Our wobbly ally

Caroline B. Glick, Jerusalem Post, Aug. 15, 2003

Eyebrows were raised on Tuesday when, just hours after Fatah and Hamas bombed civilians in Rosh Ha'ayin and Ariel, US Secretary of State Colin Powell said that Palestinian terrorism would have no effect on US Middle East policy.

So while the Bush administration claims to be going on the offensive, it attacks every move Israel makes both defensive and offensive to protect itself against terrorism.

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Israel's Ambassador accuses UN of hypocrisy
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, NEW YORK, Jerusalem Post, Sep. 15, 2003
 

The UN Security Council met Monday to discuss palestinian protests over the Israeli government's decision to remove Palestinian Chairman Yasser Arafat.

In advance of the meeting, Ambassador to the United Nations Dan Gillerman Monday accused the Security Council of hypocrisy for considering the Palestinian resolution. Gillerman said the Security Council has met repeatedly to condemn Israeli actions, but ignores Palestinian suicide bombings and shooting attacks on Israelis.

As Gillerman was speaking, the Palestinian envoy to the UN Nasser al-Kidwa got up and left the discussion hall.

"High-minded rhetoric about the so-called legitimacy of Mr. Arafat's leadership and the illegitimacy of Israel's interference, are meaningless and hypocritical in the face of the hundreds of dead and injured innocent civilians killed with the direct approval or acquiescence of Mr. Arafat himself."

"For how long will there be states among us who are willing to continue the charade of touting Mr. Arafat as a legitimate leader committed to the welfare of his people and peaceful relations with his neighbors. The ruin that Mr. Arafat has left behind in Jordan, in Lebanon, and in the West Bank testify that he has brought nothing but despair and devastation to his own people and to other people in the region," Gillerman said.

"It would be a grave error if the Council were to come to the aid not of the victims of terrorism, but of their sponsor and perpetrator. The Council's focus should be directed first and foremost at terrorism and at its facilitators, and not at the response to terrorism. Pressure should be directed against the problem and not against those who are its victims, " he added.

Vice Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and other members of the security Cabinet have made clear that the army has three options for "removing" Arafat: expulsion, assassination or laying a siege on his West Bank headquarters, including cutting off phone lines and electricity.

The council began consultations on a resolution drafted by the Palestinians late Friday and then adjourned until today, despite Palestinian pressure for a quick vote.

Council ambassadors said they wanted to consult their capitals and wait for the outcome of Secretary-General Kofi Annan's meeting in Geneva on Saturday with the foreign ministers of the five permanent council nations - the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France.

Russia considers that any attempt by Israel to remove Arafat would be
counterproductive and could lead to a serious global crisis in the Mideast, Deputy Foreign Minister Yuri Fedotov said.

An attempt to kill Arafat could lead to "an immense and wide scale growth in the threat of terrorism," he said.

So far, the council has only issued a press statement saying "the removal of chairman Arafat would be unhelpful and should not be implemented." The statement, read by the council president, British Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry, reflected the consensus among the 15 council members.

The government is trying to persuade the United States to veto the resolution, Gillerman said, but at the moment it seems more likely Washington will abstain, allowing the resolution to pass. The United States has in the past vetoed resolutions that it has felt are too hard on Israel.

Without a U.S. veto, "we can expect a resolution, which the Palestinians and others are presenting as a moderate and lukewarm statement...but in my opinion the very fact of the meeting is proof...of the U.N.'s real hypocrisy," Gillerman said in an interview with Army Radio.

Israel has intensified its hunt for militants since an Aug. 19 bus bombing in which 23 people, including six children, were killed. After twin suicide bombing attacks last Tuesday, in which 15 people were murdered, the security cabinet decided to "remove" Arafat, calling him the major obstacle to peace.

"The fact that the Security Council remembers meet because of a decision to expel a person, who in everyone's opinion is a murderer and responsible for the wave of terrorism, and possibly for the worst terrorism in the 21st century, is a black mark," Gillerman said.

Arye Mekel, Gillerman's deputy, said Israel would use the Security Council podium on Monday to air its grievances against Arafat.

"Even if the U.N. doesn't like this (the Cabinet decision), it certainly isn't the first time that there is a difference of opinion between the state of Israel and the U.N...These resolutions have no teeth," Mekel told Israel Radio.

The Palestinian U.N. envoy Nasser al-Kidwa said the council must take an immediate stand "when illegal actions are taken by member states."

The Palestinian draft "demands that Israel, the occupying power, desist from any act of deportation and to cease any threat to the safety of the elected president of the Palestinian Authority."

It calls for the cessation of violence - including all acts of terror, provocation, incitement and destruction - and increased efforts by both sides to ensure implementation of the road map.

It also would reiterate the council's concern over the "tragic and violent" events that have taken place since September 2000 when the latest Israeli-Palestinian clashes began, "and the recent dangerous deterioration of the situation, including the escalation in extrajudicial executions and suicide bombings."

In the UK, Prime Minister Tony Blair's government on Monday said the Israeli government's suggestion that it was considering killing Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was "unacceptable."

A spokesman for Blair said the Israeli ambassador, Zvi Shtauber, was summoned to the Foreign Office and met with a British minister, Baroness Symons.

"At that meeting, it was made clear that the government views that the expulsion of President Arafat would be wrong, and would not be in the interests of long-term peace, and that the comments made about assassinating President Arafat were unacceptable," said Blair's spokesman, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity.

Earlier, Blair's office had been more guarded in its reaction.

