HAMAS DE-CEASES THE CEASE-FIRE

We welcome your comments to this and any other CIJR publication. Please address your response to:  Rob Coles, Publications Chairman, Canadian Institute for Jewish Research, PO Box 175, Station  H, Montreal QC H3G 2K7 –

Contents:

The Resurrection of Abbas: David M. Weinberg, Israel Hayom, Aug. 8, 2014 Bungling international envoys, stale politicians, and clichéd columnists are revving up a campaign to "re-empower" Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank and Gaza.

Hamas' Phony Statistics on Civilian Deaths: Alan M. Dershowitz, Gatestone Institute, Aug. 7, 2014: It's a mystery why so many in the media accept as gospel Hamas-supplied figures on the number of civilians killed in the recent war.

The Tunnels of Hamas—and of Ancient Jews: Benny Morris, Wall Street Journal, Aug. 6, 2014 — I often walk my dog along the dusty paths of Khirbet Madras in the Judean foothills, just south of Beit Shemesh in central Israel.

In Defense of Zionism: Michael B. Oren, Wall Street Journal, Aug. 1, 2014 — They come from every corner of the country—investment bankers, farmers, computer geeks, jazz drummers, botany professors, car mechanics—leaving their jobs and their families.

On Topic Links

What Gaza Tells us About Canadian Politics: Konrad Yakabuski, Globe & Mail, Aug. 7, 2014

Jews Rejected Child Sacrifice 3,500 Years Ago. Now It’s Hamas’ Turn: Elie Wiesel, Algemeiner, Aug. 1, 2014

What is Going to Become of Gaza?: Dr. Mordechai Kedar, Arutz Sheva, Aug. 8, 2014  

The 20 Most Ridiculous Things People Believe About The Hamas/Israel Conflict: Elder of Ziyon, Aug. 8, 2014

Finnish Reporter Sees Rockets Fired From Gaza Hospital: Ynet, Aug 2, 2014

Reporter: Gazans Only Want Us to Show Damage, Not Shooting: Lahav Harkov, Jerusalem Post, Aug. 8, 2014

Urgently Investigate Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law by Hamas in Gaza (Petition): Change.org, 2014

THE RESURRECTION OF ABBAS                                                                

David M. Weinberg                                                                                         

Israel Hayom, Aug. 8, 2014

Bungling international envoys, stale politicians, and clichéd columnists are revving up a campaign to "re-empower" Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank and Gaza. They want Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to "pluck peace from the rubble of Gaza," and throw himself into a conciliatory embrace of Abbas. This means that Israel should embark on withdrawals from the West Bank, not just from Gaza, and once again bet its future on "moderate" Palestinians. This is dodgy talk. The notion that Abbas and his Palestinian "Authority" can be Israel's salvation is without evidentiary foundation. Abbas is not "part of the solution," but a central part of the problem.

Abbas' regime is extraordinarily feeble — corrupt and unpopular. His security forces are politicized and inert. Hamas and other Islamic jihadists blew him away in Gaza and would do so in the West Bank too, if not for effective IDF control of the territory. Abbas cannot guarantee Israel's security, neither in the Jordan Valley and the Samarian mountaintops overlooking Ben-Gurion International Airport, nor in Shujaiyya, Beit Hanoun and the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt. Moreover, Abbas' rump regime is no partner for any real peace accord, as the failed Kerry diplomatic process proved for the umpteenth time. Abbas made it clear over the past year that the Palestinian liberation movement will never recognize Israel as a Jewish state, or agree to forgo the so-called "right" of refugee return. He views Israel's maximum contours for a two-state solution as a "sovereign cage"; as nothing more than a "statelet" in which he is not interested.

Sure, Abbas wants his state, but without an end to the conflict. He wants state status in order to continue the conflict; in order to brow-beat Israel into dissolution through demonization and criminalization. That is why Abbas was last seen fleeing the scene of negotiations. Perhaps some people have failed to understand the meaning of Israel's…mini-war against Hamas in Gaza. This offensive was not about solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or opening a door to newfangled diplomatic arrangements. It was about destroying Hamas' attack tunnels and rocket armories. It was about crushing an Iranian-backed terrorist army on our southern border. And to the extent that the job wasn't finished, the IDF will have to go at it again. In other words, the war was about degrading the enemy's firepower and deterring it from attacking again for an extended period of time. Israel was "mowing the grass," which is a way of managing protracted conflict. No more, no less.

