The Hurvah Synagogue before Being Blown up by the Arab Legion of Transjordan, Courtesy of His Britannic Majesty's Generals and Officers

REVISION/EXPANSION 3-30-2010

JERUSALEM, THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS CITY OF THE EAST BY FAR, NOT MERELY OF JUDEA, Pliny the Elder

The recent rededication of the Hurva Synagogue in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, a synagogue going back to circa 1700, destroyed twice and rebuilt three times, occasioned noisy outbursts of Arab anger. One Arab group supposedly devoted to "human rights" called the rebuilding a "war crime." This shows "human rights" is sometimes used as a slogan to mobilize hate against the rights of Jews. Other groups and mouthpieces of both Fatah/PLO/Palestinian Authority and of Hamas raged against the rebuilding and called for mob action against it, in some cases alleging a threat to the al-Aqsa Mosque on the originally Jewish Temple Mount [here & here & here].

Here is a series of photos showing the Hurva Synagogue and the Jewish Quarter of the Jerusalem Old City before and after the fighting.

This shot shows a British soldier in a guardposition on a building in the western part of the Jewish Quarter. The position was called "The Kahana Postion." The Armenian Quarter which is just west of the Jewish Quarter is behind the soldier. The major combat did not begin until the British left the Old City 13 May 1948. The Hurva Synagogue stands out in the right center of the photo with its great round dome. The mountain in the east is the Mount of Olives.

A soldier of the Transjordanian Arab Legion stands on a roof in the market in the center of the Old City, near the tower of the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer. The dome of the Hurva synagogue is seen to the south in the background of the photo, apparently shot after the battle for the Jewish Quarter had ended with an Arab victory. Another domed-roof synagogue, the Tif'eret Yisrael [also called Nisan Bek] Synagogue is partly obscured by the Lutheran church tower. This church is in the Christian Quarter in the northwestern corner of the Old City, the Jewish Quarter lies to the south-southeast. The Hurvah Synagogue would shortly be blown up by the British-officered Arab Legion.

The Tif'eret Yisrael [Nisan Bek] Synagogue which was hit in the battle before being blown up by the Arab Legion. A legionnaire stands on a pile of rubble outside the synagogue.

This shot shows the Jewish Quarter in flames on 25 May 1948, with the destruction of some of the synagogues and yeshivot [academies for study of the Bible and Talmud] by the Arab Legion, Sir John Bagot Glubb commander. Smoke and flames are visible. Note on the left of the photo the still standing walls of a public building --perhaps the Porat Yosef Yeshiva-- with flames inside and apparently without a roof.

Top photo: The Jewish Quarter in flames
Bottom: The Jewish Quarter in ruins [photo taken by the Arab Legion, Sir John Bagot Glubb commander]

These photos were taken from the book The Battle for Jerusalem in the War of Independence by `Ovad Mikhaeli [Jerusalem: Ariel Publishers n.d. (circa 1995?) in Hebrew. Hebrew title:
הקרב על ירושלים במלחמת העצמאות]
Here are two powerpoint presentations on the restored synagogue: [here & here]
Here is an informed blogger's account of the fall of the Jewish Quarter [here]
Our previous blog post here gives a brief account of the Hurva.

Hilary Clinton's Little Lie in Her Speech to AIPAC

UPDATED/REVISED 3-23-2010

Hilary Clinton's tone in her speech to AIPAC today was rather mild compared to the hysterical attacks on Israel made by her, Biden and Axelrod in the past two weeks. But the substance was not much improved and indeed the speech was replete with lies of various sorts. Here is one lie that she made in order to protect the would-be Nazi murderers of Fatah and the Palestinian Authority, that includes the notorious "moderate," Abu Mazen [Mahmud Abbas]. She was blatantly lying. Here is her blatant pro-Fatah lie:

When a Hamas-controlled municipality glorifies violence and renames a square after a terrorist who murdered innocent Israelis, it insults the families on both sides who have lost loves ones in this conflict. And when instigators deliberately mischaracterize the rededication of a synagogue in the Jewish quarter of Jerusalem’s old city and call upon their brethren to “defend” nearby Muslim holy sites from so-called “attacks,” it is purely and simply an act of incitement. These provocations are wrong and must be condemned for needlessly inflaming tensions and imperiling prospects for a comprehensive peace. [full text here]

