World against Jews: Battleground Jerusalem/other news
(Please remember that if you click on an individual article's link and get my personal AOL email page, to click on the main link for that website or else copy and paste it, in order to read entire article and see videos, and remember, it is the rich oil cartels that control the world, NOT the Zionists. If a specific article stands out for you, I ENCOURAGE you to copy and paste it in its entirety and send it to the groups. Permission is granted to fwd and share any posts that I send. MBS)
(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.israpundit.com
http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/
http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/
- Book Publishers' Continued Cold Feet over Islam
- Internet Freedom Under Siege
- Nobel Peace Prize Update
- $900 Million for What?
- Netanyahu's Jewish-State Gambit
- Introduction to a Farce: The Current State of Israel-PA Negotiations
- Geert Wilders, Close to Exoneration
yidwithlid.blogspot.com
sheikyermami.com http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/ - Sabbath music video
- Please send money
- Turkey files a complaint with the International Criminal Court
- Carl Bildt goes off the deep end
- 'Palestinians' reject plan to 'resettle' them in the US
- Uh oh... Netanyahu backing off Jordan Valley demand
- LATMA tribal update: Media unmasked on film and fun with Walid in the Tel Aviv sun
- IDF deploying third anti-missile battery
- Michael Oren helps out with Rahm's Jewish problem
- If at first you don't succeed, talk some more
- Shamir's son to Netanyahu: 'Just say no'
- Gary Ackerman's Soros money
- Portugal upgrades relations with the 'Palestinian Authority'
- How one elite IDF combat unit is spending October
jihadwatch.org http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com/ Mideast conflict blamed for Christian exodus By NICOLE WINFIELD
VATICAN CITY -- Bishops summoned to the Vatican to discuss the flight of Christians from the Middle East have blamed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for spurring much of the exodus and warned that the consequences could be devastating for the birthplace of Christianity.
Some bishops have singled out the emergence of fanatical Islam for the flight. But others have directly or indirectly accused Israel of discriminating against Arab Christians and impeding solutions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
In fact, the working document of the two-week synod accused the Israeli "occupation" of Palestinian territories of creating difficulties in everyday life for Palestinian Christians, including their religious life since their access to holy sites is dependent on Israeli military permission.
Pope Benedict XVI called the two-week synod, which continued Wednesday, to try to encourage Christians in the largely Muslim region, where the Catholic Church has long been a minority and is shrinking as a result of war, conflict, discrimination and economic problems.
In Iraq alone, Catholics represented 2.89 percent of the population in 1980; by 2008 they were just .89 percent. In Israel, home to important Christian holy sites, Catholics made up 3.8 percent of the population in 1980; by 2008 they were just 1.82 percent.
About 185 bishops are taking part in the synod from Latin and Eastern rite Catholic churches across the region and from the diaspora. In addition, two Muslim imams and a rabbi were invited to address the synod.
Patriarch (
PRRH.OB -
news -
people ) Gregory III, archbishop of the Greek-Melkites in Damascus, Syria, said fundamentalist movements such as Hamas or Hezbollah had been born from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and warned Tuesday that the resulting flight of Christians would make a "society with only one color: only Muslim."
"Should this happen, should the East be emptied of its Christians, this would mean that any occasion would be propitious for a new clash of cultures, of civilizations and even of religions, a destructive clash between the Muslim Arab East and the Christian West," he said.
American Cardinal John Foley, a longtime Vatican official who now raises money to support Christian sites in the Holy Land, also said the conflict had contributed to the growth of Islamic fundamentalism but blamed Israeli policies specifically.
"While many including the Holy See have suggested a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian crisis, the more time passes, the more difficult such a solution becomes, as the building of Israeli settlements and Israeli-controlled infrastructure in East Jerusalem and in other parts of the West Bank make increasingly difficult the development of a viable and integral Palestinian state," he told the gathering.
Rabbi David Rosen, head of inter-religious affairs for the American Jewish Committee, said he expected some degree of blame would be voiced against Israel during the synod. But he said he thought the Vatican had done a responsible job in containing it and trying to ensure that the synod "is not totally politically hijacked by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict."
In his speech to the synod Wednesday, Rosen objected to the suggestion that the Israeli "occupation" of Palestinian territories was the root cause of the conflict, noting that the conflict preceded the 1967 war during which the West Bank and Gaza came under Israeli control.
"'Occupation' in fact is precisely a consequence of the conflict, the real 'root issue' of which is precisely whether the Arab world can tolerate a non-Arab sovereign polity within its midst," Rosen said.
He said Arab Christians in Israel fared comparatively well compared to Christian communities in other countries in the region, noting that their socio-economic status was higher than the Israeli average.
At a news conference, Rosen acknowledged that one issue - the recent decision by Israel to require new citizens to pledge a loyalty oath to a "Jewish and democratic" state - had ruffled some feathers and said he personally regretted it.
But he said it had been misunderstood by the Coptic Catholic patriarch of Alexandria, Egypt, Antonios Naguib, who is running the synod. During a first-day news conference, Naguib called the decision a "flagrant contradiction" since Israel claims to be the only democratic state in the region.
Rosen said Naguib "did not understand the difference between 'Jewish' as an ethnic collective and 'Jewish' as a religious expression, which is not what most Israelis understand the meaning to be of a Jewish state.
In comments to The AP, Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor contended that Israel is "the only country in the Middle East where the number of Christians has been constantly increasing over the years. In the Palestinian territories, the Christian population has dwindled over the years because of pressures by Islamic extremists."
