The Covenant of the Islamic Resistance Movement

by MEMRI

The Covenant of the Islamic Resistance Movement – Hamas: From the MEMRI Archives

In view of the recent reconciliation between Fatah and the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), and efforts to restart Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, MEMRI is republishing its translation of the Hamas covenant. [1]

For more from the MEMRI Palestinian Media Studies Project, visit http://www.memri.org/palestinianmediastudies.

In the name of Allah the Merciful and the Compassionate

Palestine, Muharram 1, 1409 A.H./August 18, 1988

In the name of Allah the Merciful and the Compassionate

"You are the best nation that has been brought out for mankind. You command good and forbid evil and believe in Allah. If only the people of the Book [i.e., Jews and Christians] had believed, it would have been well for them. Some of them believe, but most of them are iniquitous. They will never be able to do you serious harm, they will only be an annoyance. If they fight you, they will turn their backs and flee, and will not be succored. Humiliation is their lot wherever they may be, except where they are saved from it by a bond with Allah or by a bond with men. They incurred upon themselves Allah's wrath, and wretchedness is their lot, because they denied Allah's signs and wrongfully killed the prophets, and because they disobeyed and transgressed." (Koran, 3:110-112).

"Israel will exist, and will continue to exist, until Islam abolishes it, as it abolished that which was before it." [From the words of] The martyr, Imam Hasan al-Banna', Allah's mercy be upon him.[2]

"The Islamic world is burning, and each and every one of us must pour water, even if it be a little, to extinguish whatever he can extinguish, without waiting for others." [From the words of] Sheikh Amjad Al-Zahawi, Allah's mercy be upon him.[3]

In the name of Allah the Merciful and the Compassionate

Preamble

Praise be to Allah. We seek help from Him, we ask forgiveness from Him, we ask Him for guidance, and we rely on Him. Prayer and peace be upon Allah's messenger and upon his family and companions, and those who are loyal to him and spread his message and follow his sunna [the Prophet's custom]. Prayer and peace be forever upon them as long as heaven and earth exist.

Oh people, from the midst of great troubles and in the depths of suffering, and from the beating of believing hearts and arms purified for worship, out of cognizance of duty and in response to Allah's command – thence came the call [of our movement] and the meeting and joining [of forces], and thence came education in accordance with Allah's way and a resolute will to carry out [the movement's] role in life, overcoming all of the obstacles and surmounting the difficulties of the journey. Thence came also continuous preparation, [along with] readiness to sacrifice one's life and all that is valuable for the sake of Allah.

Then the seed took form and [the movement] began to move forward through this stormy sea of wishes and hopes, yearnings and aspirations, dangers and obstacles, pains and challenges, both locally [in Palestine] and abroad.

When the idea ripened, and the seed grew, and the plant shot its roots into the ground of reality, away from fleeting emotions and improper hastiness, then the Islamic Resistance Movement [Hamas][4] set out to play its role, marching onward for the sake of Allah. [In doing this, Hamas] joins arms with all those who wage jihad for the liberation of Palestine.[5] The souls of its jihad fighters meet the souls of all those jihad fighters who sacrificed their lives for the land of Palestine, from the time when the Prophet's companions conquered it until the present.

The covenant of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) reveals its face, presents its identity, clarifies its stand, makes clear its aspiration, discusses its hopes, and calls out to help it and support it and to join its ranks, because our fight with the Jews is very extensive and very grave, and it requires all the sincere efforts. It is a step that must be followed by further steps; it is a brigade that must be reinforced by brigades upon brigades from this vast Islamic world, until the enemies are defeated and Allah's victory is revealed.

This is how we see them coming on the horizon: "And after a time you will come to know about it."(Koran, 38:88)

"Allah has written: It is I and My messengers who will surely prevail. Allah is Strong and Mighty." (Koran, 58:21)

"Say: This is my way. I call on Allah with certainty, I and those who follow me, and glory be to Allah, I am not among the polytheists." (Koran, 12:108)

Chapter One: Introduction to the Movement

Ideological Premises

Article One

The Islamic Resistance Movement: Islam is its way. It is from Islam that it derives its ideas, concepts, and perceptions concerning the universe, life, and man, and it refers to Islam's judgment in all its actions. It is from Islam that it seeks direction so as to guide its steps.

The Relation between the Islamic Resistance Movement and the Muslim Brotherhood

Article Two

The Islamic Resistance Movement is one of the wings of the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine. The Muslim Brotherhood movement is a global organization and is the largest of the Islamic movements in modern times. It is distinguished by its profound understanding and its conceptual precision and by the fact that it encompasses the totality of Islamic concepts in all aspects of life, in thought and in creed, in politics and in economics, in education and in social affairs, in judicial matters and in matters of government, in preaching and in teaching, in art and in communications, in secret and in the open, and in all other areas of life.

Structure and Formation

Article Three

The Islamic Resistance Movement is founded upon Muslims who gave their allegiance to Allah and served Him as He ought to be served. "I did not create jinns and men except that they should serve me." (Koran, 51:56)

[These Muslims] recognized their duty towards themselves, their families and their homeland, fearing Allah in all of this. They raised the banner of jihad in the face of the oppressors, in order to deliver the land and the believers from their filth, impurity and evil. "We hurl the truth against falsehood and crush its head, and lo, it vanishes." (Koran, 21:18)

Article Four

The Islamic Resistance Movement welcomes every Muslim who embraces its creed, adopts its ideology, is committed to its way, keeps its secrets and desires to join its ranks in order to carry out the duty, and his reward is with Allah.

The Islamic Resistance Movement – Dimensions of Time and Place

Article Five

The temporal dimension of the Islamic Resistance Movement – in view of the fact that it has adopted Islam as its way of life – go back to the birth of the Islamic message and to the righteous early believers; Allah is its goal, the Prophet is its example to be followed, and Koran is its constitution.

Its spatial dimension: wherever there are Muslims who embrace Islam as their way of life, everywhere upon the earth. Thus, [Hamas] sends its roots deep into the ground, and it extends to embrace the heavens.

"Do you not see how Allah has given us a parable? A good word is like a good tree; its roots are firm and its branches extend to the heavens. It always bears its fruit at the right time in accordance with God's will. Allah recites parables to men so that they will take heed." (Koran, 14:24-25)

Distinctiveness and Independence

Article Six

The Islamic Resistance Movement is a distinct Palestinian movement that is loyal to Allah, adopts Islam as a way of life and works to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine. Under the wing of Islam, followers of other religions can all live safe and secure in their life, property and rights; whereas in the absence of Islam, discord arises, injustice spreads, corruption burgeons, and there are conflicts and wars. Allah bless the Muslim poet Muhammad Iqbal[6] who said:

When faith is gone, there is no safety,

And there is no life to him who has no religion.

He who is content to live without religion

Has taken death as a consort of life.

