September 2009 Archives

The Consulate General of Venezuela presents:

a concert in solidarity with Palestine & Honduras featuring:

Dame Pa Matala
revolutionary hip hop and folk music
and from Palestine: Sabreena Da Witch
with
The Foundation Movement, Natural Bliss & los trovadores por Honduras
FREE!

FRIDAY OCTOBER 2nd 8 PM
Kresge Auditorium
77 Mass Ave
Cambridge MA
more info: 781 724 0752

cosponsored by: Boston Boycott Divestment Sanctions
Proyecto Hondureño
and MLK Bolivarian Circle

The UN Human Rights Council and its recent Goldstone Report are either biased or mistaken respectively in some of their fundamental accusations against Israel, according to the director of one of Israel's main rights groups.

Even so, "Israel has only itself to blame" for its failure to investigate the accusations of abuses during January's Operation Cast Lead that led to the report, according to B'Tselem executive director Jessica Montell.

"There's no question that the HRC, which mandated the Goldstone [fact-finding mission into the Gaza fighting], has an inappropriate, disproportionate fixation with Israel," she said, adding that the Council was "a political body made up of diplomats, not human rights experts, which means that the powerful states are never going to come under scrutiny the way the powerless will. So China, Russia and the US will never have commission of inquiry, regardless of how their crimes rank relative to Israeli crimes."

Furthermore, the Goldstone Report itself, which was presented in its final version to the Human Rights Council on Tuesday, is "disagreeable" and mistaken in some of its gravest accusations against Israel, she believes. These include the claim that Israel intentionally targeted the civilian population rather than Hamas, and the "weak, hesitant way that the report mentions Hamas's strategy of using civilians [in combat]."...

A senior Hamas official said on Wednesday that a video to be released Friday will prove that abducted Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit is alive and well.

Musa Abu-Marzouk said that the video, to be given to Israel in exchange for the release of 20 female Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails, will also include proof that it was filmed recently...

...Of the 20 female Palestinian prisoners to be released by Israel, Hamas has stated that four are members of Hamas, five belong to the rival Fatah faction, and three are members of Islamic Jihad. Only one of the prisoners is a resident of the Gaza Strip, the rest are from the West Bank.

The prisoners had all served at least two thirds of their sentences and none had more than two years left to serve.

Last week, Egypt's foreign minister urged Israel to release 1,000 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for Shalit.

Egypt has been mediating a prisoner swap and Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said Israel needs to show flexibility.

Now that the Bush administration is no longer there to actively lobby for Israel, the situation for the Jewish state at the hands of the assorted Israel bashers and anti-Semites of the world is growing more and more grave.

Currently, the top-of-the-page headline on the home page of the influential left-wing British newspaper The Guardian is "Lawyers seek arrest of Israeli defence minister in UK for alleged war crimes."

Ehud Barak, who is the leader of Israel's Labor Party, is due to speak at a meeting at the British Labour party conference in the Southern English town of Brighton today. Barak is also scheduled to meet British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and David Miliband, the foreign secretary, for talks on the Middle East and Iran.

The Guardian notes that "The accusations against Barak are based, in part, on a United Nations investigation conducted by the former South African judge Richard Goldstone. It concluded earlier this month that Israel had committed war crimes."...

Westminster Magistrates court in central London on Tuesday evening rejected a petition to issue an arrest warrant for Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak on the grounds that he committed "war crimes" by defending Israel from Hamas attack. The British government intervened on Barak's behalf, submitting legal briefs to the court, and thus avoiding what would have been the most serious clash between Britain and Israel since 1948.

The Jerusalem Post reports that Al Mezan is the organization behind the British arrest efforts. Al Mezan had instructed expensive London law firms to carry them out.

As noted by NGO Monitor, Al Mezan is funded by Sweden (1.1 million SEK), Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, the Ford Foundation, the International Commission of Jurists, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Netherlands Representative Office, the International Human Rights Funders Group/co Mertz Gilmore Foundation, the Open Society Institute, Medico International and the European Commission, among others...

...More recently, however, individuals and organizations with political grievances have started to make use of war crimes legislation in order to pursue a variety of officials from states equipped with well-run courts and tribunals, notably the United States, Great Britain, and--most of all--Israel. Should this matter to us? Aren't war crimes clear and cut; shouldn't those who commit them be pursued with the full force of the law? This essay tries to answer those questions and others...

...No doubt the same editorial news judgment that neglects the obsessive attacks on Israel, prompted the Times essentially to ignore Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's September 24, 2009 address to the UN General Assembly in New York. The Israeli leader's speech (see in full below) was a call to action against one of the most grotesque propagandists of our time -- a Holocaust denier sworn to Israel's destruction whose regime is working to develop nuclear weapons to implement its aims. The Israeli leader also used the forum to expose Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's lies about the Holocaust as well as to challenge the distortions of the UN's new Goldstone Report related to the recent Gaza conflict. In addition, he warned of the peril the world generally faces should weapons of mass destruction fall into the hands of radical Islamicists.

The paper chose to bury reference to the Israeli leader's appearance in the second half of a story by Neil MacFarquhar at the bottom of page 6 entitled "With Bush Gone, Chavez Smells No Sulfur, While Netanyahu Assails Iran's Leader" (Sept 25). A small photo of Netanyahu was paired with one of equal size of Hugo Chavez...

Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), both on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, are circulating a letter asking Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the State Department to block any punitive actions against Israel related to the Goldstone Report.

"As the State Department has stated, Israel is a democratic country, like the United States, with an independent judiciary and democratic institutions to investigate and prosecute abuses," says the letter. "The Israel Defense Forces have a reputation for investigating alleged violations of international law and its internal military code of conduct. As a law-abiding state, Israel is in the process of conducting numerous investigations for which it should be commended not condemned...

Last evening, Friday, September 25th 2009, An Israel Air Force air-craft targeted and identified hitting three terrorists east of Gaza City who were on their way to fire rockets at Israel's southern communities.

The three terrorists hit were Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives residing in Gaza City, and part of a terrorist cell that has been firing rockets into Israel for the past few weeks, including rockets that hit the city of Sderot during the holiday of Rosh HaShana (the Jewish New Year) a week ago. The names of the three terrorists are Mahmoud Mussah Rammadan Bana, Kamel Hamdan Ibrahim Dakhdukh and Mohamed Salem Barawi Marshoud.

Approximately 50 rockets and mortar shells were launched at Israel during the last three months, totalling more than 250 since the end of Operation Cast Lead and more than 750 in 2009. Throughout 2008, over 3300 rockets and mortars were fired from the Gaza Strip at Israel.

The IDF will respond harshly to any attempt to break the calm in Israel's southern communities.

Statement by Carter L. Clews to Steve Capus' "Stonegate Scandal" Comments

The increasingly hysterical responses by NBC news boss Steve Capus and NBC News itself to the escalating Stonegate Scandal are disappointing at best and chilling at worst. Here is a man who runs what used to be a highly respected major news bureau who now finds himself conjuring up gremlins in cyberspace to defend what appears to be horrendously bigoted behavior within his own news room.

Having spoken directly with Mr. Capus for nearly 15 minutes Friday afternoon, I want to once again repeat my offer to him: if you really don't believe that Ms Stone sent the "Bite me, Jew boy" email to ALG staffer Alex Rosenwald, we will be happy to work with you to track down who sent it from her Blackberry using her email address.

This is precisely the same offer I made to Ms Stone at 11:00AM Friday morning, when she denied having sent any such email to Alex Rosenwald. Now, Mr. Capus has changed her story to say that, yes, she sent an email on Thursday, but it did not say "Bite me, Jew boy."

Again, we are more than willing to help NBC resolve its internal problems, but Mr. Capus needs to work with those trying to ferret out the full story, not against, us. Tom Brokaw, one of Mr. Capus's closest friends has said of the NBC news boss, "He does have a little bit of a hair trigger. He could blow. But I could always walk in and close the door and say, 'Take a breath.' "

My message to Mr. Capus now is, "Take a breath, and let's try to get to the bottom of what has now become of your once-respected news organization."

Mr. Clews is the Director of Communications for Americans for Limited Government, the group that exposed the NBC email.

Now we know: Kineavy was deleting e-mails that relate to the public's business.

In the way we communicate today, this is the contemporary equivalent of shredding mounds of memos and letters. It is not a trivial matter, and even many of us who use e-mail as a lifeline to the world have underestimated what this says about the Menino Administration's lack of commitment to open government.

What this reveals, er, confirms, about the Menino Administration is its arrogance, insularity, and sense of entitlement to a public office. There's no sense of having done something wrong (at this juncture, it would be appropriate for Kineavy to step down), no sense of mea culpa (as in an apology for having made government less accountable). Instead, we get only a petulant 'tude of having been put upon...

Americans for Limited Government is appalled that an employee of the NBC news network apparently felt it was appropriate to send an email to an ALG employee, in response to a standard news release, saying, "Bite me, Jew Boy."

