THIS YEAR IN JERUSALEM

Barack Obama in 2009 incanting "Next Year in Jerusalem" What's he going to say this year?

Today's Australian has a good coverage of the multiple issues involving Israel at the moment - here and here. Foreign editor Greg Sheridan superbly covers the kerfuffle over allegations of the Mossad's use of Australian passports in the totally unproven and unsubstantiated supposed hit on Hamas arms dealer and drug pusher Mahmoud al-Mabhouh and the incredible reaction of Barack Obama to the ill timed announcement by an Israeli ministry official about construction of dwelling in a Jewish neighbourhood of Jerusalem.

Sheridan exposes the fair amount of hypocrisy we are seeing in the world today. Perhaps Obama might reflect on this when he sits down at his now annual Passover seder to toast the liberation of the Jews.

Meanwhile, Mahmoud al-Mabhouh seems to have been elevated by some in Britain to sainthood. That's what happens when Palestinian Bambis confront anyone Jewish these days in the eyes of a desperate British government lagging behind at the polls and needing to pander to a population of several million Muslims and their far left rabidly antiSemitic minions.

We don't have such conditions here in Australia and, despite Kevin Rudd's fit of piqué when the passports affair first arose, he simply doesn't need to alienate the population here, many of who look upon the Israelis as being heroes for standing up to Islamist pressure tactics, lies and incitement. Most of the Western world including the US under Barack Obama is displaying a decided lack of spine in this regard.

As discussed yesterday, the outrage about Passportgate has descended to a level where certain hypocrites in the media have found the need to move to Fantasyland to support their obvious Israel bashing agendas.

Interestingly, two polls conducted in the media this week, came out decidedly in favour of Israel. Both polls were worded in such a way that they virtually implicated Israel as the guilty party in the passports scandal. Despite this, the "yes" vote for following the British lead in the ABC poll was in the low 30s - no doubt much to the chagrin of the ABC biffin who dreamt up this drivel.