Posted tagged ‘Palestinians’

Dividing the Arabs: America and Europe’s Double Game

August 29, 2015

Dividing the Arabs: America and Europe’s Double Game, The Gatestone InstituteBassam Tawil, August 29, 2015

  • Iran is on its way in a few years to having nuclear weapons capability. The breakout time, according to President Obama, would effectively be “zero.” Iran could then make as many bombs as it would like, along with intercontinental ballistic missiles to delver them to major American cities, directly from Iran, from South America, or — making identification and retaliation impossible — from submarines submerged off the U.S. coast.
  • Obama with one hand allows Iran to glide to nuclear capability and encourage the Muslim Brotherhood and similar Islamist terrorist organizations such as the Islamic State in the Sinai Peninsula — while with the other hand, he claims to support Israel.
  • Qatar’s role is duplicitous. It plays host to U.S. military bases at the same time that it funds and supports ISIS.
  • Hamas, since last year’s war, has chosen to use its scant resources to rebuild its kidnapping tunnels and war capability, instead of developing businesses and turning the Gaza Strip into a magnificent Arab Riviera, as Dubai has become. Hamas’s failure does not come from a lack of resources; it comes from a deliberate choice of how to use them.
  • The Iranians, in opposing American policy, which is a tissue of amateur plans and plots, are flexible and exploit Islam’s taqiyya [dissimulation] — religious approval to lie in the cause of Allah and to further Islam. However, they are not even bothering with that, they are telling the truth: “Death to America; Death to Israel.”

The United States is playing a double game in the Middle East: empowering Shiite Iran, while at the same time enabling Sunni ISIS to overthrow the moderate Arab regimes, as if to stop Iran.

The Americans are well aware that the Sunni Arab countries around Iran will now have to arm themselves to the teeth, thereby gutting the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

America, despite its power and the image it projects of working against ISIS in Iraq, does not touch ISIS in its real headquarters, Syria, where ISIS actually could actually be hurt. So nothing really changes, and both Iran and ISIS continue to strengthen.

Even as the members the UN Security Council, eager do business with Iran, voted to allow Iran to build nuclear weapons, the Iranians continue to fund Hezbollah, Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip — all Iranian proxies — in order to split the Arab ranks.

In other words, the hypocritical Obama administration, in backing the Iranians, keeps trying to sabotage the Arabs and provoke dissension.

The U.S. “divide-and-conquer” policy can also be seen in America’s ongoing support for Turkey and Qatar, both loyal to the Muslim Brotherhood. Turkey and Qatar, however, do nothing but foment incitement and support terrorist organizations. Both countries have totally abandoned the real existential interest of the Arab nation: its historic battle against Iran.

Qatar’s role is duplicitous. It plays host to U.S. military bases at the same time that it funds and supports ISIS, which is working against the West and against moderate Arab regimes.

The worst, however, is Turkey, which supports ISIS — the enemy of the West — despite Turkey being a member of NATO. Turkey also expends inordinate efforts at retaining its control of occupied Cyprus. Above all, its hypocrisy is scandalous. While it claims to care about the independence and human rights of the Palestinians, Turkey is really nothing but a radical Islamist country now denying independence and human rights to its own Kurdish citizens. At the same time, it supports Hamas and Iran in their effort to crush the unity of the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the PLO as the only legitimate representatives of the Palestinian people.

Turkey, like many other nations, including the countries that negotiated with Iran, is just waiting for the sanctions to be lifted from Iran, so that its dubious military and economic relations with the Mullahs will finally be acceptable.

Turkey and Qatar have also divided the Sunni Islamic camp and fragmented the Arab ranks. Both countries give the Palestinians political support, the deluded hope of “return,” and funding that is used for rebuilding Hamas’s military capabilities and kidnapping tunnels.

It is both folly and underhandedness for the United States to provide these countries with even a tattered umbrella of military aid.

Not only the U.S. but Europe, which supports Iran, would like to see Hamas — a terrorist offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood — become stronger at the expense of the Palestinian people.

Europe would like to empower Hamas even further by handing it diplomatic and political support. There are rumors that the UN is planning to grant Hamas observer status in the General Assembly, as it did the Palestinian Authority.

We all know that the issue of Palestine could have been resolved long ago by establishing a demilitarized Palestinian state next to Israel, and giving the descendants of the original Palestinian refugees living in the Arab states full citizenship. But the manipulations employed by the Europeans and Americans deliberately perpetuate the Palestinian issue by using “good cop – bad cop” tactics. (Emphasis added. — DM)

Europe and the U.S. whitewash not only Hamas’s threats to Israel, but also, more importantly, its deadly subversion of Palestinian Authority. Both Europe and America totally disregard Hamas’s planned coup against PA leader Mahmoud Abbas last year, Hamas’s war crimes in the Gaza Strip, and the unspeakable treatment of its own people at home. Only one year ago, Hamas was murdering its own citizens extra-judicially, and ordering them to be cannon fodder for the benefit of international television crews.

