NY UNRWA: Time for Arab Nations to Absorb 'Refugees'/other news
(Below is a list of some newsletters that you can either click on or copy and paste into your browser (in case the links don't work) if you care to see more of today's news. I will be adding more websites to the newsletter list, as time permits . MBS)
http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=193367
(Hmmm, I wonder what kind of response I would get,if, in my posts, I warned about the CHRISTIAN THREAT? Of course, I am being facetious but want others to realize how offensive Pike and those of his ilk are. MBS)
Bible Study: "When is the Second Coming of Christ?" with Rev. Ted Pike
11-1-10
Today millions of evangelical Christians believe the Second Coming of Jesus will happen within the next several years. Christ will "rapture" them to heaven, away from all worldly conflict.
Yet, in my latest Bible study I express caution. I remind Christians that, while Christ promised He would return unexpectedly, He also promised He would come only after certain, as-yet-unfulfilled criteria have been met.
Take this link to join me as I explain what Christ meant.
Biblical Answers with Rev. Ted Pike
One of the most common requests the National Prayer Network receives is if we know of a church where families can hear both truth about the Zionist threat, along with sound biblical teaching. We have been saddened, in most instances, to respond in the negative.
But now at Truthtellers.org you, your family and friends may gather and listen to sermons/Bible studies I lead, in which I not only keep you apprised of current events and threats, but also plumb the heights and depths of Christian theology, doctrine, and eschatology, as well as providing simple, common-sense guidance necessary for creating happy, effective Christian families.
http://www.israeltoday.co.il
Jerusalem church fire blamed on Jews
Jerusalem Alliance Church suffers serious fire, at least 3 staff wounded; church officials insist it was arson, and Arab media has jumped all local Jewish groups
Read More >>
UN official says Arab refugees will never get 'right to return'
Outgoing director of UN office responsible for Palestinian refugees says they should finally be absorbed into their host nations; Palestinian and Arab leaders outraged
Read More >> http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/
Posted: 31 Oct 2010 07:56 PM PDT
Bias is a normal part of human thought. It is not a good thing, but it exists because we are only human. Our viewpoints influence how we see things. And that in turn influences how we describe them. But just because bias is normal, does not mean that it is acceptable.
A doctor may like one patient better than another. That does not mean that he has the right to provide an inferior level of medical care to one patient. He may not be able to help being nicer to one patient than the other, but he may not actively mistreat a less favored patient. That is medical malpractice. Similarly a reporter who does not simply favor liberal politicians, but actively biases stories against their opponents is guilty of journalistic malpractice. He can no longer claim to be providing a public service, only serving as the mouthpiece for his ideology of choice.
Bias always exists, but journalistic bias has a tipping point at which instead of a free press, we have a propaganda press. When does that tipping point occur? Henry David Thoreau wrote that there is a certain amount of injustice in government, just as there is a certain amount of friction in operating a machine. But when "friction has its own machine", then the injustice is no longer an unfortunate byproduct, it is now the purpose of the machine. That is the case with tyrannical regimes who exist to oppress people, rather than the oppression being an unfortunate by product of the exercise of authority, as was formerly the case in the United States.
When it comes to the media, there is also a point at which "friction has its own machine". That happens when bias is no longer just injected into the reporting of a story, but when bias is the reason for the existence of a story.
It's easy to spot the difference between the two. For example, a reporter who covers a possible teacher's strike might favor the teacher's union and give more time to their grievances than to the plight of the municipal budget and the overburdened taxpayer. This is bias. On the other hand, when that same reporter begins running a series of stories about juvenile delinquency and rising crime connected to school dropout rates in order to warn taxpayers against voting down a proposed school budget-- then "bias has its own media."
The difference is that our hypothetical reporter is no longer only biasing legitimate stories, his stories are part of a narrative that exists for no other purpose than to convince readers to follow his agenda. That is acceptable on the Op Ed page, but not when it is disguised as news. And when entire newspapers, TV stations, magazines and news sites are run in this way, then there is a word for it-- propaganda.
When "Bias has its Own Media", then bias is no longer just the byproduct of journalism, or a symptom of bad reporting. It is the actual product. It is no longer a flaw in the process by which stories are reported. That process has been replaced by a new process in which positive material about liberals and negative material about conservatives is fast-tracked for a purely political agenda. In which news stories exist not to provide information about events, but to manufacture narratives in order to directly or indirectly achieve policy goals.
This is the literal definition of propaganda. The hypocritical mainstream media pretends that it's both independent and patriotic because it bashes the government when it's conservative and then boasts about its crusading independence, and then licks the government boot when it's liberal and boasts about its patriotism. This is a repulsive perversion of both words. The media is not independent, it is dependent. It is dependent on ideology and independent of the truth.
Today when the media pretends to report stories, when it's actually repeating White House talking points, then it is no longer engaged in filing stories, only in manipulating the minds of its readers. It is serving as the conduit for the narrative and agenda of a political party. This alone is not particularly groundbreaking, except for its comprehensiveness. There have always been political newspapers in American history, but they generally tended to self-identify as existing for the purposes of political agitation. And they were balanced out by other rival competitors, and by newspapers which were determined to try their hand at objective reporting, which made for a print landscape that resembled the present day blogsphere more than anything else.
However the corporate centralization of media ownership combined with the transformation of reporting into a field whose training is provided by radical academics looking to radicalize their students has created a structured left wing bias in reporting, that has since thoroughly tipped over into propaganda. And so we no longer have a free press, we have a propaganda press. We no longer have a biased media. Instead bias has its own media.
A single doctor who decided to stop treating Republicans would be a crank. And it would be easy enough to avoid him. However if the entire medical profession were taken over. If the majority of hospitals were owned by a handful of liberal corporations and doctors were trained in Med School that the public good requires letting Republicans die, rather than treating them-- you would have the same mindset in medicine that we suffer from today in journalism.
Media bias is the product of the politicization of a field to such a degree, that this politicization itself becomes the culture of the most influential segment of an entire profession. Rather than fighting for an armed overthrow, the American left sought to work from "within the system". And what that meant was infiltrating, influencing and subsequently radicalizing a country's fundamental institutions so that they would serve their agenda, rather than that of the people.
The left does not follow rules because it does not believe that democracy or a system of checks and balances or any form of rules that allows different political views to have expression is what is in the public interest. They believe that their way and only their way alone, is what is in the public interest. To see what a country run that way looks like, you could go to North Korea and try to sneak across the border. Or you could just make a much shorter trip to Washington D.C. where another Beloved Leader dictates his wishes and the mechanisms of government comply, without regard for what the people want. And if you want to see what a media run by people who think that the public good rests in convincing them to do what they are told looks like, well it's all around you right now.
I was riding in a cab to LAX when a local left wing talk radio station's message blared its motto. "Listen like you mean it." That is the motto not just of that station, but of the entire liberal media. And of their attached politicians as well. Listen like you mean it. That is exactly what they expect. A population of listeners that they will pretend to listen to, but mostly just ignore. Not people who are involved. Not owners. But listeners. Passive. Compliant. Willing to do what they are told for the greater good.
People who think that way do not believe in democracy. They do not believe in plurality. They do not believe in choice, because then people might not choose to do the right thing. Modern liberalism is inherently totalitarian. It is tied up with the belief in Government as God, in central planners and cooperative bodies (under community organizers) replacing individuals and elected officials as the key relationship in American government.
And the media's understanding of its role in such a system is to ensure that the people voluntarily participate in the cooperative bodies, and understand and comply with the instructions of the central planners to insure a positive outcome for everyone. Sure it didn't work under the USSR or China or Cuba or anywhere as a matter of fact, but as they say, "29th Time's The Charm". The future's so bright, you have to wear recycled burlap. And the Collective Compost toilet only overflows on Wednesdays.
But it is inevitable that every ideology whose goal is a political system that attempts to control people "for their own benefit" also believes that the goal of the press is to communicate the intentions of the authorities to the people so that everything flows harmoniously and smoothly with a minimum of gulags. Every time the media began launching into another explanation of why Obamacare was so great, and the only reason anyone thought otherwise was because they were ignorant brainwashed guntoting racists, you could see that same exact dynamic at work. The progressive propaganda machine ranting about reactionaries and blaming them for the lack of progress.
