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Jimmy Carter Endangers Jews

Over the weekend, the Washington Post published an anti-Israel falsehood-ridden op-ed written by former president Carter. Elliot Abrams thankfully refutes it with gusto in today's paper. Unfortunately, it is Tuesday, the day after Labor Day.  Everyone is back at work, fewer people have time to read the paper.  Carter's piece was published on Sunday.  How many read it and were poisoned by it?  How many many will now read Abram's repudiation?  

Abrams writes:

In an op-ed on Sunday ["The Elders' View of the Middle East"], former president Jimmy Carter, speaking on behalf of a self-appointed group of "Elders," described a rapacious Israel facing long-suffering, blameless Palestinians, who are contemplating a "nonviolent civil rights struggle" in which "their examples would be Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. and Nelson Mandela." 

As with most of Carter's recent statements about Israel and the Palestinians, instead of facts we get vignettes from recent Carter travels. And while he finds "a growing sense of concern and despair" among "increasingly desperate" Palestinians, polls do not sustain this view. The most recent survey by the leading Palestinian pollster, Khalil Shikaki (done in August, the same month Carter visited), shows "considerable improvement in public perception of personal and family security and safety in the West Bank and a noticeable decrease in public perception of the existence of corruption in [Palestinian Authority] institutions." This does not sound like despair. In fact, positive views of personal and family safety and security in the West Bank stood at 25 percent four years ago, 35 percent two years ago and 43 percent a year ago, and they have risen to 58 percent in the past year, Shikaki reports. There are other ways to measure quality of life in the West Bank: The International Monetary Fund recently stated that "macroeconomic conditions in the West Bank have improved" largely because "Israeli restrictions on internal trade and the passage of people have been relaxed significantly."

The IMF predicts that "continuation of the relaxation of restrictions could result in real GDP growth of 7% for 2009 as a whole," a rate of growth that would be far in excess of ours -- or Israel's.

Carter's efforts to portray life among the Palestinians as unbearable and getting worse are belied by data. His efforts to blame Israel for all the problems that do exist are equally unpersuasive...

Read the whole thing.

I only hope no one will take Carter's rantings seriously, but I fear that enemies of Israel and anti-semites everywhere will pounce upon the words of a former US president and use them to support further bombings and terrorism.  This is what makes this anti-semitic political has-been a threat.   

Jewish Refugees From Arab Countries

An underreported piece of Middle Eastern history:

Regina Waldman, chair of JIMENA (Jews Indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa) addresses the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva on the issue of the nearly 1 million Jewish Refugees from the Arab countries.

JIMENA is a human rights organization seeking to educate and advocate for the plight of Jewish refugees from the Middle East. Prior to 1948, approximately 850,000 Jews lived in Muslim countries of the Middle East, North Africa, and the Persian Gulf. Today, 99 percent of these ancient Jewish communities no longer exist due to Arab and Islamic government actions that directly led to their displacement.

JIMENA FAQs

"Our story must be returned to the narrative of the modern Middle East from which it has been erased."

(Hat tip: Helene)

More on the AIPAC Case

Shocking and nauseating to think of the disdain for Jews and Israel behind all of this:

U.S. Drops Case Against Former AIPAC Lobbyists 

Federal prosecutors Friday abandoned an espionage-law case against two former lobbyists for a pro-Israel advocacy group. In asking a judge to dismiss charges against Steven J. Rosen and Keith Weissman, formerly of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), officials said recent court rulings had made it unlikely that they would win. The two men were charged in 2005 with conspiring to obtain classified information and pass it to the Israeli government and journalists from the Washington Post and other news organizations - the first civilians not employed by the government charged under the 1917 espionage statute.

Rosen said Friday that the case was politicized and pushed by government officials "who have an obsession with leaks...and an obsession with Israel and the theory that it spies on America."

The WAPO couldn't resist ending with an unsupported gratuitous swipe:

Gary Wasserman, a professor of government at Georgetown University who is writing a book about the case, said he was not surprised that AIPAC was pleased by the proposed dismissal. A trial, he added, "would have provoked a lot of public discussion about how they worked." 

More analysis, from the WSJ:  

Four years, millions in legal fees and a half-dozen conspiracy theories later, the Justice Department dropped its case against the two former AIPAC staffers. Now where do Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman - and everyone else besmirched, including California Democrat Jane Harman - apply to get their reputations back? Attorney General Eric Holder deserves credit for dropping the charges, though we wish he had also announced that the case should never have been brought.

The core of the prosecution's case concerns a memo sent to the men from Defense Department analyst Larry Franklin - now serving a 12-year prison sentence - about internal White House deliberations on Iran policy. The government also used Franklin (whose main offense was taking classified documents home) to plant an apparently bogus story with Weissman claiming that American and Israeli lives were in imminent danger. The planted story, putting the defendants in a moral quandary - share classified information and save lives; keep it secret and let people die - is the worst form of entrapment. This prosecution needs to be understood in the context of the aftermath of the Iraq invasion and the swirl of conspiracy theories about "neocon" and Jewish influence over U.S. policy. In this bizarro reading of events, President Bush, Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld, and Condoleezza Rice chose to invade Iraq due to the influence of Jewish officials such as Paul Wolfowitz, Doug Feith, Scooter Libby and Richard Perle. One sign of those times: In the immediate aftermath of Mr. Franklin's arrest, CBS's Lesley Stahl asked whether "Israel [used] the analyst to try to influence U.S. policy on the war in Iraq?" In other words, the Aipac case resembled a political hit more than a legitimate "espionage" case. 

A Fundamental Right to Self-Defense

Verdict: Israel Not Guilty - John Hinderaker (Power Line)

• George Bisharat is a Palestinian-American law professor who has made a career out of defaming Israel. On April 4 the New York Times donated space on its op-ed page for his latest screed, titled "Israel On Trial." It begins: "Chilling testimony by Israeli soldiers substantiates charges that Israel's Gaza Strip assault entailed grave violations of international law." He fails to mention that the "chilling testimony" turned out to be untrue.
• Bisharat states: "Despite Israel's 2005 'disengagement' from Gaza, the territory remains occupied." The statement is simply false. It is because Israel withdrew from Gaza that Hamas was able to take control and launch thousands of rockets and mortars into Israel over a period of years.
• He accuses Israel of "imposing collective punishment in the form of a blockade, in violation of Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention." Israel had a perfect right to prevent military supplies from being shipped or smuggled into Gaza so that more rockets could be launched.
• He accuses Israel of "willfully killing civilians without military justification." Hamas' principal military strategy is the employment of human shields. Those who want to avoid civilian casualties in Gaza should stop firing rockets from there. There is no evidence, however, that Israel's military killed any civilians in Gaza otherwise than by accident in the course of operations undertaken for self-defense.
• He accuses Israel of "deliberately employing disproportionate force." The "proportionate force" theory is beloved by Israel-bashers. In fact, however, no such principle exists in international law. It was invented for the occasion and has never been used as a club against any nation except Israel. No sane country, when attacked, responds "proportionally." Nazi Germany never did attack the United States. Was the fire-bombing of Dresden proportionate?
• A sane country, when attacked, reacts with all of the force at its command in order to win the war that was started by its enemy. Has anyone ever questioned this fundamental right of self-defense, except as applied to Israel?

Israel and the Media War

Daniel Pipes writes:

“Who, a century back, would have imagined Jews making the better soldiers and Arabs the better publicists?” I asked back in 2005.

A foremost example of the Arabs’ p.r. prowess lies in their ability to transform the map of the Arab-Israeli conflict. In the early decades, maps of the Arab-Israeli conflict showed Israel in a vast Middle East, a presence so small, one practically needed a magnifying glass to locate it. These days, however, the conflict is typically portrayed by a huge Israel looming over the fractured West Bank and Gaza areas.

This shift in size implies a shift in underdog status; whereas Israel’s weak-actor status once came through clearly, the Palestinians have now usurped that position, with all its attendant benefits.

A recent study by Joseph A. Vandello, Nadav P. Goldschmied and David A. R. Richards, “The Appeal of the Underdog,” in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin takes as its starting point the assumption that “When people observe competitions, they are often drawn to figures that are seen as disadvantaged or unlikely to prevail. … If people are drawn to sympathize with figures seen as underdogs, attitudes about the parties in this conflict might be strategically shaped by emphasizing the underdog status of one group over the other.”

The trio then tested this hypothesis by looking, in part, at the Arab-Israeli conflict. To uncover the possible advantage of being perceived as the underdog, the authors conducted an experiment in which they operationalized underdog status by subtly reinforcing physical size disparities through maps that shifted the perspective to make salient Israel as large, surrounding the smaller occupied Palestinian territories, or conversely, by making Israel appear small by showing it surrounded by the Arab countries of the greater Middle East.

Having set up the experiment with two maps, the authors “predicted that this shift in visual perspective would create perceptions of underdog status, which would in turn predict support for the "underdog side."

They predicted correctly. Small size turns out to be key to being perceived as the underdog:

Participants were asked which side they considered the underdog in the conflict. When Israel was portrayed as large on the map, 70% saw the Palestinians as the underdog. In contrast, when Israel was portrayed as small on the map, 62.1% saw Israel as the underdog.

Being perceived as underdog does indeed confer advantages for winning political sympathy:

Participants were also asked toward which group they felt more supportive. When Israel was portrayed as large on the map, 53.3% were more supportive toward the Palestinians. In contrast, when Israel was portrayed as small on the map, 76.7% were more supportive toward Israel.

Read the whole thing.

Former CNN Producer Harangues Israeli Politician at Debate

Could she be any more biased?

Read the full story.

Update:

Speaking of media bias, there's much more - do click the link and read it all:

In January, Jews in Britain suffered a level of anti-Semitic attacks on a level not seen since the 1930s. This can be attributed to at least in part by the inflammatory and false coverage of Israel by the BBC and other British media.

The BBC has finally added a small footnote correction to the end of one of its stories that falsely claimed Israel shelled a school in Gaza. [link]

Report: Eyewitness Visitor to Gaza

The reality does not fit the mainstream media descriptions.  An eyewitness writes:

I'm a poet, an English Jew and a frequent visitor to Israel. Deeply disturbed by the reports of wanton slaughter and destruction during Operation Cast Lead, I felt I had to see for myself. I flew to Tel Aviv and on Wednesday, January 28, using my press card to cross the Erez checkpoint, I walked across the border into Gaza where I was met by my guide, a Palestinian journalist. He asked if I wanted to meet with Hamas officials. I explained that I'd come to bear witness to the damage and civilian suffering, not to talk politics.

