Remnants of the Intifada

BY CARMIA

The Second Intifida, which began in 2000, has long fizzled out but the memorials remain. Today is the seven-year anniversary of a suicide bombing which took place near my house and blew up a bus. Seventeen people were killed on bus number 37, which goes to and from the University of Haifa through the Carmel and Hadar, all the way down to the old central bus station at Bat Galim. One of my former students was lucky - he survived this bombing, albeit with hearing and vision damage and a face full of shrapnel.

An unofficial memorial has also grown on the location. It is made up of personal messages dedicated to the various victims of the bombing and messages to humanity in general that people have left all over the wall by the site.

On the other side of the Green Line, there are memorials as well. My friend took some pictures on her visit last year to Nablus and was most struck by the line, "Never Forgive, Never Forget" on the memorial below.

The memorial is obviously intended for the international media as well, having been written in (misspelled) English. The memorial below for "shaheeds" is not meant for the international community.

Interfaith Kishkushim?

BY CARMIA

Event advertisement on campus: "When was the last time you met a swami/chief rabbi/imam/bishop/lama/Sikh?"

This evening, the University of Haifa hosted the fourth meeting of the Elijah Board of World Religious Leaders. Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Ramakrishna, and Sikh representatives came to share their views on issues of religious leadership. Druze and Bahai leaders were also expected. The audience, mostly, but not only, composed of University of Haifa students, was almost as diverse.

Opening remarks were made by Professor Majid al-Haj, Vice-President and Dean of Research at the University of Haifa.

He addressed the audience in Hebrew (simultaneous English translations were provided via headsets). He started out with a citation commonly invoked in these types of gatherings. Here is a partial transcript:

"As a Muslim, I have to mention that in the Quran there is a passage that says, 'We have made you nations and tribes so that you may meet one another.' That's the main concept that exists in Judaism, in Christianity, and in all religions... The function of religion is to improve the society, and to regulate the relationships within the society and between the different groups."

As I've attended a few interfaith gatherings in the past, the concept and the content didn't seem entirely novel to me. One of the Buddhist monks described what often happens at these gatherings in a very humorous way: "You're nice, I'm nice, bye bye!" He did add that this was not his experience in this case, as these religious figures have been traveling together extensively for the past few days and have shared intimate experiences with each other.

One thing that sometimes frustrates me with these kind of meetings is that in order to stay civil and maintain their peaceful and unified stance, they must remain at the level of "interfaith kishkushim." No doubt that the visual message of all these different religious leaders together, highlighted by the various head coverings and robes and different ethnic backgrounds, is powerful. However, it seems obvious to me that there were many subjects that speakers shied away from (or possibly were told to avoid) for the sake of unity. And yet, that is not what will help people clear up misconceptions they may hold or understand the point of view of other religions.

Advertising for this gathering promised people the chance to meet different religious leaders. That means that it is potentially an opportunity for people to get answers about very real questions they may have about other religions. However, those very questions, though they represent dialogue, might also at the same time shut down real dialogue. I think there are two basic conditions which must exist at this type of gathering in order for real dialogue - by which I mean dialogue which transforms the people it engages - to occur. The first is that the leaders must be willing to speak openly and bravely about their faith, and the second is that the audience must not ask questions in order to provoke or to prove their own religion "right," but rather to learn and understand.

In my opinion, there were two highlights at the conference. The first was Imam Dr. Abduljalil Sajid from England, who was brave enough to speak about what he termed, "religiously-motivated violence." He said very clearly that this is an issue in his faith community which will not go away by wishful thinking or by prayer alone, and in fact will grow. He elaborated that imams and sheikhs must stand up and challenge it. Collective actions with others (including people from other faith communities and "people with no faith") is what is needed. He also said, "My appeal to all of you is do not ignore or deny it. Accept it and do something about it. Share the concerns with your community and work against violence."

The second highlight was the "meet and greet" which followed the more official part of the program. Here came the real chance for the audience to approach, question, and learn from the international visitors. Unfortunately, some of the local leaders left a little early.