According to ALG records, the email came from the Blackberry and email address of Jane Stone, a producer for NBC's Dateline. The email was sent to Alex Rosenwald, the ALG Director of Media Outreach. The news release to which Ms Stone apparently responded was one in which ALG called upon Congress to defund ACORN.

Americans for Limited Government does not contend that NBC or its parent company GE, are anti-Semitic. What is highly disturbing, however, is that there clearly is a culture at NBC that has allowed this person who clearly has issues to go unchecked.

Ms Stone claims she did not send the offensive email. If that is not the case, we at ALG call upon her to help ascertain who did send it using her Blackberry and her email address. If Ms Stone did, in fact, send it, we at ALG call upon Ms Stone to apologize to Mr. Rosenwald, and we call upon the NBC hierarchy above Ms Stone to join her in issuing that apology.

ALG Response to NBC Accusations on Politico: "We did our due diligence."

Carter Clews, Director of Communications, Americans for Limited Government

We at Americans for Limited Government are saddened that instead of helping us to get to the bottom of the hateful email that was indeed sent from NBC's server, and this can be verified, and was not tampered with, which can also be verified, that NBC President Steve Capus has instead chosen to circle the wagons and protect what is indefensible with hysterical, frantic accusations.

This email has left a digital footprint that is undeniable. We did our due diligence. We have confirmed that it indeed came from NBC's server and Jane Stone's email address.

As before, we renew our offer that we made to both Ms. Stone and NBC President Capus over the phone today to get to the bottom of who sent this email from Ms. Stone's Blackberry email address. That offer remains open, and we would like it very much if both Ms. Stone and NBC would issue an apology to both Americans for Limited Government, and Mr. Alex Rosenwald, who was the target of this hateful email.

Founded over 30 years ago to protect political dissidents from repressive regimes, the leaders of Human Rights Watch have long since lost sight of the original ethos and values.  On Middle East issues, HRW has degenerated into a political lobby, utilizing the façade of human rights and international law to promote a radical agenda.

As documented by NGO Monitor's comprehensive research report, HRW is a leading player in the international campaign to demonize Israel.  Time and again, HRW's publications are shown to lack credibility or the impartiality necessary for moral judgments. In the Middle East region, which is dominated by regimes that violate human rights on a daily basis, HRW officials have chosen to consistently and disproportionately single-out Israel for condemnation.

Far fewer resources are devoted to Libya, Jordan, the Palestinian Authority, Saudi Arabia and Syria.  And HRW's disregard of human rights in favor of hostility towards Israel is underscored by their virtual silence over the fate of Gilad Shalit, and a refusal to condemn Hamas' widely documented use of human shields during the recent Gaza conflict.

Recently, HRW's agenda was further exposed when senior officials from the organization held a dinner to raise funds in Saudi Arabia -- one of the world's most notorious human rights abusers.  In making her presentation, Sarah Leah Whitson, head of the Middle East division, emphasized HRW's contribution in using the rhetoric of international law to isolate Israel, and the need to combat critics associated with "pro-Israel pressure groups".

In order for the organization to have any future relevance, we call upon HRW's board members to institute a full independent review and reform in the organization for which they are responsible. This should include the replacement of senior officials, particularly in the Middle East division, who have been instrumental in HRW's decline, and the adoption of firm guidelines to prevent such abuses in the future.     

Signed by the following NGO Monitor International Advisory Board members:

Elie Wiesel
Prof Alan Dershowitz - Harvard University, lawyer and author
R. James Woolsey - Former Director of Central Intelligence (1993-95)
Elliott Abrams - Former US Deputy National Security Advisor for Global Democracy Strategy  
Douglas Murray - Director, the Centre for Social Cohesion
Prof Judea Pearl - UCLA and President, Daniel Pearl Foundation  
Tom Gross - Journalist and international affairs commentator

Platters of dates and challah; bowls of hummus and curried apple soup; and plates of apples and honey and Egyptian noodles and rice--such was the fare at the Muslim and Jewish holiday potluck.

Shortly after the end of Ramadan and Rosh Hashanah, more than 60 Jews and Muslims in their 20s and 30s gathered at the Workmen's Circle in Brookline to share holiday traditions and food.

Monday's potluck kicked off an initiative by a new Muslim-Jewish leadership team that aims to promote interfaith relations and social justice...

...Margie Klein noted that from the standpoint of religious observance, many of the Muslims at the gathering appeared to have more in common with Orthodox Jews than with the less religious Jews who attended.

Klein is the founder of the Moishe/Kavod House, a Brooklinebased organization that promotes social justice. It sponsored the potluck along with the Boston Chapter of the Muslim American Society and the Workmen's Circle, a secular Jewish cultural center...

...While the participants Monday talked about religion, they tended to avoid politics. One exception was a Jew who cited protesting for Palestinian rights outside of synagogues over the High Holidays as a meaningful holiday experience...

Iran has told the U.N. nuclear watchdog that it has a second uranium enrichment plant under construction, a belated disclosure sure to heighten Western fears of a stealthy Iranian quest for nuclear arms capability.

Iran told the International Atomic Energy Agency of the plant's existence in a letter to IAEA Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei on Monday just as six world powers and Iran prepare for rare talks on October 1 on its disputed nuclear drive...

...A senior White House official said President Barack Obama and the leaders of Britain and France, now at a G-20 summit of industrialized nations in Pittsburgh, would accuse Iran on Friday of concealing a sensitive plant from the IAEA for years.

Obama would demand that Iran allow an immediate IAEA inspection of the plant, the official said.

He said the nascent plant was believed to be designed for about 3,000 centrifuges for enriching uranium, nominally enough machines to produce material for one nuclear device in a year if run nonstop, although Iran does not appear to have mastered the sophisticated technology consistently yet, nuclear analysts say...

World War II ended 64 years ago, but it comes to life every time Kenneth Rendell turns on the lights inside a squat, nondescript building in Natick. Amid the glitz of nearby shopping centers, the exterior is purposely plain to protect the anonymity of the place and its treasure - an evocative and jaw-dropping collection of more than 6,000 wartime artifacts Rendell has gathered over four decades.

For eight years, the Museum of World War II has been a preserve open only to a circle of Rendell acquaintances, historians, and military veterans or enthusiasts.

Within its walls, the museum houses a section of the sofa that Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun committed suicide on, silicon likenesses of the period's major figures outfitted in their actual uniforms, a Sherman tank, and a trove of historically significant letters and documents, including the complete plans for the invasion of Normandy and a draft of the 1938 Munich Agreement, with Hitler's handwritten changes.

No less an authority than Phil Reed, a former curator at Britain's Imperial War Museum, has said it "simply has no equal.''...

...Israel is not perfect. As much as we as a society try to uphold the IDF's ethical code, mistakes sometimes happen and deviations from procedure occur. Whether we like it or not, Israel is one of the most scrutinized countries in the world. And when we are told that things may not be right, we check it out and, when necessary, prosecute those involved. We are now pursuing two dozen criminal investigations regarding events that occurred in Gaza. We don't need the Human Rights Council, Richard Goldstone, or anyone else to teach us how to maintain the democratic principles which are our lifeblood.

As sobering as the thought may be, terrorists will welcome this report. It has made their work much easier, and the work of their potential victims more difficult.

I believe that the time has come for us to put an end to this calculated erosion of common sense. The nations that share democratic values must not allow themselves to be handcuffed by the abusive application of lofty ideals. Democracies should be concentrating on defending themselves from extremism--not from accusations by kangaroo courts.

The Goldstone Report pretends to investigate whether Hamas used Gazans as human shields. As it does so, it bends over backwards to give the impression that Hamas is innocent even as the evidence it brings shows the opposite...

The Goldstone commission has been dealt another blow to its already tattered reputation.

Jonathan Halevi, who recently detailed how over 90 percent of the Gazan policemen killed in the initial Israeli strike were members of Palestinian terror groups, has now published a report that provides the names and personal details of Hamas operatives and affiliated terrorists killed in each of four highly publicized incidents in which the Goldstone report alleges Israel targeted Palestinian civilians. Halevi's report deals with the strike on the Ibrahim al-Maqadma mosque, the shelling of the al-Fakhura UN school, the attack on the al-Sammouni home and the killing of Khaled Abd Rabbo's daughters...

IN APRIL 2000, while serving as a US delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Commission (now called the Human Rights Council), I was asked to visit the ambassador of a Middle Eastern country in order to lobby his government on behalf of the United States.

The issue was the Chinese government's violation of international human rights standards. The Chinese government was aggressively moving to prevent discussion of its human rights record before the Commission. My mission was to urge the ambassador of this moderate Arab state to vote against the Chinese resolution to stifle discussion or abstain from voting on it.

The ambassador looked at me with a blend of affection and pity. "I don't think you understand,'' he said. The Chinese government had sent emissaries to his capital six months earlier with a basket of lucrative contracts worth tens of millions of dollars to his government, on the specific condition that it vote to block any discussion of human rights violations in China. The die had been cast, long before the ambassador's vote...