...THE GAZA I saw was societally intact. There were no homeless, walking wounded, hungry or underdressed people. The streets were busy, shops were hung with embroidered dresses and gigantic cooking pots, the markets were full of fresh meat and beautiful produce - the red radishes were bigger than grapefruits. Mothers accompanied by a 13-year-old boy told me they were bored of leaving home to sit on rubble all day to tell the press how they'd survived. Women graduates I met in Shijaya spoke of education as power as old men watched over them.

No one praised their government as they showed me the sites of tunnels where fighters had melted away. No one declared Hamas victorious for creating a forced civilian front line as they showed me the remains of booby trapped homes and schools.

From what I saw and was told in Gaza, Operation Cast Lead pinpointed a totalitarian regime's power bases and largely neutralized Hamas's plans to make Israel its tool for the sacrifice of civilian life.

Corroboration of my account may be found in tardy and piecemeal retractions of claims concerning the UNWRA school at Al-Fakhora; an isolated acknowledgment that Gaza is substantially intact by The New York Times; Internet media watch corrections; and the unresolved discrepancy between the alleged wounded and their unreported whereabouts.

[Link]

Hat Tip: Media Backspin

There They Go Again

The Economist and their oleaginous, pretentious, pious, holier-than-thou, off-kilter, off-base, error-ridden, poorly researched, ignorant, idiotic, biased, and-let-us-please-not-forget moronic coverage of Israel. 

[LINK]

Learning About Terror From the Battle of Algiers

If you read nothing else this year, READ THIS.  Brilliant and chilling.

Answering Israel's Critics

Six clichés you are likely to hear about the Israel-Gaza situation — and why they’re false.

The New York Post Tells it Like it is

The New York Post has a fantastic, no-holds-barred, truthful, kick-butt, tell-it-like-it-is op-ed page.  Maybe it always had it - I don't know.  I never noticed until I started following world events more closely after 9/11.  Here's a perfect example:

THE international media have already morphed the horrific slaughter in Mumbai into the murky realm of euphemism and apologetics.

Al Jazeera and The Guardian label the terrorists "gunmen"; CNN calls them "militants." Some analysts identified the underlying cause as the Kashmir dispute between India and Pakistan. Psychological guru Deepak Chopra called it the result of "collateral damage" from the US war on terrorism and the Iraq war.

But how does the especially bloodthirsty attack on Mumbai's Nariman-Chabad House fit into this puzzle palace?

The New York Times theorized that Chabad House may have been an "accidental hostage scene." The BBC initially chose to hide the Jewish character of the target by describing it as just "an office building." Al Jazeera refused to show Chabad House as the site of the carnage. Some Western media outlets unsympathetically labeled victims there as "ultra-Orthodox" or "missionaries."

Contrary to these fantasies, the all-too-obvious truth is now being confirmed:

* The Times of India reported that some of the terrorists, claiming to be Malaysian students, rented nearby space in order to scout out Chabad.

* The Indian doctor who conducted the post-mortems related in a shaken voice that: "Of all the bodies, the Israeli victims bore the maximum torture marks. It was clear that they were killed on the 26th [the first day of the attacks] itself. It was obvious that they were tied up and tortured before they were killed."

* The only captured terrorist, Ajmal Kamal, confessed under interrogation that his fellow murderers were specifically ordered to target the Jews killed at Chabad.

It's not only close India-Israeli ties that the terrorists wanted to destroy. It's likely that Mumbai's age-old history of hospitality to Jews made the Nariman-Chabad House a strategic target.

Mumbai is notable for two distinctive Jewish communities: Bagdhadi Jews, whose ancestors first arrived as traders about 250 years ago, and the Bene Israel, descendants of Judean Jews shipwrecked off the Indian coast 2,100 years ago. Among traditional Hindus forbidden to press oil from seeds, the Bene Israel found a welcome niche as the "Saturday Oil Presser Caste." Experiencing almost no discrimination, they were accorded high status in Indian society - one served as Gandhi's personal physician.

Now the survivors and loved ones of all the innocent victims of the Mumbai massacres begin the heartbreaking task of picking up the shattered pieces of their lives. But the families of the Chabad House victims have to also live with the double standard that lets the world look the other way when Jews are targets of terror.

At a house of fellowship and prayer, nine religious people were bound, tortured and executed because they were Jews - just as Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl had his head cut off in Pakistan because, as he told his kidnappers, "I am Jewish."

Terrorism may not succeed in destroying our civilization - but politically correct euphemisms and apologetics are already crippling our ability to defend it. [link]

Kudos are also due to the writers, of course:

Rabbi Abraham Cooper is associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center. Harold Brackman, a historian, is a consultant for the center.

Political Forensics: The Great Revelation

No surprise whatsoever - media bias played a HUGE role in the presidential election. Those of us who supported McCain/Palin saw consistent signs of it throughout the campaign.  But now, documentation and supporting evidence is being revealed. 

Results from a Zogby poll of Obama voters:

512 Obama Voters 11/13/08-11/15/08 MOE +/- 4.4 points

97.1% High School Graduate or higher, 55% College Graduates

Results to 12 simple Multiple Choice Questions

57.4% could NOT correctly say which party controls congress (50/50 shot just by guessing)

71.8% could NOT correctly say Joe Biden quit a previous campaign because of plagiarism (25% chance by guessing)

82.6% could NOT correctly say that Barack Obama won his first election by getting opponents kicked off the ballot (25% chance by guessing)

88.4% could NOT correctly say that Obama said his policies would likely bankrupt the coal industry and make energy rates skyrocket (25% chance by guessing)

56.1% could NOT correctly say Obama started his political career at the home of two former members of the Weather Underground (25% chance by guessing).

And yet.....

Only 13.7% failed to identify Sarah Palin as the person on which their party spent $150,000 in clothes

Only 6.2% failed to identify Palin as the one with a pregnant teenage daughter

And 86.9 % thought that Palin said that she could see Russia from her "house," even though that was Tina Fey who said that!!

Only 2.4% got at least 11 correct.

Only .5% got all of them correct. (And we "gave" one answer that was technically not Palin, but actually Tina Fey)

Illustrating the point:

Hot Air notes:

As for the video, without the Zogby poll, it would be hilarious but without context.  Anyone can find fools for “man on the street” interviews; Jay Leno does it as a regular staple for the Tonight Show.  Zogby’s poll shows that Ziegler’s video is no anomaly.  Wait for the end, where the ignorant endorse their favorite media outlets, which is the real highlight of this project.

Relevant links:

John Ziegler's site  

Read the story here >>
Get full poll results here >>

Zogby Attacked >>

John Ziegler Releases Statement in Response to Attacks >>

Zogby Forced to Defend Poll >>

Just a Little Tilted

Why did the WaPo's admission of guilt have to wait until AFTER the elction? Their survey didn't end until election day? What a bunch of cow's waste product.

Reporting, 2 Ways

There's this:

• Palestinian Terrorist Rams Car into Pedestrians in Jerusalem, Wounds 17 - Efrat Weiss
  A Palestinian terrorist ran a car into a crowd of soldiers and civilians at a busy intersection in central Jerusalem on Monday evening, wounding at least 17 people. The terrorist, from eastern Jerusalem, was shot dead by an IDF officer. (Ynet News)
• Israeli Soldier Blinded in One Eye after Palestinian Woman Throws Acid in His Face - Yuval Azoulay
  An IDF soldier was wounded on Monday when a Palestinian woman threw acid in his face at the Hawara checkpoint near Nablus. Doctors fear he may have lost vision in one eye as a result of the attack. (Ha'aretz)

And then there's the "BBC version."

With the Best of Intentions, of Course

The Media is Angry

...because their candidate of choice is floundering.

Earth to NYTimes!

The NYTimes's unbelievably biased big blaring headline:

Israeli Raid in West Bank Imperils Talk of Truce

Uh, we seem to be overlooking something:

Palestinians Fire 15 Rockets at Sderot - Shmulik Hadad
Palestinians in Gaza fired at least 15 Kassam rockets at Sderot on Wednesday. Two rockets landed in town, near a school and next to a warehouse, and caused some damage. Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility, saying the barrage was an "initial response" to the killing of four terrorists in Bethlehem.
    Prime Minister Olmert visited a school in Ashkelon on Tuesday, where he discovered that students had no time to reach bomb shelters. Olmert asked the children to demonstrate what happens when a Color Red alert sounds, prompting the children to vanish under their desks in seconds. (Ynet News)

The NYTimes ITSELF noted:

Palestinians Fire Rocket at Ashkelon - Isabel Kershner and Taghreed El-Khodary
Palestinian militants in Gaza fired a rocket at the Israeli city of Ashkelon on Tuesday, fracturing a tenuous lull. The rocket landed south of the city and caused no casualties, an Israeli police spokesman said. Ashkelon, a city of 120,000 people about 10 miles north of Gaza, was struck by at least 20 foreign-made, Katyusha rockets during the recent increase in hostilities. (New York Times)

Little Green Footballs is calling it, "Mainstream Media Anti-Israel Day."

If all the Jews in NY stopped buying the NYTimes...

Unfair and Unbalanced

Goldie Hawn recently spoke at a Jewish fundraising event in Scotland, where she was met by pro-Palestinian protestors.  Here's an example of coverage of the protest from a Scottish newspaper:

Palestine Campaigners Confront Goldie Hawn At Scottish Event

GOLDIE HAWN was confronted by furious protesters as she arrived at a fund-raising dinner last night.

About 200 members of the Stop The War Coalition and the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign turned up at the Hilton Hotel in Glasgow.

They chanted as the actress gave a talk called "Laughter Is The Best Medicine" at the Jewish National Fund event.

Israel has killed more than 120 Palestinians in recent attacks on Gaza.

That's the article in its entirety. Not a word about anything the Palestinians have done leaving the impression they are innocents and the Israelis are ruthless killers.

Lovely.

Asymmetrical Warfare

When editorialists decry Israel's "disproportionate" response to Palestinian rockets, other facets of asymmetry are always completely ignored.  First, Israel follows a moral code and tries to spare civilians, whereas the Palestinians deliberately target innocents.  Then, Palestinians use Western media openness against the Israelis, while they themselves answer to no one.  Additionally, Israelis care about world opinion and doing the right thing, while their opponents care only about winning. These differences form the basis of a psychological imbalance that all the military might in the universe cannot remedy.