Northern Front Erupts

The katyusha rockets fired at the northern Israeli town of Nahariya today from southern Lebanon have raised the stakes of the current conflict significantly. They raise the specter of wide-scale bombardment of the north of the sort we saw in the summer of 2006.

 On December 25, 2008, a number of katyusha rockets, apparently all aimed at Nahariya, were discovered by Lebanese security forces in southern Lebanon. They were disarmed shortly before their launch times. 

This time around, the Lebanese army did not reach the rockets in time, and UNIFIL has been shown to be incapable of stopping such attacks. As Lebanese sources rushed to declare, the rockets were most likely not fired by Hizbullah, but rather by one of the Palestinian factions allied with it. Nevertheless, it would be hard to imagine that Hizbullah did not know about the firing of these rockets. Nasrallah so far has stayed away from involving Lebanon in the Gaza conflict; he may have gotten a soft go-ahead from the Iranians or Syrians, to give a green light to Palestinian proxies. 

It remains to be seen whether this will lead to a major escalation. Israel will have to weigh its response carefully. Reservists are available to operate in the north, but Israel cannot afford to see Haifa, Nahirya, and who knows what other cities engulfed by Hizbullah fire. For now, it must attempt to curtail any escalation. 

Victims of Hamas

I wonder if the Knesset members from the Arab parties will mention these victims of Hamas's rocket attacks in their speeches:

One Israeli was killed and fourteen others were wounded by a Palestinian Grad missile which exploded near a construction site in the coastal town of Ashkelon.

Most of the victims were construction workers from the Galilee village of Manda and the Bedouin town of Rahat. Five were considered in serious condition, four sustained moderate wounds, and five suffered light injuries. 

The man who was killed was named as 27-year-old construction worker Hani al Mahdi, from the Bedouin village of Aroer (Ha'aretz).

Murder and Torture

It took the New York Times a while to state with certainty that the Chabad Center in Nariman House was targeted by the plotters of the Mumbai attacks because it was a Jewish site. Now, the paper is reporting news that have been circulating since the end of the Nariman standoff; the victims were brutally tortured before being murdered:

Some of the six people killed at the Jewish center in the city had been treated particularly savagely, the police said, with bodies bearing what appeared to be strangulation marks and other wounds that did not come from gunshots or grenades.

Qassams on Gaza and the Dream of Palestinian Statehood

Image: Map Showing Entry Points into Gaza (Source: Palestine Trade Center)

Once in a while, we read accounts of qassam rockets landing inside the Gaza Strip. Today, a mortar shell apparently hit a power cable that provides electricity for the Hamas-ruled territory. Unlike the April 9, 2008 attacks, which deliberately targeted the Nahal Oz fuel depot used by Israel to transport gas to Gaza, this latest incident appears to have been an accident. But many of the Palestinian mortar attacks and cross-border raids into Israel have struck precisely those points through which the territory receives supplies crucial to its inhabitants' lives. How can Hamas seriously complain about fuel or food shortages when its own actions directly threaten the infrastructure used to provide these necessities to Gazans?

Of course, in a larger sense, every qassam attack on Israel is an own-goal by the Palestinians. The rocket attacks that have plagued southern Israel since the withdrawal from Gaza in August 2005 as well as the cross-border raids such as the one that led to the kidnapping of Gilad Shalit on June 25, 2006, imperil the likelihood of a future withdrawal from the West Bank more than anything else. The Gaza evacuation showed that both Israel's leadership as well as the majority of the Israeli population support a withdrawal from much of the territory captured in 1967. But no responsible leadership can authorize such evacuations, when it results in more attacks on Israeli citizens inside the country's recognized borders. 

The Palestinians and their supporters will argue that settlement expansion and the IDF's actions in the territories have had a similar effect in undermining Palestinian trust as the qassams (and the suicide bombings before them) have had on Israelis. This kind of argument might fly in academia, but it is a dead end, especially for anyone who is serious about Palestinian statehood. Israel is in a position to grant Palestinians the land that they need for an independent state in the West Bank and Gaza. It depends on Israel to realize these ambitions. But the Palestinian dream of statehood requires the Palestinian organizations to demonstrate their trustworthiness to Israel, not vice versa.