First, the smaller problem in this passage is not a direct lie but an evasion. She refuses to mention the American citizen murdered in the attack, who happened to be the niece of a US Senator, like Hilary herself. Secondly, the big problem here is that it was Fatah --not Hamas in Gaza-- that named a square in Ramallah after Dalal Mughrabi, the murderess who led a Fatah death squad to slaughter 38 Jews in Israel 30 years ago in 1978 [here]. So Hilary obviously lied, probably to protect Fatah's undeserved "moderate" reputation. Jennifer Rubin rightly pointed out this lie on the Commentary blog but she didn't call it a lie. Maybe she doesn't want to use such strong language against the US secretary of state. In other words, the very gifted Ms Rubin was protecting the guilty. But her post on this is still worth reading. Now here's the Jerusalem Post on the event in Ramallah:

Fatah holds ceremony naming square after terrorist
By KHALED ABU TOAMEH
15/03/2010 06:33

Move comes despite PA announcement it had postponed inauguration of square named after Dalal Mughrabi, who led 1978 Coastal Road massacre in which 37 Israeli were killed announcement it had postponed inauguration of square named after Dalal Mughrabi, who led 1978 Coastal Road massacre in which 37 Israeli were killed.

Despite the Palestinian Authority’s announcement that it had postponed the inauguration of a square in el-Bireh named after Dalal Mughrabi, the Fatah woman who led the 1978 Coastal Road massacre in which 37 Israeli civilians and an American photographer were killed, and 71 were wounded, Fatah officials on Thursday evening went ahead with the ceremony.

In addition, the PA on Sunday launched a seminar named after Mughrabi. The four-day seminar, called “Martyr Dalal Mughrabi Camp,” is being held in Jericho under the auspices of the PA’s Military Science Academy. Its main goal is to discuss the legislative and local elections in the PA territories. . . . [JPost 3-15-2010]

The third flaw in Hilary's remarks quoted above is that she also mentioned the Arab-Muslim hate agitation over the rededication of the Hurva Synagogue [first built in 1700] but not who was doing the hate agitation. The "instigators" whom she mentioned as misrepresenting the rededication were both Hamas and Fatah [here & here & here]. But on this matter she did not name either terrorist group, no doubt to protect the guilty. The Hurva Synagogue was first built ca. 1700, destroyed by Arab creditors of the Ashkenazic Jewish congregation in 1720, rebuilt starting in 1857, finished in 1864, and blown up by the British-officered Arab Legion of Transjordan [Sir John Bagot Glubb commander] in May 1948 after the Arab Legion had conquered the Old City and driven the Jews out of the Jewish Quarter. The present structure is faithful to the one finished in 1864.
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Clarification: The square named after the terrorist Dalal Mughrabi is actually in el-Bireh [see the Jerusalem Post article by Khalil Abu Toameh above. Most reports have placed the location in Ramallah. In fact, el-Bireh [al-Birah] is a town next to Ramallah. Because of urban sprawl, an observer today cannot tell he has left one municipality for the next. They run one into the other. El-Bireh, like Ramallah, is fairly prosperous. But whereas Ramallah was historically a Christian village populated by four clans, often at odds with each other, el-Bireh was historically Muslim. Its city council is dominated by Hamas. But Fatah men were eager to dedicate the square to one of their own, the murderess Mughrabi. Today, the population of the country as a whole, including these two towns, is much much greater than 100 or even 50 years ago. Moreover, today Ramallah too has an overwhelimingly Muslim population though some Christians remain there. The presence of so many journalists and other foreign representatives, NGO agents, and other foreigners provides much of the prosperity for the two towns, now economically one.
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An Arab, pro-Palestinian Authority website celebrates the event [here]
Here is our previous post on the insult to the United States inherent in the renaming and the naming ceremony [here]
Israel Matzav [here]
3-24-2010 Leading Palestinian Authority and Fatah officials praise the murderess, even calling her a "victim" [here]

Clinton & Axelrod See "insult," "affront" to United States in Israel's Decision to build homes, but no Insult by Arabs Honoring Murderess of American

Hilary Clinton claims that Israel's announcement of building housing for Jews in Jerusalem is "insulting" to the United States. White House flunkey David Axelrod called it an "affront" to the United States. Just parenthetically, it's always nice to see a stalwart old "leftist" like Axelrod worry about the honor of the United States.