"We have to recognize that raising the rhetoric is not necessarily a helpful way" of forwarding the road map to peace in the region, a spokesman told reporters earlier in the day.

Israel would be making an "extremely dangerous" mistake by forcibly removing Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat from his seat of power, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said Monday.

Following talks with French President Jacques Chirac in Paris, Mubarak said fears that Israel might even assassinate Arafat would only plunge the troubled region into further violence.

"If everyone in the world killed his adversary, the world would be in total chaos," he told reporters, speaking in Arabic. A translation of his remarks was provided by Chirac's office.

Insisting, that killing Arafat "would resolve nothing," Mubarak said he has asked the Bush administration in Washington to pressure Israel into leaving the Palestinian leader alone.

"We told them (the Americans) that removing Yasser Arafat would be extremely dangerous," Mubarak said. "This is not because we love Yasser Arafat. This is about life, security and the stability of two countries."

Chirac agreed that expelling or otherwise eliminating Arafat would be futile, according to presidential spokeswoman Catherine Colonna. She added that world opinion viewed Israel's threats against Arafat as "counterproductive."

Chirac and Mubarak called on Israelis and Palestinians to start implementing the peace plan known as the "road map," which was drafted by the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia.

Read the full text of the speech given to the Security Council by the Israeli Ambassador

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Muslim rage

Editorial, Jerusalem Post, Sep. 16, 2003
 
Yesterday, this newspaper ran a headline: "US: Israel shouldn't enrage Muslims." This is odd, coming from the United States. It is a clear throwback to the sentiment in some quarters that if only that thorn, Israel, were to be removed from the paw of the Arabs, things would go more smoothly.

The headline was based on Secretary of State Colin Powell's comment opposing exiling or harming Yasser Arafat, because "...there would be rage throughout the Arab world, the Muslim world, and in many other parts of the world." But if one were to follow such logic, does not Israel have at least as great grounds for complaint against the US? If assuaging radical Arab sensibilities should be a centerpiece of Western policy, would not a headline "Israel: US shouldn't enrage Muslims" be in order?

The US, after all, has recently invaded two Muslim countries and toppled their regimes; it occupies both and rules one of them directly. Along the way, the US has used aerial bombings against key targets in civilian areas in Afghanistan and Iraq, almost certainly killing more Muslim civilians than Israel has over the past three years.

At the same time, the US supports some Muslim regimes, such as in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, that are not held in high esteem by their citizens so much so that it is not thought to be a coincidence that all of the 9/11 terrorists who attacked America came from those two countries.

If sparking Muslim rage is a problem, than we here are amateurs compared to the US. Nor would we be disinterested parties, given that in the Muslim world, Israel is considered not only to be an American outpost, but the one most physically and diplomatically convenient to attack. Having been living under a terrorist onslaught for almost three years, Muslim "rage" is hardly an academic concern for us. If rage-minimization were the goal, it is Israel that would have to worry about the US more than the US about Israel.

Why, then, is Israel not asking the US to stop enraging Muslims? Because Israel agrees with the US that the surest way to enrage radical Muslims is to recognize the legitimacy of their rage rather than blame them for it. And we agree that the surest way to douse that "rage" is not by succumbing to terrorism but by proving that it can and will be fought and beaten.

Just before the US invaded Afghanistan in 2001, for example, it was widely predicted that the Arab "street" would rise up and turn over the Middle East. In fact, the moment it became clear that the Taliban would be defeated, the anti-American protests in Arab capitals dissipated. According to the do-not-provoke theory, the result should have been the opposite: The "rage" should have peaked when Kabul fell.

The American people and government know that a policy of attempting not to enrage Arab radicals would be disastrous and would paralyze the war against terrorism. They also know that there is nothing America did or could stop doing that would have prevented 9/11, and that the only way to prevent future acts of mega-terrorism is to work relentlessly to root out terrorist groups and confront the countries that support them.

The idea that Israel should be an exception to this American understanding is strange, especially since the US has come to the same conclusion as Israel: that Arafat is preventing any Palestinian leader from lifting a finger to fight terrorism.
Presumably, the US position is based on the idea that Arafat can be persuaded to release his grip on the armed forces under his control or direct them to fight terrorism. Yet the US has provided no basis for this position. Given the failure and resignation of Mahmoud Abbas, the US cannot simply ask Israel to restrain itself without providing a reasonable alternative.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's acquiescence to US dictates has, for the time being, strengthened Arafat. It also places a burden on the US to deliver an alternative policy, given that Israel has been asked to desist from what it believes it must do.

The Arafat/Hamas alliance is testing the proposition that Palestinian statehood can be achieved through terror, rather than by crushing terror. If the US has an idea how to confront or break up this alliance without causing Muslim rage, we are all ears.

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Egyptian MP: Nothing Will Work with Israel Except Nuclear Bomb (AP/Ha'aretz)
    "That cursed Israel is trying to destroy al-Aqsa mosque," Mohammed el-Katatny of President Hosni Mubarak's National Democratic Party told a heated Egyptian parliament session on Monday.
    "Nothing will work with Israel except for a nuclear bomb that wipes it out of existence," he said.

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, Feb 13, 2007]

Egyptians See Israel, Denmark, U.S. as Enemies (AFP/Ynet News)
    A poll made public on Wednesday by an Egyptian state institute showed that 92% of Egyptians see Israel as an enemy - despite the peace agreement between the two countries.
    60% say Denmark is an enemy of Egypt, while 50% view America as an enemy.
    Countries crowned as "friends" of Egypt include Saudi Arabia, Libya, the PA, Sudan, and Syria.