The bear puppet host, Nassur, of a Hamas children's TV program used different words for "slaughter" to describe how to rid Israel of Jews.

First the bear explains that all Jews must be "erased from our land." Later in the conversation he adds, "We want to slaughter them, Saraa, so they will be expelled from our land." He repeats, "...We'll have to [do it] by slaughter."

He first uses the Arabic expression for "slaughter," "Nidbah-hom," and later on uses the word "Shaht."

The following is the transcript from the children's program Tomorrow's Pioneers:

Nassur: "There won't be any Jews or Zionists, if Allah wills. They'll be erased."

Saraa: "Chased away."

Nassur: "And just like we will visit the Qaaba [in Mecca]... everyone will visit Jerusalem."

[Seven-year old Palestinian child on phone tells how his father, a member of the Hamas Al-Qassam Brigades, "died as a Shahid (Martyr)."]

Nassur to child on phone: "What do you want to do to the Jews who shot your father?"

Child on phone: "I want to kill them."

Saraa: "We don't want to do anything to them, just expel them from our land."

Nassur: "We want to slaughter (Nidbah-hom) them, so they will be expelled from our land, right?"

Saraa: "Yes. That's right. We will expel them from our land using all means."

Nassur: "And if they don't want [to go] peacefully, by words or talking, we'll have to [do it] by slaughter." (Shaht) [Al-Aqsa (Hamas) TV, Sept. 22, 2009]

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today welcomed the election of Bulgarian Ambassador Irina Bokova as Director-General of UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. Bokova defeated Egyptian Culture Minister Farouk Hosni by a vote of 31-27.

Hosni has a long record of stymieing cultural relations with Israel, promoting censorship in Egypt, and making harsh anti-Israel and anti-Jewish statements. The 193 member states of UNESCO are slated to vote to confirm the election on October 15...

...In the days leading up to the vote, ADL issued an open letter to UNESCO foreign ministers urging them to reject Hosni's candidacy. "As Egyptian Culture Minister for over two decades, Mr. Hosni has a long history of expressing hostility toward Israeli culture and opposing cultural exchanges with Israel," the letter said. "These views are emblematic of the rampant anti-Jewish sentiment that pervades Egypt's cultural elites and is a trend UNESCO is meant to counter, not to legitimate."

Republican Sen. Charles Grassley has blocked the ambassadorial nomination of Alan Solomont, currently chairman of the board of the government agency that oversees AmeriCorps, in retaliation for what Grassley says is the administration's stonewalling of Congress over documents relating to the firing of AmeriCorps inspector general Gerald Walpin. Specifically, Grassley has sought, and been denied, information relating to the White House's role in the decision to fire Walpin.

Solomont, a major Democratic donor, is chairman of the Corporation for National and Community Service, which includes AmeriCorps. His term ends in October, and President Obama has nominated him to be U.S. ambassador to Spain. The nomination was approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last week and now moves to the Senate floor -- except that Grassley has placed a hold on it, meaning it will go nowhere until the senator's objections are resolved.

On June 12 of this year, shortly after Walpin was summarily fired, Grassley wrote to the Corporation demanding "all records, email, memoranda, documents, communications, or other information, whether in draft or final form" related to the firing. Among other things, Grassley asked for any contacts between the Corporation and the White House and between the Corporation and the United States Attorney's Office. Although the Corporation has provided information requested in other areas -- mostly internal documents involving Walpin -- Grassley says the Corporation has not responded at all to the request for information relating to the White House and U.S. Attorney's Office...

CAIRO -- It is unlikely anyone has ever come to this city and commented on how clean the streets are. But this litter-strewn metropolis is now wrestling with a garbage problem so severe it has managed to incite its weary residents and command the attention of the president.

"The problem is clear in the streets," said Haitham Kamal, a spokesman for the Ministry of State for Environmental Affairs. "There is a strict and intensive effort now from the state to address this issue."

But the crisis should not have come as a surprise.

When the government killed all the pigs in Egypt this spring -- in what public health experts said was a misguided attempt to combat swine flu -- it was warned the city would be overwhelmed with trash.

The pigs used to eat tons of organic waste. Now the pigs are gone and the rotting food piles up on the streets of middle-class neighborhoods like Heliopolis and in the poor streets of communities like Imbaba...

...For more than half a century, those collectors were the zabaleen, a community of Egyptian Christians who live on the cliffs on the eastern edge of the city. They collected the trash, sold the recyclables and fed the organic waste to their pigs -- which they then slaughtered and ate.

Killing all the pigs, all at once, "was the stupidest thing they ever did," Ms. Kamel said, adding, "This is just one more example of poorly informed decision makers."...

Fourteen Columbia professors are protesting the university's apparent decision to award tenure to Joseph A. Massad, a controversial anti-Israel professor of Arab studies.

The professors are from the schools of law, business and public health. They expressed their concern in a five-page letter to the incoming Provost, Claude M. Steele. The letter asserts that the university's decision to guarantee Massad a life-time teaching post "appears to have violated" Columbia's own rules, thus raising profound questions about the university's academic integrity. The university's administration, weirdly, still refuses to confirm or deny that Massad won tenure, but yesterday the Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures department let the cat out of the bag---it announced a beginning-of-term party next week congratulating Massad on gaining tenure.

This week Provost Steele belatedly issued a polite, noncommittal response. In a four-paragraph "Dear Colleagues" letter to the fourteen professors, Steele, a former Stanford psychologist, says he would "welcome" a meeting to discuss their concerns. After he learns more about Columbia's tenure process, Steele writes, he may "want to make some changes in our procedures." But nowhere does he state that Massad has, in fact, been awarded tenure. Nor does he acknowledge that the professors raise deeply troubling concerns, that if true, go to the heart of what many regard as the core of a university's integrity...

Leading Democratic and Republican congressmen expressed outrage following a report in Monday's Jerusalem Post that Saudi Arabia has been violating its promise to Washington to stop enforcing the Arab League boycott of Israel.

Democrat Howard Berman of California, Chairman of the powerful House Foreign Affairs Committee, told the Post from Washington that he had read the report in Monday's paper.

"This is a very disturbing report," Berman said, "particularly in light of the fact that US officials assured us four years ago that Saudi Arabia would abandon the boycott as the condition for its entry into the World Trade Organization."

Berman declared that he would take action on the issue.

"I intend to pursue this matter with the administration," he said.

Across the aisle, Congressman Mike Pence of Indiana, who chairs the House Republican Conference, also criticized Riyadh for its duplicity.

"Saudi Arabia's disregard of its 2005 pledge to end the boycott against Israel is unacceptable," Pence told the Post.

"Congress and the administration must hold Saudi Arabia accountable. The United States cannot stand by and continue to witness this mistreatment towards the peace-loving people of Israel," he said.

"Ending the Arab League boycott and establishing trade relationships with Israel would help foster much needed peace in the region," Pence added...

AMHERST -Town Meeting this fall will consider only one citizen petition - a resolution to help in the resettlement of Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp detainees in Cuba.

The deadline for petitioned articles was Sept. 8 for the fall Town Meeting, that begins Nov. 2.

Part of the resolution urges Congress to repeal the ban allowing resettlement in this country. The resolution asks the town to assist in the safe resettlement of cleared detainees in the area once that happens. It is being brought to the meeting by a group called No More Guantanamos, said Town Meeting member Ruth F. Hooke.

She said the group has been working with lawyers and has two particular detainees in mind - one from Russia and from Algeria - who they would like to aid.

The group does not need Town Meeting approval, but she said the resolution is "an educational endeavor. We don't want to slip them in." Town Meeting provides the forum for education, she said...

...About 50 detainees have never been charged and have been cleared for release but are unable to go home because they would be persecuted or killed, she said...

...The petition was signed by 140 registered voters - the signatures of 100 voters are needed for the petition article. She said organizers could have collected more signatures, but didn't want to overburden staff having to verify them.

GOP gubernatorial candidate Charles Baker runs a charity that's funded ultraliberal outfits which have fought for tuition breaks and driver's licenses for illegals, accused American soldiers of torture and blamed Israel for "genocide" in Palestine, a Herald review found...

In this age of Barack Obama transparency, we need an open, wide-ranging public debate on U.S. Middle East foreign policy. John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt point out the hypocrisy of aid to Israel in their book "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy."...

A rare and surprising archaeological discovery at Tel Dor: A gemstone engraved with the portrait of Alexander the Great was uncovered during the 2009 season of excavations

A rare and surprising archaeological discovery at Tel Dor: A gemstone engraved with the portrait of Alexander the Great was uncovered during excavations by an archaeological team directed by Dr. Ayelet Gilboa of the University of Haifa and Dr. Ilan Sharon of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. "Despite its miniature dimensions - the stone is less than a centimeter high and its width is less than half a centimeter - the engraver was able to depict the bust of Alexander on the gem without omitting any of the ruler's characteristics" notes Dr. Gilboa, Chair of the Department of Archaeology at the University of Haifa. "The emperor is portrayed as young and forceful, with a strong chin, straight nose and long curly hair held in place by a diadem."...

