecedented steps (such as letting humanitarian officials into their war room) to make sure that Lebanese civilians had plenty of food and water. So that can't be it.
Maybe it's soccer balls. Yeah, the Arab countries want Israel to lift its blockade of Lebanon so that Hezbollah can get soccer balls. To help the peace process along. Obviously.
Omri | |

Jimmy Carter's Former Ambassador to the United Nations Was / Is an Unapologetic Anti-Semite. This Explains So Much.

Could anything happen that would cause Jimmy Carter to have less credibility when it comes to dispensing advice about international law to Israel? Yes:

Wal-Mart’s very own paid Civil Rights Leader/apologist Andrew Young abruptly resigned from his position yesterday after giving an interview... "Jewish, Arab and Korean shop owners had 'ripped off' urban communities for years, 'selling us stale bread, and bad meat and wilted vegetables.'

This would the same Andrew Young who Jimmy Carter appointed as as United States ambassador to the United Nations. And the same Andrew Young who "secretly" met with a Palestinian Liberation Organization representative in 1979 - back when the PLO was still openly blowing up planes and bragging about it, as opposed to funding other people who blew up planes and denying it (which in turn was a practice good enough for the next Democratic President to invite Arafat to the White House).
It's almost tough to understand how Jimmy Carter could still be apologizing for Hamas's terrorism and writing demonstrably false statements about Hezbollah's genocidal intentions. We begin to think that maybe - just maybe - he doesn't take anti-Semitism very seriously.
Omri | |

Reuters Inadvertently Publishes Very Funny Humor at Expense of the French

They wanted Paris to provide what?

About 50 French peacekeepers arrived in south Lebanon on Saturday, the first reinforcements for a U.N. force charged with helping the Lebanese army take over the area, witnesses said. France has pledged just 200 army engineers, disappointing the United Nations and the United States, which had hoped Paris would provide the backbone and leadership of the force that is to monitor a truce between Israel and Hizbollah guerillas.

First we were going to point out that this line makes no sense, because cheese-eating surrender monkeys don't have backbones. But obviously all primates have spines. And then it turns out that even snakes more or less have backbones, so calling the French "crawling reptiles with anti-Semitic venom dripping off their fangs" also doesn't really get the metaphorical work done. In fact, you'd be shocked at just how difficult it is to think of suitably Gallic invertebrates.
Which shouldn't distract anyone from how totally pathetic the French are in light of their "we're going to fix this Lebanon thing, except we're way too weak and cowardly to actually contribute soldiers" stunt. But seriously, it's hard!
Omri | |

Hezbollah "Stretches" Ceasefire, Israel "Breaks" It (Also: Lebanon Uses Pathetic Excuse to Not Do What They Were Already Not Doing.)

A day after the ceasefire went into effect, Hezbollah launched ten rockets into Israel in total violation of UNSC 1701. This strangely did not break the ceasefire:

Barely 24 hours old, the ceasefire accepted by Hezbollah and Israel is already being stretched, with Israel's army claiming ten rockets were fired at its positions in South Lebanon overnight. The Israeli Defence Force says it won't retaliate, as the rockets did not land in Israel, but elsewhere Israeli soldiers say they shot dead a number of Hezbollah militiamen.

Last night, Israel sent commandos to enforce the arms embargo against Hezbollah that UNSC 1701 calls for but that the UN and Lebanon refuse to enforce. This predictably does break the ceasefire:

Israel said the raid was to prevent cross-border arms smuggling from Syria and Iran to Hezbollah, while Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora blasted the operation as a "blatant violation" of the truce, which began on Monday. Lebanon warned it might suspend its historic troop deployment to Hezbollah's stronghold in the south if the United Nations failed to ensure Israel honoured the UN security council resolution to end the war with Hezbollah. "I could ask the cabinet to stop the army's deployment to the south, as we did not send the troops to fall into an Israeli trap," Defence Minister Elias Murr said after talks with visiting UN envoys Vijay Nambiar and Terje Roed-Larsen.

This post was supposed about to be how, when Hezbollah fires rockets at Israeli civilians, it doesn't break the ceasefire - but when Israel fires ammunition at Hezbollah fighters, it does break the ceasefire. But now we're past that, because this whole "Lebanon is reacting to Israel's violation" meme - which is all over the newspapers this morning - is just so dishonest.
Listen, Lebanon has been obligated to deploy their troops into Southern Lebanon for over half a decade - ever since the UN certified that the Israeli withdrawal meant that Israel had met its obligations under Resolution 1559 and that it was now Lebanon's turn. So now, Lebanon is claiming that Israel has violated 1701 - which Israel was more "enforcing" than "violating" - and that because of this "violation" Lebanon won't meet its own 1701 obligations - obligations that they were supposed to meet anyway five years ago anyway!
But it's Israel that's violating international law. Obviously.
Omri | |

Kofi Annan's Condemnation of Israel is Hypocritical and Biased

Ha'aretz diplomatic editor Aluf Benn (or as he's being cited in this article, "Aluff Benn, Haaretz Correspondent") thinks that Israel needs to explain itself to Kofi Annan. We don't mean to be overly simplistic on this issue, but Kofi Annan promised that Hezbollah would be disarmed*. Instead, Hezbollah will not be disarmed. Kofi Annan also promised that the border would be secured by a neutral peacekeeping force. Instead - while he pathetically begs the impotent Europeans to at least pretend to help, the force is shaping up to be an armed force of soldiers from countries that don't recognize the existence of Israel - which is less of a "peacekeeping force" and more of a "reserve army for Hezbollah".
And after all that, Annan still has the nerve to criticize Israel for failing to live up to UNSC 1701 - and his biased and hypocritical statements are affirmed by Arab and Western diplomats and parroted by Arab and Western journalists. And so with due respect to Aluf Benn, no, Israel doesn't owe Kofi Annan an explanation for anything.
PS - We're sorry and a little ashamed of how bad the headline to this story is. We apologize. But it's late, we're tired, and "Snakes on a Plane" means that blunt, descriptive titles are in vogue this week.

* The original post didn't have the words "would be disarmed" following the phrase "Kofi Annan promised that Hezbollah". Thanks to Elliot for the heads up.
Omri | |

YNet Takes a Swipe at Ha'aretz. MR Decides: Kind of Funny

The English website of Israel's lead overall newspaper (Yedioth Ahronoth) needed to describe the fact that Israel's lead leftist paper (Ha'aretz) has to a greater or lesser extent recently been purchased by Nazis. This is all you need to know to realize that comedy gold is right around the corner

Haaretz's 'Nazi problem'. German publishing group that purchased 25 percent of Israeli daily cooperated with Nazis... Controversial deal: The decision to sell 25 percent of Haaretz Group's shares to newspaper and book publisher DuMont Schauberg last week has come under scrutiny as a result of the German publisher's ties with the Nazi regime.

We haven't done enough reading (nor, frankly, do we think we care enough to do enough reading) on this buyout. But we pass it along anyway, because one newspaper describing a rival newspaper as having a 'Nazi Problem' is objectively funny. Also, because we kind of don't like Ha'aretz (in that we've accused them of treason kind of don't like). So screw them.
Omri | |

We're Starting to Get Suspicious About Iran

We're really bad about evaluating good analysis from conspiracy theory. We were way behind on calling out the Killian memos, and we didn't learn enough from thatincident to be anything but way behind - again - on the Reuters photo-manipulation scandal. Every time, we end up thinking "no, no one could both have such a stupid ideology and not know enough not to be a caricature of that ideology" (CBS can't be this obvious about pathologically hating Bush and do something so stupid because of it; Reuter's can't be this obvious about pathologically hating Israel and do something so stupid because of it; etc).
So the August 22nd meme - Iran is going to do something incredibly stupid on August 22 because it's a mystical date involving the lost 12th Imam that Ahmadinejad thinks sits on his shoulder and whispers geopolitical advice to him - is something that we've been loath to pass on.
Except that two days ago, Iranian police started going door to door destroying satellite dishes. And except that today, the Iranian army held large military exercises in anticipation of an Israeli attack that would be unprecedented, desperate, and massive.
Sleep well.
Omri | |

Video of Hezbollah Fighter Showing Weapons He Keeps In His House

The baby stroller in the background while he shows off his M-16 rifle, rocket-propelled grenades, AK-47 and ammunition is what really makes this priceless. And by priceless, we mean disgusting. But hey, at least we have the UN to watch out for Israeli human rights violation. (hat tip: Merav)
Omri | |

MR Begs the Main Stream Media: Please Go Back to Lying to Us

So there's this war going on between the countries on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. Most of the combatants are taking a couple of days off... not the Palestinians though - they're still trying to commit mass murder (incidentally, do you know how we find links to stories about Palestinian terrorist attempts? we type in "palestinian infiltration" to Google, and just like magic, there's always a new story to link to. Hbw sad is that?). Anyway, so most of the combatants in the Israeli-Arab conflict are taking a couple of days off, but no one really thinks the ceasefire is going to last. And in the meantime, there's a bunch of other interesting stuff - UN deployments, political maneuverings, etc
So what's on Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC? The news that some idiot in Thailand may or may not have been arrested for the JonBenet Ramsey murder. A murder that we'll remind you, happened ten years ago! They actually have Wolf Blitzer reporting on the case from Jerusalem (where he was sent to report about that war thing) on one side of the screen, while on the other side of the screen they play footage of police entering the Ramseys' house... from ten years ago!
Unbelievable. We literally could not be more pissed off right now. We really think we like it better when these idiots try to lie to us. At least then, you can kind of sort of can make yourself believe that these people actually have brains. And that maybe there is some hope left - some future for humanity other than slow drowning in a swamp filled of vapidness and stupidity.

UPDATE: This post was obviously originally written in the kind of mental and physical state that would make it seem well-advised to post something like this. While we're going to keep it up here as a warning to ourselves and others about blogging while... er...angry, we have corrected the typos, misspellings, and at some points totally missed words.
Omri | |

Reflexive Equivalence Watch (Smuggling Arms From Israel Edition)

Moral equivalence and anti-Israel scapegoating do not always have to make sense. Since they're fundamentally irrational in the most academic sense - they arise not from careful reflection but more from ideological commitments - they can pop up in the weirdest contexts. "Everything that Israel's Arab enemies are doing Israel must also in some way be doing" - it's a habit of thought and a style of writing. And sometimes this habit and style can be particularly dumb:

Lebanon's army has begun setting up checkpoints near dozens of illegal border crossings with Syria and Israel in a bid to help prevent arms smuggling in the region, a Lebanese military official said today. The plan is apparently aimed primarily at preventing arms supplies from reaching Hezbollah guerrillas - a key demand of last week's UN ceasefire resolution that ended 34 days of ferocious fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.

Because if we want to stop arms smuggling into Lebanon, it's important to get those illegal Israel border crossings too. Let's devote a whole lot of troops there - those things are very porous, and Hezbollah undoubtedly gets thousands of weapons from Israel every day. Idiots.
And how could something like this make from a journalist, past an editor, and into print? Because it seems like the most natural thing in the world - it's precisely what you'd expect from the anti-Israel media, because it's precisely how the anti-Israel media approaches the conflict. That it's so silly merely makes it definitive that there's nothing that could have driven the journalist to write it other than pure habit.
Omri | |

Newsflash: The International Community Will Not Keep Its Commitments to Israel (Disarming Hezbollah Edition)

It's Lebanon's responsibility:

"The building of the force, setting its mandate and defining its standard operational procedure are in the making," one official said. "There are ups and downs." US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the force would not be responsible for disarming Hizbullah. That would be the responsibility of the Lebanese, Rice said in an interview with USA Today. She said that in the past, the Lebanese government had been unwilling or unable to disarm Hizbullah.

Except not so much:

Thousands of Lebanese soldiers were set to head south today to take over territory seized by Israel in its war with Hezbollah. But Lebanon said its army wouldn't be disarming the militants or searching for their weapons.

As always, the frustrating thing is not necessary that Arab countries aren't keeping their obligations in exchange for Israeli concessions - it's that everybody always knew that the promises were hollow, but diplomats went right on acting as if they didn't know that - and insisting that Israelis do the same.
Omri | |

Lebanon and Hezbollah Already Not Implementing UNSC 1701. Countdown to Israel Scapegoating Begins... Now...

Well that was fast:

The IDF will have to resume operations in Lebanon if the expanded United Nations force being assembled does not fulfill its obligation to dismantle Hizbullah, an official in the Prime Minister's Office warned on Tuesday. Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora and Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah reportedly reached a deal allowing Hizbullah to keep its weapons but refrain from exhibiting them in public. Israeli officials called the arrangement a violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which passed over the weekend and was approved on Sunday by the cabinet.

Want to know who's going to get blamed for violating the terms of the ceasefire? We'll give you one - and only one - guess. And if you get it wrong, you're never allowed back here ever again. Go read USA Today, where the world is safe and shiny.
Omri | |

Hamas Seems to Believe that They're Hezbollah

Someone needs to remind Hamas that they don't have many missiles, and that they don't get to act like they do:

Egyptian mediators have presented Hamas and other groups with a new proposal aimed at ending a six-week-old standoff over an Israeli soldier seized near the Gaza strip, Hamas officials said on Tuesday. A source close to the negotiations said the proposal called for Hamas to transfer Corporal Gilad Shalit to Egyptian authorities in return for Israel's release of up to 600 Palestinian prisoners, including women and minors. Another group of Palestinian prisoners, including many who have served longer sentences, would be freed by Israel at a later date.