Operation Protective Edge was not meant to be segue to swell peace conferences in Camp David or Geneva. It was not meant to give birth to phantasms of Palestinian unity, Palestinian moderation, and Palestinian statehood. It was not meant to wedge Israel into yet another round of withdrawals. Israel has suffered enough from escapades of iffy peacemaking. Nine years (exactly) after the disengagement from Gaza and destruction of Gush Katif, Netanyahu can honestly and bluntly say to the world: Not again. Perhaps those who are now beautifying and remarketing Abbas have failed to notice the major changes that have come about in Israeli strategic thinking. Seismic shifts in Israeli defense concepts have been wrought by the gains made by radical Islamists in Arab civil wars raging across the region, and by the serial failures of peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

In short: Israel intends to build strong defenses on every frontier and to ensure the non-militarization of the West Bank and Gaza over the long term with its own forces. There is no power that can guarantee Israel's security in these areas other than the IDF. Israel cannot afford to, and does not intend to, withdraw anywhere, anytime soon. Faced with multiple threats from implacable, nonstate enemies like Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, al-Qaida, and ISIS; and faced with chronically unreliable Palestinian neighbors, Israel will not quickly relinquish strategic tracts of land. Moreover, it will be lashing out occasionally to quash nearby insurgencies, especially when weapons are actually fired at Israel. Israel is in a long war of attrition.

Thus the Palestinian "independence" that Israel can countenance essentially amounts to a Palestinian province (or provinces) with political and economic autonomy, while Israel remains fully in charge of perimeter and inland security. A full-fledged, unitary Palestinian state, as in the "two-state solution," has become an anachronism. Netanyahu must not allow the Left to wring Israeli diplomatic defeat and introduce new security risk out of the hard-fought battles in Gaza. He should not be party to the glamming up of Abbas or any daft plans for Israeli withdrawal.

Contents                                                                                                                 

HAMAS' PHONY STATISTICS ON CIVILIAN DEATHS                   

Alan M. Dershowitz                                                                                             

Gatestone Institute, Aug. 7, 2014

It's a mystery why so many in the media accept as gospel Hamas-supplied figures on the number of civilians killed in the recent war. Hamas claims that of the more than 1800 Palestinians killed close to 90% were civilians. Israel, on the other hand, says that close to half of them were combatants. The objective facts support a number much closer to Israel's than to Hamas'. Even human rights group antagonistic to Israel acknowledge, according to a New York Times report, that Hamas probably counts among the "civilians killed by Israel" the following groups: Palestinians killed by Hamas as collaborators; Palestinians killed through domestic violence; Palestinians killed by errant Hamas rockets or mortars; and Palestinians who died naturally during the conflict. I wonder if Hamas also included the reported 162 children who died while performing child slave labor in building their terror tunnels. Hamas also defines combatants to include only armed fighters who were killed while fighting Israelis. They exclude Hamas supporters who build tunnels, who allow their homes to be used to store and fire rockets, Hamas policemen, members of the Hamas political wing and others who work hand in hand with the armed terrorists.

Several years ago I came up with a concept which I call, the "continuum of civilianality"—an inelegant phrase that is intended to convey the reality that who is a civilian and who is a combatant is often a matter of degree. Clearly every child below the age in which he or she is capable of assisting Hamas is a civilian. Clearly every Hamas fighter who fires rockets, bears arms, or operates in the tunnels is a combatant. Between these extremes lie a wide range of people, some of whom are closer to the civilian end, many of whom who are closer to the combatant end. The law of war has not established a clear line between combatants and civilians, especially in the context of urban warfare where people carry guns at night and bake bread during the day, or fire rockets during the day and go back home to sleep with their families at night. (Interestingly the Israeli Supreme Court has tried to devise a functional definition of combatants in the murky context of urban guerrilla warfare.)

Data published by the New York Times strongly suggest that a very large number—perhaps a majority—of those killed are closer to the combatant end of the continuum than to the civilian end. First of all, the vast majority of those killed have been male rather than female. In an Islamic society, males are far more likely to be combatants than females. Second, most of those killed are within the age range (15-40) that are likely to be combatants. The vast majority of these are male as well. The number of people over 60 who have been killed is infinitesimal. The number of children below the age of 15 is also relatively small, although their pictures have been shown more frequently than others. In other words, the genders and ages of those killed are not representative of the general population of Gaza. It is far more representative of the genders and ages of combatants. These data strongly suggest that a very large percentage of Palestinians killed are on the combatant side of the continuum. They also prove, as if any proof were necessary to unbiased eyes, that Israel did not target civilians randomly. If it had, the dead would be representative of the Gaza population in general, rather than of the subgroups most closely identified with combatants.