Hilary said:

"But we have to make clear to our Israeli friends and partners that the two-state solution -- which we support, which the prime minister himself says he supports -- requires confidence-building measures on both sides," Clinton told CNN's Jill Dougherty. "And the announcement of the settlements the very day that the vice president was there was insulting." [CNN here]

Of course, she would never ask whether the "two-state solution" would really bring peace, or whether it would be any more than a second Final Solution. Nor does she mention any "confidence building measures" demanded of the Palestinian Arab side. But there may have been one, albeit not very significant. And here Clinton missed what was clearly an insult to the United States. The Palestinian Authority was supposed to hold a ceremony while Biden was in Israel that was to honor an Arab terrorist who led a mass murder gang that slaughtered 38 Jews. They were to honor her --yes, a fine specimen of Arab-Muslim womanhood-- Dalal Mughrabi who led the notorious Coastal Road massacre of 1978. Because of Biden's presence in the country, the PA postponed the honoring ceremony until after Biden left, that is, for a few hours. That could be called a "confidence building measure." The honor was to dedicate the main square of Ramallah, the Palestinian Authority capital, to Miss Mughrabi.

Now where does American honor come into this? The first Jew that Mughrabi and her terrorists murdered in their paroxysmic cavalcade of mass murder, was an American citizen, Gail Rubin. Miss Rubin, a renowned nature photographer, was --just coincidentally-- the niece of a Democratic United States senator, Senator Abraham [Abe] Ribicoff. Curiously, American honor does not enter into the equation when the American victim is a Jew, not even the niece of US senator who belonged to Clinton and Obama's own Democratic Party.

White House Flunkey Axelrod said that "what happened was an affront, was an insult." He said this after kapo Jake Tapper of ABC News fed him some questions that Axelrod himself had probably supplied to Tapper. Anyhow, Tapper lied by calling the neighborhood in question "an Arab" area or neighborhood. The existing houses of Ramat Shlomo probably reach to about 1/2 kilometer on the west from the large, prosperous Arab houses of the Shu`afat neighborhood [doubters can come look and see for themselves]. However, I think that the planned new housing is to be built to the west and/or north of present Ramat Shlomo houses. But if Axelrod, Clinton and Tapper don't want Jews to live near Arabs, then that means they want apartheid to be enforced against Jews. Of course, the Palestinian Authority wants that.

Our main point is that American honor is insulted --as Obama, Clinton, and Axelrod define it-- when Jews build houses where the State Dept and Arab advocates of apartheid don't want Jews to live. In other words, when Jews get out of their place, when Jews rise above their station. The fact that the Palestinian Authority [basically run by Fatah] honors a murderess of an American woman does not dishonor the United States, not even when that victim was the niece of a US senator who happened to belong to the Democratic Party of Obama and Clinton. After all, the victim, Gail Rubin, and her uncle, Sen. Ribicoff, were Jews.

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The Elastic Honor of the United States, according to Obama, Clinton & Axelrod
Honors for Dalal Mughrabi by Palestinian Authority long before the square in Ramallah was named for her [here]
Other comments on this affair [here] & [here]&[here]&[here]
Unfortunately, the commentaries that I link to do not mention the connection with Senator Ribicoff.
Sultan Knish [here]
PLO Arabs draw encouragement from Obama gang's excoriation of Israel and incite their masses to violence, "protesting" against rebuilding and rededicating an old synagogue in the Old City, first built in 1700, that the Arab Legion blew up in the summer of 1948 [here]
The Arab League responds to the Obama gang's attacks on Israel but tentatively on account of uncertainty about what he wants [here]

Joe Biden Blames Israel for future attacks on American troops -- Yet plays up to Syria, the major facilitator of terrorism in Iraq

UPDATING 3-15 & 24 & 4-1-2010 at bottom

Anti-Zionism is the anti-imperialism of fools

In a typical hypocritical or know-nothing outburst, US Vice President Joe Biden blamed Israel for future jihadist attacks on American troops because of Jerusalem housing plans. Yet the Obama administration plays up to Syria which has been actively facilitating the entry of jihadist terrorists from throughout the Arab world into Iraq for seven years. Here is Biden:

But in closed conversations, Joe Biden took an entirely different tone. . . .