The Universality of the Islamic Resistance Movement

Article Seven

Muslims who adopt the way of the Islamic Resistance Movement are found in all countries of the world, and act to support [the movement], to adopt its positions and to reinforce its jihad. Therefore, it is a world movement, and it is qualified for this [role] owing to the clarity of its ideology, the loftiness of its purpose and the exaltedness of its goals. It is on this basis that it should be regarded and evaluated; it is on this basis that its role should be recognized. Whoever denies its rights, refrains from helping it, becomes blind [to the truth] and makes an effort to blot out its role – he is like one who attempts to dispute with [divine] predestination. Whoever closes his eyes to the facts, intentionally or unintentionally, will eventually wake up [to find that] events have overtaken him and that the [weight of the] evidence has rendered him unable to justify his position. Precedence shall be given to those who those who come first [to the movement]. The iniquity of one's own relatives is more painful to the soul than the blow of a sharp sword.[7]

"We have revealed to you the Book in truth, confirming the scripture that came before it and guarding it. Judge between them according to what Allah has revealed, and follow not their capricious will, turning away from the truth that was revealed to you. To each among you Allah has appointed a law and a way. If Allah had so desired, he would have made you a single nation. However, he desired to test you in all that he had given you. So vie with one another in good works. It is to Allah that you shall all return, and He will then reveal to you [the truth] about the matters in which you differed." (Koran 5:48)

The Islamic Resistance Movement is one link in the chain of jihad in confronting the Zionist invasion. It is connected and linked to the [courageous] uprising of the martyr 'Izz Al-Din Al-Qassam and his brethren the jihad fighters of the Muslim Brotherhood in the year 1936. It is further related and connected to another link, [namely] the jihad of the Palestinians, the efforts and jihad of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1948 war, and the jihad operations of the Muslim Brotherhood in 1968 and afterwards. Although these links are far apart, and although the continuity of jihad was interrupted by obstacles placed in the path of the jihad fighters by those who circle in the orbit of Zionism, the Islamic Resistance Movement aspires to realize the promise of Allah, no matter how long it takes. The Prophet, Allah's prayer and peace be upon him, says: "The hour of judgment shall not come until the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them, so that the Jews hide behind trees and stones, and each tree and stone will say: 'Oh Muslim, oh servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him,' except for the Gharqad tree, for it is the tree of the Jews." (Recorded in the Hadith collections of Bukhari and Muslim).

The Motto of the Islamic Resistance Movement

Article Eight

Allah is its goal, the Prophet its model to be followed, the Koran its constitution, Jihad its way, and death for the sake of Allah its loftiest desire.

[1] Islamonline, http://www.islamonline.net/Arabic/doc/2004/03/article11.SHTML . This link was active at the time of original publication.

[2] Hasan Al-Banna' (1906-1949) founded the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928 and was its Director General until his assassination in 1949.

[3] Amjad Al-Zahawi was an Iraqi Sunni religious scholar who was affiliated with Muslim Brotherhood and active in various initiatives to support the Palestinian cause.

[4] Hamas is the Arabic acronym for Islamic Resistance Movement (harakat al-muqawama al-islamiyya); it is also an Arabic word meaning enthusiasm, ardor or zeal.

[5] Due to the importance of the concept of jihad in the Hamas ideology, we leave this term in Arabic wherever it appears in the text.

[6] The verses of Muhammad Iqbal (1873-1938), an Indian Muslim poet and religious thinker, are often used by both reformist and conservative Muslims in support of their opposite orientations.

[7] This is an often quoted verse by the famous pre-Islamic poet Tarafa.

Source: http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/5319.htm.

MEMRI (Middle East Media Research Institute)

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Teenagers before draft: If We [are] Captured, do not Exchange us for Terrorists

by Dr. Aaron Lerner


“We hereby declare that we know that as soldiers we may fall in battle for the State of Israel and the defense of its citizens. We absolutely request that should we, forefend, be captured during the course of our army service, that we do not want the State of Israel to release for us terrorist murders or those who aided in terror that might return to hurt the People of Israel.”

From letter signed by 30 students in the Maaleh Adumim military preparatory school who are about to be drafted as reported by Yediot Ahronot correspondent Akiva Novak on 26 May 2011.

Source: http://imra.org.il/story.php3?id=52597

Dr. Aaron Lerner, Director IMRA (Independent Media Review & Analysis)

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

The Arab Spring from a Counter-Terrorism Perspective

by Dr. Boaz Ganor


Jerusalem Issue Briefs Vol. 11, No. 1 27 May 2011

•World War III is occurring right now. It is not only a war of ideas, it is a religious war – not between Islam and the rest of the world, but first and foremost a war within the religion of Islam. It is a war of the culture of Islamic radicalism against the rest of the world, which includes the majority of Muslims worldwide.

•A few months ago, White House Counter-Terrorism Advisor John Brennan said, “Islamists and Jihadists are not our enemy.” In response, I wrote an op-ed in the Jerusalem Post which explains that moderate Arab leaders know that Jihadists and Islamists are the enemy. By saying that Islamists and Jihadists are not the enemy, the United States – the spearhead of Western society and the protector of liberal values in the world – is sending a confusing message to its allies worldwide.

•In the competition between the Iranian axis and the pragmatic axis, the Iranian axis is winning. Hizbullah is growing stronger in Lebanon and Hamas is gaining power and scoring points in Gaza for the Iranian axis. Also, the decision of Turkey to choose the Iranian axis is becoming quite clear.

•Dr. Condoleezza Rice has said that her next book is going to refer to a pillar of American foreign policy: the introduction of democracy in the Muslim world. My upcoming book will address exactly the opposite. It will be about how terrorists and fundamentalists are misusing the democratic apparatus of the state in order to promote their goals. When fundamentalists win in democratic elections, it is one man, one vote, one time.

•Is there anything we can do in order to change this negative outcome? I would call to immediately establish a second Marshall Plan, similarly to what happened after World War II, for those new regimes being established in the Muslim world and to support other pragmatic regimes that have not yet faced internal revolutions. Since imposing democracy on these societies might be counterproductive and dangerous, it should be an incremental process. At the end of the day, only Muslims can and should educate Muslims.

A War within Islam

What is the connection between terrorism and the processes that we are seeing in the Muslim world? They are interdependent, have many common denominators, and will definitely influence one another in the coming years.

World War III is occurring right now. It is not only a war of ideas, it is a religious war. It is not a war between religions, between Islam and the rest of the world, but first and foremost a war within the religion of Islam. It is a war of the culture of Islamic radicalism against the rest of the world, which includes the majority of Muslims worldwide. Essentially, the Muslims have a responsibility to deal with those bad seeds which are coming from Islam.

The Equation of Terrorism

The equation of terrorism involves two factors: motivation and operational capability. When a group of people has both the motivation to conduct terrorist attacks and also the operational capability to do so, there are going to be terrorist attacks.

In the equation of counter-terrorism, you either need to reduce the motivation or the operational capability. The ultimate solution is to deal with both factors at the same time. In the counter-terrorism literature there is only one way to reduce the terrorists’ operational capability, and this is by attacking them. Once you do this, you raise their motivation to retaliate.

Israel is the best example in the world of a state that understands the need to fight the operational capability of the terrorists, and succeeds in doing that based on a very efficient intelligence capability, as well as defensive capabilities (e.g., the West Bank security barrier).

At the same time, a lot more can and should have been done in the last two decades in understanding and countering the motivations that lead to terrorism, as, for example, in people-to-people activities and interaction. Among the Palestinians, many hate us, but many understand at the same time that we were born to live with each other and that overcoming the personal obstacles is crucial. This would never be a replacement for ending the conflict and solving the political dispute, but even at times of dispute it is crucial to lower the flames of hatred and establish the platform needed for the next step – to build a political solution.

The American Approach to Counter-Terrorism

After 9/11, America’s focus was on reducing the operational capability of the terrorists. The outcome was the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. The effort was designed to reduce the capabilities of al-Qaeda, the global Jihadists, and terrorists worldwide. Yet the Americans did not pay enough attention to the simultaneous need to deal with counter-motivation.

