Marrickville fiddles while Greens Byrne

Despite a 5.2% swing against Labor on an evening where the Government was thrown out by electors in a landslide, the ALP's Carmel Tebbutt appears to have retained the NSW State seat of Marrickville.

If this holds true then Green's candidate and Mayor of Marrickville, Fiona Byrne will have lost the "unlosable election".

I suspect that in her municipality's sister city, the Hamas dominated Bethlehem Council is already taking some time off from persecuting its Christian minority and planning attacks on Israeli civilians to declare a day of mourning or a day of rage whichever way it's inclined.

A small triumph for the concept of democracy which was all but dead in Marrickville after Byrne's Greens supported by ALP members of Council voted to boycott Israel without any apparent mandate or consultation with its citizens.

Byrne who admitted she didn't know all that much about the conflict (but wanted a peaceful resolution) then compounded her problems with conflicting and confused comments about her intentions to raise the Israel/Palestine boycott in Parliament if elected.

It appears that she won't have any such problems because she won't be elected and I suppose this means she's now free to join her BDS mates in that planned singalong with the bigots and haters taking place next week.

TWO FACES OF MAHMOUD ABBAS

This is a politician telling a porkie pie ...



... he's not standing for the State seat of Marrickville but he's eminently qualified to join the NSW Greens.

Thanks to Palestine Media Watch

BYRNE BOYCOTT BOOB

She feels a bit of deja vu?

She needs to go and campaign on local issues?

But if elected, will she vote for BDS in State Parliament?

Vote for this?

No way!

The artful dodger ...

She admitted to the Australian Jewish News in December last year that she was no expert on Israel but that she supported a "peaceful solution".

This was after she led the Marrickville Council in adopting a vote for the BDS boycott of Israeli products which is anything but a "peaceful solution" as any reader of this blog would know.

Now, Fiona Byrne who is a NSW Greens candidate for the State seat of Marrickville in tomorrow's NSW elections, has been exposed for twice "misrepresenting the Greens' position and treating the voters like fools" - Fiona Byrne dodges on Israel

Coming at a time when an Israeli family including three young children was butchered while sleeping, a Palestinian bomber killed an English woman and injured scores of others in a bus bombing, Palestinian missiles attacked Israeli civilian centres and a boatload of heavy duty weapons headed for Gaza was intercepted by Israeli naval forces, its surely about time Byrne

(a) started educating herself about the conflict;

(b) made a reappraisal of whether the BDS she she supports is really aimed at achieving a "peaceful solution" to the conflict; and

(c) looked up the word "transparency" in the dictionary.

The extraordinary thing about this is that commentators give this ignoramus a chance of winning her seat in the election.

What an indictment that would be on the folk of Marrickville?

GET REUTERED!!!

Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg notes the language Reuters uses in its mealy mouthed description of yesterday's terrorist attack in Jerusalem - Dear Reuters, You Must Be Kidding

Reuters said: Police said it was a "terrorist attack" -- Israel's term for a Palestinian strike. It was the first time Jerusalem had been hit by such a bomb since 2004.

Goldberg: Those Israelis and their crazy terms! I mean, referring to a fatal bombing of civilians as a "terrorist attack"? Who are they kidding? Everyone knows that a fatal bombing of Israeli civilians should be referred to as a "teachable moment." Or as a "venting of certain frustrations." Or as "an understandable reaction to Jewish perfidy." Or perhaps as "a very special episode of 'Cheers.'" Anything but "a terrorist attack." I suppose Reuters will mark the 10th anniversary of 9/11 by referring to the attacks as "an exercise in urban renewal."

The mind reels.

Tel Aviv Journal: The Atrocity in Itamar

The New Republic's Marty Peretz weighs in on the atrocity in Itamar and, if you didn't want to see the gruesome vision of Helen Thomas yesterday then you won't like the pictures displayed in Tel Aviv Journal: The Atrocity in Itamar.

In any case, Itamar, again like the other Jewish villages in the area, is not a building site. Its residents may be hoping against hope that when (or if) Israel and the Palestinian Authority reach an agreement Itamar will be allowed to remain. But the fact is that, given any kind of understanding between the parties and not necessarily a formal peace pact, there will be no new construction in this settlement ever again. After all, there is none now. The construction now being done in the territories is only in the larger towns cleaving to the 1949 armistice lines which no one—yes, no one—believes will ever be a part of Palestine. Not Abbas, not Fayyad, not Bibi or Ehud Barak, not even Barack Obama who probably still wishes it was otherwise.

So the atrocity committed against Ruth, the mother, aged 35, Udi, the father, aged 36, and two children, Elad, aged 3, and Yoav, aged 11, was simply an atrocity, and it was claimed by the Al Aqsa Brigade, an armed rump of Fatah run until his death by Yassir Arafat. Hadas Fogel, the last of the victims, was three months old when the brave Palestinian freedom fighter slit her throat. Two other children went unnoticed by the fanatic, and the oldest wasn’t home.

I am now taking sides in one of those perfectly asymmetrical disputes that always rages around Israel. Recall these scenarios: Hezbollah continually bombards the Galilee with rockets and missiles. Hamas does the same but over a much longer period. And the liberal world immediately demands to know why Israel uses disproportionate power in retaliation. As if a country dragged into war by its tormentors should limit its retaliatory power to that which will give it no military advantage. This is the one really new ethical problem of our time.

FROM PAPPE TO PORN

Yesterday, it was Ilan Pappe and, moving onward and alphabetically we go to Playboy and Porn with the April edition of that august magazine covering a personality whose visual attributes match perfectly with Pappe himself (some would say right down to the moustache and growth on the face).

Read about Helen Thomas here - Playboy's Meeskeit of the Year.

EXPOSING PAPPE

Ilan Pappe is a filthy liar who poses as an historian and who is revered by those who seek to find Israel and the Jews as solely to blame for the situation of the Palestinian people today and for all of the ills of the Israel/Arab conflict.

Thanks to the Mike’s Place blog, Elder of Zion and a real historian in Benny Morris writing in the New Republic, Pappe has found his rightful place among the charlatans whose dirty work causes as much harm to the Palestinians as it does to the Israelis.

THE BANK JOB

I came across this article form earlier in the month in which Reuters was quoting a bank official who claimed Hamas police had forcibly taken $250,000 (i.e. stolen) from a Palestinian Authority-backed fund's account - Gaza banks close in protest at Hamas cash seizure

"All banks closed their doors today to protest against Hamas's assault on the Palestine Investment Bank," said the official, who declined to be identified.

A Palestine Monetary Authority official has described the grab as "armed robbery" which sits nicely with allegations of murder,  bribery and various human rights abuses, most of which are generally excused in the eyes of the Western media but which go together to confirm that Hamastan under this regime with its Muslim Brotherhood connections is worse than Ghaddafi's Libya.

In recent days, it has been alleged that Hamas has beaten several journalists in Gaza who were covering demonstrations - Hamas Targets Journalists: Media, Human Rights Groups Silent.

Hamas believes that intimidation of the media will prevent the truth from coming out. Like most Arab dictatorships, Hamas does not tolerate stories that reflect negatively on its radical regime in the Gaza Strip - the reason the Hamas government has been cracking down on local journalists who fail to toe the line.

Although some of the journalists who were assaulted work with international news organizations, many of these foreign media outlets ignored the story, apparently out of fear of retribution by the Hamas authorities.

These journalists who chose to defy Hamas should be supported not only by their foreign colleagues, but also by Western governments and human rights organizations.

Among the media that routinely ignores Hamas' abuses is the Fairfaz media in Australia. Hamas and the Muslim Botherhood are treated with such respect and reverence by this media organisation that the very word "Hamas" was omitted when Paul McGeough's six page puff piece on the Gaza movers and shakers was published last November.