Hamas, since then, has chosen to use its scant resources to rebuild its kidnapping tunnels and war capability, instead of to develop businesses and turn the Gaza Strip into a magnificent Arab Riviera, as Dubai has become. Hamas’s failure does not come from a lack of resources; it comes from a deliberate choice of how to use them.

Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad are now operating against Egypt and Israel not only from the Gaza Strip, but from the Sinai Peninsula as well. Thus, in addition to allowing Iran to sail to nuclear weapons capability, President Obama encourages the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist terrorist organizations such as the Islamic State in the Sinai Peninsula with one hand, while with the other hand he claims to support Israel.

After all is said and done, if we Arabs had joined ranks — even temporarily and even with Israel — we could have long ago put a stop to Iran’s plans for expansion.

But because of our own shortsightedness, we waited too long and now the Iranians have established footholds in the Arabian Gulf and the Red Sea, and are increasing their control of Arab states such as Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen.

Iran is on its way in a few years to having nuclear weapons capability. The breakout time, according to President Obama, would effectively be “zero.” Iran could then make as many bombs as it would like, along with intercontinental ballistic missiles to delver them to the major cities of the “Great Satan,” the United States, directly from Iran, from South America, or — making identification and retaliation impossible — from submarines submerged off the U.S. coast.

The Iranians, in opposing American policy, which is a tissue of amateur plans and plots, are flexible and exploit Islam’s taqiyya [dissimulation] — religious approval to lie in the cause of Allah and to further Islam. However, they are not even bothering with that, they are telling the truth: “Death to America; Death to Israel.”

1225U.S. President Barack Obama (left). Iranian President Hassan Rouhani (right).

By this point, near the end of the process of Sunni Muslim self-destruction, a large part of the Arabs’ energy has been wasted on internal wars and the misallocation of resources to the barren, useless confrontation with Israel, even while many Arab states secretly collaborate with the Zionists.

All that will be left for the Arabs will be to continue to argue among themselves and with the Israelis about the Palestinian issue. We should instead stop the distractions and the wounds we are inflicting upon ourselves, and put the Palestinian problem behind us by granting equal rights and citizenship to Palestinians residing in Arab countries, in order to shift our focus totally, if belatedly, to the real battle: The Islamic Republic of Iran.

PLO claims it can’t pay terror victims, spends $13 mil on palace

August 26, 2015

PLO claims it can’t pay terror victims, spends $13 mil on palace, Front Page Magazine, Daniel Greenfield, August 26, 2015

obamaarafat

Maybe once it’s done, there’ll be room there for an Obama sleepover.

*********************

The PLO’s Palestinian Authority is constantly experiencing an economic crisis. Maybe that’s because

1. Their imaginary country doesn’t actually produce anything and is funded by the UN, the EU and the US

2. They spend $144 million a year paying the salaries of convicted terrorists in prison and the families of suicide bombers

The PLO recently lost a major lawsuit against terror victims in the United States. The PLO claimed it couldn’t pay, even though it kept on paying terrorists. And Obama intervened to aid the terrorists.

A judge in New York on Monday ordered the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) to post $10 million in cash or bond while they appeal a jury’s finding that they supported terrorist attacks in Israel, Reuters reported.

At a court hearing in Manhattan, U.S. District Judge George Daniels said the defendants must also deposit $1 million each month pending the appeal of a February jury verdict worth $655 million in favor of 10 American families.

The order came a week after the Obama administration took the unusual step of urging Daniels to “carefully consider” the PA’s financial condition, saying too high a bond could compromise its ability to function.

Just think. The PLO might not be able to afford to pay terrorists… or build a palace for its terror boss.

Palestinian Authority (PA) chairman Mahmoud Abbas is building a $13 million palace for himself in Ramallah, the PA governmental seat in Samaria, as revealed in an official website recently.

The palace is to sprawl over 27,000 square meters of land, and is itself to be 4,700 square meters in size. Along with the palace, a “building for the Presidential Administration and Guards” is also to be built spanning 4,000 square meters.

Two helipads for helicopter transport are also to be built on the grounds of the palace, which according to architectural sketches on the site – that can be viewed here – is to be nothing short of royal in terms of its design and scale.

Pretty nice for a “concentration camp” where no one has any room to live. And it’s being paid for by American taxpayers. We’re funding another Saddam building himself palaces while American families are losing their homes.

Maybe once it’s done, there’ll be room there for an Obama sleepover.

Egypt and the Hamas “Cockroaches”

August 26, 2015

Egypt and the Hamas “Cockroaches,” The Gatestone InstituteKhaled Abu Toameh, August 26, 2015

  • “What were your four [Hamas] men doing in Sinai? Haven’t you denied in the past the presence of any Hamas men in Sinai? So where did these men pop up from?” — Dina Ramez, Egyptian journalist.
  • The incident also proves that Hamas does not hesitate to take advantage of Cairo’s humanitarian gestures to smuggle its men out of the Gaza Strip. Obviously, the four Hamas men were not on their way to receive medical treatment. That they are members of Hamas’s armed wing, Ezaddin al-Qassam, speaks for itself.
  • The Egyptians are particularly fed up with reports about Hamas’s increased involvement in their internal affairs and links to terror groups in Sinai.
  • This practice by Hamas is something that the Egyptian authorities have come to understand, which is why they are refusing to reopen the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt. The question now is whether the international community will understand Hamas’s true intentions and plans — namely to prepare for another war against Israel.