"To ignore this key factor and to pretend that the Christian plight is one and the same across the region is to do a disservice to truth," he added.
http://www.jta.org/news/article/2010/10/14/2741290/european-jews-facing-anti-semitic-onslaught-kantor-says European Jews facing anti-Semitic onslaught, Kantor says
October 14, 2010
BERLIN (JTA) -- European leaders must intervene to save small Jewish communities from an anti-Semitic onslaught, the head of the European Jewish Congress said.
In a statement issued Thursday, Moshe Kantor said European Jewish communities are in "grave danger" from the anti-Semitism, some of it officially sanctioned, as made clear by recent sensational anti-Semitic incidents in Belgium and Sweden.
Kantor, who is hosting a conference in Dubrovnik, Croatia, later this month on best practices for combating racism and xenophobia, said European Union and European leaders should "launch a campaign against intolerance and anti-Semitism to remind European citizens that the new Europe was established after the Second World War on the concept of 'Never Again.' ''
Among the recent incidents he cited were a "Palestine Day" at a Catholic school in Antwerp, Belgium, during which children were invited to throw replicas of Jewish and Israeli soldiers into two large tanks. The game was called "Throw the soldiers into the sea."
In another incident, a gang shouting "Heil Hitler" and "Jewish pigs" attacked a Jewish children's event in Malmo, Sweden, last weekend. Many Jews reportedly have been leaving Malmo this year due to an increase in anti-Semitic incidents.
Kantor also pointed to recent anti-Semitic statements by German former Central Bank board member Thilo Sarrazin and other public figures.
Citing a feeble official response, Kantor said that "anti-Semitism is at best actively promoted and at worst ignored by some officials in Europe. Due to this intolerable situation, small Jewish communities, like Malmo, are teetering on the brink of extinction," threatened by extremists on the left and right.
"If they can't receive protection or respite from mainstream officials," he said, "then we are entering a very dark period for the Jews in Europe."
http://rightwingnews.com/2010/10/swastikas-painted-on-a-jewish-candidates-sign-w\
hy-isnt-this-a-front-page-story/
Swastikas Painted On A Jewish Candidate's Sign: Why Isn't This A Front Page Story?
(Read WP posts from John Hawkins) | (Read MT posts from John Hawkins) | rss If a noose is found on a college campus, it can be front page news all across the country. If some local Republican official in nowhereville, South Dakota says something racist, there's a decent chance it'll make the New York Times. If there's a racist sign at a Tea Party in the backwaters of Louisiana, it's treated as representative of the tens of millions of Americans who attend Tea Parties.
So, with all that in mind, why is
this being treated as a non-story by the mainstream media?
Symbols of the National Socialist Party (NAZIs) were recently spray-painted on signs of a Jewish Republican candidate for Maine State Senate. Blogger Al Diamon DownEast.com explains:
Last week, somebody defaced some of Republican state Senate candidate Roger Katz's campaign signs in Augusta with anti-Semitic slurs. The wording of the messages indicated the graffiti was probably not the work of kids, since it mirrored phrases favored by neo-Nazi hate groups (including the acronym "ZOG," which stands for "Zionist Occupation Government").
You'd think that such an incident might be news, particularly since Katz is the city's mayor, and the vandalism was reported to police. But the Kennebec Journal didn't seem to think the story merited coverage. Nor would it allow publication of at least two letters to the editor on the subject — one of them from a city councilor.
That embargo remained in place for nearly a week, ending on October 8, after the story showed up on WGME-TV out of Portland. Even then, the KJ gave it only a brief mention in the second section.
The number of stories showing up about this under a search for "
roger Katz nazi" at Google News? 1.
Welcome to life in America, where the media has decided racism aimed at Republicans means little and is symbolic of nothing, while every act of racism at a Democrats is incredibly significant and represents an entire movement.
Top American Islamic Cleric Threatens U.S. on Egyptian TV
Pajamas Media – Patrick Poole
http://doctorbulldog.wordpress.com/2009/01/07/founder-of-islamic-american-univer\
sity-caught-on-video-threatening-destruction-for-america/ Islamic cleric Salah Sultan appeared on Egypt's Al-Nas TV last week and
delivered a warning of death and destruction for America. Not only did he attack
the U.S. for its military support of Israel in its fight against the Hamas
terrorist organization, but he vowed retaliation such that more Americans would
be killed than those Palestinians (and, presumably, Hamas terrorists) killed in
the present conflict in Gaza, emphasizing that this would take place "soon":
America, which gave [Israel] everything it needed in these battles, will suffer
economic stagnation, ruin, destruction, and crime, which will surpass what is
happening in Gaza. One of these days, the U.S. will suffer more deaths than all
those killed in this third Gaza holocaust. This will happen soon.
He also invoked a notorious Islamic hadith on the inevitable annihilation of the
Jews by Muslims:
The stone, which is thrown at the Jews, hates these Jews, these Zionists,
because Allah foretold, via His Prophet Muhammad, that Judgment Day will not
come before the Jew and the Muslim fight. The Jew will hide behind stones and
trees, and the stone and the tree will speak, saying: "Oh Muslim, there is a Jew
behind me, come and kill him." The only exception will be the Gharqad tree.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcjpTyflYmM&feature=player_embedded This harangue would be nothing new on television in the Islamic world; in fact,
it is commonplace. What is unique about Sultan's threats against America is that
he holds U.S. permanent residency status and, according to one federal law
enforcement official, travels regularly on a U.S. passport. And as I have
reported elsewhere, Sultan is pursuing U.S. citizenship (the status of his
application is unknown due to federal privacy laws). Thus, Salah Sultan has
lived quite comfortably for more than a decade under the protections of the very
country he now threatens with death and destruction.