To understand the background of the Muslim Brotherhood and its evil past read Richard Cohen in the Washington Post - Can the Arab world leave anti-Semitism behind?    

During World War II, the leader of the Palestinians lived in a Berlin villa, a gift from a very grateful Adolf Hitler, who clearly got his money's worth.

Haj Amin al-Husseini, the grand mufti of Jerusalem and as such the titular leader of Muslim Palestinians, broadcast Nazi propaganda to the Middle East, recruited European Muslims for the SS, exulted in the Holocaust and after
the war went on to represent his people in the Arab League. He died somewhat ignored but never repudiated.

...

Israel's critics have a case. Yet they make no case when it comes to Arab anti-Semitism. The prominence of Qaradawi cannot be reassuring to Israelis.

They know that words can be weapons and hate is a killer. Nonetheless, since the days of Husseini, a true Hitlerian figure, Arab nations have shamefully been granted an exception to the standards expected of the rest of the world, as if they were children. If I were an Israeli, I'd be worried. If I were an Arab, I'd be insulted. If I were a critic only of Israel, I'd be ashamed.

In answer to the question Cohen poses, I'd like to be positive but it ain't easy and will require a large educational effort, a great deal of goodwill and a massive overhaul of Arab propaganda machines, notably those of both Hamas and the Palestine Authority.

But what of the anti Semitic fixation of journalists who give Hamas and the PA a free pass every time there's an unsavoury incident like Hamas' latest bank grab and its attacks on journalists? We know what to expect from the usual suspects in the Guardian and the Age. The answer is silence - the same silence that has people asking why they were never informed of the dreadful human rights records of Tunisia, Egypt and more lately, Libya. 

Good question. 

Breaking Walls, or Making Walls?

by Kobi Oz

Pink Floyd frontman Roger Waters has come out in favor of the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign targeting Israel. The British rock legend recently issued “a plea to my colleagues in the music industry, and also to artists in other disciplines, to join this cultural boycott.” Below, Israeli musician Kobi Oz responds to Waters’s boycott call.

Dear Mr. Waters,

I was deeply disappointed to learn that you have decided to build a wall between yourself and your Israeli fans. We love you here in Israel. Surely, you must know that from the warm reception you received when you performed here five years ago at the Jewish-Arab village of Neve Shalom.

What you may not realize is that most Israelis believe in a two-state solution. But this vision is not as easy to turn into a reality as you may think. Instead of recognizing the situation’s complexity, you have joined the campaign to boycott Israel, appointing yourself as a judge in a conflict between Middle Eastern tribes. (How British of you!)

I’m surprised that you would choose to side with the extremists who don’t believe in dialogue. I come from a small town in Israel called Sderot. My hometown is frequently bombarded with missiles from Gaza — eight years of children living in fear, eight years of running to bomb shelters. Yet I meet and play music with my Palestinian colleagues. When there is bad news, we do not boycott each other; we argue. Even when it’s hard, we try to keep in touch, because we know that peace starts with musicians playing together, with the two peoples getting to know each other.

Unfortunately, the Middle East isn’t the most stable place, so Israelis know we have to be very careful as we pursue peace. We could sign an agreement with a moderate regime and suddenly find ourselves confronted with a fundamentalist enemy. We withdrew from Gaza and got Hamas. We pulled out of southern Lebanon, and now Hezbollah dominates the Lebanese government. We gave back the Sinai, and now Egypt is a great unknown.

Still, we yearn for peace. We try to talk with our neighbors in the Palestinian Authority, where life is getting better for ordinary Palestinians. If Hamas’s leaders would stop the bombardment of Israeli civilians and stop calling for our destruction and start having a normal relationship with their brothers in Ramallah, I’m sure that most Israelis would want to talk to them, too. And our wall, which you want to see dismantled, will fall when we have lasting quiet. Insha’Allah.

But in the meantime there are events like the murders in Itamar. Terrorists sneaked into a family’s home while they were sleeping and cut their throats. That settlement was outside of our security fence — they did not have this “appalling edifice,” as you called it, to protect them. A father, a mother and three kids — one a 4-month-old infant — paid the price.

Should we give up the fence that has made the last few years mostly free of suicide bombers? If we did, would you stand by our soldiers when they go out to intercept terrorists, or would you continue tying our hands while we fight to protect our citizens’ lives? I didn’t hear your voice, or the voices of your friends in the BDS movement, when thousands of Qassam rockets were being launched at my hometown and neighboring communities after we got out of Gaza. We only heard the world’s voice when we fought back.

Lastly, I want to ask, when you demand that we “promote” the right of Palestinian refugees to return to Israel, do you understand that this means Israel would no longer be a Jewish state? If so, why should the Jews not be allowed to have their one state, while the Palestinians get four states? (Let me count them for you: the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, the Hamas state in Gaza, Jordan with its Palestinian majority ruled over by a Hashemite king and an Israel that would have a majority of Palestinian citizens after millions of refugees’ descendants move here.)

Jews have come home to Israel after centuries of living under Christian and Muslim “hospitality.” My own parents immigrated to Israel from Tunisia; they had to give up all their property and start their lives over. Jews from around the world came to Israel to fulfill our ancient dream of returning to our homeland, and to bring an end to our long nightmare of having no country to call our own.

Now you, in effect, are demanding that we forget all our dreams and become a minority in our own homeland. Are you serious? Have you not seen how the Coptic minority is treated in Egypt? Have you not seen how the Kurds have suffered in Turkey and Iraq? We won’t share their fate — we have had enough of that already.

At your age you ought to be suspicious of open-and-shut narratives of the sort embraced by the BDS movement, and be willing to look more deeply at the other side. Of course, we Israelis have plenty of room for improvement and could do more to pursue peace. But you should understand that if we are cautious, it is because our very survival is at stake.

If you truly want to be helpful in bringing about peace, embrace the power of dialogue, not boycotts. Music is for breaking down walls, not for building new ones — Kobi Oz

Kobi Oz was the lead singer of the Israeli rock band Teapacks. His latest solo album is “Mizmorey Nevochim (Psalms for the Perplexed).”

The Flotilla

No, not the fake one that gave rise to saturation coverage in the Melbourne Age and elsewhere last year.

This is the real flotilla and it explains why Israel needs to be vigiliant in the waters outside a Gaza ruled by thugs who threaten genocide against its people.



Naturally, you'll only find it in the blank pages.

Correction - Albert Dadon

The Age has had to place another postage stamp sized correction relating to articles which appeared on June 29, August 19 and September 22 last year mentioning a Mr Albert Dadon. The correction states that "there is concern that in those articles there were inappropriate and unwarranted references to his Jewish background in the context of reporting on his business activities."

It goes on to say that the Age "takes its responsibilities very seriously in relation to reporting in a way that does not cause vilification of racial and religious groups" and accordingly an apology was made "for any offence that may have been caused by the publication of the articles."

No further comment required of course.

Crime of the Century - The Thai Butler Did it!

*Bad Taste Warning - We're about three weeks into Israeli Apartheid Week so in keeping with the bad taste of the BDS and Israel Apartheid crowd, here is our contribution*

The Palestine Authority has come up with a new angle on the grizzly murders at Itamar. The perpetrator was not a Palestinian at all, but instead, a disgruntled employee of the Fogel family who was allegedly owed wages -    Itamar killings carried out by foreign worker

Before dismissing this as another fantastic lie from the fertile imagination of Pallywood's finest mythologists, let us consider the possibility that this atrocity might have been carried out by a foreign worker rather than a terrorist operating from a nearby Palestinian village.

