Today at 10AM Eastern: Second Draft's Dr Richard Landes and Yaacov Ben Moshe

UPDATE
You can listen to the podcast here
Today at 10AM Eastern (special time) we continue our series on Israel, the Middle East, and media propaganda with Dr Richard Landes and Yaacov Ben Moshe of Second Draft.

Chat's open at 9:45AM and the call-in number is 646 652-2539. Join us!

US removes uranium from Iraq

From Associated Press, that arm of the vast right wing conspiracy:
US removes uranium from Iraq.

Let's pay attention to that: The United States military have removed

550 metric tons of "yellowcake" - the seed material for higher-grade nuclear enrichment

which was stored at the nuclear facility in Tuwaitha, Iraq, some 12 miles south of Baghdad.

Again:

• Saddam Hussein had a nuclear program
• At the Tuwaitha nuclear complex just south of Baghdad
• Which included 550 metric tons (over 1.2 million pounds) of "yellowcake", or concentrated uranium
• And multiple devices that could be used in a nuclear weapon

The AP does not say alleged nuclear program. It does not add "according to military experts." It simply says "Saddam Hussein's nuclear program."

Other important points:
1. The yellowcake removed is the last mayor remnant of Saddam's nuclear program. There was more.
2. The military had removed earlier this year four devices for controlled radiation exposure which "contain elements of high radioactivity that could potentially be used in a weapon".
3. The yellowcake was sold to Cameco, which may have been involved in the Oil-For-Food scam, and is a company in which Soros Fund Management LLC owns a substantial portion.

It Must Suck Being Joe Wilson Today - Joe, you’ve been punk'd!

In other news, Iraqis lead final purge of Al-Qaeda, Islamism is discredited, and We're winning this War on Terror.

The Carnival of Latin America and the Caribbean will be up in a couple of hours. Bear with me - with the rescue of the Colombian hostages, it's going to be huge!

Special thanks to Hip Hop Republican and Larwyn.

Crossposted



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Ignorant, not naive

Betsy links to Jennifer Rubin's post,

An advisor, Daniel Kurtzer, to Barack Obama says that Obama didn't realize what he was saying to AIPAC when he used the term "undivided" in reference to Jerusalem. According to Kurtzer, Obama had "a picture in his mind of Jerusalem before 1967 with barbed wires and minefields and demilitarized zones." Kurtzer says that only after the speech did Obama realize it was a "code word" to use the phrase, "but it does not indicate any kind of naivete about foreign affairs."

As Rubin says,

Once again, this suggests that there is too little adult supervision of a candidate unaccustomed to speaking on the world stage about issues in which there are lots of code words, indeed in which every word (e.g. "preconditons," "immediate withdrawal") has meaning to Americans' foes and friends."

Bashar Assad Understands What Obama The 'Never Mind' Candidate Doesn't

Syria's Assad says wants results from Israel talks:"This is not like drinking tea," Assad, in India on a four-day visit, said when asked if he would meet Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Paris.

"The meeting between me and the Israeli prime minister will be meaningless without the technocrats laying the foundation, without reaching the final stage."

And as the campaign develops, Poohbama rolls right along. Drew has a photo of Obama's foreign policy team.




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Willful Blindness reviewed

Via Memeorandum, Thomas Joscelyn reviews Andrew McCarthy's book, Willful Blindness: Memoir of the Jihad. McCarthy was the prosecutor responsible for leading the investigation of Blind Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman and others involved in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Joscelyn's review shows an overview of that case, but more importantly (emphasis added),

Had McCarthy stopped at telling the story of the many tactical failures that allowed Rahman's terrorists to menace America in the early 1990s, Willful Blindness would have been an invaluable addition to the literature of 9/11. But he takes his argument a step further, showing how these tactical failures were merely symptoms of a larger strategic failure to comprehend the nature of our terrorist enemies. In the process, McCarthy has given us one of the most important books on jihadist terrorism.

The strategic failure McCarthy exposes is ongoing, and extends even to something as basic as naming the enemy. Just as Willful Blindness was released, the State Department and other agencies published an edict banning the use of the word "jihadist" (as well as similar terms) from the government's lexicon. The thinking is that the terrorists like to call themselves "jihadists," thereby appropriating an Islamic term which can have far more benevolent meanings, such as the struggle for spiritual betterment or simply to do good.

