IN ISRAEL A DOG OR CAT IS WORTH MORE THAN A PALESTINIAN LIFE

How many times have I started a post by saying this sentence: "Israel never ceases to amaze me?" But it's just SO true. The lengths and breadth Zionists will go to in order to give the "appearance" of being humane, or human............. Is truly deserving of a Hollywood Oscar.

So we all saw the "hasbara" operation in Haiti, Israel to the rescue, look how nice we are, helping the poor dark skinned people in Haiti, whilst murdering, de-homing and ethnically cleansing the dark skinned people in Jerusalem and Palestine.

But now the Zionists have moved on, to yet another "hasbara moment" this time it's about animal welfare. Yup, Israel is to become the first "fur free" country, because they love furry little animals and all mankind. And, as added benefit, according to Zionists, this will show the world how nice they are:

link The campaign began when an Israeli news station reported that much of the “fake” fur being imported from China was, in fact, made from the pelts of cats and dogs. Since then it has mushroomed into an effort to make Israel the first fur-free state. Mr Rotbart added that the move would give the country much-needed positive publicity, after a year in which it was criticised in a UN report for alleged war crimes.

And here it comes, the big "hasbara" moment:

“We’d have something more humane to show the world,” he said.

How insane is that? Because in fact, Israel has done the exact opposite. Instead of people viewing them as "wonderful humane" people. They will be seen for what they are. Opportunistic Zionists, continually looking for any worthy cause to "use" in a vain attempt to rehabilitate their rotten image in the world. Instead of viewing these actions as "positive publicity" people will instead wonder why they make a fuss about the fur of animals whilst they have no morals about killing or ethnically cleansing their fellow human beings.

Moral of the story is that in Israel, one dog or cat is worth more than all the dead or homeless Palestinians....................

Hasbara Document

Here's a good read:

September 20, 2009 (5 months 21 days ago)
• “Clearly differentiate between the Palestinian people and Hamas. There is an immediate and clear distinction between the empathy Americans feel for the Palestinians and the scorn they direct at Palestinian leadership. Hamas is a terrorist organization – Americans get that already. But if it sounds like you are attacking the Palestinian people (even though they elected Hamas) rather than their leadership, you will lose public support. Right now, many Americans sympathize with the plight of the Palestinians, and that sympathy will increase if you fail to differentiate the people from their leaders.”

get the rest here and you must scroll down to read it

ISRAEL'S VERSION OF "ONE STATE SOLUTION"

“Fear Not” oh you Palestinians and non-Jews, because Israel needs you. Not all Palestinians and non-Jews are to be ethnically cleansed from within the evil rogue state. There will be a place for you in Israel, you will serve a purpose. Your “new” purpose will be to replace them all when their religion forbids them to work, and you will work for them in any capacity they see fit. Welcome to the “One State Solution” Israeli style. There is a term for this, it’s called Apartheid Slavery:

Intel to employ only non-Jews at Jerusalem plant on Shabbat. Intel will not employ Jewish workers on Saturday shifts in its Jerusalem plant, the chip-maker has suggested in a new compromise proposal. The move comes after large crowds of ultra-Orthodox protesters attacked the plant on Saturday, in protest of it continuing operations on Shabbat. The plant, in the Har Hotzvim industrial area in Jerusalem, employs some 150 workers.

all Jewish workers who were employed on Saturdays will be replaced by non-Jewish ones that day. source

Racist Zionist Dating Police "No Arabs Allowed"

Israel's vile anti-miscegenation squadsWhen the police lend support to vigilante groups hounding Jewish-Arab couples, what hope is there for coexistence?

Whilst the proliferation of ultra-orthodox "vigilante police" is a stain on Israeli society, their Taliban-esque actions can at least be contextualised as the inevitable consequence of religious fundamentalism gone wild. Such communities are dominated by leaders who refuse to accommodate any form of modernisation or freedom of thought into their archaic systems of governance, and the emergence of "modesty squads" is simply a manifestation of such primitive and patriarchal thinking.

Regardless of the reasons behind their appearance, the groups should not be tolerated by Israel's leaders, as they contravene the most basic human rights of the state's citizens. Israeli lawmakers have a duty to clamp down hard on the mobs' extrajudicial activities, in order to prevent a localised problem spreading from isolated religious strongholds into the rest of the country's towns and cities.

Yet the ultra-orthodox enforcers have good reason to challenge any efforts to rein in their sheriff's posses, given that the example set by several Israeli municipalities implies that what is sauce for the religious goose is sauce for the secular gander. While the local authorities in Petah Tikva, Kiryat Gat and elsewhere aren't sanctioning all-out violence against girls deemed behaving inappropriately, their modus operandi is no different in intent – and the targets of their self-righteous rage no more deserving of punishment – than the girls in Meah Shearim opting out of the ultra-restrictive dress code.

According to reports in the Israeli press:

A special team in the youth department of the Petah Tikva municipality will locate [Jewish] girls in the habit of meeting with men from minorities and will assist them … 'The problem of minority men is well-known,' said the chief of the youth department, Moshe Spektor. 'Our attempts to deal with this problem are real and sincere. The municipality is making an effort to examine the matter in co-operation with the police'.

Of course, the minority in question is the Arab community – rather than any of the Jewish minorities in Israel such as those hailing from Ethiopia, Russia or South America – since it is the spectre of intermarriage between Jews and gentiles which is the cause of such abject fear among diehard Israeli nationalists, both religious and secular alike. As reported in Ha'aretz, Kiryat Gat's state-sanctioned anti-miscegenation programme's sole aim is preventing Jewish girls from becoming romantically involved with Israeli Bedouin:

The programme enjoys the support of the municipality and the police, and is headed by Kiryat Gat's welfare representative, who goes to schools to warn girls of the "exploitative Arabs". The programme uses a video entitled "Sleeping with the Enemy," which features a local police officer and a woman from the Anti-Assimilation Department, a wing of the religious organisation Yad L'ahim, which works to prevent Jewish girls from dating Muslim men.

