Al-Zahar: Jeruzalem wordt hoofdstad van Islamitisch Kalifaat

"PLC member Fathi Hamad called for the death penalty for anyone giving up one inch of Jerusalem or Palestine."

 

 

Hamas wil geen vrede. Toch is het in de mode om te beweren dat er een gematigde tak is waarmee zaken kan worden gedaan. Wanneer liet deze gematigde tak het laatst van zich horen? Zeggen zij dat wat hun betreft het land gedeeld moet worden en de Joden er ook rechten hebben?

 

Zelfs Abbas krijgt de woorden 'Joodse staat' al niet over zijn lippen, laat staan leden van Hamas.

 

Beweren dat met Hamas gepraat kan worden maakt ze niet gematigder, en zelf stiekem met ze gaan praten (zoals verschillende politieke partijen van de zomer deden) is geen steun in de rug voor Abbas en het vredesproces. De steun van zogenaamd gematigde Arabische staten (zoals Egypte en Saoedi-Arabië) voor 'verzoening' en een nieuwe eenheidsregering is dat evenmin.

 

Het is tekenend dat al diegenen die menen dat er met Hamas te praten valt nooit dergelijke uitspraken veroordelen.

 

 

Ratna

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Al-Zahar: Jerusalem Will Be Capital Of Islamic Caliphate

http://www.thememriblog.org/blog_personal/en/3949.htm

 

Members of the Hamas faction in the Palestinian Legislative Council in Gaza and the West Bank have approved the first reading of a bill banning the relinquishing of Jerusalem and considering the act of doing so to be against the law.

 

Former Palestinian foreign minister Mahmoud Al-Zahar said that Jerusalem will be the capital of the state of the Islamic Caliphate in Palestine.

 

PLC member Fathi Hamad called for the death penalty for anyone giving up one inch of Jerusalem or Palestine.

 

 

Source: Al-Ayyam, Palestinian Authority, December 6, 2007

Israëlische minister mijdt Groot-Brittanië

Stel je voor: een minister van een bevriend land wordt door een denktank uitgenodigd om over recente ontwikkelingen in zijn land te komen spreken, maar moet de uitnodiging afslaan vanwege het gevaar aldaar gearresteerd te worden.

 

Als er daadwerkelijk oorlogsmisdaden zijn begaan of daar sterke verdenkingen voor bestaan, dan moet iemand daarvoor berecht worden door het Internationale Strafhof. Het kan niet zo zijn dat advocaten internationale leiders naar believen kunnen aanklagen en deze op grond daarvan gearresteerd kunnen worden. Dit zou het aantal internationale bezoeken drastisch reduceren maar heeft vooral een hoog arbitrair gehalte.

 

Als de Britse rechters consequent zijn, dan kunnen Russische, Chinese, Turkse of Indonesische leiders Groot-Brittannië ook maar beter mijden, en laten we de Amerikanen niet vergeten. Maar wacht even, hebben Britse militairen zich niet ook aan oorlogsmisdaden schuldig gemaakt in Irak?

 

 

Ratna

---------

 

Israëlisch minister mijdt Groot-Brittanië

De Volkskrant

 

Van onze correspondent Alex Burghoorn
gepubliceerd op 07 december 2007 07:45 , bijgewerkt op 07:45

 

JERUZALEM - De Israëlische minister van Openbare Veiligheid, Avi Dichter, heeft een reis naar Groot-Britannië afgezegd uit vrees na aankomst in Londen te worden gearresteerd wegens oorlogsmisdaden.

 

Als hoofd van de veiligheidsdienst Shin Beth was Dichter in 2002 betrokken bij de liquidatie van Hamas-leider Salah Shehadeh. Met een vliegtuigbom legde de Israël zijn huis in Gaza-Stad in puin; behalve Shehadeh en zijn lijfwacht kwamen daar 15 burgers bij om, onder wie 11 kinderen.

 

De luchtaanval op Shehadeh is destijds wereldwijd hevig bekritiseerd. Niet alleen omdat de leider van de gewapende tak van Hamas zonder enige vorm van proces was vermoord, maar vooral ook omdat daar buitenproportionele middelen voor waren ingezet – de gebruikte bom woog grofweg 1000 kilo.

 

Minister Dichter was door een Britse denktank gevraagd te komen spreken over de betekenis van de top in Annapolis, waar Israël en de Palestijnen tien dagen geleden hebben beloofd over een vredesakkoord te gaan onderhandelen. Maar na overleg met de ministeries van Buitenlandse Zaken en Justitie heeft Dichter de uitnodiging afgeslagen.

 

'Enkel onder zeer speciale omstandigheden zou hem immuniteit zijn verleend', zei donderdag zijn woordvoerder, Mati Gill.

 

De angst voor arrestatie in Londen leeft onder Israëlische legerofficieren en ministers sinds Britse agenten in 2005 op vliegveld Heathrow klaarstonden om generaal Doron Almog in te rekenen.

 

Britse advocaten hadden in opdracht van een Palestijnse mensenrechtenorganisatie een klacht tegen Almog ingediend wegens de moedwillige verwoesting van tientallen huizen in de Gazastrook. De rechter had daarop een arrestatiebevel uitgevaardigd.

 

Maar Almog werd net op tijd getipt, bleef in het vliegtuig zitten en vloog terug naar Tel Aviv. Zeker een officier, Aviv Kochavi, heeft nadien van een reis naar Groot-Brittannië afgezien. Avi Dichter is de eerste minister die Londen mijdt.

 

De Israëlische regering dringt er sinds 2005 bij de Britse regering op aan de mogelijkheden te beperken voor particulieren om bij justitie oorlogsmisdaden aanhangig te maken.

 

Tot nu toe zijn de Britten daar niet op in gegaan. De Israëlische lobby is in 2006 door Britse parlementariërs veroordeeld als inmenging in binnenlandse aangelegenheden.

 

Positie van de Joden in Irak in 1950

Hieronder een verslag van een debat in het Iraakse parlement in 1950 over de positie van de Joden in Irak. Opmerkelijk is de vergelijking die de Britse ambasadeur maakt met de positie van zwarten in het zuiden van de VS in die tijd.

 

Zie ook: Palestijnse en Joodse vluchtelingen in het Midden-Oosten

______________________ 

March 1950: 'Iraqi Jews treated like US negroes'
http://jewishrefugees.blogspot.com/2007/12/march-1950-iraqi-jews-were-treated-like.html


Iraq, March 1950. A pathetic scene: the last Jewish senator in the parliament makes a last stand on behalf of the Jewish community of Iraq. (To no avail: within a year most of the 140,000 Jews would be gone and their property confiscated. A bill was passed which allowed Jews to leave Iraq legally, on condition they forfeited their nationality.)

Norman Stillman's book The Jews of Arab Lands in Modern Times (Part 2) contains this (edited) summary by the British ambassador to Baghdad of the decisive Iraqi Parliamentary debate. The ambassador makes a startling comparison between the discriminatory treatment of the Jews in Iraq and the negroes in the American South. Contrary to revisionist accounts of glowing relations between the Jews and their Muslim neighbours, the Jews were repressed, jittery, and fearful of what the future might hold.

"The debate in the Iraqi Senate on March 4th on the Draft Law supplementary to the Ordinance for Cancellation of Iraqi Nationality produced two speeches of some pathos from the aged Jewish Senator, Sayyid Ezra Menahem Daniel.

"Senator Ezra (Daniel) said:" Doubtless the Government has brought forward this bill with reluctance in view of the painful condition in which Iraqi Jews find themselves today and in order to reduce the disturbances caused by illegal emigration. This bill deals with only aspect of the Jewish question in Iraq. What can be done to reassure the Jews who do not wish to leave their homeland for good and who are loyal and law-abiding citizens? They are now deprived of their constitutional and legal rights as a result of administrative measures placing restrictions *on them alone of all Iraqi nationals.

"They have been discriminated against, and their liberties, actions, education and means of livelihood have been handicapped. Does not the Government consider it to be its duty to reassure this large section of loyal citizens by removing those extraordinary restritctions in order to restore to Iraqi Jews their sense of security, confidence and stability? The Jews have lived in Iraq for 3,500 years. That is why they are reluctant to emigrate unless thei are really obliged to do so. History will reveal the real reason for this emigration and will show that the Iraqi Jews have nothing to do with the unhappy conditions of which their fellow citizens complain."