It should be noted that Salah Sultan is not some obscure figure in the American
Islamic world. He serves as a member of the Fiqh Council of North America.
Touted as the top Islamic governing body in the U.S., the Fiqh Council is an arm
of the Islamic Society of North America. Sultan founded and served as president
of the Islamic American University in Southfield, Michigan; he was the national
director of tarbiyah (Islamic instruction) for the Muslim American Society; and
he continues to operate the American Council for Islamic Research, based in my
hometown of Hilliard, Ohio.
Sultan's Al-Nas TV appearance last week was recorded and translated by the
indispensable Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). Curiously, as soon
as MEMRI published the video clips of Sultan's harangue, references to Sultan's
membership with the Fiqh Council were scrubbed from its website. His name has
been removed from its list of council members, even though he appeared there as
recently as early last week. However, Sultan is still listed as a member on the
Fiqh Council's brochure posted online (no doubt that will be remedied as soon as
they are informed of this report).
This is not the first time that Sultan has been the subject of a MEMRI report
for his statements made and activities conducted outside of the U.S. In July
2007, MEMRI reported on a conference held in Doha, Qatar, in honor of Hamas
spiritual leader Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, who has been banned from the U.S. since 1999
for his active support of Islamic terrorism. One of the conference's keynote
speakers was Hamas head Khaled Mash'al, a "specially designated global
terrorist" by the U.S. government who praised the terror cleric for his fatwa
endorsing Hamas suicide bombings against Israeli civilians. Sitting beside
Mash'al and Qaradawi on the speaker's dais was none other than Salah Sultan, who
gave two separate addresses during the conference honoring his mentor, Qaradawi.
This appearance by Sultan with two terrorist leaders directly violates the
much-ballyhooed 2005 anti-terrorism fatwa issued by the Fiqh Council and signed
by Sultan himself prohibiting such contact. Sultan also spoke at a July 2006
pro-Hamas rally in Istanbul held by the extremist Saadet Party, which also
featured an address by Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh — again, a glaring
violation of the Fiqh Council's terrorism fatwa.
But with several former Fiqh Council members in prison on terrorism-related
charges (former council trustee Abdurahman Alamoudi, currently serving a 23-year
prison sentence), deported for concealing their terrorism ties (Fawaz Damra),
fingered in illegal terrorist fundraising (current member Muhammad Al-Hanooti),
and named as unindicted co-conspirators in terrorism trials (former chairman
Taha Jaber Al-Awani), it should be apparent that the group is not rigorous in
the fatwa's enforcement. The Investigative Project has published a dossier on
the extensive roster of Fiqh Council members tied to the international Islamic
terrorist network.
May 2006 saw Salah Sultan's first starring role in a MEMRI report when he was
recorded on Al-Risala TV saying the U.S. government was behind the 9/11 terror
attacks, which he claimed were then used to declare war on Muslims worldwide,
and also praising Osama bin Laden mentor and "specially designated global
terrorist" Abd-al-Magid Al-Zindani (see the MEMRI video clip and transcript of
Sultan's Al-Risala interview). These comments were made just two weeks after the
Columbus Dispatch published a lengthy defense of Sultan as a moderate and the
Central Ohio Islamic school that he was religious director of at the time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LIyy5jqMUlg&feature=player_embedded Sultan's Middle East media appearances also caught the eye of the Los Angeles
Times in July 2007. The paper cited him by name in an article by Borzou Daragahi
on a group of Islamic clerics who "share the outlook of al-Qaeda" and who were
"glorifying holy war" on Bahraini TV. Sultan was a regular guest on a program
hosted by Muslim Brotherhood cleric Wagdi Ghoneim, who was expelled from the
U.S. in December 2004 and banned from reentering for his ties to Islamic
terrorism. As noted by Bahraini blogger and journalist Mahmoud Al-Yousif, their
television program was shut down by the Bahraini government after extensive
criticism by members of parliament and the media.
Considering Salah Sultan's lengthy résumé of Islamic extremism and regular
association with designated terrorist leaders — much of it captured on video —
you might think that the Department of Homeland Security would take some action
with respect to his permanent residency status (despite owning a home in Ohio,
he spends most of his time in Bahrain, disqualifying him for permanent
residency), if not ban him completely from the country. You would be wrong,
however. In fact, Sultan spent most of December touring mosques in Central Ohio
before jetting off to Egypt last weekend for his Al-Nas interview.
But now that Salah Sultan is publicly inciting violence against the U.S. and
predicting the deaths of hundreds or even thousands of our citizens through
foreign media outlets, on what basis can Homeland Security officials continue to
ignore this very real and extensively documented terror threat, his connections
to leading U.S. Islamic groups notwithstanding? That remains to be seen.
World against Jews: Battleground Jerusalem by Obadiah Shoher
Presenting the conflict as Israeli-Palestinian is misleading, a classic case of
what mathematicians know as the Achilles-and-the-turtle paradox of infinitely
small iterations. The conflict is between Jews and the world. European powers
evicted Jews from Europe, and allocated to us 0.01% of the Middle East. In fact,
there were several arrangements, Jewish demands diminishing at each turn. The
Balfour Declaration gave Jews a fraction of what Jews and Christians know as the
Promised Land. Afterwards, the British gave away 3/4 of the Jewish land in order
to accommodate a friendly Iraqi prince left without a kingdom, and thus appeared
Jordan. At the time, Jews numbered a hundred times the population of the
Jordanian Bedouin, but the Bedouin got three times more land. Then came the 1947
partition between the Jews and those Arabs whom even Jordan refused to take in.