It could have been a newsflash from Moscow in 1929. Unfortunately it was actually a story being run in newspapers, magazines, newscasts and news sites all across America just now. And that shows the tragic degradation of the media, not simply into an organ of political advocacy, but into the lowest sewers of government propaganda.
And when journalists become whores, their government patrons treat them that way. What the media has yet to understand is that no one on the Right has as much contempt for them as their own Obama Administration, which has dispensed with such outmoded relics of journalism Presidential press conferences, access to the press or allowing reporters to interview a Supreme Court nominee. Those were reserved for the days of yore when the media at least tried to pretend that they were independent of the White House. By giving up their independence, the media also gave up the only reason why they should be taken seriously. And so instead the Obama Administration treats the press corps likely badly behaved employees who still haven't learned their place.
The paradox is that neither the Clinton or George W. Bush administrations which were at times authentically under siege by the press, showed this kind of contempt and hostility toward the press. But in 2008, the media gave up any pretense of being anything but carnival barkers for the Barry Hussein Show. And when that happened, they also gave up any credibility they might have had, not just with the Right, but with the White House. They stopped being the Fifth Estate, and became PR people who don't always know how to take orders from Rahm and Dave Axelrod.
The Obama Administration feels free to smack the press around, because by giving up their independence, the press also gave up any of the leverage they used to have. Once the media sold out everything, they have nothing left to offer anymore. As long as they are wedded to promoting socialism at any cost, the White House is the only game in town, and as long as they create the news out of White House talking points, the Obama Administration has the media right where it wants it.
By selling their birthright of objectivity for the pottage of ideology, the media gave up its power, and is now discovering that they man they gave it all up for sees them as nothing more than errand boys to carry his message to the people. By acting like the PR men for Obama, the media were reduced to just that. Bias now has its own media. And so does the White House.
Benny Morris: "The 1948 War Was an Islamic Holy War"
Middle East Quarterly Summer 2010, pp. 63-69 (view PDF) http://hosted.verticalresponse.com/385137/b6304b8718/1473000383/dbe7b2e248/ (Its pretty pathetic when asinine Jews don't seem to know what APARTHEID is. Maybe they should go to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, Afghanistan, etc and find out how many Jews live in those lands instead of turning against their own people. MBS) No Loyalty to Apartheid
On October 10, 2010, the Israeli government proposed a bill obligating non-Jewish naturalized citizens to swear loyalty to a "Jewish and democratic state." The International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN) deplores this attempt to demand recognition of Israel as a Jewish state – a state whose existence is premised on the removal of the indigenous people of Palestine.
In response to this bill, members of the Zionist "Left" in Israel issued a "declaration of independence from fascism." Announced at a rally in Tel Aviv, the Middle East's most ethnically cleansed city (indigenous population: four percent), the declaration asserts that the proposed law "violates [Israel's] basic commitment to the principles of equality, civil liberty and sincere aspiration for peace -- principles upon which the State of Israel was founded."
The Zionist "Left" is distancing itself from this policy, but the proposed oath is entirely consistent with Israel's racist foundations and continued ethnic cleansing – all of which the Zionist "Left" has played a central role in perpetrating and whitewashing.
In the 1930s, as the Zionist state was forming, the Histadrut and other Labor Zionist institutions campaigned to dispossess Arab peasants and workers, while helping crush the resulting 1936 Arab rebellion.
In 1947-1948, under the leadership of David Ben Gurion, Labor Zionism — the dominant force in the Zionist "Left" — also directed the Nakba (catastrophe), which established the "Jewish state" by terrorizing and expelling at least eighty percent of the indigenous Palestinian population.
In the following decades, "Left" Zionism imposed domestic apartheid, made apartheid South Africa Israel's closest ally, and led or supported every Israeli war of domination -- most recently in Lebanon and Gaza. Under Labor governments, Israeli settlements in Jerusalem and the West Bank exploded in number.*
Today, "Left" Zionists, no less than their right-wing counterparts, view Palestinians as a "demographic threat" to Jewish supremacy. Like the "Right," they insist that Palestinians ratify their own unequal status by recognizing 1948 Palestine ("Israel") as a "Jewish state." Ironically, this Zionist racism, violence and apartheid serve to deliver a segregation of Jews that parallels traditional European anti-Semitism.
The problem, then, is not alleged betrayal of Israeli "principles" at the hands of right-wing "extremists," but Zionism itself -- both "Left" and "Right." For Israeli Jews who reject Israel's racist foundations, we stand with you.
We ask others not only to join us in opposing the loyalty oath, but to reject the Zionist principles upon which it rests. Concretely, that means supporting Palestinian demands for an end to military occupation, implementation of the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their land, and equal rights for all throughout Palestine.
Official Trailer for new documentary short about the oldest Holocaust survivor in the world Alice Herz-Sommer. If you want to see the finished film early next year please email: dancingunderthegallows@gmail.com
Alice, the lady in apartment #6
http://www.youtube.com/user/AliceTheFilm *PETITION*
UNESCO is a danger to the world as it is a servant to the Big Lie that
would erase all western civilization, doesn't care about the murdered by
jihad worldwide, carries terrorists in its vehicles. UNESCO sides with
haters, As a loving Jewish Mother Rachel Imeinu denier and as a suicide's
mother supporter it is in effect ignoring the reality of suicide murder and
bombing of police and soldiers of free countries thoughout the Far East,
Middle East, Africa and Europe.
It is a tool of world jihad and revolution that would change things to
worse than WWII which was the reason the UN was created. UNESCO is against
the reasons it was formed, Stop the Big Lie. Stop UNESCO, a rubber stamp
for Jihad that ignores 3600 years of Jewish history when Jewish Mother
Rachel was buried "on the way " as quoted in the Bible to teach the good
ideology of the loving Mother Rachel who cries for her Jewish children to
return, for life and for Jewish Israel, the holy land of Rachel's and
Israel's Children. Not only is UNESCO acting as a cell for anti-Semitism,
history deniers, it is using American taxpayer dollars to do it. It ignores
the Oslo II Accords where Arafat, Clinton and Rabin on The Whitehouse Lawn
recognized Rachel's Tomb as a Jewish holy site to forever be under Israel
control. UNESCO must be removed as an official institution as it is
fostering the Big Lie philosphy and hate and would disrupt world stabillity.
re: UNESCO Erases Israeli Protests from Rachel's Tomb Protocol by Hillel Fendel
"The attempt to detach the Nation of Israel from its heritage is absurd," a
statement by the Prime Minister's Office asserts, in response to the UNESCO
decision to recognize Rachel's Tomb as a mosque and criticize Israel's
inclusion of the Machpelah Cave as a "national heritage
site."<http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/140347>
<http://info.a7.org/php_en/c.php?b=2770&z=17&clientid=1823&dest=http://www.webye\
shiva.org/fall2010a7300>
"If the nearly 4,000-year-old burial sites of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs
of the Jewish Nation – Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and
Leah – are not part of its culture and tradition, then what is a national
cultural site?" the statement asked rhetorically.
On Oct. 21, UNESCO – the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and
Cultural Organization – resolved that "Bilal bin Rabah
Mosque<http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/news.aspx/140345>/Rachel's
Tomb [is] an integral part of the occupied Palestinian territories and that
any unilateral action by the Israeli authorities is to be considered a
violation of international law."
Rachel's Tomb <http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/news.aspx/140172>,
located less than a kilometer south of the Jerusalem municipal border, has
been recognized for more than 1,700 years as the tomb of Matriarch Rachel.
Only ten years ago, some Muslims began calling it the "Bilal ibn Rabah
mosque" as well. However, no Muslims have been known to pray there
throughout the 43 years of Israeli control of the site.
"It is sad," the PM's office stated, "that an organization that was
established for the purpose of promoting the legacy of historic sites
around the world tries, for political reasons, to uproot the ties between
the People of Israel and their legacy. The State of Israel, as opposed to
our neighbors, will continue to maintain freedom of worship for all
religions in these sites."
*UNESCO Erases Israeli Protests from Protocol*
INN has learned that UNESCO erased from the protocol at which the resolution
was voted on the remarks of protestation by Israeli representative Nimrod
Barkan. UNESCO claimed that his words were "too aggressive."
Barkan said afterwards, "The decision is politically slanted, and UNESCO is
making a mockery of itself." Israel's Foreign Ministry released a similar
statement.