From the Middle East Quarterly:

Most analysts acknowledge that Israel enjoys military superiority over its Arab neighbors,[2] a status preserved in part by the U.S. commitment to Israel's qualitative military edge relative to the Arab states.[3] Many Arab commentators and academics use this asymmetry for propaganda. Pro-Palestinian polemicist Edward Said juxtaposed "Israeli power" and "Palestinian powerlessness."[4] Nabil Ramlawi, the permanent observer for Palestine to the United Nations in Geneva wrote in 2002 of an alleged massacre in which Israel used "tanks and armoured vehicles, under a barrage of heavy gunfire from Apache gunships," and further committed a "long list of massacres" and "war crimes, State-sponsored terrorism and systematic human rights violations against the Palestinian people."[5] But Israel's technological edge does not mean that it enjoys every advantage in its battles with terror groups: While Israel subscribes to traditional restrictions on its battlefield conduct, its Islamist and jihadi adversaries, who eschew international humanitarian law, enjoy an asymmetric advantage born of psychological impunity.
The Israeli military faces a serious dilemma because it adheres to a specific moral code. Despite Arab propaganda to the contrary, Israeli military planners respect human life.[6] Tel Aviv University philosophy professor Asa Kasher and current Israel Defense Forces (IDF) intelligence chief Amos Yadlin write that, even when dealing with terrorists, Israeli soldiers conduct operations "in a manner that strictly protects human life and dignity by minimizing all collateral damage to individuals not directly involved in acts or activities of terror."[7] When trying to oust terrorists from Jenin in April 2002, for example, Israeli commanders decided to pursue a house-to-house ground strategy rather than employ the kind of airpower that would keep Israeli soldiers out of danger but would heighten the risk of collateral civilian casualties.[8] This decision cost the lives, in one incident, of thirteen IDF soldiers in an ambush in the Hawashin district on April 9.[9]
The Israeli judiciary also provides a check on the military. Israeli courts regularly impose restrictions on military tactics, despite the "price paid by the limitations put on the army's actions."[10] Arab petitioners have a voice. Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz wrote that Israel's courts represent an "independent judiciary willing to stand up to its own government."[11] In 2004, the Israeli High Court of Justice ruled for petitioner Fatma al-Aju against the Israeli military in a case that called for the IDF to take into consideration obligations towards civilians, such as allowing medical teams to enter combat areas, and other humanitarian needs when planning military operations.[12] The court also sided with Palestinian Arabs regarding the routing of Israel's security barrier.[13] Arab states have no such judicial independence nor are their leaderships subject to the rule of law.
Comparative prisoner treatment also highlights the discrepancy: The Israeli government provides access to and information about captured terrorists, opening itself to criticism of their treatment,[14] whereas neither Hamas nor Hezbollah even acknowledge whether captured Israelis are alive, let alone allow international monitors access to them.
The result is an asymmetry in which Israel restricts itself in accordance with international law from indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets while groups such as Fatah, Hamas, and Hezbollah intentionally target Israeli civilians and employ their own civilians as human shields to deter an Israeli response. Avi Dichter, Israel's public security minister, spoke to this predicament in the context of the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war: "You can [conduct military operations] in a short time; you can flood southern Lebanon with ground troops, and you can bomb villages without warning anyone, and it will be faster. But you'll kill a lot more innocent people and suffer a lot more casualties, and we don't intend to do either."[15] Maj.-Gen. Giora Eiland, Israel's national security advisor from 2005 to 2006, explained the Israeli decision-making process: "We are forced to kill someone only when four conditions are met: Number one, there is no way to arrest someone. Number two, the target is important enough. Number three, we do it when we believe that we can guarantee very few civilian casualties. And number four, we do it when we believe that there is no way that we can delay or postpone this operation, something that we consider as a ticking bomb."[16]
Israel is further harmed by the invocation of international law to implicate the legitimacy of its fight against its adversaries. International law is routinely misconstrued by the media commentators and non-specialists who cite it. Some journalists, for example, describe Israeli treatment of Palestinian terrorists as a contravention of international law. This is misleading. Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, among others, fail to meet the criteria required for full protection under the Geneva conventions.[17] More broadly, human rights groups selectively quote international law but fail to note that "protected persons" (i.e., citizens under occupation) may not participate in violent activities against the occupying power.[18] Despite rhetoric to the contrary, there is no "right of resistance" under international law to either civilians under occupation or irregular forces that purport to challenge an occupier.[19]
Conventional war between armies may favor Israel, but the fact that Islamists do not differentiate between civilians and legitimate combatants creates an asymmetry in favor of those who are eager to use any method available to advance their cause.

There's a lot more. Good article.

Addendum: 

A few minutes after posting this, I came across a BBC article that completely misses the boat as described above.  It is even titled, "The Middle East's Asymmetric Warfare." They discuss the frustration of the Israeli military in dealing with the Palestinians, unable to answer their puny rockets.

Completely ignoring the reasons why.

The BBC article states:

What is going on between the Palestinian rocket squads in Gaza and the Israeli army is a classic fight between the strong and the weak - which is known these days as asymmetric warfare.

The thing about it is that the weaker side can exert leverage far beyond the power of its weapons.

That accounts for some of the rage and frustration in Israel's defence establishment.

They are big, they are strong, and they have some of the most sophisticated weapons systems in the world. And they are struggling to stop rockets that are the lowest of low tech.

It is not because they can't stop the rockets.

It is because they choose not to, in order to spare civilians.

Why does the BBC draw a moral equivalence between the two sides?  They can't be that stupid. There's an agenda involved.

Lousy Reporting From the MSM

From Honest Reporting:

Anyone relying the on the mainstream media (MSM) to understand Israel's raid on the Gaza Strip on Tuesday would have been left without some essential context for Israeli actions. Too often, major media outlets downplayed the salvo of more than 40 missiles that hit Sderot that day and wounded four people, as well as the murder of a foreign volunteer shot by a Palestinian sniper from within Gaza.

While continuous terror from the Hamas-controlled territory remains a serious threat to Israeli lives in the western Negev, it hardly rates a mention in day-to-day coverage of the region, resulting in shoddy, one-sided journalism.

A snapshot of reports from some international media exposes some of the worst offenders.

• Incredibly, The Scotsman failed to acknowledge the latest Qassam barrage at all, while at the same time omitting the crucial detail that the majority of those Palestinians killed in the Israeli raid were armed Hamas terrorists.
• The Times of London also muddied an otherwise good piece of reporting by not giving enough detail regarding the nature of the Palestinian casualties.
• In a dreadful case of moral equivalence, The Daily Telegraph's Tim Butcher makes it clear just how lightly he perceives the suffering of Israeli civilians targeted by Palestinian missiles:

Fewer than a dozen Israelis have been killed by the rocket fire in recent years, while hundreds of Palestinians have been killed in reciprocal attacks.

• The AFP barely acknowledged the issue of Qassams while the BBC muddled the situation even further, leaving the mistaken impression that Sderot had been spared from attack for many months:

Hours after the Gaza City raid Hamas claimed to have fired 17 mortars at two small border crossings with Israel and three rockets at the Israeli town of Sderot, the first time in several months that Hamas has targeted the town.

Of course, while Hamas may not have taken credit for recent Qassam attacks up until Tuesday, it has given its blessing to any number of Palestinian terror groups willing to fire missiles into Israel on a daily basis.

• While the LA Times got that piece of information right, it managed to bury all mention of the Qassams right at the bottom of its extensive coverage of Tuesday's violence.
• The prize, however, for media distortion and sheer idiocy goes to the UK's Mirror. Headlining the story "Israel kills 19 in Gaza bloodbath", this tabloid newspaper would have served its uninformed readers better by not covering the story at all. Instead, the entire issue is neatly summed up in the space of two paragraphs:

Tanks and helicopter gunships pounded the region in the bloodiest fighting since Hamas militants took over in June. Leader Mahmoud Zahar's son Hussam, 24, was one of 19 killed in the attack, which may have scuppered planned peace talks.

A farmer in Israel was shot dead by a Hamas sniper and the group launched rockets over the border.

How's that for context?

Note:  Elder of Ziyon has been keeping a record of missiles fired on Sderot. It's a real eye opener to see them arrayed on the calendar so graphically.  Here are January's hits.  Links to previous months are provided as well.

New York Times 6 Month Study

The New York Times: April-September 2007 - Summary of Findings:

• Balance: Despite an evenly balanced selection of stories on Israel and the Palestinians, the New York Times gave far more weight to Israeli military incidents in text location, headlines and photo selection than to Palestinian attacks. More than 60% of images sympathetic to one side or the other favored the Palestinians.
• Consistency: Israeli and Palestinian actions were not treated consistently in choice of language. Israel or the Israel Defense Forces were the subject of strongly worded, direct headlines in 18 out of 20 cases (90%). However, in the 20 cases where the Palestinians were responsible for attacks, the language was mostly passive and the group responsible was only named in eight instances (40%).
• Context and Accuracy: Inaccurate statements or important context that would give readers a fuller picture of news events was often omitted. Terms such as "militants", "occupied territory," and "illegal settlements" were used without providing a proper explanation.

Findings in Depth:

I. BALANCE:

An important indicator of bias, balance means the news source gave equal weight to conflicting claims over a period of time. Both subject matter and style are important factors in weighing bias.

During the time period under review (April 1 through September 30, 2007), we analyzed a total of 121 articles whose dominant focus dealt with Israel or the Palestinians, including 40 that focused on a violent attack or military action by Palestinian terrorist groups or the IDF. Some described events between Israel and Palestinian groups and others described internal Palestinian fighting. We found that reporting favored the Palestinian side through both text priority and selection of images.

Text Priority:

In articles that reported on violent actions, Israeli moves were almost always reported first, regardless of whether they occurred prior to or in response to a Palestinian attack. Only later -- lower down in the article -- was there mention of the cause of the Israeli action. By placing accounts of Israeli military actions before those of Palestinian attacks, the Israeli actions seem to lack justification.

For example, the article "8 Israeli Airstrikes in Gaza Kill at Least 7" opens with this paragraph and photograph:

Israel moved a small number of tanks and soldiers over the Gaza border and hit Hamas with eight airstrikes on Thursday and early Friday, killing at least seven Palestinians.

Only after this does the reader see:

Some 14 rockets fired by Hamas militants in Gaza on Thursday landed in Israel, 6 of them near Sderot, a border town, the Israeli Army said. The government bused some Sderot residents to hotels in what it called a respite, not an evacuation.