It is true that, in some Islamic traditions, "jihad" has been endowed with such inoffensive meanings. But as McCarthy rightly argues, "jihad" has far more frequently been used to connote violent campaigns against infidels since the earliest days of Islam. When Sheikh Rahman called on his followers to wage "jihad," they knew that their master did not mean for them to become absorbed in prayer.

Moreover, Washington is apparently too obtuse to notice that Saddam Hussein, al Qaeda's terrorists, Tehran's mullahs, and Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi clerics have called for a militant brand of jihad persistently over the past several decades. All of these parties know how their words will be interpreted by the Muslim masses, and no fiat from the Washington bureaucracy will undo this widely accepted meaning.

Not only does Washington have a hard time properly naming our jihadist enemies, it still fails to understand that terrorist-sponsoring regimes have long backed them. Here, McCarthy has been at the forefront of explaining how jihadist terrorism is frequently, but not exclusively, a tool of hostile regimes: Writing in these pages in 1998 ("The Sudan Connection"), he explored the many ties between the 1993 plotters and the Sudanese regime then led by an Islamic radical named Hassan al-Turabi. Indeed, Turabi and Rahman were longtime friends and allies. McCarthy returns to this aspect of the story in Willful Blindness to show how Sudan's U.N. delegation provided material support to Rahman's terrorists as they plotted to blow up New York's landmarks. (The Clinton administration even expelled two Sudanese delegates because of their involvement.)

Sudan's sponsorship went far beyond Rahman's goons. In the early 1990s Turabi forged a broad terrorist coalition that included Osama bin Laden's core group of followers, all of al Qaeda's affiliates, and a number of other organizations. Turabi envisioned bringing all of these parties together in one grand anti-American terrorist coalition. And he received the support of the two leading state sponsors of terrorism: Saddam Hussein's Iraq and the mullahs' Iran. Out of this witch's brew of state and nonstate actors grew the network that we commonly call "al Qaeda."

It is beyond my scope here to summarize all of the evidence that supports this thesis, but suffice it to say that McCarthy is exactly right when he asserts,

It is not difficult to find some current or former intelligence official ready and willing to opine that Sunnis [such as Rahman and bin Laden] would never cooperate with secularists or Shiites--overlooking abundant evidence of the Ba'athist Saddam Hussein coddling Sunni jihadists and a years-long history of collaboration between al Qaeda and Shiite Hezbollah.

McCarthy argues that, more than a decade after the Blind Sheikh was convicted of inspiring terrorism on American soil, America remains largely blind. Even the September 11 attacks did not fully awaken our nation, or its leaders, from their slumber. An implacable hate drives our enemies to never-ending violence. For them, we are the "other," infidels who deserve to be slaughtered as victims of a religious jihad, and there are many who are willing to support their war on us.

Scott Johnson at Powerline points out that

In the Bush administration, the "willful blindness" takes the form of political correctness. This political correctness, however, is more than an intellectual failure. On the one hand, the administration has supported the prosecution of the Holy Land Foundation and the naming of CAIR and the Islamic Society of North America as HLF's unindicted co-conspirators supporting Hamas. On the other hand, the adminstration continues to treat CAIR and ISNA, for example, as respectable organizations and occasional partners.

On the Democratic side, the failure runs deeper. Listening to the Democratic debates over the past year, one could not help but be struck by the candidates' understanding of the Bush administration as an enemy far more formidable than any we are facing beyond our borders. Next to the Bush administration, the threats posed by Iran, Syria and their terrorist proxies pale in comparison. Should the Iranian Revolutionary Guard be designated a terrorist group? According to Barack Obama, this is going too far: the Bush administration is merely engaged in "saber rattling." He would prefer to rattle the tea cups with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Tehran.

Scott quotes from Bruce Thorton's review,

This jihadist ideology motivated Abdel Rahman and the 9/11 jihadists, and continues to motivate Islamic terrorism today. But, then and now, this obvious traditional belief is ignored or rationalized away by those entrusted with our security: The secretary of state publicly croons that Islam is the "religion of peace and love," and the State and Homeland Security departments instruct their employees not to use words like "jihad" or "mujahedeen" (holy warrior) in their communications. In contrast to this delusional thinking, McCarthy bluntly, and correctly, states the obvious: "Islam is a dangerous creed. It rejects core aspects of Western liberalism: self-determination, freedom of choice, freedom of conscience, equality under the law." We refuse to face the truth about Islam, and thus we disarm ourselves before "a doctrine that rejects our way of life and a culture unwilling or unable to suppress the savage element it breeds wherever it takes hold."