How about instead of that, Hamas transfers Corporal Gilad Shalit to Egyptian authorities and Olmert promises not to try to restore his domestic credibility by assassinating each and every person in the Hamas leadership? See how good we are at this? Seriously - they should let us do this job.
Omri | |

Bloggers' Conference Call With Former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

Earlier today, we were privileged to participate in a bloggers' conference call with former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The interview was organized by Rick Richman of Jewish Current Issues. The other participants were Ed Lasky from American Thinker, Pamela from Atlas Shrugs, Anne Lieberman from Boker Tov, Boulder!, Lynn B from In Context, Paul Mirengoff and Scott Johnson of Power Line, and David Gerstman of Soccer Dad. Pamela (who, we'll spoil the ending for you, is not a big fan of the ceasefire) helped coordinate some of the interview's logistics - you can already go to her site to grab the audio of the interview.

Two themes in Netanyahu's responses bear particular comment: his emphasis on domestic Israeli unity - plus the unstated political calculations that might be driving that emphasis - and his insistence on the inevitability of Western-Islamic conflict - plus the very explicitly stated tactical consequences that he draws from that insistence. Also, David Gertsman got him talking about the blogosphere after we totally bombed on our question - comedy gold followed by interesting commentary!

(1) Domestic unity - The former Prime Minister quite simply refused to be drawn into even the most limited discussions about Israeli politics. He repeatedly declined to speculate about political scenarios, citing the need for national unity as long as soldiers are still in the field. Our and others' past criticism about his political opportunism aside, it's undeniable that some of his concern is genuine.

Still, there are two potential factors influencing Netanyahu that should not be underestimated. First, his future political career relies precisely on his ability to put his reputation for political opportunism behind him. And he knows it - the last month has pretty much just been him giving unequivocal support to Olmert. As ubercommentator Judith Klinghoffer pointed out this morning, Netanyahu's "stellar behavior during the war [has gone] a long way towards rehabilitating his standing with the Israeli public" (although for what it's worth, Klinghoffer's column is about the possibility of a unity government - a possibility that Netanyahu indicated in the interview was unlikely for the foreseeable future).

The other political reality preventing the former Prime Minister from coming out against Olmert is simply that he doesn't have to: in fact, he can only lose by adding his voice to the growing anti-government chorus. Why take the risk of seeming opportunistic when just about everyone else in Israeli society is already calling for Kadima and Labor to be thrown out of office? The right-leaning Jerusalem Post is obviously calling for Olmert's resignation, but so is the left-leaning Ha'aretz. The entire party seems like it's disintegrating. Olmert's Chief of Staff Dan Halutz (actually a Sharon appointee) has maybe a few hours before he has to resign for selling his stocks right after he found out about the Hezbollah kidnapping. Kadima Justice Minister Haim Ramon will probably face sexual harassment charges in the near future, while Kadima MK Tzahi Hanegbi will definitively be indicted for corruption (MR on Hanegbi, 12/07/05: "all but confirmed crook Tzachi Hanegbi... [is] bringing himself and his future corruption indictment into Kadima."). This is not a group of people who have a political future.

So the Israeli public will turn away from Kadima with or without Netanyahu's help. And when they do, who are they going to choose - the guy who's been predicting for years that Hezbollah and Hamas will launch a rocket war, or the guy who thinks that the day after an Israeli military defeat is a great time for himself, the Defense Minister, to get up and call for giving land to Syria and Hamas. Seriously, there are undiscovered tribes of pigmies in the Amazon who have never even heard of Israel who could still do a better job as Defense Minister than Amir Peretz (MR on Peretz, 03/31/06: "the only thing that makes us less giddy than the thought of Peretz controlling the Israeli economy is the thought of Peretz controlling Israeli defenses"). We'd like to take yet another opportunity to thank the students who gave their votes to Gil and thereby prevented Shual Mofaz from becoming Defense Minister. Way to stick it to the Establishment, kids!

Anyway, long story short, Netanyahu will not come out against the Israeli government for at least a while longer - it would be a politically stupid move, and he is not politically stupid, and it would be an unpatriotic move, and he is a patriot.

(2) International conflict - The former Prime Minister repeatedly emphasized that this ceasefire is a mere lull - not only in the Israeli-Arab conflict, but also in the broader conflict between militant Islam and the West. The superficial sectarian conflict between Sunnis and Shiites masks a more fundamental similarity between the Muslim groups that makes a global war all but inevitable. Both groups' armies are dedicated to the reestablishment of an Islamic empire which - and here Netanyahu was explicit - "they intend to resurrect with nuclear terror". With unequivocal and intentional bluntness, he declared early that "President Bush's commitment to prevent Iran from arming itself with nuclear weapons is the most important decision of our time."

The former Prime Minister reiterated two themes in several ways: this war is inevitable because it is being forced upon the West as a matter of ideology and this war will require a kind of tactical division of labor between Israel and the United States. Israel must and will dismantle the Islamists from Hezbollah and Hamas that are sitting on its doorstep (also: "Hamas and Hezbollah should not underestimate the ability of Israel to learn lessons... if they persist in their plans to attack Israel, they will be destroyed"). Nonetheless, it is the United States and only the United States that can "lead its own or an international effort to disarm Iran". He also has a message for Europe: if Israel is the Little Satan and the United States is the big Satan, then Europe is right in between - which is not a safe place to be during a war. Iran's missiles can now reach not only Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, but also London and Paris, something that the Europeans - especially given the radical, unassimilated in their inner cities - seem surreally copasetic about.

(3) The blogosphere - Two things. First, we definitively established that we are the worst interviewers in the history of blogging. Seriously. This is the actual exchange between us and the former Prime Minister of Israel:

Mere Rhetoric: "Good morning Mr. Former Prime Minister this is Omri Ceren from Mere Rhetoric. I'd like to thank you for joining us today. This government's actions during the war confused even non-political actors. STRATFOR described Olmert's behavior during the war as 'perplexing' and suggested that he seemed to be 'geniunely concerned about something, and it's not clear what it is.' Obviously you are not criticizing this government too harshly in the current situation, but I was wondering if you could offer us some thoughts on why Prime Minister Olmert and why Defense Minister Peretz were so hesitant to unleash the IDF against Hezabollah and against the Iranian and Syrian forces in Lebanon."

Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: "I don't know."

Compare the "I don't know" that we got to how Soccer Dad David Gerstman managed to get Netanyahu talking about the need for bloggers to emphasize the shared interests of Israel and the United States:

The American public has a pretty good feel for who the bad guys are and who the good guys are. But the important thing is to mobilize the American people to understand that this is not a war between two native tribes... I wish it were... this is the first, opening salvo in Iran's bid for Empire [and] Islam's bid for world dominion... it will use nuclear weapons once it acquires them... you have a matching creed that Al Qaeda would have used nuclear weapons... the only limitation they had was not having the weapons, so they improvised. If Iran has nuclear weapons, then every American is in great peril... it is very important to understand that this is not [just] Israel's war.

Anyway, more proof that Mere Rhetoric is pretty much just playing Charlie Brown to the universe's Lucy. Joking aside, this interview was an amazing opportunity and experience. Paul at Power Line has already declared that he hopes that Netanyahu will be the next Prime Minister of Israel, and the political reality in Israel may well grant him his hope. We echo everyone who was on the call in thanking Rick Richman for setting up the interview and in expressing our gratitude to former Prime Minister Netanyahu for taking the time to talk to us.

UPDATE: The STRATFOR report that we referenced in our question is behind their subscription wall. It reads in part:

In looking at Israeli behavior -- which has become the most interesting and perplexing aspect of this conflict -- we are struck by an oddity. The Israeli leadership seems genuinely concerned about something, and it is not clear what it is. Obviously, the government doesn't want to take casualties, but this is not a political problem. The Israeli public can deal with high casualties as long as the mission -- in this case the dismantling of Hezbollah's capabilities -- is accomplished. The normal pattern of Israeli behavior is to be increasingly aggressive rather than restrained, and the government is supported. When a government becomes uncertain, it normally reverts to established patterns. We would have expected a major invasion weeks ago, and we did expect it. Something is holding the Israelis back and it is not simply fear of casualties. The increasing confusion and even paralysis of the Israeli government could be explained simply by division and poor leadership. But we increasingly have the feeling that there is an aspect to Israeli thinking that we do not understand, some concern that is not apparent that is holding them back from doing what they would normally do. Hezbollah has fought well, but it is hard to believe that the Israelis can't defeat them or that Israel can't take casualties... However, while there are those who would argue that Israel's inability to decide clearly on a path is simply cover for action, our view is that the situation has gone well beyond that. Hezbollah is not being rattled at all. The Israelis are.

You can reach the entire report (we don't understand how - you certainly can't reach it directly via url) by going through this Google News link. If there was something legitimate - some fear or some intelligence - that was holding Olmert back, then what looks from the outside like inexcusable incompetence might be excused. But if Benjamin Netanyahu knows what that something is, he's certainly not telling.
Omri | |

More Journalists Pretend That Israel is Still Occupying Gaza

It has been pointed out by more nuanced and reasonable bloggers than ourselves that the anti-Israel Left and the anti-Israel press use the Jewish State's presence in lands outside the Green Line as pathetic pretexts for their animus toward Israel. That excuse, of course, has become a lot harder to justify since the disengagement from Gaza. After all, if the occupation is the problem and Israel is no longer occupying Gaza, then how to explain all of the violence still coming from Gaza?
Last month, we noticed the ingenious solution that some journalists had stumbled upon: just pretend that Israel never really left the Gaza Strip! On July 4th, we caught Switzerland declaring that Israel was still occupying Gaza. Then on July 13th, we noticed the BBC doing the exact same thing. And now it's the Australian Herald Sun:

An Israeli taken in a raid by Palestinian militants in Gaza in June also remains captive. An Israeli air strike hit a house in Gaza where a member of Islamic Jihad lived, witnesses said, wounding eight people.

No, no, no, no, no. It doesn't matter how much you want to believe it, it is simply not the case that Shalit was "taken" in Gaza. He was kidnapped from Israel - where he was definitely not in occupation of Gaza. But hey - wouldn't it be great for the anti-Israel Left if he was?
Omri | |

NYT Analysis Not False, Just Vaguely Dishonest

The New York Times is reporting as "news" the fact that Hezbollah isn't about to disarm. Fair enough. But check this part out:

For the moment, Hezbollah is bathed in a heroic light, not just in Lebanon but throughout the Muslim world. Lebanon’s prime minister, Fouad Siniora, appears unable or unwilling to force the issue of Hezbollah’s disarmament, at least in the south, as called for in the United Nations Security Council resolution that halted the combat. Hezbollah’s leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, said in a television speech that his fighters would accept the cease-fire. Yet he insisted that Hezbollah would continue to fight in violation of it so long as Israeli troops remained on Lebanese soil.

It is true that UNSC Resolution 1701 called on Hezbollah to disarm. But this was at least the second UN resolution that has done so. The first was 1559, where Israel was told to withdraw and in exchange Hezbollah would be disarmed. Israel withdrew, and yet no Hezbollah disarmament. So the implication that this time a new Israeli concession is supposed to be exchanged for the same old Hezbollah promise seems kind of dishonest.
On the other hand, journalists covering the Israeli-Palestinian peace process used to pull this infuriating trick all the time. Israel would make a deal with Arafat - something like, "we'll give you these 5 towns, and in exchange you should stop telling Palestinian kids to murder Jews". Israel would begin implementing its half of the deal, and in exchange Arafat would do nothing. So there would be another round of negotiations, and Israel would make another deal - something like, "we'll give you these additional 5 towns, and seriously, in exchange, how about you stop telling Palestinian kids to murder Jews?" And of course, Arafat would do nothing of the sort.
But here's where the trick came in: when reporting on the second round of talks, journalists would write something like "Arafat keeps writing things like 'good kids kill Jews' in Palestinian textbooks, even though he promised in his last agreement not to". No mention would be made of the fact that he had also promised to do so in the agreement before that, and in the agreement before that agreement, and so on. So it always looks like the Israelis are slowly implementing their obligations on one side and the Arabs may or may not be implementing their obligations on the other - instead of the real situation, which is that Israel has already fully implemented a past UN resolution that was supposed to secure Hezbollah's dismantling to no effect, and now this new UN resolution will also have no effect.
Omri | |

ABC News Headline Not False, Just Vaguely Dishonest

It is technically true that, as the ABC News headline says, Rockets Hit Lebanon Despite Cease-Fire. Obviously, that is the case. But you might be surprised to know that it was Hezbollah - not Israel, the side fighting against Lebanon - that fired the rockets:

Highlighting the fragility of the peace, Hezbollah guerrillas fired at least 10 Katyusha rockets that landed in southern Lebanon early Tuesday, the Israeli army said, adding that nobody was injured. The army said that none of the rockets, which were fired over a two-hour period, had crossed the border and so it had not responded.

A headline like "Hezbollah Fires Rockets Despite Cease-Fire" would have been just as true, and it would have had the extra benefit of not being totally misleading about who's doing the firing. But that would be a missed opportunity to oh-so-subtly demonize Israel, and we can't have that now can we?
Omri | |

UPI Publishes Anti-Israel Propaganda as "News", Is Really Bad At Hiding It

We don't think that Sana Abdallah is really the most objective journalist that UPI could have found for their 1701 story. The reason we don't think that is because, instead of writing a news story, she seems to believe that her job is to publish transparent Hezbollah propaganda:

Could Hezbollah leader Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah have been right in his prediction last month that Israel's war on Lebanon will be Israel's last? In an unpredictable Middle East, it is hard to tell... This gives Israel either 48 hours, a week, or as long as it takes UNIFIL and the Lebanese army to deploy in the area, to try to capture as much Lebanese territory as possible and more time to try to inflict as much damage as possible against its intended target: Hezbollah.