While the reporting is technically accurate, the fact that Hamas fired rockets at Gaza is overshadowed by the description of the Israeli response. In fact, 20 out of 24 articles describing fighting between Israel and the Palestinians lead with the Israeli action, regardless of which action took place first. This style of reporting gives the reader the impression that the Israeli military attacks occurred much more frequently than the Palestinian ones. In truth, during this time period, there were weekly (and often daily) actions by both sides. Although Palestinian casualties were higher, the number of rocket attacks against Israel was far greater than Israeli responses. Proper balance would have made this clear.   

Photographs:

Editors have many choices which photographs accompany news articles. We looked at the photographs that ran with the New York Times' articles and found that there seemed to be an inappropriate and unbalanced emphasis on either Palestinian suffering or Israeli military operations. The Sometimes the photos which accompanied the articles did not even feature the primary content of the article. For example, on May 17, the Times published "Unity Fractures as Palestinians Battle in Gaza." The primary thrust of the article described fighting between the Palestinian Hamas and Fatah organizations. Yet, the photo chosen to accompany the story showed an Israeli attack. 

For our study, we focused on images that clearly favored one side or the other. Images of Palestinian suffering or Israeli attacks favor the Palestinian side. Images of Israeli suffering or masked Palestinian terrorists encourage understanding of the Israeli perspective. Of the images showing one point of view or the other, over 60% were pictures that evoke more understanding or sympathy for the Palestinian side. The viewer thus gets the impression that there are far more Israeli military strikes against Palestinian civilians than Palestinian rocket attacks.

Read the rest

Jewish History

What has been taken away from Judaism and the Jewish people over the past 2,000 years?  Taken away and forgotten in some distant past - and the world moves on.  But some people study history, and maybe as suggested in the article below, such study can border on obsession, but it's an obsession I can understand.  Jews are directly affected today, and Jewish right to Israel is questioned based upon lies, the origin of which gets forgotten. Theft is forgotten, wrongs are not righted and there is no accountability.

But even as I say this, I am reminded of those who would say that others have been wronged too, that other civilizations died off completely - that at least the Jewish people still live, and what am I complaining about?

However, in my view, each people has a story of their own and are responsible for it and for carrying on their civilization and culture.  My responsibility and focus is on Jewish civililization and culture.  I have a double responsibility in supporting American civilization and culture - but America is not in nearly as much need of my help and focus, having many others to help it.  Jews are few and far between and each of us has to shout louder and more frequently to make up for our lack in number. 

This doesn't mean I don't care about other cultures, but of course I think about mine and what concerns me and my family first and foremost.  Yes, that's blunt, but true. And it's true of everyone (or should be) who cares about their culture and feels it has something to offer them and their descendents and the rest of the world.

I see Judaism and the Jewish people as being endangered - and not only from hostile forces, but from our own lack of interest and assimilation into the cultures in which we live. I see something there, a lot actually, worth fighting for, and I try my best to get my children to understand and see it too.  Frankly, I don't know how well I've succeeded.

My concerns play out on this blog - I keep coming back to them, though I don't always write about it overtly, I just keep posting articles showing different aspects of the same thing - Judaism, Jews and Israel endangered, and the misinterpretation of the facts - both deliberately and in ignorance - by other cultures who would like to conquer Jewish territory and by the media.

The article below is a discussion of a book called God's Gold, written by an archeologist who specializes in the archeology of the Holy Land.  His views are disputed by some Israeli archeologists.  In my opinion he may or may not be wrong, but the one thing his book does do is help to focus interest on the area, its meaning to the Jewish people and their historical claim.  From the Jewish World Review: 

The boundary between quest and obsession is not defined until it is crossed. By then it is too late — and extremely perilous. This is inevitable when the search is for some of the most precious and potentially explosive objects in the world: religious icons that, if found, will further agitate the roiling cauldron that is the Middle East.

In "G-d's Gold: A Quest for the Lost Temple Treasures of Jerusalem," archaeologist Sean Kingsley provides a dramatic account of his personal journey in search of the golden menorah, silver trumpets, and jewel-covered Table of Divine Presence taken from the Second Temple of Jerusalem in the year 70. These iconic artifacts were spirited away by the Roman emperor Vespasian and his son, Titus, during the razing of Jerusalem that followed the First Jewish Revolt. Back in Rome, the treasures became the centerpiece of a massive victory parade, the report of which can still be read 2,000 years later as intricate carvings on the Arch of Titus.

Although missing since antiquity, there are enough written references to them, and more than enough conspiracy theorists who claim that they reside in the Vatican, to suggest that the treasures were not melted down for pagan purposes. This is all Kingsley needs to launch what seems to be an impossible mission — one that is both delicate and dangerous because of the ever-present tensions that surround the jurisdiction of the Temple Mount.

I visited the Vatican several years ago and was shocked to see not only the extent and value of the treasures it owns, but the fact that there were Jewish artifacts in its posession. I no longer remember exactly what I saw, but I do remember the flash of anger that the objects were owned by someone else and not exhibited in a Jewish museum. I wondered at the time how it was they came to be there.

In a narrative that is part history, part travelogue, and all action movie, Kingsley describes his 10 years of travels from the Holy Land to Rome to Tunis to Istanbul, digging for clues in the dusty texts of ancient scribes and the dangerous dirt of Hamas-controlled territory.

Has Kingsley crossed over, then, from quest to obsession? Perhaps. He is absolutely obsessive about knowing the objects of his search, although this is just excellent methodology. Part forensics investigator and part profiler, Kingsley is adamant that the key to any search is the understanding of both the material and psychological properties of the missing objects. It is not enough to know what the Temple treasures were made of, and their design; it is just as important to know their significance to Second-Temple Jews, and to the Romans and Vandals after them. It is Kingsley's hypothesis that the icons survived not because of their monetary value, but because they could be used to support the founding myths of all those who held them, an ultimate source of "via fide" — street cred — in a world breaking free from Roman rule.

Read the rest.

A review from the Boston Globe which discusses the archeological controversy raised by God's Gold.

The History Channel has a 2-part series based on the book which I have not seen.  Part 2 will be shown on 10/15 and part 1 will be repeated on 10/27.

Israel Refutes Al Dura

But the damage has been done and cannot be completely undone.  From Honest Reporting:

Exactly seven years after the iconic images of Muhammad al-Dura's alleged death in Gaza inflamed Palestinian sentiment and provoked terrible bloodshed, Israel has finally officially denied responsibility:

"The creation of the myth of Muhammad al-Dura has caused great damage to the State of Israel. This is an explicit blood libel against the state. And just as blood libels in the old days have led to pogroms, this one has also caused damage and dozens of dead," said Government Press Office director Daniel Seaman.

Addressing France 2's original report, of which only 59 seconds out of some 27 minutes of raw footage were aired, Seaman stated: "It turns out that the events could not have occurred as they were described by the network's reporter Charles Enderlin, since they contradict the laws of physics… Furthermore, it was not even possible to hit them (the boy and his father) in the place they were hiding according to the report."

Shurat HaDin, the Israel Law Center intends to take legal action, demanding that the Israeli press credentials of France 2 TV reporter Charles Enderlin and Gaza-based cameraman Talal Abu-Rahma be revoked.

...Natan Sharansky writes in the Jerusalem Post:

The al-Dura incident wasn't the only media report to inflame passions against Israel in recent years, but it was the one with the highest profile. Moreover, if, as Karsenty and others have claimed persuasively, the al-Dura incident is part of the insidious trend in which Western media outlets allow themselves to be manipulated by dishonest and politically motivated sources (recall the Jenin "massacre" that never was, or the doctored Reuters photos from Israel's war against Hizbullah in 2006), then France 2 must be held accountable...

Tragically, there is no way to repair the damage inflicted on Israel's international image by the France 2 report, much less restore the Israeli and Jewish victims whose lives were exacted as vengeance. It is possible, however, to deter slanderous news reporting - and the violence that often accompanies it - by setting a precedent for media accountability via the handover of Abu Rahmeh's full 27 minutes of raw footage. Encouragingly, the judge presiding over Karsenty's appeal has now requested the tapes. France 2 must make a full public disclosure. If there is nothing to hide, why should it refuse?

CNN's "God's Jewish Warriors"

Very short of time, but I wanted to make sure to mention CNN's latest "documentary" being hosted by Christiane Amanpour.  I'd seen a bit of it a couple of nights ago and couldn't watch more than a few minutes - it was much too disturbing to hear Amanpour oh so casually disseminate arguments against Israel which were so off-base. Some details from CAMERA:

CNN's "God's Warriors," hosted by Christiane Amanpour, is a three-part series intended to examine the growing role of religious fundamentalism in today's world. Unfortunately, the first program in the series, "God's Jewish Warriors," is one of the most grossly distorted programs to appear on mainstream American television in many years. It is false in its basic premise, established in the opening scene in which  Jewish (and Christian) religious fervency is equated with that of Muslims heard endorsing "martyrdom," or suicide-killing. There is, of course, no counterpart among Jews and Christians to the violent jihadist Muslim campaigns underway across the globe, either in numbers of perpetrators engaged or in the magnitude of death and destruction wrought.

While in reality Jewish "terrorism" is virtually non-existent, the program magnifies at length the few instances of violence or attempted violence by religiously-motivated Jewish individuals - including having to go all the way back to 1980, for example, to explore a bombing campaign by a small group of Israeli Jews on West Bank Arab mayors. By dredging up such an old incident Amanpour unintentionally undermines her own thesis.

Settlements are likewise a key focus of the program, their residents and adherents being deemed "God's warriors" – along with those Americans, Jewish and Christian alike, who support them. American presidents and Members of Congress are said to be held hostage to the so-called "Israel Lobby," ostensibly dark forces consisting of AIPAC and other pro-Israel groups who supposedly enable the nefarious expansion of West Bank communities.

Disproportionate reliance on partisan voices, some extreme figures, skews the message dramatically. Jimmy Carter and John Mearsheimer, chief proponents of the discredited canards about Jews subverting American national interests to those of Israel, are repeatedly and respectfully interviewed. Carter, for example, claims that no American politician could survive politically while calling for settlement-related aid cuts to Israel: "There's no way that a member of Congress would ever vote for that and hope to be re-elected."

That would be news to politicians like Senate Majority Leader Robert Byrd, who has long been a critic of aid to Israel and opposed loan guarantees to Israel in 1992. As well, contrary to Amanpour and Carter, Representatives James Trafficante, Dana Rohrabacher, Nick Smith, Fortney Pete Stark, Neil Abercrombie, David E. Bonior, John Conyers Jr, John D. Dingell, Earl F. Hilliard, Jesse L. Jackson Jr.,  Barbara Lee, Jim McDermott, George Miller, Jim Moran, David R. Obey, Ron Paul and  Nick J. Rahall II, have voted against aid to Israel and/or opposed other resolutions favoring Israel.