Of course, if the crime was indeed perpetrated by a Thai worker from Itamar, it would surely rank as a work of sheer genius comparable with the perfect crimes that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle or Agatha Christie produced in their fictional works and what we really need is a Sherlock Holmes or a Hercule Poirot to solve the puzzle.

In order to carry out this mass murder, the worker put himself at great risk of apprehension by leaving Itamar, heading in the direction of a nearby Arab village of Awarta, then breaking back into Itamar where he waited for the Fogel family to fall asleep, did the deed, crept back out of Itamar and breached the perimeter fence a second time on his way out, making his way back into the  Arab village with his tracks leading all of the way to Awarta in order for suspicion to fall on its peaceful Palestinian inhabitants.

Of course, once there he again placed himself in mortal danger of being caught in Awarta with no apparent reason for being there at night with lynching a possible outcome (I've checked - there is no Thai restaurant in Awarta). Then, he made his way back to Itamar undetected either by the Arab villagers or by security in Itamar. Perhaps he walked backwards and broke back into Itamar through the perimeter fence for a third time that evening to make it look like the perpetrator was a local Arab.

That he managed to do this without raising suspicion from the army, the police or security was just brilliant although it might have been accomplished by simply bribing some or all of the above so that they might look the other way.

Elementary my dear Watson.

The Thai butler did it!

No wonder the world is outraged at the Zionists for suggesting it was the work of a local whipped into a frenzy by one of those Palestine Authority broadcasts about Jews being pigs and monkeys.

Everyone knows that they don't broadcast that stuff in the Thai language.

Sex sells

A dildo made the news in the Melbourne Age yesterday after "anti-terrorist bomb squad experts" were called to a post office in Russia to make safe a package from which a suspicious ticking sound was coming - 

Russian bomb squad nabs sex toy

Editors at the same newspaper deemed unnewsworthy, a story about the apprehension by the Israeli Navy of tonnes of weapons being  smuggled from Iran via Syria and Turkey to Egypt and then on to that haven of peace and brotherly love - Gaza:
Navy: Gaza-bound anti-ship missiles found on seized ship.

Another story apparently consigned to the blank pages is this one from Egypt (recently freed by people power) - Egypt intercepts vehicles carrying weapons from Sudan to Gaza

The Age on line didn't entirely forget about the region today. It republished an article from the Washington Post about Palestinians wanting Hamas and the PA unite to fight the "occupation". But the capture of large quantities of lethal weapons that were planned to be used against innocent Israeli civilians in areas that are not occupied escaped the attention of the busy Age editors.

After all, no dildos, no sex angle, look away people. Nothing to see here.

GREENS HOPELESSLY CONFLICTED OVER ISRAEL

Greens candidate for the NSW lower house seat of Marrickville Fiona Byrne (she who pushed a boycott of commercial, cultural and sporting exchanges with Israel last year without a mandate from her constituency to do so) has made it clear that if successful in next week's election "she will seek to extend the Israel boycott across the state" - Byrne's Israel boycott slammed.

Despite the Council ban, the local town hall has been booked for a function for an AFL "peace team" made up of Israeli and Palestinian footballers later this year.

The AFL Peace Team was condemned when it made its last visit to this country by anti-peace groups such as Australians for Palestine who are behind the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement whose aim is to deligitimise and dehumanise the Israeli people.

The members of the Peace Team have been harassed in the past by Byrne's type of people but it's hard to allege "Apartheid" when you get two such groups together in the same team - a team which sets an example for others in their troubled land and elsewhere that two warring peoples can overthrow old hatreds and co-exist together in peace and harmony.

The Greens, Marrackville Council, the Australiand For Palestine and BDS boycotts are at odds with the attainment of this noble aim. They also cut across the Greens Party's own national policyon the conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbours.

That policy was on the books when the Greens councillors on the Marrackville Council were elected to manage their local municipality (you know, collect the garbage, grant or deny planning permits etc). If a citizen of this municipality wanted to find out the candidate's views on Israel and the Arabs, he or she would have been sadly mistaken if they looked up the policy on the net.

So if you ask a Green what his or her party's policy is on Israel/Palestine, will you get a straight answer?

I doubt it - and that's enough reason why the conflicted Byrne and her party should be ignored by the voters of Marrackville and why she has been deservingly labelled an "extremist by NSW Labor.

One can only hope that the State's Liberals do the right thing in this electorate and place Byrne last on their how to vote cards.

APARTHEID WEEK CONTINUED

ROGER WATERS AND JEW KILLERS

Another sweet in the wall: A Palestinian man in Gaza pays homage to Pink Floyd rocker Roger Waters by handing out sweets to fellow long-suffering Palestinians in celebration of yet another massacre. The sweets were handed over in the place where some five years ago the Israelis ended their occupation which was interpreted by some Palestinians as an invitation to fire rockets at Israeli civilain targets.

Delusional aging rocker Roger Waters has proudly joined the BDS movement whose founder says has the ultimate aim of ending the Jewish State.

Waters recalls how, "under the protection of the United Nations", he once visited Jerusalem and Bethlehem.

Really Roger - you needed protection in Jerusalem?

I've visited Jerusalem a number of times and I never needed any protection - United Nations or any other form (or do you mean the sort of protection the UN is supposed to be providing the Israelis by policing the flow of arms to Hizbullah in Lebanon?).

Anyhow, I agree with you about Bethlehem because I once visited the place which was under Palestine Authority control and I was told my safety could not be assured.

Now why was that Roger?

Perhaps because, I'm a Jew?

"Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw that day. The wall is an appalling edifice to behold. It is policed by young Israeli soldiers who treated me, a casual observer from another world, with disdainful aggression."

I agree with you about that too Roger.

The "wall" ... where it is a "wall" is an appalling edifice to behold. What makes it so appalling is that it had to be erected to save Israeli lives ... and it has saved many.

Actually, Yasser Arafat is the man responsible for that appalling edifice and you can go to Ramallah (with or without UN protection) to thank him yourself.

Oh, and when you do, don't forget to ask him about the billions he stole from those poor, oppressed people he once represented.

Hearing about soldiers giving a big headed former rock star a bit of a hard time and treating him with "disdainful aggression" is a bit upsetting but I'm willing to wager that the disdain and the agression you received at the hands of a couple of 20-year-old soldiers from the IDF wasn't anywhere near at the level of the disdainful aggression your Palestinian friends applied to the Fogel family this week ... was it Roger?

You might possibly think you're doing some good in this part of the world, but as this report in the Jerusalem Post shows, the waters into which a former Pink Floyd member can stumble are very murky - Roger Waters' Apartheid Fantasies

The words of your hit song have been adapted to give comfort to poor oppressed Palestinians so a couple of lines for little Hadas Fogel, the three month old baby whose throat was slit by one of your mates wouldn't go astray along with a verse or two for the four other members of the family also murdered by a Palestinian who managed to make his way through the bricks in that peace wall of yours.

Accessories Before and After the Fact

The youngest victim, three month old Hadas Fogel who the Age shamelessly branded "a settler".

For more than ten years the Melbourne Age has treated its readers with news from Israel and Palestine slanted in favour of the Palestinian narrative.

Despite having a bureau chief based in Jerusalem for almost all of that time, there has been a clear reluctance by the likes of Ed O'Loughlin and Jason Kotsoutkis, not to mention "star" reporter Paul McGeough to cover the incitement to violence that is daily routine in the Palestinian media and in the mosques in the Palestinian territories ... and when I refer to Palestinian media I mean official state controlled organs of the Palestine Authority in the West Bank and of Hamas in Gaza.

There has however, been no such reluctance to publish anything critical about Israel and its leadership (nor should there be as long as such reports are factual and accurate which, sad to say, they are often not).