How does an anti-Israel journalist - forced to feign objectivity by whatever thin journalistic norms still exist - manage to turn a "report" into an anti-Israel policy statement? There are several ways. One way is to frame the issue in a particular, subtle way that tilts the story by establishing tone and relevance. When that happens - and it happens a lot - media critics have to spend significant time and energy untangling all of the sleights-of-hand and demonstrating how an unbiased story could have written. Another way is to quote two opposing sides as if they were both of equal reasonability and plausibility ("Israelis showed pictures of Hezbollah firing missiles from civilian areas, but Prime Minister Siniora implied that such pictures were fabricated to justify further Israeli atrocities"). That situation is even worse for media critics, because to demonstrate bias it's necessary to elaborate extensively on what assumptions ought to orient journalists and what positions should be acceptable in reasoned debate.
Or you could just to what Abdallah and the UPI editors did - quote exclusively Arab or anti-Israel "analysts" as if you were passing on their propaganda as objective observation. When that happens, media critics can basically just point and laugh:

Whether the Israeli operations will continue until a Cabinet decision or until the Lebanese and U.N. forces are deployed in Lebanon's southern border areas, Arab analysts believe the Jewish state is trying to "buy time" to try to achieve at least some of what it set out to do in this war. Arab military analysts insist the Israeli army is seeking to "retrieve some of its dignity" before the resolution is enforced, in the hope of capturing Lebanese areas south of the Litani River, from where Israel believes Hezbollah is firing rockets at northern Israel...
But the plan may not succeed so easily, just as the Israeli plan from the outset of the war on July 12 has failed in stopping Hezbollah's rockets from slamming into northern Israeli towns and settlements and into subduing the guerilla organization, which has exercised what Arabs see as impressive resistance against Israeli incursions into the country. Lebanese military officials say the Israeli forces in the past weeks have not remained in positions they tried to capture due to Hezbollah's fierce resistance on the ground, predicting that what the IDF has failed to achieve in the past month cannot be accomplished in the next two or seven days...
Arab analysts say the Security Council decision would not have accommodated Hezbollah demands -- backed by the Beirut government -- had it not been for group's military performance on the ground, which has given powerful blows to the Jewish state. Among these demands is that no new international deterrence forces are dispatched on the southern Lebanese borders and that Israel withdraws from areas it occupied in the country

This article is very good at telling you what "Arab analysts believe", what "Arab military analysts insist", what "Lebanese military officials say", and again what "Arab analysts say". Not so much with other kinds of analysts. Except at the end, where Abdallah finally tries to pull off the journalistic trick where you quote two opposing opinions - each ostensibly equally reasonable - so that you can be unbiased. Except Abdallah is really bad at this trick:

Some analysts say because this decision includes a clear framework for international action for a ceasefire solution, it will likely work on the ground and stop this war. And, they add, Hezbollah's Nasrallah may prove to be right that this will be Israel's last war after what is widely seen by Arabs as the Jewish state's defeat against the Lebanese resistance and an experience it will not want to repeat. But then again, other analysts argue this war, triggered by Hezbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border operation last month, may have come to avenge the Israeli humiliation by Hezbollah six years ago when the guerilla group was credited for forcing Israel to end its 22-year occupation of southern Lebanon in May 2000.

So some analysts say that Hezbollah has finally defeated Israel, while "then again" (!!!) "other analysts" say that Israelis are warmongers. We're not sure that Abdallah or the UPI editors know what "then again" is supposed to mean. "Then again" doesn't mean that if you take two different statements and put them next to each other, they suddenly become opposing statements. We can right "Mary is allergic to cats, but then again the sky is blue" - that doesn't make us unbiased, it just makes us stupid. "Israel was defeated but then again Israelis are warmongers" are not two opposing statements!
And the final paragraph is just pure brilliance:

If Tel Aviv sees this 2006 war on Lebanon in the same way as the Arabs see it -- as an Israeli defeat -- it might take a shot at another war to regain its military prestige in the Middle East.

You know how you could find out if Israelis think about the war in the same way Arabs do? Maybe ask some of them.

[Cross-posted at Israpundit]
Omri | |

US Makes Another Promise to Israel, and Pauses Long Enough Before Reversing Itself for Us to Blog It

Some day very soon, we're going to need to know where to find this article. So we're putting it right here:
s
A United Nations-brokered cease-fire would go into effect on Monday morning at 7 A.M., a senior Israeli government official said Saturday afternoon. By then, Israel Defense Forces troops are expected to reach the Litani River, some 30 kilometers inside Lebanon, with the purpose of cutting off Hezbollah forces further south, toward the border with Israel. In the event that the fighting resumes, IDF forces will then be in a position to move more effectively against Hezbollah militants... Haaretz Diplomatic Correspondent Aluf Benn reports that an agreement reached between Israel and the United States on the disputed Shaba Farms area, located on Israel's border with Lebanon, enabled a breakthrough in reaching a cease-fire resolution at the United Nations on Friday. In letters exchanged between U.S. and Israeli leaders, U.S. officials assured Israel that UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan would be authorized to determine whether the area belongs to Lebanon or Syria, but that the future status of the territory would only be determined in negotiations between Israel and Farms' rightful owners. A senior government source said that Israel would not be obligated to withdraw from Shaba Farms, even if Annan's investigation determines that they belong to Lebanon.

Remember the time when the US promised Israel that UNIFIL would get a Chapter 7 mandate - getting Israel to agree to a UN ceasefire in principle - and then took it back to get a ceasefire passed? Or the time that the State Department committed Israel to the view that the government of Lebanon was uninvolved in the war - preventing Israel from really going after Hezbollah infrastructure - and then took it back to get a ceasefire passed?. We strongly suspect that this will proceed similarly.
Omri | |

Israel Reaches the Litani - Finally

And Northern Command Chief Udi Adam points out the obvious:

Northern Command Chief, Udi Adam, said in a journalist briefing... "We have been prepared for ten days, but only now the command has been given. The plans have been presented to the political establishment weeks ago. We always had plans in the drawer. We waited for the green light," he added.

Ehud Olmert is in a lot of trouble. His political existence relies on getting the kidnapped soldiers back before Israel withdraws form Lebanon, and Hezbollah has all the time in the world not to hand them over.
Omri | |

France To Disarm Hezbollah

That's just so precious:

Bush said the U.N. resolution aimed to "stop Hizbollah from acting as a state within a state, and put an end to Iran and Syria's efforts to hold the Lebanese people hostage to their own extremist agenda." French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy made clear in an interview with Le Monde newspaper that the mission of the larger UNIFIL would not include disarming Hizbollah by force.
"We never thought a purely military solution could resolve the problem of Hizbollah," he said. "We are agreed on the goal, the disarmament, but for us the means are purely political." UNIFIL said a Ghanaian peacekeeper had been wounded by Israeli artillery fire near the southern village of Haris.

Luckily, purely political methods of disarming Hezbollah have had a lot of success in the past. Especially political methods like UN resolutions. Like UN Resolution 1559 which totally and completely and utterly failed to even come close to disarming Hezbollah. Awesome.
Omri | |

Hezbollah's Acceptance of the Ceasefire... This Might Not Surprise You, But We're Skeptical

So the news outlets are all abuzz about how Hezbollah has committed to abiding by the ceasefire. Even the Jerusalem Post:

Hizbullah leader Hasan Nasrallah said on Saturday that his organization would abide by the United Nation's resolution calling for a cease-fire with Israel, although he was not completely satisfied with it's text. Nasrallah's announcement came as the Lebanese government, which also accepted the cease-fire, met in Beirut to approve the resolution... Nasrallah warned, however, that despite the UN resolution, the war was still not over. "We must be aware of the fact that the war will continue for another few days," he said. "That's why we are continuing to fight today. We will fight as long as Israeli soldiers are in Lebanon."

Great! Except for this part:

Nasrallah warned Hezbollah would continue to defend Lebanon from "Israeli aggression," and militants would "fulfill our national and jihadic obligations," the Post reported.

You see, here's the thing about Hezbollah's "jihadic obligations" (and we're not making this part up)... they kind of include the total annihilation of the Jews in Israel:

Hezbollah wants to murder all the Israelis in Israel... "We are going to make Israel not safe for Israelis. There will be no place they are safe," Safiadeen told a conference that included the Tehran-based representative of the Palestinian group Hamas and the ambassadors from Lebanon, Syria and the Palestinian Authority. "You will see a new Middle East in the way of Hezbollah and Islam, not in the way of Rice and Israel."

There's something about the way this ceasefire is proceeding that makes us kind of queasy. Maybe it's the part where the ceasefire will totally screw Israel for the indefinite future.
Omri | |

How Badly Does the UN Draft Screw Israel? Part V: Iran

Earlier this week, Israel found documents on dead Hizbollah guerrillas identifying the fighters as Iranian Revolutionary Guards. So the part of 1701 that kindly asks Iran to stop sending in troops to Lebanon (as opposed to just weapons and supplies) would be really great, but for the fact that it totally doesn't exist.
Omri | |

How Badly Does the UN Draft Screw Israel? Part IV: UNIFIL Will Not Get a Chapter 7 Mandate

The United Nations can authorize peacekeeping missions either under Chapter 6 or Chapter 7 of the UN charter. In the crudest sense, Chapter 6 peacekeeping missions are observation-only missions and Chapter 7 peacekeeping missions are authorized to use force. UNIFIL, the peacekeeping force in Lebanon, is a Chapter 6 mission. So while they can do things like "observe" Hezbollah forces crossing the Blue Line to kidnap Israel soldiers (and then "shamelessly lie" about how they didn't videotape the whole incident) they can't actually do anything. Obviously, since dealing with an armed Hezbollah requires things like armaments, this is stupid.
So earlier this week, when the US was trying to convince Israel to publicly commit to the idea of a UN ceasefire, they were promising to expand UNIFIL's mandate...

The new force is expected to operate under Article 7 of the UN Charter, granting it enforcement authority. Its troops will be authorized to open fire in order to carry out Security Council resolutions, not just in self-defense. UNIFIL, whose mandate is based on Article 6 of the UN Charter, has no such authority. Its role is one of observing and reporting.

Screwed again!

The resolution authorises the UN force, known by its acronym Unifil, to take "all necessary action" to stop the area it patrols from being using for any kind of hostile activities. But in a significant concession to the Lebanese it will still have a traditional peacekeeping mandate, under Chapter 6 of the UN charter. A Chapter 7 mandate, which Israel had wanted, allows troops to use military force to enforce peace.

Israeli diplomats should not be allowed to complain about this blatant bait-and-switch: if they were too stupid to see it coming, it's their fault.
Omri | |

How Badly Does the UN Draft Screw Israel? Part III: It's Not a Total Ceasefire, But Everyone Will Condemn Israel As If It Is

Secretary Rice says it's not supposed to be a total ceasefire:

Rice said the "hard work of diplomacy'' was only beginning with the passage of the resolution and that it would be unrealistic to expect an immediate end to all violence.

The Israeli government is only agreeing to it because it's not supposed to be a total ceasefire:

Olmert's spokesman, Asaf Shariv, said that the expanded incursion had already begun. He said that the cease-fire deal being worked out by the Security Council failed to meet Israel's basic requirements, such as stationing a strong force of international combat troops in southern Lebanon once Israel withdraws. "Yesterday we were very optimistic, but they (the Security Council) took the wrong turn," Shariv said.

And yet somehow the AP has found a way to condemn Israel for disobeying the UN ceasefire:

Israeli officials said the military would push forward with the expanded offensive, ordered Friday by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, despite a UN Security Council resolution that calls for an end to the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah. The campaign will continue at least until Sunday when Olmert will bring the resolution to his government for discussion, said Gideon Meir, a senior Israeli Foreign Ministry official, adding Olmert intends to urge the cabinet to approve it.

We're putting at about even the odds that Reuters and AP journalists just did a search-and-replace on their stories from the ostensibly total 48 hours ceasefire that they lied about.
Omri | |

How Badly Does the UN Draft Screw Israel? Part II: Hezbollah Not Really So Much Included

In 1984, George Orwell famously defined doublethink as "the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them". For instance, the State Department could state unequivocally that the government of Lebanon is not a party to the war...

Fernandez rebuk[ed the Israeli] position toward the Lebanese government. He specifically said: "If it gets me in trouble, it gets me in trouble. I don't care. The Israeli Government has said 'we hold the Lebanese government responsible.' The US Government has not said that, and we don't believe that."...

... and a week later insist that this conflict is only the government of Lebanon and Israel:

BLITZER: Well, what about Hezbollah? Is there any indication that this group that you characterize as a terror group will go ahead and play ball, will cooperate? RICE: Well, let's remember that the parties to this cessation of hostilities will be the Lebanese government and the government of Israel. Hezbollah, of course, has ministers in the Lebanese Cabinet, and we've been working with the government of Lebanon, and assuming that the government of Lebanon is making sure that all parties represented in its government will abide by the cease-fire. But let's remember that we have a democratically elected government of Lebanon whose territory is at issue here, and the democratically elected government of Israel whose territory is at issue here. And when they accept this, we expect that there's going to be adherence to the cessation.