Amanpour ignores all this, and turns instead to former Senator Charles Percy, who joins in denouncing Jewish political influence. Only Morris Amitay is presented as balance on this critical issue.

Whether wittingly or not, Amanpour's program, with its reliance on pejorative labeling, generalities, testimonials, and a stacked lineup of guests, is a perfect illustration of classical propaganda techniques. Unfortunately propaganda is the opposite of journalism, the profession Amanpour is supposed to practice.

The program was misleading and inaccurate in many other ways as well:

Land

Amanpour says: "But it is also Palestinian land. The West Bank - it's west of the Jordan River - was designated by the United Nations to be the largest part of an Arab state." 

This is highly deceptive. The United Nations 1947 Partition Plan proposed dividing all the land west of the Jordan into a Jewish and an Arab state; the Arabs rejected the plan, choosing instead to launch a war to eliminate Israel. The land did not become "Palestinian land" via this UN Plan. Likewise, UN Security Council Resolution 242, passed after the Six Day War, underscored that territorial adjustments related to the West Bank were to be expected.

Settlements

• Amanpour suggests settlements are the cause of Arab anger: "the Jewish settlements have inflamed much of the Arab world," yet the Arab world was just as anti-Israel (actually more so) before the settlements were built.

• She presents at length the views of Theodor Meron asserting the illegality of settlements as the definitive word, but makes no mention of more senior Israeli experts such as former Supreme Court Chief Meir Shamgar, who disagreed with Meron. Nor does Amanpour mention such foreign experts such as Professors Julius Stone and Eugene Rostow who also argued for the legality of settlements. (See for example CAMERA BACKGROUNDER: The Debate About Settlements and  From "Occupied Territories" to "Disputed Territories" by Dore Gold.)

• She grossly misleads about America's position on settlements in the following sequence:

WILLIAM SCRANTON, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO U.N. UNDER JIMMY CARTER: My government believes that international law sets the appropriate standards.

AMANPOUR: From the earliest days of the settler movement, even the United States, Israel's closest ally, blasted Israel's settlement policy.

SCRANTON: Substantial resettlement of the Israeli civilian population in occupied territories, including East Jerusalem, is illegal.

AMANPOUR: Ever since American presidents both Democrat and Republican have spoken from virtually the same script. They consistently oppose settlement growth.

RONALD REAGAN, FORMER PRESIDENT: The United States will not support the use of any additional land for the purpose of settlements.

In fact, while the Carter administration did deem settlements illegal, President Reagan very much did not speak from the "same script." He explained: "As to the West Bank, I believe the settlements there — I disagreed when the previous Administration referred to them as illegal, they're not illegal" (NYTimes, Feb. 3, 1981). Other presidents, including Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, also did not term settlements "illegal."

Read the whole thing. 

My Town's Local Rag

Today's Washington Post deserves to line every bird cage and and cat litter box in the US.  The fact that they are blaming President Bush for the chaos in Gaza is no surprise does not make it any less annoying.  Why am I annoyed?  Because the Post has so blatantly been after Bush from the moment the soles of his shoes hit the rug in the Oval Office. I am so tired of them looking for any and every excuse to criticize him - always from that annoying liberal holier-than-thou, wearing-full-blinders-with-regard-to-the-rest-of-the-world anti-American perspective. Secondly and even more annoyingly, because they refuse to hold accountable the people who really deserve the blame for Gaza - the Palestinians themselves who voted for the thugs and gangsters who rule in the vacuum where law and order should be.

The only good thing about the WaPo is Charles Krauthammer and the movie listings.

Media Farce

Palestinian Rockets Ignored Abroad - Yitzhak Benhorin (Ynet News)
    Palestinian rocket attacks on Sderot have received very little coverage in world media, despite the heavy barrages that have been going on for the past three days.
    Only when Israel began to respond to the attacks by aerial bombings, cannons and tanks did this part of the world receive attention from the American media.
    An American television producer explained that, as sad as it may sound, Sderot is a story that has been going on for years, and is no longer news.
    The producer added that there are very few injuries in Sderot, and images of shock victims do not sell.
    The moment that the IDF began to retaliate, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict went back to making headlines.

NYTimes Media Bias: Must Read

SoccerDad has a long post up excoriating the NYTimes for its repeated misreadings and faulty analyses which perpetuate bias against Israel:

...the lesson is that if left unchecked Israel's enemies will grow, threaten and, when ready, attack. Israel has taken risks (withdrawing from Lebanon and Gaza) and seen no tangible benefits for those risks. For the NYT, for Israel to "steer ... wisely" means absorbing terror without retaliating and then submitting to international supervision that allows its enemies a free hand but constrains Israel. Sorry, the editors of the NYT exist in a different reality from the rest of us. They live in a reality where the UN is honest and effective. Where the Arab world accepts Israel's right to exist. And where terrorists observe the terms of the agreements they make.

Read the whole thing.

"Ceasefire?"

I have not remarked upon it, but it is an extremely rare day that passes that I don't see a report of kassam rockets attacks on Israel in the news.  The news is only being reported by Israeli sources, so relatively few know about the attacks.  Honest Reporting has an excellent round up of information and an explanation of exactly how it translates into a biased view of Israel from abroad:

Over the past few years the media has consistently downplayed or ignored Palestinian violence, while apportioning blame on Israeli retaliatory or preventative actions as the cause of "escalating violence" or "breaking of ceasefires". It appears, yet again, necessary to protest this inaccurate and misleading representation of the conflict. 

Unless you read the Israeli press on a daily basis, it is almost impossible to get a full and accurate picture of events in Israel and the Palestinian territories from the international media. One could get a false impression of relative quiet in the absence of media reports of mass casualty events.

A 22 April Associated Press report says that: "Hamas militants called Sunday for a fresh wave of attacks against Israel after troops killed nine Palestinians in weekend fighting, straining a five-month-old cease-fire."

Thus, Israel is blamed for "straining a ceasefire".  According to the AP: "The Gaza truce has largely held, though militants have frequently fired rockets into Israel and have attacked Israeli patrols along the border fence." How serious must Palestinian actions be in the eyes of  the AP before a "ceasefire" is broken? Why are Israeli counter-measures designed to protect this truce regarded as violations while constant Palestinian terror is not?

Recent Israeli operations against targets in Gaza are a direct response to the latest Qassam missile attacks. Yet, the AP saves this for the third paragraph of its report: "The fighting also included a Palestinian rocket attack on the southern Israeli town of Sderot that damaged a home."

The Elder of Ziyon blog has been keeping a calendar of Qassam attacks and Israeli responses, demonstrating that while Israel has exercised an enormous amount of restraint over the past months, the Palestinians have not actually enforced the Gaza "ceasefire" that they claim to be adhering to.

There's a lot more.

The Biased Broadcasting Comany

Via The Corner, a video describing the BBC as a trojan horse of anti-American, anti-Israel and anti-Capitalist values: 

The Media War

Andy has linked to a blog post by Michael Yon, a reporter/blogger in Iraq.  It's long, detailed, rough, graphic (pictures of dead people) and it meanders all over, frankly, but it also bravely puts the unvarnished things that Yon has witnessed out there for all to evaluate.  No filter.  No slant.  Just the facts. Yon went to Iraq out of a feeling of duty; he is not there to pander to anyone, and he faces great danger for the sole reason of providing the public with a description of what he sees. 

Andy writes:

We lost the victory in Vietnam. We are in danger of losing the victory in Iraq. We lost the victory in Somalia. Osama and Al Qaida have forecast that we have a history of running away from victory.

We need to know what is happening. The truth, not the spin. We need to see it from the views that our troops see it. This is a real war. The consequences of losing are great. The consequences of losing at the point of victory will cause problems for our grandchildren.

I agree with him 100%.  We simply must make the right decisions now.  We hold the future in our hands.  Either we fix the Middle East, or it will haunt our children and their children and their children's children, and they will look back at us and wonder why we squandered the opportunity to make it right.

The foremost points that emerge from Yon's writing - to me, at least - are that the military desperately needs our support, that our fighting forces are lean and mean and well-trained, and that we are not getting the true picture of Iraq from the MSM. Yon writes:

Since the start of this war, there’s been a lot of killing going on: killing of our soldiers and allies; killing of Iraqi civilians, soldiers and police; but, especially, a lot more killing of bad guys. The particulars of the killings are seldom publicized, but killing the enemy is in fact one of the primary purposes we have soldiers in Iraq.

That is war.  That's what it is all about.  Kill enough of them, and they eventually give up and we win and we get to have things done our way. Lose, and we are humiliated, the Great United States of America will no longer be effective as the umbrella under which the free world can find shelter, and the enemies of freedom and the West become even stronger.  Next time, 9/11 might look like child's play.

The thing is, we are winning.  But ask yourself:  Is this country feeling/acting like it is winning?

The Slanted Economist

Well those AIPAC Jews are certainly getting too big for their britches, aren't they?  If you didn't think that before, you certainly would after reading the Economist's report on AIPAC's recent conference in Washington DC.  As soon as I saw the picture illustrating the article, I knew what I had in store - the great pleasure of witnessing once again, the accusation that Jews were running...and of course ruining the world.  Many points scored for the trick of using pretty colors for the giant sea monster.  Hey look kids! It's Puff the Magic Joo Dragon.  He sure is pretty, but don't be fooled -  keep your kids far away from the matzo factory:

How will the poor people in those teensy tiny boats ever contain him?  That guy on the lower right is shouting, "Get out the harpoons! He's about to capsize world peace and brotherhood and everything good in the world!"

You know that as soon as the big Jewish monster is contained, the sunshine and rainbows will be out, don't you? Giant lollipops for everyone!

So, what did the article have to say?

THIS week saw yet another reminder of the awesome power of “the lobby”. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) brought more than 6,000 activists to Washington for its annual policy conference. And they proceeded to live up to their critics' darkest fears.

[Dun, dun, dun...<----cue up the portentious music] 

Whoa, Nelly.  The darkest fears of Joo critics? Human blood in matzo? Protocols of the Elders of Zion?  Palestinian genocide?  Jews running Hollywood and the banks?  You mean those fears?  YIKES!

They heard from the four most powerful people on Capitol Hill—Nancy Pelosi and John Boehner from the House, Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell from the Senate—as well as the vice-president (who called his talk “The United States and Israel: United We Stand”) and sundry other power-brokers. Several first-division presidential candidates held receptions.