"Later in the debate the Senator spoke again saying he did not know what the Jew could do in Iraq after he had submitted to the exceptional conditions of the past two years. He had not been admitted to the Higher Colleges and was not allowed to study at his own expense abroad. Work was denied him and he suffered restrictions in business. But for these severe handicaps, Iraqi Jews would not have gone so far as to attempt large-scale flight from the country.

"The Senator added that if the Government wanted to reassure the Jews and induce them to resume their ordinary avocations it should remove these handicaps and encourage them to work.

"The Minister of the Interior, Sayyid Saleh Jabr, said in reply that the government was sympathetic with loyal citizens who did not put themselves in an attitude of opposition to the national interest. A not inconsiderable section of Jewish nationals, however, had committed acts which were not consistent with the country's interests and were in fact a disservice to the nation.Their motivation might have been political or religious. The Minister continued that the Government felt it was not in the national interest to prevent the emigration of these people to any destination they might choose...."

The British Ambassador to Baghdad adds: " It may be worthwhile to attempt to provide a more convincing answer to Senator Ezra Daniel's questions than did the Minister of the Interior. As I have already reported , the PM has told me there are now no administrative restrictions applied to Jews which do not apply to all other Iraqi citizens. I have no reason to believe this is untrue. Nevertheless, discrimination against Jews is applied in practice. In the Southern States of America, it is said to be difficult for a negro to obtain his rights against a white American in the Courts or to send his son to study alongside his white fellow citizen in higher colleges. An Iraqi Jew today suffers similar disabilities, which extends to many aspects of his life. Most educated Iraqis deplore this state of affairs,and the Iraqi governing class is increasingly perturbed by the stagnation which has been caused in the markets by the uncertainty with which the Jews regard their economic future.

"Governments in Iraq, however, are too weak to lead public opinion in a matter of this kind, and any direct attempts on their part to improve the position of Jews are immediately the object of Nationalist attack. I think the Iraqi government sincerely hoped that the departure of the Jewish malcontents under this new Ordnance would improve the atmosphere and facilitate good treatment for those who remained. Like many well-intentioned Iraqi measures its effects have been different from those intended. It has resulted in an increase in attacks by the Nationalist press on the Iraqi-Jewish community as such..."

* as recorded by Nissim Rejwan in his book The last Jews of Baghdad

 

Fundamenten van oud paleis ontdekt in Jeruzalem

Het is best wel spannend om middels archeologische opgravingen te achterhalen wat er wel en niet historisch klopt van de geschiedenis zoals die in de Bijbel staat beschreven. Zo is er in Egypte nooit een spoor gevonden van een massale uittocht van Joodse slaven, en lijkt er nooit een gewelddadige verovering van het land van Kanaän door de Israëlieten te zijn geweest. Zij kwamen waarschijnlijk voort uit inheemse stammen en zijn geleidelijk aan het gebied gaan overheersen. Mogelijk hebben ze daarvoor wel strijd geleverd met de Egyptenaren, want het Egyptische rijk heeft zich in bepaalde perioden uitgestrekt tot in Syrië.

 

Alle archeologische vondsten (alsmede de oude Griekse en Romeinse geschiedschrijving) bevestigen wel de Joodse aanwezigheid in Jeruzalem en het land van Israël gedurende meerdere milennia en hun heerschappij daar in tenminste een deel van die periode. Het is daarom van de gekke dat Palestijnse 'wetenschappers' en andere prominente Arabieren de historische band van de Joden met de Tempelberg, Jeruzalem en het land proberen te ontkennen. De Palestijnen schroomden zelfs niet om archeologische vondsten onder de Tempelberg op het stort te dumpen.

 

Een empirische wetenschap als archeologie verdraagt geen politieke agenda, maar moet onbevangen oude munten, potscherven en muurresten opgraven en kijken wat daaruit valt af te leiden, en dan kijken in hoeverre dat overeenstemt met de geschiedschrijving in historische bronnen.

 

 

Wouter

________________

Dec 5, 2007 18:14 | Updated Dec 6, 2007 0:01

2nd Temple palace uncovered

By ETGAR LEFKOVITS

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1196847260218&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

 

Israeli archeologists have uncovered a monumental Second Temple structure opposite the Temple Mount that was likely Queen Helena's palace, the Israel Antiquities Authority announced Wednesday.

 

The building was unearthed during a six-month excavation in the Givati parking lot just outside the Old City's Dung Gate, ahead of the planned expansion of the Western Wall parking lot.

The site also indicates that the ancient City of David was much larger than previously thought, said archeologist Doron Ben-Ami, who is directing the dig at the site.

The palace, which was destroyed by the Romans when they demolished the Second Temple in 70 CE, was dated to the end of the Second Temple period by pottery and stone vessels, as well as an assortment of coins from that time, Ben-Ami said.

He said the elaborate edifice, which is an anomaly in the landscape of the lower city at the end of the Second Temple period - otherwise marked with only modest buildings - was probably a palace built by Queen Helena, a wealthy Babylonian aristocrat who converted to Judaism and moved to Jerusalem with her sons.

Helena became known for her generosity in helping the city's poor during a famine. She was buried in Jerusalem.

The site of the dig.
Photo: Israel Antiquities Authority

According to the prominent 1st century historian Josephus, Helena's family built lavish buildings in the City of David, which stood out at the time in a largely residential area that was noted for its almost complete absence of public or monumental buildings.

The archeologists carrying out the dig have not yet found any inscription to identify the building they uncovered, but Ben-Ami said there was a "high probability" that the site was indeed Helena's palace.

"We need more evidence to decide, but almost everything fits," he said.

The well-preserved structure being uncovered in the excavation is an impressive architectural complex that includes massive foundations; walls, some of which are more than five meters tall and are built of stones that weigh hundreds of kilograms; halls that are at least two stories tall; a basement level that was covered with vaults; and remains of polychrome frescoes, water installations and mikvaot.

The narrow openings that were discovered in the basement level of the structure were likely used by its inhabitants to flee shortly before the Romans destroyed the palace, Ben-Ami said.

The building was destroyed by dismantling the walls of the large structure, causing the massive stone walls and ceilings from the upper stories to collapse onto the basement.

The large edifice was covered with remains that date to later periods - Byzantine, Roman and early Islamic. Below it there are remains from the early Hellenistic period and artifacts from the time of the First Temple.

"It is like an open history book of Jerusalem," Ben-Ami said.

 

Archeologie en Joodse rechten in Jeruzalem

Naast bagatellisering van de Holocaust, ontkennen dat de Joden een volk zijn, en alle mogelijke vormen van antisemitisme, bestrijden Palestijnen, Arabieren en andere antizionisten het Joodse recht op zelfbeschikking in Israël ook door hun historische band met Jeruzalem en het land van Israël te ontkennen. Ook Arafat stond hier bekend om: hij verzon de meest fantastische verhalen om te 'bewijzen' dat de Joodse tempel helemaal niet in Jeruzalem heeft gestaan, maar bijvoorbeeld in Jemen.

 

De hedendaagse archeologie vindt (tot nog toe) geen ondersteuning voor de oude Bijbelverhalen van de uittocht uit Egypte en de gewelddadige verovering van het land van Kanaän door de Israëlieten, maar bevestigt wel hun aanwezigheid in het land van Israël gedurende meerdere milennia en hun historische binding met Jeruzalem en de Tempelberg.

 

Tot verbijstering van de meeste weldenkende mensen, heeft de Palestijns-Amerikaanse antropologe Nadia Abu El-Haj onlangs een positie gekregen aan de Columbia Universiteit in New York, op basis van een werkstuk waarin zij deze historische connectie van de Joden met hun land onderuit probeert te halen met een hoop postmodern geblabla waarin het er niet meer toe zou doen of je nu het graf van koning David of de Ark van het Verbond onder de Tempelberg ontdekt. Het zou allemaal maar om politieke ideologie gaan en een kwestie zijn van Zionistisch-kolonialistische manipulaties en interpretaties. Wetenschappelijke, empirische feiten boeien niet. Dat is overigens ook hoe Ilan Pappe geschiedenis schrijft.