In yesterday's podcast Dr. Andrew Bostom discussed his book The Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism: From Sacred Texts to Solemn History where he examined a vast amount of Middle Eastern Islamic anti-Semitic literature that has endured through the ages, literature that goes ignored. From the Middle East through Europe, the US and Latin America, the Jihad continues.

We are blinding ourselves again and again to the reality of Jihad. When will we wake up?



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A Trip Across Israel

My friend Steven posted this video, A Trip Across Israel - as you can see,

This video documents a drive across the entire width of Israel from the West Bank wall to the Mediterranean Sea. The point is to illustrate how small and intrinsically vulnerable it is.

The video is at liveleak: A Trip Across Israel.



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The al Dura case revisited

Nidra Poller writes in the WSJ European edition Al-Durra Case Revisited,

It's hard to exaggerate the significance of Mohammed al-Durra, the 12-year-old Palestinian boy allegedly killed by Israeli bullets on Sept. 30, 2000. The iconic image of the terrified child crouching behind his father helped sway world opinion against the Jewish state and fueled the last Intifada.

It's equally hard, then, to exaggerate the significance of last week's French court ruling that called the story into doubt. Not just whether the Israeli military shot the boy, but whether the whole incident may have been staged for propaganda purposes. If so, it would be one of the most harmful put-up jobs in media history.

You probably didn't hear this news. International media lapped up the televised report of al-Durra's shooting on France's main state-owned network, France 2. Barely a peep was heard, however, when the Paris Court of Appeal ruled in a suit brought by the network against the founder of a media watchdog group. The judge's verdict, released Thursday, said that Philippe Karsenty was within his rights to call the France 2 report a "hoax," overturning a 2006 decision that found him guilty of defaming the network and its Mideast correspondent, Charles Enderlin. France 2 has appealed to the country's highest court.

Judge Laurence Trébucq did more than assert Mr. Karsenty's right to free speech. In overturning a lower court's ruling, she said the issues he raised about the original France 2 report were legitimate. While Mr. Karsenty couldn't provide absolute proof of his claims, the court ruled that he marshalled a "coherent mass of evidence" and "exercised in good faith his right to free criticism." The court also found that Talal Abu Rahma, the Palestinian cameraman for France 2 who was the only journalist to capture the scene and the network's crown witness in this case, can't be considered "perfectly credible."
...
Judge Trébucq said that Mr. Karsenty "observed inexplicable inconsistencies and contradictions in the explanations by Charles Enderlin

France2's reaction? They haven't reported on the decision at all. The inconsistencies and contradictions remain.

Prior posts on the Al Dura case here. Last week's podcast here.

Don't miss also Richard Landes's Pallywood,




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Today's podcast: the al-Dura verdict

UPDATE
You can listen to the podcast here
To donate to Second Draft, the mailing address isSecond Draft
P O Box 590591
Newton Center Mass 02459
French courts are due to render a verdict on the libel suit brought about by a media watchdog group against France2, a government-run news TV station. The case has to do with a news report where France2 reporter Charles Enderlin claimed that the child Mohammed al Dura had been shot dead by the Israeli Defense Forces.

The verdict on the al-Dura trial in France is due tomorrow.

This morning at 11AM, Dr Richard Landes and Yaacov Ben Moshe of Second Draft discuss what the possible verdicts will mean for the media, France, Israel and the Middle East.

The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) has BACKGROUNDER: Mohammed Al Dura
Anatomy of a French Media Scandal. From their timeline:

2000
Sept. 30, 2000:
Palestinian gunmen and Israelis soldiers clash at the Netzarim junction in the Gaza Strip. A large contingent of foreign reporters, photographers and television crews are present, including France 2 cameraman Talal Abu Rahma. Much of the day’s events are filmed by the various (20 or so) television crews, but only Abu Rahma records what he claims to be Mohammed Al Dura’s death by Israeli bullets. (A Reuters clip apparently captures Jamal and Mohammed Al Dura filmed from a different angle.) He records 27 minutes of footage that day. While France 2 Middle East Bureau Chief Charles Enderlin is not at the scene at this time, he later views Abu Rahma’s clips and accepts the cameraman’s account of events.

Enderlin edits the film and provides the voice-over commentary for that evening’s news broadcast. Only a small portion (55 seconds) of Abu Rahma's footage is broadcast on the evening news. The footage shows Jamal Al Dura and his son Mohammed huddled behind a thick concrete barrel, gunshots hitting the wall behind them. The footage does not show the child dying.

