Contents: Media-orcities of the Week |
Weekly Quotes | Short Takes|On Topic
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STICKS AND STONES AND DAMAGE FROM WORDS
Regarding David Feith's "Dancing Around Genocide" (op-ed, Dec. 5): International law, like U.S. law, makes clear that incitement to genocide occurs only if there is an imminent connection between words and actions. While Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's anti-Semitic statements are thoroughly repulsive and unacceptable, that connection does not exist. Human Rights Watch sticks by the law and the facts in its analysis of Iran as with all its work around the world. — Iain Levine, Human Rights Watch, New York. (Wall Street Journal, Dec. 7, 2012) [What about Iran’s nuclear drive, Iain?-Ed.]
“This weekend, the leaders of Hamas openly called for the destruction of Israel. Where was the outrage? Where were the UN resolutions? Where was President Abbas? Why weren’t Palestinian diplomats summoned in European and other capitals to explain why the PA president not only refused to condemn this, but actually declared his intention to unite with Hamas? There was nothing. There was silence. And it was a deafening silence. Well, we can’t accept that. We can’t accept that, when Jews build homes in [Israel's] ancient capital, the international community has no problem finding its voice, but when Palestinian leaders openly call for the destruction of Israel, the one and only Jewish state, the world is silent.” —Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in response to Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal’s statements during his recent visit to the Gaza Strip. (Times of Israel, Dec. 10, 2012)
“Palestine is ours from the river to the sea and from the south to the north. There will be no concession on any inch of the land. We will never recognize the legitimacy of the Israeli occupation, and therefore there is no legitimacy for Israel, no matter how long it will take. We will free Jerusalem inch by inch, stone by stone. Israel has no right to be in Jerusalem.” —Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal during his recent visit to the Gaza Strip.
“We are imposing a new reality on the Israeli occupation,” —Salah Bardawil, a Hamas spokesman. “All the factions are here, and the Hamas flags embrace the Palestinian flags and the Fatah flags. We need to extend the Arab revolution to all Palestine from the sea to the river, and every refugee returns to his home.” (New York Times, Dec. 8, 2012)
“I am not happy with Europe’s position that for another time in history it ignores calls to destroy Israel. Hamas leaders said repeatedly that their goal is clear – to destroy the State of Israel. And Europe is quiet. The EU’s call yesterday was not condemnation of Hamas’s statements, but a call for Hamas heads to refrain from inflammatory statements. We already went through that with Europe at the end of the 1930s and in the 1940s.”—Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman speaking at the Jerusalem Post Diplomatic Conference in Hezliya. (Jerusalem Post, Dec. 11, 2012)
"It doesn't matter what you think about settlements. We have settlement blocs close to the Green Line and the only way for the conflict with the Palestinians to end is for Israel to keep them. Any pre-agreement by the international community to a withdrawal to 1967 borders before the talks occur, makes it difficult to negotiate. It was clear in the talks I conducted with the Palestinians that there would not be return to 1967 borders." —Tzipi Livini speaking at the Jerusalem Post Diplomatic Conference in Hezliya. (Jerusalem Post, Dec. 12, 2012)
“The UN did not create the State of Israel with the partition resolution in 1947 and the UN cannot create the State of Palestine by recognizing one today. A Jewish state came into being in 1948-49 because Jews had returned to their land, built the institutions of statehood, fought to expel oppressors, declared the establishment of their state, fought to defend it and achieved sovereignty within its borders A Palestinian state in our homeland, on the other hand, is a danger we may never escape. But this danger is not inevitable.” —Daniel Tauber, executive director of Likud Anglos and a formal candidate on the Likud-Beytenu list for the Knesset. (Jeruslaem Post, Dec. 11, 2012)
"We in the government have no illusions. We want a true peace with our neighbours. But we will not close our eyes and stick our heads in the sand. They [Palestinians] have no intention of compromising with us. They want to destroy our country, but they will obviously fail." —Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaking to his Cabinet. (Calgary Herald, Dec. 10, 2012)
“They can forget about seeing a single agora for the next four months. First we will get back what we are owed, and then after four months we will check and see what to do.”—Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, referring to the NIS 400 million in tax and tariff revenue that Israel collects for the PA and normally passes on to it each month. Israel withheld NIS 900m. to pay PA debts, which includes unpaid electrical bills, and advanced it another NIS 700m. to pay salaries.