 

 

Wouter

_______

Archeology and Jewish rights in Jerusalem

It should not be necessary to prove the ancient Jewish connection to Jerusalem, which has been universally accepted for thousands of years. It became an issue only when Palestinian politicians and anthropologists like Nadia abu El Haj began rewriting history based on fantasy, discarding "positivist facticity" (derogatory term for facts). 

 

Ami Isseroff

_____________

 

Analyze This...: Digging for the truth about Israeli archeology

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Calev Ben-David , THE JERUSALEM POST Dec. 5, 2007
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

In his autobiography, Once Upon A Country: A Palestinian Life, Sari Nusseibeh writes of the disenchantment Palestinians felt after the failure of the Camp David talks in 2000.

 

"Back in Palestine, Arafat stoked this by more myth-mongering. He used a verse from the Koran to prove a crazy theory that Solomon's Temple had really been in Yemen. At some point during the forty years in the desert, the People of Israel took a wrong turn and ended up far from Jerusalem. [Arafat said] 'Do you know the story of the Queen of Sheba sending a bird to Solomon that arrived the same day. How could a bird fly there so fast? Because the temple was in nearby Yemen!' When I [Nusseibeh] heard this I feared the chairman was losing his grip on reality."

 

Seven years later, the reality of the Jewish ancestral connection to the Temple Mount is still being challenged in some Palestinian and Islamic circles. As Israeli-Palestinian negotiations get under way that will include discussion of the future permanent status of a site holy to both Jews and Moslems, those "crazy theories" are likely once again to get more airing.

 

Yet the depth of Jewish historical ties to the site have been repeatedly confirmed, by facts not on the ground, but in the ground - archeological discoveries and revelations that have been unearthed by excavation and reclamation work done in the area of the Mount.

 

There have been several examples just in the past few months, including: the exposing for the first time of a site in northern Jerusalem where some of the massive stones used to construct the Second Temple were quarried; the discovery of several artifacts (shards of bowls, oil juglets and figurines) dating to the First Temple period and found during the Wakf's recent renovation work on the Mount; and the unveiling yesterday by the Israel Antiquities Authorities of a large structure just south of the Temple Mount, dating to the late Second Temple period, that fits the description of the palace of the fabled Jewish convert Queen Helena.

 

If the latter is indeed the case, it speaks volumes about the importance of the Mount in ancient Jewish life. According to Flavius Josephus, after converting to Judaism, Helena chose to leave her native kingdom of Adiabene in the latter years of her life and settled in Jerusalem next to the Holy Temple (her gravesite is found in Jerusalem's "Tombs of the Kings").

 

If archeology helps prove the case for the Jewish connection to the Mount, then the next step for those who wish to deny just that is to attack the archeology itself. This ideological and intellectual assault has taken a few forms.

 

The most pernicious, because it is the most inflammatory, have been the repeated false claims that Israeli authorities have used archeological excavations in the area of the Mount to secretly dig underneath the site itself, in a supposed effort to undermine the Moslem holy structures found there today.

 

This calumny was directly responsible for the deaths of dozens of Israelis and Palestinians during the so-called "Western Wall Tunnel riots" of 1995. It has been raised again this year, sparked by efforts by Israeli authorities to carry out badly needed renovations on the Mughrabi Gate entrance ramp to the Mount from the Western Wall plaza. In an effort to dampen these inflammatory falsehoods before they do real damage, the IAA and Government Press Office have held several tours of the Mughrabi excavations and Western Wall tunnels for the foreign press, including one this week.

 

A more sophisticated, but still insidious accusation is that Israeli archeologists are engaged in a campaign to deliberately destroy ancient Islamic remains and erase historical levels dating from periods of earlier Muslim rule in this land, in an intentional effort to strengthen Jewish claims of sovereignty.

 

Among those making that charge is American-Palestinian anthropology professor Nadia Abu El-Haj, whose book, Facts On the Ground: Archeological Practice and Self-Fashioning in Israeli Society, has been widely criticized for its flawed and tendentious scholarship, and its slandering of noted and conscientious Israeli archeologists.

 

Unfortunately, that fact was apparently not seriously weighed in the controversial decision last month by New York's Barnard University to grant El-Haj tenure.

 

No one denies that archeology has played a crucial role in the developing of an Israeli-Jewish national identity, in the way it has in almost every country with deep historical roots. Or that archeology, here and everywhere else, has sometimes been influenced by ideological and political pressures that impact negatively on genuine scholarly inquiry.

 

To its credit, Israeli archeology in recent years has gone through a period of self-examination, criticism and revision, in an effort to come to grips, and when necessary correct, past errors and practices stemming from a time when the goal of just "proving the Bible" played too prominent a role in the discipline. Unfortunately, the results of that commendable work are often misused and quoted out of context by enemies of Zionism in order to completely discredit the historical connection of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel.

 

Visitors to the Temple Mount can get a better sense of where Israeli archeology is today by visiting the impressive remains of the Islamic Umayyad palaces (660-750 C.E.) just south of the site, excavated and restored in recent years by Israeli archeologists, working under government supervision, and funded in part by Jewish philanthropy.

 

But they also shouldn't forgo the chance in the near future to see the remnants of the structure unveiled by the IAA yesterday, which speaks to a Jewish connection to the Temple Mount that no "myth-mongering" or pseudo-academic propaganda can deny.

 

Source of this Israel News Article

 

NIE rapport over atoomprogramma Iran gedreven door politieke motieven?

Waarom kwamen de Amerikaanse veiligheidsdiensten juist nu - kort voordat de VS een derde ronde aan sancties tegen Iran in de Veiligheidsraad wilden brengen - met dit rapport? Volgens hardliners is het rapport door politieke motieven ingegeven. Anderen beweren dat men extra voorzichtig is geworden nadat het rapport over Irak, dat van het worst case scenario uitging, er zo faliekant naast zat, en men nu naar de andere kant doorschiet.

 

Onderstaande analyse suggereert dat het rapport vanuit regeringskringen is gemanipuleerd om het agressieve Iranbeleid te kunnen ombuigen, en een compromis met Iran te kunnen aangaan met het oog op haar rol in Irak.

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------

 

The NIE Report: Solving a Geopolitical Problem with Iran
By George Friedman - Stratfor - Strategic Forecasting, Inc.
GEOPOLITICAL INTELLIGENCE REPORT - December 3, 2007

The United States released a new National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Dec. 3. It said, "We judge with high confidence that in the fall of 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program." It went on to say, "Tehran's decision to halt its nuclear weapons program suggests it is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005." It further said, "Our assessment that Iran halted the program in 2003 primarily in response to international pressure indicates Tehran's decisions are guided by a cost-benefit approach rather than a rush to a weapon irrespective of the political, economic and military costs."

With this announcement, the dynamics of the Middle Eastern region, Iraq and U.S.-Iranian relations shift dramatically. For one thing, the probability of a unilateral strike against Iranian nuclear targets is gone. Since there is no Iranian nuclear weapons program, there is no rationale for a strike. Moreover, if Iran is not engaged in weapons production, then a broader air campaign designed to destabilize the Iranian regime has no foundation either.

The NIE release represents a transformation of U.S. policy toward Iran. The Bush administration made Iran's nuclear weapons program the main reason for its attempt to create an international coalition against Iran, on the premise that a nuclear-armed Iran was unacceptable. If there is no Iranian nuclear program, then what is the rationale for the coalition? Moreover, what is the logic of resisting Iran's efforts in Iraq, rather than cooperating?

In looking at the report, a number of obvious questions come up. First, how did the intelligence community reach the wrong conclusion in the spring of 2005, when it last released an NIE on Iran, and what changed by 2007? Also, why did the United States reach the wrong conclusions on Iran three years after its program was halted? There are two possible answers. One is intelligence failure and the other is political redefinition. Both must be explored.

Let's begin with intelligence failure. Intelligence is not an easy task. Knowing what is going on inside of a building is harder than it might seem. Regardless of all the technical capabilities -- from imagery in all spectra to sensing radiation leakage at a distance -- huge uncertainties always remain. Failing to get a positive reading does not mean the facility is not up and running. It might just have been obscured, or the technical means to discover it are insufficient. The default setting in technical intelligence is that, while things can be ruled in, they cannot simply be ruled out by lack of evidence.