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, Nov 2, 2006]

Egyptian Democracy Activists Demand End to Peace Treaty with Israel - Hamza Hendawi
Egypt's best-known democracy movement has switched causes and is now focused on demanding an end to the country's peace treaty with Israel. The Kifaya movement has launched a campaign to collect one million signatures on a petition calling for the annulment of Egypt's 1979 peace treaty with Israel. 100,000 signatures have been collected so far, said Kifaya spokesman George Ishaq.
    "One of the costs of pressing for democracy in the Middle East is the fact that most democratically based Arab parties...will be hostile to Israel," said Edward S. Walker, a former U.S. ambassador to Egypt and Israel and now with the Middle East Institute, a Washington-based think tank. (AP/Washington Post)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, Sep 15, 2006]

Jackson Diehl, Washingon Post Columnist, 12/5/2005:   How autocrats like Mubarak undermine their liberal opponents while strengthening Islamists in order to impress upon their people and the world at large that their only choice is between tyranny and Islamism.

Egypt Primes Children for Jihad - Yaakov Lappin (Ynet News)
    Egyptian Islamic Sheik Muhammad Nassar, a cleric working for the state ministry of religious endowment, has used a children's television program broadcast on Al-Nas television to encourage young children to strive for holy war.
    During the program, made available by the Arabic translation service MEMRI, the cleric told about Muslim children in history keen to "sacrifice" themselves and kill "infidels" for the cause of Islam.
    See also Egyptian Cleric Tells Children about Child Martyrdom (MEMRI)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, Jul 6, 2006]

A Cold Peace with Jordan? How About No Peace at All - Uriel Heilman
Near the Shariah Islamic Law Department at the University of Jordan in Amman, a blue Star of David is spray-painted on a concrete path so students can trample the symbol every time they walk by. At the Center for Strategic Studies, center director Mustafa Hamarneh says, "Israel is probably the last openly bigoted racist country today." This is the voice of moderation in Jordan today. While the two governments have developed close strategic ties since their leaders signed a historic peace treaty 12 years ago, acceptance of Israel among rank-and-file Jordanians remains abysmally low.
    "The peace is between governments, not the people," said Hani Hourani, the director general of the Al-Urdun Al-Jadid Research Center in Amman. "It is not even between the elites. It is not even between NGOs." A recent survey by the Pew Research Center found that a whopping 100 percent of those polled in Jordan have "unfavorable" views of Jews - more even than Lebanon's 99 percent. "Israel is not a country. It is a terrorist organization founded by the British government in 1948," said University of Jordan student Omar Al-Hinfi, expressing a commonly held view in his country. "It is something put in the whole Arab world to serve the colonial powers." (JTA/Philadelphia Jewish Exponent)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, Oct 27, 2006]

Column One: A grave and gathering threat

Caroline B. Glick, Jerusalem Post, Dec. 12, 2003

One week after Egypt scuttled Israel's proposed UN resolution condemning the murder of Israeli children by terrorists, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom met with Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak in Geneva.

Commenting on Wednesday's meeting on Israel Radio, Shalom explained, "The very existence of the meeting... show[s] more than anything that the Egyptians have tried to warm up relations with Israel."

Shalom met with Mubarak ahead of the autocrat's trip to Washington. In so doing, while Shalom received nothing for his trouble of meeting with Mubarak, Mubarak received Israeli cover ahead of his meetings with US President George W. Bush. And Mubarak could use such Israeli legitimacy. This week, Egypt absorbed a public relations blow when the UN's Human Rights Report lambasted its miserable human rights record.

It is a shame that our foreign minister felt it necessary to confer such legitimacy on Mubarak. One of the worst-kept secrets in our region is that aside from Iran's nuclear weapons program, Egypt is the greatest looming threat to Israel's national security. As our governing officials pander to Mubarak and his top brass, these men oversee diplomatic and military policies that endanger the very existence of the Jewish state.

Egypt is generally applauded for what is considered its "constructive" role in attempting to end the Palestinian terror war. Mubarak's intelligence chief Omar Suleiman's efforts to secure a temporary cessation of terrorist attacks are viewed in a positive light.

In the Foreign Ministry's press release about the meeting in Geneva, the ministry said that Shalom "found that the Egyptian president was committed to the peace process." And yet Egypt plays a pivotal role in enabling, justifying, and prolonging the Palestinian terror war against Israel.

As Chairman of the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee MK Yuval Steinitz points out, the Egyptian initiative to achieve a temporary cease-fire among the various Palestinian terrorist organizations is aimed not at achieving peace, but at "preserving Hamas's terror capabilities."

"In pushing for the so-called hudna, the Egyptians are trying to force a temporary cease-fire that will save Hamas from the demand that it be dismantled as is dictated by the road map," Steinitz explains. "Doing so is not only counter to the expressed demands of the road map.

It is antithetical to the objectives of the US war on terror. These call explicitly for an end to state sponsorship of terrorism and for the denial of safe havens and bases of operation for terrorists," he adds.

For the past three years, the Egyptian military has turned a blind eye to the constant smuggling of weaponry to Palestinian terrorist forces through tunnel networks in the Sinai Desert. "In enabling the continuation of the smuggling operations, Egypt has become the logistical base for Hamas," Steinitz argues. [PAC Comment:  Direct from Egyptian army bases no less]

Egypt's support for the continuation of the Palestinian terror war is part and parcel of an overall strategy of weakening Israel politically, diplomatically, and defensively while building up the Egyptian armed forces to a level of parity with the IDF. Dr. Arieh Stav, director of the Ariel Center for Policy Research, explains, "Egypt is an impoverished country. Its per capita income is $870.