Egypt’s President Abdel Fatah Sisi has once again proven that he and his country will not tolerate any threats from Hamas or other Palestinians.

The crisis that erupted between Sisi’s regime and Hamas after the removal from power of Muslim Brotherhood President Mohamed Morsi two years ago, reached it peak in the past few days with the kidnapping of four Hamas operatives in Sinai.

The four men were snatched from a bus shortly after crossing from the Gaza Strip into Egyptian territory on August 19. Reports said that unidentified gunmen stopped the bus and kidnapped the four Hamas men, who are wanted by Egypt for their involvement in terrorism.

1222A bus carrying Palestinians drives through the Rafah crossing, from the Gaza Strip to Egyptian Sinai, on August 23, 2015. (Image source: Aqsatv video screenshot)

Although initial reports suggested that the kidnappers belonged to a salafi-jihadi group based in Sinai, some Hamas officials have accused Egyptian security forces of being behind the abduction. The Hamas officials even issued veiled threats against Sisi and the Egyptian authorities, and said that they held them fully responsible for the safety of the Hamas men.

A statement issued by Hamas warned the Egyptian authorities against harming the four men. “These men were the victims of deception and their only fault is that they are from the Gaza Strip,” the statement said. “This incident shows that the criminals are not afraid to target our people.”

Hamas leader Musa Abu Marzouk said that his movement holds the Egyptian authorities fully responsible for any harm caused to the abductees. He said that the kidnapping raises many questions and its circumstances remain unclear.

Hamas claims that salafi-jihadi groups in Sinai have informed its representatives that they did not kidnap the four men. According to Hamas officials, the abduction took place near the border with the Gaza Strip — an area where the Egyptian army maintains a large presence.

Sources in the Gaza Strip, however, have confirmed that the four men belong to Hamas’s armed wing, Ezaddin al-Qassam. The sources said that the men were apparently on their way to Iran for military training. The sources pointed out that the four had received permission from the Egyptian authorities to leave the Gaza Strip through the Rafah border crossing. The visas, however, are supposedly for civilians, not for Hamas operatives.

Hamas’s threats against Egypt have, meanwhile, enraged the Egyptian authorities as well as some top journalists in Cairo.

Egyptian authorities responded by refusing to give permission to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh and some leaders of his movement to travel to Qatar and Lebanon through the Rafah border crossing. The Hamas leaders were hoping to hold talks with some of their colleagues in those two countries about the possibility of reaching a long-term truce with Israel.

The Egyptians’ refusal to allow the Hamas leaders to leave the Gaza Strip has further strained relations between the two sides. Hamas representatives in the Gaza Strip were quoted as accusing the Egyptian authorities of “conspiring” against the movement and all Palestinians.

In Cairo, Egyptian security officials denied any link to the kidnapping of the four Hamas men. However, the denials have fallen on deaf ears and no one in Hamas seems to believe the Egyptian authorities. Even worse, Hamas representatives continued over the past few days to issue warnings and threats against Egypt.

As in the past, each time tensions rise between Hamas and Egypt, the Egyptians unleash some of their senior journalists against the Islamist movement. Since President Morsi’s removal from power, the Egyptians have displayed zero tolerance when it comes to Hamas. They are particularly fed up with reports about Hamas’s increased involvement in their internal affairs and links to terror groups in Sinai.

During the last war between Israel and Hamas, several Egyptian journalists and public figures openly expressed hope that the Israelis would destroy the movement for once and for all. Other journalists in Cairo, who are openly affiliated with the Sisi regime, have even urged their government to launch attacks against Hamas bases in the Gaza Strip.

This week, and in wake of the renewed tensions between Hamas and Egypt, Egyptian journalists resumed their rhetorical attacks against the movement. The question that most of these journalists asked was: What are Hamas members doing on Egyptian soil in the first place? The journalists accused Hamas of exploiting Egypt’s humanitarian gestures to smuggle its men out of the Gaza Strip.

One of these journalists, Dina Ramez, who is known as a staunch supporter of President Sisi, launched a scathing attack on Hamas, calling its members and leaders “cockroaches.”

Referring to the Hamas threats against Egypt, Ramez said: “Has anyone ever heard of cockroaches or ants that could threaten lions? These cockroaches belong to Hamas, which is threatening Egypt following the abduction of four of its men. I want to ask the Hamas cockroaches a simple question: What were your four men doing in Sinai? Haven’t you denied in the past the presence of any Hamas men in Sinai? So where did these men pop up from? I dare you to approach the border with Egypt. We have confidence in our army and our response will be painful. It will be a strong and deterring response against any cockroach that dares to come close to our border or threaten Egypt.”