You heard it.  Power brokers.  First division candidates. People in the upper echelons. The hoi-polloi.  All at the beck and call of the {{{{shudder}}}} GREAT JEWISH LOBBY.

Hey, I'm a Jew and even I'm scared!  What the hell are those yarmulke-wearing folks up to?

The display of muscle was almost equalled by the display of unnerving efficiency.

"Unnerving efficency?"  You mean like when the nazis created their killing camps and found methods to murder as many Jews as quickly as they could?  That kind of "unnerving efficiency?" 

There were booths for “congressional check-in”, booths for “delegate banquet troubleshooting”, and booths full of helpful young people.

Ah yessss, Puff the Magic Joo Dragon makes it all look pretty, don't he?

The only discordant note was sounded by a group of a dozen protesters—Orthodox Jews in beards, side-curls and heavy black coats—holding up signs saying “Stop AIPAC”, “Torah forbids Jews dictating foreign policy”, and “Judaism rejects the state of Israel”.

Oh, if it isn't the good Jews!  The sane ones! The ones who like to kiss and hug cuddly old Ahmadinejad. 

Yet [AIPAC has] reason to feel a bit nervous, too. The Iraq debacle has produced a fierce backlash against pro-war hawks, of which AIPAC was certainly one. It has also encouraged serious people to ask awkward questions about America's alliance with Israel.

And a growing number of people want to push against AIPAC. One pressure group, the Council for the National Interest—run by two retired congressmen, Paul Findley, a Republican, and James Abourezk, a Democrat—even bills itself as the anti-AIPAC. The Leviathan may be mightier than ever, but there are more and more Captain Ahabs trying to get their harpoons in.

Serious people asking awkward questions about America's allaince with Israel?  More likely awkward people making serious accusations.  And they speak of pro-war hawks, eh?  At least they didn't mention the dreaded neo-cons! And see, I told you they wanted to stick harpoons into poor Puff.

An even bigger threat to AIPAC comes from the general climate of opinion. It is suddenly becoming possible for serious people—politicians and policymakers as well as academics—to ask hard questions about America's relationship with Israel.

Suddenly possible?  Like people haven't been making these accusations all along?  Like the Economist has suddenly given permission for it to be ok to accuse the Jews of having too much power and being a negative influence on American foreign policy?  It's ok, now, is it? It's become a "serious issue" being considered by "serious people?"

Well, the Economist, a British publication, did get one thing right.  The climate IS changing - in Europe.  Anti-semitism is on the rise.  It IS ok to ask these sorts of "serious and awkward questions" (aka allegations and accusations) in Europe.

The Economist, a major British magazine, obviously has no intention of protecting British Jews or any other Jews for that matter, from any of the attacks - from the destruction of synagogues, to the beating and murdering of innocents, to the burning of a Jewish kindergarden in Germany, to the fear of wearing Jewish symbols out in public in both Germany and France, to the defacing of Jewish cemetaries - which have been occurring with greater and greater frequency. With complete disregard, they write a distorted article that only adds fuel to the fire.

Europe has learned no lesson from WW2.  Their essential selfish and ugly character remains exactly the same as it was in 1938, '39, '40, '41, '42, '43, '44, and '45. Expecting them to put themselves out, to stand up for anyone or any thought or value other than that which benefits they themselves is like expecting unicorns to fly us all to the clouds.

Oh, not true, you say?  They have changed?  Then I anticipate many articles coming out in opposition to this one.  People decrying the obvious bias and distortion of making Jews look bad to promote the Economist's/Europe's own personal agenda of cowardice and appeasement.

Yeahrightsure.

**************************

Welcome Discarded Lies readers.  Thanks to Joem for linking.   

More on Israel's Media War

The Price of a Free Press - Anshel Pfeffer (Jerusalem Post)

• "The Israeli-Hizbullah War of 2006: The Media as a Weapon in Asymmetrical Conflict" by veteran reporter, author and broadcaster Marvin Kalb is a must-read for journalists, the military, politicians, spokesmen and news consumers.
• Kalb writes that democratic societies living by the ideals of a free and unfettered press will always be at a disadvantage to dictatorships and oppressive ideologies, adept at manipulating the media. "A closed society conveys the impression of order and discipline; an open society, buffeted by the crosswinds of reality and rumor, criticism and revelation, conveys the impression of disorder, chaos and uncertainty."
• Israel's campaign was remarkably transparent. Even openly hostile Arab TV networks, such as Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya, were allowed to operate in almost total freedom and film IDF units preparing for battle. Every failure and mishap on the battlefield - and relative chaos on the home front - was highlighted.
• On the other side, Hizbullah controlled the journalists covering Lebanon with an iron fist. Media tours of Hizbullah-controlled areas were tightly managed, with foreign reporters sternly warned against wandering off and talking to local residents unsupervised.
• Hizbullah also forbade any photographs of its fighters. Cameramen were warned never to show men with guns or ammunition. The only armed personnel seen during this war were IDF soldiers; Hizbullah remained throughout a phantom army.
• Another scene almost never shown was the hundreds of Hizbullah firing positions and missile launch sites within residential areas and private homes, the cause of many civilian deaths and a violation of international law.
• Footage coming out of Lebanon dealt almost exclusively with the results of the IDF bombing. Few news organizations made an effort to balance these pictures with those of the damage from Hizbullah's indiscriminate bombing of Israeli civilians.

Ted Koppel on the War

Maybe now that he's retired from Nightline, he feels freer to give his real opinion? Or maybe he was giving it all along and no one noticed? 

Noel Sheppard of Newsbusters.org writes about Koppel's appearance on Sunday's Meet the Press:

Former “Nightline” anchor Ted Koppel was one of Tim Russert’s guests on Sunday’s “Meet the Press.” As amazing as it might seem, he made some truly shocking and compelling statements about the Iraq war and the war on terror that virtually no Democrat or media member is willing to accept or report:

• First, Koppel made it clear that America’s premature departure from Iraq would turn the entire Persian Gulf region into a battlefield between Sunnis and Shia, “something the United States cannot allow to happen”
• Second, he said the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are part of the war on terror that “has been going on for the past 24 years” starting when “the precursors of Hezbollah blew up the U.S. marine barracks in Beirut, Lebanon” in 1983 
• Finally, he stated that America’s departure from Iraq and Afghanistan, regardless of when it occurs, will not represent the end of this battle, but, instead, that it is just “going to be a different war” after that point. 

...a little later on in the discussion, Russert asked Koppel a very telling question:

Ted Koppel, you are tonight airing on the Discovery Channel a special called “Our Children’s Children’s War,” the “long war” as you call it repeatedly, that this war on terror is much more than just Iraq, and it’s going to go on for a long time.

Amazing. Did Tim Russert just accidentally admit that the war in Iraq is indeed a part of the war on terror? Shocking. Yet, not close to as shocking as Koppel’s answer...

Read the whole thing and watch the video. 

A Necessary Conversation

About the German media's anti-American neurosis.

Another "Protocols-style" Slander

Joining the spurious bombardment of antisemitic slime against Israel in the media, a false letter which was claimed to have been written by Nelson Mandela:

IS ISRAEL an apartheid state? Apparently Nelson Mandela thinks so. In a recent letter to New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, Mandela lays out the case against Israel with unusual candour. Mandela’s words are now being quoted all over the world. Last month, former US president Jimmy Carter cited the letter in a speech at Brandeis University. And who’s going to argue with Madiba? Unfortunately for Israel’s critics, the letter is a hoax. It is the creation of a man named Arjan El Fassed, who runs an anti-Israel website called The Electronic Intifada. El-Fassad has admitted that he made the whole thing up, but the Mandela letter has now entered the anti-Israel canon alongside countless other fictions. Yet, much like the Israel-apartheid comparison itself, it is completely spurious.

Link

Middle East Punditry

It was six men of Indostan,
To learning much inclined,
Who went to see the Elephant
(Though all of them were blind),
That each by observation
Might satisfy his mind.

The First approach'd the Elephant,
And happening to fall
Against his broad and sturdy side,
At once began to bawl:
"God bless me! but the Elephant
Is very like a wall!"

The Second, feeling of the tusk,
Cried, -"Ho! what have we here
So very round and smooth and sharp?
To me 'tis mighty clear,
This wonder of an Elephant
Is very like a spear!"

The Third approach'd the animal,
And happening to take
The squirming trunk within his hands,
Thus boldly up and spake:
"I see," -quoth he- "the Elephant
Is very like a snake!"

The Fourth reached out an eager hand,
And felt about the knee:
"What most this wondrous beast is like
Is mighty plain," -quoth he,-
"'Tis clear enough the Elephant
Is very like a tree!"

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,
Said- "E'en the blindest man
Can tell what this resembles most;
Deny the fact who can,
This marvel of an Elephant
Is very like a fan!"

The Sixth no sooner had begun
About the beast to grope,
Then, seizing on the swinging tail
That fell within his scope,
"I see," -quoth he,- "the Elephant
Is very like a rope!"

And so these men of Indostan
Disputed loud and long,
Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right,
And all were in the wrong!

MORAL,

So, oft in theologic wars
The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean;
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen!

-John Godfrey Saxe

Snatching Defeat From the Jaws of Victory

It's damned near impossible to tell what really is going on inside of Iraq.  I have absolutely zero trust in the MSM to get the story right.  Amir Taheri explains how the MSM obscures the truth - through incompetence, naivete and blame-America-first mentality.  And this same media bias and incompetence has a negative effect on the Iraqis too:

[A] problem is that Iraq has become the focus of anti-American passions. Millions want Iraq to fail so that the United States will be humiliated. And Iraqis watch satellite TV - including channels from Iran, Egypt and Qatar that make a point of presenting post-liberation Iraq as a tragic quagmire. When CNN and the BBC send a similar message, Iraqis can be persuaded that their country is lost.

Imagine a resident of, say, Mandali or Nasseriah, who is told day and night that Iraq is sinking in a sea of fire and blood. He looks around and sees no evidence of that - but one can't blame him if he thinks that what the media say must be true in other parts of Iraq.

The fact that more than 90 percent of the violence that dominates reporting from Iraq takes place in five neighborhoods in Baghdad, plus one of the 18 Iraqi provinces, is neither here nor there. The perception is that all of Iraq is lost.

The old rule in the news business still holds: "If it bleeds, it leads." Stories about suicide attacks and carnage are more attractive than boring stuff about the emergence of a pluralist political consciousness and the mushrooming of thousands of small businesses.