The best analogy might be that of a lender and a hopeful borrower. Even if the lender has failed to repay debts to other people or to the would-be debtor himself, s/he is still the one with the capital that the debtor hopes to borrow. In order to procure the loan, it is incumbent upon the debtor to demonstrate to the lender ability to return the principal and interest in the future. Everything else is irrelevant. 

I hope that my analogy, which equates Israel with a lender and the Palestinians with a debtor will not occasion yet another self-righteous diatribe on the alleged immorality of the Zionist enterprise. Those who believe that Israel does not have a right to exist or to be a "lender," are living in a dream world. They may continue idling away their time with stirring, moralistic pronouncements. But they would do well to remember that no state has been created on moral claims alone - not even the State of Israel, which, post-WWII had a stronger claim to a moral right for its existence than any other country in the world. Statehood is achieved by those who combine moral vision with pragmatic politics and, most importantly, attention to the contingencies of history and the vagaries of fortune.

Countering the Qassam

Photo: Amos Yadlin (IDF)

The capabilities that the Palestinians demonstrated with yesterday's rocket attack on Ashqelon are impressive. Despite the limitations placed on them by the blockade and by occasional IDF operations, the terrorist groups in Gaza have consistently upgraded the range and power of their missiles. In comments to Ha'aretz today, Amos Yadlin, head of AMA"N (Military Intelligence Department), warned that two years from now, even Be'er Sheva might become a target. He did not announce any specific initiatives to forestall this threat.

The aims of Hamas and the other groups rocketing Israel's southern communities are various. One of the goals seems to be to pressure Israel into a truce that would result in lifting the "siege," whose effects have of course been greatly exaggerated by Hamas propagandists. Paradoxically, the Palestinians are trying to achieve this by demonstrating their ability to bomb Israeli civilians and by blowing up crossing points designed for the delivery of food and fuel.

Another aim of Hamas, which Yadlin also acknowledged in comments to the press, is to create deterrence against Israel comparable to the deterrence that Hizbullah achieved. Just like Hizbullah, Hamas wants to be able to strike at will deep into Israeli territory, turning Israeli civilians into its hostages in order to ensure that the IDF does not attack Hamas's fighters and leadership in Gaza.

These two aims suggest a number of different responses.

1. Israel might agree to a truce and to the conditions imposed by Hamas, in return for an end to rocket attacks (diplomatic solution)
2. Israel might acquiesce to Hamas's regime of deterrence and cease attacking its forces, in the hopes of quiet
   
3. Israel can opt for its own policy of deterrence (military and economic)
4. offensive operations to destroy the Palestinians' rocket-firing capabilities (military)
5. defensive measures to limit the impact of the rocket strikes (military)

The problems with these options are as follows:

1. Gives Hamas time to build up its forces for the next round; given the organization's ideology and support/pressure from Syria and Iran, it will not be turned into a pacific neighbor
2. Same as above without even a formal set of protections; liable to break down at any moment.
3. Hamas does not care if Palestinian civilians die as a result of IDF operations; in fact, images of civilian deaths or injuries aid its cause.
4. the IDF has so far proven unable to do this; its efforts in this area during the Lebanon War of 2006 were unimpressive.
5. expensive and so far ineffective

As I have said before, none of these options are particularly appealing or likely to be effective in ensuring the long-term interests of the state and its population. For this reason, I do not anticipate any changes in Israeli or Palestinian policy over the next 2 years but rather a continuation of the type of attrition that we have observed since the withdrawal from Gaza. I also doubt that we will see the release of Gilad Shalit anytime soon.

Revenge for Mughniya in Jerusalem?

Map of Jerusalem (ArcIMS), Qiryat Moshe in orange

According to Ha'aretz, Hizbullah flagship station Al Manar reported that the "Liberators of the Galilee - Shaheed Imad Mughniya Group" took responsibility for the shooting which occurred hours ago at the Merkaz ha-Rav Yeshiva in Jerusalem. Needless to say, the authenticity of this claim is highly suspect. It is extremely unlikely that the perpetrators of the attack, which has so far claimed the lives of eight, are Lebanese or directly affiliated with Hizbullah. However, they may have been Palestinians recruited by Hizbullah handlers or sympathizers. To be sure, retaliation for the assassination of Mughniya in Damascus was expected around this time.