And yet, it spends a quarter of its GDP on its military. Egypt has 450,000 men in uniform and another 450,000 men in its paramilitary units. This battle roster does not include its reserve forces. By way of comparison, at the height of World War II, Nazi Germany did not spend such a large proportion of its GDP on its war efforts."

Egypt's military capabilities include a sophisticated and well-stocked arsenal of chemical and biological weapons as well as advanced ballistic missiles capable of targeting Israel.

According to Dr. Dany Shoham from Bar-Ilan University's Begin Sadat Center, the Egyptian chemical arsenal includes VX, sarin, mustard gas, and luisite.

"Egypt was the first Middle East country to develop and use chemical weapons. It did so effectively in its war with Yemen between 1962-67," Shoham notes, adding, "Egypt's chemical and biological weapons procurement programs reached their height in the 1970s and 1980s.

While in the 1990s, Egypt claimed alternately that its non-conventional arsenals were of a defensive nature or that it had no such arsenals, the fact is that there are no indications whatsoever that their chemical and biological weapons were dispensed with – to the contrary. Their weapons were also not rendered obsolete with the passage of time. There is in fact no certainty whatsoever that the Egyptians ceased their development programs."

Egypt's biological arsenal contains advanced strains of toxins, bacterial and viral agents. Egypt possesses varied and advanced dispersal systems for its unconventional weapons. These include chemical mines, artillery shells, aerial bombs, and ballistic warheads. Egypt's ballistic missile systems include advanced Scud and Nodong missiles. As late as this year, Egypt continued its ballistic missile collaboration with North Korea and there have been scattered reports of cooperation with Libya as well.

In the 1980's Egyptian scientists and engineers actively participated in Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons programs. This Egyptian-Iraqi cooperation continued, with less publicity during the 1990's according to US government sources at the time. In the lead-up to the US-led invasion of Iraq, the Egyptian government refused US and British requests that those engineers and scientists be interviewed by US officials.

Egypt has continued to cultivate its weapons of mass destruction programs while modernizing its conventional armed forces. The $2 billion in annual US military assistance has allowed Egypt to transform its armed forces from a Soviet era force to a modern and sophisticated Western military.

Egypt has built local production facilities for the US M1A1 Abrams main battle tank. Israeli pilots have noted with alarm over the years that the US-trained Egyptian pilots in US-supplied F-16 fighter jets may well have achieved operational parity with the IAF.

And, Steinitz notes, "While Egypt has achieved near parity with Israel in ground and air forces, its naval power has outstripped Israel's. Today, the Egyptian navy has 2-3 times the number of naval platforms as Israel."

A former senior IDF intelligence officer allows that "Egypt's military buildup is beyond any proportion to conceivable external threats to Egypt and is a cause for alarm." Yet, at the same time, he argues that under Mubarak's dictatorship, Egypt has no interest in moving towards open warfare with Israel. "The problem will arise if a succession crisis ensues after Mubarak's death."

This argument, that 75-year-old Mubarak's despotic rule of Egypt acts as a barrier to protect Israel from his own massive buildup of Egypt's military forces, is the conventional wisdom on Egypt. It is voiced by officials throughout the political spectrum in Israel and accepted unquestioningly in Washington. The problem is that Egypt's military is explicit in naming Israel as the intended recipient of the full brunt of its massive might.

Starting in 1996, the order of battle at Egypt's annual Bader combined forces exercise has explicitly named the opposing force as "a small nation to the country's northeast." Unless the Egyptians are referring to the Gaza Strip, that nation is of course Israel.

"The Egyptian military has already achieved absolute superiority against any Middle Eastern and African state. Egypt has no military threat to deal with from anywhere. It does not even have border disputes with any of its neighbors," Steinitz notes. "It is clear that Egypt is working to achieve military parity with Israel. This is made all the more dangerous when one bears in mind that in the event of a war, Egypt will not be fighting by itself but rather as part of a coalition of Arab states."

Steinitz also notes with worry the recent intensification of cooperation between the Egyptian and Saudi Arabian air forces.

The Saudi air force has drawn recent attention because since the US-led invasion of Iraq it has stationed F-16 squadrons at Tabuk airfield, within striking distance of Israel. This deployment is in contravention of US pledges to Israel that the Saudi F-16s, flown by US-trained pilots, would be prohibited from using the Tabuk air base.

The US, which has almost singlehandedly overseen Egypt's conventional military ascendancy, has not made any serious attempt to alter Egypt's behavior. Again, the common wisdom is that Mubarak is a moderate who, regardless of his personal view of Israel, understands that it does not serve his interests to abrogate his country's peace treaty with Israel. And yet, largely as a result of the actions of officially-sponsored incitement, Egypt is one of the most anti-Semitic countries in the world.

As Steinitz notes, "Mubarak, through years of incitement, has prepared his people psychologically for war against Israel and has even brought them to assume that such a war is inevitable."

By signing a peace agreement with Israel, Egypt became the second-largest recipient of US military assistance in the world. It has received a pass for its anti-Semitism and active support of Palestinian terrorist organizations. Its massive militarization, non-conventional arsenal, and its refusal to develop its civilian economy or grant political freedom to its subjects have been systematically ignored.