Regardless of the identity of the kidnappers, the incident shows that Sisi and the Egyptian authorities continue to view Hamas as a threat to Egypt’s national security. The incident also proves that Hamas does not hesitate to take advantage of Cairo’s humanitarian gestures to smuggle its men out of the Gaza Strip. Obviously, the four Hamas men were not on their way to receive medical treatment or pursue their studies in Egypt or any other country.

That they are members of Ezaddin al-Qassam speaks for itself. Instead of dispatching its fighters to Iran and Turkey, Hamas should have allowed medical patients and university students to leave the Gaza Strip. But Hamas does not care about the well-being of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Rather, it cares about sending its men to Iran and Turkey to receive military and security training.

This practice by Hamas is something that the Egyptian authorities have come to understand, which is why they are refusing to reopen the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt. The question now is whether the international community will understand Hamas’s true intentions and plans — namely to prepare for another war against Israel.

Iran: Nuclear Deal Will Enable Support for Terrorism

August 26, 2015

Iran: Nuclear Deal Will Enable Support for Terrorism, Washington Free Beacon, August 25, 2015

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif speaks at the New York University (NYU) Center on International Cooperation in New York April 29, 2015. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif speaks at the New York University (NYU) Center on International Cooperation in New York April 29, 2015. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

Multiple senior officials in recent days have said that the Iranian nuclear deal will help the Islamic Republic fund its global terrorist operations, including the financial backing of Hamas and other regional groups, according to a briefing by an Israeli intelligence group.

Iranian officials, speaking at multiple forums in recent days, stressed that the nuclear deal will embolden Iran’s support for its “regional allies” and that weapons and military support would continue to be delivered on the “resistance front,” according to a recent brief by the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center.

The officials outlined Iran’s plan to bolster its global terrorism operation and stated that the recent nuclear deal between Tehran and global powers will do nothing to deter Iran’s pursuit of regional dominance.

Ali-Akbar Velayati, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s adviser for international affairs, stated at a recent conference in Tehran that support for the “resistance front” is a top foreign policy objective.

The nuclear agreement, Velayati said, “would make it possible to increase Iran’s support for its regional allies,” according to recent comments noted in the brief. The official went on to say that “the situation of the resistance front had improved.”

Other senior Iranian officials have echoed these remarks.

Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, who led nuclear negotiations with the United States, recently travelled to Syria and Lebanon to announce Iran’s renewed support for Hezbollah and the embattled regime of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria, according to the brief.

Iran will “continue providing weapons to support the Middle Eastern countries fighting terrorism,” Zarif is quoted as saying by Iran’s state-controlled press.

In light of the nuclear deal, Iran will “preserve its defensive capabilities and send weapons to its regional allies,” according to Zarif, who stressed that “without Iran and the weapons it provided to the countries fighting terrorism, the capital cities of the Middle East would have been occupied by” the Islamic State (IS, also known as ISIS or ISIL).

Iran also intends to boost its support for fighters in Yemen and Palestinian terrorist groups.

More than 70 members of the Iranian parliament, for instance, recently petitioned President Hassan Rouhani to increase “Iranian support for the regional resistance front after the nuclear agreement,” according to the report.

“They called on the president to use the ministries of defense and foreign affairs to send aid to the Palestinians in accordance with instructions from the Supreme Leader to arm the Palestinians in the West Bank,” the report notes.

Another senior Iranian national security official, Javad Karimi Qoddousi, demanded this month that “all the senior Iranian officials … support aid for the Palestinian people and the resistance front so that the nuclear agreement [is not] exploited to strengthen Israel’s security,” according to the brief.

These remarks have been accompanied by aggressive military moves by Iran, which has conducted multiple war drills in recent weeks and announced the upcoming launch of missiles, a move that could violate current United Nations Security Council resolutions barring such activity.

Iran appears to be attempting “to impress its allies with its commitment to continue supporting them even after the nuclear agreement with the West,” the Meir Amit center concluded in its brief. “The speeches of senior officials also reflected Iran’s approach to the rise and strengthening of ISIS and radical Sunni Islam.”

Iran also has committed itself to preventing the United States from gaining a foothold in the Middle East.

Iran will “not allow the United States to again extend its political influence in the region,” Velayati said in another recent interview. “Middle Eastern countries and people, led by Iran, had awakened and were standing firm” against America.

Senior Hamas officials have also disclosed in recent days that a delegation would soon be visiting Tehran.

Since the nuclear deal was secured, “relations between Hamas and Iran [have been] good,” according to these officials.

Introducing Yasser Abbas – the son whom the Palestinian leader plans to succeed him

August 25, 2015

Introducing Yasser Abbas – the son whom the Palestinian leader plans to succeed him, DEBKAfile, August 25, 2015

Yasser_AbbasYasser Abbas is tagged to succeed his father as Palestinian leader

The reports swirling around the Arab world over the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas’s decision to quit disguise the octogenarian’s next plans. According to our Middle East sources, Abbas (known to all as Abu Mazen) has confided to his close circle that he has lost faith in President Barack Obama, whom he accuses of deserting the Palestinian cause, and in Secretary of State John Kerry, whom he has nicknamed “the tall liar.” He is now looking for new champions, possibly in Tehran, while at the same time shoring up his rule over the Palestinian Authority and designing his legacy.