People who heard what Biden said were stunned. “This is starting to get dangerous for us,” Biden castigated his interlocutors [Netanyahu & other Israelis]. “What you’re doing here undermines the security of our troops who are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. That endangers us and it endangers regional peace.”
[quoted by Laura Rozen on Politico]

Syria actively trains and dispatches terrorists going into Iraq to kill American troops and fellow Arabs. But Syria is OK. Syria has been allowed by the United States to take over Lebanon using its terrorist proxies, the Hizbullah, but Syria is OK. No harsh words for Syria that actively endangers American troops in Iraq. But harsh words for Israel that is trying to provide housing for the Israeli population. Now if the Arabs are so bigoted about Jews exercising their human rights, then maybe Obama and Biden ought to take them to task for that.

Furthermore, blaming Jews for future war was a trick that Hitler used, blaming the Jews in advance for bringing about a future world war when he himself was planning what became the world's most lethal war, with more dead than any previous war.

Biden went on:

The vice president told his Israeli hosts that since many people in the Muslim world perceived a connection between Israel’s actions and US policy, any decision about construction that undermines Palestinian rights in East Jerusalem could have an impact on the personal safety of American troops fighting against Islamic terrorism. [quoted by Laura Rozen on Politico ]

So the human rights of Israeli Jews depend on whether prejudiced, bigoted Arabs are bothered by the Jews' exercise of those rights. In fact, neither the PLO/Palestinian Authority nor the Arab League made a halt of Jewish housing construction anywhere a condition for negotiations, until Obama's administration demanded that Israel stop building housing for Jews. But neither the PLO/PA nor the Arab League could afford to be "less Arab" than the president of the United States, so the Arabs followed suit after Obama & Co. So the Obama administration and State Dept are promoting the denial of Jewish human rights in practice. Actually several Arab governments are bothered more by Obama's inaction on the Iranian bomb project --and the concealment of --misrepresentation of-- Arab fear and opposition to the Iranian bomb, than they are by Jewish construction in Jerusalem. What Obama, Biden, H Clinton and the State Dept are doing is using the Arabs' presumed sentiments and prejudices as a tool or pretext for pressuring Israel to give up Jewish rights. Truly a sinister policy in line with that of the Euro Nazis [see our previous post].

Here's more Biden:

Beyond his desire to allay Israel’s fears about the Iranian nuclear threat, Biden asked the Israeli decision-makers to show the same degree of understanding and sensitivity to the United States’ interests in the Middle East and the military campaign that it is currently waging against radical Islamic agents in Afghanistan and Pakistan. [here]

How about Biden showing "understanding and sensitivity" for Jewish human rights?

Washington is getting itself into a very ugly and repulsive mood that they justify by fake concern for American troops fighting Islamic terrorists. Where was and is Washington's concern over Syrian help for the terrorists operating in Iraq since 2003?? When did any US official ever vehemently denounce Syria, using strong words like "condemn," for facilitating the mass murderous terrorism in Iraq?? Of course, there may have been some powder puff words of mild indignation about Syria from time to time, which told the Assad gang that the United States government was really not very upset with them. But neither Obama and his crew nor George Bush II and his crew ever said anything to compare with the word "condemn" now used for Jews building homes in Jerusalem.

The Obama administration is an enemy of Jewish human and civil rights. Decent Jews will stand up against the Obama policy of anti-Jewish racism. David Axelrod and Rahm Emanuel are kapos.

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Jennifer Rubin on Beiden & the White House's outburst [here] & [here] & on AIPAC's criticism of Obama [here]
3-15-2010 Barry Rubin on how the UN too indulges Syria and its friends [here].
Noah Pollak on Appalling Obamanoid hypocrisy [here]
US State Dept twists Ambassador Oren's arm [sounds like imperialism to me, indeed an ultimatum. Do you call that a friend?] [here]
Ambassador Dore Gold on Israeli military & intelligence aid to the USA [here]
4-1-2010 Michael Totten on Syria's motives for dispatching terrorists into Iraq [here]

Europe Promotes Apartheid in Jerusalem

"The negro . . . had no rights which the white man was bound to respect"
[Dred Scott v. Sandford, US Supreme
Court decision, 1857]