You need to go into the building. Indeed, you need to go into many buildings, look around, see what is happening and report back. Getting into highly secure buildings may be easy in the movies. It is not easy in real life. Getting someone into the building who knows what he is seeing is even harder. Getting him out alive to report back, and then repeating the process in other buildings, is even harder. It can be done -- though not easily or repeatedly.

Recruiting someone who works in the building is an option, but at the end of the day you have to rely on his word as to what he saw. That too, is a risk. He might well be a double agent who is inventing information to make money, or he could just be wrong. There is an endless number of ways that recruiting on-site sources can lead you to the wrong conclusion.

Source-based intelligence would appear to be the only way to go. Obviously, it is better to glean information from someone who knows what is going on, rather than to guess. But the problem with source-based intelligence is that, when all is said and done, you can still be just as confused -- or more confused -- than you were at the beginning. You could wind up with a mass of intelligence that can be read either way. It is altogether possible to have so many sources, human and technical, that you have no idea what the truth is. That is when an intelligence organization is most subject to political pressure. When the intelligence could go either way, politics can tilt the system. We do not know what caused the NIE to change its analysis. It could be the result of new, definitive intelligence, or existing intelligence could have been reread from a new political standpoint.

Consider the politics. The assumption was that Iran wanted to develop nuclear weapons -- though its motivations for wanting to do so were never clear to us. First, the Iranians had to assume that, well before they had an operational system, the United States or Israel would destroy it. In other words, it would be a huge effort for little profit. Second, assume that it developed one or two weapons and attacked Israel, for example. Israel might well have been destroyed, but Iran would probably be devastated by an Israeli or U.S. counterstrike. What would be the point?

For Iran to be developing nuclear weapons, it would have to have been prepared to take extraordinary risks. A madman theory, centered around the behavior of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was essential. But as the NIE points out, Iran was "guided by a cost-benefit approach." In simple terms, the Iranians weren't nuts. That is why they didn't build a nuclear program.

That is not to say Iran did not benefit from having the world believe it was building nuclear weapons. The United States is obsessed with nuclear weapons in the hands of states it regards as irrational. By appearing to be irrational and developing nuclear weapons, the Iranians created a valuable asset to use in negotiating with the Americans. The notion of a nuclear weapon in Iranian hands appeared so threatening that the United States might well negotiate away other things -- particularly in Iraq -- in exchange for a halt of the program. Or so the Iranians hoped. Therefore, while they halted development on their weapons program, they were not eager to let the Americans relax. They swung back and forth between asserting their right to operate the program and denying they had one. Moreover, they pushed hard for a civilian power program, which theoretically worried the world less. It drove the Americans up a wall -- precisely where the Iranians wanted them.

As we have argued, the central issue for Iran is not nuclear weapons. It is the future of Iraq. The Iran-Iraq war of 1980-1988 was the defining moment in modern Iranian history. It not only devastated Iran, but also weakened the revolution internally. Above all, Tehran never wants to face another Iraqi regime that has the means and motivation to wage war against Iran. That means the Iranians cannot tolerate a Sunni-dominated government that is heavily armed and backed by the United States. Nor, for that matter, does Tehran completely trust Iraq's fractured Shiite bloc with Iran's national security. Iran wants to play a critical role in defining the nature, policies and capabilities of the Iraqi regime.

The recent U.S. successes in Iraq, however limited and transitory they might be, may have caused the Iranians to rethink their view on dealing with the Americans on Iraq. The Americans, regardless of progress, cannot easily suppress all of the Shiite militias. The Iranians cannot impose a regime on Iraq, though they can destabilize the process. A successful outcome requires a degree of cooperation -- and recent indications suggest that Iran is prepared to provide that cooperation.

That puts the United States in an incredibly difficult position. On the one hand, it needs Iran for the endgame in Iraq. On the other, negotiating with Iran while it is developing nuclear weapons runs counter to fundamental U.S. policies and the coalition it was trying to construct. As long as Iran was building nuclear weapons, working with Iran on Iraq was impossible.

The NIE solves a geopolitical problem for the United States. Washington cannot impose a unilateral settlement on Iraq, nor can it sustain forever the level of military commitment it has made to Iraq. There are other fires starting to burn around the world. At the same time, Washington cannot work with Tehran while it is building nuclear weapons. Hence, the NIE: While Iran does have a nuclear power program, it is not building nuclear weapons.

Perhaps there was a spectacular and definitive intelligence breakthrough that demonstrated categorically that the prior assessments were wrong. Proving a negative is tough, and getting a definitive piece of intelligence is hard. Certainly, no matter how definitive the latest intelligence might have been, a lot of people want Iran to be building a nuclear weapon, so the debate over the meaning of this intelligence would have roared throughout the intelligence community and the White House. Keeping such debate this quiet and orderly is not Washington's style.

Perhaps the Iranians are ready to deal, and so decided to open up their facility for the Americans to see. Still, regardless of what the Iranians opened up, some would have argued that the United States was given a tour only of what the Iranians wanted them to see. There is a mention in the report that any Iranian program would be covert rather than overt, and that might reflect such concerns. However, all serious nuclear programs are always covert until they succeed. Nothing is more vulnerable than an incomplete nuclear program.

We are struck by the suddenness of the NIE report. Explosive new intelligence would have been more hotly contested. We suspect two things. First, the intelligence on the Iranian nuclear program consisted of a great number of pieces, many of which were inherently ambiguous and could be interpreted in multiple ways. Second, the weight of evidence for there being an Iranian nuclear program was shaded by the political proclivities of the administration, which saw the threat of a U.S. strike as intimidating Iran, and the weapons program discussion as justifying it. Third, the change in political requirements on both sides made a new assessment useful. This last has certainly been the case in all things Middle Eastern these past few days on issues ranging from the Palestinians to Syria to U.S. forces in Iraq -- so why should this issue be any different?

If this thesis is correct, then we should start seeing some movement on Iraq between the United States and Iran. Certainly the major blocker from the U.S. side has been removed and the success of U.S. policies of late should motivate the Iranians. In any case, the entire framework for U.S.-Iranian relations would appear to have shifted, and with it the structure of geopolitical relations throughout the region.

Intelligence is rarely as important as when it is proven wrong.

--------------------------------------------
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis
Website: www.imra.org.il

Waarom Israël een Joodse staat is en de Palestijnen dit maar niet willen erkennen

Het volgende suggereert dat, hoewel met 'Joodse staat' niet Joods in religieuze zin wordt bedoeld, de binding met het verleden wel vooral religieus is.

 

If Israel as a Jewish state does not have to be Jewish in the religious-halachic sense, what then does it mean to be Jewish? That meaning has not changed since Herzl's time: The Jews, at least since the Emancipation, are a people, a single people that has a very important religious element to it, and which, like other peoples, is strongly connected to its religious past. That past is the launch-pad from which its modern national identity takes-off.

 

 

Juist in het verleden waren religie en volk bij de Joden nauw met elkaar verbonden. De meeste feestdagen (bijvoorbeeld Pesach en Chanoeka) hebben evenzeer een nationale betekenis, en het verlangen naar Zion is niet ontstaan met het politieke zionisme.  

 

 

Ratna

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On dreams and nightmares
Amnon Rubinstein , THE JERUSALEM POST  Nov. 27, 2007

 

 

If Israel is not a Jewish state, it can't be called Israel, because Israel is a synonym for the Jewish people. If Israel is not Jewish, its Declaration of Independence should be annulled, because it talks about the establishment of a Jewish state named Israel.

 

If Israel is not Jewish, the United Nations resolution of November 29, 1947 regarding the partition of Palestine into two states, one Jewish and the other Arab, should be revoked.

 

If Israel is not Jewish, the Law of Return should of course be abrogated, along with Basic Law: Human Dignity and Freedom, which determines that Israel's values are based on it being a Jewish and democratic state.

 

If Israel is not Jewish, a new national anthem will have to be found instead of Hatikva. If Israel is not Jewish, it won't be Catholic. Or Buddhist. It will be Arab-Muslim - even if the path toward this outcome has to go via a bi-national state.