Correspondent Charles Enderlin comments on the footage for France 2 :

3 pm... everything has turned over near the Netzarim settlement in the Gaza Strip...here Jamal and his son Mohammed are the targets of gunshots that have come from the Israeli position.... A new burst of gunfire, Mohammed is dead and his father seriously wounded.

France 2 distributes the footage – free of charge – to the global media, and it is broadcast around the world.

Oct. 1, 2000:
ABC's Gillian Findlay also says the boy died "under Israeli fire." She repeats this language a few days later. Other media outlets make clear that the father and son were caught in the crossfire between Israelis and Palestinians.

Oct. 3, 2000:
Palestinian Cameraman Testifies

Talal Abu Rahma volunteers to testify in a sworn statement to the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights the details of what he saw at Netzarim on Sept. 30. He says:

I spent about 27 minutes photographing the incident which took place for 45 minutes.... I can confirm that the child was intentionally and in cold blood shot dead and his father injured by the Israeli army.

(For complete statement, click here.)

Preliminary IDF Investigation

There is no autopsy on the boy and no bullets recovered. After a hurried preliminary investigation, the IDF expresses sorrow over the tragedy, concluding that its troops were probably responsible for killing Al Dura. IDF Major General Giora Eiland says:

There is no way to prove who shot him. But from the angles from which we fired, it is likely that he was hit from our gunfire.... It is very reasonable that they were hit from our gunfire.

While the IDF attempts to put the incident to rest by accepting responsibility for Al Dura’s death, Major General Yom Tov Samia, commanding officer at the time, and other senior officers in the Southern Command are convinced that IDF soldiers have not shot the boy.

October 2000:
Nahum Shahaf, an Israeli physicist, contacts Major General Samia to voice his doubt about Israeli responsibility and offers to collaborate in an investigation of the matter. Samia agrees and the IDF investigates further.

Oct. 23, 2000:
An IDF re-enactment of the Al Dura incident, with the participation of Nahum Shahaf, raises serious doubt about whether the gunfire could have come from Israeli positions. Investigators lay out replicas of the Israeli army position, and the concrete barrel and wall which sheltered Al Dura. Soldiers fire shots at the barrel and wall using a variety of different weapons and study the indentations made by the bullets. Also studied is the dust clouds which result from the wall being struck by bullets from various angles. The shape and size of the clouds is compared to the shape and size of dust clouds in the video of Al Dura.

The re-enactment indicates that based on the location of the Israeli soldiers, the concrete barrel would have prevented Israeli bullets from hitting Jamal and Mohammed Al Dura. The bullet holes and dust clouds in the Al Dura video further indicate that the fatal shots could not have come from the Israeli position, but rather from an area more directly across from the father and son, near a Palestinian police position.

Oct. 25, 2000:
Telerama, a French magazine, publishes an interview with Charles Enderlin in which he explains the brevity of the news clip broadcast of the incident. He asserts:

I cut the images of the child's agony (death throes), they were unbearable. The story was told, the news delivered. It would not have added anything more...As for the moment when the child received the bullets, it was not even filmed.
Nov. 27, 2000:
IDF releases the findings of its comprehensive investigation into the Al Dura killing. It concludes that Al Dura was likely killed by Palestinian gunfire. States Israeli Major General Yom Tov Samia:

A comprehensive investigation conducted in the last weeks casts serious doubt that the boy was hit by Israeli fire. It is quite plausible that the boy was hit by Palestinian bullets in the course of the exchange of fire that took place in the area.

Dr. Landes produced the documentary Pallywood. You can download it from Second Draft, and here's the YouTube:


The podcast starts at 11AM Eastern, and the chat room's open by 10:45. The call-in number is (646) 652-2639. Join us!





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"There was a lot of hate in that little Nakba rally."

Yesterday Mary, Yid With Lid and Pamela attended the Al-Nakbah rally in Dag Hammarskjold Park.

Aside from the curiously phallic signs the women carried, it's interesting to note that
1. most of the attendees were bussed in school buses
2. the people carrying signs reading "Peace, not ethnic cleansing" were screaming, "Jew Jew I hope you die today!" at a Jewish guy.

As Mary said, "There was a lot of hate in that little Nakba rally."



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The missing France2 rushes

Joe Noory has posted The Missing France 2 Rushes on YouTube.

Dr. Richard Landes and Nidra Poller have reported on the al Dura case.