Orwell went on to explain that doublethink involved the need "to tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies" - so for instance, sometimes the US State Department needs to insist that the Prime Minster of Lebanon is an innocent bystander to Hezbollah's recklessness (even though he made Hezbollah part of the Lebanese government, ignored their use of human shields, and defended their attacks on Israel) - during those times, it's important that the government of Lebanon have nothing to do with the war. But other times, the US State Department needs to pretend that a deal that humiliates Israel can actually work - and during those times, it's critical that they forget what they already the fact that Hezbollah has announced that its committed to the complete eradication of the Jews in Israel. So suddenly, this is a conflict between the governments of Israel and Lebanon. How creative of them.
How stupid is the idea that Hezbollah isn't involved? Let's look at the text of the draft itself:

Calls for Israel and Lebanon to support a permanent ceasefire and a long-term solution based on the following principles and elements: - full respect for the Blue Line by both parties

The government of Lebanon... wait for it... isn't the party that violated the Blue Line! That was Hezbollah. So the actual party that crossed the Blue Line into Israeli territory - the party that started the war - is literally (literally (!!)) not even called upon to stop doing so.
Omri | |

How Badly Does the UN Draft Screw Israel? Part I: Expanded UNIFIL Presence

Increasing UNIFIL to 15,000 peacekeepers? Sweet!
* 15,000 construction workers who will rebuild infrastructure for Hezbollah.
* 15,000 human shields who will sit in front of Hezbollah rocket launchers
* 15,000 international peacekeepers who will make it impossible for Israel to defend itself
* 15,000 duplicitious bastards who will outright lie about how they filmed - and de facto aided - Hezbollah attackers who crossed a border to kill and kidnap Israeli soldiers.
Omri | |

War in Haifa

Taken with a digital camera in Haifa and passed on to us by a reader, here are 6 rockets fired some time last week that did not hit the Israel civilians that they were targeted at:


An 11 story building, on the other hand, took a direct hit today from one of the 120 rockets that rained down on northern Israel. Just in time for a UN-imposed ceasefire.
Omri | |

It's Amazing How Speaking and Thinking Like an Anti-Semite Makes You Into an Anti-Semite

It's not exactly news that the most virulent anti-Semitic tropes are now heard regularly in the context of anti-Zionism. We're talking about the kinds of things that have really inspired massacres - accusations of baby-killing, well-poisoning, dual loyalty, etc. If these accusations were true, we would still insist that they were springing from something other than rational reflection (as philosopher Slavoj Zizek has pointed out, even if Jews had been controlling the banks in Germany, the role of the Final Solution in the Nazi project would still have been pathological). But the fact that these "anti-Zionist" accusations aren't true - but are being made anyway - makes even that analysis totally unnecessary. When you accuse the Jewish state of historically Jewish crimes and you happen to be mistaken, there's something else going on:

An article in a leading Norwegian newspaper last weekend lambasted Israel and Judaism and said Israel has lost its right to exist in its present form. Entitled "God's chosen people," the article by author Jostein Gaarder in Aftenposten is raising a storm in Norway. Gaarder, author of the book "Sophie's World," links the Israel Defense Forces' acts in Lebanon to Jewish history and foresees the coming dismantling of the state as it exists today, with the Jews becoming refugees...
The article compares Israel's government, the Afghan Taliban regime and South African apartheid, and states, "We no longer recognize the State of Israel" and "the State of Israel in its current form is history... We call child murderers 'child murderers,' and will never accept that they have a divine or historic mandate excusing their outrages," Gaarder writes. "Shame on ethnic cleansing, shame on every terrorist strike against civilians, be it carried out by Hamas, Hezbollah or the State of Israel!"

Before you deluge us with emails that we're trying to demonize this committed human rights activist as an anti-Semite just because he's criticizing Israel, answer this: why is he making these particular mistakes? If he was randomly making up crimes, how did he stumble upon and publish these particular accusations? There are by definition an infinite number of wild untruths that anyone can invent - why is it that anti-Zionists keep targeting the Jewish State with these quintessentially anti-Semitic accusations?
Omri | |

MR Comments on Today's Search Terms

Some of the words and phrases that brought readers to Mere Rhetoric today:
* origin term antisemitism - it warms our little academic hearts that people are thinking about this
* www.mererhetoric.com - kind of a stupid search, you have to admit
* israel losing - yes
Omri | |

Breaking: Vital Perspective Has Leaked UN Ceasefire Draft

How do you know that the Israeli government is getting their act together and beginning to utilize blogs? Someone leaked them a copy of the UNSC Draft Resolution on the Lebanon ceasefire. Go now, and look at how badly the UN is trying to screw Israel.
Omri | |

US to Israel: Is There Any Way We Can Convince You Not to Win?

It's picture day here at MR:


Will either Walt or Mearsheimer please call Secretary Rice and remind her that she serves at the pleasure of AIPAC? That'd be great. Thanks.
Omri | |

Anti-Semitic Anti-Zionist Peace Activists

The potential defeat of the IDF by a combination of international diplomacy and Iranian weaponry is potentially too depressing to write about today. Maybe tomorrow. Instead, you get pictures from a Southern California peace rally. These people are very interested in peace - just look at their signs:


Notice the woman with the peace sign? Notice the girl next to her? Let's zoom in on that future Leftist activist, and take a closer gander at what she's being taught:


Resentment and hatred are ugly emotions, capable of warping and corrupting even the strongest constitutions. So you know this girl is going to grow up totally balanced.
Omri | |

Brutally Obvious Headine of the Day

Israel says BBC not reporting war fairly. Also, the New York Times, Reuters, Al Jazeera, and most of the other outlets considered required reading by international sophisticates.
Omri | |

Israel Gives Up on Victory?

This is outright depressing:

The IDF went on standby Thursday night when Defense Minister Amir Peretz froze a planned thrust deep into Lebanon and up to the Litani River. Israel, Peretz said, would exhaust the diplomatic front before launching the operation... "We hope to achieve our goals through diplomatic efforts," Peretz told reporters during a visit to Northern Command headquarters in safed, just before he was rushed into an underground bunker as sirens warned of incoming rockets. "if that doesn't happen, we will use all of our tools."

Why is the world in such a rush to establish a ceasefire?

A high-ranking IDF officer said Thursday that the army had killed more than 100 Hizbullah gunmen during the course of the day, the largest number of terrorists killed in a single day since the fighting began last month.

The United Nations: where Israel's enemies run when Israel starts firing back.
Omri | |

Boston Globe Wins Dumbest Argument of the Day Award

Unfortunately, the article is from July 30 - still, we defy anyone to beat this:

Nevertheless, Bush's refusal to risk political capital in Mideast mediation is having calamitous consequences. Bush refused to talk to Arafat because Arafat lied to the White House about a shipment of arms destined for Palestinian gunmen. Arafat, however, lied to nearly everyone.

Oh, well in that case let's give him lots of money and weapons. Because if he lies to everyone, then at least we know what to expect. How does that even get published? No seriously - how stupid do you have to be to type that into a word processor, tilt your head, consider it, and conclude "yeah, that sounds about right"?
Omri | |

MR Endorses Yet Another Hezbollah Statement

Hezbollah lunatic Hassan Nasrallah is calling on Israeli Arabs to leave their homes:

Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah on Wednesday warned all Israeli Arabs to leave the port city of Haifa so the militant group could step up attacks without fear of shedding the blood of fellow Muslims. Haifa, Israel's third-largest city, has been the frequent target of Hezbollah's rocket attacks. "I have a special message to the Arabs of Haifa, to your martyrs and to your wounded. I call on you to leave this city. I hope you do this. ... Please leave so we don't shed your blood, which is our blood," Nasrallah said.

Awesome idea. They can flee to Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, and Jordan - Israel promises to let them come back to their homes as soon as the war is over! [achem -- ed what - 1948 refugee jokes are suddenly out of bounds?]
Omri | |

Cynthia McKinney's Supporters Are Very Anti-Semitic Anti-Zionist

Maybe they're not anti-Semitic - maybe they're just really, really, really anti-Zionist:

What you see happening with Representative Cynthia McKinney is a Jewish financed War against the Black People of the United States. I don't care how much it appears otherwise.
Ms. Mckinney is a "PURE" leader. Ms. McKinney is exposing the Jews and their crimes against Humanity and The United States People. Jews are responsible for the Child Porn Business, they are responsible for illegal lobbying practices, they are spies, they are the architects of every war the world has ever seen. In short, Jews are responsible for all the misery in the World. They are War criminals. They stand in defiance of nearly 100 UN resolutions and have the "nerve" to lecture us on the resolution to disarm Hezbollah.
Israel is the only country in the World where the buying and selling of children is LEGAL. Israel is the only country in the World that has a Nuclear Weapons program and does not allow UN inspections.
They know they can't buy Cynthia they way they have bought every other Congressman and Senator in Washington.
They are not even Jews, they are REALLY Khazars, with a religion called Phallic Worshipping. They just took that name, "Jew' because no one else was using at the time.
JEWS ARE RESPONSIBLE FORT ALL THE MISERY OF THE WORLD. STUDY THEM . . .

The linguistics lesson aside ("they're not really Jews... it's just that they're the only referent of that signifier…"), we never knew that Israel was such a happening place. We wonder how much money we could get if we sold ourselves [you're way too old to be a 'child' ... still a student though - doesn't that count?... not really, no]. You should scroll up in the discussion too - the "boycott Jews" campaign is comedy gold. Oh well - what else do you expect from the supporter of a a virulent anti-Semite committed anti-Zionist like McKinney?
Omri | |

NYT: US Support for Israeli Self-Defense Hurts Moderate Muslim Revolution That Was Just About to Happen

Add this one to the tediously long and constantly growing list of bad things that were already going to happen anyway - but that Israel is nonetheless being blamed for:

Moderate reformers across the Arab world say American support for Israel’s battle with Hezbollah has put them on the defensive, tarring them by association and boosting Islamist parties. The very people whom the United States wanted to encourage to promote democracy from Bahrain to Casablanca instead feel trapped by a policy that they now ridicule more or less as "destroying the region in order to save it." Indeed, many of those reformers who have been working for change in their own societies - often isolated, harassed by state security, or marginalized to begin with - say American policy either strangles nascent reform movements or props up repressive governments that remain Washington’s best allies in the region.

So in addition to causing Muslim hostility toward Israel (because that was on the decline) and preventing the freeing of liberation of Shalit (because that was about to happen), Israeli self-defense has now apparently blocked the impending success of Arab moderates throughout the Middle East. What? There was no actual evidence that any kind of success was probable for any Muslim reformer any time in the near future? You're such a racist!
Here's the other problem: there hasn't been a week in the last three years without a New York Times article to the effect that the US presence in Iraq has crushed Arab moderates. But now they're saying that the US shouldn't support Israel because if they do, it'll hurt Arab moderation - something that the US has supposedly ground into a fine dust some time right after the overthrow of the Iraqi dictatorship. So either Arab moderates are doing much better than the Times has been hysterically insisting or Arab moderates have been hopelessly undermined by the Iraq war - yet the Times wants to also denigrate US support for Israel. In other words, either the Times has been misleading people about the actual Arab reaction to the liberation of Iraq or they're misleading people now about why Arab moderates are failing - and wouldn't you know it, it's Israel's fault.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

AP Writers are Geniuses

We were browsing old Houston Chronicle articles on Lebanon II and came across this gem from four days ago. It has absolutely no news value, but it has the best headline we've seen on the war: "Analysis: Mideast conflict complicated". Brilliant!
Omri | |

Reuters Has No Idea What's Going on in Israel

We assume that Ari Rabinovitch is an Israeli Reuters employee (bonus question: does that mean he's self-hating?), but that's no excuse for writing a stupid lede designed to reinforce the idea that Israelis are having a lot of fun with this whole war thing:

Siens warning of a rocket attack would likely be drowned out by the steady thump of music in Adi Cohen's nightclub in the heart of Israel's entertainment and commercial capital. "Business has actually been great," Cohen said in Tel Aviv, a city some 220 km (130 miles) from Lebanon but a world apart from the fighting between Israel and Hizbollah and the daily rocket attacks the group has directed against northern Israel. Tel Aviv's beaches and restaurants are packed. Many residents of Israel's embattled north have found refuge in the city, boosting revenues for local business owners.

The headline is "Tel Aviv a world apart from Lebanon war". Apparently having one out of every five people you know get plucked out of daily life and sent to a warzone is the same thing as being "a world apart".
Omri | |

US Border Security Rocks!

They are just so bad at their jobs that it's mindboggling:

Eleven Egyptian students who were supposed to travel to a Montana university after flying to JFK airport late last month disappeared in New York, spurring federal authorities to issue a nationwide alert, officials said yesterday. The students - who were traveling with six classmates from Mansoura University in Egypt - had their student visas revoked for failing to show up at Montana State University in Bozeman, the officials said. The other six students made it to the college.
"The FBI and ICE [Immigration and Custom Enforcement] would like to locate these 11 students in order to speak with them," said FBI Special Agent Richard Kolko after the "be-on-the-lookout" alert was issued to all police in the United States. Kolko said there is no reason to believe the missing students, all men around 20 years old, represent a threat. "At this point, all they have done is not show up for a scheduled academic program, and their visas have been revoked," Kolko said.

While we sympathize with any students in trouble for not showing up to classes on time (no seriously - there's no sarcasm there... we're starting a club... we have hats)... anyway, while we sympathize with any students in trouble for not showing up to classes on time, it's not quite accurate to say that there are zero reasons to believe the missing students, Muslim men of about 20 years old who have dropped off the radar, represent a threat. Because we can think of at least 19 reasons (or, if you prefer, about 3,000 reasons).
Omri | |

Jews Israelis Expelled From Fiji

It's not anti-Semitism, obviously anti-Zionism:

Three Israeli backpackers were evicted from Fiji after a Muslim immigration officer ruled that they had humiliated Palestinians during their military service in the territories. The three - Amit Ronen, Eldar Avracohen, and Nimrod Lahav - left Israel in February for a tour in Australia. In July they decided to spend a week in Fiji. On July 13 they arrived at Fiji airport where a surprise awaited them. "We gave our passports to the officer, and when she saw we are Israelis she asked for ID cards. We told her we don't understand why we need ID cards and she responded shouting: 'You know very well how to ask Palestinians for IDs and humiliate them for three years."