The shooting at Merkaz ha-Rav is the worst terrorist attack that Jerusalem has seen for quite some time. The yeshiva is located in the west of the city, in Qiryat Moshe. It remains to be seen what route the terrorists took to reach the site, and where exactly they came from. I was surprised to hear that they may have infiltrated from East Jerusalem. But perhaps they took a more circuitous route.

At this point in time, it is still unclear how many attackers were involved, and what weapons they used. There are reports of one terrorist having fired an AK-47 for several "long minutes." One witness spoke of 500-600 rounds having been shot.

If the police and security forces release details of the origins of the attackers, we can be sure that there will be a major response by the IDF in Gaza or the West Bank. Tensions are already high after a roadside explosive device near the security fence around the Kisufim Crossing in Gaza destroyed an IDF jeep, killing one soldier (a Bedouin tracker). To me, that attack had all the marks of an attempted kidnapping.

"Lessons" from the Kisufim Attack

The Kisufim ("Yearnings") Crossing, marked in orange

The thwarted attempt by Palestinian militants to capture an Israeli soldier near the Kisufim crossing has again raised questions about the government's "policy of no response" (Debka Hebrew).

In the incident, which occurred on Saturday afternoon, a team of four Islamic Jihad fighters broke through the security fence in a white jeep marked "TV." Lookouts immediately alerted nearby forces from the Givati Brigade. Meanwhile, the militants, who were dressed in military fatigues, stormed an empty outpost (a pillbox) and started firing. When they realized that the outpost was unoccupied and saw IDF jeeps arriving at the scene, three of the fighters returned to Gaza. Israeli troops began combing the area. A dog from the Oketz unit discovered the fourth terrorist, who had hidden in a pipe. After he revealed his location when he shot the dog, Israeli soldiers surrounded the man, who was killed in the two-hour long gun battle that ensued (Ynet Hebrew, New York Times).

The vehicle used by the attackers (Reuters)

Soon after the initial news of the incident, army sources expressed concerns about "tactical shortcomings" in the response of the unit summoned to the scene (Ha'aretz Hebrew). "Why," they asked, "was there no pursuit of the [Islamic Jihad] crew at Kisufim?" To Lt. Colonel Bassam 'Alian, who commands the Rotem Battalion (one of the four battalions in the Givati Brigade) and was among the first to arrive on the scene, the answer is simple: the troops focused on securing the area first and making sure that the terrorists did not reach nearby residential areas. (A quick excursus: Bassam 'Alian made the headlines in August 2006, after he was injured in Lebanon, shortly after being promoted to Lt. Colonel.)

I will leave it to the military to investigate these alleged tactical deficiencies, but it strikes me that the criticism might not be entirely rational. I cannot help linking this disappointment that Israeli soldiers did not manage to arrest or kill the other attackers with a general sense of frustration about the government's defensive policy. This frustration is most palpable among reservists from Sderot and the south. In a recent article, "An Israeli defeat in Sderot," Ze'ev Schiff argues that despite the organization's military weakness, Hamas has achieved deterrence vis-a-vis Israel, just as Hizbullah has in the north. He calls this a "national failure" more serious than the outcome of the Lebanon war. Schiff concludes by bemoaning

the almost total disappearance of the strategic principle set by David Ben-Gurion, to the effect that upon the outbreak of a military confrontation, Israel must quickly transfer the fighting to enemy territory. At present, it is the enemy who is immediately transferring the fighting to Israeli territory (Ha'aretz).

In recent days, IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi has also called for an expansion of offensive action in Gaza by the army, though he still rules out a major ground operation comparable to Defensive Shield. Israel's National Security Council, on the other hand, believes that the current policy should be continued (Ha'aretz English).