For now, here are the rushes








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Al-Qaida No. 2 says 9/11 theory propagated by Iran

Nothing is going to convince the truthers, but here it goes:
Al-Qaida No. 2 says 9/11 theory propagated by Iran

Osama bin Laden's chief deputy on Tuesday denied a theory that Israel carried out the Sept. 11 attacks and blamed Iran and Shiite Hezbollah for spreading the idea to discredit the Sunni al-Qaida's strike against the U.S.
...
One of the questioners asked about the theory that has circulated in the Middle East and elsewhere that Israel was behind the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Al-Zawahri accused Hezbollah's Al-Manar television of starting the rumor.

"The purpose of this lie is clear — (to suggest) that there are no heroes among the Sunnis who can hurt America as no else did in history. Iranian media snapped up this lie and repeated it," he said.

Of course, Al-Zawahri has theories of his own:

"Iran's aim here is also clear - to cover up its involvement with America in invading the homes of Muslims in Afghanistan and Iraq," he said.

According to him, the Crusaders and the Iranians are working together:

Answering questions about Iraq in Tuesday's tape, al-Zawahri said the insurgent umbrella group led by al-Qaida, called the Islamic Nation of Iraq, is "the primary force opposing the Crusaders and challenging Iranian ambitions" in Iraq, he said, referring to the Americans.

As he often does in his messages, al-Zawahri denounced the "Crusader invasion" of Iraq, but in Tuesday's tape he paired it with a mention of "Iranian complicity" or "Iranian agents."

He didn't leave out global warming,

He predicted that global warming would "make the world more sympathetic to and understanding of the Muslims' jihad against the aggressor America."

Still,

In the latest tape, al-Zawahri was also asked if the terror group had further plans to attack Western countries that participated in the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and subsequent war.

"My answer is: Yes! We think that any country that has joined aggression on Muslims must be deterred," he replied.

Was the question and answer session replies done by a committe? Maybe:

Queries were submitted on the main Islamist Web site until the cutoff date of Jan. 16.

Took him three months to reply.



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Should Carter be censured?

UPDATED
Gateway Pundit has the video of Carter explaining why he wants to meet with Hamas:

In the video, Carter explains (emphasis added),

"It's very important that at least someone meet with the Hamas leaders to express their views, to ascertain what flexibility they have, to try to induce them to stop all attacks against innocent civilians in Israel, and to cooperate with Fatah as a group that unites the Palestinians"

Let's remind Carter that Fatah is yet another terrorist sponsor through its al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades.

As Gateway Pundit points out, this mission to Hamas is such a hairbrained scheme that even Jimmy's fellow elders are staying away.

My friend Gay Patriot is initiating a request for a Resolution of Censure against former President Jimmy Carter. (Also at Instapundit). It's about time someone did.

Prior posts on Carter here.

UPDATE
The Dimwitted Dodo Awards
Can anybody spell "Logan Act"?

Oh, well, just when you think Jimmy can't stoop any lower, it isn't for his lack of trying: Carter wanted to meet Islamic Jihad, too.



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Insane

One of the great flaws in American foreign policy is that second-term presidents start looking to their "legacy" and of course want to be The one who make permanent peace in the Middle East possible.

The Bush administration is now in full "paving the legacy" mode: US says Mid-East peace on track

What does "on track" mean? It means more concessions from Israel, of course.

(h/t the Baron) MIDEAST: RICE WRINGS CONCESSIONS FOR WEST BANK FROM ISRAEL

(ANSAmed) - TEL AVIV, MARCH 31 - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, during her third Middle East trip for the past months, received from Israel a list of measures which will be introduced in the immediate future to ease the living conditions in the West Bank.

The 35-page dossier includes the construction of thousands of new homes in Ramallah; the removal of "some 50" roadblocks along the roads in the West Bank and of a military checkpoint; the strengthening of the operative capacities of the police of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) and several thousand new entrance permits in Israel for Palestinian workers.

"We've been told that this is going to start and, hopefully even be completed in a relatively short period of time. I am expecting it to happen very, very soon," Rice said. Saturday, Rice met in Jerusalem Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. Yesterday, she met Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayad for the first time together with Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak, then had talks with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and the leader of the rightist opposition Benyamin Netanyahu (Likud). Rice also visited Amman for a meeting with PNA President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen). Today she will meet Olmert again.

In a move, which Barak defined as "calculated risk", Israel has also decided to remove from the streets in the West Bank some 50 roadblocks (of the over 459 counted by the Israeli human rights organisation Betselem) and a military checkpoint (of a total 99) south of Jericho from where Palestinians will be able to reach the northern coast of the Dead Sea, a famous tourist destination, so far forbidden.