...The significance of the discovery at Dor is in the gemstone being uncovered in an orderly excavation, in a proper context of the Hellenistic period. The origins of most Alexander portraits, scattered across numerous museums around the world, are unknown. Some belonged to collections that existed even prior to the advent of scientific archaeology, others were acquired on the black market, and it is likely that some are even forgeries...

In a little noticed interview with the Daily Beast (presumably little noticed because serious people don't read the Daily Beast), Zbigniew Brzezinski suggests that Barack Obama do more than just refuse to support an Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear sites -- the American president must give the order to shoot down Israeli aircraft as they cross Iraqi airspace:

DB: How aggressive can Obama be in insisting to the Israelis that a military strike might be in America's worst interest?

Brzezinski: We are not exactly impotent little babies. They have to fly over our airspace in Iraq. Are we just going to sit there and watch?

DB: What if they fly over anyway?

Brzezinski: Well, we have to be serious about denying them that right. That means a denial where you aren't just saying it. If they fly over, you go up and confront them. They have the choice of turning back or not. No one wishes for this but it could be a Liberty in reverse.

Contrary to Brezinski's half-hearted disclaimer that no one wishes for such an outcome, there are plenty on the left who would delight in a pitched battle between the United States and Israel. Democrats in Congress routinely support resolutions affirming Israel's right to take whatever steps it deems necessary to assure its own national defense. And Obama has at least paid lip service to the concept. But hostility to Israel among the rank and file is very real on the left -- and among "realists."...

Seems that both FOX Glen Beck [ I wear secret underwear LDS] and WTKK's Michael "Cracker" Graham have become the evil reincarnations of the drunken Joe "Tailgunner" McCarthy (R) Wisconsin and bigotted anti-semetic Roman Catholic priest Father Charles Edward Coughlin  .

Beck is the out of control mimic of Tailgunner Joe saying he has a document proving so and so is anti-American each time he spews the venom from his mouth.

Graham "Cracker" just today used 'code words' to blame all his perceived problems on " those Newton Liberals"... read that the majority of people of the Jewish faith who live in Newton. This of course comes from a Fundamentalist who graduated from Bob Jones University who still believes in separating the races.

The world is going into retrograde.

...When Mitt Romney was governor, Rep. Balser voted against allowing a governor to appoint an interim US Senator, saying on the floor of the house "It's a job that by definition cannot be replaced except by a choice of the people," and "A governor cannot appoint someone who can represent the voters."

(Watch the video here--it's fantastic!) [Oh, do watch the video. -S]

Last night, she voted to allow Democrat Deval Patrick appoint a replacement US Senator.

When confronted by WBZ-TV, Rep. Balser--proving that her last name is no coincidence--said this:  "I have not changed my position....I'm taking a very consistent position."

Her explanation for how "a governor cannot appoint" and "I'm voting to allow the governor to appoint" is consistent?

She doesn't have to. The voters of Newton are too dumb to notice, and the liberals at the Boston Globe-Democrat don't care.

During his investigations into possible war crimes committed by Israel and Hamas during Operation Cast Lead, Judge Richard Goldstone asked a group of prominent South African expatriates living in Israel to persuade government officials here to cooperate with his commission.

Goldstone told them the commission's findings and recommendations would be more balanced if Israel made its case.

The expats traveled to Jerusalem with the message, but after a relatively short briefing with Israeli experts, the delegation did a complete about-face and supported Israel's position of having nothing to do with the UN fact-finding mission.

The trick: Israeli officials briefed the visitors on what Goldstone's commission was already doing in Gaza, on the makeup of the UN Human Rights Council and on the rancid history of the HRC's deliberate targeting of Israel...

JStreetJive was started to provide deep background information on the new organization, J Street.

While the majority of J Street grass roots supporters are indeed "Pro-Israel" in the sense that they believe in the Jewish people's need for and the right to its historical and sovereign homeland, J Street's leadership has demonstrated a cavalier attitude towards existential threats to Israel, a hyper-critical record against Israel and a virtually uncritical policy vis a vis Palestinians and Arab states.

Accuracy and accountability will be the watchwords of JStreetJive.

We welcome your comments and information.

If we all want peace and security in the region, let our words reflect a commitment to the truth.

Palestinian Government Spokesman Dr. Ghazi Hamad said that Israel must be wiped off the face of the earth.

...Hamad added that "this is not a country of humans. These are animals and a group of gangs, and this country must be wiped off the face of the earth."...

After reading the Goldstone Report on human-rights abuses committed during the Gaza War (December 27, 2008-January 19, 2009), all I can say is, it's a good thing that the United Nations wasn't around during World War II. I can just imagine its producing a supposedly evenhanded report that condemned the Nazis for "grave" abuses such as incinerating Jews, while also condemning the Allies for their equally "grave" abuses such as fire-bombing German and Japanese cities. The recommendation, no doubt, would have been that both sides be tried for war crimes, with Adolf Hitler in the dock alongside Franklin Roosevelt. Actually, that may be giving the UN more credit than it deserves. To judge by the evidence before us, the likelihood is that the UN in those days would have devoted far more space to Allied "abuses" than to those of the Axis and would have recommended that FDR stand alone before the world court...

Light of Guidance
Fundamentals of Faith 101

October 16th-18th & 24th-25th, 2009

Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center

Taught by Sheikh Yasir Qadhi

Boston's First Double-Weekend Seminar

Al-Maghrib's Most Popular Seminar Right Here in Your Backyard...

Americans for Peace and Tolerance June 25 2009 Press Conference from Charles Jacobs on Vimeo.

On June 26, Governor Deval Patrick and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino will be honored guests at the grand opening of the Islamic Society of Boston's Cultural Center in Roxbury, Massachusetts. Americans for Peace and Tolerance wish the Boston Muslim community well in their new cultural and religious center, and we celebrate the growing religious diversity it represents. We are deeply concerned, however, about the extremist leadership of this new institution. This video is from a press conference held to discuss our concerns.

All of these Polish Jews which Hitler was supposedly trying to exterminate, that's another point, by the way, Hitler never intended to mass-destroy the Jews. There are a number of books out on this written by Christians, you should read them. The Hoax of the Holocaust, I advise you to read this book and write this down, The Hoax of the Holocaust, a very good book. All of this is false propaganda and I know it sounds so far-fetched, but read it. The evidences [sic] are very strong. And they're talking about newspaper articles, clippings, everything and look up yourself what Hitler really wanted to do. We're not defending Hitler, by the way, but the Jews, the way that they portray him, also is not correct.

Mayor Thomas M. Menino's administration was warned by a state judge late last year that city employees were deleting e-mails in apparent violation of state public records law, but city officials failed to halt the practice.

The judge's order, made in a lawsuit against the Boston Redevelopment Authority, shows that the problem of records destruction at City Hall has extended well beyond Menino's closest aide, Michael J. Kineavy, whose e-mails the Globe sought through a public records request this summer.

Superior Court Judge Ralph D. Gants wrote in a November court order that BRA employees had been permitted to delete e-mails without keeping hard copies or electronic backups.

"It is plain that the BRA failed to comply with its obligation to retain e-mails in accordance with [state law],'' Gants wrote. "Prior to 2007, the BRA frequently asked its staff to delete e-mails so that its e-mail storage load would not exceed what was desirable for the efficient use of its e-mail servers.''

State public records law requires municipal employees to save electronic correspondence for at least two years, even if the contents are of "no informational or evidential value.'' Penalties include fines of up to $500 or prison sentences of up to one year...

Some writers get all the luck!

Really.

How unfair is this? Osama Bin Laden (or someone who pretends to be him) has endorsed Jimmy Carter's Palestine Peace Not Apartheid and The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy by John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt.

According to an entry in the New York Times' blog Bin Laden (or some fascimile thereof) recently issued a tape in which he exhorts his listeners to read the texts mentioned above along with a few other books, stating: "After you read the suggested books, you will know the truth, and you will be greatly shocked by the scale of concealment that has been exercised on you."...

Israel did not feel able to cooperate with the Fact Finding Mission because its mandate was clearly one-sided and ignored the thousands of Hamas missile attacks on civilians in southern Israel that made the Gaza Operation necessary. Both the mandate of the Mission and the resolution establishing it prejudged the outcome of any investigation, gave legitimacy to the Hamas terrorist organization and disregarded the deliberate Hamas strategy of using Palestinian civilians as cover for launching terrorist attacks.

The unbalanced nature of the resolution establishing the Mission was the reason that so many States on the Council, including all member states of the European Union, Switzerland, Canada, Korea and Japan, did not support it, and why many distinguished individuals, including former High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson, refused invitations to head the Mission.