We are living in the era of total war, mass murder and the Big Lie. The last named facilitates the first two. The currently fashionable Big Lie is that Israel is an "apartheid state." It seems that apartheid has become a smear word for one's enemies that no longer has a specific, objective meaning. What it meant in South Africa is far from Israel's reality. But the Israelophobes don't care. At the same time, ironically, countries where this Big Lie is commonly propagated actually advocate, even demand, apartheid in Israel, particularly in Jerusalem, a city which has had a Jewish majority since the mid-19th century, although Arab irregular forces starting in December 1947, later joined by Transjordan's Arab Legion, ethnically cleansed Jewish neighborhoods in what became "East Jerusalem" under Arab rule. Jews were forbidden by Jordanian law [Transjordan changed its name to Jordan circa 1950] to live anywhere under Jordanian rule, including formerly Jewish neighborhoods of Hebron and "East Jerusalem" plus a number of farming settlements such as in the Gush Etsion area, `Atarot and Neveh Ya`aqov in northeastern Jerusalem, etc.

European Union member states with representations in Jerusalem actually work to promote apartheid between Jewish and Arab Jerusalemites. According to EU rules, the national day celebrations and festivities held by the consulates of these states in Jerusalem must comprise separate receptions for Jews and Arabs. Teddy Kollek protested against this policy repeatedly when he was mayor, to no avail. The Euros insisted on apartheid.

Moreover, in order to promote Arab nationalism and Islamic interests, the EU wants to divide Jerusalem, where, as said above, Jews have been the majority since the mid-19th century, since 1853 at least. The EU went so far as to sponsor a "concert" for youth with the Irish singer, Sinead O'Connor, circa 1997, that was to call for division of the city. Fortunately, this racist "concert" did not take place because not enough tickets were sold.

Kollek protested this European practice of apartheid in the way that he thought most practicable. He boycotted national day celebrations by the Euro govts that practiced this racist policy.
This use of the "apartheid" label by those, both Arabs and Westerners, that in fact want to impose apartheid on Israeli Jews, is another sign of the Orwellian character of our times. Here is one report on Kollek's policy:

Jerusalem Mayor Teddy Kollek's office announced today that Kollek is planning to boycott next week's Bastille Day celebration sponsored by the French Consulate here to protest the longstanding diplomatic practice of holding separate social receptions for Arabs and Jews.

The policy of separate receptions is one of several western diplomatic practices Israelis contend deny the reality that Jerusalem is Israel's capital and, since 1967, has been united under its rule. But many Palestinians argue that to hold only one reception in the Jewish part of the city, where most of the consulates have their main offices, would amount to tacit recognition of Israel's 1967 annexation of their sector. [Washington Post, July 7, 1987][see here]

Now the EU govts as well as the US State Department, demand that Jews not be allowed to live in what was "East Jerusalem" for 19 years, not even on Jewish-owned real estate. Those were 19 years of exclusion of Jews, of refusal to allow Jews access to Jewish holy places, of taking Jewish tombstones from the Mount of Olives and using them to pave a path to a Jordanian army latrine, etc. The govts now members of the EU never complained about Jordanian abuse of Jewish tombstones in that demeaning way. But now they echo all sorts of bizarre Arab complaints. This is most repugnant when coming from the British who facilitated the Arab expulsion of Jews from Jerusalem neighborhoods in the period of civil war in the country initiated by the Arabs shortly after the UN General Asssembly recommended partitioning the Land of Israel ["palestine"] into a Jewish state, an Arab state, and an internationally governed enclave in and around Jerusalem [also meant to include Bethlehem, Beyt Sahur, and Beyt Jala]. Now Britain and the other Euro friends of Arab fascism deny the Jews the right to return to places whence Jews were expelled in the period from 30 November 1947 up to the first truce in June 1948. That is, according to the EU and the US State Dept, Jews don't have the right to come back to Jewish-owned real estate. Jews today are in the position of the American Blacks according to the notorious Dred Scott decision of the US Supreme Court:

"The negro . . . had no rights which the white man was bound to respect"

Just change "negro" to Jew and change "white man" to Arab or Westerner --or both together-- and you have the situation today.