The media should immediately stop using Hamas-approved statistics, which in the past have proved to be extremely unreliable. Instead, they should try to document, independently, the nature of each person killed and describe their age, gender, occupation, affiliation with Hamas and other objective factors relevant to their status as a combatant, non-combatant or someone in the middle. It is lazy and dangerous for the media to rely on Hamas-approved propaganda figures. In fact, when the infamous Goldstone Report falsely stated that the vast majority of people killed in Operation Cast Lead were civilians and not Hamas fighters, many in Gaza complained to Hamas. They accused Hamas of cowardice for allowing so many civilians to be killed while protecting their own fighters. As a result of these complaints, Hamas was forced to tell the truth: namely that many more of those killed were actually Hamas fighters or armed policemen. It is likely that Hamas will make a similar "correction" with regard to this conflict. But that correction will not be covered by the media, as the prior correction was not.

The headline—"Most of those killed by Israel were children, women and the elderly"—will continue to be the conventional wisdom, despite its factual falsity. Unless it is corrected, Hamas will continue with its "dead baby strategy" and more people on both sides will die.

 Contents

THE TUNNELS OF HAMAS—AND OF ANCIENT JEWS                           

Benny Morris      

Wall Street Journal, Aug. 6, 2014

I often walk my dog along the dusty paths of Khirbet Madras in the Judean foothills, just south of Beit Shemesh in central Israel. Occasionally, after the rains, an ancient coin—Hasmonean, Roman, Byzantine—will surface, testifying that here stood a small Jewish and then Byzantine town. Archeologists have uncovered the remains of a synagogue and a church. At the center of the ruins are entrances to an underground cave complex, which the Jews had hewn out of the rock 2,000 years ago. Archaeologists say there are some 450 such cave systems in Israel/Palestine, 350 of them in the Judean hill country, especially in the foothills, at 1,000 to 1,600 feet above sea level, where the rock is soft and easily excavated. During the two Jewish revolts against Rome, in 66-73 and 132-135 A.D., which ended in the destruction of Jerusalem and in much of the population's exile, the Jews used these cave systems to hide from the ravaging Roman legions and, guerrilla style, to attack them from behind.

Dio Cassius, the Roman historian who died in 235, described the second Jewish revolt: "To be sure [the Jews] did not dare try conclusions with the Romans in the open field, but they occupied the advantageous positions in the country and strengthened them with mines and walls, in order that they might have places of refuge whenever they should be hard pressed, and might meet together unobserved under ground; and they pierced these subterranean passages from above at intervals to let in air and light." There is an eerie parallel here, in terms of modus operandi, with the Hamas battle against the Israeli army in the Gaza Strip in recent weeks. Hamas fighters slipped in and out of concrete tunnel-and-shaft networks, in front of and behind the more or less static Israeli troop concentrations, picking off a soldier here or an armored personnel carrier there, and vanishing quickly underground, only to pop up a few hours later from a new shaft hundreds of yards away.

The tunnels, some extending well into Israel, proved to be effective for substantially harrying the Israel Defense Forces before a ceasefire was agreed on this week and the IDF withdrew from Gaza. Using the tunnels—and armed, by Iran and Syria, with antitank missiles and rocket-propelled grenades, explosive devices, mortars, and Kalashnikov assault rifles—the Hamas fighters battled with great courage, and no little Islamist religious fervor, against the much more numerous and powerful Israeli troops. The Hamas fighters had a major advantage over the Jewish guerrillas of 2,000 years ago: The use of Gaza's civilian population as a vast human shield. And when the IDF, deploying bombs and shells to keep down its casualties, tried to break through the shield, Hamas used the inevitable civilian casualties to splatter TV screens in the West, with great political and propaganda effect.