Notwithstanding its reservations, Israel will read the Report carefully - as it does with all reports prepared by international and national organizations. Israel is committed to acting fully in accordance with international law and to examining any allegations of wrongdoing by its own forces. To date, the IDF has opened investigations into over 100 allegations regarding the conduct of its forces during the Gaza Operation. While most of these investigations were closed because the allegations were found baseless, 23 criminal investigations were opened and are still pending.

...Goldstone's press conference in New York and the report's recommendations constitute another step in the Durban strategy, in which the language of human rights and international law are used as weapons in the political war to isolate and demonize Israel...

...Human Rights Watch is referenced 33 times, including the "Rain of Fire" report co-authored by Marc Garlasco. He was HRW's "senior military expert" (until yesterday's exposure of his Nazi memorabilia fetish), but his analyses are also tainted by false claims. Goldstone's long association with HRW essentially means that in this report, he is quoting his own highly problematic organization. More generally, the methodology used in the 36 incidents examined by the committee will give critics of the report and the commission the strongest basis for rejecting its conclusions.

If this was a real court process, and not a façade based on a political mandate from the inherently biased United Nations Human Rights Council, both Goldstone and Professor Christine Chinkin would have been disqualified from participating. As UN Watch noted in its 28-page legal brief to the UN, Chinkin's bias was reflected in statements that "categorically rejected" Israel's right to self-defense against rocket attacks from Gaza and accused Israel of "aggression" and "prima facie war crimes." But without any due process, this brief was simply dismissed...

...Near the end of his statement, Goldstone told his audience that they should "rejoice that we are living in a world today in which there is accountability for war crimes." The Hamas leadership and its supporters, including the Iranian regime, will indeed rejoice, but few Israelis will find this mission, its report and its recommendations as providing accountability or restoring the morality of the United Nations.

Noam Badin [sic: Bedein], one of six Israeli civilians who testified before the Goldstone Commission probing Operation Cast Lead blasted the investigation's report Tuesday for equating the actions of Israel and Hamas, saying it was "disgusting," Israel Radio reported.

According to the radio station, Badin said that Goldstone fell asleep when he was shown clips of Sderot children running for their lives after hearing a Color Red rocket warning siren.

...I was flown to testify in front of the committee at the UN headquarters in Geneva and during my testimony, which included raw video footage of children running from rocket fire, Richard Goldstone fell asleep...

A leading human rights group has suspended its senior military analyst following revelations that he is an avid collector of Nazi memorabilia.

The group, Human Rights Watch, had initially thrown its full support behind the analyst, Marc Garlasco, when the news of his hobby came out last week. On Monday night, the group shifted course and suspended him with pay, "pending an investigation," said Carroll Bogert, the group's associate director.

"We have questions about whether we have learned everything we need to know," she said...

The film, "The Third Jihad" will be shown in Hunneman Hall at the Public Library of Brookline on Tuesday, September 15th at 7 p.m. Dennis Hale and Charles Jacobs will lead a brief discussion after the showing. Dr. Hale is a professor of political science at Boston College. Dr. Jacobs is president of Americans for Peace and Tolerance (APT). The program is free and open to the public. The library is located at 361 Washington St., Brookline.

The Third Jihad explores the phenomenon of radical Islam in America and the risk that homegrown jihad poses to national security and the American way of life. Narrated by Muslim-American Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, the 72-minutes film reveals how Islamic supremacists, driven by a religiously motivated rejection of western values, are engaging in a multifaceted strategy to overwhelm the West. In contrast to the use of violent jihad and terror to instill fear in "non-believers," cultural jihad is a means of infiltrating and undermining Western society from within, as the film shows.

The film is sponsored by Americans for Peace and Tolerance and co-sponsored by the Boston Israel Action Committee.

For directions to the library go to www.brooklinelibrary.org. For more information call 617-869-1202.

...One wonders what Rep. Berman thinks now. The administration has made itself, and those who were banking on some onset of diplomatic sobriety, look foolish. Those in Congress who were moving forward with an array of sanctions to enhance Obama's bargaining position have been undercut by an administration that apparently doesn't want its bargaining position enhanced.

The administration has prostrated itself before the Iranian regime and afforded it still more time to continue with its nuclear-weapons program. It has signaled that it has neither the will nor the interest to set deadlines or enforce them, and that it has failed to lay the groundwork for sanctions...

An unprecedented team of fifty British and Canadian lawyers are challenging the refusal of a U.N. investigator to step down from an inquiry on the recent Gaza conflict, arguing that London School of Economics professor Christine Chinkin's participation on the panel - after she declared Israel guilty prior to seeing any evidence - "necessarily compromises the integrity of this inquiry and its report."...

IAF officer Lt. Assaf Ramon, the son of Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon who died in the 2003 fatal Columbia mission, was killed on Sunday after the F-16 he was piloting crashed into the southern Hebron hills.

IAF commander Maj.-Gen. Ido Nehushtan and head of the IDF Manpower Division Avi Zamir personally went to Rona Ramon's house to deliver the news.

The story of the crash and the identity of the pilot resonated widely throughout the IDF and particularly in the Air Force where Ilan Ramon was a legend.

"This is shocking," said one senior IDF officer.

The cause of the accident was under investigation and was complicated by the large crash scene. Officials said that the debris was spread over a large piece of land near the settlement of Pinei Hever.

Sunday's flight was his 47th flight since finishing the IAF pilots course in June, Channel 10 reported...

...Assaf Ramon announced his plans to follow in his father's footsteps shortly following the Columbia tragedy. In 2006 he enlisted in the IDF and successfully passed the IAF's grueling examinations and trials for the prestigious pilot's course.

Assaf was the valedictorian of his class which graduated in June. Several months ago, during a routine training flight in a Skyhawk A4, Ramon encountered a technical failure when the engine suddenly died. Instead of ejecting, like protocol dictates, Ramon, together with the flight instructor, succeeded in restarting the engine and safely returning to base.

Ken Roth: Marc, can you come in please? Marc...very important....we've just had an incident in Gaza between Israel and the Palestinians and we need you to fly out at once.

Garlasco: Oh...uh...where did you say again?

Roth: Gaza. Incident with the Israelis...

Garlasco: That's what I thought you said. See...uh...well, there's something I've been meaning to tell you...and...say, got anything going on in Congo by any chance?

Roth: No. Gaza. Listen, what's the problem?

Garlasco: Well, see I have a potential issue...

Roth: What, knocked-up a Hamas girl did you? Hahahahaha! Listen, whatever it is, the Israelis (who we're gonna give a good screwing to, btw...get it? "Knocked-up...screw..." I kid...) will protect you. Don't worry, you're a human rights worker, it's not like you're a...a NAZI or something!

Garlasco: NO! Oh no...[aside] well, not exactly...

Roth: Well, whatever it is, I'm sure it can wait. Now get out there kid. We have complete faith in you!

HRW are (deliberately?) missing the point. The question raised by his Nazi obsession is valid: is there a connection between his Israel bashing and his obsession with memorabilia associated with Jew-hating mass-murderers?

Imagine for a second if someone claiming to be objective had a penchant for collecting IDF memorabilia. If this person came out repeatedly with reports favorable to Israel, wouldn't people have reason to question their objectivity?

You also have to question how someone working for a human rights organization - and claiming to really care about people - can look at Nazi memorabilia and not feel repulsed.

These are valid questions, and HRW's informal response is nowhere near adequate.

... Saying that this is him doing "research" is an insult to everyone's intelligence. He is a collector of Nazi-era German objects like daggers, Iron Crosses, swastikas. He has written hundreds, maybe thousands, of posts on forums dedicated to the topic. He has written a 400 page book on the topic. Writing a monograph on German medals does not make one a "historian" in any real sense; it makes him a rabid collector. I am fairly sure that his purchase of many of these items would be illegal in many European countries. To deflect those disturbing facts by saying that he also owns a few American air force memorabilia is to dodge the real issue.

It is extraordinarily bad taste and truly offensive that the same person who habitually castigates the Jewish state to a worldwide audience has a creepy obsession with the symbols of those who tried to destroy all Jews...

HRW Press office should be aware that form letters containing platitudes and bland denials do not work when real issues are on the table. The historical value of the flak 88 batteries medals is about as important as the historical value of recording the color of the manure of the Carthaginians' war elephants as they changed altitudes in crossing the Alps. The detailed immersion in the stylization and lurid imagery of the Nazi medals betrays a mania that is simply not explainable as a normal hobby- especially given the ideology and ethos they represent. These are not treasures nor are they of any historical value they are lustrous totems of an inhumane totalitarian regime that should be, rightly forgotten and dishonored rather than worshipped...