*When Did it Ever Become Moslem?*
Even the UNESCO decision itself could barely explain the Moslem connection
with Rachel's Tomb. In an explanatory
note<http://unispal.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/8F8CBDCA74D7D20385257721007157CF>to
the proposed resolution, prepared by seven Arab states, the holy site
is called "the Tomb of Rachel, home to the historic Bilal ibn Rabah Mosque."
But nowhere in the 11-paragraph document is it explained how or when the
site came to be Moslem.
In fact, Rachel's Tomb was venerated as such by Moslems for centuries, and
up to only a few years ago, official Palestinian Authority publications
never referred to the "Bilal bin Rabah Mosque." Nadav Shragai notes that a
publication called "Palestine, the Holy Land," published by the Palestinian
Council for Development and Rehabilitation, with an introduction by Yasser
Arafat, simply says that "at the northwest entrance to [Bethlehem] lies the
tomb of the matriarch Rachel, who died while giving life to Benjamin."
(IsraelNationalNews.com)
"Two countries, Syria and Palestine" share borders with Lebanon, in PA education
http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=3481
In a PA TV quiz for Palestinian university students, contestants were asked
how many countries share a border with Lebanon. The correct answer given by
the student and confirmed by the PA TV host was: "Two countries: Syria and
Palestine."
Although Israel is the country bordering Lebanon to the south, it is not
mentioned, and "Palestine" could only be Lebanon's neighbor if Israel did
not exist.
The Palestinian Authority as policy repeatedly denies Israel's existence in
its Arabic TV programing, presenting to children and youth a world in which
only "Palestine" exists and replaces Israel.
Palestinian Media
Watchhttp://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=ovtqbicab&et=1103840884766&s=4998&e=001AphYTz1ac8FbYWNa8yppilSz2XSQ4V5HhjqRdB8jvyKOvYvTUynb5bEp3i7pasVgc-xBv9x2X8_89m_0elWd7kkteNFOJIQPNDJ6DIPbGUA=
has previously documented similar questions denying Israel's existence on
the same PA TV quiz program. Israeli cities Haifa and Nazareth as well as
Israel's coast have all been termed "Palestinian." See transcripts
below.http://www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=2394
See PMW's website for additional examples of how "Palestine" replaces Israel
in the PA.http://www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=466
The following is the transcript of the question and answer in the PA TV
quiz:
PA TV quiz program
The Stars:
Host: "How many countries share a border with Lebanon?"
Contestant: "Two countries - Syria and Palestine."
Host: "Of course, two countries - Syria and Palestine. [Lebanon] is our
neighbor - it's impossible that we wouldn't know."
[PA TV (Fatah), Oct. 8 and 11, 2010]
The following are the transcripts of other questions denying Israel's
existence from the PA TV quiz program The Stars:
PA TV host: "[True or false:] The Palestinian coast is 335 km long.
Palestine Polytechnic team - your answer was correct.
The answer is 'false.' It's 235 km."
[Note: 235 km is distance from southern Gaza to Israel's northernmost
point.]
PA TV host: "[True or false:] The Palestinian city known as "the Chamomile
of Palestine" is Haifa.
The answer is 'false.' [Correct answer is] Nazareth." [Note: Nazareth is an
Israeli city.]
PA TV host:" Here is a simple question.
The area of Palestine is:
1. 27,000 sq.km.
2. 51,000 sq. km.
3. 81,000 sq. km."
Student: "The answer is 27,000 sq. km."
host: "Of course, we should all know the area of Palestine. 27,000 sq. km.
That is the correct answer."
[Note: 27,000 sq. km. includes the area of Israel, the West Bank and Gaza.]
[PA TV (Fatah), June 25, 2010]
Promotion of PA TV quiz program The Stars. On the screen the following
question appears, and is read out loud:
"A Palestinian coastal city is:
1. Ramallah
2. Bethlehem
3. Haifa
Send answers to the number that appears on the screen and win $500."
[Note: The Israeli city Haifa is the only coastal city of the three.]
[PA TV (Fatah), May 27, 2010]
In November 2009, PA TV introduced a weekly quiz program entitled The Stars.
The first season was funded by the European Union, and the quiz questions
all related to Europe, covering topics such as history, geography,
personalities, government, culture, arts and sports. Each program featured
competing representatives from two Palestinian Authority universities or
colleges. In January 2010 the competition ended, and the last program showed
a prize ceremony with the participation of Minister of Welfare Majda
Al-Masri; Minister of Prisoners' Affairs Issa Karake; and director of the
MAAN news agency, Nasser A-Lahham.
In May 2010, a new season of the program was announced, sponsored by the
cell phone company Jawwal. Palestinian Media Watch has been unable to verify
whether this season is also sponsored by the EU. The program's logo, a
virtual copy of the EU flag but lacking two stars, continues to be used in
this season as well.
Website: www.imra.org.il
Egyptians know the next Israeli war on Gaza
http://www.qassam.ps/news-3691-Egyptians_know_the_next_Israeli_war_on_Gaza.html
Al Qassam website - Top Egyptian officials informed Palestinian authorities
in Ramallah that Israel has its sights set on launching a military strike on
the Gaza Strip by the end of 2010, political analyst Mustafa Al Sawaf said,
adding that Cairo has placed conditions to hinder agreement between
Palestinian factions on security issues.
Sawaf said on Saturday that he was informed by sources who accompanied a
visit by Egyptian officials to the PA headquarters in Ramallah last Thursday
that Egyptian intelligence minister Omar Sulaiman told Abbas that Netanyahu�s
security consultant, who visited Cairo a few days back, informed Egypt that
Israel will carry out a military strike on the Gaza Strip before the year�s
end.
Quoting informed sources, Sawaf said Omar Sulaiman told Abbas that Netanyahu�s
consultant said the Israeli government was not content with Hamas�s growing
military strength or with humanitarian aid convoys allowed to be sent to the
Gaza Strip through Egypt.
Sawaf speculated that the Egyptian government may tighten its blockade on
the Gaza Strip by denying the passage of aid convoys and sympathizers and
monitoring borders to stop the import of weapons to Gaza.
Sawaf said that Cairo imposed conditions on Fatah negotiators before going
to meet with Hamas in Damascus to discuss security issues mainly not to
accept that Hamas cadres would assume command of any security forces in the
West Bank or the Gaza Strip, but the Egyptian regime did not object to Hamas
members acting as elements of such security forces.
Hamas would not agree to such conditions, the political analyst asserted,
which means that a reconciliation relied on by the Palestinian people would
not be achieved.
�We�re not talking about this to undermine Egypt, as Egypt is too big to be
undermined, but we put these matters out there now so the picture becomes
clear to everyone, and to reveal the nature of the [Egyptian] regime, which
works to materialize the interests of Israel and America at the expense of
the interests of the Palestinian people,� the writer went on to say. source:
PIC
Website: www.imra.org.il
PA upset over UNRWA official's remark on refugees By KHALED ABU TOAMEH
10/31/2010 01:59
"The Palestinian refugees' right to return to their homes and lands is one of the most important rights," says PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat in letter.
Talkbacks (40)
The Palestinian Authority is extremely disappointed with a senior UNRWA official who recently said that Palestinian refugees should acknowledge that they will almost certainly not be returning to Israel, officials said last week.
Andrew Whitley, outgoing director of the United Nations Refugee and Works Agency's New York office, was quoted earlier this month as saying, "If one doesn't start a discussion soon with the refugees for them to consider what their own future might be – for them to start debating their own role in the societies where they are rather than being left in a state of limbo where they are helpless but preserve rather the cruel illusions that perhaps they will return one day to their homes – then we are storing up trouble for ourselves."
RELATED:
'Hamas is in contact with most foreign countries'
Mashaal: Israel as Jewish state is attack on refugees
Whitley added: "We recognize, as I think most do, although it's not a position that we publicly articulate, that the right of return is unlikely to be exercised to the territory of Israel to any significant or meaningful extent.
"It's not a politically palatable issue, it's not one that UNRWA publicly advocates, but nevertheless it's a known contour to the issue."
Chief PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat strongly protested against Whitley's remarks in a letter to UN Middle East envoy Robert Serry.
Erekat praised UNRWA for quickly distancing itself from Whitley's remarks.