But there is another significant difference between Hamas and the Jewish rebels. Those long-ago Jews sought to free themselves from the yoke of an all-powerful imperial oppressor; they never aimed at destroying Rome. All they wanted was to be left alone, to be free and to worship their own god as they saw fit. Hamas and their allies in the Palestinian camp seek, as a first stage, liberation from foreign rule or constriction and, as a second stage, to destroy their neighbor, Israel. They also look to the eventual world-wide victory of Islam over infidels. Hamas's constitution, or charter, written in 1988 and never since rescinded or amended, says: "Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it" (the reference is to the medieval Crusader states). Hamas defines its struggle as "against the Jews," who are "smitten with vileness wheresoever they are found." According to the charter, the prophet Mohammed said: "The Day of Judgment will not come until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say 'O Moslems, O Abdullah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.' " The Israel Defense Forces say that they destroyed 32 Hamas tunnels before the troop withdrawal this week, but they have no way of knowing whether others remain undetected. And Hamas is still in place in Gaza, free to resume its work.

Contents

IN DEFENSE OF ZIONISM                                                                     

Michael B. Oren              

Wall Street Journal, Aug. 1, 2014

They come from every corner of the country—investment bankers, farmers, computer geeks, jazz drummers, botany professors, car mechanics—leaving their jobs and their families. They put on uniforms that are invariably too tight or too baggy, sign out their gear and guns. Then, scrambling onto military vehicles, 70,000 reservists—women and men—join the young conscripts of what is proportionally the world's largest citizen army. They all know that some of them will return maimed or not at all. And yet, without hesitation or (for the most part) complaint, proudly responding to the call-up, Israelis stand ready to defend their nation. They risk their lives for an idea.

The idea is Zionism. It is the belief that the Jewish people should have their own sovereign state in the Land of Israel. Though founded less than 150 years ago, the Zionist movement sprung from a 4,000-year-long bond between the Jewish people and its historic homeland, an attachment sustained throughout 20 centuries of exile. This is why Zionism achieved its goals and remains relevant and rigorous today. It is why citizens of Israel—the state that Zionism created—willingly take up arms. They believe their idea is worth fighting for. Yet Zionism, arguably more than any other contemporary ideology, is demonized. "All Zionists are legitimate targets everywhere in the world!" declared a banner recently paraded by anti-Israel protesters in Denmark. "Dogs are allowed in this establishment but Zionists are not under any circumstances," warned a sign in the window of a Belgian cafe. A Jewish demonstrator in Iceland was accosted and told, "You Zionist pig, I'm going to behead you."

In certain academic and media circles, Zionism is synonymous with colonialism and imperialism. Critics on the radical right and left have likened it to racism or, worse, Nazism. And that is in the West. In the Middle East, Zionism is the ultimate abomination—the product of a Holocaust that many in the region deny ever happened while maintaining nevertheless that the Zionists deserved it. What is it about Zionism that elicits such loathing? After all, the longing of a dispersed people for a state of their own cannot possibly be so repugnant, especially after that people endured centuries of massacres and expulsions, culminating in history's largest mass murder. Perhaps revulsion toward Zionism stems from its unusual blend of national identity, religion and loyalty to a land. Japan offers the closest parallel, but despite its rapacious past, Japanese nationalism doesn't evoke the abhorrence aroused by Zionism.

Clearly anti-Semitism, of both the European and Muslim varieties, plays a role. Cabals, money grubbing, plots to take over the world and murder babies—all the libels historically leveled at Jews are regularly hurled at Zionists. And like the anti-Semitic capitalists who saw all Jews as communists and the communists who painted capitalism as inherently Jewish, the opponents of Zionism portray it as the abominable Other. But not all of Zionism's critics are bigoted, and not a few of them are Jewish. For a growing number of progressive Jews, Zionism is too militantly nationalist, while for many ultra-Orthodox Jews, the movement is insufficiently pious—even heretical. How can an idea so universally reviled retain its legitimacy, much less lay claim to success? The answer is simple: Zionism worked. The chances were infinitesimal that a scattered national group could be assembled from some 70 countries into a sliver-sized territory shorn of resources and rich in adversaries and somehow survive, much less prosper. The odds that those immigrants would forge a national identity capable of producing a vibrant literature, pace-setting arts and six of the world's leading universities approximated zero.

Elsewhere in the world, indigenous languages are dying out, forests are being decimated, and the populations of industrialized nations are plummeting. Yet Zionism revived the Hebrew language, which is now more widely spoken than Danish and Finnish and will soon surpass Swedish. Zionist organizations planted hundreds of forests, enabling the land of Israel to enter the 21st century with more trees than it had at the end of the 19th. And the family values that Zionism fostered have produced the fastest natural growth rate in the modernized world and history's largest Jewish community. The average secular couple in Israel has at least three children, each a reaffirmation of confidence in Zionism's future. Indeed, by just about any international criteria, Israel is not only successful but flourishing. The population is annually rated among the happiest, healthiest and most educated in the world. Life expectancy in Israel, reflecting its superb universal health-care system, significantly exceeds America's and that of most European countries. Unemployment is low, the economy robust. A global leader in innovation, Israel is home to R&D centers of some 300 high-tech companies, including Apple, Intel and Motorola. The beaches are teeming, the rock music is awesome, and the food is off the Zagat charts.