In many ways, the Egyptian experience is mirrored by that of the PLO, itself an organization founded by Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1964. After signing the 1993 Oslo Accord with Israel, the PLO benefited from Israeli arms and US training of its forces.

Its incitement was ignored. Its corrupt autocracy in the territories was encouraged in the interest of "stability." The fact that on paper the PLO remains committed to peace with Israel preserves its international legitimacy in spite of its actions and declarations that prove unequivocally that it is still bent on Israel's destruction as its principle aim.

In Egypt's case, as Steinitz explains, "It is an alarming irony that while Israel has a peace agreement with Egypt, but remains in an official state of war with Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Syria, and Libya, Egypt causes Israel more damage diplomatically and constitutes a larger threat militarily than all these states that are still our declared enemies."

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On the front lines

Caroline B. Glick, Jerusalem Post, January 30, 2004

(Click here to be taken immediately a few paragraphs down to the analysis PM Sharon's Gaza Plan)

My home is alongside the ambulance route in Jerusalem so I don't need to listen to the radio to know when bombs go off in the city. If I don't hear the blasts themselves, I hear the ambulance convoys – their sirens screeching and howling as they pummel into traffic on their way to evacuate wounded and take them to the trauma wards. The sirens are a constant reminder that I live on the front lines of the war.

By noon yesterday, I received a more personalized confirmation of this fact. I heard news that among the wounded in yesterday's carnage are two of my friends. One is still in surgery as I write these lines. I am told that his wounds are not life threatening. The other, who got off with a broken knee, lies in Shaare Zedek's orthopedic ward awaiting word of whether she needs surgery. [PAC comment: January 29, 2004, 8:48 AM, Jerusalem: the 109th suicide bombing during the last 3 years]

Government sources were quick to tell us that there is no connection between the carnage in Rehavia and the deal negotiated with Hizballah that was proceeding in Germany as our enemies murdered and maimed us in the streets of Jerusalem. Science Minister Eliezer Sandberg announced, "There is no connection and it is forbidden to make a connection between the bombing and the deal for the prisoner swap."

The fact that the PLO's Fatah terror group claimed responsibility for the attack on Hizballah television should give considerable pause to those like Sandberg who protest that there is no connection. In fact Fatah and Hizballah have been cooperating closely since late 2001. Fatah receives funding and direction from Iran. Hizballah is an Iranian organization.

The date of the prisoner swap was announced publicly last week. No doubt, Hizballah has known the date for some time. There is no reason not to suspect that this information was passed on to Fatah and so today was chosen for the attack. What better way for Hizballah chief Hassan Nasrallah to declare complete victory over Israel than for his allies to carry out a massacre of Israeli civilians the day he secures the release of hundreds of their terrorist brethren?

We shouldn't be surprised that our national leadership is making such statements in the wake of the bombing. In the sensational build-up to the prisoner swap, we have received a full diet of groundless assertions by our leadership. IDF Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Moshe Ya'alon for instance said on Tuesday in the Knesset that Hizballah would be unlikely to resume kidnappings after the prisoner swap because its leadership knows that the IDF will respond militarily to such an action. Even Channel 2's left-wing commentator Amnon Abramovich couldn't resist mentioning that given Israel's decision not to retaliate for the abduction of our soldiers and subsequent Hizballah attacks, Israeli threats today have little credibility with Nasrallah.

Indeed, how can anyone with a modicum of common sense make the argument that terror doesn't pay when they look at the current positions of our government and security brass? Hizballah received 461 live terrorists and 59 dead terrorists for going to the trouble of abducting and murdering our soldiers and kidnapping Elhanan Tannenbaum. If that isn't a good payoff for terrorism, what is?

And yet, the deal with Hizballah is but one of the strategic errors of the government in recent days and weeks.

On Sunday, the government approved the election of Irineos I as the Greek Orthodox patriarch of Jerusalem. In July 2001, Irineos penned a letter to PA chief Yasser Arafat riddled with anti-Semitic slanders. He told Arafat that the Jews are "crucifying" the Palestinians. In addition, Irineos informed Arafat that he looked forward to cooperating with Arafat in Jerusalem. Irineos has claimed that the letter is a forgery, but a police investigation, which was closed two weeks ago, substantiated its authenticity. Sources close to the investigation say that three people were with Irineos when he penned the letter and all provided testimony to the police that the letter was authentic.

The Greek Orthodox Church is the largest landowner in Israel after the Jewish National Fund. The church owns large swathes of Rehavia and Talbiyeh neighborhoods in Jerusalem including the land on which the Knesset, the Prime Minister's Residence and the President's Residence are located. As patriarch, Irineos will have the power to refuse to renew the leases for the land when they come due in the coming years.

The cabinet had no reason to approve the appointment. Israel is under no obligation to approve the lifetime appointment of an anti-Semite to an office which owns such sensitive sites. One must wonder what motivated our ministers to approve this appointment that risks handing control of such vital properties to Arafat's friend. In an interview with Kul al-Arab last week, Irineos's spokesman said that the cabinet bowed to pressure from the US and Greek governments as well as to pressure from Israeli businessmen in approving the appointment.