Most inaccurate of all, and most bizarre, is Carter's claim that "a total freeze of settlement expansion is the key" to a peace agreement. Not a halt to terrorism, not the building of Palestinian institutions, not the rule of law in the West Bank, not the end of Hamas rule in Gaza -- no, the sole "key" is Israeli settlements. Such a conclusion fits with Carter's general approach, in which there are no real Palestinians, just victims of Israel. The century of struggle between moderate and radical Palestinians, and the victories of terrorists from Haj Amin al-Husseini to Yasser Arafat, are forgotten; the Hamas coup in Gaza is unmentioned; indeed the words "Hamas" and "terrorism" do not appear in Carter's column. Instead of appealing for support for the serious and practical work of institution-building that the Palestinian Authority has begun, Carter fantasizes about a "nonviolent civil rights struggle" that bears no relationship to the terrorist violence that has plagued Palestinian society, and killed Israelis, for decades. Carter's portrait demonizes Israelis and, not coincidentally, it infantilizes Palestinians, who are accorded no real responsibility for their fate or future. If this is "the Elders' view of the Middle East," we and our friends in that region are fortunate that this group of former officials is no longer in power.

Carter enemy of peace

Ben-Dror Yemini

Like all "peace activists", the former president engages in revilement against Israel, which feeds Palestinian rejectionism

Israel has become a permanent stop in the travels of the former president of USA Jimmy Carter. It transpires that his approach to Israel is special. Two weeks ago he visited in Israel, this time in a special delegation of the Elders - the Elders of the world's tribe. As soon as he returned to the United States, he published an anti-Israel article in the Washington Post. In this article, Carter mentions the Hanun family, "who were evicted from the house when they had lived in East Jerusalem for 65 years". Really? In fact, the building belonged to Jews who were banished from Jerusalem during the War of Independence. The Jewish ownership of the house is not in doubt, and goes back to the year 1875. A Star of David is etched on at least one of the old structures there. The Hanun family however were not there 65 years ago. They are refugee family from Haifa. (By the way, Haifa Arabs were not banished but left voluntarily) Together with several other families, they were housed in the building in 1956 by the Jordanian authorities. The owners of the property petitioned to realize their property rights. Carter's article mentions not a word of the background.

In Carter's state, Atlanta, thousands of residents have been evicted from their homes because they had no money for mortgage repayments. The rights of the Smith family, who were thrown onto the street in Atlanta, are far more well-based than the rights of the Hanun family. But Carter is not looking for justice; he is seeking to revile.

Criticism of the eviction of the Hanun family can well take the form of justified criticism. Even if the eviction was justified, from the legal aspect, there is room for political criticism. But this is on the condition that if Carter wishes to deprive Jews of property rights, he must clearly state that Palestinians have no right to reclaim abandoned property either. In fact, the property that was confiscated from Jews in Arab countries as a result of legislation, pressure, persecution, flight and banishment exceeds the value of the property that was confiscated as the result of the (self-imposed) exile and banishment of the Palestinians. But there is one difference: The Palestinians suffered (self-imposed) exile and banishment because of a declaration of a war of annihilation against the Jewish state that had barely come into existence. The Jews in Arab countries suffered a similar fate - of banishment and confiscation of property - even though they had not declared war on Arab countries. So whose rights are greater?

Did Carter ever tell the Palestinians of this fundamental truth? We know the answer. Like other "peace activists", he relates to the Arabs as a whole and the Palestinians in particular as if they were retarded children. They must not be told the truth. They must not be told that if they are to have rights, then both Jews and Arabs must have these rights as well. And if not, neither do Jews nor Arabs have any rights. He does not tell them that in those years, the 1940s, tens of millions of people suffered the harsh experience of population exchanges, and there is no reason why the Palestinians, and only them, should have "the right of return". He does not tell on that more Jews fled Arab countries than the number of Palestinians who fled or were exiled from Israel.

It is quite legitimate to criticize Israel with respect to the settlement enterprise. Such criticism is sometimes justified. But Carter, like thousands of other "peace activists", is not bringing peace nearer. Their demonization of Israel is strengthening the position of peace rejectionists. Appearing in the same newspaper after all - the Washington Post - Was Abu Mazen's position on May 29. He stubbornly insisted on demands, which quite clearly imply objection to the existence of Israel. Officially of course, he naturally agrees to a two-state solution, but on condition that one of the states is a Palestinian state and that the other is Palestinian as a result of the realization of the right of return. He received an amazing offer from (former Israel Prime Minister) Olmert, which included the evacuation of 97% of the territories, but rejected it outright. Did Carter issue an announcement condemning Abu Mazen? We all know the answer.

Carter published an Israel-bashing article; one of many. Instead of acting as a critical but honest broker, Carter is becoming part of the incitement campaign against the State of Israel. He has succeeded in achieving success in other regions. For some reason, when he broaches the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he loses his sense of fairness and balance. This does not contribute to the advancement of peace. This is Carter's contribution to strengthening Palestinian rejectionism and making the chances of peace ever more distant.

It's high noon for the high holidays.

Fearing jihadists will attack synagogues during Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, a group of badass rabbis has developed a program to turn your average shul-goer into a lean, mean fighting machine.

The group, which calls itself the International Security Coalition of Clergy, was founded by Rabbi Gary Moscowitz, who boasts a black belt in karate, teaches martial arts and was an NYPD cop for nine years.

He's teaching others basic and advanced fighting moves -- how to take down a terrorist by the neck, how to use a table as cover from gunfire and how to execute a nifty running somersault while drawing a gun -- that he says can be used by Jews if they're attacked by terrorists during prayer.

"Jews are not like Christians," Moscowitz said. "If I turn my cheek, I'm coming around to make a kick."...

Downing Street has hit back at Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton for attacking the decision to release the Lockerbie bomber.

President Obama and the US Secretary of State fuelled a fierce American backlash against Britain, claiming Abdelbaset Al Megrahi should have been forced to serve out his jail sentence in Scotland - but a senior Whitehall aide said their reaction was 'disingenuous'.

British officials claim Mr Obama and Mrs Clinton were kept informed at all stages of discussions concerning Megrahi's return.

The officials say the Americans spoke out because they were taken aback by the row over Megrahi's release, not because they did not know it was about to happen.

'The US was kept fully in touch about everything that was going on with regard to Britain's discussions with Libya in recent years and about Megrahi,' said the Whitehall aide.

'We would never do anything about Lockerbie without discussing it with the US. It is disingenuous of them to act as though Megrahi's return was out of the blue.

'They knew about our prisoner transfer agreement with Libya and they knew that the Scots were considering Megrahi's case.'

Mr Obama said Megrahi's release on compassionate grounds was a 'mistake' while Mrs Clinton phoned the Scottish administration to complain in person...

In stark contrast to the cable leaked last month by Israel's consul-general in Boston saying support for Israel in the US has declined, a recent poll for The Israel Project shows support has bounced back significantly after slipping in the aftermath of US President Barack Obama's Cairo speech.

The poll, conducted by Neil Newhouse of Public Opinion Strategies and Stan Greenberg of Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research (GQRR), asked some 800 likely US voters the following question: "Thinking about the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians in the Middle East, please tell me whether, in general, you consider yourself to be an Israel supporter, Palestinian supporter, or neither/undecided."

Some 59 percent of the respondents said they were Israel supporters, compared to 8 percent for the Palestinians. The poll was conducted by telephone from August 22 to 25.

This was a considerable jump in support for Israel since June, following the US president's speech in Cairo, when the same question was asked by the same pollsters and Israel's support was only 49 percent...

...No American president has ever attempted to acquire the image of King of the Universe by officiating at a meeting of the UN's highest body. But Obama apparently believes that being flanked by council-member heads of state like Col. Moammar Qaddafi -- who is expected to be seated five seats to Obama's right -- will cast a sufficiently blinding spell on the American taxpayer that the perilous state of the nation's economy, the health-care fiasco, and a summer of "post-racial" scapegoating will pale by comparison.

After all, who among us is not for world peace?

Unfortunately, however, the move represents one of the most dangerous diplomatic ploys this country has ever seen. The president didn't just decide to chair a rare council summit; he also set the September 24 agenda -- as is the prerogative of the state holding the gavel for the month. His choice, in the words of American UN Ambassador Susan Rice, speaking on September 2 at her first press briefing since the United States assumed the council presidency, is this: "The session will be focused on nuclear nonproliferation and nuclear disarmament broadly, and not on any specific countries."

This seemingly innocuous language has two profoundly disturbing features. First, UN documents indicate that the Security Council is currently dealing with over 100 issues. While "non-proliferation" is mentioned, "disarmament" is not. Similarly, a UN Secretariat compilation "forecasting the Council's program of work" for the month of September -- based on prior activities and requests -- lists non-proliferation specifically in relation to Iran and North Korea and does not list disarmament. But in light of Obama's wishes, a tailor-made subheading will likely be adopted under the existing entry "maintenance of international peace and security." The new item will insist on simultaneous consideration of nuclear non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament and make no mention of particular states.

This is no trivial technicality. The linguistic formula, which Obama's confrere Qaddafi will undoubtedly exploit, shamelessly panders to Arab and Muslim states. It is a familiar recipe for stonewalling efforts to prevent Iran or other Muslim and Arab states from acquiring nuclear weapons until Israel is disarmed or Israel's (unofficial) nuclear capacity is exposed and neutralized. It is also a frequent tool of those whose real goal is to stymie America's defenses...