Silly Muslim anti-Semite anti-Zionist: enlisted Israeli troops have to go through at least a few months of boot camp. They could only have been humiliating Palestinians by asking for IDs (how humiliating!) for maybe two years and a few months. Maximum.
Omri | |

Slate Publishes Things That Our Undergraduates Would Get Flunked for Writing

Seriously, if one of our students turned in a paragraph like this, we would put a big X through it and write the pedantic and obvious statement "you can't use an anecdote to answer a poll:

And what of Hezbollah's anchors in Lebanese society? For over a decade, the armed group used its militancy against Israel, Syria's backing, intimidation, and Shiite support to protect its independence and prerogatives. This now lies in tatters. Much has been made of two polls recently released in Beirut, claiming that more than 80 percent of Lebanese citizens support Hezbollah's resistance against Israel. These results are simply not borne out by facts on the ground. Anecdotally, while there may be hostility to Israel in many quarters, there is no noticeable backing among Christians, Sunni Muslims, or Druze for what Hezbollah has done. If anything, hostility is being expressed with greater boldness.

We congratulate the professional media on their multiple layers of editors. Now if they can just hire some high school students who've taken intro-level statistics classes, they'd be well on their way to not being a decaying caricature of head-in-the-sand, Arab-publics-don't-really-want-war-with-Israel fantasizing. How absurd will the media get in their attempts to pretend that Israeli self-defense is preventing the blossoming of love and support from the Arab world? For clarity, the passage is "two polls recently released in Beirut [show] that more than 80 percent of Lebanese citizens support Hezbollah... Anecdotally... there is no noticeable backing". If we can drop whatever thin pretense of subtlty we might have left: that is a mind-bogglingly stupid thing for a reasonably educated grown-up to write. Anybody who knows the word "anecdotally" should be smart enough never to write a passage like that.
As to the idea of "Hezbollah's resistance against Israel", we again quote Alberto Fernandez, Director of Public Diplomacy in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the State Department - a guy who's job it is to be nice to Muslims:

"Oh come on, the 'Lebanese Resistance', if I may use that term sarcastically, didn't know the Shebaa Farms was occupied until the Syrians told them so. That is just ridiculous."

It's almost like Michael Young, opinion editor at the Daily Star newspaper in Beirut and apparent Slate contributor, will write anything - no matter how illogical or untenable - to subtly and not so subtly scapegoat Israel.
Omri | |

List of Things That Would Cause Us to Have More Sympathy for Lebanon's Prime Minister

He seems genuinely torn up:

Lebanon's prime minister, choking back tears, demanded a "quick and decisive ceasefire" on Monday after an Israeli air raid that he said killed more than 40 civilians sheltering from fighting in a southern village. As diplomatic efforts to end the 27-day-old war between Israel and Hizbollah guerrillas stalled, air raids elsewhere in the south and the Bekaa valley killed at least 24 Lebanese and Israel said it may expand its ground offensive. "An hour ago, a horrific massacre took place in Houla village as a result of the intentional Israeli bombardment that resulted in more than 40 martyrs," Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora told an Arab foreign ministers meeting in Beirut.

We'd have more sympathy for him if:
(1) He hadn't previously made Hezbollah - the proxy army that, we remind you, actually started this war - a respected member of the ruling coalition that he chose to put in charge of Lebanon
(2) He hadn't issued a statement all but thanking Hezbollah for starting the war that he's now crying about.
(3) He wasn't, you know, lying through his teeth:

Lebanon's Prime Minister said today that Israeli raids had killed 40 civilians in a "horrific massacre" in a border village, before correcting himself hours later to put the toll at just one dead... Prime Minister Fuad Saniora broke into tears at a meeting of Arab League foreign ministers as he described the attack.

Because those kinds of things make us not like him very much.
Omri | |

There is a World Where UN Investigations Are Not Biased. That is Not This World.

We'll agree that this is fair...

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annanhas said Israel's shelling of the Lebanese village of Qana appears to fit a pattern of violations of international law marking warfare between Israel and Hizbollah guerrillas, said on Monday. In a report to the UN Security Council, Annan said a comprehensive investigation was needed to gather evidence of possible violations of international humanitarian and human rights laws affecting both Lebanese and Israeli civilians during the conflict.

... when Iran agrees to let international inspectors look at the missile factories where they produced the rockets that brought down Haifa apartment buildings.
Omri | |

Israel and Venezuela in Diplomatic Crisis. We Literally Could Not Care Less.

Last week, Venezuela recalled their ambassador from Israel because Israel was commiting genocide. Israel considered, and then decided that comparing the Jewish State to Hitler was a little too much:

Israel has recalled its ambassador to Caracas following comments made by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez comparing Israel to Hitler, Israel's foreign ministry said on Monday. "We have recalled our ambassador to Caracas for consultations," said ministry spokesman Mark Regev.

No seriously, because we recall lots of times that Hitler fought defensive wars or coordinated humanitarian relief missions for Jews. How could Hugo Chavez be so irrational and wrong? Because he's a raving anti-Semite. It seems one of the benefits of being a pariah state in the eyes of much of the world should be that you don't have to rub shoulders with people like Chavez. Good riddance.
Omri | |

The IDF Is The World's Most Moral Army (Humanitarian Coordination Edition)

The IDF devotes precious resources and forces to helping the people of southern Lebanon. Those would be the same people who voted to fill 24 out of 24 parliamentary seats from their region with Hezbollah and Hezbollah political allies:

One IDF unit in Tel Aviv has a mission very different from that of the forces pounding Hizbullah in the North - getting humanitarian assistance to Lebanon. Following the escalation in violence last month, officers from the IDF's Foreign Relations Unit decided to set up an operations room in a base in northern Tel Aviv to coordinate international efforts to provide aid to Lebanon despite the army's naval-air-land siege of the country.

This distinguishes Israel sharply from Hezbollah, who rains rockets and missiles down indiscriminately on homes and schools in an effort to maximize the civilian death count. It also distinguishes Israel from Iran and Syria, who supplies Hezbollah with those very rockets and missiles. Iran and Syria, incidentally, have been threatened with absolutely no UN human rights condemnations in the last two weeks - again, in sharp distinction from Israel.
Omri | |

Hezbollah to Arab Countries: We're Losing the War. Quick, Someone Impose a Ceasefire.

How utterly and boringly predictable:

The following are excerpts from an interview with Hizbullah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, which aired on Al-Manar TV on August 3, 2006. It is noteworthy that Nasrallah is now approaching Arab leaders and imploring them to raise their voices to demand a ceasefire, in their private meetings with the Americans. In the last few weeks, he has been reviling these leaders, saying that he needs no help from them and that they should "get off his back."

Remember, Nasrallah has defined victory as merely Hezbollah's survival in the face of IDF weaponry. The faster he can get the West to pull the reigns on Israel the sooner he can go on TV and crow about how he's humiliated the Zionist entity. At least we can all be confident that the Bush administration would never think of selling out Israeli security on the thin chance that they'll be able to appease radical Muslims... Sigh.
This "don't interfere" / "quick, someone impose a ceasefire before Israel really punishes us for starting this war" dynamic is practically stereotype of the Arab-Israeli conflict. In virtually every war, Israel's Arab enemies pompously swaggered about and boldly instructed everyone to stay out of the region - until they started losing, which is when they run and pathetically hid behind the UN's skirts. In 1967, Egypt expelled UN peacekeepers from the Sinai so that they could settle their scores with Israel. For months, they had been giving these booming speeches in the UN about how anything having to do with the Middle East was a local affair and about how the UN should stay out of the Egyptian-Israel dispute.
Then Israel had enough and - responding to the act of war that Egypt committed in closing down the Straights, as well as to the Egyptian President's public promise to wash the streets of Tel Aviv with Jewish blood - dealt severely with the Egyptian armed forces. The Egyptian ambassador to the UN was put in an impossible position - for months he had been telling the international community to stay out of the conflict, now he had to beg them to intervene and stop Israel. He gave a hurried speech and then rushed off the podium - later to be seen crying openly in the hallway because of how obvious his hypocrisy was.
The United Nations: where Israel's enemies go when Israel starts firing back.
Omri | |

Associated Press: "We are all Hezbollah" is Not Anti-Israel

The JPost frontpage is a mix of the Jerusalem Post's own stories and AP feeds. After maybe like a week of reading the site regularly, just about anyone can learn to distinguish one from the other simply because the AP headlines are so obviously biased (why the Jerusalem Post runs them is a different question). For instance, you can tell without clicking through that a story titled Londoners march for ME cease-fire is going to be an Associated Press story:

"The demonstration shows the unity of any normal thinking person in this country that there should be an immediate cease-fire and that the government's line is incomprehensibly wrong," said Jeremy Corbyn, a lawmaker from Blair's Labor Party. Many placards were critical of Israel and demanded an end to occupation of the Palestinian territories. Veteran peace campaigner Bianca Jagger, walking at the head of the march, said the protest was not anti-Israel.

Let's examine that last claim more closely, shall we. Here's another, non-APdescription of the march:

Police said around 7,000 people joined the London protest as it snaked from the banks of the Thames to Hyde Park, first in brilliant sunshine and then in torrential rain. Many carried red and white Lebanese flags and placards condemning "Israeli crimes in Lebanon... We are all Hizbullah. Boycott Israel" read one. "Axis of evil: Bush, Blair, Olmert," read another, referring to the political leaders of the United States, Britain and Israel.

How did the AP get around the obvious contradiction of claim that "We are all Hizbollah" is not anti-Israel? Easy - they just didn't include any report about those kinds of placards. In fact, Hezbollah isn't mentioned in the AP story at all - in their world, it's like Israel just woke up grumpy one morning and decided to attack Lebanon. Liars.
Omri | |

IDF Sacrifices Its Commandos to Minimize Lebanese Civilian Casualties

IDF commandos carried out their 17th operation deep in Lebanon. They were dispatched under the cover of darkness to Tyre to make sure that less than 24 hours would be allowed to pass between when a Hezbollah cell launched rockets into Hadera and when that cell would be eliminated. Two of them ended up severely injured in the mission, one sustaining shots to the midsection. Why didn't Israel just let the IAF take care of the job? Because the terrorists were firing from a civilian neighborhood and hiding in an apartment building:

"The 13th Flotilla (Naval Commando Unit) set out during the night in an operation against those responsible for the firing of strategic weapons from a vehicle inside a built-up neighborhood... Forces reached the building inside the city. They approached the five-storey, 16-flat building and went up to the second floor... The fighting area [was] very crowded, inside of a small apartment building... Forces quietly entered the apartment, where three terrorists were hiding out with Kalashnikovs and grenades. When contact was made, the three Hizbullah men were hit by our forces"...
He added that the area of Tyre, to the northeast of the city, is a Hizbullah stronghold, where operatives are taking cover behind innocent civilians. "It was very right to send the crew on the mission," he stressed.

The IDF is the most moral army in the world.
Omri | |

Google: Finding the Anti-Semitism in Randomness

The problem with selecting pages based on the presence of particular words is that some rhetoric is peculiarly anti-Semitic. That became a problem for Google a couple of years ago, since it was really easy to find hate groups by writing like a hate-monger (in that case, constant use of the word "Jew"). But Google has another problem, one that is caused by the exact opposite dynamic: there's so much anti-Semitism out there that casting a very wide net is also likely to reel in some anti-Semitic specimens. For months, Google has been randomly drawing from videos from Google Video and putting them on their default personalized page. A few days ago, we got this:


Obviously, we're not implying that Google is in any way responsible for this filth (seriously - no sarcasm meant - these are probably just more or less random algorithms). But that this randomly ended up (randomly) on the frontpage shows just how common and how open anti-Semitic invective has become.
Incidentally, Google recently stopped feeding videos and replaced that part of the screen with a clock.
Omri | |

Palestinians Say They Won't Release Shalit Because of Qana - Asks World to Forget That They Weren't Going to Release Him Anyway

We've been trying to follow examples of how Israeli self-defense is being blamed for causing things that would have / were happening anyway. So Arianna Huffington blamed Israeli actions in Lebanon for (a) causing Iran to threaten to wipe out Israel and (b) making Arabs and Muslims hate Israel. Obviously, both of those things were already occurring well before the current Hezbollah-initiated war - making them particularly dumb excuses for urging Israel to retrain itself.
This week brought an even lamer excuse:

Israel's bombing of the Lebanese town of Qana will delay discussions on an Israeli-Palestinian cease-fire in Gaza and the return of kidnapped soldier Corporal Gilad Shalit, because the bombing has captured center stage in the Arab world, said Jibril Rajoub, the Palestinian Authority's former national security adviser. Last week, Rajoub had predicted that a deal for Shalit's return could be finalized this week, and he reiterated on Sunday that the various Palestinian factions were close to an agreement on the subject with Egyptian mediators. "But following the massacre in Qana, this date is no longer relevant," he said. "Everything is liable to change at the strategic level."

Yes, Rajoub had said that he thought that he could get Shalit freed. But Hamas had denied Rajoub's report, and had in fact said exactly the opposite. Now we trust Hamas on this more than we trust Rajoub for at least two reasons. First, Hamas - and not Rajoub's Fatah - is the terrorist party that's actually holding Shalit - so they might have a better idea about the chances that he'll be released. Second, in the past Hamas has actually tried to attack Rajoub and his men - so we're not sure that Rajoub has what one might call the best information about Hamas's plans.
So really, Israel's actions in Lebanon had very little effect on the odds of Shalit's release - but wouldn't it be nice for the anti-Israel media if they did?
Omri | |

Like Hezbollah, Hamas Uses Children As Human Shields

There's a link to this article in the roundup post below, but we wanted to call your attention to this particularly despicable act of Palestinian cowardice:

The videos of the air attacks show how Hamas makes use of the Gaza youth; they are sent to collect Qassam rocket launchers, after they have been used, and the IDF holds back from targetting them.

Don't tell any self-styled human rights activists about this - their heads will explode trying to figure out ways not to blame the Palestinians. Better to let them live in the peace and tranquility of their anti-Israel bias.
Omri | |

Updates About That Other Group of Genocidal Lunatics Currently Shooting, Bombing Israelis

* While nobody was paying attention, Palestinian terrorists kidnapped and murdered a 60 year old Israeli doctor. * Sometimes, Palestinian terrorists forget to hide their weapons in civilian homes, hospitals, or mosques. When that happens, the IDF quickly finds them and blows them up. This carelessness is not limited to any particular Palestinian terrorist organization - both Hamas and Islamic Jihad have had their weapons forcibly put out of commission in the last couple of days.