 

If Israel is not Jewish, there will not be two states for two peoples. If Israel is Arab-Muslim, it is not likely to be democratic.

 

If Israel becomes all of these things, all its anti-Zionist journalists and intellectuals will be the first to flee. However, the Jews from Middle Eastern countries will be left behind. Although they once fled from an Arab regime in order to live in a Jewish country, that same regime, which humiliated and oppressed them, will catch up with them.

 

SUCH a scenario would be a nightmare - one that will never come to pass, but it is essential we understand just how important the demand to define Israel as a Jewish and democratic state is. Yet we are being told that the existence of a large Arab minority in Israel means that Israel cannot be defined in this way, because defining a country without taking the minority into consideration is not democratic.

 

But when the UN declared the establishment of a Jewish state, the Arabs constituted more than 40 percent of the population, and despite this, the UN General Assembly saw no contradiction between this reality and defining Israel as a Jewish democratic state.

 

The anti-Zionists say that this reality has changed, that the world has entered the age of post-nationalism. But even in this age, most of the countries of Europe, even those with very large national minorities, remain nation-states.

 

The truth is of course that there is no justification whatsoever not to recognize Israel as a Jewish and democratic state. Our Supreme Court has repeatedly defined what the principal Jewish characteristics of the state are and has included in them the following: that the Hebrew language is its principal official language, its rest days will be held in accordance with Jewish tradition and that the state has a Jewish majority. We are told that defining Israel as a Jewish state awakens suspicions of it becoming a theocracy, and that at most, Israel is no more than the state of the Jews - like the name of Herzl's book. But Herzl himself saw no difference between the idea of a Jewish state and that of a state of the Jews, and allowed the name of his book to be translated into other languages as "The Jewish State." When the UN General Assembly decided that Israel would be a Jewish democratic state, it certainly did not have a theocracy in mind; and neither did David Ben-Gurion, who drafted the Declaration of Independence; nor did the former president of the Supreme Court Aharon Barak, who defined the essence of the state as Jewish.

 

And what good will it do to change Israel's name? Will the Palestinian Arabs ever agree to the existence of a state of the Jews under any name?

 

If Israel as a Jewish state does not have to be Jewish in the religious-halachic sense, what then does it mean to be Jewish? That meaning has not changed since Herzl's time: The Jews, at least since the Emancipation, are a people, a single people that has a very important religious element to it, and which, like other peoples, is strongly connected to its religious past. That past is the launch-pad from which its modern national identity takes-off.

 

Israel is the state of the Jewish people and all its parts, and it must also be the state of all its non-Jewish citizens, as well as of its large Muslim minority, whose leaders deny that they belong to the state.

 

The state cannot be identical to just a part of the Jewish people. It is the shared home of all - both non-Jews and Jews, Orthodox, traditional and secular - and it must not discriminate between any of the elements that constitute it.

 

Yes, there are still shortcomings in Israel's governmental system, with the absence of civil marriage being one of the most serious of them. The subjugation of Israelis to the Orthodox rabbinical courts and judges is at odds with Israel's essence as a democracy.

 

But that is not the reason the Arab leadership and the Palestinian president are opposed to defining Israel as a Jewish state. On the contrary, they themselves seek to establish a fanatical, anti-democratic theocracy of their own here, in place of Israel.

 

Their opposition is to the existence of a democratic Jewish state anywhere in the region. Their dream is our nightmare.

 

 

This article can also be read at http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1195546742297&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

 

Het verschil tussen Amerikaanse en Israëlische rapporten over Irans atoomprogramma

Waarom verschillen de Amerikaanse en de Israëlische inlichtingendiensten van mening over Irans atoomprogramma? Overigens maakt dit wel duidelijk dat de VS niet door de Zionistische lobby wordt beheerst, zoals een toenmend aantal mensen schijnt te geloven.

 

Both countries are also influenced by different political agendas. The Americans, for example, are still traumatized by the blatant intelligence failure vis-à-vis Iraq's alleged WMD and, therefore, does not want to be caught crying wolf again. Israel, on the other hand, is traumatized by its failure to learn of Libya's nuclear program before it was abandoned in a deal Col. Muammar Gaddafi struck with the US and UK.

 

Het probleem is dat dezelfde gegevens soms tot tegengestelde conclusies kunnen leiden, afhankelijk van de interpretatie.

 

 

Ratna

----------

Analysis: Why does US and Israeli intel differ?
Yaakov Katz , THE JERUSALEM POST Dec. 4, 2007
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1195546805590&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

All it took was eight pages, and the entire international front against Iran has undergone a revolution.

The US intelligence report released Monday with the claim that Iran froze its nuclear military track four years ago has Israel concerned that the United States is weakening its strong stance against Iran that had President George W. Bush warning that World War III would break out if the ayatollahs got their hands on a bomb.

What the report makes even clearer are the major differences between the various intelligence agencies in Israel and the United States.

The Mossad claims that the Iranians will be able to develop a nuclear bomb by the end of 2009; Military Intelligence warns that Teheran will cross the technological threshold within six months; and now the Americans are putting the timeline toward the middle of the next decade, or 2013 at the earliest.

Defense officials in Tel Aviv admitted Tuesday that the report would probably embolden Iran, even though the differences between Israel and the US were not so great as a superficial reading of the report might indicate.

The core of the disagreement is over the question of whether Iran abandoned its military nuclear program. While the American report claims they froze the program in 2003, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Tuesday it was highly probable that it was restarted shortly thereafter.

Putting this disagreement aside, however, both countries are on the same page regarding the possibility that Iran's civilian nuclear program could be used to manufacture bombs when it is completed. Here, the date is the only difference.

But the basic question remains: What is the true timeline? Here, as with anything from the world of intelligence, there is no clear answer. While there is high-level cooperation between the US and Israel on Iran, each intelligence agency has its own sources and its own modus operandi.

Both countries are also influenced by different political agendas. The Americans, for example, are still traumatized by the blatant intelligence failure vis-à-vis Iraq's alleged WMD and, therefore, does not want to be caught crying wolf again. Israel, on the other hand, is traumatized by its failure to learn of Libya's
nuclear program before it was abandoned in a deal Col. Muammar Gaddafi struck with the US and UK.

As a result of these traumas, both countries interpret the situation a little differently. Israel takes the more stringent track. As one defense official put it on Tuesday, "It is better to be safe than sorry." However, in America, where there is an already-growing anti-war sentiment, the report is meant to send a message that the military option is, at least for now, off the table.

One official involved in high-level discussions about Iran raised a hypothesis on Tuesday that the release of the report on Monday was actually timed with an announcement made on Sunday that America had succeeded in getting the Chinese to agree to a new round of sanctions. By taking the military option off the table, the official suggested, the US might succeed in getting China and Russia on board for sanctions.

Amerikaans rapport over de atoomplannen van Iran zorgt vooral voor verwarring

Amir Oren van Haaretz en Ami Isseroff van Israel News becommentariëren hieronder het rapport van de Amerikaanse veiligheidsdiensten over de nucleaire ontwikkelingen in Iran.

 

-----------------------------------------------------------

Iran nuclear intelligence mess

http://zionism-israel.com/israel_news/2007/12/iran-nuclear-intelligence-mess.html

 

The USA National Intelligence Estimate on Iran is truly a masterpiece of doubletalk. About 70% of it is devoted to explaining what the US intelligence service is and explaining the difference between "high probability" and "very likely" and other such terms.

 

There are two "bottom lines" to the document, only one of which is given below.

 

1- The US estimates that Iran probably could not build a nuclear weapon for another 5 to 10 years, as outlined below.

 

2- The US believes that though Iran was pursuing a nuclear weapons program until 2003, it stopped doing so at the time and has never resumed the program. This is the important news, which is not really discussed below.

 

What it might or might not mean is anyone's guess. The document itself is essentially bumph, but it is based on thousands of bits of intelligence intercepts, including a conversation in which an Iranian officer complains that work as stopped on the nuclear program.