Thousands in Gaza Celebrate Jerusalem Terror Attack, Palestinians Distribute Sweets - Ali Waked
Gaza's streets filled with joyous crowds of thousands on Thursday evening following the terror attack at a Jerusalem school in which eight people were killed. In mosques in Gaza City, many residents went to perform the prayers of thanksgiving. Armed men fired in the air in celebration and others passed out sweets to passersby. Hamas issued a statement saying it "blesses the (Jerusalem) operation." (Ynet News)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, March 7, 2008]

Iranian 8-Km Mortars Fired from Gaza - Aaron Lerner
Israel Television Channel 2 correspondent Ronnie Daniel reported that for the first time Iranian 120mm mortars were fired on Tuesday at Israel from Gaza. They can do considerably more damage than Kassam rockets. Many of the protective reinforcements that have been placed in order to shield Israelis from Kassams do not provide protection from these mortars. In addition, the Iranian mortars travel at a speed that makes the warning system meaningless. (IMRA)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, April 3, 2008]

IDF: Islamic Jihad Producing Longer-Range Rockets - Hanan Greenberg (Ynet News)
    The Islamic Jihad terror group has recently begun manufacturing rockets with a 12.5-mile range, similar to the Grad (Katyusha) rockets already in use by terror organizations in Gaza.
    The new rockets are armed with a much deadlier warhead that carries double the amount of explosives carried by Kassam rockets.
    Armed groups in Gaza have also recently obtained two new types of Iranian-made mortar shells, some of which can travel up to 6.2 miles.

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, March 27, 2008]

The city of Ashdod, several kilometers north of Ashkelon on the Mediterranean and home to over 200,000 residents, is preparing to be the next city to come within range of rockets from Gaza.

The Gaza Dilemma - Leslie Susser
If Israel had tolerated years of Kassam rockets raining down on the town of Sderot and other communities close to Gaza, the heavier, longer-range Grad [Katyusha] rockets crashing into the coastal city of Ashkelon crossed an unacceptable red line: They placed hundreds of thousands of Israelis under threat and put strategic installations at risk. Worse: If the trend was allowed to continue, bigger and heavier rockets could soon threaten metropolitan Tel Aviv.
    Maj. Gen. (res.) Doron Almog, former commander of the Southern Front responsible for Gaza, says Israel needs to act soon: "Otherwise, in a few years time, we could find ourselves fighting on two fronts, under a hail of hundreds of rockets a day, covering virtually all of Israel." (Jerusalem Report)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, March 24, 2008]

Israelis Bolster New Front Line with Gaza - Ilene R. Prusher
Seemingly overnight, the quiet seaside city of Ashkelon has become a frontline community in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Since the end of February, there have been 15 "serious hits" of Palestinian rockets here, causing damage or light injuries. Realizing that a new dynamic has emerged, Ashkelon is taking serious precautions. The one thing it doesn't have yet is a surefire way to find people a safe place when a missile is careening in their direction. The city has 26,000 schoolchildren, but no schools are armored. And though there are shelters, it's impossible to get to most of them in time. (Christian Science Monitor)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, March 13, 2008]

Hamas MP: We Used Women and Children as Human Shields (MEMRI-TV)
    Hamas MP Fathi Hammad said on Al-Aqsa TV (Feb. 29, 2008): "The Palestinian people has developed its [methods] of death and death-seeking. For the Palestinian people, death has become an industry, at which women excel."
    "They have formed human shields of the women, the children, the elderly, and the mujahideen, in order to challenge the Zionist bombing machine. It is as if they were saying to the Zionist enemy: 'We desire death like you desire life.'"

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, March 14, 2008]

Insatiable Extremism - Editorial
Israel is gone from Gaza. Yet Hamas has intensified its attacks on Israel. A mindset that loathes Israel more than it seeks its own freedom will not be remade by Israeli withdrawal or endless international funding and sympathy. A leadership inciting against Israel in its media, mosques and school system will not be rejected by the Palestinian public so long as much of that population is mired in a bigotry that inculcates permanent victimhood, refuses to recognize any shred of justice to Israel's sovereign claims, and extols the virtues of violence and death.
    What the Hamas-inspired murderous rocket fire across the Gaza border should long since have made plain to all is that even territory cleared of every last vestige of Israeli presence does not sate the appetite of the Islamists - who happen to constitute the parliamentary leadership freely elected by the Palestinian public. (Jerusalem Post)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, February 29, 2008]

Muslim Extremists from Egypt Poured into Gaza to Fight Israel - Khaled Abu Toameh
Thousands of Arab men flocked to Gaza from Egypt in the past two weeks, offering to join in the fight against Israel, sources close to Hamas said Wednesday. Some of the men had come from Iraq where they had been carrying out attacks against U.S. troops. "Hamas has turned the Gaza Strip into an international center for global jihad," said one PA security official. "Most of the men who entered the Gaza Strip through the breached border are now being trained in Hamas' camps and schools." Another PA security official said that a number of Iranian security experts had also entered Gaza to help train members of Hamas and other armed groups. (Jerusalem Post)
[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, February 7, 2008]

Israel Rising in Priority on Al-Qaeda Target List
"When the border was opened between Gaza and Egypt, I saw calls on forums for foreign fighters to come and infiltrate the Gaza Strip to lead the battle against Israel," said Dominique Thomas, a specialist on radical Islam at the School of Higher Studies in Social Sciences (EHESS) in Paris. "Israel has assumed a heretofore unprecedented priority on the target list of al-Qaeda and its allies," said Michael Scheuer, former head of the CIA's bin Laden unit. (AFP)
[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, February 27, 2008]