Many Jews in Israel and the diaspora frown upon the idea of their children marrying out of the flock, some even going as far as cutting their children out of their wills and mourning them as though they had died should they take a non-Jewish partner for a spouse. While this is by no means restricted to the Jewish faith, the idea of such proscriptions being incorporated at state level – whether against Jews, Muslims or any other category of "undesirables" – is racism reminiscent of the dark days of segregationist America and pre-enlightened European states.

This week, the Times carried an illustrative and disturbing feature on the Israeli phenomenon, demonstrating the unabashed bigotry of those behind the purity patrols:

[David's] group, which works with police, goes by several names, including Fire for Judaism, is composed of up to 45 men and funded by private donations. Members say they are fighting a 'growing epidemic' of Arab-Jewish dating and spend as many hours as they can on patrol.

Similar groups have formed across the country ... In Pisgat Ze'ev, the growing number of Arab-Jewish couples is seen as the result of more Jewish settlements in Arab east Jerusalem.

'The problem is always with Jewish girls dating Arab men. The Arab guy comes and buys them things, treats them well. They fall for it. They can't see what they are doing,' says David.

The article goes on to describe a car chase, which ensues after David spots a "problem couple" driving in a car full of Arab men. He follows them through winding mountain roads, before taking down the car's number plate and reporting the incident to police.

That the police would even deign to co-operate with such poisonous and prejudiced characters and their fantasies of racial purity is indicative of the malaise gripping certain sectors of Israeli society, both at street and state level.

Whatever the more blinkered supporters of Israel's sectarianism say, day after day more evidence piles up attesting to the shocking reality behind Israel's mask of being a tolerant, equitable and democratic "country of all its citizens". The likes of the modesty patrols and the anti-miscegenation squads belong in the furthest recesses of history, yet apparently the Israeli authorities are not only happy to tolerate their presence, but to actively support their work as well.

Were the shoe to be on the other foot, with Jews singled out for such base racial discrimination, the same people supporting such behaviour now against Arabs would rightly be up in arms and demanding justice in the name of the persecuted. But, of course, this is Israel, and therefore somehow "different" and "unique" – the standard retorts of those unable to defend Israeli crimes with any semblance of rational debate. And while they continue banging their drums to drown out any criticism of the Israeli state, at ground level the divisive and destructive behaviour continues, and another nail is driven into the coffin of coexistence in the Holy Land. source

UNDERSTANDING~ Osama, Obama & Israel......

Osama, Obama and Israel, Change the Gameplan

I have been planning on writing about how the majority of the world views America and how Muslims view America in particular. And to explain how America can change this, IF it wanted to. So given that Osama Bin Laden just made a statement to America today, this is a good time to make my post. Ok, did you ever think the day would come when Osama Bin Laden would make a good point? Now, to be clear, I am NO supporter of Bin Laden, don't like him or his politics, he actually has no real politics or agenda, he likes to capitalise on situations and use them, and he harms his own people. He is not a true revolutionary or freedom fighter. Having said that, even people like Bin Laden get it right once in a while. Today he's told the truth, albeit for his own recruitment agenda, in this recent statement regarding America's relationship with Israel. Let’s break it down and understand:

Yes, America's blind support of anything Israel does is truly causing much Anti-American sentiment in the world. After all, America cannot claim to be the world's greatest "Democracy" if they don't lead by example. By that I am referring to actually supporting Democracy in all countries. But America does not do this, instead, America is selective. By supporting some democratic elections and not others. Additionally, America attempts to covertly overthrow Governments it does not like, tamper with elections and most of all refuses to recognise democratically elected governments such as Hamas and others. America will not treat the Afghan elections the same as the Iranian elections which they “claim” were rigged. Where’s the outrage, where’s the threats, where’s the diplomatic boycott of Afghanistan? Where’s the “sanctions”??? Nowhere, because both candidates were American puppets, one just cheated the other, so that’s alright, either way America wins. As opposed to Iran’s elections where America covertly infiltrated and controlled the opposition which ended up causing innocent people to die in the streets. But who cares, it’s only dead Iranians that were used by America. When you combine this with America’s total blind support for Israel in all areas including the building of illegal settlements on Palestinian land, and illegal use of American supplied weapons to murder civilians. Then what view of America do you think the majority of Arabas/Muslims in this world have? I am not talking about the “Uncle Tom” Americanized Muslims that Obama likes to parade across your television screens ad nauseam. I am talking about the regular rank and file Arab/Muslims of this world. They see America as being an Anti-Muslim, Anti-Islamic country with racial and ethnically religious overtones.

So here’s what America needs to learn if it is EVER to change anything. Understand this: Truth is that most Muslims in the world would NOT support Osama Bin Laden, nor would they “join” Al Qaeda”, nor would they want “Al Qaeda” to govern them or control them or take over their towns, cities and countries. However, that is completely different than turning a blind eye to Bin Laden when he slams America or attacks an American compound or American soldiers on Arab land. The reason for this is simple, what do Muslims see? They see the web filled with really vile neo-con websites spouting hatred, calling all Muslims terrorists, calling their religion a terrorist religion. They see American boots on Arab land; they see Israel acting with impunity over and over again. They see America coming down hard on Arab countries that may not be adhering to one or two UN resolutions, whilst totally ignoring the 62 resolutions Israel has broken and continues to break for years on end. They see Israel being allowed to have Nuclear weapons and Iran being told it cannot, this when Iran has signed up to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and guess what? Israel has NOT! They never see Israel punished for its aggression, its war crimes, its murders, its apartheid actions, it’s burning of Palestinian land, and it’s stealing of land, its military raids into Palestine and Lebanon again and again. In short they see America’s duplicity!!!