The government's reluctance to authorize a large-scale operation in Gaza, however, is not based on the acceptance of a draw with Hamas alone. Israel is trying to avoid the inevitable civilian casualties that would accompany a return to the policies of June 2006, which included heavy artillery fire, and bombardment from the sea and air in response to qassam launches. Perhaps the government is hoping for a further deterioration of the Palestinians' diplomatic position, as well as the attrition of its fighting power in internecine conflict.

As we occupy ourselves with the management of this conflict, the future looks bleaker than ever. Because the Palestinian factions cannot guarantee Israelis' security, Israel will not give up the land the parties and the Palestinian people demand as a requirement for the cessation of attacks. To be sure, the armed struggle - at least of the sort carried out since the mid-1990s - especially the suicide bombings have only brought disaster to the Palestinians. Furthermore, the qassams and their more lethal future successors will bestow mere temporary gains upon the Palestinians (a cease fire here, a partial lifting of restrictions), until the next terrorist attack. Then, it will be two steps backward again.

I think the optimism of the "anti-Zionists," that Israel will disappear is misplaced. They believe that the world only has to be convinced of the suffering of the Palestinians. It is true that a great number of people today believe that Israel is the manifestation of evil and wholly responsible for the hardships experienced by Palestinian civilians. They bank on what they see as the inevitable triumph of justice, and the defeat of the wicked. In the words of Angry Arab:

Zionists miscalculated: the deep seated racism that characterized the minds of Zionist pioneers, and the contempt through which they looked at the Arabs, did not prepare them for an unexpected variable: the persistence of Palestinian struggle. That the Palestinians will not succumb to Zionist diktats. And that the Arabs will not let bygone's be bygone's.

I think the inverse of what As'ad AbuKhalil is saying rings just as true. The Arabs, especially the Palestinian Arabs, were not prepared for the persistence of the Jews' belief that they belong there, and that they need their own state. What the anti-Zionists don't understand is that Israeli Jews have nowhere to go. They do not intend to "return" anywhere - certainly not to the precariousness of life without national self-determination. Perhaps it is time to admit that the interests of Israelis and Palestinians are simply irreconcilable. For both sides, national self-determination seems to have requirements that the other side will not accept. But the loser of this kind of "draw" is surely the person without a state.

Getting along is easier in San Francisco (May 2007)

In a very serious interview conducted by Sayed Kashua, best known for his hilarious satirical columns in Ha'aretz [the link happens not to be his funniest piece but it's still good], Hillel Cohen, the author of four fine works on the relationship between the state (or pre-state institutions) and the local Arab population, put it this way:

-"One could also say that the tragedy of the Palestinians from the start is that they found themselves on land that the Jews claim, and say is their historic homeland - rightly so apparently, unlike what some of the Palestinians think. The Jews have roots here and they've managed to stake a claim in this land. This is where the tragedy begins. If the Jews hadn't come here, nothing would have developed the way it has. But they did come here and they are also stronger. This is the root of the tragedy. The question within this equation is what you do about it. The tragedy within this equation is that if you're quiet and don't protest it doesn't help you, and if you protest gently it also doesn't help you, and if you move to an armed struggle, then it also hurts you. Whatever you do, you're screwed."

So what should be done?

-"I don't have a proposal for what the Palestinians should do. But let's say, theoretically, if the Palestinians were to take up a non-violent struggle en masse, maybe something would happen."

Then what? That would bring them back to an Oslo-type process.

-"Perhaps. Listen, I don't know what to say to the Palestinians. If someone were to land here from Mars and ask me which nation is worth joining, I probably wouldn't recommend he join the Palestinian people."

And the Jewish people? The Israeli people?

-"No comment."