 

The intelligence estimate, like all such estimates, is characterized by totally opaque prose. For example:

 

Judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program. Judge with high confidence that the halt lasted at least several years. (DOE and the NIC have moderate confidence that the halt to those activities represents a halt to Iran's entire nuclear weapons program.)

What could be the difference between "halted its nuclear weapons program" and halt to Iran's entire nuclear weapons program??" Is the halt ongoing or not? Maybe:

 

Judge with high confidence that the halt lasted at least several years.

And what if the intelligence intercepts were plants?

 

Why then, was the document released now, of all times, when the US is trying to corral support for sanctions against Iran? Is it because the CIA disagrees with the administration and wants to embarrass it? Is that a way to run a government?

 

 

Ami Isseroff

 

Source document: National Intelligence Estimate on Iran

 

-----------------------------------------------------

Last update - 16:32 04/12/2007    

 

ANALYSIS: Iran laughing at U.S. lack of nuclear intelligence 
By Amir Oren, Haaretz Correspondent 

 

The noise that was heard last night in Tehran, according to credible reports, was a hearty Persian laugh after looking at the U.S. intelligence service's website. The unclassified document that Director of National Intelligence, Adm. Mike McConnell published, titled "Iran: Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities," as a laundered version that faithfully represents the greatest secrets collected by the CIA and the other U.S. intelligence services, can appropriately be called "much evaluation on no intelligence."

 

The document's eight pages, which include embarrassing instructions on how to differentiate between different yet related terms ("it is possible," "it may be so," "one must not remove from the equation," and "it's reasonable to assume"), enable the Ayatollas' nuclear and operations officials and the heads of the Revolutionary Guards to reach this soothing conclusion - from their point of view: The Americans have no understanding of what is really happening in Iran's nuclear program. They have no solid information, they have no high-level agents and they have nothing more than a mix of guesswork and chatter. The dissemblance and concealment have succeeded, and the real dispute is not between Washington and Tehran, but within the U.S. administration itself.

 

Only five weeks ago, McConnell announced that as a rule, he doesn't believe in the release of such documents. He regretted the publication of the principles of the intelligence evaluation on Iraq.

 

McConnel kept quiet on Monday. Donald Kerr, his deputy, was enlisted to explain why the Iran assessment followed in Iraq's footsteps. The essence of his explanation: The worst-case evaluation which has been repeatedly published since 2005 has changed, and it is important to clarify its "proper presentation." He means to say that if the politicians, President George W. Bush and Deputy President Richard Cheney, insist on leading their country into a war with Iran, this is their democratic right - on the assumption they receive Congressional support - but they shouldn't delude themselves that they can do this on the back of the CIA's investigative officers. Iraq won't repeat itself.

 

On one level, this is a philosophical debate: How should the lack of "indicative signs" be interpreted, in the face of a devious enemy, a certified cheat who is determined in his pursuit of the goal (also according to the intelligence assessors). The suspicious Bush and Cheney believe the absence of evidence is in fact evidence of the existence of an additional, hidden channel of nuclear development. Their intelligence services say that without proof there is no place for such an evaluation.

 

Responsibility is different for each rank. Intelligence is responsible for making assessments on facts collected, and the diplomats are responsible for preventing a failure at the two extremes: Not in making an over-estimation such as with Iraq (a result of former President Saddam Hussein's deception) and not in making an under-assessment such as with Al-Qaida before September 11, 2001. It is possible to say, using an Israeli parallel, like July 11, 2006, when the Israel Defense Forces Military Intelligence did not know - or did not understand what it had heard - that Hezbollah would execute a kidnapping operation on the following day.

 

On a second level, the debate is a professional one: How does one evaluate developments in the nuclear field, when there are no actual objects which can be felt (missiles or bombs, for example), and before tests have been conducted. It is possible to weigh from a distance the kilograms of uranium which have been made in centrifuges, and to count how much of them have been hidden or enriched; but the great mystery is the degree of success achieved by the "weapons group," the teams of experts attempting to make the material explosive.

 

Behind the heap of words, presented as "a low or medium level of certainty," the differences between the worst-case and the best-case views on when Iran will be capable of producing a nuclear weapon are not that great. These range from somewhere between 2009 and the following five years, starting in 2010. Even McConnell's intelligence officers agree that Iran can buy nukes off the shelf - from Syria, North Korea and maybe Pakistan - and that the renewal of the program, if it is indeed on a coffee break, depends only on the intentions of the rulers, and those intentions will change only when the rulers are replaced.

 

The CIA is so angry with Bush, it seems, that it is ready to go to great lengths in order to help another president. Not Ahmadinejad, God forbid, but the next president in Washington. The result is likely to be the opposite: Higher Iranian militancy along with Bush and Cheney's determination to act - regardless of what the intelligence agencies say.

 

 

Source of this Israel News article

 

Meeste Israëli's buiten afscheidingsbarriere niet bereid te vertrekken tegen compensatie

Dit is slecht nieuws, want het betekent dat al deze mensen tegen hun wil zullen moeten vertrekken, en de kans is groot dat een deel daartegen in actie zal komen. Voor een onpopulaire leider als Olmert is dat wellicht reden dit moment nog een tijdje vooruit te willen schuiven.

 

Van de andere kant zou op dit moment de Palestijnse Autoriteit absoluut niet in staat zijn de controle over de Westelijke Jordaanoever over te nemen, en is de kans groot dat Hamas er de macht zou grijpen na een Israëlische terugtrekking.

 

Lekker achterover leunen dus? Als Olmert en de andere ministers zich niet alleen bekommeren om hun eigen positie maar ook om de toekomst van het land, dan bereiden zij de bevolking voor op wat onvermijdelijk komen gaat, en laten ze zien dat het de regering ernst is door alvast alle buitenposten te ontruimen.  

 

 

Ratna

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Poll of Israelis beyond separation fence: 78% not willing to leave for "fair compensation"

Dr. Aaron Lerner     Date: 7 December 2006

Telephone poll of a representative sample of 400 adult Israelis residing in communities that are on the eastern side of the separation fence by Teleseker for Maariv the week of 7 December 2007. Statistical error +/- 4.9 percentage points.

In principle, would you be willing to be evacuated from your home in return for fair compensation?
Yes 18% No 78%  Don't know 4%
Religious: Yes 8% No 89%
Traditional/Secular: Yes 42% No 53%

Would you be willing to be evacuated from your home and move to live on the western side of the separation fence?
Yes 11% No 84% Don't know 5%

For compensation of 150% of the value of your home?
Yes 14% No 81% Don't know 5%

For compensation of 200% of the value of your home?
Yes 17% No 76% Don't know 7%

Maariv  7 December 2007

Dr. Aaron Lerner, Director IMRA (Independent Media Review & Analysis)
(mail POB 982 Kfar Sava)
Website: http://www.imra.org.il

Hamas verbetert arsenaal Qassam raketten

Hamas verbetert zowel het bereik van zijn raketten als de mogelijkheid ze voor langere tijd op te slaan. Dit laatste maakt het mogelijk om in korte tijd honderden of duizenden raketten af te schieten. Tot nu toe was Hamas gedwongen om raketten altijd direct af te schieten na fabricage of, wanneer dat politiek niet zo goed uitkwam, ze te overhandigen aan de Islamitische Jihad of andere terroristische organisaties.

 

The improvement in rocket-storage capability followed the entrance into Gaza in recent months of Palestinian terror experts, mostly via the Rafah crossing from Egypt. These experts, members of Islamic organizations, trained with Hezbollah and Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Lebanon and Iran.

 

 

Dit is één van de redenen dat Israël de grenzen gesloten houdt voor personen en een aantal goederen. Overigens worden bij de productie van Qassam raketten onder andere metaal, suiker en meel gebruikt, en is water en electriciteit nodig. Roep dus niet meteen 'collectief straffen' als er daarvan een tekort is in Gaza. Is het niet misdadig dat ondanks de tekorten deze 'grondstoffen' voor de fabrikage van raketten worden gebruikt?  

 

 

Ratna

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Defense officials concerned as Hamas upgrades Qassam arsenal
By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent Last update - 07:38 07/12/2007
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/932106.html

Hamas has recently upgraded its Qassam rocket capability in the Gaza Strip, raising grave concern in the Israeli defense establishment.