Instead, when Lebanon or Palestine manages to get a tiny little rocket off, America supports the annihilation of Lebanese and Palestinians using the most cutting edge weapons of mass destruction, usually delivered by un-manned drones. They see Arabs fighting with Stone Age weapons against a nuclear armed Religious state (Israel) with endless state of the art weaponry. Just who is occupying whose land? Why, Israel is occupying Palestinian land and Lebanese land it stole! Yet those under attack from Israel, who are occupied by Israel illegally, are expected to just sit there and welcome Israel to take more? Is this equal, is this a fair fight? Using this Israeli/American logic, should someone throw a stone at me, I should be able to then shoot him with a tank.

So how can America stop the downward spiral? Simple answer? “Equality” Treat Arabs equal to Israelis. Bring sanctions on ALL countries who do not obey UN resolutions that includes Israel, not just Iran! Begin to show Muslims that they are respected and seen as vibrant multi faceted human beings, with conservative Muslims and Liberal Muslims and all in between Muslims, just like everyone else and that they are not hated. Treat Islam as a religion, which it is, instead of continually sending the Bush message of combining Islam with terrorism. I find it quite funny that America has no problems with supporting “Zionism” which is not a religion but a nationalist neo-con racist movement, whereas Judaism and Islamism are religions, yet America demonises Islam and praises Zionism, go figure………

Lastly, to put this into a simple perspective. In Ireland, during the height of our conflict or war, which ever you want to call it. You could compare much with the Palestinian/Israel conflict/war. Irish Catholic people, the rank and file everyday people, saw over and over again the British Government oppressing, murdering and interning the Irish with impunity. Forcing at gunpoint, our people to live like 2nd class citizens on our own soil. Funding terrorist groups to seek us out and murder our political leaders. Shooting us when we had peaceful marches. Stealing our land and giving it to planters, creating great Irish slum areas that were tantamount to giant refugee camps instead of neighbourhoods. Burning our churches and attacking our religion. Even Irish-Catholics who had long left the religion suddenly became proud of being a Catholic, the religion became important, it became a sign, a banner. If you attempt to attack a religion then people close ranks around it and become more extreme in protecting it. In Ireland being a Catholic ceased to be a religion and then become a Nationalist rallying cause for equality. Which in turn then united ALL Catholics, even the ones who never before were religious. It became about our “identity” If that makes sense. This is exactly what America is creating now with Muslims.

So, when the IRA began to fight back against the British on our soil, the regular folks turned a blind eye. Maybe they did not actually join the IRA, maybe they would never take up the fight by hand, but they certainly looked the other way because someone was fighting against the oppressors of equality and freedom. We have an expression here, it goes like this; “Even the dogs on the street knew” but they never told……….This is what America can change with regards to Al Qaeda and the So called “War On Terror” (I HATE that phrase) but until America proves by its actions that it is truly the greatest Democracy in the world, and that it truly supports equality by treating Israel the same as Iran or any other country. Only then will America start to win the battle of the Hearts and Minds of the everyday rank and file of this world. Until then, people like Bin Laden will continue to use America’s biggest weakness, its world view and double standards, to recruit young people who have witnessed the horrors of what America and Israel can do in this world. Al Qaeda cannot function if America changes the opinions of the Majority of Arabs/Muslims and others in this world, it is the only way to kill off Bin Laden, take away his power, and his power is American Double Standards!

Israeli Army Trains on Al Aqsa Mosque Walls

Are the Zionists planning a future assault on Al Aqsa Mosque?

The Gazan Government is reporting today that the IDF are training to scale the walls of Al Aqsa. The report comes to the Government from witnesses at the Mosque and also from the Al Aqsa institution for Heritage organisation. The IDF trained for about an hour, using ladders to scale the walls from the South West side of the Mosque in the Al Maghreba district.

"Al Aqsa institution for Heritage" warned in an urgent statement that Zionist special forces perform a training to climb the walls of the Holy Al Aqsa masjid.

It said: "The training is a clear indication of the Zionist plans against the blessed Al Aqsa Mosque.

A witness told "Al Aqsa institution for Heritage" that by the evening of the day, they were surprised that about 20 of the Zionist special forces are setting up ladders on the walls of the Al-Aqsa Mosque from the outside, more specifically, on the wall of the women mosque, one of the walls from the South West of Al-Aqsa.

They were conducting training for climbing on the wall from the outside, up and down from Al Maghreba district, and the training continued for about an hour ago. source

COLLUSION~IDF & Settlers

Seth Freedman at the Guardian is right on the money today:

Israel's state-sponsored injusticeWatching the criminal collusion of settlers and the army in Susiya, it's clear this is a microcosm of an indefensible situation

Within an hour of arriving at the Palestinian hamlet of Susiya, the local settlers decided to make an unwelcome appearance on the farmers' land, shattering the calm of dusk as the sun set over the Judean hills. The intruders drove their sheep all the way to the edge of the Palestinians' encampment, encouraging their animals to gorge themselves on the sparse flora belonging to their neighbours' flocks.