"The Palestinian refugees' right to return to their homes and lands is one of the most important rights," Erekat stressed in his letter.
"The Palestinians haven't given up this right since the nakba [catastrophe] that happened in Palestine in 1948, when Israel expelled more than 700,000 Palestinian refugees. And they will never give this right up."
Erekat said that "despite Israel's insistence on denying the Palestinians' right of return to their homes and lands, the right of return was legitimate in accordance with international law and UN resolutions, first and foremost [General Assembly] Resolution 194."
Erekat added that it would have been better had Whitley defended the rights of the Palestinian refugees instead of asking them to accept harm and displacement and relinquish their rights.
Zakariya al-Agha, a member of the PLO Executive Committee and head of the organization's refugee affairs department, condemned Whitley's remarks as "extremely dangerous."
Agha said that Whitley should have demanded that Israel implement the UN resolutions that it's refusing to comply with. He also urged donor countries to fulfill their financial obligations to close the deficit in UNRWA's budget.
Agha too said that sooner or later the refugees would implement their right of return.
"Those who think that the Palestinians would give up the right of return or accept resettlement are living in an illusion," he said, calling on the UNRWA official to apologize for his statements.
http://www.arguewitheveryone.com/general-political-discussion/154223-man-kidnapped-refusing-pimp-teenager.html
Man Kidnapped for Refusing to Pimp Teenager
Six Saudis kidnapped their neighbour and photographed him naked after he refused to seduce a boy for them to rape, a local daily reported on Wednesday.
The six grabbed the 20-year-old man in front of his house in the eastern town of Qatif and drove off to a remote area, where they forced him to strip off after he refused their repeated demands to convince a teen-age boy in the same neighbourhood to go with them, Alyoum Arabic language daily said.
Read more...
Ramadan 2010 Death Toll: 1028
An American poster threatened by a Muslim infiltrator. First the Jews, then the other kafirs...
Originally Posted by American Terrorist 
Time to kill every Jew in America and in Israhell along with every American traitor like you.
http://gay.americablog.com One of the packages containing explosive devices may have been meant for a North Side Jewish gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender congregation.
The packages, which originated in Yemen, were intercepted late Thursday night aboard a cargo plane in Dubai, and the other in England.
The Chicago Tribune spoke with the Rabbi Michael Zedek of Edgewater's Emanuel Congregation, which shares space with Or Chadash, a GLBT congregation. Zedel says he received a call from an official in the Jewish community Friday.
"(The official) said, 'I've got some good news and some bad news,'" Zedek said. "'The good news is that your congregation was not one (of the targets); the bad news is that Or Chadash was.'"
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1324735/Grandmother-married-Gambian-waiter-wanted-visa-takes-revenge.html?ito=feeds-newsxml She's the granny who wed a Gambian waiter 35 years her junior, then found he only wanted a British visa. Here, she tells how she's taking delicious revenge By Natasha Courtenay-Smith
Last updated at 5:44 PM on 30th October 2010
The warning bells should have been sounding loud and clear. Just three weeks before Mary Cotnoir's wedding day, her 25-year-old husband-to-be, Mr Demba Sanneh from Gambia, was denied a visa to visit her in the UK.
The Home Office said her fiancé had failed to give a 'credible explanation' for his trip and was deeply suspicious of his true motives.
So what did Mary, a 59-year-old grandmother, do? Did she take stock and accept that her toyboy lover — a man nearly 35 years her junior — was not entirely honourable? Did she even consider postponing her nuptials until she could be absolutely sure of him?
Food of love: Unlikely couple Mary and Demba on their big day. Almost as soon as she signed the register the relationship started to unravel
Not for one minute. Utterly smitten, she got on a plane to Africa and married him anyway.
It will, of course, come as little surprise that just eight days into their union everything fell apart after Mary discovered her husband was only interested in her money and the possibility of gaining a British visa.
This week, though, her story took a most unlikely twist. Mary, in an act of delicious revenge, announced she is refusing to divorce Mr Sanneh, so he cannot dupe another unsuspecting tourist into marriage — and bringing his dream of starting a new life in the UK to an abrupt halt.
Suddenly, this unassuming care worker from Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, seems somewhat audacious; and it's clear she is revelling in taking what she sees as a valiant stand.
Back home: Mary Cotnoir had hoped she would spend the rest of her life with Demba
'I'm just playing Demba at his own game,' she says. 'I hope what I've done will make other Gambian men, who seduce older British women in the hope of getting a visa, think twice.'
So how did this rather sweet and well-spoken woman end up embroiled in a relationship with an African man the same age as her youngest son in the first place?
Mary, who has five children and four grandchildren, describes herself as a lonely divorcée who threw caution to the wind for the sake of a love affair — the kind she feared she would never experience again.
Having split up from her husband, a police officer, more than 20 years ago, she'd devoted her life to looking after her 82-year-old mother and caring for the patients she visited every day. She'd never, she admits, thought about doing anything solely for herself.
'Getting involved with Demba was so unlike me,' she says. 'Looking back now, I can't believe I did something so stupid. But I'd been alone for so long, and it seemed so exciting, that I got carried away.
'When I said to my friends I was going to marry Demba, everyone told me not to. They said, "Why are you marrying him?", and my response to that was "Why not?"
'I thought: "I've got ten good years left in me and I want to make the most of them." I wanted to take a few risks, live a little. I'd never wanted to become a sad lonely old woman, but that was where I was headed.
'Then, this lovely young man landed in my lap.'
Mary insists that when she first went to Gambia, in January of this year, it was not with the intention of finding an exotic toyboy.
'Since divorcing, I used to holiday with my mum, and we'd have great fun. But for the past few years she's been unwell, so I've gone away on my own on package tours to Turkey, India and then, this year, Gambia.
'Call me naive, but I had no idea that Gambia has a reputation for these relationships between British women and young black men.
'But as soon as the plane landed, I realised what was going on. I couldn't even step outside the hotel without young men zooming in on me. One boy even grabbed my sun lotion from my bag and had his hands all over me trying to persuade me to let him rub it in.'
Sign here: The couple are surrounded by guests as Mary signs the register with her new husband Demba looking on
Mary sought refuge on the private beach belonging to her hotel, and it was there she met Mr Sanneh, a waiter at her hotel. He offered to act as her tour guide and, somewhat ironically, declared he would 'protect' her from the locals vying for her attention.
'The next day, Demba showed me round a local monkey park, and that night we went for a drink,' says Mary
'At the end of the evening, he escorted me back to my hotel room and tried to kiss me. I was surprised and told him I wouldn't open the door to my room until he'd gone.'
Once alone, Mary — who says at that point she'd not had a sexual relationship for more than ten years — found herself contemplating an unlikely liaison.
'The sensible part of me was saying I'm nearly 60, he's 25, and that I wouldn't even know what to do in bed after so long. But the other part of me was saying that I would probably never get another offer like it again, and I'd be stupid not to take it.
'I thought it would just be a nice holiday romance.'
Newlyweds: Grandmother Mary and 25-year-old Demba
And it was with the latter rationale that romance blossomed over her remaining five days in Gambia.
'It was just lovely to be with someone who was so caring, deeply religious — he was Muslim — and who didn't drink. Two days before I left, we slept together for the first time, and it was so exciting. It had been so long since I'd been intimate with someone.
'At some point during the week, Demba laid his cards on the table. He said he was offering love, sex and companionship, but in return he wanted my help. He said perhaps I could get him a laptop, then he could go to college and get a better job.
'I thought: "Well, a laptop is nothing" — and I wanted to help him. He had nothing. He lived with 20 members of his family in a tiny place. His room was like a cupboard.'
By the time she left Gambia, Mary admits she was infatuated. She and Demba stayed in touch via email and text, and Mary returned to visit him for another fortnight in March, taking with her the promised laptop.
They stayed together in a hotel room paid for by Mary, and on the second day Demba proposed. He offered her a ring he'd had made by a local silversmith.
Lovestruck, she readily accepted.
'I know it sounds crazy, but here was this beautiful young man proposing to boring old me — and I loved him. How could I say no?
'I did know, deep down, that it was possible Demba might not have been in the relationship for the same reasons as me. I understood he earned only £25 a month working as a waiter and wanted to pull himself out of poverty. But if there was a one per cent chance we could work things out, I was prepared to go with it.