A few months ago, the White House Counter-Terrorism Advisor, John Brennan, discussed the Obama Administration's counter-terrorism policy. He explained: “Terrorism is not our enemy.” I understand that terrorism is a tactic and that a tactic cannot be an enemy. But then he said, “Islamists and Jihadists are not our enemy.” In response, I wrote an op-ed in the Jerusalem Post entitled: “If Global Jihad Isn’t the Enemy, What Is”?

I explained that President Mubarak knows who the enemy is, as does King Abdullah of Jordan and other moderate Arab leaders. They know that the Jihadists and Islamists are the enemy. By saying that Islamists and Jihadists are not the enemy, America – the spearhead of Western society and the protector of liberal democratic values in the world – is sending a confusing message to its allies worldwide.

It is true that al-Qaeda has yet to succeed in establishing an Islamist caliphate, an Islamic radical state that will control the whole world and will be governed by Muslim Sharia law. But it is succeeding in achieving its intermediate goals to gain hearts and minds that buy into its version of Islam. While the vast majority of Muslims have not bought into these views, the trend is negative, as we see more and more people buying into it. From an historical point of view, the Islamists are winning the war.

The Strengthening of the Iranian Axis

For the last decade in the Middle East there has been a competition between two players: the Iranian axis and the pragmatic axis. Unfortunately, the Iranian axis is winning, point by point. Hizbullah is growing stronger in Lebanon, which in the future may turn into a radical Islamic Shia state. We see the same process in Gaza, and some would say throughout the Palestinian arena. Hamas is gaining power and scoring points for the Iranian axis. Also, the decision of Turkey to choose the Iranian axis is becoming quite clear.

The current Middle East turmoil was not a direct outcome of any American initiative, but the Americans are somehow responsible, due to their obsession with democracy. Dr. Condoleezza Rice has said that her next book is going to refer to a pillar of American foreign policy: the introduction of democracy in the Muslim world.

My book will say exactly the opposite. It will be about how terrorists and fundamentalists are misusing the democratic apparatus of the state in order to promote their goals. When fundamentalists win in democratic elections, it is one man, one vote, one time, and there is no way to get rid of them except through violence.

Democracy is not only about free elections; nor are free elections the most important part of democracy. Democracy is a state of mind and a set of values. Democracy is human rights and women's rights. When you take people who for years have been exposed to incitement and indoctrination, it automatically leads them to believe that becoming a shahid, a suicide attacker, is the most important goal of every patriotic Palestinian youth. So do not be surprised if, when you impose free elections on them, they will vote for Hamas.

My Ph.D. dissertation was called “The Israeli Counter-Terrorism Strategy: Efficiency versus Liberal Democratic Values.” Of course there is an integral contradiction between liberal democratic values and security. Finding the correct balance is the counter-terrorism dilemma of every liberal democratic state.

Popular Rebellions in the Middle East

The current turmoil in the Middle East was not pre-planned. This was a genuine popular rebellion against those regimes. There is a connection between them because there is an epidemic effect at work. If you are a frustrated youngster watching Al Jazeera – which is playing a negative role in the whole process – and you see others succeeding, then you will do the same.

Islamic revolutions behave according to two different models. One is the Iranian model – a rapid revolution. It took only 36 days to pave the way from Shapour Bakhtiar's government – which replaced the Shah’s regime – to the takeover by Ayatollah Khomeini. The second model, that of Hizbullah and Turkey, follows a slower path. In Lebanon, the Islamic radical revolution of Hizbullah has been taking place for 15 years. Turkey is in the midst of a long-term process as well.

In Turkey, the Islamists are starting from a different point than in the Arab countries, taking people who were not fundamentalists and incrementally brainwashing them by changing the messages in the education system, by changing the constitution, reducing the power of the military, and putting their people on the supreme court. Similarly, the Iranians were one of the most pro-Western, pragmatic, non-radical populations prior to the Khomeini revolution. The Iranian people basically are not fundamentalists.

It's still a question if the outcome of the revolution in Egypt will lead to a more democratic government. Even if the Egyptians choose in a free election the most liberal and moderate figure they can vote for, does anybody think that this person has the capability to meet the expectations of the Egyptian public to change the current condition of Egyptian society, and change the fact that every year there are one million babies born in Egypt? I tend to believe that frustration will come after their new elected government does not succeed in ameliorating their welfare, and the life of that government would end in a very clear mandate for the Islamic radical option of the Muslim Brotherhood.

The United States is much weaker in the region today than it was a few months ago. Egypt was a crucial ally of the United States, but it will not be as friendly and as close as it used to be. Even if the regime would want to, they cannot. From the point of view of the United States, this is a negative trend.

What Should the West Do?

Is there anything we can do in order to change this negative outcome? I would immediately call to establish a second Marshall Plan, similarly to what happened after World War II, for those new regimes being established in the Muslim world. This Marshall Plan should also be used to support other pragmatic regimes that have not yet faced internal revolutions. The money should also come from Muslim sources, from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf countries. Those pragmatic regimes should be helped to improve the welfare of their nation and to introduce the values of democracy. Since imposing democracy on these societies might be counterproductive and dangerous, it should be an incremental process – using an educational approach.

We need to bear in mind that it should be a Muslim educational approach, with Western help and positive guidance. At the end of the day, only Muslims can and should educate Muslims. Only Muslims can and should interpret Islam in a pragmatic and moderate way.

Finally, the Israeli government must not support a comfortable status quo situation. Israel needs to support the pragmatic Palestinian elements. Abbas and Fayyad have a common interest with the pragmatic axis, and this is new because Israel, the Palestinians, Egypt, Jordan, and even Saudi Arabia today have many common interests that they did not have before, and common enemies as well.

Israel is currently enjoying a period of relative quiet. No doubt Israel’s intelligence capabilities are much better than they used to be, but there are two other important elements at work. The first is the understanding by Abbas and Fayyad that terrorism is counterproductive to Palestinian national interests, something Arafat never understood. The second is the understanding by Hamas that right now it is counterproductive for them to let the situation deteriorate into an all-out war because Hamas is eager to get international legitimization or rehabilitation, and to lift the siege from Gaza. Terrorist attacks are not going to promote Hamas’ immediate goals.

Source: http://www.jcpa.org/JCPA/Templates/ShowPage.asp?DRIT=1&DBID=1&LNGID=1&TMID=111&FID=442&PID=0&IID=7209&TTL=The_Arab_Spring_from_a_Counter-Terrorism_Perspective

Dr. Boaz Ganor is the Acting Dean of the Lauder School of Government and
Diplomacy at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya as well as the founder
and Executive Director of the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism
(ICT). He is a member of Israel’s National Committee for Homeland Security
Technologies, and of the International Advisory Team of the Manhattan
Institute to the New York Police Department. Dr. Ganor has served as a
consultant to the Israeli government on counter-terrorism on numerous
occasions and is the author of numerous articles and books on
counter-terrorism.

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

U.S. Jewish Organizations And Obama

by Caroline B. Glick

President Obama's speech on the Middle East at the State Department last week, his icy glares at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office last Friday, his address before the AIPAC conference on Sunday, and his subsequent press briefings have all made clear that he is not sympathetically inclined toward Israel, nor does he consider Israel an ally worth defending.