The democratic ideals integral to Zionist thought have withstood pressures that have precipitated coups and revolutions in numerous other nations. Today, Israel is one of the few states—along with Great Britain, Canada, New Zealand and the U.S.—that has never known a second of nondemocratic governance. These accomplishments would be sufficiently astonishing if attained in North America or Northern Europe. But Zionism has prospered in the supremely inhospitable—indeed, lethal—environment of the Middle East. Two hours' drive east of the bustling nightclubs of Tel Aviv—less than the distance between New York and Philadelphia—is Jordan, home to more than a half million refugees from Syria's civil war. Traveling north from Tel Aviv for four hours would bring that driver to war-ravaged Damascus or, heading east, to the carnage in western Iraq. Turning south, in the time it takes to reach San Francisco from Los Angeles, the traveler would find himself in Cairo's Tahrir Square. In a region reeling with ethnic strife and religious bloodshed, Zionism has engendered a multiethnic, multiracial and religiously diverse society. Arabs serve in the Israel Defense Forces, in the Knesset and on the Supreme Court. While Christian communities of the Middle East are steadily eradicated, Israel's continues to grow. Israeli Arab Christians are, in fact, on average better educated and more affluent than Israeli Jews. In view of these monumental achievements, one might think that Zionism would be admired rather than deplored. But Zionism stands accused of thwarting the national aspirations of Palestine's indigenous inhabitants, of oppressing and dispossessing them. Never mind that the Jews were natives of the land—its Arabic place names reveal Hebrew palimpsests—millennia before the Palestinians or the rise of Palestinian nationalism. Never mind that in 1937, 1947, 2000 and 2008, the Palestinians received offers to divide the land and rejected them, usually with violence. And never mind that the majority of Zionism's adherents today still stand ready to share their patrimony in return for recognition of Jewish statehood and peace…

[To Read the Full Article Click the Following Link—Ed.]

CIJR wishes all our friends and supporters shabbat shalom!

On Topic

What Gaza Tells us About Canadian Politics: Konrad Yakabuski, Globe & Mail, Aug. 7, 2014—Outside federal New Democratic Leader Thomas Mulcair’s Montreal office, an ex-supporter ripped up her NDP membership card while protesters in blood-stained shirts lay down in a “die-in” to denounce the party’s kid-gloves treatment of Israel amid the rising civilian death toll in Gaza.

Jews Rejected Child Sacrifice 3,500 Years Ago. Now It’s Hamas’ Turn: Elie Wiesel, Algemeiner, Aug. 1, 2014 —More than three thousand years ago, Abraham had two children.

What is Going to Become of Gaza?: Dr. Mordechai Kedar, Arutz Sheva, Aug. 8, 2014  —The question worrying everyone who has an interest in Israel's security is how Operation Protective Edge will end and what the near and distant future of Gaza will be.

The 20 Most Ridiculous Things People Believe About The Hamas/Israel Conflict: Elder of Ziyon, Aug. 8, 2014 —Israel started it! 

Finnish Reporter Sees Rockets Fired From Gaza Hospital: Ynet, Aug 2, 2014

Reporter: Gazans Only Want Us to Show Damage, Not Shooting: Lahav Harkov, Jerusalem Post, Aug. 8, 2014 —In recent weeks, there has been much discussion about whether or not reporting by foreign press in Gaza can be trusted, due to accounts – some confirmed, some denied – of Hamas threatening and intimidating reporting.

Urgently Investigate Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law by Hamas in Gaza (Petition): Change.org, 2014 —Hamas is an internationally recognised terrorist organisation, which is launching missile attacks from the Gaza Strip against Israeli civilians and endangering the lives of innocent Palestinians.

Rob Coles, Publications Chairman, Canadian Institute for Jewish Research/ L'institut Canadien de recherches sur le Judaïsme, www.isranet.org

Tel: (514) 486-5544 – Fax:(514) 486-8284 ; ber@isranet.wpsitie.com