'And other factors reassured me. For instance, Demba constantly dropped into conversation how much he despised people who married British women just to get a visa to go the UK.
'And Demba made me feel alive again. I was like a young woman in the first flush of love.'
Once back in the UK, Mary agreed to pay for her fiancé to take driving lessons so he could set up a taxi business. They also applied for a tourist visa so he could visit the UK for a holiday.
When this was rejected, undeterred, Mary set about arranging to visit him in September. And their wedding date, which had been loosely scheduled for sometime in 2011, was bought forward to September 23 this year.
'Demba used his religion as a reason to get married sooner than I'd wanted to,' she says. 'He said it was wrong for people to be in love and to be having sex outside of wedlock.'
So last month they were married in a ceremony that cost Mary £500 and was attended by 50 of Mr Sanneh's friends and relatives.
Fearing her own family's reaction, she did not tell any of them about the wedding. In fact, she hadn't even told her four eldest children — two sons aged 39 and 32 and two daughters aged 40 and 37 — that she'd met Demba.
'The wedding day was the happiest of my life,' she recalls. 'I wore a pretty white dress I'd bought for £20 in Turkey, and I'd had a suit made for Demba. Our reception was held in Demba's family compound, and he was full of compliments about how much beautiful I looked.'
But, says Mary, as soon as the ink was dry on their wedding certificate, the relationship began to unravel.
'We did sleep together on our wedding night, but the next day I made a joke about how, if the marriage lasted until I died, or until I was too old to want to visit Gambia anymore, I'd buy Demba a property to live in. I said: "You'll only be 45 then — you can still have another wife and children."
'The look on his face was one of horror. It was obvious he'd been hoping for a property far sooner than that. He refused to speak to me for a day, then he started on about what he was going to do when he moved to the UK, and how I'd be putting him up.
'I was stunned. And hurt. This was the first I'd ever heard about him wanting to come to the UK, and I knew then that I'd been lied to.
'Up to this point, we'd planned for me to spend six months of each year in Gambia, in a property I would rent. Then I would move out there full-time when my mother passed away. We'd only ever talked about Demba coming to England on holiday.
'Physically, too, everything changed. He ordered me not to wear strappy tops any more, and to cover myself up in bed with a nightie. I felt incredibly confused and hurt, and spent much of the time in tears.
'Meanwhile, his entire extended family seemed to be queuing up to chat to me about their plans for their future. One wanted to go to college, another wanted to set up a business, and they were all intimating that everything would be funded by me. It felt like every one of them saw me as their meal ticket.'
By the time she was due to fly home on October 1, after just eight nights together, Mary knew the relationship was over.
She says: 'After my visit in March, he'd been the one crying at the airport — but now he could barely bear to kiss me. He gave me a peck on my cheek, and then started on about money.
'He wanted money for his parents, my travellers cheques, my euros. He even had the cheek to ask for the perfume I'd just bought for myself. I can only think he wanted it for another woman.
'He got more and more demanding, until eventually I took the cash I had left and slammed it on the table. I was sobbing as I got on the plane.'
In the three weeks since Mary has been home, Mr Sanneh has been in touch, declaring his love and expressing his intention to make the marriage work.
But Mary says she will not even consider attempting to reconcile, and that the relationship is well and truly over.
However, she won't be co-operating with a divorce — which means Demba will have to wait five years until he can ask for their marriage to be dissolved by a court of law, without her co-operation.
She says: 'I'm not taking revenge on Demba because he was seeking a better life. But he just pushed things too far.
'People may laugh about what happened to me, but I don't actually regret anything. In ten years time, when I'm nearly 70, I'll be all on my own and there won't be any men like Demba throwing themselves at me.
'I didn't choose for this romance to begin — but once it did, I chose to have an adventure.
'Now, I realise Demba must have looked at me and seen a fool.
'The truth is I have been foolish — but I'm not a complete mug. And Demba will have to live with the consequences of what he's done.'
How Mr Sanneh must now wish he'd realised Mary Cotnoir was far steelier than she seemed.
I Wonder ...By Gabriel Garnica
Friday, October 29, 2010 - 5:43:47 AM ET
I wonder if any journalists have been fired for saying that people with rosaries who wear crucifixes scare them. I also tend to wonder if any Muslim people have been punished by any state government for specifically requesting a Muslim roommate. The other day I was wondering if any state official is pushing legislation stating that any threats against Christians or mockery of Christian symbols, images, or Sacred Persons should be considered hate speech worthy of heavy fines or jail time.
What if President Bush had traveled to India and booked nearly 900 rooms in various Indian hotels for a two-day visit there, all on taxpayer's money. Do you think that the liberal media might have made a few comments about that one? Suppose that growing evidence of Republican group voter fraud began to emerge days before election day. Might that same media mention that a few times an hour?
Imagine if a conservative religious group or a bunch of Catholics went around stoning women publicly for not following some strict religious code. Is it possible that some ancient, radical feminist might have wailed on about that one? What if some public school teachers were pushing Christian beliefs on classrooms of students. Do you think that we might have heard a few complaints about that little tidbit?
Pretend that Charles Rangel and Maxine Waters were African-American Republican members of Congress. Do you think that the NAACP or some other liberal group might have called them out on their despicable corruption?
Liberals love to paint Sarah Palin as ignorant and likely to utter the most foolish comments. They frequently question her credentials and qualification to speak about almost anything other than moose hunting, which they criticize as a barbaric practice. Despite this, these same liberals boast female political and celebrity mental luminaries such as Nancy Pelosi, Maxine Waters, Barbara Boxer, Joy Behar, Whoopi Goldberg, and Rosie O'Donnell, who all defend and support abortion, which these liberals defend as anything but barbaric. Frankly, watching any of the above mentioned liberal dimwits grasping papers while displaying anything resembling human thought is enough to make one choke in laughter. In fact, I am sure one could get three to one odds in Vegas that anything ever uttered by these bright lights will display the mental capacity of a drunken D student, with my sincerest apologies to drunken D students.
Have you ever noticed that patronizing, condescending look on Bill Maher's face whenever he is discussing conservative politicians or religious values? Imagine if he actually had any reasonable justification to believe that he has any clue about what he is saying or, worse, that he is in any position to judge the rationality of a squirrel, much less of any human being?
I wonder who will get blamed for the beating these liberals are going to get soon at the polls, despite their rampant voter cheating and corruption. Conservatives must be in for some election success, judging from liberals' current desperate, pathetic, swipes. I just saw actress Olivia Wilde's post-Apocalyptic President Palin video where she considers the prospect of Palin leading us "terrifying". How about this for terrifying: Being stuck on a deserted island with Nancy Pelosi, Maxine Waters, Barbara Boxer, Joy Behar, Whoopi Goldberg, Rosie O'Donnell, Bill Maher, Michael Moore, and Barack Obama as Master of Ceremonies. If that doesn't put you in the Halloween spirit, nothing will.
Copyright by Gabriel Garnica
http://au.christiantoday.com/article/muslim-tortures-accuses-christian-who-refused-slavery/9472.htm
Missions
Muslim tortures, accuses Christian who refused slavery By: Jawad Mazhar Compass Direct News
SARGODHA, Pakistan – A Muslim land owner in Pakistan this month subjected a 25-year-old Christian to burns and a series of humiliations, including falsely charging him with having sex with his own niece, because the Christian refused to work for him without pay.
Fayaz Masih is in jail with burns on his body after No. 115 Chitraan Wala village head Zafar Iqbal Ghuman and other villagers punished Masih for refusing to work as a slave in his fields, said the Rev. Yaqub Masih, a Pentecostal evangelist. The village is located in Nankana Sahib district, Punjab Province.
Sources said neither Fayaz Masih nor his family had taken any loans from Ghuman, and that they had no obligations to work off any debt for Ghuman as bonded laborers.
Yaqub Masih said the young man's refusal to work in Ghuman's fields infuriated the Muslim, who was accustomed to forcing Christians into slavery. He said Ghuman considered Masih's refusal an act of disobedience by a "choohra," the pejorative word for Christians in Pakistan.
On Oct. 3 Ghuman and 11 of his men abducted Masih from his home at gun-point and brought him to Ghuman's farmhouse, according to Yaqub Masih and Yousaf Gill, both of nearby village No. 118 Chour Muslim. Gill is a former councilor of Union Council No. 30, and Yaqub Masih is an ordained pastor waiting for his denomination to assign him a church.