Obama's advocacy of the 1949 armistice lines as a starting point for negotiations demonstrate his lack of support for Israel's right to defensible borders. His non-response to the Hamas-Fatah unity deal demonstrates that there is nothing the Palestinians can do that will make him accept the reality that their commitment to Israel's destruction, rather than Israel's continued control over Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, is the reason there is no peace between them and Israel.

And yet, disturbingly, major Jewish American organizations took it upon themselves this past week to defend Obama to their members and to the general public. The most prominent example of this was the Anti-Defamation League's press release following Obama's State Department speech. After Obama endorsed the Palestinian position that negotiations must be based on the indefensible 1949 armistice lines, and did so in the face of explicit Israeli entreaties that he abstain from doing so, the ADL released a statement applauding Obama.

ADL leaders Abe Foxman and Robert Sugarman congratulated Obama for his support for Israel. Among other things, their statement said, "This Administration has come a long way in two years in terms of understanding of the nuances involved in bringing about Israeli-Palestinian peace and a better understanding of the realities and challenges confrontingIsrael."

Why on earth did the ADL feel it necessary to defend the indefensible? Why, in the midst of an open fight between Obama and the Israeli government, did the ADL feel it necessary to side with Obama against the government of Israel?

In his speech before AIPAC on Sunday, Obama did not repudiate his attachment to the Palestinians' negotiating position. He did not mention any objection to the Palestinian demand to overrun Israel with millions of foreign Arabs. He did not announce any steps the U.S. will take to end its support for the Hamas-controlled Palestinian Authority, despite the fact that continued funding is outlawed by U.S. terror finance laws.

Moreover, Obama's speech to AIPAC included a barely-veiled threat against Israel when he asserted, "There is a reason why the Palestinians are pursuing their interests at the United Nations. They recognize that there is an impatience with the peace process - or the absence of one. Not just in the Arab world, but in Latin America, in Europe, and in Asia. That impatience is growing, and is already manifesting itself in capitols around the world."

In making this statement, Obama was effectively providing backing to the international campaign to delegitimize Israel's right to exist. The forces promoting the Palestinian narrative throughout the world are increasingly calling for the destruction of Israel. Simply by mentioning this campaign without explaining that it is inherently anti-Semitic or at least in inherently hostile to Israel's right to exist, Obama justified it.

And yet, Stand With Us, an organization founded to fight the campaign to delegitimize Israel, endorsed Obama's AIPAC speech. In a press release issued shortly after Obama concluded his remarks at AIPAC, Stand With Us co-founder and CEO Roz Rothstein praised Obama saying, "We appreciated [Obama's] repeated assurance that no debate about Israel's legitimacy will ever be tolerated."

The question is, why are American Jewish leaders defending Obama?

It would seem that there are three possible explanations.

The first explanation is fear. Several American Jewish philanthropists have mentioned over the past two years that they fear Obama. If he is reelected, they worry that since he will no longer need Jewish political contributions, he might strike out at Jewish-owned businesses the way he struck out at Republican-owned General Motors car dealerships when he nationalized GM. If they attack Obama for his positions on Israel, they worry that they will give him further justification for going after them.

The obvious response to these fears, it would seem, is to do everything possible to ensure that Obama is not reelected. If he is hostile enough to even consider going after American Jewish interests in a second term, then nothing American Jews do or don't do will have any impact on him.

The second, perhaps more plausible, explanation is that Jewish leaders are concerned that their fellow American Jews are more attached to their identity as Democrats than they are to their identity as Jews. True, the overwhelming majority of American Jews express firm support for Israel. A poll carried out last week for the Committee for Accuracy in Middle Eastern Reporting in America (CAMERA) found that support for Israel is nearly unanimous among American Jews.

Yet neither the CAMERA poll nor previous surveys by the American Jewish Committee or Brandeis which had similar findings asked respondents to weigh their support for Israel against support for the Democratic Party. So it is possible that leaders are worried that if they oppose Obama's anti-Israel positions too strongly, they will lose some support.

Survey information would be helpful for sorting out this issue. But on the face of things, it seems likely that serious donors to these groups care far more about Israel than the Democratic Party. The rest will either leave the organizations or be convinced that supporting Israel is more important than supporting Obama.

The third reason why U.S. Jewish leaders may be defending Obama's positions on Israel is because the Israeli left defends his position on Israel. In the face of Obama's latest baiting of Netanyahu, opposition leader Tzipi Livni attacked Netanyahu and accused him of destroying Israel's relations with the U.S. She and her followers also defended Obama's policies. Many American Jewish leaders must certainly believe that they cannot be more pro-Israel than the Israeli left.

Clearly, the party most responsible for calling out Livni and her associates for their irresponsible behavior is the Israeli public, which voted for Netanyahu and his coalition to lead the country rather than Livni and her party. But it important for American Jewish leaders to recognize the game being played - namely, Livni and Kadima are trying to exploit Obama's position on Israel in an attempt to win a partisan battle against Netanyahu and Likud - before they jump into it.

Non-Jewish American supporters of Israel never tire of asking how it is that so many American Jews voted for Obama in 2008. Perhaps the easiest explanation is because the American Jewish leadership papered over his hostility.

Source: http://www.jewishpress.com/pageroute.do/48421/

Caroline Glick is senior contributing editor at The Jerusalem Post.Her Jewish Press-exclusive column appears the last week of every other month. Look for her next column in the July 29 issue.

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Lessons of Netanyahu’s Triumph

by Caroline B. Glick

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was hoping to avoid his clash with US President Barack Obama this week in Washington.

Four days before his showdown at the White House with the American leader, Netanyahu addressed the Knesset. His speech was the most dovish he had ever given. In it, he set out the parameters of the land concessions he is willing to make to the Palestinians, in the event they ever decide that they are interested in negotiating a final peace.

Among other things, Netanyahu spoke for the first time about “settlement blocs,” and so signaled that he would be willing to evacuate the more isolated Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria. He also spoke of a longterm military presence in the Jordan Valley rather than Israeli sovereignty along the militarily vital plain.

Both strategically and ideologically, Netanyahu’s speech constituted a massive concession to Obama. The premier had good reason to believe that his speech would preempt any US demand for further Israeli concessions during his visit to Washington.

Alas, it was not to be. Instead of welcoming Netanyahu’s unprecedented concessions, Obama dismissed them as insufficient as he blindsided Netanyahu last Thursday with his speech at the State Department. There, just hours before Netanyahu was scheduled to fly off to meet him in the Oval Office, Obama adopted the Palestinian negotiating position by calling for Israel to accept that future negotiations will be based on the indefensible – indeed suicidal – 1949 armistice lines.

So, just as he was about to board his plane, Netanyahu realized that his mission in the US capital had changed. His job wasn’t to go along to get along. His job was to stop Obama from driving Israel’s relations with the US off a cliff.

Netanyahu was no longer going to Washington to explain where Israel will stand aside. He was going to Washington to explain what Israel stands for. Obama threw down the gauntlet. Netanyahu needed to pick it up by rallying both the Israeli people to his side and rallying the American people to Israel’s side. Both goals, he realized, could only be accomplished by presenting his vision of what Israel is and what it stands for.

And Netanyahu did his job. He did his job brilliantly.

ISRAEL TODAY is the target of an ever escalating campaign to demonize and delegitimize it. Just this week we learned that a dozen towns in Scotland have decided to ban Israeli books from their public libraries. One Scottish town has decided to post signs calling for its residents to boycott Israeli products and put a distinguishing mark (yellow star, perhaps?) on all Israeli products sold in local stores to warn residents away from them.