Say good-bye to the resorts.

Israel will allow the construction north of Ramallah of between 5,000 and 8,000 homes for Palestinians, a measure announced a year ago and affirmed now.

Israel has also agreed to grant 5,000 work permits to Palestinians, to add to the previously issued 18,500 permits.

The functioning of the PNA police will be strengthened: the Palestinian police will be allowed to dislocate 700 agents in Jenin, while 25 Russian armoured vehicles will enter service in Nablus.(ANSAmed).

I have said in the past that there is no "cycle of violence" because Israel will be bombed no matter what.

Why do I believe this?
Because I've been watching the puppet shows.

UPDATE, Tuesday 1 April
What if Condoleezza Rice came to Jerusalem, and nobody cared?, via Judith.



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In this morning's podcast at 11AM Eastern: Breath of the Beast

Today at 11AM Eastern our guest will be Yaacov Ben Moshe of Breath of the Beast blog.

Yaacov explains,

We always get a warning that is clear and unequivocal when evil is stalking us. It is up to us to notice. Warnings are all too easy to dismiss. It is a grave responsibility to pay heed to real warnings. It seems so much easier to convince yourself that the warning is not for you, or that the danger is remote and small.

This morning Siggy has an interesting post, The Willing Embrace of Failure, where he asks,

Middle East peace talks? Who wants peace?

We'll discuss the subject today at 11AM; chat will be open by 11AM, and the call-in number is (646) 652-2639. Join us!





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The fallacy of "disproportionate response"

This morning's top news:

Egypt says Israel using excessive force in Gaza

"Israel is using excessive force against the Palestinians in Gaza; this must stop," Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said Tuesday.

"Israel is bombarding civilians without distinction," he said during a joint press conference in Cairo with his American counterpart Condoleezza Rice, who is expected to meet with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Jerusalem on Wednesday.

While Secretary of State Rice asserted Israel's right to defend itself, stated that Hamas was to blame for the escalation in Gaza and demanded that they end their rocket attacks on Israel, she did't demand a ceasefire, and then issued the usual platitudes about humanitarian situation,

adding that Israel must make every effort so as not to harm the civilian population there.

It's a shame that Sec. Rice hasn't figured out yet that Hamas and Hezbollah have been firing their rockets from civilian residences.

All of these calls on Israel to cease its "excessive force" and its "disproportionate response" against Hamas, Hezbollah, or whichever other enemy boils down to one thing: a call to genocide. Siggy explains,

While the UN and much of Europe wring their hands at the heavy Israeli response to rocket fire by the Palestinians into Israel, there is talk of 'disproportionate response.'

There is no such thing as a 'disproportionate response' to calls for genocide. All conflicts end with 'disproportionate response.'

The Israelis are entitled to defend themselves from those who openly or not so openly call for their annihilation.

Peace among nations is arrived at when the cost of war becomes overwhelming.

Racism, bigotry and hate are overcome when the cost of racism, bigotry and hate becomes too great for society to bear.

As long as nations and peoples perceive the cost of war as acceptable, then we will have war.

When the cost of slaughtering Jews as 'business as usual' becomes to high for the Palestinians to bear, they will respond appropriately.

The rest, as they say, is academic.



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Exodus on TCM

Turner Classic Movies is playing Exodus, and as I write this post Barak Ben Canaan (played by L. J. Cobb) is imploring the Arabs to remain in their homes and work together.

The British mandate ended on May 14, 1948, the state of Israel was proclaimed on the same day, and the following day five Arab states - Egypt, TransJordan, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq - invaded Israel.

Fast-forward sixty years later, and what have we got?

Arab Ideological Doctrine Syndrome: A Crippling Plague (h/t Larwyn)

If the central issue is pride, not material benefit, and if battling the West and Israel are the prime directives, whether this policy leads to defeat, bankruptcy, tyranny, and general disaster is irrelevant. And despite the existence of courageous dissenters from this doctrine, it still rules the Arab world, something every Arab but few in the West understands. This is why peace, moderation, and pragmatism still cannot win there.

Indeed, PA president Mahmoud Abbas is saying he's opposed to an armed struggle against Israel - for the time being - "because we cannot succeed in it" (h/t Gringo)

but maybe in the future things will be different," he said.

Somebody ought to tell King Abdullah when he's in town talking about how "moderates" are ready to "negotiate".