...At Ambassador Rice's news briefing, she gave "an overview of the principal important meetings" to be held in September on her watch. After finishing the list of subjects without mentioning Iran or North Korea, she added: "So those are the highlights. We also have . . . three sanctions regimes that are up for regular review, chaired by the heads of the sanctions committees. We have Sudan, Iran and North Korea, and these are, I expect, likely to be uneventful and routine considerations of these various regimes."

Even hard-boiled UN correspondents were surprised. Rice was asked to explain how the recent capture by the United Arab Emirates of containers of ammunition en route to Iran from North Korea could be construed as "uneventful and routine." Her answer highlights the administration's delinquency: "We are simply receiving . . . a regularly scheduled update . . . This is not an opportunity to review or revisit the nature of either of those regimes."

A brutalized Iranian population, yearning for democracy, has repeatedly been met by nothing but sad faces from this administration. An Iranian president installed by treachery has been legitimized by American recognition of his government, a decision that has sidelined other eminently justifiable alternatives. The leaders of this state sponsor of terrorism aim to annihilate the Jewish state and are on the verge of acquiring the means to do so. But instead of making the isolation and delegitimation of Iran the top priority for America's turn at the council presidency, the Obama administration has taken Iran off the table at precisely the time when top decision-makers will be present...

...So the PTA [prisoner transfer agreement] discussions were running in tandem with talks on freeing Megrahi by other means? "I think it [talk of compassionate release] came later, but I can't be certain," he says.

Later in 2007, he wrote to Mr MacAskill saying that he could not exclude Megrahi from the PTA. In the letter, he cited "overwhelming interests for the UK". The unanswered question is whether those interests included trade and, in particular, the stalled BP deal that was signed off soon afterwards. For the first time he admits the link.

When I ask if trade and BP were factors, he says: "Yes, it was a very big part of that. I'm unapologetic about that. Libya was a rogue state. We wanted to bring it back into the fold and trade is an essential part of it -- and subsequently there was the BP deal."

Reports that the PTA exclusion was agreed by government colleagues including Gordon Brown, are wrong, he says. "I certainly didn't talk to the PM. There is no paper trail to suggest he was involved at all." So when did he first talk to Mr Brown? "I don't think I've ever talked to Gordon about Megrahi's release." Not even in the past week? "Oh, for sure in the past week," he says. Surely this vagueness adds to the impression that the Government is being evasive, if not duplicitous? "I think we have been very frank about it," Mr Straw says, none too convincingly...

...Two of the three doctors commissioned by the Libyans provided the required three-month estimates, while the third also indicated that the prisoner had a short time to live.

This contrasted with findings of doctors in June and July who had concluded that Megrahi had up to 10 months to live, which would have prevented his release.

Professor Karol Sikora, one of the examining doctors and the medical director of CancerPartnersUK in London, told The Sunday Telegraph: "The figure of three months was suggested as being helpful [by the Libyans].

"To start with I said it was impossible to do that [give a three-month life expectancy estimate] but, when I looked at it, it looked as though it could be done - you could actually say that." He said that he and a second doctor, a Libyan, had legitimately then estimated Megrahi's life expectancy as "about three months". A third doctor would say only that he had a short time to live.

This weekend it was reported that Megrahi was moved out of an emergency care unit in Tripoli...

For most American Jews, the core of their Jewish identity isn't solidarity with Israel; it's rejection of Christianity. This observation may help to explain the otherwise puzzling political preferences of the Jewish community explored in Norman Podhoretz's book. Jewish voters don't embrace candidates based on their support for the state of Israel as much as they passionately oppose candidates based on their identification with Christianity--especially the fervent evangelicalism of the dreaded "Christian Right."

This political pattern reflects the fact that opposition to Christianity--not love for Judaism, Jews, or Israel--remains the sole unifying element in an increasingly fractious and secularized community...

JERUSALEM (CNN) -- An archaeological dig in Jerusalem has turned up a 3,700-year-old wall that is the largest and oldest of its kind found in the region, experts say.

Standing 8 meters (26 feet) high, the wall of huge cut stones is a marvel to archaeologists...

...It was found inside the City of David, an archaeological excavation site outside the Old City of East Jerusalem on a slope of the Silwan Valley.

The wall is believed to have been built by the Canaanites, an ancient pagan people who the Bible says inhabited Jerusalem and other parts of the Middle East before the advent of monotheism...

The Toronto International Film Festival is under attack for its decision to present a series of films spotlighting the Israeli city of Tel Aviv, which a group of high-profile artists and celebrities say constitutes complicity in "the Israeli propaganda machine".

At issue is the festival's new City to City program, which will present 10 films focused on Tel Aviv.

The 34th edition of the festival will begin next Thursday.

Canadian filmmaker John Greyson last week pulled his documentary "Covered" from the festival in protest, and a statement published online on Thursday and signed by more than 50 artists, academics, and filmmakers likened the program to a celebration of apartheid-era South Africa.

"This program ignores the suffering of thousands of former residents and descendants of the (Tel Aviv) area who currently live in refugee camps in the Occupied Territories or who have been dispersed to other countries," say the signatories, which include actors Jane Fonda and Danny Glover, author Naomi Klein, and filmmaker Ken Loach.

They accuse the festival of taking direction from the "Brand Israel" campaign, which seeks to improve the country's image and has focused on Toronto as a test city...

...Furthermore, what this description does not say is that Tel Aviv is built on destroyed Palestinian villages, and that the city of Jaffa, Palestine's main cultural hub until 1948, was annexed to Tel Aviv after the mass exiling of the Palestinian population. This program ignores the suffering of thousands of former residents and descendants of the Tel Aviv/Jaffa area who currently live in refugee camps in the Occupied Territories or who have been dispersed to other countries, including Canada. Looking at modern, sophisticated Tel Aviv without also considering the city's past and the realities of Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza strip, would be like rhapsodizing about the beauty and elegant lifestyles in white-only Cape Town or Johannesburg during apartheid without acknowledging the corresponding black townships of Khayelitsha and Soweto...

...while the words of praise flowed, absence of Muslim community leaders was sorely noted during the event.

Leaders from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation's largest grassroots American Muslim civil rights and advocacy group, did not attend the Ramadan iftar for not receiving invitations. [Love that "for not receiving invitations" bit. -MS]

CAIR is not alone Other Muslim organizations were also not invited to the White House iftar.

Surprising, while Muslim leaders were absent, Israel's ambassador in Washington and a group of Jewish rabbis were among the guests.

Muslim leaders warned that not inviting them signals a continuation of the policies of former president George W. Bush, who used to shun many Muslim groups...

The announcement comes on the day that ousted President Zelaya is at the State Department to meet with Hillary Clinton.

The statement below from spokesman Ian Kelly says the the restoration of aid to Honduras will depend on Honduras returning to "democratic, constitutional governance."...

First the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet cited freedom of the press as its justification for accusing IDF soldiers of harvesting Palestinian organs. Now the Spanish daily El Mundo is using the same argument to defend including Holocaust denier David Irving among its list of experts to be interviewed this week to mark 70 years since the start of World War II.

An interview with Irving, who served time in an Austrian prison for his Holocaust denial, is scheduled to appear in the paper on Saturday, a day after an interview with Yad Vashem's chairman Avner Shalev.

When Israeli Ambassador to Spain Raphael Schutz learned of the plans, he wrote a letter to the newspaper, saying it was obscene to include Irving in the list of experts and give him an esteemed platform. Such exposure, Schutz argued, lent Irving credibility.

Schutz's letter appeared in the paper on Wednesday.

Schutz wrote that one of the problems facing the post-modern age was an inability to recognize anything as true, saying instead that there were only "different narratives."

As such, Schutz wrote, there was no capacity to differentiate between truth and lies, between the important and the superfluous. And in this world void of truth, everything is at the same level - the murderer and the victim, the wise and the ignorant, Mozart's opera and the latest pop song.

Even freedom of the press, Schutz wrote, had limits. One sentence that was edited out of his letter was his charge that the paper was printing the interview to cause a sensation.

The paper's response, which was run under the letter, was not to endorse Irving's ideas, but rather to cite press freedom and the right for everyone to decide on their own...

The so-called "spiritual" leader of Hamas has ordered that Palestinian children are not to be taught about the Holocaust.

Younis al-Astal - who is about as spiritual as Al Capone - has declared that the United Nations' proposal to include Holocaust education in a course on human rights would constitute a "war crime."

It would be "marketing a lie and spreading it," he said. Instead, he would have Palestinian children learn only about the so-called crimes of the Israeli occupation and the self-inflicted wound that Palestinians call the "nakba."

I am not so sure I would trust the United Nations, and especially its Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) to teach anything relating to Jews, Israel or the Holocaust. That agency has been part of the problem, not the solution, by perpetuating the refugee status of Palestinians who could have been integrated into the Palestinian mainstream over the past sixty years."...