There are many who hold the that such incitement to violence leads to terrorist attacks such as the one perpetrated yesterday in the Israeli settlement Itamar when a family of five including three young children was massacred by Palestinian terrorism. Further, that the cover up by the media of the incitement to violence such as the murders perpetrated yesterday gives succor to groups such as the BDS and Israel Apartheid movement here and to the terrorists themselves.

How has the Age treated this massacre?

It humanises the murder by terming him "a Palestinian" and dehumanises the dead victims by describing them as "settlers".

Palestinian kills Israeli settler family

A Palestinan has killed five Israelis in an attack on a West Bank settlement.

The victims being mere "settlers" so no harm done by doing away with them. The brutal killing of five members of one family while they sleep is not to be described as "terrorism", nor even the work of a "militant" - just a Palestinian like the ones the BDS and Apartheid Israel people are supporting after the fact.

Here's a description of what really happened - Three Year Old Stabbed in the Heart, Baby’s Throat Slashed

Between 22:20 and 22:30 the terrorists entered the house through the living room picture window, did not notice the 6-year-old boy sleeping on the couch and continued on to the bedroom where they slashed the throats of the father and newborn baby who were sleeping there. The mother came out of the bathroom and was stabbed on its threshold. The evidence shows that she tried to fight the terrorists.

They then slashed the throat of the 11-year old-son who was reading in bed. They did not notice the 2-year old asleep in his bed, but murdered the 3-year old with two stabs to his heart. After that, they locked the door, exited through the window and escaped.

It only gets worse because what are the Palestinians doing - Gaza celebrates; Fayyad condemns terror attack?


A Palestinian man offers sweets to Hamas policemen in the streets of the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah on March 12, 2011 to celebrate an attack which killed five Israeli settlers at the Itamar settlement near the West Bank city of Nablus.

Well ... they're celebrating the massacre by handing out sweets (a grotesque event that will no doubt escape the attention the Age editors when they put together tomorrow's edition of their newspaper).

"The report of five murdered Israelis is not enough to punish someone," said Hamas Spokesperson Sami Abu Zuhri, adding, "However; we in Hamas completely support the resistance against settlers who murder and use crime and terror against the Palestinian people under the auspices of the Israeli occupation soldiers."


And what of the Palestine Authority?

Meanwhile, Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said he "clearly and firmly denounces the terror attack, just as I have denounced crimes against Palestinians.

"We are against all types of violence," Fayyad said during a tour in Bethlehem. "Our position has not changed. As we have said many times before, we categorically oppose violence and terror, regardless of the identity of the victims or the perpetrators."

Terrific. Let's twin this brutality with "crimes" against Palestinians. Anyone from the other side ever creep into a bedroom and slit the throats of a three month old baby?

How about ending incitement in your media and in the mosques Mr. Fayyad. Or taking control of Fatah's military wing – the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades – which has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Otherwise, the lot of you including the western media who cover up the reprehensible conduct of the terrorists and those responsible for the incitement to violence are all accessories before and after the fact.

Negotiating Peace

Go figure?

The only thing I could make out of all this gibberish was that Robert Fisk doesn't like Israelis or descendents of apes and monkeys - Robert Fisk: Palestinians understand Gaddafi better than we do

bOILcott this!!!

Dore Gold writes in the Jerusalem Post of new data on Israel's massive shale oil reserves and How Israel Could Revolutionize The Global Energy Sector

A reassessment by independent oil industry analysts of Israel's shale oil reserves indicates that the country might have the third largest reserves of shale oil behind the USA and China.

With Israeli research developing new technologies to produce oil from shale rock in a clean, economic and environmentally friendly manner, the Jewish State could enter the next decade not only as one of the world's economic giants but other nations might rethink their relationships in the same way that the USA did in the post war years with Saudi Arabia.

No Irish jokes please

Irish Marxist philosopher Helena Sheehan was invited to lecture at Libya's Jamahiri Thought Academy (don't bother giving it any thought) and rolled up into a Libyan apocalypse - I went to Tripoli just to give a lecture

I have never focused on it [Libya] too closely before, but had a left ambivalence about it, because it declared itself to be anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist. ...

Any ambivalence about that regime is gone. It is brutal, corrupt, delusional. Looking forward to denouement: regime change and reconstruction.

On her safe return to Dublin she is saying that she "was totally betrayed by my hosts who abandoned me to a reign of terror."

Perhaps her message might be expanded to include other Arab regimes in the region that have in one way or other corruptly seduced westerners into sympathising with their cause - perhaps a closer examination from Sheehan and her radical left cohorts of Hamas and Hizbullah might enable them to come to the realisation how hypocritical they have been in lending their support to regimes that preach genocide against Jews and the destruction of Israel.

It probably won't if the recent recent rantings of this idiot who was given oxygen by our ABC is any indication - Hypocrisy the new policy in West's dance with Gaddafi. I'll bet he's never given any thought to Gadaffi and its forty year reign of terror and murder in all the time that he's written hundreds of appaling anti-Israel and anti-Jewish articles including those supporting Arab and Palestinian despots in the region.

Jews, Jews, Jews, Jews, Jews!

Jews, Jews, Jews, Jews, Jews!

One of the great advantages of being Jewish - and there are many (we invented both ethical monotheism and whitefish salad, after all) - is that though there are only about 14 million of us on the whole planet (18 million before World War II, Mr. Galliano), people can't stop talking about us! It is very exciting to be a part of so many different fantasies.

STRANGE ASSANGE

The bloke's as mad as Gaddafi and seems to be preaching to same audience.

A Jewish conspiracy at the Guardian indeed!

It was the gefilte fish that did it!

Letter of the Week

From The Guardian, Mon 7 Mar 2011

Antisemitism debate

In Trials of the Diaspora, I argue that Caryl Churchill's play Seven Jewish Children is antisemitic. Churchill (Letters, 4 March) denies this characterisation, writing that I rely on the line "tell her there's dead babies, did she see babies?".

I had in mind the following lines, among others.

"Tell her we killed the babies by mistake / Don't tell her anything about the army."
"Tell her I look at one of their children covered in blood and what do I feel? Tell her all I feel is happy it's not her."
"Tell her I wouldn't care if we wiped them out."
"Tell her I don't care if the world hates us, tell her we're better haters, tell her we're chosen people."

In this play, Jews confess to lying to their own children and killing Palestinian children. They also confess to something close to a project of genocide. And they freely acknowledge the source of their misanthropy to be Judaism itself.

None of this seems to bother Churchill – nor, indeed, the Guardian. As she correctly notes, the play is available on your website.

Anthony Julius
London

APARTHEID WEEK - PART SEVEN

This is Apartheid (Source: Elderofziyon)

BRITAIN IS NOW A ROGUE STATE

A little under twelve months ago, the New York Times reported in Britain Expels Israel Diplomat Over Fake Passports about how the then Labour Government in Britain expelled an Israeli diplomat to rebuke Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for what it called "the fraudulent use of a dozen fake British passports in the assassination of a Hamas official in a Dubai hotel" earlier in the year.

The "Hamas official" was confessed terrorist murderer and gunrunner Mahmoud Mahboub who used to do drug deals on the side thus double dipping when it came to causing misery to the people on both sides of the Gaza-Israel border.

David Miliband, then British foreign secretary, said there were "compelling reasons" suggesting that Israel was behind the misuse of the British passports and called Israel’s actions "intolerable" and that its actions were "completely unacceptable and they must stop." The report says others used the floor of Parliament to call "for the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador, urging criminal prosecution of those involved and going so far as to say that Israel was becoming a 'rogue state.'"

Notice, no excoriation of the Hamas junta in Gaza whose "official" in Dubai is a mass murderer and a drug peddler and no censure in the world's media about that. The allegation that British passports were used to prevent this war criminal from buying arms for use in the murder of innocent civilians is another matter altogether.