The Jews accepted even that, but the Arabs refused and have fought Israel over
six decades. The world still wants the partition to benefit the Arabs, instead
of accepting that they lost the right to the partition they fought against. The
partition of Israel wouldn't merely give Palestinians a state, but a second
state in addition to the one they already have in Jordan (ethnic Palestinian
Arabs are a majority in Jordan). Besides that partition, the world demands that
Israel accommodate two million Arab citizens and resident aliens in what is left
of Israel.
But the Jews developed these lands from desert and marshes; Arabs never settled
the plains before and have no imaginable right to them. The same world doesn't
imagine the Americans dividing their country with the American Indians, or even
the Saudis giving their oilfields back to the Bedouin tribes who exclusively
roamed them ninety years ago. Palestinian Arab nationalists identified with
Syria before the UN surprised them in 1947 by offering them a state of their
own. Not every tribe received a state of its own, and Palestinian Arabs don't
possess even tribal distinctions from the neighboring Arabs. Muslims enjoy their
fifty-seven states and every conceivable religious place, while the peace
process leaves the Jews with a tiny beach area and no places of Jewish religious
importance whatsoever. The Israel of the 1947 UN partition and the Road Map is
mostly unrelated to Jewish history or religion. Judea was located in what is now
termed the Arab West Bank. The peace process awards the defeated Muslim
aggressors the ancient Jewish land while giving the Jews a fourteen-mile-wide
beach strip little more important to our national conscience than Uganda. Oh,
and the world also allocates the Jews the uninhabitable Negev Desert and the
Galilee, which has been densely settled by Arabs.
International control of Jerusalem places a Muslim and barbarian majority of the
UN in charge of the Jewish sanctum. Jerusalem as a Palestinian capital is an
oxymoron. Jerusalem was of no importance to Muslims until the 1970s. They didn't
make pilgrimage to the city. Jerusalem is only a likely site of the purported
ascension of the Muslim prophet, whose youngest wife was a nine-year-old. They
need not keep the two immense structures on the Temple Mount. The structures are
not ancient at all, but were rebuilt in the early twentieth century, with older
parts thrown away and ending up in the Jewish Rockefeller Museum. Under the
international regime in Jerusalem, Muslims will stay in Haram ash-Sharif while
Jews will be allowed to shed tears at the ruins of our two temples buried below
the Muslim shrines, with no hope of rebuilding our temple. Every Christian
nation, most recently Greece, razed or converted Muslim structures upon
reconquest, and that's what religious leaders like the Chief IDF Rabbi Shlomo
Goren urged concerning Haram ash Sharif in Jerusalem. While the eternal Jewish
capital will lie under an international regime, Jews will be barred from Hebron
and the tomb of Rachel, along with other places of immense religious
significance abandoned to Palestinian Arabs. Muslims are somehow entitled to
three major shrine towns (Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem) while Jews are deprived
of both Jerusalem and Hebron.
http://www.israpundit.com/archives/29223
An End to Israel's Invisibility By MICHAEL B. OREN
NEARLY 63 years after the United Nations recognized the right of the
Jewish people to independence in their homeland - and more than 62
years since Israel's creation - the Palestinians are still denying
the Jewish nature of the state. "Israel can name itself whatever it
wants," said the Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas,
while, according to the newspaper Haaretz, his chief negotiator, Saeb
Erekat, said that the Palestinian Authority will never recognize
Israel as the Jewish state. Back in 1948, opposition to the
legitimacy of a Jewish state ignited a war. Today it threatens peace.
Mr. Abbas and Mr. Erekat were responding to the call by the Israeli
prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for the Palestinians to recognize
Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, enabling his
government to consider extending the moratorium on West Bank
construction. "Such a step by the Palestinian Authority would be a
confidence-building measure," Mr. Netanyahu explained, noting that
Israel was not demanding recognition as a prerequisite for direct
talks. It would "open a new horizon of hope as well as trust among
broad parts of the Israeli public."
Why should it matter whether the Palestinians or any other people
recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people? Indeed,
Israel never sought similar acknowledgment in its peace treaties with
Egypt and Jordan. Some analysts have suggested that Mr. Netanyahu is
merely making a tactical demand that will block any chance for the
peace they claim he does not really want.
Affirmation of Israel's Jewishness, however, is the very foundation
of peace, its DNA. Just as Israel recognizes the existence of a
Palestinian people with an inalienable right to self-determination in
its homeland, so, too, must the Palestinians accede to the Jewish
people's 3,000-year connection to our homeland and our right to
sovereignty there. This mutual acceptance is essential if both
peoples are to live side by side in two states in genuine and lasting
peace.
So why won't the Palestinians reciprocate? After all, the Jewish
right to statehood is a tenet of international law. The Balfour
Declaration of 1917 called for the creation of "a national home for
the Jewish people" in the land then known as Palestine and, in 1922,
the League of Nations cited the "historical connection of the Jewish
people" to that country as "the grounds for reconstituting their
national home." In 1947, the United Nations authorized the
establishment of "an independent Jewish state," and recently, while
addressing the General Assembly, President Obama proclaimed Israel as
"the historic homeland of the Jewish people." Why, then, can't the
Palestinians simply say "Israel is the Jewish state"?