Israelis shake their heads and wonder, what did we do to the Scots? In San Francisco, there is a proposition on the ballot for the fall elections to ban circumcision.

The proposition would make it a criminal offense to carry out the oldest Jewish religious ritual. Offenders will be punished by up to a year in prison and a fine of up to $1,000.

Israelis shake their heads and wonder, what did we do to the people of San Francisco? It seems that everywhere we look we are told that we have no right to exist. From Ramallah to Gaza, to Egypt, to Scotland, Norway, and San Francisco, we are told that we are evil and had better give up the store. And then Obama took to the stage on Thursday and told us that we have to surrender our ability to defend ourselves in order to make room for a Palestinian state run by terrorists committed to our destruction.

But then Netanyahu arrived in Washington and said, “Enough already, we’ve had quite enough of this dangerous nonsense.”

And we felt things we haven’t felt for a long time. We felt empowered. We felt we had a voice. We felt proud. We felt we had a leader.

We felt relieved.

The American people, whose overwhelming support for Israel was demonstrated by their representatives in both houses of the Congress on Tuesday, also felt empowered, proud and relieved. Because not only did Netanyahu eloquently remind them of why they stand with Israel, he reminded them of why everyone who truly loves freedom stands with America.

It is true that the American lawmakers who interrupted Netanyahu’s remarks dozens of times to applaud wanted to use his presence in their chamber to send a message of solidarity to the people of Israel. But during the course of his speech, it became apparent that it wasn’t just their desire to show solidarity that made them stand and applaud so many times. Netanyahu managed to relieve them as well.

Since he assumed office, Obama has been traveling the world apologizing for America’s world leadership. He has been lecturing the American people about the need to subordinate America’s national interests to global organizations like the United Nations that are controlled by dictatorships which despise them.

Suddenly, here was an allied leader reminding them of why America is a great nation that leads the world by right, not by historical coincidence.

It is not coincidental that many American and Israeli observers have described Netanyahu’s speech as “Churchillian.” Winston Churchill’s leadership was a classic example of democratic leadership. And Netanyahu is Churchill’s most fervent pupil. The democratic leadership model requires a leader to set out his vision of where his country must go and convince the public to follow him.

That is what Churchill did. And that is what Netanyahu did this week. And like Churchill in June 1940, Netanyahu’s success this week was dazzling.

Just how dazzling was made clear by a Haaretz poll of the Israeli public conducted after Netanyahu’s speech before the Congress.

The poll found that Netanyahu’s approval ratings increased an astounding 13 percentage points, from 38 to 51 percent in one week. Two-thirds of the Israelis who watched his speech said it made them proud.

As for the US response, the fact that leading Democrats on Capitol Hill, House Minority Leader Steny Hoyer and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, felt it necessary to distance themselves from Obama’s statements about Israel’s final borders makes clear that Netanyahu successfully rallied the American public to Israel’s side.

This point was also brought home with Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s interesting request to Republicans during their joint meeting with Netanyahu. In front of the Israeli leader, Wasserman Schultz asked her Republican counterparts not to use support for Israel as a campaign issue. Her request makes clear that following Netanyahu’s brilliant triumph in Washington, Democrats realize that the president’s poor treatment of Israel is an issue that will harm them politically if the Republicans decide to make it an issue in next year’s elections.

WHILE THE democratic model of leadership is certainly the model that the founders of most democratic societies have in mind when they establish their democratic orders, it is not the only leadership model that guides leaders in democratic societies. This week, as Netanyahu demonstrated the strength of the democratic leadership model, two other leadership models were also on prominent display. The first was demonstrated by Obama. The second was exhibited by opposition leader Tzipi Livni.

Obama’s leadership model is the model of subversive leadership. Subversive leaders in democracies do not tell their citizens where they wish to lead their societies. They hide their goals from their citizens, because they understand that their citizens do not share their goals. Then once they achieve their unspoken goals, they present their people with a fait accompli and announce that only they are competent to shepherd their societies through the radical shift they undertook behind the public’s back.

Before Obama, the clearest example of subversive leadership was Shimon Peres. As foreign minister under Yitzhak Rabin, Peres negotiated his deal with the PLO behind the public’s back, and behind Rabin’s back – and against their clear opposition. Then he presented the deal that no one supported as a fait accompli.

And as the architect of the deal that put the PLO terror forces on the outskirts of Israel’s major cities, Peres argued that only he could be trusted to implement the deal he had crafted.

Eighteen years and 2,000 Israeli terror victims later, Israel still hasn’t figured out how to extricate itself from his subversive legacy. And he is president.

Today, Obama recognizes that the American public doesn’t share his antipathy towards Israel, and so as he adopts policies antithetical to Israel’s security, he waxes poetic about his commitment to Israel’s security. So far his policies have led to the near disintegration of Israel’s peace with Egypt, the establishment of a Fatah-Hamas unity government in the Palestinian Authority, and to Iran’s steady, all but unimpeded progress towards the atom bomb.

As for Livni, her model is leadership from behind. Although Obama’s advisers claimed that this is his model of leadership, it actually is Livni’s model. A leader who leads from behind is a follower. She sees where her voters are and she goes there.

In Livni’s case, her supporters are on the Left and their main spokesman is the media. Both the Left and the media oppose everything that Netanyahu does and everything he is. And so, as Livni sees things, her job as the head of the opposition is to give voice to their views.

As Netanyahu stared Obama down in the Oval Office and reminded Israelis and Americans alike why we have a special relationship, Livni was telling audiences in Washington and Israel that Netanyahu is a warmonger who will lead us to devastation if we don’t elect her to replace him soon. With Obama adopting the Palestinians’ negotiating positions and with Fatah embracing Hamas rather than honestly admitting that all hope for peace is dead for the duration, Livni said that Netanyahu is leading us to war by defending the country.

Netanyahu’s extraordinary leadership this week has shown that when used well, the democratic model of leadership trumps all other models. He also showed us that he has the capacity to be the leader of our times.

In the coming weeks and months, the threats to Israel will surely only increase. And with these escalating threats will come also the escalating need for strong and certain leadership.

Netanyahu should realize what his astounding success means for him as well as for Israel.

The people of Israel and our many friends around the world will continue to stand behind him proudly if he continues to lead us as well and wonderfully as he did this week. And we will admire him. And we will thank him.

Source: http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=222417

Caroline B. Glick

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Ketsaleh "addresses" the US Congress

by INN Staff

Note: This speech was actually written by MK Yaakov Katz (“Ketsaleh”), head of the National Union party, given to Prime Minister Netanyahu and sent to INN for translation and posting, in the hope that Prime Minister Netanyahu [would] stand firm and present its message to the government of the United States.

Dear Friends, Senators and Congressmen, Representatives of the American people who are the best friend the Jewish people have had in all of history,

The Jewish people and the state of Israel are honored that the Prime Minister of Israel is invited to stand here before both houses of the American Congress.

I wish, in the name of the Israel’s citizens, to thank you for this opportunity to talk to you.

In 1492, two events of great historical significance occurred.

An evil decree of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain brought about the expulsion of the 150,000 Jews of Spain from the country where they had once lived tranquilly and had had a semblance of civil rights.

Yet an act of deliverance preceded this debacle, when, in the same year, Christopher Columbus discovered America. This was the start of the American nation, the nation whose very existence is an act of grace for the entire world and for the Jewish people in particular.