Fiamma Nirenstein, a member of the Italian Chamber of Deputies, formerly an Italian journalist stationed in Jerusalem, wrote on the "apartheid" Big Lie. I intend to translate the article in full or nearly so. Here are excerpts from it:

Apartheid Week against Israel . . . is one of the most intellectually repugnant events ever conceived. . .
In Israel everything is in contrast [with South African apartheid]: Each and every institution is multiethnic and multireligious. Racist theories and racial discrimination are forbidden by law; in the hospitals Arab and Jewish women give birth in beds side by side, cared for by Arab and Jewish staff, children and patients in general come from throughout the Arab world to be treated. They are welcomed with love. At the university, the Arab and Jewish students study together and also Arab professors, sometimes very aggressive towards Zionism, teach with Jews and to Jews, while Arab books of every kind are translated. Arab citizens sit in the Knesset, Israel's parliament, and in the government [the cabinet]. They raise their dissent (always!) without fear that someone is lying in wait for them to punish them, the only Arabs in the Middle East [to have that freedom of expression]. [Il Giornale, 7 March 2010]

I should add that there is an Arab judge on the Supreme Court, and Arabs have highly responsible positions in other public and state institutions. Further, about our hospitals, my wife went to the eye clinic at the Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus yesterday. She told me that half or more of the patients waiting there were Arabs. While waiting her turn, she had a pleasant conversation there with two other patients. One was an Arabic-speaking Christian young woman, from Nazareth, who was studying in a course in Jerusalem to become a radiology technician. The other was an Armenian young man living in the Old City.

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Also see:
Two earlier posts on Emet m'Tsiyon for photos of reality in Israel [here & here].

Seth Frantzman on EU funding of Arab and Palestinian Authority bodies that work to undermine Israeli society and besmirch Israel's image around the world.

Soft Euro colonialism, high handed Euro arrogance in Israel [here]. This EU statement against Jewish housing in formerly Jordanian-occupied parts of Jerusalem is a racist, pro-apartheid declaration. It speaks in the name of law, international law, using false representations, misrepresentations, of international law, in order to impose on Jews in the Land of Israel the same territorial segregation of Jews and disregard for Jewish property rights that prevailed for centuries both in Europe and the Arab lands [conquered by Arab invaders in the 7th and 8th centuries], both in Christendom and the Islamic domain. The Euro fakers use "human rights" rhetoric and slogans to promote apartheid against Jews, as NGOs funded by the EU slander Israel as an "apartheid state."
Catherine Ashton, an uppity British upper cruster, elected foreign affairs commissioner of the EU, had this to say about Jewish residential rights in Jerusalem, a city made important to the world by and through Jewish history where Jews have been the majority since the mid-19th century:

Ashton condemned Israel's plan to expand a Jewish neighborhood in disputed east Jerusalem, saying it should reverse the decision and "refrain from unilateral decisions and actions that may jeopardize the final status negotiations."

"The EU reiterates that settlements are illegal under international law," Ashton said in a statement. "They undermine current efforts for restarting peace negotiations ... and threaten to make a two-state solution impossible."
[Jerusalem Post, 10 March 2010]

Ashton and other EU Judeophobes & imperialists misrepresent international law with the claim that building homes for Jews in Jerusalem is "illegal under international law."
For Ashton's ilk, "law" and "international law" are only useful for bashing states that they don't like. When Iran violates the UN Charter [Article 2, clause 4] by threatening war against Israel and threatening to destroy Israel, that does not especially bother her if at all. The constant hate-Israel, hate-Jews agitprop coming out of Arab states, as well as from the Palestinian Authority and Hamas-ruled Gaza does not bother her. She may well agree with much of it. Indeed, one of Ashton's British upper crusty sisters, Baroness Jenny Tonge who sits in the House of Lords, claimed that Israel's medical mission to Haiti to aid earthquake victims was stealing organs from patients for resale [medically impossible, since organs for transplant cannot be shipped around like a commodity].
3-17-2010 Emmanuele Ottolenghi analyzes Catherine Ashton's Cairo speech. Ottolenghi informs his readers that Ashton is a "lady," specifically Lady Ashton [here]. I call her a Euro bitch. When it comes to Europe's new Nazis in "liberal" anti-imperialist garb, I am not a gentleman.