Fayaz Masih's family members told Yaqub Masih that Ghuman was carrying a pistol, and that the 11 other men were brandishing rifles or carrying clubs, axes and bamboo sticks. They began beating Masih as they carried him away, calling him a choohra, Yaqub Masih said.
Gill said that Ghuman's farmhands tied Fayaz Masih's hands and legs and asked him once more if he would work in Ghuman's fields. When he again refused, Gill said, Ghuman summoned four barbers; three ran away, but he forced one, Muhammad Pervaiz, to shave Masih's head, eyebrows, half of his mustache and half of his beard.
After they had rubbed charcoal on Masih's face, Ghuman then announced that Masih had had relations with Masih's 18-year-old niece, Sumeera, and called for everyone in the village to punish him. He and his men placed Masih on a frail, one-eyed donkey, Yaqub Masih and Gill said, and a mob of Muslim men and children surrounded him – beating tins, dancing and singing door-to-door while shouting anti-Christian slogans, yelling obscenities at him and other Christians, and encouraging villagers to beat him with their shoes and fill his mouth with human waste, Yaqub Masih said.
Some threw kerosene on Masih and alternately set him on fire and extinguished the flames, Gill said. He added that Muslims made a garland of old shoes from a pile of garbage and put it around Masih's neck.
Yaqub Masih said the abuse became unbearable for the young man, and he collapsed and fell off the donkey.
Police Ignore Court
Masih's sister, Seema Bibi, told Compass that the accusation that Masih had had sex with her daughter Sumeera was utterly false. She said Ghuman made the allegation only to vent his fury at Masih for refusing to work for him.
Seema Bibi said that Ghuman told her daughter at gun-point to testify against Masih in court on Oct. 4. Sumeera surprised the Muslim land owner, however, saying under oath that Masih was innocent and that Ghuman had tried to force her to testify against her uncle. A judge ruled that Sumeera had not had illicit relations with Masih, and that therefore she was free to go home.
Her mother told Compass, however, that since then Ghuman has been issuing daily death threats to her family.
After Masih collapsed from the abuse, Yaqub Masih and Gill called local police. Police did not arrive until three hours later, at 3:30 p.m., they said, led by Deputy Superintendent of Police Shoiab Ahmed Kamboh and Inspector Muhammad Yaqub.
"They rebuked the Muslim villagers that they could have killed this Christian youth, and they told them to give him a bath at once and change his clothes, in order to reduce the evidence against them," Gill said.
Family members of Masih said Kamboh and Inspector Yaqub arrested some of the leading figures within the mob, but soon thereafter they received a call to release every Muslim.
"Instead of taking the Muslim men into custody, they detained my brother, and he was taken to the police station," Seema Bibi said.
On Oct. 4 police sent Masih to District Headquarters Hospital Nankana Sahib for examination, where Dr. Naseer Ahmed directed Dr. Muhammad Shakeel to mention in the medical report how severely Ghuman and his farmhands had beaten him, Gill said. He said the medical report also stated that Masih had sustained burns and that his head, mustache, eyebrows and beard were shaved.
In spite of the court ruling that Masih had not had sex with his niece, police were coerced into registering a false charge of adultery under Article 376 of the Islamic statutes of the Pakistan Penal Code, First Information Report No. 361/10, at the Sangla Hill police station.
At press time Masih remained in Shiekhupura District Jail, said Gill. Gill also has received death threats from Ghuman, he said.
The 11 men who along with Ghuman abducted Masih and brought him to Ghuman's farmhouse, according to Masih's family, were Mehdi Hussain Shah and Maqsood Shah, armed with rifles; Muhammad Amin, Rana Saeed, Muhammad Osama and four others unidentified, all of them brandishing clubs; Muhammad Waqas, with an axe; and Ali Raza, bearing a bamboo stick and a club.
www.compassdirect.org http://abna.ir/data.asp?lang=3&id=211211
Yusuf Islam (aka Cat Stevens), backing Salman Rusdie fatwah, appears at DC 'Rally to Restore Sanity'
| Among those who appeared at Jon Stewart's DC snarkfest (and attempt to suppress Democratic GOTV activists?) Rally to Restore Sanity in DC today was Yusuf Islam, the artist formerly known as Cat Stephens. |
(AhlulBayt News Agency) - It's a curious choice, to put it mildly, given Yusuf's alleged support of the fatwah against Salman Rushdie. All audio of the words he used to allegedly support the fatwah (which he has strenuously insisted he did not do) has been removed from YouTube, apparently at the crooner's behest.
And here's Salman Rushdie's own take, in a 2007 letter to the Telegraph, on what Yusuf meant:
Cat Stevens wanted me dead
However much Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam may wish to rewrite his past, he was neither misunderstood nor misquoted over his views on the Imam Khomeini fatwa against The Satanic Verses (Seven, April 29). In an article in The New York Times on May 22, 1989, Craig R Whitney reported Stevens/Islam saying on a British television programme "that rather than go to a demonstration to burn an effigy of the author Salman Rushdie, 'I would have hoped that it'd be the real thing'."
He added that "if Mr Rushdie turned up at his doorstep looking for help, 'I might ring somebody who might do more damage to him than he would like. I'd try to phone the Ayatollah Khomeini and tell him exactly where this man is'."
In a subsequent interview with The New York Times, Mr Whitney added, Stevens/Islam, who had seen a preview of the programme, said that he "stood by his comments".
Let's have no more rubbish about how "green" and innocent this man was.
israelnationalnews.com
1. Egyptian Author Threatens Lawsuit Over Hebrew Translation by Elad Benari 
An Egyptian author has threatened legal action against Israeli publishers who released an unauthorized Hebrew translation of his bestselling novel.
The novel in question is Alaa al-Aswany's novel "The Yacoubian Building". It was originally published in Arabic in 2002 and in an English translation in 2004. The book takes place in 1990, at about the time of the first Gulf War, and portrays modern Egyptian society since the coup of 1952, when King Farouk was overthrown by The Free Officers led by General Mohammed Naguib. The Yacoubian Building is an actual apartment building in downtown Cairo, in which al-Aswany, a dentist by profession, had his first office.
A best selling Arabic novel in 2002 and 2003, "The Yacoubian Building" has been translated into 23 languages worldwide. It was made into a film in 2006 and into a TV series in 2007.
The Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Understanding is the organization which had translated the novel to Hebrew, and explained that it was offering it to readers for free, to "expand cultural awareness and understanding".
In an online statement the group acknowledged that Aswany had refused to give permission for an authorized translation of the novel into Hebrew. Aswany for his part told Reuters: "This is a severe violation of my copyrights. The Yacoubian Building was translated, published and distributed for free without my permission."
While Aswany would not say whether he would ever allow an authorized translation of the novel into Hebrew, he said that publishing a translation without his permission amounted to "intellectual theft".
In fact, Aswany went as far as to accuse Israel radio of playing Egyptian songs without paying royalties. "Songs of (Egyptian singer) Umm Kulthum are broadcast every day for free on Israeli radio without respecting copyrights," he said. "This would never happen to Frank Sinatra songs."
Egypt and Israel signed a peace treaty in 1979 between Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar El Sadat. The main features of the treaty were the mutual recognition of each country by the other, the end of the state of war between them, and a complete withdrawal by Israeli forces from the rest of the Sinai Peninsula which Israel had captured during the Six-Day War in 1967.
The Samaria International Liaison Office, which has been monitoring the brouhaha, commented: "Gershon Baskin's 'Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Information' emphatic and arrogant attitude has resulted in the exact opposite of their goals. They set out to force more mutual appreciation between Egyptians and Israelis. But instead they have provided a strong platform for Egyptian intuletuals like Alaa al-Aswany to maintain his claim that Israelis are degenerates and thieves. In this particular case we tend to agree with al-Aswany."
Click here for an op-ed which takes a closer look at Egypt and its relationship with Israel.
| |  Political Cartoon Sunday, October 31, 2010 View It! |
2. Swift, Large-Scale IDF Action Caught Terrorist by Gil Ronen
Swift action by the IDF led to to the capture of a terrorist just hours after he had fired a burst of bullets at a car carrying a Jewish couple Sunday night. The captive is Mohanned Mahmoud Azza, 34, of Bethlehem.