Well, today Britain joined the ranks of "rogue states" joining the Russians who last year had a diplomat expelled for use of fake passports - SAS unit, diplomats bungle secret mission into Libya

They flew in at night by helicopter: six SAS soldiers and two diplomats, armed and apparently carrying explosives and false passports, with a mission to find Libya's revolutionary leaders and establish a way to help the pro-democracy movement.

The team could have come in with HMS Cumberland, a British frigate that was openly docked in Benghazi port on Sunday, and caught a taxi a couple of miles to the court building where the revolutionary council's representatives meet the press and conduct their daily business.

That way, they might have avoided being captured.

Right, now I expect that Milliband who last year narrowly lost a poll for the Labour leadership to his brother Ed, calling for somebody's head in government to roll for causing such ignominy and shame on the nation of becoming alongside Israel a "rogue state".

Rumour also has it that a film of the operation is being planned using a soundtrack made famous in the old days by the late Benny Hill.

Despots kill ... where are the demonstrations?

Michael Coren asks in the Toronto Sun about the absence of outrage.

... in the past few weeks we have seen genuine massacres and gruesome brutality. Thousands of people have now been murdered by Arab and Iranian governments and Arab and Iranian soldiers. In Libya, ordinary mourners attending the funerals of people shot dead in the streets were themselves targeted by snipers.

In Bahrain, the police and army killed unarmed people merely asking for the right to vote. In Egypt there was the execution of demonstrators, the torture and beating of protesters, and the kidnapping and murder of apolitical Christians — this occurred during the so-called secular revolution, but was hardly mentioned in the media.

In Iran, a psychotic regime once again shot down ordinary people in the street; in Tunisia, there was gross violence and fatal shootings; and in Yemen, Jordan and Syria, political dissidents were arrested and have disappeared. Note that while some of these governments are pro-western, this cannot be said of Iran, Syria, or Libya.

Yet where are the massive street protests in Europe’s large cities? Where are the calls to boycott countries? Where are the labour unions demanding action? Where are the student groups using words like “apartheid” and “Nazi”? Where are the moralistic editorials condemning Arab intolerance, Islamic barbarism and the need for Arab countries to be banned from international sporting, cultural and literary events?

PARAiranOIA

APARTHEID WEEK - PART SIX

Apartheid Week?

No - it's Hypocrisy Week!

APARTHEID WEEK - PART FIVE

This is Apartheid (Source: Elderofziyon)

LONDON SCHOOL OF SILLY ECONOMICS

The reputation of the London School of Economics is in the sewer. Nick Cohen is quoted in Harry's Place as follows:-

The London School of Economics once had a global reputation. The Libyan revolution wiped it away as easily as if it was mist on a window.

I cannot find precedent for the collapse in liberal and academic standards Howard Davies, the LSE’s director, presided over. The Cambridge spies met at Cambridge University, as their name suggests. They did not, however, work for Stalin with the blessing of the university’s chancellor, vice chancellor, senate and masters of its colleges.The LSE’s hierarchy sold itself to a tyrant for a handful of silver. If you doubt me, watch this video of Alia Brahimi, a research fellow at its Gaddafi-funded Global Governance Centre, simpering and gurning as she introduces Gaddafi to her students by reading a welcome message from Davies worthy of Malvolio or Uriah Heep:

The lambs ... er, students loved it and they got away with this shit for years when it was only Israel that was the butt of their venom. Thanks to Colenel Ghaddafi, they have finally been exposed and thankfully, Davies has now handed in his resignation.

DAFFY

My ancestors proven right after all these years ...

They've maintained their innocence for dozens of generations and now they're finally off the hook - Jews in the clear on death of Christ.

Only one question remains.

Whodunnit?

The timing of all this is perfect as the Guardian's Jonathan Freedland discusses antisemitic diatribes and the glut of recent claims of a Jewish conspiracy in Antisemitism: the hatred that refuses to go away.

Of course the Guardian is a fairly strong contributor to the cause with the likes of Seamus Milne on board. I wonder if Freedland ever reads the Guardian's Comment is Free section?

Persecution of Christians Begins in "Democratic" Egypt

From the Barry Rubin Report - Persecution of Christians Begins in "Democratic" Egypt
By Barry Rubin

Once the revolution began, Egypt’s Christians knew precisely what to expect. It isn’t that the regime of Husni Mubarak protected them so well from Muslim wrath. On the contrary, it was reluctant to prosecute Muslims who attacked and killed or wounded Christians as well as damaged or destroyed churches. The government often arrested Christians who defended themselves. But at least the regime’s power restrained anarchy, caught terrorists, and kept the Islamists at bay.

Now all that has changed. Despite the widely publicized statements by Brotherhood ideologue Yusuf al-Qaradawi in favor of Muslim-Christian amity in his big Cairo rally, this has no effect on the ground. In Assiut, a Coptic priest was stabbed 22 times by a man yelling “Allahu Akhbar.” Next, the Egyptian army—the guardian of democracy as it is now styled—attacked the St. Bishoy monastery outside of Cairo and the St. Makarios monastery near Alexandria, using tanks and bullets. One monk was wounded and several were beaten.

Why? This is a point of tremendous significance. According to Islamic law, in countries governed by Islam new churches or synagogues cannot be built and existing ones cannot be repaired. The goal, of course, is to foster the decline and extinction of all religions other than Islam. Even in Turkey, the government has frequently tried to enforce this in practice.

During the revolutionary disturbances the monasteries had built walls to protect themselves and Christians who flocked there for refuge. Now the army is tearing down those walls so they will not be available in future to defend Christians.

Of course, the existence of these walls threaten no one. There is no conceivable reason--except for Islamic law--that they not be left in place. Indeed, with all the other problems Egypt has for the army to make this demolition a top priority tells a lot about the nature of the new Egypt.

This is only the beginning. What should be obvious is the following: a democratically elected Egyptian government—even a non-Islamist one--will not protect Christians and arrest, prosecute, and imprison Muslims who attack them. Why? Because it won’t be popular with the voters. The government would be branded as anti-Muslim and in the pay of the Pope, the West, and the Zionists. That’s how Middle East politics work, as I pointed out with this historical example.

Many of these attacks will be perpetuated by radical Islamist groups whose members have come to consider the Muslim Brotherhood too cautious. This is precisely what happened in the 1990s, when scores of Christians were murdered with virtually no prosecution of those responsible.

And presumably whether or not Egypt becomes a state based on Sharia law--something that could even happen under a non- or even anti-Islamist government--the new regime will enforce restrictive provisions of Islamic law on the large (but probably shrinking through desperate emigration) Christian minority.

Persecution against Christians will grow, whether or not it is reported in the Western media.

APARTHEID WEEK- PART FOUR

And you thought Gaddafi was barking mad?

The BDS boycotters are mad enough and Gaddafi is insane but the Iranians are coming close to putting them all to shame with their warning that they may boycott the London Olympic games because of the event's logo - Iran: 2012 Olympics logo 'racist,' resembles word 'Zion'

The obedient Brits are mad enough to comply by changing the logo, perhaps to incorporate a swasticka image given that particular symbol originated in Persia and matches Ahmadinejad's image so nicely.

Our absurd obsession with Israel is laid bare

Nick Cohen in the Guardian's Comment Is Free - Our absurd obsession with Israel is laid bare

The European Union, which did so much to export democracy and the rule of law to former communist dictatorships of eastern Europe, has played a miserable role in the Middle East. It pours in aid but never demands democratisation or restrictions on police powers in return. That will have to change if the promise of the past month is to be realised. If it is to help with democracy-building, Europe will need to remind itself as much as the recipients of its money that you can never build free societies on the racist conspiracy theories of the Nazis and the tsars. They are and always have been the tunes that tyrants sing.