"We are in a collapsing state now. We can't pay our salaries. So you have to offer this safety net. Do you agree, are you committed and how much will you pledge?" —Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, addressing delegates at a meeting of the Arab League in Qatar's capital, Doha. (Windsor Star, Dec. 9, 2012)
“The Palestinians have ingeniously retreated to a two-track strategy of miring the shop-worn, flea-bitten, hacked and torn peace process in such complexities that they can continue in the palsied demand for the destruction of the Jewish state while apparently only seeking to advance an innocuous step on the road to the two-state solution that almost everyone now purports to espouse.”—Conrad Black in an op-ed article in the National Post. (National Post, Dec. 8, 2012)
“The [peace] settlement should be based upon the borders of June 4, 1967. When we say that the settlement should be based upon these borders, President [Abbas] understands, we understand, and everybody knows that the greater goal cannot be accomplished in one go. If Israel withdraws from Jerusalem, evacuates the 650,000 settlers, and dismantles the wall – what will become of Israel? It will come to an end. If one says one wants to wipe Israel out, c’mon, it’s too difficult. It’s not (acceptable) policy to say so. Don’t say these things to the world. Keep it to yourself.” —Abbas Zaki, member of the Fatah Central Committee, in an interview on Al-Jazeera TV network. (MEMRI, Sept. 23, 2011)
“The Muslim Brothers, who put him in power, and its Islamist allies are simply not interested in a compromise. They are now about to seize power fully and redraft the rules of the game to enshrine Islamist control in the constitution itself. This is precisely why so many Egyptians, most of them ordinary citizens who have not been involved in politics, are protesting. They feel trapped by Islamists who came to power through the door of democracy only to shut it behind them.” —Mr. Choukri Fishere, a professor at the American University in Cairo. (Globe and Mail, Dec. 7, 2012)
“The Egyptian revolution proved remarkable in its ability to deliver a fell blow to the Mubarak regime. … [But] its architects were wholly unprepared [to take power.]” For the Muslim Brotherhood, “the revolution had not so much given rise to a new political and social order as it had created a power vacuum which needed to be filled. [This] domestic power vacuum, underlined further by the pathetic demise of the [Supreme Council of the Armed Forces], strong Western, particularly American, backing, regional support from oil-rich Qatar … no less than the growingly Islamist stamp on the Arab Spring – all of which seemed to give credence to what Western pundits had begun parroting repeatedly: The Islamist moment had arrived finally in the Arab world. For an international movement – who sees the Muslim-majority world from Morocco to Indonesia as its ultimate constituency – the seductive force of such a compulsion cannot be overestimated.” —Hani Shukrallah, managing editor of the Egyptian al-Ahram newspaper. The result, Mr. Shukrallah argues, has been a suicidal march to chaos caused by the movement’s arrogance. (Globe and Mail, Dec. 7, 2012)
“We are partly to blame [for the ongoing Syrian crisis], having made it impossible for Bashar [al-Assad] to even contemplate giving up. By continually extending international jurisdictions and law enforcement, we simultaneously criminalized politics and cut off escape routes for guilty and innocent parties alike. By now everybody in a conflict area is at the mercy of politicized UN investigators and tribunals. Brimming with left-liberal activists and buzzwords, they’re gullible, inexpert, tendentious, untrustworthy and untainted by any knowledge of the region in which they operate….international meddlers increase casualties by removing the option of abdication from tyrants. Prosecutorial activists extend conflicts they can neither prevent nor resolve, adding to the body-count and the suffering of the population” —George Jonas in an op-ed article in the National Post. (National Post, Dec 12, 2012)
“Islamism is a totalitarian ideology.” And just as there cannot be a “democratic totalitarianism” so there cannot be “democratic Islamism.” —Bassam Tibi, a Syrian raised in Damascus and currentlty a Koret Foundation senior fellow at Stanford University, from his new book Islamism and Islam. (National Post, Dec 12, 2012)
“[Prime Minister Steven Harper] is totally transparent on Israel, the public reasons he stated for the policy [to support Israel] are precisely the reasons he holds to it so strongly. He actually does oppose Hamas’ terrorism. He actually does support Israel for being a democracy. And he actually does think, based on his reading of history, that when you let the anti-Semites loose, eventually they destroy not just the Jews but liberal democracy.” —a former senior government official who worked closely with Mr. Harper.