Abbas joins the list of regional allies who feel abandoned by the Obama administration, like the Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz, Egyptian President Abdel-Fatteh El-Sisi and, up to a point, Israel’s Binyamin Netanyahu. For the immediate future, Abu Mazen is developing a comprehensive plan for replacing his enemies on the PLO’s Executive Committee with young faces, chosen for their ability to preserve the Abbas clan’s majority in this key institution and uphold his guiding principles for the Palestinian movement.

Since the end of July, his henchmen, Saeb Erekat, Akram Haniya and Palestinian General Intelligence chief Mejad Freij have been working on this blueprint.

They are to complete their project by September, when Abbas plans to introduce his choice of new leaders to the Executive Committee. They will consist mainly of the sons of the founders of the PLO and his own Fatah party.

Some of their names are unknown outside the Palestinian Authority’s seat in Ramallah. DEBKAfile reports that prominent among them are Sabry Shayden – son of the PLO’s first chief of staff; Maher Ghanem –  son of Abu Maher Ghanem, the Fatah Party’s first organizer; and also Gen. Majid Freij, Ayman Makbul from Nablus and Fahmi Zar’ir from the Gaza Strip.

The most important new face will be that of Yasser Abbas – Mahmoud Abbas’ own son.

The new appointments will herald another change: the PLO Exective Committee is to be elevated as the supreme Palestinian ruling institution, with jurisdiction over the Palestinian Authority and Palestinian government.

Abu Mazen is shaping this reshuffle to guarantee that his immediate successor as PA Chairman – mostly probably Erekat, whom the West knows as the most public Palestinian negotiator – will give up his seat when the time comes to make way for Yasser Abbas.

In this way, Mahmoud Abbas hopes to keep control of the Palestinian movement in the hands of his dynasty. His son, aged 52, who was named in honor of the late Yasser Arafat, moved from Ramallah to Canada in 1997 and built a business career.

A civil engineering graduate from Washington State University, he owns a string of companies in Canada, the Gulf and the West Bank. Among them is Falco Tobacco, which holds the sole agency for the distribution of American cigarettes in the Palestinian territory.

There are many rumors about how he made his fortune, including corrupt practices in high Palestinian circles. Little is known about his politics. When interviewed on occasion, he prefers to dwell on how he made his money rather than expanding on public affairs that concern his people. His good connections in Washington will no doubt be useful for opening a new chapter with the US when he takes over.

No date has been set for an Abbas visit to Tehran. It will be interesting to see whom he picks for the party to accompany him if and when it takes place.

Cartoon of the Day

August 20, 2015

H/t Jewish Press

Balanced-Reporting

Iranian Officials Ratchet Up Genocidal Anti-Israel Rhetoric After Nuclear Deal

August 18, 2015

Iranian Officials Ratchet Up Genocidal Anti-Israel Rhetoric After Nuclear Deal, Investigative Project on Terrorism, Steven Emerson, August 18, 2015

(Three additional videos are available at the linked site. — DM)

A video shows the Revolutionary Guard Corps massing on a hill overlooking Jerusalem.

A conference of religious scholars features speaker after speaker calling Israel’s annihilation inevitable and promising that a “new phase” in that effort is about to begin.

While some in the United States and among its Western allies may hope that a nuclear weapons deal with Iran might steer the Islamic Republic in a new, more responsible direction, hardliners draw new lines and issue new threats.

On Monday, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei took to social media to attack the United States and Israel. “We spare no opportunity to support anyone #FightingTheZionists,” wrote the ayatollah, whose regime supplies Hizballah and Hamas with rockets and other weapons of terror.

Perhaps more chilling is an animated video from the Islamic Revolution Design House, a media outfit associated with Iranian hardliners. It shows a soldier preparing for battle. He puts on a Revolutionary Guard patch, and then a Qassam Brigades headband, followed by a ski mask and a Palestinian scarf around his neck, while arming himself with a machine gun and a pistol. As he puts on a helmet, we see him looking over Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, home of the Dome of the Rock and Al Aqsa mosque. The image pulls back, showing the soldier amid a sea of conquering troops.

A concluding message invokes Ayatollah Khomeini’s threat that Israel must be wiped off the map and promises that day is coming soon.

 

 

A conference held in Beirut late last month reinforced that message over and over again. The General Assembly of Islamic Resistance Ulema (Scholars) held its first gathering under the banner “Unity for Palestine.” The weekend meeting included fiery rhetoric from an Iranian ayatollah and Hizballah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah.

“Annihilation of the Zionist regime is a sure thing and Quranic pledge,” Ayatollah Mohsen Araki told the assembly. Araki is secretary general of the World Forum for Proximity of Islamic Schools of Thought, emphasizing the importance of unifying “Muslims in countering the regime of Zionism and the arrogant World.”