Palestinian children are taught through formal and informal education to see a world in which "Palestine" exists and replaces all of Israel. Two children's quizzes broadcast last week on Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority television show how the PA routinely teaches its children to identify all Israeli cities as Palestinian cities.

In the two quizzes on PA TV, children were asked to identify "Palestinian" cities. The suggested answers were exclusively Israeli cities: Haifa, Jaffa, Acre and Tiberias.

The following are the transcripts of the PA TV quizzes:

Quiz 1: Haifa, Jaffa and Acre are "Palestine"
Host reads clue: "Where is Palestine's most important port, in Haifa, Jaffa or Acre?"
Child: "Jaffa."
Host: "Is it correct?" [Checks computer.]
Host: "Bravo!"
[PATV (Fatah), Aug. 26, 2009]

A Westport lawmaker who voted to hike the state sales and alcohol taxes was spotted brazenly piling booze in his car - adorned with his State House license plate - in the parking lot of a tax-free New Hampshire liquor store, the Herald has learned.

Michael J. Rodrigues' blue Ford Crown Victoria, emblazoned with his "House 29" Massachusetts license plate, was parked outside a Granite State liquor store on Interstate-95 South over the weekend, according to a witness who provided pictures to the Herald.

The witness, who requested anonymity, claimed he approached Rodrigues, noted his State House plate, and asked if he was on personal or official business. Rodrigues, who was loading booze into his car, snapped "mind your own business," the witness said...

...A member of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, Rodrigues did not return several phone calls yesterday. But in an online interview with The Standard-Times in New Bedford, he acknowledged buying the booze during a bathroom stop while he and his wife were on a weekend getaway in New Hampshire.

He also blamed the brouhaha on "Republican demagoguery."

"Unfortunately, I think that's why the Republican Party is in such bad shape in Massachusetts," Rodrigues is quoted as saying. "The electorate here is smart enough to figure out what they're up to."

The Westport Democrat, whose family owns a rug business, was among the lawmakers who voted in an unpopular 25 percent sales tax hike for Bay Staters. The increase pushed the sales tax to 6.25 percent and slapped that same levy on booze - the first time alcohol has been subject to retail sales tax...

...In the wake of a series of publications worldwide regarding the rape and torture of dissident prisoners in Iran's jails, supporters of Ahmadinejad gathered with him in Jamkaran, a popular pilgrimage site for Shi'ite Muslims on the outskirts of Qom, on August 11, 2009. According to Iranian pro-democracy sources, the gathered crowd heard from Ayatollah Mohammad Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi and Ahmadinejad himself regarding the issue.

According to the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center (ITIC), an independent Israeli intelligence analysis organization, Mesbah-Yazdi is considered Ahmadinejad's personal spiritual guide. A radical totalitarian even in Iranian terms, he holds messianic views, supports increasing Islamization, calls for violent suppression of domestic political opponents, and, according to the ITIC, "declared that obeying a president supported by the Supreme Leader was tantamount to obeying God."...

..."Can an interrogator rape the prisoner in order to obtain a confession?" was the follow-up question posed to the Islamic cleric.

Mesbah-Yazdi answered: "The necessary precaution is for the interrogator to perform a ritual washing first and say prayers while raping the prisoner. If the prisoner is female, it is permissible to rape through the vagina or anus. It is better not to have a witness present. If it is a male prisoner, then it's acceptable for someone else to watch while the rape is committed."

This reply, and reports of the rape of teen male prisoners in Iranian jails, may have prompted the following question: "Is the rape of men and young boys considered sodomy?"

Ayatollah Mesbah-Yazdi: "No, because it is not consensual. Of course, if the prisoner is aroused and enjoys the rape, then caution must be taken not to repeat the rape."

A related issue, in the eyes of the questioners, was the rape of virgin female prisoners. In this instance, Mesbah-Yazdi went beyond the permissibility issue and described the Allah-sanctioned rewards accorded the rapist-in-the-name-of-Islam:

"If the judgment for the [female] prisoner is execution, then rape before execution brings the interrogator a spiritual reward equivalent to making the mandated Haj pilgrimage [to Mecca], but if there is no execution decreed, then the reward would be equivalent to making a pilgrimage to [the Shi'ite holy city of] Karbala."...

Z32 is built around a confession-- a young man's account of his participation in the revenge killing of two Palestinian police officers by the Israeli army in the occupied territories...

A documentary about terrorists, where the criminals themselves confess their sins on camera, with their faces blurred so that no one can recognize them. As an idea, it's actually pretty interesting...

The director, Avi Mograbi, structures the film like this: on one level we have the Israeli terrorist who, encouraged by his girlfriend, tapes a confession where he expresses his regret for killing two Palestinian police officers during a reprisal operation. The girlfriend testifies on camera too, on the condition that her face be unrecognizable. On the other level, we have a series of Lynchian musical interludes, staged by Mograbi himself, which have no connection whatsoever to what's being told and seem to have been inserted simply to extend the running time. There are also additional scenes where the terrorist visits the crime scene with a friend, providing further insight.

Artistically speaking, the director might even have had an interesting point to make with this new, unprecedented approach to the subject of terrorism...

Mr. Mograbi delivers another complex journey into the deep psyche of the Israeli murder machine. The filmmaker always thinks his projects all the way through and Z32 also lacks any ideological gaps. Z32 is the file number of one soldier's testimony of his unit's revenge mission where he ambushed and killed unarmed Palestinians. He agrees to do the film, but only if his face is not shown.

If the challenge of making a film based on an interview with one person without showing his face isn't enough, Mograbi decides that it should be a musical as well. The filmmaker sings in his living room throughout the piece, songs he wrote himself while making the film. Catchy lyrics include, "Put a mask on him so we don't have to see what evil looks like," "Am I harboring a murderer because it makes a good film," and "My wife said, 'Don't film him in our living room.'" The filmmaker once again dives into the village to show us the universal and isn't afraid of the absurdity intrinsic in the horror.

Mr. Mograbi and I had a brief but meaningful conversation after the film about Truth and Reconciliation Trials. In his words, "We have to say what we've done to each other."

Seventy years ago, a sleek limousine crossed the border of Poland and Germany and sped along the autobahn between Beuthen and Gleiwitz. Inside was a 26-year-old reporter on her first assignment for The Daily Telegraph, who was about to break the scoop of the century.

Once past Gleiwitz, the road began to climb a hill. Clare Hollingworth, now nearly 98 years old, suddenly caught sight of 65 German motorcycle dispatch riders, who overtook her car and sped away with a roar. As she looked to the side, a gust of wind lifted up the hessian sheets that had been strung alongside the road.

That was when she spied hundreds of tanks, armoured cars and field artillery - von Rundstedt's 10th Army and its Panzer Corps - massed in the valley below, waiting to roll into Poland and begin the Second World War...

...in a further twist to this diplomatic crisis that swings from the bad to the farcical, Bildt - in Kabul for talks with international representatives and Afghan officials - has flatly denied that he and Frattini even discussed Sweden's standoff with Israel, according to the Swedish news agency TT.

Through the foreign ministry's head of communications, Cecilia Julin, Bildt denied that he and Frattini had discussed the disagreement between Sweden and Israel over the Aftonbladet article, or that they had discussed a possible resolution by the Council of Ministers.

"From the Swedish side we have no plans to handle this question through the informal foreign ministers' meeting in Stockholm," said Julin. She also conveyed that Bildt had suggested that the proposal must have arisen through an "Italian misunderstanding."...

The leaders of the U.S. Helsinki Commission urged European foreign ministers to unequivocally denounce an anti-Semitic article in a Swedish newspaper.

Sen. Benjamin Cardin (D-Md.), chairman of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, and co-chair Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.) on Monday called on European leaders to condemn an article in the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet that accused Israeli soldiers of harvesting the organs of Palestinian prisoners...

Now that Jerusalem has calmed down from the hysteria surrounding the organ theft article that appeared in the newspaper Aftonbladet, the Swedes have shifted from attacking Israel to self-criticism.

Swedish Chancellor of Justice Goran Lambertz published an article stating that that while criticizing the article's publication does contravene the law, the government may still criticize its contents.

The government can go further in criticizing the article without violating the Constitution, said Lambertz.

For example, one of the ministers could have said: "We have no reason to believe these allegations."

Lambertz said the decision not to react to the report stemmed from political considerations, not legal constraints.

Thorbjorn Larsson, editor in chief of Dagens Nyheter, Sweden's most respected newspaper, has said the crisis may have been inevitable, but that Foreign Minister Carl Bildt should have expressed a clearer position from its offset.

Larsson also believes ministers may react to articles clearly, without infringing on the right to free speech.

The editor also noted that Swedish prime minister Olof Palme, who was assassinated in 1968, did not hesitate to express his opinion about a controversial report accusing his justice minister of tax violations.

Meanwhile, back in Jerusalem, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman gave a ministry delegation permission to visit Sweden.