“This is a fundamental belief he has had since well before he became prime minister. In that region, Israel is an island of democracy and he thinks that must always be protected.” —Dimitri Soudas, a Harper staffer for nearly a decade. (National Post, Dec. 8, 2012)
SYRIA HAS FIRED SCUD MISSILES AT REBELS: U.S. OFFICIAL—(Kabul, Afghanistan) A U.S. official says Syrian government forces have fired Scud missiles at insurgents in recent days, a move that escalates the two-year-old conflict in the Mideast nation. The official confirmed a report that forces of President Bashar Assad have fired the missiles from the Damascus area into northern Syria. He estimated that the number of Scuds fired was more than a half dozen. (National Post, Dec 12, 2012)
JUSTIN TRUDEAU TO SPEAK AT ISLAMIC EVENT SPONSORED BY HAMAS-LINKED CHARITY GROUP—(Toronto) One of the sponsors of an upcoming conference featuring Liberal leadership candidate Justin Trudeau as a keynote speaker lost its charitable status last year after a Canada Revenue Agency audit found it had been providing support to Hamas. The Charities Directorate of the CRA wrote in a letter to IRFAN that it believed the Mississauga-based group was “an integral part of an international fundraising effort to support Hamas,” which has been a listed terrorist group in Canada since 2002. “Our findings indicate that IRFAN-Canada provided $14.6-million in resources to operating partners that were run by officials of Hamas, openly supported and provided funding to Hamas, or have been listed by various jurisdictions because of their support for Hamas or other terrorist entitles,” according to a summary of the CRA’s findings. IRFAN videos found at the group’s office “demonize Israel, characterize the Arab-Israel conflict as a religious war, appeal for all Arab and Muslim nations to join in the struggle against Israel and glorify martyrdom.” (National Post, Dec. 12, 2012)
MAURITANIA ELECTED TO UN HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL —(Geneva) UN Watch condemned today's [Dec. 10] election of Mauritania, a country that allows 800,000 of its citizens to live as slaves, as Vice-President of the UN Human Rights Council. "It is obscene for the U.N. to use the occasion of Human Rights Day, when we commemorate the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, to elect the world's worst enabler of slavery to this prestigious post" —Hillel Neuer, UN Watch executive director. "The U.N. is making an arsonist head of the fire department. It defies both morality and common sense." (UN Watch, Dec. 10, 2012)
A ‘VACCINE’ TO BOOST GLOBAL FOOD PRODUCTION—(Sharshoret, Negev Desert)A revolutionary new seed treatment from Morflora could improve the world’s agricultural output, without the need for worrying genetic engineering. The Israeli company Morflora now has an alternative seed treatment in the works that is so revolutionary it is short-listed for Best Novel Agricultural Biotechnology in the 2012 international AGROW awards.“Our technology is an innovative trait delivery platform. We can deliver any genetic trait to any seed, and the delivered gene does not transform the genome of the treated plant,” says Dotan Peleg, CEO of Morflora. “We will not have any moral issues that the GMO community faces. We keep the plant intact so that the next generation of seeds of the plants will look totally unchanged. It is a paradigm shift.” (Israel21c, Dec. 9, 2012)
ITALY STOPS WEAPONS SHIPMENT TO GAZA—(Rome) Following a tip from Israel, Italian police seize a shipment of weapons intended for Egypt with a final destination of Gaza. The weapons, which included a rocket launcher among other things, were part of a shipment that was supposed to go on an Egyptian ship which has been detained by local authorities. The container in which the weapons were found was part of a shipment of five containers, and the four remaining containers are currently being examined by the Italian customs authorities. (Israel National News, Dec. 9, 2012)