Many of the speeches were uploaded to YouTube and translated by the Investigative Project on Terrorism.

Nasrallah called Israel a “cancerous tumor” and said “It is only a matter of time” before it is defeated.

“We believe with certainty that Israel, this cancerous tumor, is headed for extinction, and that Palestine and Jerusalem will be returned to their people. It is only a matter of time and [this outcome] is linked to the will, action, jihad, and sacrifices of the Ummah, according to the principle: If you achieve victory for Allah, Allah will lead you to achieve victory.” Nasrallah said it was Allah’s will for Muslims to achieve “final victory over the Zionist scheme” and urged the assembly not to waste the opportunity.

“The day in which we will all pray in Jerusalem, Inshallah (God willing) is inevitably coming Inshallah. All of these calamities, conspiracies, and crises are merely trials to strengthen and make fit all those who believe in this project and in this path to enable them to be worthy of the coming victory. Some people may gain victory but then waste it.

Allah Almighty wants our Ummah (nation) in its final victory over the Zionist project and in restoring Palestine and Jerusalem to be worthy of this huge historic victory and to be worthy of preserving this victory and not to lose it as many victories have been lost.”

Muhammad Hasan Zamani, a former Iranian cultural counselor in Egypt who runs the Department of International Islamic Madrasas for the General Assembly of Islamic Resistance Ulema, maintained the theme, insisting there is no peaceful resolution that would end in Iran’s acceptance of a Jewish state.

“Israel must be erased from the map of the world. These are the golden words Imam Khomeini (may God have mercy on him) uttered. Why do we assert the obligation of erasing Israel from the world, and not speak of erasing America and other unjust countries from the world? We in Iran say slogans in marches, Death to Israel, Death to America, Death to the English, and so forth and so on.”

Iran considers America the “greater Satan,” Zamani went on to say, but the Islamic Republic respects other governments which were chosen by their people. By contrast, he claimed Israel is not legitimate: “I say that the example of the rule of the Zionists is the example of thieves who attack a house and occupy the house and the people of the house defend their house.”

Sheikh Abdel Halim Qadhi, a professor at Zahidan University, explained that the conflict is inherently about religion. “[T]he Holy Quran makes it know that Jews are the enemies of Islam and the Muslims, and their holy places and rites,” he said.

“Jihad is the most powerful and only way to liberate Palestine and defend Jerusalem,” he added, saying “God loves those who fight in his way.”

In a final statement from conference attendees, the group emphasized “the first and most important obligation is to unite the Umma to liberate the holy Al-Aqsa Mosque” in Jerusalem, reported Al-Manar, a Lebanese news outlet considered close to Iran’s proxy Hizballah. The group also said “resistance” was the way “to achieve victory in Lebanon and Palestine, despite the unlimited support received by the Zionist enemy and continuing inaction of the countries in the region.”

Meanwhile, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, published a 416-page book earlier this month outlining the destruction of Israel, referring to the Jewish state as an ally of “The American Great Satan.”

The book features a long-term strategy that entails terrorizing Israel in a war of attrition that would lead to Jews leaving Israel for other countries.

Supporters of the nuclear deal say it’s a fantasy to expect a better outcome should Congress override President Obama’s expected veto of a vote to defeat the agreement. The combined statements of Iran and its supporting clerics makes clear, however, that the true fantasy is any expectation Iran will turn away from terror as a result of its engagement with world powers.

Iran to arm West Bank Palestinians for new Eastern Front to “efface”Israel

August 18, 2015

Iran to arm West Bank Palestinians for new Eastern Front to “efface”Israel, DEBKAfile, August 17, 2015

Suleimani_Qassem_nameAl Qods chief Gen. Qassem Soleimani

Attesting to the seriousness of Iran’s intent, Jmail Majdalani, PLO executive committee member and personal representative of Mahmoud Abbas, chairman of the Palestinian Authority on the West Bank, has arrived in Tehran. He is there to arrange his boss’s first visit in many years to the Iranian capital.

*********************

Al Qods commander Gen. Qassem Soleimani, acting on the orders of Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, this week set up a new Iranian command to fight Israel, DEBKAfile reports exclusively from its military and intelligence sources.

It has been dubbed the Eastern Command of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.The Al Qods Brigades, which are the external terrorist arm of the Guards, are organized according to sectors, with commands for Hizballah, the Palestinians, Syria, Iraq and the Gulf.

Their newest sector is the Eastern Command which, our sources report has been assigned as its first task to start handing out weapons, including missiles, to any Palestinian West Bank group willing to receive them. Tehran’s object is to transform the West Bank into a territory hostile to Israel on the model of southern Lebanon which is ruled by the armed Hizballah and the Gaza Strip under the Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists.

In the first week of August, Tehran published a book of 416 pages written by Ali Khamenei entitled “Palestine.” The cover image was labeled “The flagbearer of Jihad to liberate Jerusalem.”

 The volume was released to Western sources, who reported that the most constantly recurring phrases in the text in relation to Israel are “nabudi” – meaning annihilation; imha – meaning disappearing or fading out; and “zaval” meaning effacement.

