In Context

By

Lynn B.

on November 19, 2012 3:33 PM | Permalink

In a truly nauseating segment this morning, filled with much dithering and hand wringing over the suffering of the people of Gaza, CNN's Carol Costello announced opined:

Gaza has basically been under siege by Israel for the past several years. Israel controls the goods that come in to Gaza, come out of Gaza. So, I'm just curious, where does Hamas get most of its weapons?

Is she kidding?  Does Carol Costello know what a siege is?  Apparently not. 

Here is a typical monthly report from Israel's COGAT (Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories), summarizing its civil and humanitarian activity in the Gaza Strip for January, 2011.  These detailed reports go back to early 2009 and beyond.  Does that sound like a "siege?"

Does this sound like a siege?

18 Nov 2012

Israel is making a major effort to maintain the fabric of civilian life in Gaza, despite the situation of current hostilities.

Crossings

1. Israel is making a major effort to maintain the fabric of civilian life
in Gaza, despite the situation of current hostilities. The IDF today (18
Nov) opened the Keren Shalom crossing for movement of food, medicine and
other goods from Israel despite the ongoing rocket attacks on the Israeli
population and previous attacks on the crossing.

2. The Erez crossing was open today, as on every other day of Operation
Pillar of Defense. Seventy foreign journalists entered Gaza today by way of
Erez. Twenty Gazans entered Israel for medical treatment, and twenty-three
foreign nationals, representing NGOs who until now had been prevented by
Hamas from leaving the Gaza Strip, departed.

Food and Housing Security

1. Gaza is not experiencing food scarcity. Israel is not blocking entrance
of goods into Gaza, except for weaponry and dual-use materials. Construction
materials can be imported to Gaza under the supervision of international
organizations.

2. Israel is continuing the yearly supply of five million cubic meters
(1,320,860,250 gallons) of water to Gaza, despite the rocket attacks on
Israeli cities and towns.

3. UNRWA (UN Relief and Works Agency) reports (17 Nov 2012) that despite
some displacement of families due to hostilities, "there hasn't been any
need to provide emergency humanitarian assistance or to open UNRWA
facilities as emergency shelters."


Medical Care

1. Between January-October 2012, approximately 14,500 patients and their
accompanying chaperones entered Israel from Gaza for medical treatment. 99%
of the medical requests by Palestinian residents of Gaza were approved by
Israel.

2. The World Health Organization has reported a ten-day slowdown in referral
process for Gaza patients due to disagreements between the Ramallah and Gaza
Health Ministries.

3. Gaza hospitals are currently operating at 80% capacity (17 Nov), slightly
higher than routine periods.

4. Israel is not blocking entrance of medical supplies into Gaza. Requests
submitted by the international community are answered within 24-72 hours of
submission, almost always positively, and Israel has opened the Kerem Shalom
passage for transit of medical materials and other goods, despite the danger
to personnel at the crossing.

5. At present, there is a shortage of some medical supplies in Gaza due to
disagreements between Hamas and the PA, and budgetary difficulties of the
Palestinian Authority.

6. UNRWA reports that all of its 21 health centers are open and functioning.
Of UNRWA's 12,000 staff members in Gaza, only one person has sustained
injuries in the hostilities, and those are minor.


Electricity

1. Israel is supplying 125 megawatts of electricity to the Gaza Strip from
the power station in Ashkelon despite the rocket attacks on Israel's
population, and on Ashkelon itself.

2. Gaza continues to suffer from power outages due to a deliberate policy of
Hamas, which opposes import of fuel from Israel. As a result, the Gaza power
station is operating at 20% capacity.

Last but certainly not least, let's not forget Gaza's open border with Egypt, now controlled by a Hamas ally, over which Israel has no control whatsoever.  That is, of course,  the all too obvious answer to Ms. Costello's clueless question.

The "news" according to CNN (and other media outlets) is sounding more and more these day like a mere regurgitation of terrorist talking points.

By

Lynn B.

on September 27, 2012 4:52 PM | Permalink

Early this afternoon, Mahmoud Abbas gave a vicious, defamatory speech at the United Nations General Assembly, loaded with lies, false accusations and vitriol.  It was, in fact, among the nastiest, least conciliatory speeches Abbas has ever made (for Western consumption, anyway).  And it did not include any expression whatsoever of sensitivity to Jewish claims to the Land of Israel.

Wait.  Why should that be surprising?