America was fated one day to become a place of refuge and support for the Jewish people.

Our people feel great affection for the American nation, which became a safe harbor for us towards the end of our exile. We thank the Almighty for choosing the American people to be the best and most helpful friend in our efforts to establish a national homeland for the Jewish people.

From the very start, there has been a covenant of love and friendship between the American people and the Jewish people and its state. The United States of America has stood by Israel in the past, in the present and will, please G-d, stand by her forever.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Senators and Congressmen,

At the close of a forced, long and cruel exile, we returned to our land. During all the 1900 years of exile, we never forgot our land, the land of Israel, our birthplace, the land promised to us and our descendants by the Creator of the world, the land of the Bible. Generations of Jewish children, young and old, studied and memorized the words of the Bible and our daily prayers, day and night, in hunger and thirst, cold and poverty, in secret and in the open, longing for a return to Jerusalem and the cities of Judea. Jerusalem is mentioned 21 times in a Jews’ daily prayers.

The Passover Haggadah that is recited at the yearly Seder, the very same one we have said through the ages, in Casblanca, Paris, Fez, London, Tsana,Barcelona, Addis Ababa, St. Petersburg, Alexandria, G’erba, Munich, Rome, and New York—whatever place we were exiled to—ends with the song “Next year in Jerusalem”.

The pioneering spirits among our people attempted to found a Third Commonwealth, but the nations of the world prevented them from succeeding. A small number managed to actually reach the land of the Bible. They started an awakening. They were followed by successive waves of tens, then hundreds, thousands and tens of thousands who founded villages, communities, cultural institutions and spread throughout the holy land, but the land remained desolate looking as It had been since its destruction thousands of years earlier.

After 18 centuries of exile, bubbles of longing began coming to the surface of Jewish life, and in the last 300 years, a large number of Jews left their places of residence to return to Israel. Today, at the state of Israel’s 63rd birthday celebration, we can state with confidence that our land was glad to see us back. Israel is a beautiful country, has one of the most stable economies in the world, is blessed with investments, research and development—it is a beacon to the entire world—and this is in addition to the rennaisance of Jewish culture and scholarship in the Jewish state.

In his book, “The Innocents Abroad”, Mark Twain describes journeying to the holy land with a group of pilgrims in the 1860’s. He describes a barren and desolate land, that contains nothing but deserts, wastelands, swamps, full of neglect and contagious diseases. All this was before the Jews returned. Once they began coming, Arab tribes followed in their footsteps, so that Arab claims to being in the land from time immemorial are put to the lie even by Twain.

In the Passover Haggadah I mentioned earlier, we also say each year: “In every generation they rise to destroy us, but the Lord rescues us from their hands.” No one, not even today, has a rational explanation for the continued existence of anti-Semitism. We only know that it is there, kicking and screaming. It began with our becoming a nation, in Egypt, and continued all through the years of exile during which period most of our nation was systematically murdered. That is how we find ourselves, after 1900 years and after the Holocaust, approximately the same population size as we were when the long exile began.

Possibly, anti-Semitism is a product of Israel’s G-d-given task of being “a light unto the nations," commanding the Jews to set a moral example and to spread monotheism in the ancient world of paganism and cruel idol worship. That may have caused jealousy and hatred, mixed with admiration. Jewish tradition had it that the world was round 1200 years before Galileo was hounded by the Church for saying so. In Jewish law, women were called “daughters of kings” long before the world realized the basic rights of women. The Jewish people served as an island of culture, purity, charity and lovingkindness, all found in the 613 commandments, those between man and his fellowman, those between man and his God. Although most of the world has abandoned idol worship by now, that hatred did not cease in the bitter exile with which we were subjected, but in which we never bowed. We remained stalwart spiritually and it is that strength that gave us the foundations for our national steadfastness.

On November 2, 1917, Lord Arthur James Balfour, Foreign Secretary and past Prime Minister of Great Britain, issued the famous Balfour Declaration, that posits the founding of a national home for the Jewish people in the land of Israel. Its authors were referring to the Biblical borders of Israel, with whose boundaries the English people were familiar from studying the Holy Book, that land which lay on both sides of the Jordan River, extending from the northernmost Golan Heights to Aqaba in the south, close to 116 thousand square kilometers.

In 1920, the San Remo International Conference confirmed the Balfour Declaration and gave Britain the mandate over both sides of the Jordan River. King Feisal of Iraq, in the name of the Arab delegation to the 1919 peace conference after WWI, wrote: “Our delegation here in Paris are fully aware of the suggestions the Zionist Federation made to the peace conference. In our eyes they are modest and fitting, and we will do our best to have them accepted. We will welcome the Jews warmly when they come home.

Two years later, the eastern bank of the Jordan, an area of about 90,000 square kilometers, was separated and closed to Jewish immigration. What remained for the Jews was the west bank of the Jordan, an area of only 26,000 square kilometers. The decision to hand over the land east of the Jordan to the head of the Saudi royal family, was decided on by Great Britain for political ends.

The plan to partition the land of Israel west of the Jordan River, as suggested by the Peel Committee in 1936, was called “a midget-sized Jewish country”, by revisionist leader Zeev Jabotinsky, in his 1937 speech before Parliament. The heads of Jewish settlement in Israel declared that even if the Jews are forced to accept the partition against their will, they see it as a temporary solution. Chaim Weizmann, later Israel’s first president, said: “This is an arrangement that can last 25-30 years”, and David Ben Gurion, later to be Israel’s first Prime Minister, reacted: “I see our future as cancelling the partition, once we have become secure in our state”.

In 1947, the United Nations Assembly ratified the Partition Plan, a decision that led to the declaration of the state of Israel on the tiny bit of land left for the Jewish homeland. Our capital,Jerusalem, was divided in two, and her heart, the site of our Holy Temples, was outside our borders. All the parts of Israel that had been clearly promised to us by God were also outside these borders.

The Arabs never accepted the Partition Plan and, led by Amin El Huseini, continued their terror attacks against the Jewish people. Huseini met with Hitler in Bernlin at the height of WWII in order to plan the extermination of the Jews in Israel and the east.

Immediately after the declaration of Israel’s independence on May 15, 1948, the armies of 7 Arab states invaded the fledgling country to attempt to murder all its Jewish residents. For the next 19 years, we lived while paying for our existence in unending bloodshed. In the War of Independence alone, 6000 soldiers and civilians were killed, that was 1% of the population at the time. God helped us defeat our enemies and we succeeded in building a wonderful country despite its narrow borders and their limitations.

Then began the infamous announcements of President Nasser of Egypt in 1967, who, together with Syria’s ruler Hafez el Assad, and Jordan’s King Hussein, decided to invade tiny Israel and wipe it off the map. Israel’s boundaries were the indefensible Green Line, called “Auschwitz Borders” by then-Foreign Minister Abba Eban. In the June 1967 war that ensued, the state of Israel and its heroic soldiers, defeated Egypt in six days and freed the remaining sections of Israel on the west of the Jordan River.

From the beginning, the Arab countries have engaged in anti-Israel incitement. Israel, for its part, has always yearned for peace with its enemies, but was always given the cold shoulder—and worse, unceasing terror attacks and bloodshed.