Khamenei asserts that Israel must be destroyed because it captured Islam’s third most sacred city and is the foremost ally of “Big Satan” – America.

The Iranian leader goes into detail about exactly how Israel should be annihilated – not by “classical wars” or “massacres of the Jews” but by means of a “long period of low-intensity warfare designed to make life impossible for a majority of Israeli Jews.”

When he visited Beirut on Aug. 12, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammed Zavad Zarif said it was necessary after the nuclear deal, to “confront the challenges of the region, the most important of which is the Zionist and extremist regime.”

Members of the Obama administration wave away these disclosures of Iranian intent as no more than letting off steam to pacify the hard-line opponents of the nuclear deal – US Secretary of State John Kerry said on July 24: “I also told them that their chants of Death to American and so forth are neither helpful and they’re pretty stupid.”

But in Iran, the supreme leader’s words are treated as decrees demanding obedience. Indeed, at the first conference of the new Eastern Command, Gen. Soleimani read out passages from Khamenei’s book and told the officers that they were under orders to carry those decrees out to the letter.

Attesting to the seriousness of Iran’s intent, Jmail Majdalani, PLO executive committee member and personal representative of Mahmoud Abbas, chairman of the Palestinian Authority on the West Bank, has arrived in Tehran. He is there to arrange his boss’s first visit in many years to the Iranian capital.

Looking Ahead at Middle East “Peace”

August 17, 2015

Looking Ahead at Middle East “Peace” The Gatestone InstituteShoshana Bryen, August 17, 2015

  • The U.S. has provided approximately $5 billion to the Palestinians in bilateral aid since the mid-1990s and about $540 million this year. The EU added more than €500 million ($558 million), making it the largest single-year donor. Why should Palestinian Authority (PA) not have to pay the bill for its own savage behavior? And why is the U.S. so determined to protect it?
  • According to the deputy head of UNRWA, the organization needs $101 million in order to open schools on time. Why does the Hamas government not pay for its own children to go to school? And why does the Hamas government not pay for the repair of its own people’s houses? UNRWA and the U.S. government seem to believe that the PA and Hamas cannot be expected to spend their own funds — or donated funds — on the needs of their own people. Hamas can therefore use all its funds to make war.
  • As long as Hamas and the PA are permitted both to spend sponsors’ money on terrorism and warfare while escaping responsibility for the needs of their people, and as long as Iran is a key donor — with all the temptations, means and opportunity to “wipe Israel,” as it repeatedly threatens to do — the idea of a U.S.-led “peace process” is fantasy.

The Obama Administration has made it clear that it will not pursue Israeli-Palestinian “peace talks” while the Iran deal remains fluid. But as the President heads into his last year in office, the “two state solution” apparently remains an important political aspiration. The Iran deal and the “peace process” are linked by concerns over Iranian behavior on the non-nuclear front, and concerns about American willingness to remain the sort of ally Israel has found it to be in the past.

The following stories — all involving money and how it is spent — should be understood together:

  • U.S. requests lower bond for Palestinian appeal of terror case
  • Infant mortality in Gaza
  • Schools in Gaza may not open
  • Iranian assistance to Hamas

First, the U.S. Department of Justice this week asked a judge to “carefully consider” the size of the bond he requires from the Palestinian Authority (PA) as it appeals the award of damages to the victims of six terrorist attacks that killed and injured Americans in Israel. Concerned about the possible bankruptcy of the PA, Deputy Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken added a statement to the Justice Department filing, saying, “A P.A. insolvency and collapse would harm current and future U.S.-led efforts to achieve a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”

The Palestinian Authority was proven in a U.S. court to have organized and paid for terrorist attacks that killed Americans and Israelis. The U.S. has provided approximately $5 billion to the Palestinians in bilateral aid since the mid-1990s and about $540 million this year. The EU added more than €500 million ($558 million), making it the largest single-year donor. Why should PA not have to pay the bill for its own savage behavior?

And why is the U.S. so determined to protect it?

Second, UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East), which maintains camps for Palestinians in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria and parts of the West Bank, released a broadside last week entitled, “Infant Mortality Rises in Gaza for the First Time in 50 Years.” Subhead: “UNRWA’s Health Director says the [Israeli and Egyptian] blockade may be contributing to the trend.”

Such a rise would be a terrible thing, and Israeli culpability would be terrible also. But is it true? It takes only a few clicks of the computer keys to find out.

Palestinian infant mortality in the West Bank and Gaza has been on a straight downward slope since 1968. Using CIA Factbook figures, infant mortality was 158 per 1000 from 1950-55; 87 per 1000 in 1968 (using an Israeli government publication); 25 per 1000 in 1985-90; and is at 14 per 1000 today in Gaza. Where is the rising trend? The UNRWA release came from an article entitled “Increasing Neonatal Mortality among Palestine Refugees in the Gaza Strip,” published by PLOS ONE, an “open access” online journal.