The reason, perhaps, is that so much of Palestinian identity as a
people has coalesced around denying that same status to Jews. "I will
not allow it to be written of me that I have ... confirmed the
existence of the so-called Temple beneath the Mount," Yasir Arafat
told President Bill Clinton in 2000.
For Palestinians, recognizing Israel as a Jewish state also means
accepting that the millions of them residing in Arab countries would
be resettled within a future Palestinian state and not within Israel,
which their numbers would transform into a Palestinian state in all
but name. Reconciling with the Jewish state means that the two-state
solution is not a two-stage solution leading, as many Palestinians
hope, to Israel's dissolution.
Which is precisely why Israelis seek the basic reassurance that the
Palestinian Authority is ready to accept our state ’Äî to accept us.
Israelis need to know that further concessions would not render us
more vulnerable to terrorism and susceptible to unending demands.
Though recognition of Israel as the Jewish state would not shield us
from further assaults or pressure, it would prove that the
Palestinians are serious about peace.
The core of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been the refusal to
recognize Jews as a people, indigenous to the region and endowed with
the right to self-government. Criticism of Israeli policies often
serves to obscure this fact, and peace continues to elude us. By
urging the Palestinians to recognize us as their permanent and
legitimate neighbors, Prime Minister Netanyahu is pointing the way
out of the current impasse: he is identifying the only path to
co-existence.
Michael B. Oren is Israel's ambassador to the United States.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/14/opinion/14oren.html?ref=opinion http://www.weeklyblitz.net/1036/land-of-israel-is-the-homeland-of-the-jewish Land of Israel is the homeland of the Jewish people - Imam Palazzi by Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury
October 13, 2010
Sheikh Prof. Abdul Hadi Palazzi legally named Massimo Palazzi, is the leader of Italian Muslim Assembly and a co-founder and a co-chairman of the Islam-Israel Fellowship, based on what Palazzi believes are the authentic teachings of Muhammad as expressed in the Koran and the Hadith.
Palazzi was born in Rome, Italy to an Italian Catholic father who converted to Islam and a Muslim mother of Syrian descent. After completing his secular and religious education in Rome and Cairo in 1987, he served as an Imam for the Italian Islamic Community. In addition to numerous Masters Degrees, Palazzi holds a Ph.D. in Islamic Sciences from the Institute for Islamic Studies and Research in Naples.
He was appointed a member of the Board of Directors of the Italian Muslim Association in 1989, and is now its Secretary General. Since 1991, he was a Director of the Cultural Institute of the Italian Islamic Community, with a program based on the development of Islamic education in Italy, refutation of fundamentalism and fanaticism, and deep involvement in inter-religious dialogue, especially with Jews and Christians, but also with Buddhists and others.
In 1997, Palazzi joined the International Council of the Root and Branch Association and his essay entitled "The Jewish-Moslem Dialogue and the Question of Jerusalem" was published by the Institute of the World Jewish Congress. He has also been a lecturer in the Department of the History of Religion at the Università della Terza Età in Velletri, near Rome.
In 1998, Palazzi and Dr. Asher Eder [Jerusalem] co-founded the Islam-Israel Fellowship, promoting a positive Muslim attitude towards Jews and Israel based on what Prof. Palazzi believes are the authentic teachings of Muhammad as expressed in the Qur'an and the Hadith. Prof. Palazzi serves as Muslim Co-Chairman of the Fellowship. Dr. Eder serves as the Jewish Co-Chairman.
Palazzi accepts Israel's sovereignty over the Holy Land, and says the Koran supports it as the will of God as a necessary prerequisite for the Final Judgment. He accepts Israel's sovereignty over Jerusalem, if the rights of other religions are protected. He quotes the Koran to support Judaism's special connection to the Temple Mount. According to Palazzi, "The most authoritative Islamic sources affirm the Temples,". He adds that Jerusalem is sacred to Muslims because of its prior holiness to Jews and its standing as home to the biblical prophets and kings David and Solomon, all of whom he says are sacred figures also in Islam. He claims that the Koran "expressly recognizes that Jerusalem plays the same role for Jews that Mecca has for Muslims".
When asked whether he see himself as a "Muslim Zionist", he replied: "If one means a Muslim who supports the right of the Jewish people to have their own independent and sovereign State, who is solidly behind the State of Israel when it is attacked by terror and when its existence in menaced, who thinks that developing friendly relations between the Muslim nations and the State of Israel is in the interest of the Muslims and of human civilization in general, then I think that the label of Muslim Zionist is appropriate.
According to scholar Dina Lisnyansky, Palazzi "created his own niche. Being born into an immigrant family, he combined the democratic rights of western Europe with a love for Islam," but added his Zionist mission. As a result, "he is a radical too, but not on the radicals' side. He is fighting everything that political Islam promotes." She explains, "One of the reasons why he is not on some black list in Iran is the fact that he, unlike Rushdie, has never said a negative word about Islam. To extremist interpreters of the Qur'an he doesn't say 'you are wrong.' He would only say: 'You got something wrong.' His mission, therefore, is clearly not about reinventing Islam; it is about correcting the perspective."
In Palazzi's view, Islam has been "hijacked" by the Wahabi movement in Saudi Arabia, a radical reformist movement which denies the moderate understanding of the Koran and has taken control of Mecca and Medina. He says that Oil money made a primitive and violent culture powerful on a global scale. And now, "they are reshaping Islam in accordance with their political issues." He said "unless an urgent change of regime is realized in Saudi Arabia, winning the war against terror is totally impossible. One cannot win a war without attacking the headquarters of the enemy."