A senior military source said the terrorist was caught as a result of "a successful chase by soldiers from the Nachshon Battalion and the antiaircraft array, which made the terrorist's escape more difficult."
The tracking-down of terrorist shooters immediately after an attack is rare. Usually, the gunmen manage to escape under cover of the night and are only caught a long time after their crime, through intelligence operations. This was not the case yesterday.
An IDF investigation has determined that at about 9:00 PM, Azza fired at an Israeli-licensed vehicle on the road from Har Gilo, northeast of Bethlehem, to Jerusalem. He managed to fire a single burst of automatic fire, from which one bullet struck the car, hurting no one. He then immediately attempted to escape, and managed to cover a considerable distance in a short time.
"We flooded the area with forces," the military source said. "We identified his tracks and the forces followed them. Because of the magnitude of the force he was forced to change the route of his escape to a more difficult one."
"We found him after three and a half hours in one of the ravines, on a steep cliff incline. The terrorist had been hiding between the bushes, but once he saw the force moving toward him he put up his hands."
The terrorist is currently under interrogation. It is not yet clear of he acted alone or was part of a group.
The IDF stressed that the Palestinian Authority security forces were not part of the investigation. 3. UNESCO Erases Israeli Protests from Rachel's Tomb Protocol by Hillel Fendel
"The attempt to detach the Nation of Israel from its heritage is absurd," a statement by the Prime Minister's Office asserts, in response to the UNESCO decision to recognize Rachel's Tomb as a mosque and criticize Israel's inclusion of the Machpelah Cave as a "national heritage site."
"If the nearly 4,000-year-old burial sites of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs of the Jewish Nation – Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah – are not part of its culture and tradition, then what is a national cultural site?" the statement asked rhetorically.
On Oct. 21, UNESCO – the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization – resolved that "Bilal bin Rabah Mosque/Rachel's Tomb [is] an integral part of the occupied Palestinian territories and that any unilateral action by the Israeli authorities is to be considered a violation of international law."
Rachel's Tomb, located less than a kilometer south of the Jerusalem municipal border, has been recognized for more than 1,700 years as the tomb of Matriarch Rachel. Only ten years ago, some Muslims began calling it the "Bilal ibn Rabah mosque" as well. However, no Muslims have been known to pray there throughout the 43 years of Israeli control of the site.
"It is sad," the PM's office stated, "that an organization that was established for the purpose of promoting the legacy of historic sites around the world tries, for political reasons, to uproot the ties between the People of Israel and their legacy. The State of Israel, as opposed to our neighbors, will continue to maintain freedom of worship for all religions in these sites."
UNESCO Erases Israeli Protests from Protocol
INN has learned that UNESCO erased from the protocol at which the resolution was voted on the remarks of protestation by Israeli representative Nimrod Barkan. UNESCO claimed that his words were "too aggressive."
Barkan said afterwards, "The decision is politically slanted, and UNESCO is making a mockery of itself." Israel's Foreign Ministry released a similar statement.
When Did it Ever Become Moslem?
Even the UNESCO decision itself could barely explain the Moslem connection with Rachel's Tomb. In an explanatory note to the proposed resolution, prepared by seven Arab states, the holy site is called "the Tomb of Rachel, home to the historic Bilal ibn Rabah Mosque." But nowhere in the 11-paragraph document is it explained how or when the site came to be Moslem.
In fact, Rachel's Tomb was venerated as such by Moslems for centuries, and up to only a few years ago, official Palestinian Authority publications never referred to the "Bilal bin Rabah Mosque." Nadav Shragai notes that a publication called "Palestine, the Holy Land," published by the Palestinian Council for Development and Rehabilitation, with an introduction by Yasser Arafat, simply says that "at the northwest entrance to [Bethlehem] lies the tomb of the matriarch Rachel, who died while giving life to Benjamin."
4. Time Clock Wreaks Havoc at Channel 1, Israel Radio by David Lev
Channel One's 9 PM Mabat newscast, which has been broadcast in its time slot since the TV broadcasts began in Israel in the late 1960s, will either move to an earlier hour or be cancelled altogether because of a contract dispute with the Treasury. The Israel Broadcast Authority, under instructions from the Finance Ministry, is cutting out overtime pay and installing a time clock which workers will have to clock in and out with at work. As a result of the new rules, nearly all live broadcasts that were broadcast after 7 PM and on weekends are set to be cancelled.
The changes are due to take effect on Tuesday, November 2.
While IBA staff and management have agreed to broadcast Mabat earlier in the evening – most likely at 6:30 PM – it is possible that the program will be significantly shortened, or may not even be broadcast at all, IBA sources said. Similarly, all other live events, such as sports matches, will no longer be seen on Channel 1, and management was seeking to work out a deal with one of the commercial or cable stations for broadcast of games of the Israel Premier Soccer League (Ligat Ha'al).
The changes also affect Israel Radio, which will also no longer broadcast live events after 7 PM. As a result, soccer and basketball games will likely not be broadcast on the radio at all.
Long-time staff members and contract workers are strongly opposed to the installation of the time clock, but the clock is a requirement of the reforms being instituted by IBA management on the orders of the Treasury, which has said that the IBA had no right to sign contracts with many of its workers.
MK Ofir Akunis, chairman of the Knesset Economic Affairs Committee, told reporters Sunday that he planned to convene a meeting specifically to discuss the situation at the IBA, and to seek ways to convince workers to continue broadcasting after 7 PM. "There is no place for these kinds of actions on the part of employees. I don't know who is to blame or why, and I don't care. The bottom line is that it is a huge error to move Mabat to 7 PM. The viewers will be mainly hurt by this move, as Channel One's audience has specific, long-time viewing habits."
IBA sources said that a committee of top IBA officials will meet daily to decide on how to handle each day's nighttime broadcasts, and to approve overtime pay if necessary.
5. Labor MK Wants Women in Peace Talks by Maayana Miskin
Labor MK Einat Wilf is pushing for more female involvement in possible negotiations with the Palestinian Authority. The Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee and the Committee on the Status of Women plan to meet to discuss the issue.
The meeting was planned to coincide with the tenth anniversary of UN Security Council resolution 1325, which calls to include women in peace talks around the world.
The organization most closely associated with Resolution 1325 is the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), a 95 year old pacifist group with radical views on Israel. In its 2010 "Statement on Palestine," WILPF's Middle East Committee blamed the Cast Lead counter-terror operation and the IDF closure of Gaza for terrible health problems: "Because of the war and the siege, Gaza has suffered health epidemics, including greatly increased birth defects and leukemia," it says. There is no reference to a study or any other source that backs up these claims.
Wilf did not mention WILPF, but said: "The important thing is to see how resolution 1325 has been implemented, beyond declarations," Wilf said. She said the issue is particularly important "due to the possibility of opening direct negotiations with the Palestinians."
Wilf declared that she believes female representatives in negotiations could have a positive impact. "Beyond the obligation to uphold the law, the inclusion of women in decision-making during negotiations will enrich the Israeli position with a perspective that is not always included in public discourse," she stated.
The push to include women in talks has continued despite the cessation of talks several weeks ago. PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has refused to speak to Israel unless Israel agrees to freeze all construction for Jews east of the 1949 armistice line – including in Jerusalem, Israel's capital city.
In July, feminist activists pushed to include a woman on the Turkel Commission, which is tasked with investigating a clash between Israeli soldiers and Turkish terrorists off the coast of Gaza. While activists said a woman should be appointed "to give voice to the necessary gender perspective," many of those involved hold radical left-wing views, and emails traded within the group suggested that they were hoping to see the commission include a woman with extreme-left political leanings.
6. Senator Schumer: Settlements No Obstacle to Peace by Israel News staff
Senator Chuck (Charles) Schumer took the Obama administration to task for its Middle East policy on Sunday. What Obama must realize is that Arab refusal to recognize the Jewish state, and not Israelis in Judea and Samaria, is the obstacle to peace, he said.
"My basic view is very simple," Schumer told his audience at the Agudath Yisrael breakfast in New York. "The reason we don't have peace in the Middle East is because a large percentage, I would say the majority.... of Palestinians and Arabs do not believe there should be a Jewish state anywhere in the Middle East. Period."