In the meantime, the UN is criticizing Israel for defending itself, with a mild chiding to the Palestinians for attacking Israel.

Peace process? Only if the Hamas thinks it'll wipe Israel off the face of the Earth.

UPDATE
Attacks Widen: Netivot, Psagot and Jerusalem Under Fire (hat tip Pamela, via Larwyn)
Thinly-veiled fiction at Siggy's.
---------------------------------------------------------------
For more insanities, Pat has the Carnival
---------------------------------------------------------------
This week's WSJ 5-best books, on composers' lives, selected by James Penrose


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This week's shoes:




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"Time is running out": Prince Abdullah of Jordan's speech at Princeton University

King Abdullah II, the reigning monarch of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan just concluded a fifteen-minute speech at Princeton University, at the invitation of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. The speech started a few minutes after twelve noon and had been announced as,

King Abdullah will address the future of Arab-American relations in the context of the Middle East's current challenges, particularly how to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, which Jordan views as the most significant issue facing the region.

The main theme was, "Time is running out", a phrase he repeated several times during this brief speech.

King Abdullah stated that 2008 is a critical year for the solution of the Israeli- Palestinian conflict, and that "we need the USA completely involved to ensure a final agreement by end of 2008."

He wants America's strong authority to act switfly, as the only time there has been peace in the Middle East has been when America took a strong leadership role: "If we fail to resolve the core problem of the region it'll become significantly harder for the countries of the region to work with America, and [those countries] will move further away from common principles of mutual respect and partnership."

He specifically asked for a homeland for the Palestinians, and believes that it'll bring security and new acceptance for Israel in region, and create a new partnership berween USA and the Arab/Muslin people.

He did take three questions:
Q. Why now?
KA: Because for the 1st time moderates have gained some ground in ME, and there is a process in place now. If that process falls apart, radicals may gain ground.

Q: Will there be greater Joradnian involvement?
KA: Whatever Israel and Jordan talk, they won't be able to solve status issues by themselves: that's when international community and the US will need to help with the obstacles.
There will be panArab involvement - the future of Israel is bigger than a 2 state solution. We're offering complete acceptance of Israel in the whole region up to and including Indonesia, that third of the world that still has no acceptance of Israel.

Q. How do you envision this Palestinian solution with Hamas in control?
Most Israelis & Pales want it. The future of the region are the 70% of the people who are under age 35 & want a future. The difficulty is the politicians who mess it up. It's going to be the Israeli & Palestinian people saying we want peace.

Reported by Fausta Wertz directly from Princeton NJ. Copyright 2008

UPDATE, Saturday March 1
King of Jordan: U.S. must step up in Middle East



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The Iraqi reconciliation law

Yesterday I posted that Iraq had passed a major reconciliation law.

Ending Impasse, Iraq Parliament Backs Measures

More than any previous legislation, the new initiatives have the potential to spur reconciliation between Sunnis and Shiites and set the country on the road to a more representative government, starting with new provincial elections.

The voting itself was a significant step forward for the Parliament, where even basic quorums have been rare. In a classic legislative compromise, the three measures, each of which was a burning issue for at least one faction, were packaged together for a single vote to encourage agreement across sectarian lines.
...
The three measures are the 2008 budget; a law outlining the scope of provincial powers, a crucial aspect of Iraq’s self-definition as a federal state; and an amnesty that would apply to thousands of the detainees held in Iraqi jails.

Belmont Club explains that the new law is a linchpin for reconciliation, and possibly the start of a new federal system,

This measure is vital to institutionalizing the gains won by the Surge. Iraq has long been crippled by the defective, UN-designed "closed-party list" voting system, which created political parties based on sectarian affiliation. A UN website describes why it adopted this system. It had the advantage of being easy ("no census is required") and creating what in the UN view was an appropriate structure of political coalitions. The trouble was the system encouraged the very same fraction that took Iraq to the brink of civil war.

One of the key problems facing strategists of the Surge was to find a way to institutionalize the grassroots movement of the past year. Former insurgents would of course, be retrained and put under the discipline of the Army or Police. But what of the political leaders? The natural path was to encourage the leadership which emerged during the Surge to stand for office, which proved very difficult to do under the closed-party list system. They were dressed up with no place to go.

The impasse in Baghdad is partly the result of a logjam of sectarian interests. There are also a fair number of politicians, who because of the sectarian nature of the coalitions, are stooges of Teheran. A new election law could sweep the logjam away in a flood, with the stooges in the bargain. Electoral reform is supremely important for long term success. It is the linchpin of "reconciliation".