I suspect that Cohen's cogent arguments will go well over the top of the heads of most in the hard left including their media representatives. As one of those who posted a comment on Cohen's article remarked:-

Mr Cohen

Your columns are invariably insightful, non-partisan, measured, non-inflammatory, reasonable, devoid of ego and don't blame the West for everything.

How on earth did you manage to get a regular gig on CiF?

APARTHEID WEEK - PART THREE

This is Apartheid (Source: Elderofziyon)

Amid Mideast turmoil, UN chastises Israel

Israel cannot depend for its survival on pieces of paper
signed by dictators.

How often do free peoples need to be taught that lesson?

Amid Mideast turmoil, UN chastises Israel

APARTHEID WEEK - PART TWO

HOW TO BANKRUPT TERRORISM

No doubt the folks at Fairfax would cringe at the mere sight of the word "bankrupt" (let alone "terrorism") so it comes as no suprise that an interview with Nitsana Darshan-Leitner would never appear in one of its newspapers.

Thankfully, the Weekend Australian wants to provide a balanced coverage for its readers so please follow the linke to HOW TO BANKRUPT TERRORISM.

APARTHEID WEEK - PART ONE

This is Apartheid (Source: Elderofziyon)

Flotilla hero, the Gaddafi Prize and the Money

Kings of the cutthroats

As the bodies pile up in Libya, flotilla hero and Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is coming under pressure to return an honour bestowed on him last November, the Al-Gaddafi International Prize for Human Rights. Other recipients include former South African President Nelson Mandela and Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez - Turkish leader keeps his Gaddafi Prize for Human Rights

The award also includes $50,000 and it's no surprise that Erdogan is hanging on to that along with the stash he has in several Swiss bank accounts according to WikiLeaks.

And, as far as I know, the bloke who wrote all those fanciful puff pieces about the so called peaceniks on the Erdogan financed fake flotilla is hanging on to his Walkley.

Bowling for Hamas

Those who read the Blank Pages will no doubt be well aware that the usual suspects who are supposed to bring you the news from the Middle East rarely highlight the fact that one of the worst tyrannies in the Arab world is the thugocracy that rules Gaza - Hamas. Some of them even go to such great lengths as to write six page supplements about the place without deigning to mention the word "Hamas".

It will come as a surprise therefore to their readers who don't go anywhere else for their news exactly what a bunch of murderous bastards they've hitched their wagons to - but only if they decided to read newspapers that provide the full picture.

Gaza's elected Islamist rulers crack down on secular community

After nearly four years of Hamas rule, the Gaza Strip's small secular community is in tatters, decimated by the militant group's campaign to impose its strict version of Islam in the coastal territory.

We saw Hamas in action when the movement wiped out opposition in the 2007 coup, in some cases throwing them off the roofs of apartment buildings.

This is only the tip of the iceberg and if the people of Gaza decided to protest against Hamas, Khaddafy's butchery of last week would look like a picnic.

JOURNALISTS TAKE A VACATION

Grad rockets fired from Gaza hit civilian targets in the Israeli city of Beersheba and journalism outside Israel takes a vacation - Grad rocket attack.

A clear sign that the media discriminates against bad Arabs who attack other Arabs (nasties like Gaddafi who wasn't such a bad guy in their eyes until very recently) in favour of really bad Arabs (like Palestinian terrorists) who attack Jews.

Where's Mr. McGeough?

Where's Mr. Milne?

Where's Mr. Loewenstein?

No doubt they'll come out of their holes when Israel retaliates against the terrorists.

THE OLDEST OBSESSION

"The British educated classes are obsessed by Israel, can’t leave it alone, pick at it without remission. It defines and distorts their whole outlook on the world. They think of it when they are talking about something totally unrelated to the Middle East, such as children’s rights. It has truly become a disease of the British mind, a kind of geopolitical Tourette Syndrome, a pathologically uncontrollable spasm of hatred and lies." - Melanie Phillips in The oldest obsession.

Agree with that although question the use of the word "educated".

LETTER OF THE WEEK

Today's Australian

Vile dictatorial regimes in the Middle East and North Africa are facing the wrath of men and woman who have suffered under decades of oppression, repression and persecution. At least some of these truly awful regimes may well, at long last, topple.

While men and women in their hundreds of thousands are fighting, and many are dying, to win their freedom, the UN Security Council, rather than supporting these people, found the time to debate yet another of its seemingly endless stream of anti-Israel resolutions. When so many oppressed people are trying to build roads to freedom, the UN remains in a rut on the road to nowhere.

Dr Bill Anderson, Surrey Hills, Vic

Here's more on the United Nations shambles:-

JEW BASHING CONTINUES AS ARABIA BURNS

The Libyan airforce is said to be indiscriminately bombing its own civilians so what is the United Nations thinking about at the moment?

Here are two items from the Australian's Cut and Paste of today:

Paul McGeough in The Sydney Morning Herald yesterday:

While upheaval continues in the Middle East, the idea that the Obama administration was more concerned about its strategic interests than the human rights of more than 300 million Arabs was confirmed when Washington torpedoed a UN Security Council resolution against Israeli settlement-building in occupied Palestinian territory.

Of course, the Obama Administration believes such action in the UN would be counterproductive to genuine attempts to bring a peaceful resolution to the conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbours. One has to ask how many times during Israel's 10 month settlement freeze that operated through most of 2010 did McGeough and people of his ilk condemn the PA for not taking up the opportunity to negotiate with Israel and how many times did they excoriate the Hamas regime in Gaza for continually preaching genocide against the Jews?

And a more rational approach to what's happening than that put forward by McGeough (also from Cut and Paste)

Anne Bayefsky on Pajamas Media on February 18:

The spectacle of the UN Security Council engaged in one more Israel-bashing exercise, while the Iranian and Arab world burns, is a stark example of the organisation's moral turpitude and irrelevance for the 21st century. Iranians are rioting today against a vicious government that stones women for alleged adultery, murders homosexuals for the crime of existing, amputates limbs by judicial decree, brutalises anyone wanting free speech, and is currently holding two Americans hostage for hiking.

Is there a security council resolution in the works on the dying and the dead in Iran? Bahrain? Libya? Tunisia? Egypt? Algeria? Not the slightest possibility. The only thing on the table at the UN is a statement that it is illegal for any Jew to live on any land that is claimed by Palestinian Arabs.

WHITEWASHING THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD

Accoridng to the BBC, the Muslim Brotherhood has morphed into a certifiable moderate movement - Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood promotes moderate path.

Never mind the organisations history of involvement with fascism including the Nazis during World War 2 or the more recent deadly attacks on the Christian Coptic population.

They're now all peaceniks in very much the same as their Turkish IHH brothers who masquerade as peace loving charities whose members like to occasionally play around with guns, knives and metal bars.

The sick story of an Israeli Finkler

How is it that monsters like this roam the face of this earth?

The America-Bashing, Pro-Taliban Tweets of Nir Rosen

At the end of the week ... time for some fun

The same old

The New York Post and very few others are reporting that Laura Logan, a 60 Minutes correspondent, was "repeatedly sexually assaulted by thugs yelling, "Jew! Jew!" as she covered the chaotic fall of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Cairo's main square" last week - CBS reporter's Cairo nightmare.

COPT THIS

ALP Member for Melbourne Ports has written an interesting article for Breakfast Politics on an interesting array of issues that have arisen in connection with Middle East in the past month or so - Copt This.

Pompous Pilger Pasted

That John Pilger is an pompous, oafish boor who enjoys hearing the sound of his own voice is a well known and well documented proposition. He proved it again on Monday night on ABC1's Q & A when he was outshone by every other member of the panel and made to look a fool (many would say he does that naturally anyway).