U.S. President Barack Obama's decision to criticize Israel over construction for Jews in Judea and Samaria was "counterproductive," he said. America's position on Jewish communities was "to the left of the PA" at one point, he added. Schumer noted that he made his objections known at the time, both in private meetings and publicly.
"Anyone who thinks the settlements are the cause of the problem, all they have to do is look at Gaza," he said. Israel withdrew from Gaza completely, "and what was the response? Missiles on Sderot!" Schumer recalled.
What Obama and America should do for peace is to make it known that America's ties with Israel cannot be broken, he said. "By giving the Palestinian and the Arab world hope that they can break the tie between the U.S. and Israel, you don't further the cause of peace, you set back the cause of peace... If they think the tie is immutable, they will say, well maybe we should throw in the towel and have some kind of peace with Israel. It's that simple."
While it is possible to hold any one of a variety of views regarding Israel-PA negotiations, "what's unequivocally wrong in my opinion is saying that settlements are the reason there's not peace and there's not talks," the senator said.
He expressed belief that the Obama's administration's views are changing "in a positive direction," saying, "We have some very strong allies within the administration."
Schumer's speech was met with enthusiastic applause.
"Senator Schumer's comments are significant because he has been one of the strongest supporters of Obama's policies both domestically and on foreign issues," explained Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) Vice-President Rubin Margules. "He has always been a strong supporter of Israel, and his pro-settlement statements this morning reflect an emerging change in the attitude of many members of congress who are more vocal in their disagreement with Obama's policies." 7. Poll Reveals 'Secrets' of the Hareidi Community by David Lev
A wide-ranging poll by the Geocartographia organization of the hareidi-religious Jewish public says that the community will consist of over one million members inside of a dozen years. By 2022, the poll says, the hareidi community in all of its forms – Hassidic, "Lithuanian," and Sephardic – will number 1,018,535 individuals.
By 2022, the poll says, the Hareidi community in all of its forms – Hassidic, "Lithuanian," and Sephardic – will number 1,018,535 individuals.
Currently, population experts estimate that the community consists of some 650,000 members. The near-doubling of the community by 2022 will be due to natural growth, as the average hareidi family has between 6 and 8 children. Experts believe there are currently 1.3 million hareidim in the world today.
The poll revealed some other interesting statistics about the community: For example, on average, hareidi families spend some NIS 3 billion ($725 million) on food products each year, out of a total of NIS 45.3 billion spent by all Israelis. Forty percent of hareidi parents go out to eat at least once a week, the poll said, as compared to 53% of the general population. Only 19% of hareidi families order food in from restaurants and fast food establishments; however, 29% of hareidim entertain guests at home on a regular basis, compared to 13% of all Israelis.
The poll also said that 66% of hareidi families do not own cars – and those that do prefer to buy used cars instead of new. Thirty nine percent own at least one cellphone, and 31.7% have more than one subscription. In addition, the poll said, 85% of hareidim said they were in good health, compared to 67% of the general population.
8. Was September Plane Crash a 'Practice Run' for Parcel Bombs? by David Lev 
United States and United Arab Emirates officials are said to be rethinking the causes of a plane crash in the UAE in September, in which a UPS jet carrying batteries was downed. Officials say that no evidence of a bomb was found, but a report on Channel 2 Sunday night said that, given the revelations that Al-Qaeda terrorists tried to send bombs to Jewish institutions in the United States via overnight parcels, experts are investigating the terror angle in September's crash. The UPS plane had made several stops in Middle Eastern countries before leaving the UAE for Europe. It was to have flown to the U.S. after stopping in Germany.
Right now we're making sure that we look at possible other events or other developments that might have some relationship with the most recent packages that we've discovered.
In an official statement, the UAE's General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) said that it "has concluded that there was no presence of acoustic evidence or any forensic signature supporting the detonation of an explosive device" in the crash of the UPS plane on September 3. The plane was on its way to Cologne, Germany, when it crashed into a military facility in Dubai. The pilot had reported smoke in the cockpit right before the crash. Despite the statement, the GCAA said it was continuing its investigation.
But on the CNN "State of the Union" interview program Sunday, John Brennan, who is a White House special counter-terrorism expert, said that the U.S. was "closely looking" at the September crash in light of the new developments. Brennan, in a follow up question on the September crash after discussing the parcel bomb plot with CNN's Candy Crowley, said that "right now we're making sure that we look at possible other events or other developments that might have some relationship with the most recent packages that we've discovered."
Brennan added that he believed – and hoped – that the current threat was over. "We are working with the intelligence that we have. We feel as though we've stopped all of the packages that have come into the United States that were originating in Yemen." However, he said, there was no guarantee that other packages would not be found. "The Yemeni authorities have cooperated to date. I really hope that cooperation continues. So we're trying to make sure that if there are other packages out there, that we're able to find them before they're able to be detonated," he added.
Speaking on Army Radio Sunday morning, an Israeli security official said Sunday that the explosive parcels found over the weekend in Britain and Dubai would not have made it onto the plane in Israel. "Already from the early 1970s our security officials realized that we had to check commercial cargo, not just travelers, hand bags, and luggage," Pini Schiff, the head of security at Ben Gurion Airport, told Army Radio. "You have to pay attention to all aspects of a plane's preparation in order to ensure that it can take off and arrive at its destination safely."
The packages discovered over the weekend were found in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and in Britain, and had been cleared for shipment to Jewish institutions in Chicago. According to the U.S. Transport Safety Administration, at least 38% of cargo coming into the U.S. was not screened for security The two largest international parcel shippers, UPS and Fedex, ship nearly 25 million packages a day between them, according to TSA officials.
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NY UNRWA: Time for Arab Nations to Absorb 'Refugees' by Chana Ya'ar
The outgoing director of the New York office of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency has angered Jordan after stating it is time for Arab nations to absorb their brethren who are "refugees" from the 1948 war.
Andrew Whitley stated that Palestinian refugees must not live in the illusion of achieving the "right to return" and that the Arab countries must search for a place for them in their lands to resettle there.
When UNRWA began its operations providing aid and services to the Arabs living in Israel in 1949, there were approximately 700,000 who qualified as "refugees." Today, according to the latest statistics, that number has ballooned to nearly five million.
"We recognize, as I think most do, although it's not a position that we publicly articulate, that the right of return is unlikely to be exercised to the territory of Israel to any significant or meaningful extent," Whitley told a conference at the National Council for US-Arab Relations.
"It's not a politically palatable issue, it's not one that UNRWA publicly advocates, but nevertheless it's a known contour to the issue," he said.
Taking the proverbial bull by the horns, Whitley then went on to add that instead of continuing to promote that "cruel illusion," it would be best if Palestinian Authority Arabs began to consider "their own role in the societies where they are, rather than being left in a state of limbo, where they are helpless."
The Hamas terrorist organization immediately demanded Whitley's dismissal: a moot point, however, since he was already leaving the agency.
Wajih Azaizeh, director general of the Palestinian Affairs Department, meanwhile, told the Petra news agency Thursday that Jordan expressed its condemnation in a letter sent to UNRWA Commissioner-General Filippo Grandi.
The letter bluntly reminded Grandi that his agency was established to offer humanitarian and social help and support to the Palestinian refugees, said Azaizeh, until their cause is resolved according to international legitimacy resolutions.
"We have asked the UNRWA Commissioner-General to clarify the U.N. Organization's official position on such dangerous remarks and procedures taken against this man who held important posts in the agency," Azaizeh said.
Political commentator Ben S. Cohen noted last week in a post on Harry's Place, however, that of the 50 million people who lost their homes due to war and military conflict in the 20th century, "practically none of the original displaced returned to their homes, never mind their descendants. The historical record shows the refugees – like those 17,000 displaced Jews administered to by UNRWA back in 1950 – are invariably absorbed by host countries."
The difference, Cohen pointed out, was that the surrounding Arab nations in this case have deliberately positioned the Palestinian refugee issue and the so-called "right of return" as an ongoing obstacle to a final settlement of the conflict with Israel.
"Accepting that the refugees will not go home, that they will live free of the apartheid conditions imposed on them in states like Lebanon and Syria, and that they might even receive some financial compensation on top, is the height of political incorrectness in the Middle East," he observed.
"It means accepting not only that Israel has the right to exist, but also the right to define itself as the democratic state of the Jewish people."
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort. ~Herm Albright~
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