This past Monday, ten "Jewish leaders" met with Mahmoud Abbas in New York and tried to give away the store.  The original Ha'aretz story is now locked behind its pay wall but is well summarized in this article at The Times of Israel (among other places).

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has reportedly demonstrated a willingness to restart talks with Israel, telling Jewish leaders that his UN speech on Thursday would include a greater display of sensitivity to Jewish claims to Israel.

And yet, shockingly, it did not.

Meeting Monday evening with about 10 Jewish leaders, Abbas endorsed Alan Dershowitz's formula for returning to talks with Israel, participants said.

The meeting was held under the auspices of the Center for Middle East Peace. Top Jewish organizational leaders declined attendance, reportedly at the request of the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has discouraged Jewish meetings with Abbas until the Palestinians leader gives up demanding a settlement freeze as a precondition for returning to talks.

So who are these ten "leaders?" Who do they speak for?  Why did they find it appropriate to snub the Israeli Prime Minister's admonition and undercut his government's declared policies and what, exactly, is the "Dershowitz formula?"  Are they embarrassed to have been so badly pwned (internet slang: to be taken in, played, hoodwinked, bamboozled)?

The Times reports:

Among those in attendance were Dershowitz, the Harvard legal scholar and a leading defender of Israel; Robert Wexler, the CMEP director and a top Jewish surrogate for President Obama; and Peter Joseph, who heads the Israel Policy Forum.

So that gives us a hint as to who they speak for and why they chose to attend the meeting. But the kicker is that the formula this group proposed requires a settlement freeze, not exactly as a "precondition," but as a necessary quid pro quo for returning to talks (a distinction without a significant difference).

Here's a summary of the "Dershowitz formula," according to the Ha'aretz article,

[t]he formula states that "Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should now offer a conditional freeze: Israel will stop all settlement building in the West Bank as soon as the Palestinian Authority sits down at the bargaining table, and the freeze will continue as long as the talks continue in good faith."

The details are spelled out in this earlier Ha'aretz article (still publicly available at this time).  In a nutshell, though, it proposes that Israel should offer Abbas an indefinite freeze on Jewish construction in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria as long as he can keep up the pretense of talking.  Having reportedly won Abbas over, Dershowitz allegedly (again according to Ha'aretz) said he would try to sell the idea to Bibi this week.  Bibi has already made his position crystal clear on settlement freezes and preconditions, in whatever guise, so good luck with that.

Meanwhile, so far no response by the ten fools to Abbas's betrayal.  You can bet he'll be laughing all the way back to Ramallah.

By

Lynn B.

on September 24, 2012 11:21 PM | Permalink

The Sunday edition of DG's Mideast Media Sampler (an indispensible resource that I can't recommend highly enough) analyzed several serious flaws in Robert Mackey's obnoxiously opportunistic manipulation of the uproar over Mitt Romney's extremely reasonable assessment of the Middle East "peace process" at that over-publicized fundraiser last spring in Boca Raton.  (Yes, that sentence is unwieldy to say the least but I need to move on ...).  The serious flaws being too numerous to count, however, here's yet another.

Mackey sez:

Mr. Romney's frank remarks, which undercut even Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's public endorsement of "a solution of two states for two peoples: a Palestinian state alongside the Jewish state," seemed to break from decades of official American foreign policy. Since before the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993, Republican and Democratic presidents have thrown their weight behind the effort to secure Israel's future as a democratic state with a Jewish majority by creating a second state for up 2.5 million Palestinians who have lived under Israeli military rule for more than four decades.

"Decades of official American foreign policy?"  For those of us who were sentient and paying attention "before the Oslo Accords," that sort of reeked of wrongness.  So I took a look.

The very first Democratic Party Platform to advocate palestinian statehood was that of the 2004 convention, and it was equivocal.

We support the creation of a democratic Palestinian state dedicated to living in peace and security side by side with the Jewish State of Israel. The creation of a Palestinian state should resolve the issue of Palestinian refugees by allowing them to settle there, rather than in Israel. Furthermore, all understand that it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949. And we understand that all final status negotiations must be mutually agreed.

In 1988, the Republican Party Platform still expressly opposed it.

We believe the establishment of a Palestinian State on the West Bank would be destabilizing and harmful to the peace process.

and didn't mention it again until, also in 2004, for the first time, they offered a highly qualified endorsement.

If Palestinians embrace democracy and the rule of law, confront corruption, and firmly reject terror, they can count on American support for the creation of a Palestinian state.