Another Day, Another Tragedy in Baghdad

Baghdad (Source: Perry-Castaneda)

Yesterday's suicide bombing in a Baghdad market was the worst such attack in the war. The bombing, which targeted a largely Shi'i neighborhood, claimed at least 130 lives. Local residents immediately blamed the U.S. for not providing them with enough security and for failing to implement the much-touted new security plan (New York Times). They are basically right. In recent weeks, the U.S. has put pressure on Jaish al-Mahdi fighters, forcing them to abandon neighborhood checkpoints and thereby reducing their ability to monitor security threats. Meanwhile, Sunni insurgent groups, in anticipation of an American and Iraqi Army offensive are trying to mount ever more spectacular attacks. As I have argued before ("Let the Militias Handle the Militias"), the U.S. needs to realize that it cannot compete with sectarian militias when it comes to providing security for their own people. Furthermore, by putting pressure on fighters affiliated with the Mahdi Army, the Americans are giving Moqtada al-Sadr a chance to evade real responsibility for the security and well-being of Iraqis. Instead, he can criticize the Americans from the sidelines and snipe at the government of al-Maliki. Even if the Americans prove somewhat successful, a single bombing can undo all of their best efforts. In any case, the Iraqi Shi'a are unlikely to credit the U.S. for even slight improvements in their lives.

In the meantime, Sunni insurgents are pursuing a policy that will only accelerate the efforts by various militias working in tandem with Iraqi government ministries to "cleanse" Baghdad of its Sunni population. Likewise, the recent escalations in Kirkuk by Sunni terrorists there will embolden Kurdish security forces to assert a more aggressive posture there. Already under pressure, the Sunni Arabs and the Turkmen in the city will inevitably face suspicion and outright hostility by their Kurdish neighbors.

Suicide Bomber Strikes Eilat

A View of Eilat (Photo: Henrik Reinholdson)

Israel was due for another suicide bombing. At around 9:40 AM local time a suicide bomber blew himself up in an Eilat bakery. So far, the attack has claimed the lives of 3 people (Ynet, Ha'aretz).

The targeting of a bakery (talk about a soft target) and the choice of Eilat, a resort town on the Red Sea, across from the Jordanian port of Aqaba and far from the center of the country, suggest just how difficult it has become for the terrorist organizations to mount suicide attacks inside Israel.

Islamic Jihad and the Al-Aqsa Brigades have taken responsibility. It is possible, however, that this was not the work of a group from the territories but of militants from Egypt or even Jordan.

There were some doubts about whether the bombing had a terrorist or a criminal background. In its initial dispatch from the scene, Ynet quoted a resident of the neighborhood named Shosh, who told reporters that she feels "like I am in Texas or the Wild West," (!) adding that she had often heard shouting from the houses nearby. Ynet readers were also quick to cast blame on local mafia elements. A reader who identified himself as Alperon from Yafo, declared that "this is what happens when you don't pay protection money on time." The Alperons are one of Israel's most infamous organized crime families.

Looking for a Job in Israel?

The Classifieds: Israel Rail's Newspaper, December 24, 2006

People in Israel often complain about how hard it is to find work. In the end, although it is a hated job, many young people turn to "shmira" (guarding).
Security guards are posted everywhere in Israel: at schools, supermarkets, post offices and banks, movie theatres, the gym, shopping malls, and bus station entrances. My belongings are searched every day an average of three or four times, sometimes more. The security guard job is hated because it is usually boring. The guards stands at a designated place for hours and checks bags and purses and may ask a few questions here and there. In the winter, most guards stand outside in the cold until their shift is over. And when the job isn't boring, it's dangerous. A number of security guards were wounded or even killed during the Intifidah while protecting entrances. The relatively low salary (often less than $6 an hour) is hardly worth risking your life for.
And yet, if 2006 is any indication of how 2007 turns out, security guards will remain to be in hot demand. On page 21 in last week's Classified section of the Israel Rail's newspaper, 11 out of the 36 ads were seeking security guards. The criteria are usually simple enough: army service, an updated arms licence, and no criminal record. Many young people in Israel who have just been released from their mandatory army service fit the bill.