Gaza's New Residents: Saudis and al-Qaeda - Nir Boms
Egyptian troops recently resealed the border with Gaza. The border incident, initiated by Hamas and Islamic Jihad, allowed some otherwise unwelcome guests to enter Gaza. The Bethlehem-based Maan news agency quoted Hamas sources as estimating the number of Arab men who had entered Gaza as new residents at 2,000. According to Arab sources, some had recently fled from Iraq, where they had been carrying out attacks against U.S. troops. A Sunni Muslim website that carries statements of al-Qaeda reported last week on the arrival of at least four Saudi militants to Gaza through Egypt. "Hamas has turned Gaza into an international center for global jihad," said one PA official. Another PA security official said that dozens of al-Qaeda operatives have managed to enter Gaza in the past two weeks. (Weekly Standard)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, February 20, 2008]

Breach in Gaza: Hamas Blockades the Peace Process - Editorial (Washington Post)

• Hamas provided a dramatic illustration of its ability to disrupt any movement toward peace between Israelis and Palestinians, as tens of thousands of residents of the Gaza Strip surged across the border into Egypt. President Hosni Mubarak announced that Gazans would be allowed to shop in Egypt because they "are starving due to the Israeli siege." In fact, as Mr. Mubarak well knows, no one is starving in Gaza.

• Israel closed its border with Gaza and disrupted power supplies in response to a massive escalation of Palestinian rocket launches from Gaza at nearby Israeli towns - between Tuesday and Saturday last week, some 225 rockets were aimed at the town of Sderot, where more than 20,000 Israelis have been relentlessly terrorized.

• Those who say their priority is an Israeli-Palestinian settlement ought to be trying to stop Hamas' disruptions. Egypt's obligation as a law-abiding state is to restore order on the border and prevent the ongoing and massive smuggling of armaments into Gaza. That would go a long way toward stopping the rockets.

• The Bush administration and European governments should act to stop the ongoing farce at the UN Security Council and the UN Human Rights Council, which have ignored months of daily rocket attacks aimed at Israeli civilians but now rush to condemn a partial, three-day disruption of Gaza's power supplies. Hamas, and the people of Gaza, should get a consistent message that relief lies not in blowing up international borders but in ending attacks on Israel and allowing a peace process to go forward.

Poverty-Stricken Gazans Spent $130 Million in Egypt in Two Days
Rami Abdou, an economic analyst, estimated that Gazans spent $130 million in less than two days, a princely sum for the poverty-stricken territory. (AP)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, January 25, 2008]

Israel to Send Animal Vaccine to Gaza after Border Breach (AP/Ha'aretz)
    Israel will deliver thousands of doses of vaccine for cattle and avian-borne diseases to Gaza.
    Gazans have brought in large numbers of camels, sheep, cows and chickens. Israeli authorities fear that with the new influx of livestock will come a wave of diseases not indigenous to Gaza, among them foot-and-mouth disease and avian flu that are known to exist in Egypt.
    Because of the proximity between Gaza and Israel, the diseases could easily spread into Israel.

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, January 31, 2008]

A Visit to a Gaza Rocket Factory - Ulrike Putz
Abdul builds bombs for Islamic Jihad. He and his fellow militants can produce up to 100 per night. The rocket factory is housed in a kind of garden shed. Metal pipes with small wings lean against the wall: half-finished Kassam rockets. There are several tightly packed garbage bags on a shelf with "TNT" - the explosive looks like lumpy sugar. A large cauldron is sitting ready on a gas cooker while bags of fertilizer for the rocket fuel are piled up high up against the wall. "We get it in Israel," Abdul says.
    Instead of the usual 12, only three of Abdul's men have turned up. "The other guys are over in Egypt, shopping," he says. Will they be looking for ingredients for building rockets? "Hardly....We have enough raw materials to last for a few years." (Der Spiegel-Germany)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, January 30, 2008]

Boy Injured by Palestinian Rocket Loses Leg - Shmulik Hadad
Doctors at Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon were forced Sunday to amputate part of the left leg of Osher Tuito, 8, who was seriously injured in a rocket attack in Sderot on Saturday. "We are trying to keep the second leg, but it's also in bad condition," said Dr. Emil Chai, the hospital's deputy director-general. "Apart from that, he has a hole in his chest and his lungs are injured."  (Ynet News)
    Osher, who dreamed of becoming a soccer player, does not know yet that he has lost one of his legs. He remains under total sedation so he doesn't suffer from severe pain. Staffers at Barzilai Medical Center were themselves traumatized by Osher's suffering, as he was conscious upon arrival at the trauma room and repeatedly screamed "Save me!" (Jerusalem Post)

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, February 11, 2008]

Israel's Statement to the Security Council: The Situation in Gaza and Sderot - Charge d'Affaires Gilad Cohen (Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs)

Since the year 2000, more than 7,000 rockets and mortars have been fired at Israel by terrorists in the Gaza Strip. Last year alone, that number was over 2,000. And since Hamas' violent takeover of Gaza in June 2007, the frequency of rocket attacks rose 150%, to more than 250 rockets and mortars a month. This means, on average, one rocket is fired at Israel every three hours.

Not a day goes by when the Red Alert warning system does not sound, which gives children on playgrounds and in schools, and parents at home and at work, less than 15 seconds to find the nearest shelter before the next rocket comes slamming into their lives.

Escalation of Terror in Gaza (Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs)

Beginning on Jan. 15 and over the next 24 hours, more than 100 rockets and mortars were fired by Palestinians from Gaza on the Israeli cities of Sderot and Ashkelon - indiscriminate fire raining down on Israeli civilians. A Hamas sniper murdered 20-year-old volunteer Carlos Chavez from Ecuador in the fields of Kibbutz Ein Hashlosha using a special .50 caliber sniper rifle.