Brit Elite Rag -- The Financial Times -- Assaults Israel Again

UPDATING 3-4-2010 at bottom

Anti-Zionism is the anti-imperialism of fools

Martin Peretz, editor of the New Republic, has done another expert job of highlighting the Israelophobia [Judeophobia] of the British elite daily, the Financial Times. Recall that the FT is not a "leftist" paper. It is solidly pro-capitalist. Hence, Israelophobia or anti-Zionism, the up to date form of Judeophobia, is not limited to "leftists" or socialists. It is a mental disease cutting across class lines and supposed ideological divisions. Emet m'Tsiyon has featured the FT's anti-Zionism before [here]. Martin Peretz' latest response to FT agitprop is here. Some excerpts follow:

Hardly a day goes by that the Financial Times doesn’t do a hit job on Israel. The otherwise sober pink sheet has such an obsession with the Jewish state that I’ve come to wonder what its views were on the rescue of Jewish children into England during the Nazi onslaught on them and on their parents.
. . . . .
The paper simply refuses to name Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. But it’s much worse than that. The Financial Times writes about the “government in Tel Aviv.’ This is not just weird. It is a lie. The FT wants to rewrite the history of the Middle East. If it can’t tell the truth about a simple geographical fact, on what, pray tell, can it be trusted?

Let's put that claim that Israel's capital is Tel Aviv in historical context. It was a regular feature of Soviet and Communist anti-Israel agitprop before the fall of the Soviet Union. Now, this pretense is employed by the --shall we say it again?-- capitalist Financial Times.

Right now the FT is screeching at Israel for the assassination of top Hamas murderer and operative, Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, in Dubai, which quite plausibly may have been carried out by Israel's Mossad spy agency. Maybe the FT regrets that there is one less top Hamas operative running around the Middle East, working to perpetrate mass murder against Jews. Anyhow, in order to properly chastise Israel for --presumably-- killing him, the FT minimizes his importance. It describes him as a mere "Hamas gun-runner." Well, if he was not so important, then why is the FT so upset? Mass murder goes in the Middle East almost every day. In Iraq, dozens of non-combatant civilians are slaughtered regularly. Those murders do not evoke as much gall and spleen from the FT --if any-- as does the assassination of one leader of Hamas whom that Iranian-sponsored mass murder organization officially mourned. Peretz comments:

. . . the FT has dismissed his [al-Mabhouh's] importance by calling him “a Hamas gun-runner in Dubai.” This is so far from the truth that it is actually laughable. He was a murderer, a certified murderer, and is an official of the far-flung Hamas movement, which specializes in the murder of Israelis. He is more than a gun-runner. But even gun- running for Hamas, recipient of military hardware from Iran and Syria, cannot be seen with indifference by Jerusalem.
http://www.tnr.com/print/blog/the-spine/another-hit-job-the-financial-times

Just to clarify the situation. Dubai is officially in a state of war with Israel as part of the United Arab Emirates. The UAE has been in a state of war with Israel since it became a state. The Hamas is not only in a state of war with Israel but openly proclaims the desirability of murdering all Jews. It does this in Article 7 of its charter. The Hamas TV in Gaza constantly brainwashes its population, starting with small children, with reasons for slaughtering Jews and for continuing war against the Jews until Israel and the Jews are destroyed. There is no possibility that any Hamas official could be extradited from Dubai to be put on trial in Israel or from elsewhere in the UAE or from Syria where Hamas has its headquarters or from any Arab state, be it the most "moderate" Arab state of all. Obviously, in a state of war the rules applying in relations between countries at peace do not apply.

The United Kingdom can rightly be seen as the most dangerous center in the world for anti-Israel agitprop. There must be a reason why British NGOs lead in smearing Israel for alleged "human rights" violations, why the movement to boycott Israeli universities is centered in Britain, why Muslim fanatics are allowed to preach murder of Jews [and all non-Muslims] in British mosques and to demonstrate publicly calling to "behead those who insult Islam", without being charged with sedition. Moreover, we may ask why terrorists who placed bombs on the Paris subway, the Metro, in the mid-1990s were taking directions from leaders based in -- London. It was French investigators who dubbed the British capital -- Londonistan. Why?

If there really is such a thing as an Israeli-Arab "peace process," then an expression of regret by the British government for the British government's role in the Holocaust from 1939 to 1945 would be helpful. Surely, the UK government should not be allowed to take part in any supposed "peace process" without an admission of guilt for the British government's past pro-Holocaust policies and without an expression of deep regret.

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UPDATING 3-4-2010 Martin Peretz updates the story of FT's mourning over the death of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. He links to an excellent article by British historian Andrew Roberts that puts the whole subject into a truthful, historical and contemporary perspective [here]. Apparently, even in Britain, a land so much of which is benighted, voices of outrage over the mad attacks on Israel in the FT were such as to lead the FT to publish Roberts' rebuttal of the anti-Israel fanatics.