In today's Australian,  Brendan O'Neill takes him and the West's so-called radical left to task - Palestine an obsession of radical West, not Arabs
In spite of everything we've seen over the past month of upheaval in Arab coutries, Pliger was sticking to tired and hackneyed lie that until "the Palestinians are given back their rights we're going to have instability throughout the Middle East. That is central to everything."

Only in the minds of those who are blind to the truth, as O'Neill points out in this article.

It's very revealing that Palestine has become less important for Arabs and of the utmost symbolic importance for Western radicals at exactly the same time. With the Palestinian people somewhat deflated, the Palestine issue can become perfect political fodder for the victim-oriented, fancy-dress radicals of the modern West.

WHEN LOCAL COUNCILS GO LOOPY ... IT COSTS

Marrackville Council's selective policies in attacking Israel alone for the conflict in its region by imposing a boycott on products from the Jewish State comes at a cost - Marrickville council: rates, roads, and global affairs.

The Inner West Courier report says that the council which has decided not to concentrate on filling in potholes, collecting the garbage, traffic control, sensible development, tree and park maintenance (all items which a correspondent to the newspaper calls "'front yard' issues that are the realm of local government" has cost ratepayers:

* The attention of 25 staff;

* More than 80 working hours;

* $1235 worth of general manager’s time;

* Time of four senior policy makers;

* Council meeting time.

This is only the tip of the iceberg as the protest movement gathers momentum against Council's loopy conduct and the delusional behaviour of those councillors who consider themselves Australia's version of the United Nations General Assembly.

At least, independent councillor Victor Macri showed that he has kept his head when he stated that the council’s focus on international conflicts has "blown out of control".

"I’ve had residents say to me, 'what the hell are you doing? What’s it got to do with you? You can’t even cut my grass, trim my trees, so how are you going to help this issue, which has been going on for over 100 years?'" Cr Macri said.

Quite!

... and now for the streets of Tehran ...

The "pro democracy" demonstrations in Egypt made great viewing on the BBC and CNN with some commentators barely holding back their support for the demonstrators and their cause.

Demonstrations will continue in this part of the world with attention turning elsewhere but how would the media react if there were similar movements in Syria or Iran?

THE JOYS OF AMERICAN EDUCATION

Believe it or not!

The Arab Tsunami of Rage

Cartoon from Qatari Newspaper headlined: "The Arab Tsunami of Rage"

Written on the door: "Security"

FIRST THE SHARKS, THEN THE CATS AND THE FALCONS ... NOW THE TREES

Stupidity Palestine Style

PLAYGROUND POLITICS

Never looked so good

Over at Huffington Post, David Suissa tells why Israel's never looked so good.

You can preach to me all you want about the great Jewish tradition of self-criticism -- which I believe in -- but right now, when I see poor Arab souls being murdered for the simple act of protesting on the street, I've never felt more proud of being a supporter of the Jewish state.

LETTER OF THE WEEK

Published today in the Australian Financial Review

Your February 4 editorial states that the US ignored Palestinian election results when Hamas won (with 44% of the vote to Fatah’s 41%), and continued to recognise Fatah. The reality was considerably more complex. Mahmoud Abbas, from Fatah, was still the legitimate president as the result of a separate election, and the division of power between the President and Parliament in the Palestinian Authority is unclear. The US had only agreed to establish relations with Fatah when it agreed to renounce violence and accept Israel’s right to exist. The Hamas government was offered relations on the same preconditions but repeatedly refused. Finally, it was not just the US that withheld relations with the Hamas government on that basis, but the Quartet, consisting of the US, European Union, Russia and the UN.
Hamas may have won the election, but it has shown by its subsequent conduct that it is anything but democratic or concerned with human rights. A major concern with Egypt, which should not be downplayed, is that if the Muslim Brotherhood, which spawned Hamas, takes power, even by democratic means, the result will be the same.

George Greenberg
Malvern, Vic

Palestinian gets 10 years for selling land to Israeli and the world yawns

A fringe group of Israelis makes racist statements about the country's Arab citizens and rightly gets shamed by its leadership, the majority of the people and in the media including internationally.

A Palestinian Authority Court gives a citizen a ten year jail sentence for selling land to a Jew, who it describes as "the enemy" (remember how the Palestine Papers told us Israel had a peace "partner" in the PA?) and there's not a single blimp on the radar.

Jason Koutsoukis has his head in the blank pages again.

Understanding the media

From a football discussion forum:

"A couple of years ago, a QANTAS plane had to turn back to land for a completely innocuous reason which warranted a three page spread, on the very same day, a Rex plane landed at Sydney airport with an engine on fire. An airport worker rang a Sydney newspaper to report that it had happened, the journalist asked if it was a QANTAS plane, when the employee replied that it was Rex, the journalist said he wasn't interested."

SYRIA'S CHEMICAL WEAPONS

A WikiLeak that is sure to be ignored by Al Jazeera, Der Guardian and Al Age:-

Viewing cable 08STATE135048, SHIELD S04B-08: SYRIA ARRANGING TO ACQUIRE CW
If you are new to these pages, please read an introduction on the structure of a cable as well as how to discuss them with others. See also the FAQs

Understanding cables
Every cable message consists of three parts: •The top box shows each cables unique reference number, when and by whom it originally was sent, and what its initial classification was.•The middle box contains the header information that is associated with the cable. It includes information about the receiver(s) as well as a general subject.•The bottom box presents the body of the cable. The opening can contain a more specific subject, references to other cables (browse by origin to find them) or additional comment. This is followed by the main contents of the cable: a summary, a collection of specific topics and a comment section.To understand the justification used for the classification of each cable, please use this WikiSource article as reference.

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Reference ID Created Released Classification Origin
08STATE135048 2008-12-30 14:02 2011-02-01 21:09 SECRET Secretary of State
VZCZCXYZ0009
PP RUEHWEB

DE RUEHC #5048 3651440
ZNY SSSSS ZZH
P 301427Z DEC 08
FM SECSTATE WASHDC
TO RUEHNE/AMEMBASSY NEW DELHI PRIORITY 0000
INFO RUEHDM/AMEMBASSY DAMASCUS PRIORITY 0000S E C R E T STATE 135048

SENSITIVE

SIPDIS

EO 12958 DECL: 12/23/2033
TAGS PARM, ETTC, SY, IN, PREL
SUBJECT: SHIELD S04B-08: SYRIA ARRANGING TO ACQUIRE CW
EQUIPMENT FROM TWO INDIAN COMPANIES

Classified By: ISN/CB Office Director Robert Mikulak for reasons 1.4 (b), (c) and (d)

¶1. (U) This is an action request. Please see paragraph 4.

¶2. (S//NF) BACKGROUND: The U.S. has obtained information indicating that a Syrian institution with connections to the country’s chemical and biological weapons programs is attempting to acquire Australia Group-controlled glass-lined reactors, heat exchangers and pumps from the Indian firms XXXXXXXXXXXX and XXXXXXXXXXXX . Both firms are believed to have received visits from the Syria institution in the past 3 months and may be close to concluding their respective deals.

¶3. (S//NF) BACKGROUND CONT’D: We would like to alert the GOI to this information. The GOI has a general obligation as a Chemical Weapons Convention State Party to never, under any circumstances, assist anyone in the development of chemical weapons. The U.S. also has publicly stated its belief that India is a strong partner on nonproliferation issues. We therefore seek the GOI’s assistance in investigating this activity and talking all steps necessary to prevent Indian entities from providing CBW equipment to Syria. We also want to remind the GOI that the Iran, North Korea, and Syria Nonproliferation Act requires us to report to Congress transfers of goods, services and technology on multilateral control lists, such as the Australia Group, to Syria. Sanctions may be imposed against individuals and entities identified in such reports.