* Because of the above point, the Palestinians are usually very careful and keep their weapons safely under the beds of women and children. The IDF has come up with a new way of dealing with this tactic - a way that the Jewish state, because of the double standards and duplicity of the international community, has been loathe to employ in the past. Here's how it works: when the IDF discovers that the weapons being used to murder Israelis are being stored in a house they tell everyone to leave the house, then they blow up the weapons from the air. Western human rights organizations refer to this tactic as "collective punishment" - because Palestinians who let Hamas store weapons in their living rooms should not be inconvenienced when Israel has to come in and blow those weapons up.

* Palestinian gunmen raided a Palestinian prison and killed 6 inmates. Not to worry - the Bush administration is confident that a stable, secure, and democratic Palestinian state is just around the corner.

* You can tell that the Palestinians are getting delusions of grandeur when they think that they deserve an international force too. Sorry Hamas – international UN peacekeeping operations are only willing to become human shields for really successful Arab terrorists. Unless you've got thousands of missiles to fire into Israeli homes, they're not generally interested in dying for you.

UPDATE: Opps - forgot to pass on the news that Israel killed an Islamic Jihad leader earlier this week. Damn you, badly sorted Firefox bookmarks, damn you to hell.
Omri | |

Iran Admits It Armed Hezbollah, In Violation of Every International Law Ever

Hey, it turns out that - contrary to sophisticated liberal opinion - Iran actually has been arming Hezbollah:

A senior Iranian official admitted for the first time Friday that Tehran did indeed supply long-range Zelzal-2 missiles to Hezbollah. Mohtashami Pur, a one-time ambassador to Lebanon who currently holds the title of secretary-general of the "Intifada conference," told an Iranian newspaper that Iran transferred the missiles to the Shi'ite militia, adding that the organization has his country's blessing to use the weapons in defense of Lebanon.

Genocidal birds of a feather flock together.
Omri | |

Pitt Love Link Update

An old Pitt comrade of ours, Jason Lawrence, has set up a new blog called The Friendly Confines, about "sports, politics, humor, and life in the Windy City". Not exactly un-ambitious topics. But if you can get past his wretched sports allegiances, his ever-so-slightly-off sense of humor, and the fact that life in Chicago is bound to be depressing and cold... we're quite confident that you'll find his political analysis well worth your time.
Omri | |

The Malaysians that the US is Trying to Appease Are Kind of Insane

Yesterday morning we expressed our concern about how Bush public diplomacy chief Karen Hughes was selling out Israel in a desperate effort to get Malaysians to hate the US a little less:

Public diplomacy: apologizing for defending civilization in the futile hope of pathetically currying favor with people who end up hating us anyway... the United States is placing pressure on Israel in the hopes of winning over the Malaysian government... we suggest again, there might be other problems in the US-Muslim relationship than "US support for Israel".

Today, parts of Malaysia's state-controlled print media announced with the journalistic equivalent of a straight that Hezbollah's not to blame for the start of this war. You'd think that being the first party to commit an act of war makes you blameworthy for starting that war, but apparently not so. We don't want to be overdramatic: but we don't think that these are people that can have their hatreds reasoned away from them.
Omri | |

The Lebanese Prime Minister is Either a Simpering Imbecile or a Shameless Liar

We're thinking "shameless liar", but we're open to arguments on the other side:

Siniora: Yes. Then they attacked that building, a civilian building [in Qana]. And it killed that many people...
Wright: Israelis insist that Hezbollah is firing rockets from that town.
Siniora: Well, what do you expect as an excuse?
Wright: They've released video showing what they say are rockets being fired from Qana...
Siniora: I think with present technology you can do anything.
Wright: So, you feel that these accounts were made up?
Siniora: Yes, you can do anything with present technology.

You have to admit, that is pretty much totally awesome. David Wright, the interviewer, didn't challenge Siniora further - which is also totally awesome. We look forward to this being incorporated into the broader liberal memos: the Killian memos were "fake but accurate", but the Israeli films showing Hezbollah firing from somewhere very close to the porch of that building are "real but inaccurate". You can get the videos - and Allahpundit's commentary - at Hot Air.
If the stakes involved were anything less than a genocide against millions of Jews for the second time in under a century, there might actually be humor in this sick comedy.
Omri | |

EU Really Is That Stupid (Syrian Help In Lebanon Edition)

We have to wonder: did Syria promise to help negotiate a Hezbollah ceasefire before or after they tried to give Hezbollah more missiles and rockets to, you know, not cease firing:

The European Union has enlisted Syria's help to end the fighting in Lebanon as Damascus pledged support to the Lebanese government's plan for a settlement. EU envoy and Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos said following talks with Syrian President Bashar Assad Thursday, Damascus agreed to play a constructive role in settling the conflict by pressing Hizbullah to accept a ceasefire. "We also agreed on backing the Lebanese government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora as time is ripe for intensifying diplomatic efforts by all parties," Moratinos said.

Joking aside, we actually do believe that Syria will do everything it can to achieve a ceasefire: imposing one on Israel is about the only way to save Hezbollah from getting dismantled by the IDF.
At least Syria didn't very publicly mobilize its army for war two days before the EU announced that Syria is totally and completely on the side of peace... usually here we'd put something like "of course they did", but this is just getting absurd. Of course mobilized its army for war two days before the EU announced that Damascus was devoted to peace. Of course they did.
Omri | |

Even 40 Years Ago, Anti-Zionism was Already Anti-Semitism

We got this email recently from Daniel, a yeshuva student in Jerusalem. A quick check confirms that NRO also had it a few days ago. It seems almost too amazing to be true, but it seems to be totally legitimate. This is apparently an article by Eric Hoffer published in the LA Times on May 26, 1968. It demonstrates that anti-Semitism is not just the world's oldest hatred - it's also one of the most stable and consistent in its symptoms:

The Jews are a peculiar people: Things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews.
Other nations drive out thousands, even millions of people, and there is no refugee problem. Russia did it. Poland and Czechoslovakia did it. Turkey threw out a million Greeks, and Algeria a million Frenchmen. Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese - and no one says a word about refugees.
But in the case of Israel, the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees. Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab. Arnold Toynbee calls the displacement of the Arabs an atrocity greater than any committed by the Nazis.
Other nations when victorious on the battlefield dictate peace terms. But when Israel is victorious it must sue for peace. Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in this world.
Other nations when they are defeated survive and recover, but should Israel be defeated it would be destroyed. Had Nasser triumphed last June, he would have wiped Israel off the map, and no one would have lifted a finger to save the Jews.
No commitment to the Jews by any government, including our own, is worth the paper it is written on. There is a cry of outrage all over the world when people die in Vietnam or when two Negroes are executed in Rhodesia. But when Hitler slaughtered Jews no one remonstrated with him.
The Swedes, who are ready to break off diplomatic relations with America because of what we do in Vietnam, did not let out a peep when Hitler was slaughtering Jews. They sent Hitler choice iron ore and ball bearings, and serviced his troop trains to Norway.
The Jews are alone in the world. If Israel survives, it will be solely because of Jewish efforts and Jewish resources.
Yet at this moment Israel is our only reliable and unconditional ally. We can rely more on Israel than Israel can rely on us. And one has only to imagine what would have happened last summer had the Arabs and their Russian backers won the war to realize how vital the survival of Israel is to America and the West in general. I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel, so will it go with all of us.
Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.

Some things do change though: there's no way that the Los Angeles Times would ever print something this pro-Israel today.

UPDATE: We just checked Lexis. Their database doesn't go back far enough to get the original article - but on April 26, 2002 the Jerusalem Post printed this article and confirmed its authenticity. They described Hoffer as "an American social philosopher who wrote nine books and won the Presidential Medal of Freedom. His first book, The True Believer, published in 1951, was widely recognized as a classic."
Omri | |

Hezbollah Threatens Tel Aviv - MR Gives You Tomorrow’s Pro-Hezbollah Media Spin Today

Seriously, this would be really, really bad:

VIDEO - Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah threatened to bomb Tel Aviv during a TV address Thursday night, should Israel attack in Beirut. "If you indeed do this, I say this clearly. I won't use terms I used up to now, past Haifa, but I will say clearly and in a way that is not open to interpretation: If you bomb our capital we'll bomb your capital. We'll bomb Tel Aviv and we can do this." A senior Israeli defense source told Israel's Channel 1 that Israel will destroy Lebanon's infrastructure if Hizbullah fires rockets at Tel Aviv.

We'll save you - our devoted readers - some time: if this happens, the liberal conventional wisdom will be that Israel is playing into Hezbollah's hands by escalating the war. Does anyone remember when the United Nations confirmed that Israel had withdrawn from Lebanon and ordered Lebanon to disarm Hezbollah? Israel withdraws, genocidal enemies follow them, Israel responds - it's a cycle of violence!
Omri | |

MR Calls Bullshit On "Israel Losing Support in the Arab World" Meme

From Arianna herself:

Israel needs to take a deep breath, take a close look at the battlefield (focusing not just on the body count but on the hearts and minds being lost), and learn from the disastrous example of Iraq what blindly and stubbornly staying a self-defeating course will bring. Israel's current strategy of trying to bomb its way to security is actually having the counterproductive effect of making its people less safe.

This argument is very, very bad:
(1) Israel is not losing support in the Arab and Muslim world - they never had any to begin with (link is to one of our favorite polls, a Pew poll that concludes among other things that fully 100% of Jordanians are anti-Semitic). Yet again we point out that Hamas won the Palestinian election, while the Hezbollah political alliance won 24 out of 24 southern seats in the last Lebanese election.
(2) If Israel ever did have any Arab or Muslim support to lose, it certainly wasn't doing them any good. Arab and Muslim hearts and minds didn't stop a single missile from falling on a single Israeli home or school. So if destroying those missiles from a F-16 causes those fickle Arabs and Muslims to stop lending Israel their totally worthless support - well, that seems like a reasonable price to pay.
PS - this is also stupid:

Meanwhile, the conflict has dramatically weakened the democratic government of Lebanon and greatly emboldened the radicals in Iran, whose president today said the "main solution" to the Middle East crisis was the "elimination" of Israel.

As if the radicals in Iran weren't "greatly emboldened" before, when they were, you know, threatening the elimination of Israel. There may be lots of reasons for Israel to de-escalation in Lebanon, but the idea that it's enabling Ahmadinejad to openly call for the destruction of Israel can't be one of them... because he was already doing that. And making Muslims and Arabs hate Israel can't be one of them either... because they already did.
Michelle Malkin did a pretty good job mocking the suggestion that Muslims throughout the world are bereft of reasons to riot (links in the original):

If it's not Qana, it's Gitmo. Or cartoons or pop singers. Or filmmakers. Or books. Or more books. Or beauty pageants and bikinis. Or American fast-food joints. Or Valentine's Day. Or playing cards. Or Piglet. Or soccer. Or South Park.

One of two things about the liberal opponents of Israeli self-defense must be true: either they are dishonestly arguing that Israel should cease causing things that they know quite well were already happening, or they know absolutely nothing about the Middle East. Either way, they ought to be more cautious about telling Israel not to retaliate to brutal acts of war, since both mendacity and ignorance are in their own ways unseemly.
Omri | |

Syria is Hiding Weapons in Civilian Aid Convoys. Of Course They Are.

Just your average despicable Syrian/Lebanese humanitarian outrage:

The IDF said Syria was continuing to try to smuggle weapons to Lebanon. Israel has attacked several convoys suspected of transporting the weapons. In at least one instance, Israel mistakenly attacked a civilian truck transporting non-military goods. The IDF said it knows Syria is hiding weapons in convoys transporting humanitarian aid to Lebanon.

To stop these convoys, Israel has chosen to bomb roads and bridges so that no transports can get through at all. It's not the ideal solution, but it's better than constantly having to hit civilian convoys because intelligence indicates they're transporting rockets that will be rained down on Israeli homes and schools. Israel's choice is to kill civilians or to blow up roads - they chose to blow up roads, and of course are being criticized for destroying Lebanese infrastructure.
Omri | |

Exclusive IDF Videos Show Hezbollah Shelling Israel From Civilian Areas

The IDF has provided pro-Israel group StandWithUs exclusive videos of Hezbollah using Lebanese civilians as human shields. The videos are dispositive on this question - to continue to maintain otherwise would be the height of head-in-the-sand apologism. Which makes now as good a time as any to link back to our mockery of that shameless Salon article which passed off "Hezbollah avoids civilians" as the cutting edge of sophisticated liberal opinion.

UPDATE: The original post had "StandWithUs" as three seperate words. That was incorrect.
Omri | |

Anti-Israel Egyptian Singer Actually Not Charming At All

Turns out, he's exactly as despicable as you'd expect:

The former laundryman who sings a kind of Egyptian-folk rap has been widely panned by critics, but developed a huge following after the 2003 release of "I Hate Israel" and the anti-American and anti-Saddam Hussein "Hitting Iraq." Following a similar formula, "For Only Two Soldiers" seems destined for success. In it, he exhorts "Oh Arab men, wake up." "One thousand times I warned of Israel, they thought I was kidding," the song opens. "The truth is now clear. Because of two soldiers, they make a big fuss."

Two soldiers and thousands of rockets, but that's not really what bothers us. Israel is not retaliating - they're fighting a war in every way imposed on it by Hezbollah. We don't want to bore you with this point, but again - retaliations are "conducted," but wars are "fought". Once a war begins, Israel is under no obligation to play with a handicap just because the other side was particularly stupid to antagonize it.
Omri | |

IDF Allowed to Forgo Fasting, Mourning So That Future Generations Will Have Less to Mourn

Walla (Hebrew) reports that soldiers and servicepeople in the North have been given a dispensation from fasting today for Tish'a B'Av - arguably the weightiest day of mourning in the Jewish calander, the so-called saddest day in Jewish history:

The Chief Rabbis gave permission to soldiers and security forces serving in the North not to observe the Fasting of Tish'a B'Av.