The study itself notes, “These estimates are based on small numbers of deaths, and the confidence intervals are wide, so the infant mortality rate could in fact be stable or continuing to decline” (emphasis added). Yet its conclusion reads, “In conclusion, we have estimated that, for the first time in five decades, the mortality rate has increased among Palestine refugee newborns in Gaza, and this may reflect inadequate neo-natal care in hospitals.”

An Israeli website that evaluated the entire study caught the inherent contradiction. “They didn’t have enough data to reach the conclusion they did… Those two statements have no place in a serious scientific paper and would merit its immediate rejection.”

Third, having dispensed with scare mongering about infant mortality, let us turn to the other UNRWA broadside of the week: “Without New Cash, UNRWA Schools Won’t Open.” According to the deputy head of the organization, UNRWA needs $101 million in order to open schools on time.

Why does the Hamas government not pay for its own children to go to school?

This is similar to a story last January, in which UNRWA suspended the repair of Palestinian houses in Gaza because of a shortage of international donor money, and it raises the question: Why does the Hamas government not pay for the repair of its own peoples’ houses?

It is UNRWA’s belief — like that of the U.S. government, apparently — that Palestinian governments, including the one on the U.S. list of sponsors of terrorism, have to be protected from the consequences of their own war-making, support for terrorism, and thievery. UNRWA and the U.S. government seem to believe that the Palestinian Authority and Hamas cannot be expected to spend their own funds — or donated funds — on the needs of their own people.

Which brings us to Iran; the only country working assiduously to ensure that its client, Hamas in Gaza, gets the assistance it needs to meet its goals, and then meets those goals.

According to Israeli government sources, Iran’s most recent assistance includes “cash, military training for Hamas fighters, weaponry, and electronics equipment including for use against Israeli drones… Hamas has also been training fighters in the use of anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles, and is training recruits to fly paragliders across the border.”

1162Bridging the Sunni-Shia divide, for the goal of genocide: Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal (left) confers with Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, in 2010. (Image source: Office of the Supreme Leader)

UNRWA and Iran, with a supporting role played by the United States, have long made it possible for Hamas and the PA to spend other people’s money building more tunnels, arming multiplemilitias, paying “salaries” to convicted terrorists in Israeli jails, and improving the quality of their rockets and missiles. They know — and Israel knows — that between the Israeli government and the international aid agencies including, but not limited to, UNRWA, no Palestinians will starve, no one will go without medical care, no one will go homeless (except those homeless because Hamas confiscated about 20% of the cement and steel meant to restore Gaza houses damaged in last year’s war). Hamas can therefore use all its funds to make war.

As long as Hamas and the PA are permitted both to spend sponsors’ money on terrorism and warfare while escaping responsibility for the needs of their people, and as long as Iran is a key donor — with all the temptations, means and opportunity to “wipe Israel,” as it repeatedly threatens to do — the idea of a U.S.-led “peace process” is fantasy.

State Department Interferes in Favor of PLO Terrorists

August 11, 2015

State Department Interferes in Favor of PLO Terrorists, Israel National News, Tova Dvorin, August 11, 2015

US President Barack Obama is reportedly seeking to lower that fine – following a series of conflicts between officials from the State Department and the Justice Department over the issue, an official involved in the case told the New York Times Tuesday. 

*********************

Washington asks a judge presiding over terror victims’ compensation case to reduce money paid to Israelis injured during Second Intifada.

The Obama administration has asked a judge Monday to “carefully consider” the size of the bond demanded from the Palestinian Authority (PA) for its role orchestrating years of terror attacks against Israelis and Jews – directly interfering in a US court case.

In February, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) – the terror group behind the PA – was found liable to pay $218.5 million to victims of terror, a figure that was set to be tripled to $655.5 million according to the anti-terrorism laws under which the case was brought.

Legal rights group Shurat Hadin (Israel Law Center) helped represent the 11 families who charge the PA and PLO of inciting, supporting, planning and executing the seven terror attacks which killed American citizens between 2000 and 2004.

In May, the PA admitted it cannot pay such a hefty fine, however – as it is struggling under billions of debt despite an ongoing stream of aid from Israel and other countries – and called the case “political extortion.”

Now, US President Barack Obama is reportedly seeking to lower that fine – following a series of conflicts between officials from the State Department and the Justice Department over the issue, an official involved in the case told the New York Times Tuesday.

In a document entitled “Statement of Interest of the United States of America,” the Obama administration expressed concerns over the payments hurting the PA’s basic government services.

Forcing the PLO to pay “a significant portion of its revenues would likely severely compromise the P.A.’s ability to operate as a governmental authority,” deputy Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken wrote. “A P.A. insolvency and collapse would harm current and future U.S.-led efforts to achieve a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”

Blinken stressed in the document, however, that the State Department allegedly values the rights of terror victims to seek “just compensation” and was not taking a position on the case itself, only on the high bond.

“The United States strongly supports the rights of victims of terrorism to vindicate their interests in federal court and to receive just compensation for their injuries,” Blinken claimed.

Justice Department officials have maintained throughout the proceedings that any State Department interference in the case would interfere with the victims’ rights for compensation and justice.