Senior defense officials say that Hamas is now able to store the rockets for a relatively long period, which would allow the organization to launch a large number of Qassams at one time.

Over the past year, the IDF and Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) have said that two developments could prompt a major Israeli operation in the Gaza Strip. One was an improvement in the range of the Qassam rockets, which would place Ashkelon within range. The other was an ability to store the rockets for a longer period of time. It seems that Hamas has already achieved the latter, and is close to achieving the other.

Until recently, Hamas had difficulty in storing the rockets. The Qassam is a relatively primitive device, assembled on improvised production lines in the Strip. The explosive charge installed on the rockets is volatile and might explode if kept for more than a few weeks. This is one of the reasons behind Hamas' haste to launch most of its rockets as soon as it gets them.

When firing rockets is politically inconvenient, Hamas hands them over to smaller organizations such as the Islamic Jihad, various Fatah factions and the Popular Resistance Committees to launch them in its place.

In previous periods of escalation between Israel and Hamas, such as last year's Independence Day, Hamas fired almost 300 rockets in a few days before running out of supplies.

The defense establishment is now concerned that Hamas may accumulate several hundred or even thousands of rockets, building up a large arsenal. Under this scenario, Hamas would be able to fire hundreds of rockets a day at Sderot for several days, prompting Israel to take extreme measures.

The Second Lebanon War showed that the Air Force is incapable of overcoming short-range rockets launched from a small area, not to mention a densely built area like Gaza. In the absence of an aerial solution, the IDF may have to mount a ground operation that would lead to heavy casualties on both sides.

The improvement in rocket-storage capability followed the entrance into Gaza in recent months of Palestinian terror experts, mostly via the Rafah crossing from Egypt. These experts, members of Islamic organizations, trained with Hezbollah and Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Lebanon and Iran.

Alongside the ability to store rockets for longer periods, Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, with Iran's help, are expected to increase the Qassam rockets' 15-kilometer range, which would place Ashkelon and dozens of small communities in the northern and western Negev within rocket range.

Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai met Thursday with mayors and regional council heads from Ashkelon, Sderot, Netivot and the communities bordering on the Gaza Strip. He advised them to prepare their communities for an escalation in the area, including increased rocket fire.

 

PA verbluft over Egyptisch-Saoedische deal met Hamas over haj pelgrims

Terwijl de door Abbas gecontroleerde Palestijnse Autoriteit met Israël was overeengekomen dat 2000 Palestijnen uit Gaza via Israël naar Saoedi-Arabië konden reizen, om daar aan de jaarlijkse haj pelgrimage in Mekka deel te nemen, hadden Egypte en Saoedi-Arabië een deal met Hamas gesloten:

 

"The Egyptians stabbed us in the back," a senior PA official said. It turned out that the move had been coordinated with the Hamas government and Saudi Arabia. The Saudi embassy in Cairo swiftly processed the Gaza pilgrims' visa applications sent by the Hamas government, while the Saudi embassy in Amman held up all the visa applications sent by the PA, even those of West Bank pilgrims.

 

Waarom heeft Saoedi-Arabië niet beide groepen Palestijnen een visum gegeven? Dan hadden 4000 Palestijnen naar Mekka kunnen reizen. Terecht menen PA funtionarissen dat hier een politieke motivatie achter zit: Egypte en Saoedi-Arabië zijn voorstander van een verzoening tussen Fatah en Hamas, en hebben even duidelijk laten voelen dat wat hun betreft Hamas evenzeer een legitieme vertegenwoordiger van de Palestijnen is. Hoe dit zich verhoudt tot hun positie als 'gematigde' staten en bondgenoot van de VS, is een goeie vraag.

 

 

Ratna

---------

PA miffed at Egyptian-Saudi deal with Hamas over hajj pilgrims

By Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz Correspondent Last update - 05:12 07/12/2007
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/932107.html

The news from the Rafah border crossing earlier this week astounded the leaders of the Palestinian Authority (PA) in Ramallah. They had arranged with Israel to allow some 2,000 Palestinians from Gaza to go to Saudi Arabia via the Kerem Shalom and Allenby Bridge border crossings for the hajj celebrations.

But Cairo apparently had different plans. The Egyptians allowed 700 Palestinians on Monday and 1,300 on Tuesday to cross the border into Sinai, where buses were waiting to take them to Saudi Arabia.

"The Egyptians stabbed us in the back," a senior PA official said. It turned out that the move had been coordinated with the Hamas government and Saudi Arabia. The Saudi embassy in Cairo swiftly processed the Gaza pilgrims' visa applications sent by the Hamas government, while the Saudi embassy in Amman held up all the visa applications sent by the PA, even those of West Bank pilgrims.

The PA, which had invested huge efforts in organizing the pilgrims' trip to Saudi Arabia in a bid to improve President Mahmoud Abbas' status in the Gaza Strip, was enraged by Egypt and Saudi Arabia's conduct. The PA official in charge of civil coordination, Hussein al-Sheikh, had told the people in Gaza that the visas Hamas would issue for traveling to Saudi Arabia would be invalid. PA officials managed to reach an agreement with the Israeli authorities on taking some 2,000 people out of Gaza and transferring them through Israel - an unprecedented understanding in Hamas-era Gaza.

Ismail Haniyeh's government, however, had assured Gaza Strip residents all along that the pilgrims would leave via the Rafah crossing in coordination with Egypt. In other words, this was a planned move.

PA officials have difficulty understanding why Egypt and Saudi Arabia acted against Abbas' interests in this way. Only a week earlier Abbas met Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Now they assume that Cairo and Riyadh wanted to protest Abbas' persistent refusal to resume the dialogue with Hamas. Egypt and Saudi Arabia have recently given Abbas hints that he should resume the talks, but a senior Palestinian official said that "all told it's a continuation of the Egyptian game and the dual policy regarding Hamas."

Indeed, it seems that despite Egypt's repeated assertions of its uncompromising war on Hamas and Gaza terror organizations, Cairo and especially Egyptian intelligence officials prefer to keep normal relations with Hamas, even at Abbas' expense.

Bush in januari voor het eerst op staatsbezoek in Israël

Het werd tijd dat Bush officieel Israël bezoekt, want hij is er in zijn 7 jaar als president van de VS nog nooit geweest.

 

Het lijkt erop dat hij nu serieus wil zoeken naar een oplossing van het Midden-Oosten conflict, om als hij volgend jaar moet aftreden toch nog één succesje op zijn CV te kunnen schrijven. Als hij daarin daadwerkelijk zou slagen, zou dat één van de grootste na-oorlogse Amerikaanse successen op buitenlands gebied zijn. Niemand durft dan ook optimistisch te zijn dat iemand als George Blunder Bush dat voor elkaar kan krijgen...

 

 

Wouter

____________

Bush to make 1st official visit to Israel in January
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent and Haaretz Service

Last update - 22:07 04/12/2007
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/931129.html

United States President George W. Bush will make an official visit to Israel in January, Haaretz learned on Tuesday.

During his visit, Bush is expected to focus on promoting Israeli-Palestinian negotiations in the framework of agreements reached at last week's Mideast peace conference, held in Annapolis, Maryland.

This visit will be Bush's first visit to Israel since he took office seven years ago. Bush visited Israel in 1998 when he was governor of Texas. In contrast, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice visited Israel three times in the six week period leading up to the Annapolis peace summit.

It is still unclear whether Bush will be visiting neighboring countries while in the region.

Bush's visit will come approximately one month after the Annapolis conference. Last week, Bush was criticized by American columnists for not having visited Israel. With this visit, Bush hopes to demonstrate his commitment to the peace process relaunched in Annapolis.

Bush is also expected to discuss with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert the issue of Iran's nuclear program, and steps to prevent Tehran from developing nuclear weapons.

Last week, Haaretz reported that Bush had been invited to take part in Israel's 60th anniversary celebrations in 2008.

Officials at the Prime Minister's Office reported that Bush's visit has not yet been confirmed, but it will likely take place in January, and will likely include a tour of Gulf States as well.

Toespraak Benjamin Netanyahu in de Knesset over 29 november 1947

Een heldere en krachtige speech van Netanyahu in de Knesset op de speciale 29 november zitting, helaas een stuk mooier dan zijn daden als minister van financien, toen hij zware bezuinigeingen in het leger doorvoerde, die mede het slechte verloop van de Libanon oorlog veroorzaakten.