Setting a budget is a very big step towards reconstruction and the building of not only an infrastructure but also a strong economy.

In a thorough post, Bill Ardolino examines the Iraqi legistalive branch.

While the term "accomodation" may or may not be more appropriate than "reconciliation", there is no doubt that the Iraqi Parliament has made a huge step towards more representative government.

UPDATE
Ed Morrissey notices that Even The New York Times Notices Progress

They leave a few points out of this editorial. For instance, they leave out that none of this would have been possible had we listened to General Harry Reid and Admiral Nancy Pelosi, both of whom declared defeat -- Reid doing so literally -- and demanding a bug-out for the last two years. They don't mention that Hillary Clinton all but called (the real) General David Petraeus a liar for telling Congress that the situation had greatly improved in Iraq. The editors also fail to mention their acceptance of an ad that called Petraeus a traitor, placed by MoveOn, which supports candidates like Reid, Pelosi, and Clinton.

Had we listened to them, Iraqis would be dying by the tens of thousands, al-Qaeda would have turned Iraq into their own state, and they would have their hands on Iraq's oil resources. The Times doesn't bother to mention that, either.

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The "who are they fooling" headline of the day:

Russia sells weaponry and nuclear technology to the Iranians, and now we're supposed to believe the Russians are surprised that Iran can do the sum 1 + 1 = 2:
Russia suspicious over Iran test

Russia thinks the launch of an Iranian rocket into space raises suspicion over the true aim of its nuclear programme, a foreign ministry official has said.

Well, slap me sideways with a feather.


Maybe Putin was taken by surprise that the Mullahs inagurated their own space program on Monday, after the Mullahs went shopping at Arms-R-Us.

'Jad wore special goggles for the ocassion (h/t Larwyn).



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Now it's five broken cables

As I posted earlier, last week three undersea cables were cut in three consecutive days.

Now I find at Belmont Club that it's five cables.

Albawaba:

A total of five cables being operated by two submarine cable operators have been damaged with a fault in each. These are SeaMeWe-4 (South East Asia-Middle East-Western Europe-4) near Penang, Malaysia, the FLAG Europe-Asia near Alexandria, FLAG near the Dubai coast, FALCON near Bandar Abbas in Iran and SeaMeWe-4, also near Alexandria.

Of course, as Wretchard points out, the Jews are being blamed because they weren't affected. The real reason they weren't affected is that Israel uses a different cable since other Middle East countries refused to share theirs.

Never mind that undersea cable damage is an everyday thing.

In other cable news, Obi's Sister says that this would make a great geek wedding cake design



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Third undersea Internet cable cut in Mideast

Remember that massive internet failure I posted about on Thursday?

It's happened again. For three days in a row.

Third undersea Internet cable cut in Mideast

An undersea cable carrying Internet traffic was cut off the Persian Gulf emirate of Dubai, officials said Friday, the third loss of a line carrying Internet and telephone traffic in three days.

This time it appears ships' anchors are to blame,

Stephan Beckert, an analyst with TeleGeography, a research company that consults on global Internet issues, said the cables off Egypt were likely damaged by ships' anchors.

Since ships don't sail with the anchor down, is it possible to locate what ships were anchored in those locations?

But

Officials said Friday it was unclear what caused the damage to FLAG's FALCON cable about 50 kilometers off Dubai. A repair ship was en route, FLAG said.

This is hardly coincidental: as Defense Tech points out,

The abiguity in previous news reporting about whether one or two fiber optic cables were cut in the Med on Tuesday, and whether they were cut in the same place 8 miles off Alexandria or at opposite ends of the Med at the same time, has been replaced by a much worse conundrum. It’s not at all ambiguous now that at least two distinct cables were cut about 250 miles apart, on opposite sides of the huge Arabian Peninsula landmass.

Of course this is the sort of news that lends itself to the wildest speculation. Jules Crittenden has the best theory:

I think it might be someone who has a beef with a credit card company or an airline or a car rental agency

If they experienced as many delays as J (one of my readers who's been stuck in the Chicago Airport several times in the past 3 months), I fully sympathize.

Time to feed your inner geek: This is what an undersea cable looks like inside:

The Beeb has the details.

Via USA Today: The internet's undersea world.

UPDATE
J emails to say that his life has become a cheap remake of Trains, Planes and Automobiles, only with him trying to get out of Chicago.



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