It was on the 9th (Tish'a) of the month Av that the first and second Temples were destroyed, that the Bar Kokhba revolt failed, and that Jerusalem fell to Rome. Haredi Jews mourn the victims of the Holocaust on Tish'a B'Av, and indeed the first murders in Treblinka took place on that day in 1942. In the broadest sense, over the last 2,000 years, Tish'a B'Av has been the day for mourning the loss of the Jewish homeland - and for reflecting on the atocities that not having a home enabled. Now that Israel has been restored, the Chief Rabbis will do nothing to hinder the IDF's efforts to never let any of those atrocities happen again.
Omri | |

Public Diplomacy Means Always Having to Say You're Sorry

You especially have to apologize for endorsing Israeli self-defense:

Claims that Israel has a green light to fight in Lebanon until it ousts Hezbollah are “outrageous,” a top aide to President Bush said. In interviews over the weekend with Malaysian media, Karen Hughes, Bush’s envoy for public diplomacy in the Middle East, rejected Israeli Justice Minister Haim Ramon’s claim of U.S. authorization to wipe out Hezbollah. "That is an outrageous statement," Hughes said. "It is false, and my understanding is the government of Israel has disavowed it."

Public diplomacy: apologizing for defending civilization in the futile hope of pathetically currying favor with people who end up hating us anyway.
So does this mean that the United States is placing pressure on Israel in the hopes of winning over the Malaysian government? The government that punishes people for kissing in public and destroys Hindu temples? They're obviously willing to pretend that they're pressuring Israel - largely for reasons passing understanding since, we suggest again, there might be other problems in the US-Muslim relationship than "US support for Israel". Things like, you know, knocking down Hindu temples.
Omri | |

Shimon Peres Called Upon to Shield Israel Diplomatically - Again

If the peacenik credibility of former hark Shimon Peres helps Israel delay a US-imposed stop time for Lebanon II, will you all apologize for calling him a worthless traitor:

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Vice Premier Shimon Peres disagreed Tuesday on the expected end to Israeli military operations against Hezbollah in Lebanon. Rice said that a cease-fire could be reached in Lebanon within days while Peres said the fighting may go on for weeks... Peres, however, said Israel's military campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon could go on for weeks despite international pressure for a cease-fire sooner. Asked in Washington how long it would be before the Israel Defense Forces campaign ends, Peres told reporters: "In my judgment, it is not far away. You can count it in a matter of weeks, not months."

We have friends in Israel who insist on Shimon Peres's irrelevance. That's because they don't understand that other countries matter.

Continue reading "Shimon Peres Called Upon to Shield Israel Diplomatically - Again" »

Omri | |

Wherein We Disagree With the EU's Priorities

The EU kind of sort of but not really called for a ceasefire:

The European Union called for an immediate end to fighting in the Middle East but failed to demand a formal ceasefire straight away, as Israel extended its ground war in Lebanon. Papering over lingering differences, the EU's Finnish presidency said that an emergency meeting in Brussels of the 25-member bloc's foreign ministers had laid the foundations for a peace plan to be reached at the United Nations.

Yeah whatever. We're more interested in what Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja said:

"The Council (of EU ministers) calls for an immediate cessation of hostilities to be followed by a sustainable ceasefire," Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja told reporters after three hours of talks. When asked repeatedly to explain the difference between the two, he said curtly: "The most important thing is that no weapons will be fired."

We disagree. We think hat the most important thing is that Hezbollah return the soldiers that they kidnapped from sovereign Israeli territory. Then we think the next most important thing is that they divest themselves of the rockets and missiles that they've been raining down on Israeli towns. Then - and only then - it might be the case that the list reaches "no weapons being fired". Why is it so unreasonable that the side that started the war should have to make the first gesture toward ending it?
Omri | |

Rightist Refusniks Make it Easy for MR to Appear Centrist

How noble of them:

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Wednesday predicted that the outcome of the Israel Defense Forces' fighting in Lebanon would create "new momentum" for Israel's plan to separate from the Palestinians by withdrawing from much of the West Bank. At least 10 settlers being called up for reserve duty in the IDF infantry corps on Wednesday threatened to refuse service in Lebanon to protest Olmert's comment. "We will not go into Lebanon if the whole goal is to help expel us from our homes," the reservists told their commanders.

Then they can go to jail. Just like the last group of right-wing crazies that refused to obey legitimate, lawful orders. And just like the group of left-wing crazies before them. See - how hard is that to figure out?
Omri | |

Juan Cole is Intellectually Dishonest, Part [Insert Big Number Here]

Dishonest enough to write this...

Israeli helicopter gunships are said to have destroyed a hospital in the city... eyewitnesses are saying that the Israelis fired a missile at the Dar al-Hikmah hospital, setting it ablaze. Unless the hospital had been turned into a military base, this action (if it occurred) was a war crime.

... without telling his readers that it had obviously been converted into a military base:

After the commandos withdrew, warplanes destroyed the three-storey hospital, which had been evacuated of wounded Hizbollah and civilian patients before the Israeli raid.

And dishonest enough to write this...

The Israelis then carried out air raids in the far north of Lebanon, a Sunni area with no Hizbullah, destroying three bridges, in an ongoing attempt to cripple the national infrastructure.

... (incredibly) without telling his readers that those bridges were bridges being used to get weapons from Syria:

The Israelis say that they did go in there, that they snatched a number of people and according to Lebanese sources, they've taken five prisoners in the helicopters and flown them back to Israel. They've attacked two bridges on the road to Syria - which Israel accuses of supplying Hezbollah with arms - those bridges were knocked out. That comes after three days of attacks on various roads leading from Syria into Lebanon."

Now, you can agree or disagree about whether the bridges are actually being used to transport arms from Syria. But intellectual honesty would require at least passing on the Israeli justification. But that would dilute the propaganda value of Cole's "academic and scholarly" blog, and make it harder for mindless Leftists to repeat his half-truths as - as per his insufferable title - informed comment and opinion.
This is typical Cole - technically true but so devoid of context as to cross into dishonest advocacy: "if the hospital was a military base, it was a war crime" is true - but the hospital was a military base... "Israel destroyed bridges outside of Hezbollah strongholds" is true - but those bridges were being used to supply Hezbollah. For someone who claims to be informed, Cole fails to pass on relevant, pro-Israel information on a pretty consistent basis.
Omri | |

Here's the Thing About the Anti-Israel Media: They Lie - 48 Hour Ceasefire Myth Won't Die Edition

In our developing list of media outlets misleading their readers about what exactly Israel promised regarding a post-Qana bombing ceasefire, we now add:
* the New York Times: "Israel promised Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Sunday that it would halt air operations for two days, except to respond to 'imminent threats'"
* Zaman Daily: "Israel had agreed to implement an immediate 48-hour suspension of air strikes to diminish the international outcry over the killing of 60 civilians in the Lebanese town of Qana. However, just 21 hours after the cease-fire agreement Israel pounded southern and eastern Lebanon from sea and air"
These two distinguished outlets join the Washington Post, which let Jimmy Carter tell the same fib yesterday. To review the original AP release on this question:

Israeli officials earlier left open the possibility that Israel might hit targets to stop imminent attacks on Israel, and that the suspension could last less than 48 hours if the military completes its inquiry into Sunday's incident in Qana before then.

Since it became clear pretty early that Israel could not have been solely responsible for the Qana tragedy - since there were 7 hours between the last bombing raid and when the building fell - there was no reason to continue with the ceasefire... which obviously isn't preventing journalists from pretending otherwise in their efforts to demonize Israel.
Omri | |

No Really, Hezbollah Uses Human Shields

A letter sent to a German daily, describing Hezbollah's strategy in detail:

I lived until 2002 in a small southern village near Mardshajun that is inhabited by a majority of Shias like me. After Israel left Lebanon, it did not take long for Hezbollah to have the say in our town and all other towns. Received as successful resistance fighters, they appeared armed to the teeth and dug rocket depots in bunkers in our town as well. The social work of the Party of God consisted in building a school and a residence over these bunkers! A local sheikh explained to me laughing that the Jews would lose in any event because the rockets would either be fired at them or if they attacked the rocket depots, they would be condemned by world opinion on account of the dead civilians. These people do not care about the Lebanese population, they use them as shields, and, once dead, as propaganda. As long as they continue existing there, there will be no tranquility and peace.

Remember how Salon just published a so-contrarian-it-must-be-chic article saying that Hezbollah avoids civilians? Yeah, that's because the anti-Israel media lies.
(via Andrew Sullivan)
Omri | |

Memo to Conservative Journalists: Hezbollah is the Best Trained Arab Army Israel Has Ever Faced

Ralph Peters is giving Ehud Olmert military advice, arguing that air power isn't enough to win the war against Hezbollah. He thus joins the growing chorus of conservative journalists who can't understand why Israel hasn't won yet. Besides Peters, the best example of this frustration was yesterday's Bret Stephens column in the WSJ:

Israel is headed for the greatest military humiliation in its history. During the Yom Kippur War of 1973, Israelis were stunned by their early reversals against Egypt and Syria, yet they eked out a victory over these two powerfully armed, Soviet-backed adversaries in 20 days. The conflict with Hezbollah - a 15,000-man militia chiefly armed with World War II-era Katyusha rockets - is now in its 21st day.

That's mostly wrong in its facts, but even more egregiously wrong in its implications. As a strict factual matter, Hezbollah is not armed chiefly with WW2 weapons - Iran has ensured that their proxy army has of state of the art light weapons, cutting edge anti-tank weapons, and not a few anti-ship and anti-plane weapons. But more importantly - and read this carefully - Hezbollah is the best trained, best disciplined army that Israel has ever faced. Israel managed to turn back the Syrian army because, among other things, it had no idea how to manage battlefield communications. Hezbollah has no such problems - nowhere near them in fact. A friend of ours in the IDF was comparing Hamas's forces to Hezbollah's, and commented dryly that "Hezbollah's snipers actually hit things".
But what about Peters's suggestion that Israel has been relying too heavily on air power? That complaint also springs from what seems to be a misunderstanding. Since Israel left Lebanon in 2000, Hezbollah has been availing itself of Israel's old bunkers. They've also dug their own encampments and bunkers. They are deeply, deeply entrenched into their positions. Ergo Israel's reliance on air power – it's nothing more than the prelude to an invasion. The IDF needed to soften up the enemy for a week or two before sending ground forces in. Israel is already going to take heavy casualties fighting the best army they've ever faced on a battlefield - no reason to make the situation more perilous by undertaking a rash invasion rather than a well-prepared campaign.
Omri | |

OK, Just One More on Iran-Hezbollah Connections

We know that we literally just promised that we're done droning on about the Guardian's "Hezbollah and Iran aren't connected" head-in-the-sand, anti-Israel "journalism", but just one more. There are now descriptions of the specific weapons that Tehran gave Hezbollah:

In addition, the extent of Iran's intimate involvement in Hizbullah attacks is also starting to emerge. According to the defense establishment, the reason Hizbullah has not fired long-range Iranian-made Fajr missiles at Israel is due to Teheran's opposition. Israel now understands that without direct orders from the ayatollahs, Hizbullah is not allowed to use Iranian missiles in attacks against Israel.

Because the thing about the anti-Israel media, you see, is that they lie.
Omri | |

IDF Commandos Raid Hezbollah Stronghold

The IDF seems less and less amused with Hezbollah's refusal to stop trying to kill Israelis. They've begun undertaking spectacular operations as well as preparing for a major ground offensive:

Israeli aircraft flew support missions as troops hit the ground about 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) north of Baalbeck in the Bekaa Valley near the Syrian border, the sources said. The Lebanese army also reported heavy helicopter traffic east and west of the town, the northernmost ground operation for Israel during the nearly three-week conflict.. Witnesses, however, said "several" people were taken out of the hospital.

Israeli newspapers are reporting that "several" means "six", and are naming three of them. All are relatively low-ranking members of the group - but the entire raid still sounds like something from the days of Entebbe:

After several hours of intense fighting in and around the in the eastern Lebanon town of Baalbek, which was built by Iran for the express purpose of treating Hizbullah operatives, IDF commando forces on Wednesday morning took a number of Hizbullah operatives captive. An IAF helicopter dropped commando forces a short distance from the hospital late Tuesday night. The force was discovered as it moved towards the structure, where Hizbullah operatives were suspected of hiding. Several hours of gunfights ensued, and at least 10 Hizbullah guerrillas were reported killed. Another force was helicoptered in to extricate the commandos and provide backup for the mission. After inspecting the identification of everyone in the hospital, the IDF soldiers proceeded to arrest several Hizbullah officials, who were later transported back into Israel... The main target of the operation was Muhammad Yazbek, a senior figure in the organization. Yazbek was not in the hospital at the time of the raid.

On the other hand, the Entebbe forces didn't have this kind of air support:

Lebanese security sources said the IDF commandos landed by helicopter, launching several strikes near Baalbek, which is located in eastern Lebanon's Bekaa Valley. One Lebanese officer said the Israel Air Force presence in the air above the ancient city was "unprecedented."

One other thing: the hospital that the commandos raided? Yeah, it was built for Hezbollah by Iran specifically to provide first-rate care to Hezbollah militia members. One last time: remember when the Guardian said that there was no overt relationship between Hezbollah and Tehran?

UPDATE: Originally, the second and third links were accidentally identical. Second link fixed now.
Omri | |

Yes, There Are Some Arabs Who Really, Really Just Want to Kill Jews. Could Be, There Are Quite a Few of Them.