Imam Sheikh Abdul Hadi Palazzi of Italy, who is a Muslim Zionist accorded an exclusive interview to Weekly Blitz. The interview as conducted by Weekly Blitz editor Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury. Excerpts:
Q: Is Sharia Koranic law? Is it mandatory for every Muslim to follow Sharia Law?
A: To be more exact, Shari'ah is not "Koranic Law", but it is Islamic Law as competent human beings deduces it on the base of legal Islamic source. The Qur'an is only one of these sources, the other being Sunnah (the Prophetic tradition as detailed into authentic Hadith), Ijma' (the consensus of scholars) and Qiyas (analogical reasoning). The differences which exist witin the sources and those which exist among the scholars who interpret it causes discrepancies in deducing the different rules of Sharia. There exist four main schools of Shari'ah, and even inside those same school there are discrepancies among scholars about some specific rules. For a Muslim it is mandatory to follow the Sharia, not on the base of his own hypothesis or on the base of claims from non-competent people, but only on the base of authoritative representatives of the legal school he belongs to.
Q: Is beheading people, cutting hands for theft, stoning for adultery are endorsed by Koran and Islam?
A: Stoning for adultery is not endorsed by the Qur'an but by Torah; cutting hands for theft and capital punishment for murder are on the contrary prescribed in principle in the Qur'an, although beheading is not specified as a form of punishment. In all cases, they are specified as forms of punishment which can only be applied by a judge after a regular trial and with the necessary authorization of the head of the Islamic State. Since presently the conditions for the existence of the Islamic State according to the Sharia do not exist, no person and no State can legally apply any punishment for adultery or any physical punishment for theft. Capital punishment for murder can on the contrary be legally applied, in cases it is prescribed by the law of the State.
Q: Does Koran say "kill every Jew and Christian"? If so, will you please quote the verses of Koran?
A: It never says so, and history proves that - when some Christian sects of Jews were persecuted in their country of origin - they saved themselves from persecution by taking refuge in countries subjected to the Sharia, i.e. in countries where the ruler was obliged to protect its Jewish or Christian citizens.
Q: What Koran says about the State of Israel? Does it not say that, Israel is the blessed land for the Jewish people? In this case, those Muslims opposing Israel to be the homeland of Jewish people, are they not defying Koran? And by defying Koran, do they remain Muslims?
A: The Qur'an cannot deal with the State of Israel as we know it today, since that State came into existing in 1948 only, i.e. many centuries after the Qur'an itself was revealed. However, the Qur'an specify that the Land of Israel is the homeland of the Jewish people, that God Himself gave that Land to them as heritage and ordered them to live therein. It also announces that - before the end of the time - the Jewish people will come from many different countries to retake possession of that heritage of theirs. Whoever denies this actually denies the Qur'an itself. If he is not a scholar, and in good faith believes what other people say about this issue, he is an ignorant Muslim. If, on the contrary, he is informed about what the Qur'an and openly opposes it, he cease to be a Muslim.
Q: Hamas, the most notorious mega terrorist group, which is opposing the Jewish homeland is involved in numerous crimes, including suicide bombing. Does Koran endorse suicide bombing? As Hamas does not recognize Israel as homeland of Jewish people and as they are continuing crime like suicide bombing, can we still call those Hamas people as Muslims?
A: Islam condemns suicide [even in case no other victim is involved in it] and condemns the killings on innocent people and civilians. Shari'ah sources clearly specify that the one who is involved in these crimes will never enter Heaven. It is evident that - from the point of view of Islamic Law - the leaders of Hamas are among the worst criminals which is possible to conceive. However, it is possible that some of its members, because of ignorance are in good faith misguided by its leaders, and wrongly suppose that committing those horrible crimes is in line with Islam. That is one of the reason why Muslim scholars must inform and warn them, hoping they can repent and be brought back to Islam.
Q: Some people say, "Every Muslim is a terrorist and Muslims are Nazi". Also there are quotes from Koran, which promotes hatred towards Jews. Will you please clarify these points? Can we also get comments from any Jewish scholar in Root and Branch on this issue?
A: There is no Qur'anic verse which promotes hatred toward a Jews as a Jew, or toward any human being because of his sexual, ethnic or religious identity. There are verses which criticize those Jews which are not faithful to the Sinaitic covenant and to the observance of Torah. Similar verses do exist in the Tanach (Jewish Scriptures), too, and are even more numerous than they are in the Qur'an.
Q: Many Muslim nations are yet to establish relations with Israel and stopping their people from visiting Jerusalem and Temple Mount [Al Aqsa]. How you look into this?
A: Those regimes are oppressive, do not respect human rights and oppose any form of democracy and pluralism. That is reason why they hate Israel so much and prevent their citizens to visit her. They do not want Israel to be compared to their countries, to be taken as an example of what under those totalitarian regimes is missing.
Q: You are a Muslim Zionist. Being an Islamic scholar, how and why you think, to be a Muslim Zionist is not something against Islam?
A: As an Islamic scholar, taking into consideration what the Qur'an teaches about the return of the Jewish people to its Land, I find natural to be a Zionist and to call all Muslims to support Zionism as a necessary aspect of their religion. Since the return of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel is openly announced in the Qur'an, it is evident that opposing Zionism means opposing the Divine will, and opposing the Divine will is the exact opposite of Islam.
Q: How you look into Koranic promises of 72 virgins for those martyrs who die by fighting against non-Muslims? How you see the verses of Koran [Sura Ar Rahman], where Muslim are described of virgins, they will sexually enjoy in the heaven and after each sexual intercourse, those virgins will turn into virgin again? Don't you think, such thoughts are perversion?