Watching a crime take place is never pleasant for onlookers, but the experience is made infinitely worse when there is no recourse whatsoever to ameliorate the situation. In more tolerant and equitable societies, witnesses can pick up the phone and call the authorities, in the hope and expectation that the police will intervene on behalf of the victim and right the wrong being committed. But when the very security forces meant to deal out justice are standing alongside the criminals and providing armed cover for their actions, the sense of disbelief and disaffection with the status quo is off the scale.

In this case, the two settlers were aided and abetted by a pair of M16-toting Israel Defence Force guards, who stood menacingly in position to keep the distraught Palestinian farmers at bay; the hopeless cries of opposition by the landowners falling on deaf ears, the stony-faced soldiers gazed on impassively and let the settlers brazenly steal the crops from under their noses. Neither the farmers, their families, the NGO workers staying with them nor our group of eight visiting observers could do a thing to prevent the theft – and the micro-story on this remote patch of scrubland embodies the macro situation across the region as a whole.

Before arriving in Susiya, we had spent the morning in Hebron, witnessing the state-sponsored land grab and destruction of thousands of livelihoods to make way for a few hundred fundamentalist settlers whose ultimate goal is ridding the city of all Palestinians to live out some warped interpretation of Torah-based commandments.

Whole streets of Palestinian-owned shops stood deserted; their doors welded shut by the army – in the all-trumping name of "security precautions", of course – and daubed with outsized Stars of David and "Death to the Arabs" graffiti, courtesy of the local settlers. Palestinian homes sported vast metal grilles on their windows, doors and outside stairways to fend off the rocks and other projectiles hurled daily by settler men, women and children alike.

Back in Susiya, the situation is even worse.

After a night's sleep in a tent still sporting the scars of a settler attempt to raze it to the ground, we woke at the crack of dawn to accompany the shepherds into the mist-covered hills to graze their sheep. A pair of early-rising settlers were spurred into action, and they laid into one flock with fists and rocks, screaming at the shepherds to go back to their camp – and, once again, all under the benevolent watch of the soldiers on duty a few metres away.

Two attacks within 12 hours was nothing out of the ordinary for the residents of Susiya but were a major shock to those of our group paying their first visit to the South Hebron hills: ample proof that the settlers and the army collude to make the Palestinians' lives unbearable in an attempt to force them to leave the region for good. As a sergeant who served in the area explained in his testimony to Breaking the Silence, "The practical objective of our brigade was to guard the Jewish settlement in the Hebron Hills. To guard means also to make a ring around them, where other people won't live. They embittered the lives of the people who live there."

For those who see such embitterment up close, the settlers' and soldiers' actions are indefensible. An army of apologists couldn't convince the neutral that such crimes are in any way conscionable

WITNESS~Ethnic Cleansing in Progress

This has got to be one of the most vile things I've ever seen. Rhetorical Question: What has happened to Jewish people. Answer: Zionism, the 21st Century Nazis...

Uh Oh, Somebody's Not Happy

Israel's Ambassador Michael Oren has been called into the Principals office for a stern talking to! (make frown face here) Yes, Headmaster Obama is none too thrilled with Michael Oren who represents an evil ruthless gang that has been operating in the area. The terrorist gang has been forcing people to leave their homes at gunpoint and then stealing their homes and possessions.

The US State Department summoned the Israeli ambassador on Monday to protest the gunpoint eviction of two Palestinian families from their homes in Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem, an Israeli newspaper reported.

Haaretz said on Wednesday that US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman summoned ambassador Michael Oren the US views Sunday's evictions in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood as a "provocative" and "unacceptable" act that violates the Road Map peace plan.

Israeli forces first demolished gates on the two houses and then forced some 50 members of the Al-Ghawi and Hanoun families out at gunpoint, without letting them remove furniture or belongings. Israeli settlers who claim to own the buildings were then allowed to move in. source

These evil Satanic settlers need to be sent back to Hell from whence they came from. Yes, There is a special place in Hell for them all, at the right hand of Satan, exactly where they belong!

"Regrettable" ....The Other Choices

Hillary Clinton has called the continued ethnic cleansing in Jerusalem "Regrettable." After reading that lack lustre phrase. I wondered, as one would wonder, what other choices were available. So, I dutifully looked up all the synonyms for the word "Regrettable" such as: afflictive, calamitous, deplorable, dire, disappointing, distressing, dreadful, grievous, heartbreaking, ill-advised, lamentable, pitiable, pitiful, sad, shameful, unfavorable, unhappy, woeful; Given these choices,perhaps the words "Dire, Deplorable, Dreadful, Grievous, or Shameful" would have been a much better description of reality

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton condemned on Monday Israel’s expulsion of two Palestinian families from their homes in East Jerusalem, although later and in softer terms than her European counterparts.

“Well, I think these actions are deeply regrettable,” she said, source

In Another "Nazi" Move..............

Israel says to all Arabs, you WILL sing the Führer’s praise:

A leading Arab educator in Israel has denounced the decision of Gideon Saar, the education minister, to require schools to study the Israeli national anthem.

Officials announced last week that they were sending out special “national anthem kits” to 8,000 schools, including those in the separate Arab education system, in time for the start of the new academic year in September.

The anthem, known as Ha-Tikva, or The Hope, has long been unpopular with Israel’s Arab minority because its lyrics refer only to a Jewish historical connection to the land.

Mr Saar’s initiative is widely seen among Israel’s 1.3 million Arab citizens as a further indication of the rising nationalistic tide sweeping policymakers.source

Gaza's Children

Here's some good news about the children of Gaza. Video link after this:

From the BBC: More than 6,000 children in the Gaza Strip have attempted to set a new world record by flying the largest number of kites together in one location.