In 1993, a minority Israeli government signed the Oslo Accords with the PLO terrorist leader Yasser Arafat. The US government had reservations about the agreement limits at various stages of its development. The immediate result of these agreements was the terrorist murders of over 1500 Israelis, most of them civilians: the elderly, women, men, children - in the city centers, on buses, at restaurants and shopping centers. The PLO broke the Oslo Accords and forced Israel to engage in a military operation to reestablish full security control in PA cities, an act that was taken to prevent terror in Israel today.

It is no secret that of the 120 members of the United Nations General Assembly, 57 are Islamic, and that they vote automatically against Israel no matter what the issue. The United States of America, along with several other countries, have led the fight against anti-Israel activities in the UN for the 63 years since Israel’s establishment.

We are immeasurably grateful to the Presidents, Cabinet Members, Senators and Congressman who kept the hate and anti-Semitism in check, not allowing them to win another war waged against the Jewish people who have come home after thousands of years in exile.

In recent years, another enemy of the Jewish people has arisen, one who reminds us of Adolf Hitler, an enemy who does not hesitate to declare that he wishes to complete the genocide that Hitler planned. Israel, the entire world and especially the United States must make the battle to eliminate this ruler, who is developing non-conventional weapons of destruction and preparing his army to destroy Israel, a top priority. We must act towards Ahmadenijad as the United States did successfully and so bravely against arch- terrorist Osama Bin Laden.

Six years ago, then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon decided on a “Disengagement Plan” and expelled 10,000 Jews from the Katif Bloc. Although I was in the coalition when this was decided, I realized my mistake and left the government. Today, in retrospect, almost everyone admits that this plan was an egregious error and that Israel should have remained in that part of the Gaza Strip instead of leaving it for Iran’s puppet, Hamas.

Israel expelled Jews, destroyed their homes and brought about the burning of their synagogues by rioting Arabs. Immediately afterwards, Israel became a target for missiles raining from Gaza.

Over 10,000 rockets and missiles have been launched at Israeli cities as a result of this immoral and irresponsible decision. Our strategic, existential and security status have all become more vulnerable. We were forced to initiate the Cast Lead Operation to try to change the situation, but at great cost.

Israel yearns for peace, it is capable of overcoming past grievances. It has diplomatic, economic and even security relations with countries that took part in the destruction of the Jews only 70 years ago.

Israel gives equal rights to all her citizens, even those who once fought against her, and even to those who work against her even at present - and announce publicly that they do so.

There is no Arab or Muslim country in the world whose citizens have the freedom that Israel’s Arabs have. They vote, are members of the Knesset, serve as judges on the Supreme Court and in any capacity they wish.

Our right to the land of Israel is inalienable. It is an historical right and is stated clearly in the Book of Books. God’s command is that the Jewish people be connected to the holy land forever and ever. We must do our best to rebuild its ruins and settle its desolate areas.

My grandfather, the gifted speaker and well known Zionist, Rabbi Natan Milikovsky-Netanyahu, may he rest in peace, was a good friend of the first Chief Rabbi of Israel, Rabbi Avraham Kook. He traveled round the world at his behest, most especially to American Jewish congregations, during the 1920’s, to convince Jews to move to Israel and live their Zionism. Speaking in Rochester, New York in 1927, he said: “ We will not abandon our people to die. We must live. We have proven our integrity and just cause for two thousand years. We have our old weapons with us—justice and integrity—we will return to our homeland, our birthplace, our past and independence. The land awaits us.”

Dear Senators and Congressmen,

I wish to tell you that of some 7.5 million residents of the state of Israel, 6 million are Jews. 650,000 of them live in what is called “East” Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria – Israel’s heartland, the dwelling place of our forefathers, liberated in the Six Day War.

A good many places in the United States are named for Jewish holy cities: Beit El, Bethlehem, Shiloh and more.

The anti-Semitism always unleashed against the Jewish people, is now aimed at the Jewish state. It is inconceivable that 500 years after the Jews were expelled from Spain and suffered so many expulsions from the countries of Europe through the centuries, that Israel will be expected to expel 650,000 Jews from their ancestral homes, the cities of ancient Israel that have come back to life: Beit El, Hevron, Shechem, Elon Moreh, Kiryat Arba, Susiya, and above all, Jerusalem.

There is no doubt that the American people, who enjoy American’s freedom, who love and know the uniqueness of the Bible, will come to the aid of the millions of Jews who have renewed their lives in all parts of the holy land. You are the representatives of this wonderful nation and there is no doubt in our hearts that you will stand at our side and help defend our rights to live everywhere in biblical Israel.

At the present time, the Arab residents of Judea and Samaria are being led astray by leaders who are eaten up by hatred. Anti-Semitic caricatures in the PA press are an everyday occurrence. PA media, official textbooks, do not accept the existence of Israel and the Jewish people’s rights for a state in the holy land. Children are taught to be shahids from an early age, taught to kill as many Jews as possible. As long as this goes on, there is no way of talking to the PA. The treaty they signed with Hamas only makes this more obvious.

In exactly the same way we offered full citizenship to Israel’s Arab citizens decades ago, we are willing today to extend that gift to the Arabs of Judea and Samaria. Accept Israeli citizenship and become loyal to the state.

We are a peace loving nation. We will always be one. We never tried to undermine the countries in which we lived during our centuries of exile and always wanted peace. But peace is not derived from the destruction of another. Peace is the ability to live together.

Our integrity is reflected in our policies. I am the head of the Likud party, voted in on a platform that vowed to keep all of Israel in the hands of the Jewish people. I must tell you that in the Jewish communities of Judea and Samaria, not counting “East” Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, 26.5% of the voters chose me. They have not authorized me to destroy their homes, even had I wished to do so.

In the name of the Israeli nation that has sent me here, I ask you to help bring a painful isue that puts a pall on the quality of our relationship to an end. I am referring to Jonathan Pollard, and it seems to me that we must decide together, in the name of rationality as well as morality, to free him. He has paid a much higher price than anyone who has committed a comparable crime.

I turn to you to also help us gain freedom for our soldier Gilad Schalit from the hands of Hamas terrorists, the ones who expressed outrage and grief at the elimination of Ben Laden.

We in Israel have to learn from the United States, not to negotiate with terrorists. Gilad has not been visited by the Red Cross, has not seen a lawyer. Hamas ignores international principles of the freedom of mankind and commits crimes against humanity. We ask the world to raise its voice against this.

To close, I wish to pray that one day the world realize that the shared longing of the Jewish and American peoples for peace and liberty, is one that the entire world should share. May we pray together for world peace.

Thank you once again for the opportunity to address you. All of you are invited to visit the holy land, the land of the Bible, to enjoy her beauty, her rebuilding and progress.

Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/144360

INN Staff

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Muslim Brotherhood Aims for Islamic Egyptian State

by Gavriel Queenann

The Muslim Brotherhood will impose Islamic Sharia Law in Egypt if it comes to power, according to the movement's Sobhi Saleh, the Egyptian Arabic daily Al Masry Al Youm reports.

Saleh, a leading Muslim Brotherhood figure, claimed Sharia would protect Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

“Terms like civil or secular state are misleading,” he said. “Islamic Sharia is the best system for Muslims and non-Muslims."

Sharia implements an Islamic state that excludes non-Muslims from full participation in government, and which does not regard non-Muslims are full citizens. Under Sharia the lives and property of non-Muslims are only protected in an Islamic state after Jizya ["protection money" -ed.] is paid.