Strange Reaction to the Seattle Shooting

Medics Evacuate the Wounded (Seattle, not Israel)

It finally happened. On Friday, a gunman penetrated the Jewish Federation building in downtown Seattle and opened fire on people inside, killing one woman and seriously injuring five others, some of whom are in critical condition. Naveed Afzal Haq, an American citizen of Pakistani descent, apparently identified himself as an American Muslim “angered by Israel.” The FBI believes that he acted alone and does not belong to any terrorist organizations. It is possible that the attacker was a mentally unstable individual; his police record indicates a prior charge for lewd conduct. Most American Muslim organizations immediately condemned the terror attack. Nevertheless, there have been a few isolated reactions that deserve some scrutiny. I was a bit baffled, for example, to read the following statement by Ziyad Zaitoun, a 52-year-old civil engineer taking part in a protest against Israel’s operation in Lebanon, who was quoted in the Seattle Times:

"[A]ny time something like this happens — especially against the state of Israel or people connected to the state of Israel — we fear for our lives" as Muslims, Zaitoun said.

There are some who claim that American and European Jews are alarmists who exaggerate threats to Jewish communities in the Diaspora in order to further pro-Israeli political agendas. Those who belittle threats against Jews and Jewish organizations, sometimes simultaneously insist that Muslims, in America, Europe, and the Middle East, are more deserving of “victim status.” Inevitably, the clamoring for victim status becomes a zero-sum game. After all, the perfect victim cannot also be a perpetrator. Furthermore, the argument for Muslim victim status sometimes turns into a corollary argument that Jews are the real perpetrators. Zaitoun’s statement plays on fears about a backlash against Muslims in America to insinuate that the state of Israel, Jewish organizations and their allies represent a mortal danger to American Muslims! This is a malicious and dangerous distortion. Zaitoun might be justified in dissociating Muslim Americans as a whole from the attack (though the reality is that there are some in the North American Muslim communities who do incite attacks against Jews). But his insinuation could also justify further attacks, as it implies that Jews are threatening Muslim lives.

It was also bizarre to read that

Seattle police were protecting temples and mosques Saturday after a suspected hate killing prompted fears of the Middle East crisis spreading to the United States (CNN).

Muslim extremists in Canada, the US, and Europe have attacked Jews and Jewish institutions in the past. In doing so, they have indeed spread the means used by terrorists in the Middle East to North America and Western Europe. But it is simply misleading to suggest that the “Middle East crisis [is] spreading to the United States.” This statement implies that there has been some kind of parallel Jewish response, and that American Jewish groups and individuals are gearing up to launch attacks on mosques or Muslim community centers. In fact, American Jewish organizations, perhaps because of their long experience in battling hate crimes, have been very vocal in speaking out against attacks on Muslims institutions and the marginalization of Muslim Americans.

Olmert Announces Harsh Response to Ashqelon Attack

Olmert Speaking at Independence Day
Celebrations at the US Embassy in Tel Aviv

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert must have surprised the consular staffers and select group of VIPs celebrating July 4th at the American Embassy in Tel Aviv. Instead of addressing them in English, as he had probably planned to do, he delivered a speech in Hebrew that focused on an event about which many of the guest had probably not yet been briefed. Olmert referred to the event as being of unparalleled gravity. Here is a a translation of an excerpt from the speech he delivered at the embassy. The translation is based on digital video footage of the event provided by a source:

The rocket that landed today in the heart of Ashqelon is an unprecedented escalation in the terrorist war directed by the Hamas organization, which today rules the Palestinian Authority. Here and now we will say only that to this attack, to this failed attempt to hurt civilians living in the borders of the sovereign state of Israel, there will be a wide-ranging and yet-unseen response. Hamas will the first to notice this.

Olmert also mentioned the soldier Gilad Shalit, who is still in the hands of Palestinian militants. He vowed that Israel would do everything it could to bring Shalit home safely, to which the audience responded with loud applause. It seems clear, however, that the IDF mission in Gaza, originally launched to free the captured soldier, has been turned into a ground operation against the Qassams. The Ashqelon attack has provided Olmert with further evidence to convince the court of world opinion about the necessity of serious measures against the rockets. (That the firing on Sderot was not enough seems profoundly unjust; it is true that Ashqelon has more strategic sites and a larger population, but the people of Sderot are worth no less than the residents of Ashqelon). Olmert also implicitly emphasized the city's presence within the 1967 borders - something which, of course, also applies to Sderot. In so doing, the Israeli PM has tried to persuade the world that Israel is acting as any other sovereign state would and must - something which the Europeans especially, not to mention the Jewish State's numerous enemies, have been slow to grasp. The American line continues to be one of implicit approval.