The Guinness Book of World Records said it had received an application from Gaza but that it was unable to send a judge to the event due to travel restrictions imposed by the Israeli blockade.

A spokeswoman said there were other ways of verifying the feat and UNRWA says a final tally of the number of kites flown will be released on Saturday.

John Ging, head of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency in Gaza, described the colourful effort as "an expression of the demand for liberty from these children." video link

"Cast Those Devils Out"

And who says "Satan" does not exist? Oh those "Warm and Fuzzy" Zionist men of "God" like Ovadia Yosef, a radical racist nutjob that makes Lieberman look like an Evil Little Chipmunk. Preaching from his perch overlooking Hell, Ovadia Yosef is at it again:

The spiritual leader of Shas movement, Ovadia Yosef launched a sweeping attack on the United States because of its demand that Israel cease settlement. He said: "We are not slaves to them."

He objected during the weekly sermon to the pressure exercised by the U.S., said: "Our messiah will kick them out."

Joseph criticized U.S. President Barack Obama and Western leaders to exercise pressure on Israel to stop settlement activity, adding: "Do not build here and can not build there, as if we are slaves. We were judged by the slaves (referring to Arabs), but our messiah will come and cast those devils out". source

This is no isolated incident sadly. Some of his past rants have included these "Warm and Fuzzy" statements:

In 2000, Yosef declared that Prime Minister Ehud Barak has "no sense" because he is trying to make peace with the Palestinians, which he likened to another senseless act, attempting to make peace between a human and an animal such as a "snake", which is motivated by instincts that cannot be overridden, asking, "Will we make peace with a snake?"

AND THIS:

In April 2001, BBC News reported that, "The spiritual leader of Israel's ultra-orthodox Shas party, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, has provoked outrage with a sermon calling for the annihilation of Arabs."

AND THIS:

July 2001 speech, Rabbi Yosef called for Arabs to go to hell: "In the old city of Jerusalem they [Arabs] are swarming like ants. They should go to hell — and the Messiah will speed them on their way.

Evil is, as Evil does………….and So,speaking of furry Critters, here's some comedy, check this Evil Chipmunk and Indecent Squirrel reports

Ho Hum, Israel "Wants Peace"

Someone needs to deal with these lunatics once and for all. Seriously, the world needs a bigger hammer........

Zionist Defiance to the US Continues:

Netanyahu Announces Four Impossible Conditions, Pre-Empting Negotiations with the Palestinians

Netanyahu's conditions prove futility of PA-Israeli negotiation

Before a special session held by the Israeli parliament on Wednesday, Netanyahu reiterated his conditions to resume the "peace process" with the Palestinians, including:

1. Recognizing Palestine as Jewish homeland,

2. Withdrawing all litigations filed against Israel for its crimes against the Palestinian people,

3. Dropping of the Palestinian Right of Return, and

4. Accepting a demilitarized Palestinian state.

Nazi Israel Bans Books

Israel takes lesson from Hitler.....again. Israel has surely learned a great many lessons from the Nazis'. Such as how to ethnically cleanse people they don't like, steal land, create a Theocracy based on a Racist Ideology and fire up their Cult Members to kill without remorse or humanity. And today we see another similarity, they are banning books. Nazi-=Zionist

Two days ago Mariam Kassis, a resident of the village of Mi'ilya - near Ma'alot in the north of the country - returned from a visit to Amman. When she sent her bags through the x-ray machine at the border crossing between Israel and Jordan, the Israeli customs inspectors spent time checking a dozen volumes that she bought for her father in the Jordanian capital, all from the series "Qawlun ala Qawl" ("Saying on a Saying"), written by Arab radio personality Hasan Karmi.

The series of books written by Karmi are in effect transcripts of selected conversations from an international radio program that he presented on the BBC Arabic service in the 1950s.

"People used to call this program from all over the world and the listeners conducted discussions with the moderator about literature, art, songs, folklore and anecdotes," Kassis explained yesterday, still upset by the incident at the border crossing. "My father has had the series of volumes for several years, so I read them and he read them and we enjoyed it. Before my trip to Jordan he asked me to buy a copy of the seriesas a gift for my brother, who is planning to visit here from the United States."

But then, said Kassis, "one of the border inspectors checked the books, passed them through the X-ray machine, flipped through the pages to see if I had smuggled anything - and handed them over for perusal to one of the customs officials. He doesn't know how to read Arabic, he doesn't speak Arabic and he didn't understand what kind of books I wanted to take home with me. He only decided that I couldn't bring them into Israel. When I asked him why, he replied that this was a type of 'trading with the enemy,' because the books were published in Beirut, and that Israeli law forbids it. I tried to explain to him with a smile what kind of books they were, but I'm an Arab woman - so he and his friends didn't believe me."

A customs official declared the books a "confiscated asset."

"I'm an attorney and I know when an asset is confiscated: Only when there's a criminal procedure and confiscating it is meant to ensure that a monetary debt is covered," she said. "All my pleas were in vain."

With tears in her eyes Kassis ended her trip to Jordan and returned embittered to her home village.

"I'm determined to get those books and I have no intention of giving in. I plan to fight to have the books returned to me. It's not because they cost me $100 and not because there's anything in them that I haven't read. It's a matter of principle," she said yesterday.source

It's a matter of "equality"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Israel May Self Destruct

In the Op-Ed section of the latimes I found this piece discussing the internal war in Israel, something I wrote about several days ago. Whilst I agree with the general premise of this piece, I think it is far more than just Jews for peace vs Zionist Jihadists. In fact it is the many years of a State creation and fostering of a nationalist separatist apartheid ideology called "Zionism" that will be the death of Israel. The general premise of Zionism is in itself exclusionary and separatist not only with regards to ideals and principles but over years has progressed into such a hardcore group being allowed to operate outside any man made laws because they are fanatics who answer only to a version of God they created. Where each person must submit to the hardcore principles or be ostracised as a "self hating Jew" anyway here's the times op ed piece, a good read:

Israel's war with itself

The rift between the Peace Party and Zealots that sent the Jewish nation wandering for 2.000 years has reappeared.