A: No Qur'anic verse contains a promise of 72 virgins. This promise is contained in a Hadith, but involve no reference to martyrdom, since it concerns every believer who enters in Heaven, irrespective of whether he is martyred, dies a natural death, etc. Islam does not accept that negative attitude toward sex which is typical of Christianity. Sex - in Islam - if performed according to the rules of Sharia, is a blessing from God, and orgasm represents the only condition in which an ordinary being perceives - although for a single instance - that kind of beatitude which is typical of Heavenly life. Since we have no exact knowledge of the condition of life in Heaven, Islam refers to it by means of examples of things we know has pleasant in this world. By referring to the 72 virgins, the Hadith wants to teach that the pleasures of Heaven are incapably greater than any pleasure we can taste in this word, exactly like other Hadith and some Qur'anic verses describe Hell as a burning and inestinguible fire, to show that it causes a pain which is greater than the one which can be suffered in this word, where a human being cannot continuously burn while being alive. Christianity accept this example of inestinguible fire to describe the suffering of Hell, but does not accept the example of the virgins because of its negative conception of sex as a whole.
Q: Why Islam imposes mandatory wearing of Burqa and Veils by the Muslim women? Why Muslim women are barred from becoming an Imam, while Judaism allows women to be a Rabbi?
A: Burqa, i.e. a garment which covers the face, is not prescribed by Islam, but is a pre-Islamic pagan tradition which was imposed again to Muslim women during the centuries, although Islam does not prescribe it and does not encourages it. Everyone knows that, if a woman prays by having her face covered, her prayer is invalid, and if she performs the Pilgrimage while covering her face, her Pilgrimage is also void. That should be enough to prove that burqa as such is not an Islamic garment. Out of modesty, Islam prescribed women to cover their head (not their face) and to wear a garment which does not show the forms of her body. In Judaism there is exactly the same rule, although limited to married women.
I must also say that orthodox, Torah-based Judaism never allowed and still does not allow women to be Rabbis. It only happens in some reform movements which grew recently in America, not in Israel. In Hebrew there does not even exist a word for a she-Rabbi. Rabbanit, in Hebrew, means the wife of a Rabbi, not a woman-Rabbi!
Apart from this, there is no similarity between the position of an Imam and that of a Rabbi. In Islam, an Imam is simply a person who leads the congregational prayer in a certain mosque. His only prerequisite is knowing the rules and the words of prayers. He does not need to be a scholar, and in most of cases is not a scholar. A Rabbi, on the contrary, is a scholar who must educated a specific community, and has no special rule in the congregational prayer of a community. So one can say that the Imam in Islam corresponds to the Hazzan in Judaism, will the 'Alim (scholar) corresponds to the Rabbi, and the Mufti to the Chief Rabbi.
Now in Islam a woman cannot be an Imam because of the posture the Imam assumes in from of those who pray behind him. Were she acting as an Imam, men would be looking at her posterior parts. On the contrary, the is no limitation of sex for what concerns an 'Alim or a Mufti; he can be either male or female, and the history of Islam mentions some women who were Muftis of the highest rank: Aysha bint Abi Bakr, who was a Mufti for the first generation of Muslim in Medina; Zaynab bint al-Husayn and Nafisah bint al-Husayn, who were among the masters of Imam as-Shafi'i; Rabi'a al-'Adawiyyah, who was the teacher of Harith al-Muhasibi. Muslim scholars of the highest level saw no problem in becoming students of those women-Mufti.
Q: How do you look into Islamic law of polygamy?
A: Illumined and unconditional polygamy was the rule in the milieu were Islam spread and in many societies of that time. That societies were also characterized by slavery, and suddenly abolishing either polygamy and slavery would have caused the economical collapse of the society. Consequently, Islam took a gradual approach: it stated that slaves must be treated well, must be dressed by the same garments their masters wear, must eat the same food they eat, and must be freed as a virtuous deed or as atonement for certain sins. That led to the gradual abolition of slavery. As for polygamy, before Islam a man was permitted to marry as many women he wanted, could discriminate between favourite and non-favourite women, and in many cases mused to marry other wives even when he has no income to support the wives and the children he already had. Islam limited to number of wives to four, forbade favoritism among them and limited polygamy to those who were able to support more than one wife. It was a period of frequent wars, and obviously most of dead people in war were male. Polygamy thus permitted widows to have new husbands, and permit women to have a family even when the number of men was very limited.
In our time, this situation does not exist anymore, and the number of men and women in any society is almost equal. Consequently, some Muslims States, like Turkey and Tunisia, chose to forbid polygamy by law. As such polygamy is not prescribed by the Sharia, but only permitted, and the government can decide to forbid to its citizens what in abstract terms is permitted. In the Sharia, the rule of obedience to the authority statues that - when the authority forbids by law what in general is permitted - the Muslim must abstain from it. Consequently, from decades Muslims of Turkey and Tunisia have been having one wife only. I think other Muslim and non-Muslim States should benefit from that example to forbid polygamy, too.
Q: When according to fundamental four pillars of Islam, it is mandatory for every Muslim to have faith in all Holy Scriptures [Torah, Bible, Koran etc] and prophets [Moses, Jesus, Mohammed etc], why in Muslim nations, only criticism of Islam and Koran is seen as blasphemy, while saying anything against other religion is not opposed?
A: It happens because the regimes which prevail in those nations do not really care to apply the dictates of Islam.