If a survey has a really small sample size but shows unanimous opinions, is it still significant? Certainly seems that way:

Impressed by this point of view that I haven't considerd before, I asked him what he would've thought, if a Hezbollah rocket had attacked a building in Israel, killing 55 civillians, of which 30 were children. He responded immeidtely "I would've thought it was great! A7san!". So I repeated the same question to 8 other co-workers, and the responses so far have been as follows: 7 said they would celebrate, and 2 said that such an attack would've been bad, but justified! Yeah! Not a single person said that the death of any civllian, on either side, is an equal tragedy.

There's a deep pathology that has taken root in the Arab world - a poisonous mix of stagnating ideology, religiously-inspired hatred, and vicious resentment. The result is predictable:

This begs another question: If we were the ones who had the superior military machine, would we have shown them any mercy, or any regard to their civillian casualties? Would we have hesitated to wipe them all out? Armed forces, civillians, whatever? Would any of us have felt bad about it at all? Or would we be filled with the feelings of Pride, honor and dignity that we keep talking about day and night?

Genocidal maniacs - and the societies that back them - have historically been able to rationalize any atrocity against Jews. There is, however, something unique about the genocidal rhetoric coming out of the Arab world - and this writer is exactly right to point out how it expresses itself as an obsession with pride and honor. This is the same pathetic, testosterone-soaked mania that could cause Lebanon II to escalate. It's absurd to believe that the same people who attacked Israel out of a genocidal mix of hatred and resentment would somehow become magnanimous if they were to win.
Omri | |

In Just Seven Short Paragraphs, Jimmy Carter Tells 2 Lies, Makes 2 Incoherent Arguments, Takes an Anti-Israel Stance that the State Department Mocks, and Just Generally Annoys the Hell Out of Us

First of all, how shameless does Jimmy Carter have to be to dare to take up pen and give Israel advice on how to protect its citizens from terrorists? This is the man who lost Iran to Islamofascism. If we were comatose ferrets, we wouldn't try to give Lance Armstrong athletic advice. Yet nonetheless, here is Carter offering the best he can come up with.

There is barely a sentence or passage of this sanctimonious drivel that is not somewhere between intellectual dishonesty and demonstrable lying. This article reads like it could have been compiled from random anti-Israel columns: virtually every popular excuse for violence ("Shebba Farms is disputed"), facile red herring ("Israel will fail in their attempt to bomb Arabs into opposing terrorism") and incoherent argument ("Israel has made Hezbollah and Hamas popular") makes an appearance. It's like anti-Israel apologists aren't even trying any more - they've just got a list of catchphrases that they insert randomly into their propaganda.

Beginning of second paragraph:

This stratagem precipitated the renewed violence that erupted in June when Palestinians dug a tunnel under the barrier that surrounds Gaza and assaulted some Israeli soldiers, killing two and capturing one. They offered to exchange the soldier for the release of 95 women and 313 children who are among almost 10,000 Arabs in Israeli prisons, but this time Israel rejected a swap and attacked Gaza in an attempt to free the soldier and stop rocket fire into Israel.

That is a verifiable, obvious, bald-faced lie. Hamas never offered to exchange Shalit in exchange for " the release of 95 women and 313 children". They offered to release information about Shalit in exchange for those women and children under 18. The very minimum that Hamas would ever accept for Shalit was - from the very first moment - all terrorists without blood on their hands. Seriously - from a former President of the United States, right there in the second paragraph, an outright lie.

Rest of second paragraph:

The resulting destruction brought reconciliation between warring Palestinian factions and support for them throughout the Arab world.

Actually, it was the success of the kidnapping that increased Hamas's popularity throughout the Arab world and brought about a reconciliation with Fatah. But wouldn't it be nice if it was Israel's fault?

Beginning of third paragraph:

Hezbollah militants then killed three Israeli soldiers and captured two others, and insisted on Israel's withdrawal from disputed territory and an exchange for some of the several thousand incarcerated Lebanese.

Calling the Shebba Farms is "disputed territory" from a Lebanese standpoint is about as legitimate as calling California "disputed territory" from a Mexican standpoint. In May 2000, Israel withdrew from Lebanon and had the UN walk over the border inch by inch to verify that. So theoretically, a resistance group like Hezbollah should have had no more purpose for existing. But since Hezbollah is committed to wiping out every Jew in Israel, they needed an excuse to keep fighting. So Syria declared that some of the land that Israel had taken from them in 1967 (the Shebba Farms) had actually been Lebanese land all along and that Hezbollah needed to liberate it. This trick was so transparent that State Department Near East Public Diplomacy Director Alberto Fernandez outright mocked anyone who would be so stupid as to suggest its validity:

Oh come on, the 'Lebanese Resistance', if I may use that term sarcastically, didn't know the Shebaa Farms was occupied until the Syrians told them so. That is just ridiculous.

Someone should tell Carter that people at the State Department think that the things he's telling the American people are worthy of sarcastic ridicule.

Whole fourth paragraph:

It is inarguable that Israel has a right to defend itself against attacks on its citizens, but it is inhumane and counterproductive to punish civilian populations in the illogical hope that somehow they will blame Hamas and Hezbollah for provoking the devastating response. The result instead has been that broad Arab and worldwide support has been rallied for these groups, while condemnation of both Israel and the United States has intensified.

You know how when racists say that they have lots of black friends, people make fun of them? That's how we feel when we read "Israel has a right to defend itself, but...". It's a caricature of how people who don't really believe that talk and write. It's also worth noting that Israel isn't targeting civilian populations to turn those populations against Hamas or Hezbollah - they're trying to destroy the weapons that have been hidden among those populations. But the real gem of this passage is the ever-popular "Israel has made Hamas and Hezbollah more popular". As if Hamas and Hezbollah needed to be more popular: Hamas won a majority of the Palestinian vote, while the Hezbollah political alliance won 24 out of 24 seats in southern Lebanon. And even if that wasn't true, it certainly seems like they have enough support to murder and kidnap Israeli soldiers. And as for the absurd implication that an Arab world that had been trying to successfully attack Israel for 50 years would turn their backs on the Arabs who finally managed to do it - to point out the logic is to embarrass the advocate who is shameless enough to suggest it.

Beginning of the fifth paragraph:

Israel belatedly announced, but did not carry out, a two-day cessation in bombing Lebanon

We've been mocking that argument all day. In a word, did Israel unconditionally promise a two-day cessation in bombing Lebanon? No. Implying otherwise is a fib.

End of sixth and beginning of seventh paragraphs:

Tragically, the current conflict is part of the inevitably repetitive cycle of violence that results from the absence of a comprehensive settlement in the Middle East, exacerbated by the almost unprecedented six-year absence of any real effort to achieve such a goal. Leaders on both sides ignore strong majorities that crave peace, allowing extremist-led violence to preempt all opportunities for building a political consensus.

Israel leaves Gaza to Hamas and Lebanon to Hezbollah. Hamas comes out of Gaza to keep killing and murdering Israelis. Hezbollah comes out of Lebanon to keep killing and murdering Israelis. It's a cycle of violence! As to the "strong majorities that crave peace", we hope he's not referring to the majority that elected Hamas or to the entire south of Lebanon that unanimously elected the Hezbollah coalition - because we don't remember any of those parties running on a peace platform.

Rest of seventh paragraph:

Traumatized Israelis cling to the false hope that their lives will be made safer by incremental unilateral withdrawals from occupied areas, while Palestinians see their remnant territories reduced to little more than human dumping grounds surrounded by a provocative "security barrier" that embarrasses Israel's friends and that fails to bring safety or stability.

Remember above how we made the joke about racists who talk about having black friends. If we would have known that this paragraph was coming, we would have written something like "racists who talk about having black friends - but complain about how ineloquent those friends are". Because that would make Carter's claim to be a friend of Israel who is embarrassed by Israeli self-defense much funnier.

Also totally precious is this part from the middle of the eighth paragraph:

Except for mutually agreeable negotiated modifications, Israel's official pre-1967 borders must be honored.

Here's why we don't think Jimmy Carter should be taken seriously when he talks about the Middle East (besides the whole he lost Iran to Islamism thing). It's because he pretends that he would take a stand against people who refuse to honor Israel's official borders - yet just a few paragraphs above he had sought to explain why Hamas and Hezbollah's failure to honor said borders wasn't really all that bad.

In just seven paragraphs, former President Jimmy Carter used whatever glow of the office he still possesses to:

* assert a demonstrably falsehood about Hezbollah's prisoner swap offer
* assert a demonstrably falsehood about how Israel announced an (unconditional) 48-hour break in air attacks
* endorse a Hezbollah interpretation of "disputed land" that's so bad that State Department diplomats go on the record to mock people who use it
* incoherently argue that Hamas and Hezbollah - despite doing things like dominating local elections - were not popular before Israel attacked them
* incoherently argue that Hamas and Hezbollah would have lost popularity if Israel let them achieve a victory that Arabs have been trying to achieve for half a century
* annoyingly call the dynamic in which "Israel withdraws, yet its enemies chase them across international borders to kill Israelis" a "cycle of violence"
* annoyingly imply that he supported the sanctity of Israel's borders
* annoyingly imply that he is a friend of Israel despite the seven vapid anti-Israel myths described above - myths that he sanctimoniously peddled as insightful and brave

But hey, what do we know - the man has a Nobel Prize. Maybe if Israelis didn't fire back, their Arab enemies would stop trying to kill them - nonviolence always works against genocidal maniacs.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
Omri | |

Fall of Indonesia Into Islamism Demonstrates Domino Theory

In the world's most populas Muslim country, moderate Islam is in freefall:

Across this most religious of Indonesia’s provinces, brown uniformed policemen in black wagons enforce Shariah, or Islamic law. They haul unmarried couples into precincts and arrest people for drinking or gambling. Increasingly, many of the cases are pushed to the ultimate conclusion, public canings at mosques in front of pumped-up crowds. In mid-July, a 27-year-old man sentenced to 40 lashes fainted on the seventh stroke of a rattan cane from a hooded man in the yard of a mosque here in the provincial capital. The caning was televised nationally, with an announcer reporting that the man, who had been arrested for drinking at a beachside stall, would receive the remainder of his punishment once he had recovered.

These people are actually moving backwards in time. It's the death of a culture, as it sinks from civilization and activity into an ocean barbarism and stagnation. But cultures aren't small things - they don't just slip quietly under the water. They create a whirlpool that traps and drags down everything around them:

Aceh is undergoing a profound transformation that is likely to have considerable impact on the nature of Islam in Indonesia, the most populous Muslim country. For centuries Indonesia has been known for the open-minded, sometimes freewheeling, interpretation of its dominant religion. That is changing as moderate Muslims find themselves under siege from more orthodox proponents, and as the moderates are hesitant to push back. Aceh... put Shariah law onto the books. Special Shariah courts established to mete out punishments have been operating for a year. Now, some of Indonesia’s other provincial governments are looking to Aceh as a model for how they might more formalize Shariah laws already on the books. More than a score of townships across Indonesia have introduced Shariah-like laws that fall short of the precision of the religious laws here.

This kind of effect can't be contained within countries. Masses that drag their societies into Islamism will serve as models for populations across their borders. The War on Terror has to be global - either it will be fought in other countries or it will be fought just outside our front door, with fifth columns inside the living room.
Omri | |

Here's the Thing About the Anti-Israel Media: They Lie - 48 Hour Ceasefire Edition

They really are just that shameless:

Israel breaks vow, airstrikes continue.
As it poured soldiers and artillery shells into southern Lebanon, Israel vowed on Monday to press ahead with its war on Hezbollah and made a number of airstrikes after promising a 48-hour pause in its air campaign. "The fighting continues," Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said. "There is no cease-fire and there will not be any cease-fire in the coming days."

This headline, ladies and gentlemen, actually makes the Detroit News more dishonest than Al Jazeera!

But another senior political official said that the suspension of aerial bombardment didn’t include retaliation for any Hezbollah rocket attacks, the assassination of the group's leaders or assistance to Israeli ground forces in southern Lebanon. The official also said that the cessation could last less than 48 hours if the army concludes its probe into the Qana attack earlier than expected.

The break was so that Israel could take some time and determine what happened in Qana. Now we know that Hezbollah at the very least shares responsibility for this tragedy - somewhere between choreographing its aftermath to outright causing the collapse - there's no reason to continue the ceasefire. But hey, it's the anti-Israel press: no reason to let little things like "what the Israelis actually said" get in the way of calling Israelis liars.

[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]

UPDATE: Of course, the Mirror is running the same garbage about broken Israeli vows.

UPDATE 2: No they're not.
Omri | |

It's Amazing What a War Can Do to a Deluded Peacenik Union Thug

Less than half a year ago, Arab MKs in the Knesset were really, really huge fans of Amir Peretz:

We're not saying that this actually rises to anything like an argument, but it's certainly something to think about: "Katsav met Tuesday with representatives of the Arab factions and Likud members. Hadash representatives did not recommend a prime minister candidate, but stressed that they would definitely prefer Peretz over Olmert."

Now they think he's just another Jewish baby killer:

Termed a "child killer" and "scoundrel" by Arab MKs during an appearance at an emergency Knesset session Monday, Defense Minister Amir Peretz said Israel must not agree to an immediate cease-fire, but rather expand and strengthen its attacks on Hizbullah. Peretz's speech was interrupted dozens of times, and three Arab MKs - Ibrahim Sarsour and Taleb a-Sanaa (United Arab list) and Jamal Zahalka (Balad) - were eventually ejected from the session by Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik. Sarsour called Peretz a murderer and a child killer. Zahalka said he was a liar and a warmonger. Itzik said she was giving the three the "gift" of throwing them out, since they had plainly sought to cause a stir with their own constituency.

We never would have been so hard on Peretz if we knew that one day he'd have these kinds of enemies.
Omri | |

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