A few years ago, while walking through Mea Shearim, the Orthodox Jewish neighborhood of Jerusalem, I came across a strange poster. It pictured the Second Temple, the center of the world before the world was smashed in AD 70 by Rome, over a Hebrew phrase that means something like, "Jews! Watch what you say! For The Holy of Holies was destroyed not by Roman soldiers, nor by the Divine will, but by the gossip of the people."

What could it mean, this talk of gossip? After all, the history and its lessons seemed plain. The Jews revolted; Titus sent in the legions; Jerusalem was sacked and burned; soon after the wandering began.

In other words, don't defy Rome.

The makers of the poster, though, the story has a different meaning. Israel was not destroyed by Rome, they say, but by the feuding that preceded the invasion, the battle between the members of the Peace Party, who wanted to render unto Caesar, live like Greeks and then drift away gracefully in their own beds, and the Zealots, who wanted to die fighting. It's a debate that ribbons Jewish history, disappearing for centuries but reappearing in moments of stress.

As we head into yet another round of peace talks and the heat is turned up on the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, it's crucial to understand the divisions that run beneath Israeli life. There's the rift between Arabs and Jews, yes; the rift between Labor and Likud, yes; but there's also the rift between descendants of the Peace Party and descendants of the Zealots, evident in the never-ending debate: Are we too stubborn, or not stubborn enough? Are we too hated, or too afraid of being hated? Are we too aggressive, or has our fear of appearing aggressive caused us to sit in the sun as old Nebuchadnezzar builds his nuclear gallows?

In the 19th century, when the first modern Zionists decamped from Russia, they came with many theories but a shared intention -- to build a country where being a Jew would be so inconsequential that being a Jew would cease to have meaning. Only in a nation filled with Jews, they believed, could a Jew be free of being a Jew. These were secularists, scientists, students of the Enlightenment. They, and the waves of immigrants who followed them, became the elite of the new community: the left-wing politicians, professionals and kibbutzniks who built Israel, which they envisioned as a pragmatic, sane little country free of zealotry. For years, this state went unrecognized by certain ultra-religious Jews, to whom it was a grotesque presumption because, in their view, only the Messiah can gather in the exiles and restore the Kingdom. In the state of Israel after independence, many of them were marginalized --and marginalized themselves -- while the state was run by the progressive secularists, epitomized by David Ben-Gurion, the country's first prime minister.

But the national mood began to change in 1967, when, as a result of the Six-Day War, Israel took control of old Jerusalem with its holy places and the West Bank of the Jordan River, the Judea and Samaria of the Bible. The images of the war -- Israeli tanks in the tight lanes of Jerusalem, the Star of David flying above the Temple Mount, Jewish soldiers praying at the Western Wall, a remnant of the Second Temple complex -- were too powerful. People went mad with the miracle of it. For certain groups of religious Jews, the victory seemed to prove that God had in fact been involved all along -- that Yahweh was the secret force behind Zionism. No longer sinners, secular leaders like Ben-Gurion were now seen as dumb beasts, in the nature of the ass that pulls the cart with the tablets, knowing neither why nor whither it goes.

In this way, the Zealots got back into the Temple and then wandered out to the West Bank, where they built and prayed. In the years that followed, they and their right-wing allies gained political power, especially after the 1977 election of Menachem Begin, the first non-Labor Party prime minister of Israel. In this way, the argument resumed. The positions are basic: For one group, Israel is the only place a Jew can stop being a Jew; for the other, Israel is the only place a Jew can live an authentically Jewish life.

Though they inhabit the same nation, such people live in different worlds -- those who are in Israel to be more Jewish, and those who are there to be free of Judaism. If the former, you will see a flaw in relinquishing the West Bank. Without Judea, you will no doubt feel, Israel is not Israel. If the latter, the problem is just as acute. Israel, in possession of the West Bank, is outside the law, and being outside the law is not the way for a Jew to shed distinction.

History has described a tremendous arc, returning us to that same mountain, the same walls -- this time called the "security fence" -- where the rivals fight the same fight: more or less, worldly or pure, settle or retreat? (Last time, the Zealots won -- a victory followed by 2,000 years of nowhere to go.)

Unless Israel can find a way to settle this argument, the poster in Mea Shearim may well read as prophecy.

For another take on the same subject READ THIS

Zionists On Trial

It has been reported today that the "World Zionist Organization" better known as the "World Association of Racist Cockroach Settler Supporters" are on trial for stealing land, homes and ethnically cleansing Palestinians. So, what will the ruling be "Guilty" or "Innocent", "Remove the Settlers" or "Let Them Stay" Well, I'm rubbing my "Magical Zio-Crystal Ball" as I type, yes, the answer is becoming clearer, yes, I can see it now, the Judges ruling: "Too Bad So Sad, yes you Zionists were wrong (note the obligatory hasbara fake hand slap sound) "but as the Zio-Jihadists Cockroaches have already built their cockroach nests and are living among all the other cockroaches we cannot now force the cockroaches out of their illegal nests." In other words, my "Zio-Crystal Ball" has not much hope of any real justice for the Palestinian victims of the criminal Zio-Jihadists.