Even the violence can't be properly covered. Reporters have no access to those who cause it and can only guess at their motives.

For a Western journalist who speaks no Arabic and has no contacts in the country, there are two options: embed with a U.S. or British military unit, or rely on Iraqi aides. Being embedded means seeing things through a narrow, and necessarily biased, angle. Relying on hired Iraqis means becoming a secondhand dealer in information that one cannot verify.

*

Last month, Iraq received the U.N.'s special environmental prize for reviving parts of the marshes drained by Saddam, thus saving one of the world's most precious ecological treasures. Almost no one in the media noticed.

Also last month, the Iraqi soccer squad reached the finals of the Asian Games - beating out Japan, China, South Korea and Iran. Again, few in the West noticed.

In 2006, almost 200 major reconstruction projects were officially completed and 4,000 new private companies registered in Iraq. But few seem interested in the return of private capitalism after nearly 50 years of Soviet-style control.

Iraq's new political life is either ignored or dismissed as irrelevant. The creation of political parties (some emerging from decades of clandestine life), the work of Iraq's parliament, the fact that it is almost the only Arab country where people are free to discuss politics to their hearts' content - these are of no interest to those determined to see Iraq as a disaster, as proof that toppling Saddam was a modern version of the original sin.

Iraq may still become any of those things - but right now it is none of them. When the real history of the Iraq war is written, posterity might marvel at the way modern media were used to manufacture that original sin.

Read the whole thing

And so what we have is a snowball effect, from the left-leaning media that wants nothing more than to see failure, to the US that is trying to fight the good fight, to the rest of the world that watches and criticizes, to the Iraqis themselves.

It is frustrating beyond belief to see the potential for victory, a free Iraq, and peace in the Middle East being ruined in this way. It is there, right in front of us all, ready to reach out and grab it - - but the naysayers and negativity junkies keep aiding those who fight us to move the goal further out of our reach.

And maybe the most egregious sin of all - - those who fight for freedom deserve better. 

And Here We Go

It didn't take long:

Arab Media Suggests "Zionists" Executed Saddam

In the days following the hanging of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, columnists and cartoonists in the Arab and Muslim press have promulgated conspiracy theories suggesting that "Zionists" played a behind-the-scenes role in meting out his death sentence and participated in the actual execution.

Editorial columns and political cartoons appearing in mainstream newspapers in various Arab countries, including Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan, Algeria and elsewhere, suggested that "Zionists" aided in Saddam's demise in an effort to promote what several described as Israel's "colonial aspirations."

Criticizing Israel's treatment of the Palestinians and its so-called "colonial" character, various columnists asserted that Saddam's execution would give Israel an opening to push further East in its "conquest of the Middle East."

The language and imagery in the Arab and Muslim press frequently portrayed the execution as a cooperative effort between the United States and Israel -- drawing upon common anti-Semitic notions of a Jewish conspiracy in Washington.

Media in the Arab and Muslim world also praised the former dictator's legacy, noting his "achievements" of shelling Tel Aviv during the first Gulf War and pursuing pan-Arabism and a strengthened Arab world.

The Kurds and Iran were thrown together with the U.S. and Israel as either explicitly benefiting from Saddam's death or taking part in the execution itself. Iran was often paired with Israel as a "colonial state" with an interest in expanding its sphere of influence in the region.

Link.

Via Yid With Lid

Arafat: Murderer of Americans

Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Yasser Arafat was a master of the big lie. Since he invented global terrorism with the founding of the Fatah terror organization in 1959, Arafat successfully portrayed himself as a freedom fighter while introducing the world to passenger jet hijackings, schoolhouse massacres and embassy takeovers.

To cultivate the myth of his innocence Arafat ordered his Fatah terror cells to operate under pseudonyms. In the early 1970's he renamed several Fatah murder squads the Black September Organization while publicly claiming that they were "breakaway" units completely unrelated to Fatah or to himself.

In 2000, as he launched the current Palestinian jihad, he repeated the process by renaming Fatah terror cells the Aksa Martyr Brigades and then claiming that they were completely unrelated to Fatah or to himself. This fiction too, has been successful in spite of the fact that all Aksa Martyr Brigades terrorists are members of Fatah and most are members of Palestinian Authority official militias who receive their salaries, guns and marching orders from Fatah.

Last week, with the quiet release of a 33-year-old US State Department cable, a good chunk of the edifice of his great lie was destroyed.

ON MARCH 1, 1973, eight Fatah terrorists, operating under the Black September banner stormed the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Khartoum, Sudan during a farewell party for the US Embassy's Charges d'Affaires George Curtis Moore. The terrorists took Moore, US ambassador Cleo Noel, Belgian Charges d'Affairs Guy Eid and two Arab diplomats hostage. They demanded that the US, Israel, Jordan and Germany release PLO and Baader-Meinhof Gang terrorists, including Robert F. Kennedy's Palestinian assassin Sirhan Sirhan and Black September commander Muhammed Awadh (Abu Daud), from prison in exchange for the hostages' release.

The next evening, the Palestinians brutally murdered Noel, Moore, and Eid. They released their other hostages on March 4.

Arafat denied any involvement in the attack. The US officially accepted his denial. Yet, as he later publicly revealed, James Welsh, who served at the time of the attack as an analyst at the National Security Agency, intercepted a communication from Arafat, then headquartered in Beirut to his terror agents in Khartoum ordering the attack.

In 1986, as evidence of Arafat's involvement in the operation became more widely known, more and more voices began calling for Arafat to be investigated for murder. As the New York Sun's online blog recalled last week, during that period, Britain's Sunday Times reported that 44 US senators sent a letter to then US attorney-general Edwin Meese, "urging the American government to charge the PLO chief with plotting the murders of two American diplomats in 1973."

...In a November 14, 2006 interview on Palestinian television, Ahmed Hales Abu Maher who serves as Secretary of Fatah in Gaza, bragged of Fatah's role in the development of international terrorism. In his words, reported by Palestinian Media Watch, "Oh warrior brothers, this is a nation that will never be broken, it is a revolution that will never be defeated. This is a nation that gives an example every day that is imitated across the world. We gave the world the children of the RPG [Rocket Propelled Grenades], we gave the world the children stone [-throwers], and we gave the world the male and female Martyrdom-Seekers [suicide bombers]."

Imagine what the world would have looked like if, rather than clinging to Arafat's big lie that he and his Fatah terror organization were central components of Middle East peace, the US had captured and tried Arafat for murdering its diplomats and worked steadily to destroy Fatah.

Imagine how our future would look if rather than stealthily admitting the truth, while trusting the media not to take notice, the US government were to base its current policies on the truth, and the media were to reveal this truth to the world.

At this point, it is sadly beyond imagination to picture a world devoid of bias against Israel and seeing Palestinian leaders for what they really are. 

Read the whole thing.

Regarding Ex-President Carter's New Book

It is distorted (euphemism for "dishonest") and Alan Dershowitz explains how, with references and supporting evidence.  Dershowitz writes:

Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid is so biased that it inevitably raises the question of what would motivate Jimmy Carter to write such an indecent book.

...Palestinian-Arab terrorism is virtually missing from Mr. Carter's entire historical account, which blames nearly everything on Israel and almost nothing on the Palestinians. Incredibly, he asserts that the initial violence in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict occurred when "Jewish militants" attacked Arabs in 1939. The long history of Palestinian terrorism against Jews -- which began in 1929, when the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem ordered the slaughter of more than 100 rabbis, students, and non-Zionist Sephardim whose families had lived in Hebron and other ancient Jewish cities for millennia -- was motivated by religious bigotry. The Jews responded to this racist violence by establishing a defense force. There is no mention of the long history of Palestinian terrorism before the occupation, or of the Munich massacre and others inspired by Yasser Arafat. There is not even a reference to the Karine A, the boatful of terrorist weapons ordered by Arafat in January 2002.

Mr. Carter's book is so filled with simple mistakes of fact and deliberate omissions that were it a brief filed in a court of law, it would be struck and its author sanctioned for misleading the court. Mr. Carter too is guilty of misleading the court of public opinion. A mere listing of all of Mr. Carter's mistakes and omissions would fill a volume the size of his book.

Read the whole thing.

Israel/Iraq/Media Bias/Wimping Out Update

News I've been meaning to post about:

Gaza on the Brink of Civil War - Shlomo Brom
Following the failure of efforts to reach agreement between Hamas and Fatah on the formation of a government of national unity, there are growing fears among Palestinians that the two movements are now on the brink of an all-out civil war. The prevailing opinion in Israel is that the failure stems from the refusal of the Damascus-based political leadership of Hamas to accept the Quartet's demands: recognition of Israel, endorsement of previous agreements between Israel and the Palestinians, and non-violence. This explanation may be a handy excuse for the two parties, but their inability to agree also stems in large measure from the internal fragmentation and power plays in both camps.
    Both sides are now preparing for a decisive showdown. Accelerated arms smuggling through the tunnels along the border with Egypt is not just part of preparations for a confrontation with Israel; it also reflects the determination of the various militias to be better prepared for the expected internal clash. (Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies)
    See also Is a Violent Fatah-Hamas Confrontation Inevitable - Pinchas Inbari
Senior sources in Fatah say a confrontation with Hamas is inevitable. Fatah feels it must make a move to bring a change or it will lose power to Hamas. In Gaza, Hamas is able to recruit from inside the PA security forces since Hamas can pay salaries, unlike the PA. In addition, Palestinians are becoming more religious and more affiliated ideologically with Hamas. Fatah sources envision a bloody and intense all-out confrontation which will last a few days and that will help break the existing deadlock. Yet in Israel, Fatah's threats are taken with a grain of salt and are seen as aimed at pressuring Hamas to reach an agreement. (JCPA-Hebrew)

In the meantime, rockets continue to rain down upon Israeli civilian targets:

Rockets in Sderot - Noam Bedein
I'm sitting in the back of a synagogue in Sderot on Friday night when I hear the siren go off. We have about 15 seconds to seek shelter. The congregants carry on praying and pay little attention to the siren. After 27 seconds, the synagogue shook with a loud thud. Everyone jumped out of their seats. The rocket came down close - real close. It fell 100 meters from the synagogue, in the backyard of a family home. Nearby car and home windows were shattered. A young boy on the sidewalk was wounded by shrapnel. Residents of Sderot and the region's 45 communities have been living with this horrifying reality for more than five years.
    Sderot's chief security officer showed me a map covered with dots indicating the places were the rockets have hit. He stopped putting dots on the map two years ago, because it was completely full. Would any other Western democratic nation put up with this? (Jerusalem Post)

Of course they wouldn't.  More:

Dodging Death in a Sderot Playground - Josh Brannon
The Kassam rocket just cleared the apartment block before slamming into the Sderot playground, less than 15 meters from the jungle gym. A child was wounded and another four individuals were treated for shock in Tuesday afternoon's rocket attack. "You see how we live? I don't need an alarm clock, because almost every day the Red Dawn (warning system) wakes me up," said Ura Meshayilov, 22. "No one should have to live like this." Robert Pessako, also 22, said, "We are playing by two separate rules. They launch rockets indiscriminately into our neighborhoods, and then we put our own soldiers at risk, sending them in there and telling them not to shoot if they think they may hit a civilian, while the terrorists shoot from behind them." (Jerusalem Post)

Funny, all the MSM can seem to do is tell the story from the Palestinian point of view.  If THEY had rockets raining down on THEIR heads, would they tell it the same way?