US EXTENDS EXEMPTIONS TO IRAN OIL SANCTIONS—(Washington) Announcing that they would extend waivers to certain countries from having to fully comply with American sanctions targeting Iran’s oil exports, the United States Department of State has announced that nine countries, including India and China, Malaysia, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Turkey and Taiwan would be eligible, citing their significant reduction in oil import from Teheran. (Jewish Voice, Dec. 12, 2012)
US RECOGNIZES SYRIA OPPOSITION GROUP—(Washington) US President Barack Obama granted American recognition on Tuesday to a Syrian opposition coalition as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people but he stopped short of authorizing US arming of rebels fighting to overthrow Assad. France, Britain, Turkey and the Gulf states led the way last month in recognizing the opposition coalition. But little in the way of direct military or financial support is expected to be channeled to the coalition, partly because it lacks the ability to act as a provisional government and because Western powers are still wary of backing Islamist fighters in the rebel ranks. (Jerusalem Post, Dec. 8, 2012)
OBAMA PLANNING DIRECT TALKS WITH IRAN—(Washington) Washington has reportedly decided to negotiate directly with Iran, and will resort to military force in four or five months if diplomacy can’t persuade Tehran to relinquish its alleged atomic weapons program, Israel’s Channel 10 News carried this report on Tuesday night, quoting a “senior American official”. The channel’s veteran diplomatic correspondent Emmanuel Rosen reported that President Barack Obama had decided to bypass Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and leave Israel out of the loop. Rosen said that Obama believed Netanyahu was personally behind a recent series of purported leaks from reports produced by the UN’s International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) about the Iranian program. (Jerusalem Post, Dec. 12, 2012)
CANCELLING CANCER CELLS WITH NEW RADIATION—(Ariel) Somewhere on the spectrum between electromagnetic waves that produce visible light, and those that cook food in a microwave oven, are millimeter waves that might hold the key to conquering cancer cells. When tested in an Israeli lab on human lung-cancer cells, millimeter wave radiation knocked out the cells’ ability to reproduce. “It disrupts their activity, although we don’t yet know how beyond some speculation regarding the mechanism,” says Asher Yahalom, head of Ariel University Center’s Free Electron Laser (FEL) Laboratory User Center, who also noted that the rays seem to have no effect on normal cells. (Israel21c, Dec. 10, 2012)
UN Vote: from ‘Occupation’ to Border Dispute: Eugene Kontorovich, Jerusalem Post, Dec. 10, 2012—
Justin Trudeau Keynote Speaker For Islamic Relief In Toronto: Point de Bascule, Dec. 6, 2012 —Justin Trudeau, the frontrunner in the Liberal Party of Canada leadership race, will take part in a meeting sponsored by Islamic Relief, a charity linked to Hamas by Canada Revenue Agency, at the end of December in Toronto.
Dancing Around Genocide: David Feith, Wall Street Journal, Dec. 4, 2012— Is promoting genocide a human-rights violation? You might think that's an easy question. But it isn't at Human Rights Watch, where a bitter debate is raging over how to describe Iran's calls for the destruction of Israel. The infighting reveals a peculiar standard regarding dictatorships and human rights and especially the Jewish state.
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