Bethlehem – Ma’an – Israel’s Attorney General has ordered police to investigate whether the World Zionist Organization (WZO) allocated private Palestinian land for construction in the illegal Israeli settlement of Ofra, north of Ramallah.

According to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Attorney General Menahem Mazuz ordered the probe after five Palestinian landowners filed a petition with the Court of Justice to stop construction of five settler houses.

The newspaper said construction was well underway when the petition was submitted, with the help of two Israeli human rights groups, Yesh Din and B'Tselem. By the time of the hearing, the houses were already inhabited.

During the hearing, the Israeli state's lawyers conceded that the buildings were on private Palestinian land, the newspaper said, citing a Channel Two television report.

Israel’s Justice Ministry wrote a letter to Yesh Din stating that it was launching an investigation.

The expropriation of Palestinian land in the West Bank for settlements often takes place through a series of bureaucratic transactions that obscure the overall project of settlement expansion.

The newspaper also said the settlers who purchased the land showed the court their contracts with the settlement division of the WZO. These documents stated that the land was transferred to the WZO by the Civil Administration official in charge of “abandoned property” in the West Bank.

The WZO’s settlement division in turn transferred the property to Ofra's “partnership organization,” which sold it to the settlers, the report stated. source

Israel Time Travels To Wild West

In a scene more reminiscent of Wild West Armed Outlaws, today Zionist outlaws on horseback waged a rampage on Palestinian land. Torching 2000 Olive trees owned of course, by native Palestinians. In the attack two Palestinians were injured and as always folks, "No Comment" from the ZOF (Zionist Occupying Force) or the RZP (Racist Zionist Police) it's the old "Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Cover Up" policy

Settlers on horseback torch WBank trees-Palestinians

Israeli settlers on horseback set fire on Monday to at least 1,500 Palestinian-owned olive trees in the occupied West Bank and others stoned cars, a Palestinian security official said.

Two Palestinian motorists were slightly wounded and five vehicles damaged near the settlement of Yitzhar, outside the Palestinian town of Nablus, said the official, Ghassan Daglas.

He said 10 settlers riding horses and carrying torches set fire to between 1,500 and 2,000 olive trees. Olives are an important cash crop for Palestinians, who have complained of frequent attacks on their groves by settlers.

Israeli military and police spokesmen had no immediate comment. Israeli media reports said the rampage was a response by settlers to the army's destruction hours earlier of a caravan at a settlement outpost built without Israeli government approval.source

Israel Has Big Problem

I recently wrote a piece covering the strategy of any peace deal,pointing out the huge problem Israel has created with regards to any real peace prospects. This problem is self created and is a much more of a serious problem regarding any solution to the Israel/Palestine conflict than the unity of Fatah and HAMAS. Today Haaretz has also touched on this subject as well:

Why should settlers have to pay the price for peace between Israel and the Palestinians?

The answer, in short: Because of what the settlement movement has cost us, cost Israel. And because of what it is costing Israel now.

1. The cost in dollars

The settlement movement has cost Israel some $100 billion over the past 40 years.

Setting aside the considerable waste and graft in building projects in the West Bank and Gaza, the cost to Israel's development has been incalculable. Settlement in remote areas has siphoned off critically needed funds for investment in employment, infrastructure, housing and social welfare in central Israel, the Galillee and the Negev.

Huge expenditures on West Bank road construction, including parallel highways intended only for use by Israelis, and roads built at great expense to remote and often illegal settlements, have taken a human toll as well. They have put off the upgrading of dangerous roads [designated "red highways"] within Israel, adding materially to one of the country's most lethal problems. Last year more than 440 people died on Israel's highways, more than 12 times the number of Israelis killed in terror attacks.

2. The cost to Israel's security

For decades, the enormous burdens of guarding settlements, policing roadblocks and maintaining the far-reaching bureaucracy of occupation have robbed the IDF of vitally needed resources of time and funding for military training.

In recent months, as Haaretz military commentator Amir Oren has reported, Prime Minister Netanyahu's wrangling with President Obama over settlement construction has been doing damage to the IDF's capability to face the threat posed by Iran.

3. The cost to Israeli democracy and the rule of law

The unwillingness of the settlement movement to brook compromise, even when in direct defiance of national consensus, and its explicit threats to exploit Israel's precarious political system to topple any democratically elected government which makes significant progress in negotiations with the Palestinians, places the very nature of Israeli democracy in doubt.

The double standard which for decades has favored settlers with inexpensive housing, heavily subsidized social services, and blind-eye building permits has long been accompanied by a kid-gloves approach regarding settler violence against Palestinians and their property.


4. The cost to Israel's diplomatic credibility

Both in established settlements and in outposts acknowledged by Israel as illegal, settlers and settlement planners have covertly bent and distorted zoning procedures, military directives, and government decrees in order to boost settlement, block Palestinian construction, agriculture, and access to employment, and effectively neutralize measures intended to foster Israeli-Palestinian peace progress.

Measures aimed at driving a secure wedge between settlers and Palestinians have had the effect of tarnishing Israel's international image, and have kept many nations from normalizing and strengthening diplomatic ties with Israel.

The settlers' rejection of all territorial compromise renders moot all proposals similar to the Arab League peace initiative.

5. The cost to Israel's relationship with the U.S.

With every move of ostentatious defiance mounted by the Netanyahu government, the Obama administration finds the Palestinian Authority a more reliant, cooperative, and businesslike partner for diplomacy and West Bank security.

The gratuitous machismo characterizing many of the declarations of right-wing parties, in particular the shrill back-benchers of Netanyahu's Likud and members of Avigdor Lieberman's indictment-shadowed Yisrael Beiteinu, has done little to win domestic backing in Israel, but has landed with dramatic and destructive effect in Washington.