 

Het volgende is wishful thinking:

 

 

That is why I was shocked to hear in the press that the prime minister said: "If there will not be two states, Israel is finished."

Mr. Prime Minister:  The State of Israel will never be finished!  Our fate will be determined by us, and us alone!

Our existence does not depend on the willingness of the Palestinians to make peace with us. Our existence is secured by our right to live in this land and our capacity to defend that right.

We built up our country for 31 years before the peace agreement with Egypt, we continued to build it for another 16 years before the peace agreement with Jordan, and I hope we will not wait long before we can achieve a peace agreement with the Palestinians and with others in the Arab world.

But we do not condition our existence on their agreement. That was the policy of all Israeli governments until now, and it must be the policy of all Israeli governments in the future. Let me repeat: Our fate will be determined by us and us alone!

 

Olmert had natuurlijk gelijk, al is het de vraag of het verstandig was dit zo te verwoorden: Israël is afhankelijk van de VS, en de VS heeft meer belangen dan een sterk en veilig Israël. Geen enkel land kan zonder strategische bondgenootschappen, en Israël is vanwege haar kwetsbare positie zeer afhankelijk van Westerse steun en erkenning. Israël kan uiteraard niet haar bestaan afhankelijk maken van Arabische goedkeuring, maar zal continu duidelijk moeten maken dat het bereid is tot pijnlijke compromissen, en dat het er alles aan doet om tot vrede te komen.  

 

Netanyahu was - evenals Sharon - fel gekant tegen de concessies die Israël onder het Oslo proces moest doen, en evenals later Sharon won hij de verkiezingen dankzij een golf van Palestijnse aanslagen, die hij als reden aanvoerde om de Oslo afspraken niet uit te voeren. Netanyahu wist het Palestijnse geweld sterk terug te dringen, maar het vredesproces kwam bijna tot stilstand. Hij tekende alleen onder zware Amerikaanse druk de Wye akkoorden met de Palestijnen, die door beide kanten nauwelijks werden uitgevoerd, en hij deed niets om de groei van de nederzettingen te stoppen. Dat was weliswaar geen vereiste van Oslo, maar het ondermijnde wel het vertrouwen van de Palestijnen in het vredesproces. Het vastlopen van het vredesproces is dan ook zeker mede aan hem te wijten.

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Opposition Leader Benjamin Netanyahu's Knesset Speech - Commemorating November 29

The UN resolution of November 29, 1947 recognizing a Jewish state was an important moment in the history of our nation, and an important moment in the history of all nations.

Since then, we have made peace with Egypt and Jordan, but the obstacle to widening the circle of peace remains what it has always been: the refusal of Israel's enemies to recognize the Jewish State in any borders.

Our enemies do not want an Arab state next to Israel. They want an Arab state instead of Israel.

Time and again they were offered an Arab state next to Israel: first, in the partition plan of 1947; then, indirectly, in the Oslo accords; later, unequivocally, at Camp David in 2000; and finally, in the countless declarations since then by both Israeli and international leaders which have called for two states for two peoples.

And how did our enemies respond to these offers? Time and again they violently rejected them. In 1947, they launched terror attacks and then an all out war to annihilate the Jewish state. During the Oslo peace process, they terrorized Israel with suicide bombers; after Camp David, they orchestrated the Second Intifadah in which over 1,000 Israelis were murdered; since then they have fired thousands of Katushya rockets on the Galilee and thousands of Kassam rockets on the Western Negev in order, they say, "to liberate occupied Palestine" - in other words, "occupied" Haifa, "occupied" Acre, "occupied" Sderot and "occupied" Ashkelon.

In doing so, Hezbollah and Hamas are merely following the words of Jamal Husseini, a cousin of the Mufti and a member of the Arab High Committee, who said four days before the UN partition vote: "Palestine will be filled with blood and fire if the Jews receive even a part of it."

Regrettably, even the more moderate Palestinians refuse to support making peace with Israel as a Jewish state. They support two states for one people: A Palestinian state cleansed of Jews, and a bi-national state that they hope to flood with Palestinians according to what they call the "right of return."

Until they truly recognize and internalize the right of the Jewish people to a state of their own and until their leaders show the courage of President Anwar Sadat of Egypt and King Hussein of Jordan, it is doubtful that we will have a real partner for a genuine peace.

In this context, we can understand what happened - and what didn't happen - with the adoption of the UN partition resolution in 1947.

The resolution did not fix for all time the contours of a final settlement between us and our neighbors. After all, the Arabs rejected the establishment of a Jewish state and sought to destroy it. The day after the vote the Mufti himself said, "what the UN wrote in black ink, we will write in red blood."

Arab leaders cannot come today, 60 years later, and demand to turn back the clock as if nothing happened. They cannot demand that we accept an agreement that they themselves tore to shreds because, having failed to destroy Israel, they have now concluded that its provisions would spell Israel's doom.

Ben Gurion understood this well when he said in one of the first meetings of the government of Israel: "The decisions of November 29 are dead. The borders of partition are dead.  Jerusalem as an 'international city' is a mere fantasy."  He repeated these ideas in his speech to the Knesset on December 12th, 1949 when he said that the UN decision was null and void.

Thus, neither the borders of partition nor the internationalization of Jerusalem are the enduring features of the UN vote.

What is enduring is the international recognition of the right of the Jewish people to their own state, a right anchored in the Balfour Declaration which recognized the right of the Jews to a national home in the Land of Israel and which was reaffirmed by both the San Remo conference in 1920 and by the League of Nations in 1922.

But the UN partition vote is seared in our memory because immediately following the vote Britain began to leave the country, opening the way to the fateful battle that almost snuffed out our existence.

The UN partition vote did not establish the state of Israel. It merely recognized the historic right of the Jewish people to return to their homeland and restore their sovereign existence.

But had it not been for the millennial longing of the Jewish people for the land of Israel, the continuous presence of Jews here across the centuries and the seventy years of intensive Jewish settlement in the land that preceded the UN vote, this historic right would never have been realized.

And even these would not have sufficed had not the sons of a tiny nation, in the wake of the horrific Holocaust, raised the sword of the Macabees and with incomparable heroism repelled an Arab onslaught that was about to overwhelm the fledgling state.

The enduring belief in our historic national rights, the settlement effort that realized those rights and the military struggle that defended them- these are what established the Jewish state.

The UN vote merely gave international recognition to this. Yet the UN vote was an important and historic decision, and it is right that we commemorate that vote today with the distinguished ambassadors of the nations that supported it.

But consider this: What would have happened to the UN decision if we would have been defeated in the War of Independence?

The key to Israel's existence has always been rooted in strengthening Zionism and our ability to defend ourselves - and this remains the key to our existence and the key to forging a genuine peace with all our Arab neighbors. Only when some of them recognized Israel's permanence and indestructibility did they reconcile themselves to making peace with us.

That is why I was shocked to hear in the press that the prime minister said: "If there will not be two states, Israel is finished."

Mr. Prime Minister:  The State of Israel will never be finished!  Our fate will be determined by us, and us alone!

Our existence does not depend on the willingness of the Palestinians to make peace with us.   Our existence is secured by our right to live in this land and our capacity to defend that right.

We built up our country for 31 years before the peace agreement with Egypt, we continued to build it for another 16 years before the peace agreement with Jordan, and I hope we will not wait long before we can achieve a peace agreement with the Palestinians and with others in the Arab world.

But we do not condition our existence on their agreement. That was the policy of all Israeli governments until now, and it must be the policy of all Israeli governments in the future. Let me repeat: Our fate will be determined by us and us alone!

In the Middle East, peace and security go hand-in-hand. In fact security, which stems from Israel's strength, precedes peace and peace agreements.
Whoever does not understand this will be left without security and without peace.

Only a strong Israel, confident in the justice of its cause and led by a strong leadership, will be able to achieve the lasting peace with our neighbors for which we all yearn.

--
Ari Harow
Senior Advisor to Benjamin Netanyahu
011-972-3-621-0888
www.netanyahu.org.il