Ok, the party platform doesn't always reflect administration policy.  But it's common knowledge that G.W. Bush, in his first term (2001-2005), was the first president to explicitly advocate a palestinian state while in office and then both parties' platforms rushed to catch up.  Clinton's presidential endorsement was, at best, implied, and then only ... when?  I think we can trust Glenn Kessler to put the best possible face on it.

By

Lynn B.

on September 13, 2012 2:45 AM | Permalink

From Mitt Romney's press conference yesterday:

ROMNEY: I spoke out when the key fact that I referred to was known, which was that the Embassy of the United States issued what appeared to be an apology for American principles. That was a mistake. And I believe that when a mistake is made of that significance, you speak out.

Regardless of the timeline or what preceded or followed what, isn't that the point?

By

Lynn B.

on September 6, 2012 12:33 PM | Permalink

As Barry Rubin pointed out yesterday before the language about Jerusalem (and about God) was reinserted, the "Middle East" section of the Democrats' platform had two paragraphs about Israel what Obama has done for Israel and only one sentence (given its own paragraph) about all the Middle East countries other than Israel. 

That hasn't changed.  (See more from Prof. Rubin on this important point here.)

Curiously, the reinserted Jerusalem language was added back, not to the paragraphs that address Israel but rather to the end of this one (my emphasis):

Elsewhere in the region, President Obama is committed to maintaining robust security cooperation with Gulf Cooperation Council states and our other partners aimed at deterring aggression, checking Iran's destabilizing activities, ensuring the free flow of commerce essential to the global economy, and building a regional security architecture to counter terrorism, proliferation, ballistic missiles, piracy, and other common threats. Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel. The parties have agreed that Jerusalem is a matter for final status negotiations. It should remain an undivided city accessible to people of all faiths.

At least that's the way it reads right now.  This could well be just another sloppy mistake that will be "fixed" later. 

By

Lynn B.

on September 5, 2012 11:39 PM | Permalink

Too little, too late, too ... badly botched?

Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz on Wednesday denied any "discord" over the Democratic Party's decision to return "God" and "Jerusalem" to the party platform, and said the move "absolutely" received the two-thirds delegate vote required.

"Well, really, it was essentially a technical oversight," Wasserman Schultz, referring to the reversal, said on CNN. "And President Obama, because he personally believes that Jerusalem is and always should remain the capital of Israel, he made sure that we amended the platform to reflect his personal view as well as reflect the language that we had in the platform in 2008."

But after the delegates voted by voice, there was some dispute over whether the amendment passed by two-thirds. Some delegates booed the measure, but Wasserman Schultz denied that there was a rift in the convention hall.

Baloney.  On all counts. 

"Some" delegates booed?  If you haven't already seen it, watch the video.  And the reaction to the video.  Expect to see a lot more of it in the next 61 days.

By

Lynn B.

on September 4, 2012 2:04 AM | Permalink

The Democrats will serve a heaping helping this week of disaster scenarios that would result from a GOP victory in November.  In short, the end of ... just about everything ... "as we know it."

But what about that fabled unshakeable support for Israel that's always been given at least lip service by the Democrats in the past?  Are we seeing the end of that support as we know it?  The Weekly Standard reports that in this year's party platform, it's been watered down beyond recognition.  Judge for yourself:

In the 2008 Democratic party platform, there was this language on Jerusalem, Israel:

Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel. The parties have agreed that Jerusalem is a matter for final status negotiations. It should remain an undivided city accessible to people of all faiths.

This year, however, that language has been removed. Indeed, there is no mention of Jerusalem in the 2012 party platform adopted by Democrats.

Since 1968, with the sole exception of the rather odd platform (more like a manifesto) adopted in 1988, every Democratic party platform has included language similar to that quoted above from 2008.  Note that recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, a point to which every Democratic (or Republican) administration has refused to acquiesce once safely in office, was always explicitly acknowledged.  In fact, the Democratic platforms for the years 1972 through 1984 all included this language as well:

As a symbol of this stand, the U.S. Embassy should be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

And Jimmy Carter's 1980 platform actually contained this statement:

We oppose creation of an independent Palestinian state.

As a very old cigarette ad used to say ... you've come a long way, baby.

And it's not only on the issue of Jerusalem that this plank of the platform has been diluted.  It focuses much more on (you guessed it) Obama and his alleged accomplishments than it does on the relationship between the U.S. and Israel.  In fact, this platform is unique in that it makes no mention of Israel as an "ally" nor of the "special relationship" between our countries.  You have to go back to 1980 to find a platform that doesn't use at least one (usually both) of those terms.