More than two years ago, Israel removed all of its civilians, soldiers and settlements from Gaza and redeployed behind the recognized border in order to promote a peaceful solution - yet in return received Hamas-backed terror.

Since the Hamas takeover of Gaza in June, approximately 1,500 rockets and mortars have been launched at Israel. Israel has suffered dozens of casualties, hundreds of shock victims, thousands of traumatized children, and severe disruption of daily life.

[Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, January 18, 2008]

Diplomat: Israel and U.S. Differ on Interpretation of Bush's 2004 Letter to Sharon - Barak Ravid and Nadav Shragai (Ha'aretz)
    The U.S. clarified to Israel during President Bush's visit that it disapproves of all Israeli building in eastern Jerusalem and the West Bank - including in the large settlement blocs, a senior Western diplomat said Tuesday.
    He added that Israel and the U.S. differ on their interpretation of the letter President Bush sent to former prime minister Ariel Sharon in April 2004.
    "The letter refers to major population centers and not the settlement blocs, while stressing that everything must also be decided in the negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians," the diplomat said.

Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, January 16, 2008

Gaza Tunnel Smugglers Stay Busy - Dan Murphy (Christian Science Monitor)
    A visitor to the Palestinian border with Egypt completely ignorant of the problems of this part of the world might imagine for a moment that Gaza is home to a species of giant and unusually industrious ant.
    In dozens of spots along the narrow swath of land between the Palestinian town of Rafah and the metal fence that marks the Egyptian border, the region's sandy soil is piled high in crescents that fan out from holes leading underground, the work of hundreds of Palestinian smugglers.
    Never have the signs of smuggling activity been so obvious.

Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, January 15, 2008

The Unholy Return of the Palestinian Pilgrims - Zvi Mazel (Jerusalem Post)

Under the joint agreement signed by Egypt, Israel, the PA, and the EU following Israel's unilateral disengagement from Gaza, the checkpoint at Rafah between Gaza and Egypt was to have been closely monitored by EU inspectors and double-checked by Israel through video surveillance.

However, the Hamas takeover of Gaza led to the flight of the EU inspectors, who feared for their lives, and ultimately to the closing of the checkpoint.

Israeli Defense Minister Barak came back from a visit to Egypt last week with a firm Egyptian commitment to have the Palestinians cross through the Kerem Shalom checkpoint so that Israel could make sure that no explosives or cash for Hamas would go through. Yet Egypt was not prepared to be portrayed any longer in the Arab media as a country persecuting innocent pilgrims in order to do Israel's bidding.

Though Egypt has made peace with Israel, it is first and foremost an Arab country aspiring to regional leadership, and wholeheartedly on the side of the Palestinians in their struggle against Israel. The idea that Egyptian soldiers would be instructed to stop smuggling at all costs is ludicrous in that context.

The writer is a former Israeli ambassador to Egypt

Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, January 3, 2008

Israel Has Video of Egypt Helping Hamas Terrorists Cross Gaza Border - Yaakov Katz, Herb Keinon, and Hilary Leila Krieger (Jerusalem Post)
    Israel is sending video footage - which shows Egyptian security forces assisting Hamas terrorists cross illegally into Gaza - to the U.S. Congress to pressure Egypt to clamp down on Hamas smuggling activities.
    The House and Senate agreed Sunday to hold back $100 million in military aid for Egypt unless Secretary of State Rice certifies that concerns about smuggling weapons into Gaza and human rights abuses have been addressed.
    Last week, Israel filed an official complaint with Cairo after Egypt unilaterally opened the Rafah Crossing and allowed Palestinians who claimed to be traveling to Mecca for the hajj pilgrimage to leave Gaza.
    Israel has received intelligence indicating that among the 1,700 pilgrims are a significant number of Palestinian terrorists who traveled to Iran and Lebanon for military training.

Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, December 18, 2007

The Rocket Threat from Gaza, 2001-2007 - Reuven Erlich
Palestinian rocket fire at Israel from Gaza began in 2001. As of the end of November 2007, there have been a total of 2,383 identified rocket hits in Israel. Rocket fire has been directly responsible for the deaths of ten Israeli civilians , nine of them Sderot residents. In addition, 433 individuals have been wounded. Mortar fire has been responsible for the deaths of ten individuals, eight civilians and two IDF soldiers. Of the 150 wounded, 80 were civilians and 70 soldiers. More than 190,000 Israelis now live under the potential threat of daily rocket and mortar attacks. (Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center)
    See also Video: Israelis Under Siege in Sderot
You try to be never more than 15 seconds away from the nearest shelter. (EuroNews)

Courtesy -- Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Daily Alert, December 14, 2007

Fatah Isn't the Answer - Michael Oren (Wall Street Journal, 20Jun07)

Though Fatah originally aspired to replace Israel with a secular state, it refashioned itself in the 1990s as an Islamic movement, embracing the lexicon of jihad. Hundreds of mosques were built with public funds, and imams were hired to spread the message of martyrdom and the hatred of Christians and Jews. These themes became the staple of the official PA media, inciting the suicide bombings that began in 2000 and poisoning an entire generation of Palestinian youth.

   Fatah has never fulfilled its pledges to crack down on terror. Though Mahmoud Abbas routinely criticizes Palestinian terrorist attacks as "contrary to the Palestinian national interest" - not an affront to morality and international law - he has never disavowed the al-Aqsa Brigades, a Fatah affiliate responsible for some of the bloodiest attacks against Isra