The Home-Grown Terrorists

Nada Farooq

The Globe and Mail in a story titled Hateful chatter behind the veil reports on blogs and online forums run by Nada Farooq and other Muslim Canadian women, discovered by the newspaper. Farooq is the wife of Zakaria Amara, one of the “Toronto 17” arrested in early June (see Anti-Terror Raid in Canada Leads to Arrest of 17 Suspects, and The Motivations of Terror). The posts were made over a 20-month period , mostly in 2004, long before the arrests. The posts of these young women, almost all of whom were raised in Canada, provide a window onto the self-fuelled rage of Islamist extremists in the West. They provide further evidence against the view that such factors as discrimination against Muslims, on the one hand, or American foreign policy, on the other, are primarily responsible for the hatred preached and practiced by Muslim fundamentalists in the east and west.

Most jarring is the posters’ contempt for Canada: “Ms. Farooq's hatred for the country is palpable,” the reporters write,

She hardly ever calls Canada by its name, rather repeatedly referring to it as "this filthy country." It's a sentiment shared by many of her friends, one of whom states that the laws of the country are irrelevant because they are not the laws of God.

In late April of 2004, a poster asks the forum members to share their impressions of what makes Canada unique. Nada's answer is straightforward. "Who cares? We hate Canada."

Farooq rails against democratic institutions and secular governments:

"Are you accepting a system that separates religion and state?" she asks. "Are you gonna [sic] give your pledge of allegiance to a party that puts secular laws above the laws of Allah? Are you gonna [sic] worship that which they worship? Are you going to throw away the most important thing that makes you a muslim [sic]?"

Her views on Jews are hardly surprising:

May Allah crush these jews, [sic] bring them down to their kneees, humuliate [sic] them. Ya Allah make their women widows and their children orphans.

But she is equally intolerant of homosexuals, and of Muslims who do not share her embrace of terrorism and her disdain for Canada and the west. Alongside a photograph of a rally held by a Canadian support group for gay Muslims she writes:

Look at these pathetic people ... They should all be sent to Saudi, where these sickos are executed or crushed by a wall, in public.

All this is combined with the most self-serving paranoia, which insists that Muslims are the perpetual victims of conspiracies and persecution at the hands of non-Muslims:

"You don't know that the Muslims in Canada will never be rounded up and put into internment camps like the Japanese were in WWII!" [another woman] writes in one 2004 post. This is a time when Muslims "are being systematically cleansed from the earth," she adds.

European Condemnation of Tel Aviv Suicide Bombing

Obviously a condemnation of the bombing, but this time it is coupled with an indictment of the Hamas and the PA government that preceded it. The op-ed argues that Hamas, unlike its predecessor, has made its support of terorism clear and open. The Sueddeutsche Zeitung argues that Hamas's claim that the bombing was "self-defence" characterizes the organization's misanthropic worldview, which is shaped by the "crude assumption, that the land of the Middle East has been polluted through its settlement by Jews."

Das Gute an der palästinensischen Autonomiebehörde ist die Klarheit, die von ihr ausgeht: Sie wird von der Terrorgruppe Hamas geführt, die Israels Existenzrecht und somit jegliche Friedensverhandlungen ablehnt. Jassir Arafat hatte es stets verstanden, die Weltöffentlichkeit hinters Licht zu führen. Die Hamas aber lässt nun keinen Zweifel mehr an ihren Absichten.

Der Terroranschlag am Ostermontag, exekutiert von der Palästinenser-Miliz „Islamischer Heiliger Krieg“, wird von der Hamas als „Recht auf Selbstverteidigung“ gerechtfertigt. Darin drückt sich das menschenverachtende Weltbild der Hamas aus, das von der kruden Annahme geprägt ist, der Boden der Nahost-Region werde durch die bloße Besiedlung durch Juden verunreinigt.