Daniel Pipes has a piece today at NRO entitled "What the 2012 Election Means for Israel" in which he concludes that "[i]f elected, Romney will be staunchly loyal, but Obama's coldness will turn glacial."  I think it's somewhat overwrought in places, but his warnings about the waning support for Israel among Democrats obviously merit consideration.

By

Lynn B.

on August 28, 2012 12:18 PM | Permalink

No surprises here.  After three short paragraphs of actual news reporting the verdict, the Times launches into full denial of its findings, starting with a summary of some of the accolades to Corrie's martyrdom, including this:

Numerous books and documentaries have told of how Ms. Corrie, a 23-year-old student, stood in an orange vest with a bullhorn between a bulldozer and the home of a Palestinian family in March 2003 during the height of the second intifada, or uprising.

But, as the court found, after examining extensive evidence,

d.    The mission of the IDF force on the day of the incident was solely to clear the ground.  This clearing and leveling included leveling the ground and clearing it of brush in order to expose hiding places used by terrorists, who would sneak out from these areas and place explosive devices with the intent of harming IDF soldiers.  There was an urgency to carrying out this mission so that IDF look-outs could observe the area and locate terrorists thereby preventing explosive devices from being buried.  The mission did not include, in any way, the demolition of homes.

So the fact that Corrie might have been standing "between a bulldozer and the home of a Palestinian family" is irrelevant.

What follows is a completely one-sided review of the responses to the court's decision.  Guess which side.

A lawyer representing the state said after the hearing on Tuesday that the driver of the bulldozer did not see Ms. Corrie and could not have.

But at a news conference after the verdict, the Corrie family's lawyer, Hussein Abu Hussein, showed pictures of Ms. Corrie taken that day in 2003, pointing out her bright garb that he said "anyone could have seen."

Yes, that "orange vest" again.  But Corrie's "bright garb," as the verdict makes clear, was also irrelevant, because the bulldozer operator couldn't have seen it.

g.    Based on the evidence presented to me, including the testimony of the
expert for the prosecution, Mr. Osben, I hereby determine that at
approximately 17:00, the decedent stood roughly 15 to 20 meters from the
relevant bulldozer and knelt down.  The bulldozer to which I refer was a
large, clumsy and shielded vehicle of the DR9 model.  The field of view the
bulldozer's operator had inside the bulldozer was limited.  At a certain
point, the bulldozer turned and moved toward the decedent.  The bulldozer
pushed a tall pile of dirt.  With regard to the field of view that the
bulldozer's operator had, the decedent was in the "blind spot".  The
decedent was behind the bulldozer's blade and behind a pile of dirt and
therefore the bulldozer's operator could not have seen her.

The Times wanders through laments and promises of appeals by the Corrie family and its supporters, including a representative from Human Rights Watch.  And it concludes with a quote from an anti-Israel protester, part of a small crowd demonstrating outside the courtroom.  All of which leaves the reader with almost no information as to what the verdict actually said and what evidence it was based on.  For that, you can read the English translation of the court's ruling here.

Update (Aug 29 at 11:46AM): The New York Times has substantially revised its story on the Corrie verdict, eliminating the comments of HRW rep Bill Van Esveld and protester Uri Gordon and adding comments by Mark Regev and by Victoria Nuland as well as some nonsensical babbling by Hanan Ashrawi.  To their credit, the Times also added this paragraph:

By

Lynn B.

on August 15, 2012 11:00 AM | Permalink

The Sacramento City Council voted unanimously Tuesday night to name Ashkelon, Israel, a sister city.

Most of those in a packed City Council chambers stood and applauded following the vote. The council decision followed an hour of impassioned - but mostly civil - testimony from supporters and opponents.

Thus ended the latest attempt by the anti-Israel Boycotts Divestment and Sanctions movement to push its junk into yet another corner of civil society.  Note: the vote against them was unanimous.

Interesting background information on the Sacramento-Ashkelon sister city debate and the BDS attempt to rewrite history here and here.

By

Lynn B.

on August 5, 2012 10:52 PM | Permalink

Without the wisdom and insight of Barry Rubin, we'd be much deeper in the dark.  Without his spirit and conviction, we'd be struggling much harder to discern the truth about many of the things that have been going on in the Middle East in recent years.  Let's hope and pray that this light isn't extinguished any time soon.

Please read:
Why I've Always Written So Much with Such Intensity ... And Why I Won't Stop Now

UNDERSTANDING THE GOLDSTONE REPORT

IS IT PEACE YET???