Israel kills 4 Palestinians in Gaza Reuters - 1 hour ago By Nidal al-Mughrabi. BEIT HANOUN, Gaza (Reuters) - Israeli troops killed four Palestinians including two civilians and trapped scores ... Israeli Incursion into Gaza Causes Carnage Zaman Online, Turkey - 2 hours ago The second day of the Israeli “Autumn Clouds” operation in Beit Hanoun, a northern Gaza town, has brought the death toll to 12, while leaving 80 wounded. ... Israel Tightens Grip on Gaza Town; Wall Street Journal (subscription), NY - 3 hours ago AP. GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- Israeli helicopter gunships, tanks and ground troops tightened their grip Thursday on a northern Gaza ... Four Palestinians killed in Gaza as Israeli offensive grinds on Monsters and Critics.com, UK - 4 hours ago Gaza/Tel Aviv - Israeli soldiers killed four Palestinians Thursday morning, Palestinians said, as the 'Autumn Clouds' offensive in the northern Gaza Strip ... Israeli forces kill 4 Palestinians in Gaza: medics Reuters - 4 hours ago By Nidal al-Mughrabi. GAZA (Reuters) - Israeli forces backed by tanks killed four Palestinians in northern Gaza on Thursday, two ... Press despair over Gaza raid BBC News, UK - 4 hours ago Israel's latest raid into the Gaza Strip in which at least 10 Palestinians and an Israeli soldier have died has hit a raw nerve in the region's press. ... Palestinians die in raid Chicago Tribune, United States - 5 hours ago By Richard Boudreaux. TEL AVIV -- Israeli troops backed by tanks and helicopter gunships killed eight Palestinians on Wednesday after ... Palestinian Deaths in Gaza Raid Rises Washington Post, United States - 5 hours ago By IBRAHIM BARZAK. AP. GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- Israeli helicopter gunships, tanks and ground troops tightened their grip Thursday ... Israelis mount offensive in Gaza Strip Detroit Free Press, United States - 5 hours ago Israeli troops seized a town in the northern Gaza Strip in an air and ground attack Wednesday, part of an operation the army said is intended to stop rocket ... dead, dozens wounded after Israeli attack in Gaza San Jose Mercury News,  USA - 5 hours ago By Scott Wilson. GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Israeli special forces backed by tanks and drone aircraft pushed into the northern Gaza ... Three die in northern Gaza raid BBC News, UK - 6 hours ago Three Palestinians have been killed in Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza on the second day of a major Israeli operation, hospital officials say. ...

Looking at those headlines makes one just want to join in and say, "Damn those nasty Israelis."

You may have heard about this - JWR sent out a special Sunday edition just to report on Cal Thomas's interview with Condoleezza Rice.  From Thomas's post-interview write up:

Views of a Palestinian State - Cal Thomas
During a recent interview, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and I disagreed on the issue of a Palestinian state. I think the Palestinians want the state to obliterate Israel, the proof being the five wars fought by Arab states, terrorism, and the continuing anti-Israel rhetoric from mosques and media throughout the region. According to Rice, "The great majority of the [Palestinian] people just want a better life. I just don't believe mothers want their children to grow up to be suicide bombers." Then she added: "If human beings don't want a better future, don't want their children to grow up in peace and have opportunities, then none of this is going to work anyway."
    Exactly right. We cannot impose our morality on those who don't share it. And the propaganda, religious teachings, and historical revisionism coming from every pore of the Palestinian structure convinces me they mean it and regard the State Department view over several administrations as self-delusional. (Washington Times)

It seems like Bush Administration strength has been used up.(Or is it diverted elsewhere?  Those damned elections.)  Gone are the days of cockiness that so many frowned upon.  Is wishy-washiness better?  We ALL hope for peace, but who's going to go out there and grab the *ssholes by the throat and make peace happen?  There's no other way.  It must be forced from the outside because the Pals/fanatical Muslims will not retreat when they sense weakness on our part.

It is very difficult to remain focused and determined with all of the noise and distraction out there. But one of the things I admired most about Bush - could it possibly be gone?  He possessed such self-confidence and was so sure of himself and that he knew what was right.  It's true that things did not go nearly as smoothly as planned in Iraq, but man, I hope that the difficulties don't turn Bush into a diplomacy wimp.  I for one would much rather see him striding across the deck of an aircraft carrier, and making statements like, "Bring it on." 

Woe is us if he's faltering. 

Just because Iraq is going pear-shaped at present, doesn't mean we can't get it right. Elections could not be happening at a worse time.  What are the American people going to do?  I don't believe in polls after election 2004.  Where did I read it - think I even posted it:

The only poll that counts is the one on election day.

Maybe this writer is right, and it's time for us to join Israel in re-grouping and re-thinking:

A New Road for Israel - Avigdor Lieberman
To the editor of the New York Times: Your editorial got it wrong. The Middle East peace process has failed miserably, and trying to breathe new life into an already defunct process is not the way to go. I suggest we redefine our goals and focus on bringing security and stability to the Middle East instead of setting our sights on an unrealistic, unattainable fantasy. The declared missions of Hamas and Hizballah are not to expel Israel from Lebanon or Gaza but to eradicate all Jews from Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Jerusalem, and until they achieve that goal, they will not lay down their arms.
    Israel is where the war on terror started. Sadly, we have had to stand alone for many decades in the face of unrelenting attacks on our Western ideas and values of freedom and democracy. After the terror attacks of 9/11, Madrid in 2004, London in 2005 (and the list goes on), the world knows better. That's why old thinking, regardless of how well intentioned, simply won't work. It is time to go back to the drawing board, re-evaluate the goals of the peace process, and start anew. The writer is Israel's new Minister of Strategic Affairs. (New York Times)

Claptrap:
pompous or pretentious talk or writing [syn: bombast, fustian, rant, blah]
Claptrap \Clap"trap`\, n.
1. A contrivance for clapping in theaters. [Obs.]
2. A trick or device to gain applause; humbug.
Claptrap \Clap"trap`\, a.
Contrived for the purpose of making a show, or gaining
applause; deceptive; unreal.

CNN and the US: At Cross Purposes

As far as I can tell and from what I read, CNN comes across to anyone who supports the war in Iraq, President Bush and conservative issues as biased - against the US. 

Those of us who support the war and Bush, feel that highlighting and dwelling only on flaws works against the cause.  It's not that flaws don't exist.  Of COURSE they do.  It's just that a difficult war is not winnable unless the majority of the population supports it.  Some of us wonder: What are the consequences if the US throws in the towel in Iraq? How will it affect the Iraqis?  The Middle East situation?  The efficacy of the US in fighting terrorism and Islamofascism? The entire world?

But CNN has different priorites.  It wants to be the World's News Source.  It's good for their business to be watched by many.  It's part of their sales pitch that they connect the entire world.  When CNN first began and for many years after, it was fantastic.  It's very easy to take it for granted now, but the ability to access news from all over the world 24 hours a day was quite a thing at the time. 

It all worked fine when little nitpicks and gripes of others against the US were only little nitpicks and gripes. We heard it when they said they thought we had no culture, that we were unsophisicated, over-religious, fast food-gobbling, gas-guzzlers. We heard it when they said that globalization, Disney and McDonalds were the ruination of the world. 

But it didn't matter.  We could shrug it off.  They only people who seemed to care were the stupid conservatives - they and their incessant flag-waving and patriotism.  Kind of an embarrassment, really.  Perhaps Europe was right about us - Middle American flag wavers were kind of bumpkin-like.  The real coolness came from the big city multi-culturalist anomie centers.  Oh, the drama of being alienated.  The boredom of keeping your doors unlocked and having potluck dinners with the neighbors. Bowling, for gawd's sake.

Perhaps it should have mattered to us more.  Perhaps we should have answered back and attempted to sell ourselves better, and should have tried harder to drive home the point that Middle America was our backbone, and also served as the deeply hidden, humble and silent backbone of world freedom. 

But, we thought that everyone loved us anyway, and that it didn't matter.  They loved our rock and roll and blue jeans and movies and our American dollars - didn't they?  Middle America?  Who gave a damn?

This fine kettle of fish developed teeth and came back to bite us right in the ass.  We can't fight an effective war with the world looking down on us.  And we certainly can't convince them to stop looking down on us while a chunk of our citizens not only agrees with them, but does so through its media mouthpieces - like CNN. 

Oh, CNN and the majority of liberal news sources do it very subtly and politely.  And they can turn around and say, "Anti-American?  Who?  US?" with big puppydog Anderson Cooper eyes.  But the fact is, they are not with us.

Yet, CNN has a point -  they exist to report the news.  And they have a financial and self-protecting interest to be perceived as "unbiased." 

But what they and every Western media outlet and reporter might want to ask themselves is this:  What happens to them and their ideas and their freedom and their sophistication if the West - supported and defended ONLY by US military and coalition forces - should lose.

Please note:  No one is forcing CNN at gun point to change their reporting.  No one is being thrown in prison.  No lives are being threatened.   

But the questions should be asked: What is the role of the media in wartime? How do changes in technology and worldwide communications affect their role? 

Does CNN owe the US anything?

If the media helps the enemy, do they become the enemy?

See:

Lawmakers Fault CNN for Sniper Video

Hunter asks Blitzer, “Does CNN want America to win this thing?”

My Friend's Son was Killed in Iraq

Follow-up questions for Byron Calame
and the Times' Bush-bashing allies

Oh, Did I Say That My Country Was Arrogant and Stupid? Gee, Sorry About That ...

WHAT WOULD EDWARD R. MURROW HAVE THOUGHT?

Oops, Never Mind