For yet another angle, you can read THIS

Israel Creates Plan for Palestinian State

Well, here is Israel's outline plan for a "Limited Palestinian State" under Israeli control, of course! This "plan" will be part of a presentation to Washington. Yes, Netanyahu wants to show how using force and oppression, with a little wee tiny bit of freedom and a few juicy melons sprinkled over the top, will be just the ticket for a Palestinian state...Israeli style. But me thinks the natives aren't "buying" it:

“If Netanyahu thinks we’ll be satisfied with a few more Israeli shoppers, he’s kidding himself,” said Mohammed Larool, a melon seller. “Our rights as a nation are more important than my selling a few extra melons.”

A look at Netanyahu's "shopping" plan for Palestine, using Jenin as a model:

Israel offers Palestinians day shoppers, not statehood

Jenin’s model of ‘economic peace’
by Jonathan Cook

JENIN. The reality of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s promises of “economic peace” for the Palestinians is nowhere under greater scrutiny than in Jenin, the northern West Bank city being aggressively promoted as a potential model of co-operation with Israel.

Once known as the City of Martyrs for the high number of suicide bombers it despatched into Israel, Jenin was the site of a savage fight in 2002 as the Israeli army reoccupied much of the West Bank.

Israelis find it hard to forget that this was where they suffered the biggest loss of life in a single battle -- 23 soldiers killed retaking the city. Palestinians find it hard to forgive the bulldozing of Jenin’s large refugee camp, and the killing of 56 inhabitants in a few days.

But today Jenin, the first Palestinian city to be sealed behind Israel’s separation wall, is being feted -- at least by Israel -- as a successful experiment in peacemaking.

The Palestinian gunmen who once roamed the streets are gone, replaced, by day, by lightly armed Palestinian security forces trained in Jordan by a US general, Keith Dayton.

(NOTE:If you are not familiar with Col Keith Dayton, you should read this HERE)

Israeli soldiers, meanwhile, have unfettered access to the city between midnight and dawn, though nowadays, say local people, the army rarely makes incursions.

For Mr Netanyahu, Jenin represents his best hope of persuading Washington that an “economic and diplomatic peace”, as he referred to it at the cabinet meeting on Sunday, rather than full statehood, will satisfy the Palestinians.

The process of easing restrictions began before Mr Netanyahu’s tenure in March. Last year, Ehud Barak, then as now the defence minister, called Jenin a “great success” in what was widely interpreted as a test of Palestinian readiness for limited statehood on Israeli terms.

In addition, the Israeli government has backed the creation of a German-sponsored industrial park next to Jenin that could one day provide thousands of jobs. Four more such parks, all foreign funded, are planned for other West Bank cities, which are supposed to follow Jenin’s lead.

And a few hundred men from Jenin are being given permits to work inside Israel, most of them as manual labourers, while a handful of entrepreneurs have permission to do business in Israel.

But the most immediate effect on Jenin’s economy -- even if a relatively minor one -- has been felt from the decision to allow Israel’s own Palestinian citizens to cross into the West Bank on day trips.

Israeli estimates suggest that on Fridays and Saturdays, when Jewish towns are closed for business, hundreds of Palestinian citizens of Israel -- or Israeli Arabs as they are called by the government -- make the journey through Jalameh crossing to Jenin.

Most people in Jenin cannot afford luxury items, while Israel’s Palestinian citizens, even if attracted by cheaper prices, are constrained by restrictions that allow them to enter only on foot.

The most obvious change in Jenin is to the refugee camp, which is no longer the devastated space of a few years ago. It has been rebuilt with funds from the Gulf, though the Israeli army insisted on planning constraints: the roads are wide enough for a tank to navigate them.

If few of Jenin’s inhabitants question the financial benefits of Israel’s more liberal policy, there is a widespread belief that “economic peace” is being tailor-made for Israel’s benefit in much the same manner as the rebuilt camp.

“If Netanyahu thinks we’ll be satisfied with a few more Israeli shoppers, he’s kidding himself,” said Mohammed Larool, a melon seller. “Our rights as a nation are more important than my selling a few extra melons.”

Khaled Hamour, 26, who runs the Mankal restaurant in Jenin, said the prosperity felt by businesses was relative. “Things have been so dire here that just a little relief feels like a major change.”

But “as long as the settlements are still here, our farmers are being shot at, and we have no control over our borders, then economic peace is hollow”.

Shir Hever, an Israeli economist based in Jerusalem, said he was sceptical Jenin’s industrial park would ever open, or that the fruits of economic peace would be more than temporary.

“Netanyahu has no long-term plan for peace,” he said. “This is a delaying tactic and an attempt to improve Israel’s image internationally without making significant concessions.”

He added: “There is also a political message for Jenin and the rest of the West Bank in this policy. It says: remember you’re lucky not to be in the same situation as Gaza. Don’t resist or you’ll end up like them.”

“Israel is counting on Palestinians inside Israel being prepared to help Palestinians in the occupied territories,” said Tareq Shehadeh, a tourism official in Nazareth who has been invited to Nablus this week to lecture on co-operation across the Green Line.

“But they won’t go into the West Bank if they are treated like terrorists every time they do so.”

Samia Ziadat, from the Israeli Arab village of Mqeibleh, was waiting her turn to pass through the security checks with her five young children, after a brief visit to see her sick husband in Jenin.

“I have no choice but to go to Jenin, but it surprises me anyone is willing to endure this humiliation unless they have to.”

Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. His latest books are “Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East” (Pluto Press) and “Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair” (Zed Books). His website is www.jkcook.net.