Q: What is your opinion on the proposed mosque at Ground Zero site, promoted by Imam Faisal Abdur Rauf?
A: The so-called "mosque at Ground Zero" in reality is not a mosque, but an Muslim community center, and is not located in Ground Zero, but in a closer area, Lower Manhattan. In abstract and general terms, I agree with President Obama when he says that religious freedom is a right of all the U.S. citizens, and it includes the freedom to built - according to the rules of law - places of worship and comminity centers in all the territory of the United States. To be more specific, I think the real problem is with Saudis funding and controlling mosts of mosques and Muslim community centers in the United States. In my opinion, the project of Lower Manhattan is included in a wider question: how it is possible that a regime which does no grant any religious freedom to its citizens and to its alien residents is permitted to fund its own places of worship in a free country? Unfortunately, the power of the oil lobby in the U.S. is such that this capital question is passed under silence. Immediately after 9/11, Bush Jr. worked hard to cover the links existing between al-Qa'idah and the House of Sa'ud, and Obama keeps doing so until today.
Q: Does Islam endorse autocracy or authoritarian rule? If not, then, how you look into the Saudi and Arab monarchism?
A: Islam prescribes the principle of Shura, according to which the only legitimate government is the one based on the will of its subjects. Apart from this, it does not specify which kind of State it must be; it can be a Unitarian State, a federal republic or a constitutional monarchy. The Sa'udi regime does not fit those criteria, because it is a tyrannical regime and because its Royal Family is formed by depravity people and criminals.
http://www.debka.com/article/9080/ America All But Disappeared in Maneuvering by Portugal, Brazil, and Cuba
| October 12, 2010
UNITED NATIONS - Canada's increasing ties with Israel and its defense of
Jerusalem have cost it a seat on the United Nations Security Council,
diplomats here are saying after days of maneuvering by Arab countries,
Brazil, and Cuba in which the United States had nearly disappeared.
Canada's failure to capture a seat on next year's Security Council will
break a tradition in which America's northern neighbor has been elected to
the most prestigious United Nations body in every decade since 1948.
Diplomats here say Brazil was instrumental in handing defeat to Prime
Minister Harper in an international contest that pitted Canada, a
traditional U.N. power house, against one of the European Union's least
powerful countries - Portugal.
Canada withdrew its candidacy in today's election for five available council
slots after it realized that Portugal had sewn up enough General Assembly
votes in the secret ballot to win the only contested seat. Several sources
told me that members of a powerful voting bloc in the 192-member assembly -
the 57 countries of the Organizations of Islamic Conference - were united in
voting for Portugal over Canada, mostly because of Mr. Harper's record of
supporting Israel.
In addition to the OIC, anti-Western countries like Cuba and Venezuela have
been active in opposing Canada's candidacy. Mr. Harper's right-of-center
government, which had originally tried to stay above the fray, increased its
efforts in the final weeks, mounting a world-wide campaign to capture the
council seat.
But a diplomat familiar with the behind-the-scenes horse trading that marks
the annual General Assembly vote tells me that top diplomats from
Portuguese-speaking Brazil became particularly active in the last few weeks,
convincing Muslim countries that "Canada's vote on Israel-related issues
will be no different than that of the United States, while Portugal would be
The U.N.-based correspondent of Canada's National Post, Steven Edwards,
reported yesterday that foreign ministry officials in Ottawa criticized the
timing of a Tel Aviv visit by the country's international trade minister,
Peter Van Loan, in which he announced Sunday - on the eve of the U.N. vote -
his intention to tighten Canada's trade relations with Israel even further.
"That's no way to win friends and influence people at the U.N.," one
diplomat here said today. While blocs that included the African and Latin
American countries were largely thought to have split their vote on the
contested seat, the Arab countries and the OIC were largely believed to have
voted en-bloc to bar Canada entry to the council.
Mr. Harper's government has become one of Israel's more forthright defenders
in organizations like the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Council, where
members like Cuba and Libya often single Israel out and garner enough votes
to condemn its human rights record.
Only a few years ago, the American ambassador here would have made a public
issue in defense of Canada. But in the maneuvering leading to today's vote,
American diplomats were all but absent.
Conversely, Israeli diplomats who habitually count heads before the votes at
international bodies do not see Portugal as a reliable ally among the
members of the European Union, which often joins the majorities or abstains
after attempting to "soften" anti-Israel votes.
Portugal ended up winning 122 votes in the first round of today's General
Assembly ballot - just short of the 127 needed. Canada got only 114 votes in
the first round, and eventually withdrew in the second round, after which
Portugal received 150 votes. The balloting is often marked by small bribery
in the form of trinkets. Vials of Canadian Maple syrup - an ambrosia
unequaled on the planet for its deliciousness - were found by ambassadors as
they arrived at their seats before the vote.
There are 10 elected seats at the Security Council, of which five new
members are chosen once a year for a 2-year stint according to regional
affiliation. The group of democracies known as the Western European and
Others Group fielded three candidates this year for the two available seats
that were vacated by Turkey and Austria. Germany won easily, which left
Canada and Portugal.
Three other regional groups sent one candidate for each available council
seat. Colombia replaced Mexico, India replaced Japan, and South Africa -
which has amassed a remarkable anti-Western and anti-Israel voting record in
its last council stint - replaced Uganda.
On January 1, the five new members will be seated at the famous
horseshoe-shaped table alongside the five countries that were elected last
year - Bosnia, Brazil, Gabon, Nigeria, and Lebanon - as well as the five
permanent council members, Communist China, Russia, Britain, France, and
America.
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