¶4. (SBU) ACTION REQUEST: Request Post deliver the points in paragraph 6 to appropriate host government officials and report a response. The points may be left as a nonpaper.

¶5. (S//NF) Please begin all responses with SHIELD S04B-08 and slug for ISN.

¶6. (U) Begin talking points/nonpaper:
(SECRET//REL INDIA)
-- In the spirit of our cooperation in preventing proliferation we would like to raise a matter of chemical weapons (CW) proliferation concern and request the Indian government’s assistance in investigating this activity.
-- We have information that the Indian company XXXXXXXXXXXX may be planning to sell glass components and related chemical processing equipment to an end-user in Syria.
-- In addition, we have information that the Indian company XXXXXXXXXXXX may be planning to sell heat exchangers, immersion heaters, pumps, and glass equipment to the same end-user in Syria.
-- Further, XXXXXXXXXXXX and probably XXXXXXXXXXXX agreed to support a visit in mid-September 2008 by representatives of a Syrian institution with connections to Syria’schemical and biological weapons programs, to finalize contracts for glass-related equipment.
-- XXXXXXXXXXXX is located in XXXXXXXXXXXX, India. -- XXXXXXXXXXXX is located in XXXXXXXXXXXX, India.
-- While they have legitimate commercial uses, glass or glass-lined chemical reactor vessels, heat exchangers and pumps can be used in the production of CW agents and therefore are controlled by the Australia Group (AG).
-- We are concerned that the equipment in question is intended for, or could be diverted to, Syria’s CW program.
-- The Syrian Research Council (SSRC) is a key entity behind Syria’s chemical warfare program and may be behind Syria’s biological warfare program as well.
-- In light of its CW and other programs of proliferation concern, support to terrorist organizations, and efforts to destabilize other countries in the region, we believe Syria is an unreliable destination for dual-use exports, and Syrian end-user statements or other assurances are neither credible nor trustworthy.
-- In addition, the Iran, North Korea, and Syria Nonproliferation Act (INKSNA) requires us to provide periodic reports to the U.S. Congress identifying persons (including individuals and entities) who have transferred to, or acquired from, Iran, North Korea or Syria, items that are on multilateral export control lists, such as glass or glass-lined reactor vessels, or that could make a material contribution to developing a weapon of mass destruction or missile system.
-- Under INKSNA, sanctions also may be imposed against persons identified in such reports.
-- We therefore request that the Indian government take all steps necessary to investigate this matter and prevent Syria from acquiring dual-use items, such as glass or glass-lined reactor vessels, heat exchangers, and pumps that could be used in its CW programs.
-- We look forward to the Indian government sharing with us the results of its investigation into this matter.
End talking points/nonpaper.
RICE



Hat tip: elderofziyon

UNBALANCED AND UNHINGED

At the Fairfax AGM last November, Company Chair Roger Corbett responded to questions from shareholders about his organisation's anti-Israel bias by claiming that the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald coverage was "balanced".

This claim is of course utter nonsense and this item in yesterday's Australian demonstrates the contempt of this response towards shareholders and readers alike - Can you win a Walkley for explaining why a little bit of Islamism never hurt anyone?

SMH star journo Paul McGeough sees the bright side of terrorists taking over in the Middle East.

Targeting terrorists? Treason. Paul McGeough in The Sydney Morning Herald , January 27:

THE level of guidance and direction from the West in the West Bank and the extent of the collaboration between Abbas's Palestinian Authority and the Israeli defence and intelligence establishment is extraordinary. In any other country, the weaker half of the body politic teaming up with powerful foreign forces and the government of the country that occupies its land would be seen as treason.

What's wrong with Islamists? McGeough in the SMH , January 29:

BY current American thinking it would never do to have Islamists in power in the Palestinian Occupied Territories or in Lebanon and therefore they heed every despot's warning that the Islamists are waiting in the wings across North Africa and the Middle East.

McGeough in The New York Times , April 12, 2009:

OVER the long term, Hamas accepts the concept of two states in the Levant, which arguably puts Mr Mishal's terrorist movement closer to Washington than Mr Netanyahu is -- he now proposes only "economic peace" between Jews and
Palestinians.

Al-Aqsa TV (Hamas) video clip, December 3, 2010

ALLAH, oh our Lord, vanquish Your enemies, enemies of the religion [Islam] in all places. Allah, strike the Jews and their sympathisers, the Christians and their supporters, the communists and their adherents. Allah, count them and kill them to the last one, and don't leave even one.

Get it? Fairfax and its "star" reporter really do have a hide.

The Israelis and Arabs have been locked together in a deadly conflict for several decades and these people have the temerity to tell those Palestinians who seem to be making genuine attempts to resolve their differences based upon parameters suggested by the world's peacekeepers to walk away from peace efforts.

This is tantamount to telling them to embrace the warmongering fascists of Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood and thereby consigning future generations to hatred and to miserable lives of conflict and bloodshed. Which is in fact nothing new for this reporter.

Indeed, it comes as no surprise at all to those who have read McGeough's ridiculous one-sided accounts of recent events including the Islamist inspired flotilla debacle and his sympathetic puff pieces about the Free Gaza movement which strangely omit any mention of the fascist, genocidal Hamas movement and "accidentally" blame Israel for a murder of a young Palestinian child which a French court has ruled it almost certainly did not commit.

And how strange it was for Fairfax to somehow edit the words of a Walkley award winner so that a correction was required within a week of their publication leading many to ask the question "who really writes this stuff if such glaring mistakes arise as a result of the editing process"?

Anyway, back to the Australian's point about whether a little bit of Islamism ever hurting anyone. The Middle East is littered with vicims of Islamism. Pictured below is Palestinian leader Mohammad Amin al-Husayni meeting with Adolf Hitler in December 1941. They were planning a solution to the Jewish "problem" which fundamentally does not differ from that which Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood are pushing to the Arab world at the moment. That is the alternative that some people are suggesting to a peaceful negotiated solution. Please look at the picture and then read the comments above for an understanding of the disgustingly unbalanced and unhinged world view they present.

PYRAMIDS

Posted on an Israel's Facebook:

"Dear Egyptian rioters, please don't damage the pyramids. We will not rebuild. Thank you."

WHO'S NEXT?

After Egypt, will it be Jordan (in which case we might see a Palestinian State created very soon) or perhaps Syria? Why not Lebanon?

According to israellycool, the Syrian dictator is about to see mass protests against the rule of President Bashar Al-Assad. The problem for the Syrian protesters is TV cameras. There are far less foreign journalists in Damascus and I wonder if they and their cameramen would be willing or have the stomach to risk all to provide coverage for the international media from this part of the world?

Then there's the question of whether the international media would be interested anyway. I mean I can't see the BBC cheerleaing for the removal of Assad in the way they've been doing in Cairo and Alexandria against Mubarak this week. The fact that Assad is more corrupt and more of a butcher than Mubarak ever was (and I'm not saying he's a nice guy at all) says more about the media than it does about Assad.

REPLAY

Dry Bones blog cartoonist Yaakov Kirschen takes a look at the events in Egypt.

Are we seeing a replay of events from a few decades ago?

FRIEND OF PALESTINE GUILTY OF RACISM

Brendan Lee O’Connell has been found guilty of publishing racist material online after a two week trial which was centred around a video he made of himself arguing with Jewish man Stanley Keyser at a Friends of Palestine protest against the sale of Israeli oranges at a South Perth supermarket in 2009 - Man found guilty over race hate video.

The precedent has been set. O'Connell has plenty of mates in this country. Some of them write comments on ABC and newspaper websites as well as some local municipal councils.