"The acceptance of the Jizya establishes the sanctity of their lives and property, and thereafter neither the Islamic state, nor the Muslim public have any right to violate their property, honor or liberty," the 20th century Islamist thinker Shaikh Syed Abul A'ala Mawdudi wrote.

Sheik Najih Ibrahim Ibn Abdulla, another major Islamic thinker of the 20th century, summarized the purpose of the Jizya,

"Since the entire religion belongs to God, it aims at humiliating ungodliness and its followers, and insulting them. Imposing the Jizya on the followers of ungodliness and oppressing them is required by God's religion. The Qur'anic text hints at this meaning when it says: `until they give the tribute by force with humiliation.'" (Qur'an 9:29)

Prior to the "Spring revolutions" that have shaken many Arab regimes to the core and brought new governments to power in Egypt and Tunisia, the United States Central Intelligence Agency had classified the Muslim Brotherhood as a "secular organization."

US president Barack Obama has pledged USD 1 billion to Egypt as well as the cancellation of an addition USD 1 billion in Egyptian debt in his bid to democratize the Middle East and advance American values in the region.

"We support a set of universal rights," Obama explained. "Those rights include free speech; the freedom of peaceful assembly; freedom of religion; equality for men and women under the rule of law; and the right to choose your own leaders – whether you live in Baghdad or Damascus; San'a or Tehran."

The Muslim Brotherhood is one of Egypt's most powerful political forces and is well-situated to be the big winner in Egypt's coming elections. This underscores critics' doubts about Obama's plans to use Egypt as the flagship of his vision to democratize and liberalize the region.

The Brotherhood recently set aside differences with rival Salafist group Jama’a al-Islamiya, to form an alliance of Islamic parties.

"Recent attacks on the Islamic groups brought us together," Saleh told reporters.

Although it now claims to have renounced violence, Jama’a al-Islamiya was responsible for a number of terrorist atrocities in Egypt throughout the 1990s, including the 1997 Luxor Massacre, in which 62 people were killed.

A victory for te Islamists would likely put Egypt at odds with Obama's aims for the region and bring into question his plan to give aid to emergent regimes.

The Muslim Brotherhood has called for the cancellation of the 1979 Camp David Accords signed by Israel and Egypt.

Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/144527

Gavriel Queenann

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Obama's Revisionist History

by Philip Averbuck

Always a master at misdirection and diversion, President Obama and his flacks have taken pains to assert that his new "1967 lines as a basis for peace" formulation for Israel's borders is, hey, "nothing new."

There's a grain of truth in this argument. But a mountain of lie. The lie renders the truth utterly irrelevant. Let's take a little walk down memory lane of prior US administrations, and see just how fraudulent it really is:

Nixon

When the Nixon Administration considered the situation (the 1970 "Rogers Plan"), the objective was to wean Egypt away from the Soviet orbit, and dealt only with Egypt's territorial losses to Israel in 1967. In case Barack hadn't noticed, these territories were completely returned to Egypt by 1982, pursuant to the Camp David Accords of 1978. The Rogers plan did not address any of the Jordanian territories (Judea and Samaria, so-called "Palestine") captured by Israel in 1967, much less even suggesting a "Palestinian" state. That would have been seen as an outrageously provocative and unfriendly act by then-King Hussein, a US ally, who was at that time obliged to respond with extreme force to an attempted "Palestinian" putsch against him; he drowned the putsch in the blood of at least 5,000 Arafat loyalists.

Carter

When the Carter Administration considered the problem, Egypt had already broken with the USSR, and had independently approached Israel to seek peace talks. The Carter Administration did little more than put a heavy thumb on the scale to ensure a favorable result for Egypt, which by any normal reading walked away from the table with negotiating windfall after windfall. However, the Camp David Accords also did not address the disposition of the Jordanian territories captured by Israel, except to declare that they should receive a period of "autonomy" before their final status was determined.

It is important to note that, at the time of the Nixon and Carter diplomatic efforts, the two strongest Muslim nations in the Middle East (Turkey and Iran) were both strong American allies, and both semi-open allies of Israel. This reality has turned 180 degrees today, to the point that Turkey's membership in NATO is an open scandal and an absurdity, as it is now weaving together its operational activities with Iran. Barack may have not noticed the dozens of kissy-face visits of Erdogan to Iran or Ahmadinejad to Turkey in recent years (and many more high-level military and security visits), but that is to his everlasting discredit. Israel has noticed them, of course. The new anti-Israel Iranian/Turkish alliance alone makes all of the earlier State Department calculations utterly irrelevant.

Reagan

The Reagan Administration started in 1982 to seek territorial concessions from Israel, but that position was soon abandoned as new Sec. of State George Schultz moved up the learning curve and reviewed the devastating intelligence and weaponry captured by Israel from the PLO in Lebanon that summer. Not to mention the unprecedented trouncing that Israel laid on Syria, which had been supplied with the latest Soviet weaponry. Shortly after Israel's Operation Peace for Galilee in Lebanon, President Reagan addressed the nation on Sept 1, 1982 -- you be the judge how similar this sounds to Barack Hussein Obama in 2011:

I have personally followed and supported Israel's heroic struggle for survival, ever since the founding of the State of Israel 34 years ago. In the pre-1967 borders Israel was barely 10 miles wide at its narrowest point. The bulk of Israel's population lived within artillery range of hostile Arab armies. I am not about to ask Israel to live that way again.

...

Beyond the transition period, as we look to the future of the West Bank and Gaza, it is clear to me that peace cannot be achieved by the formation of an independent Palestinian state in those territories, nor is it achievable on the basis of Israeli sovereignty or permanent control over the West Bank and Gaza. So, the United States will not support the establishment of an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, and we will not support annexation or permanent control by Israel.

There is, however, another way to peace. The final status of these lands must, of course, be reached through the give and take of negotiations. But it is the firm view of the United States that self-government by the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza in association with Jordan offers the best chance for a durable, just, and lasting peace.

So, to summarize: the Reagan Administration firmly rejected the idea of Israel returning to the "wasp-waist" 1967 lines; firmly rejected a Palestinian state; and supported the idea of Jordan negotiating with Israel for the final territorial disposition. No Palestinian state.

Bush I

The first Bush Administration was indeed set to pressure Israel in 1990, but Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait -- wildly supported by the "Palestinian" Arabs -- derailed them. However, even the unfriendly-to-Israel patrician George H.W. Bush rejected a Palestinian state, telling Arab journalists in 1991:

Q. What do you mean by political rights to Palestinian people in your speech?

The President. About political rights? Listen, there will not be peace until the whole question of where the Palestinians have a right to be is taken care of. And some say "state." It's not been our position in favor of the state, and there we differ with many of our Arab friends.

Clinton

It in fact isn't until the sixth (6^th) US President following the 6 Day War (Clinton) that the idea was finally floated to give the "Palestinians" a state with borders approximating those of West Bank Jordan on June 4, 1967. At the same time, the PLO under Yasser Arafat had made a tactical decision to peacefully engage Israel on the surface, while secretly maintaining a strategy based on the mass murder of Jewish civilians. This clear but unrealistic strategy was based on the assumption that enough "independent" non-PLO, arms-length terror-bombings and shootings would bring Israel to its knees where entire Arab armies had failed. The strategy culminated in "the second intifada" of September 2000 (which was finally militarily liquidated in April 2002), leaving even the notoriously concessionist Clinton (who had invited Arafat to the White House more than any other foreign official) completely empty-handed, and embarrassed.

Therefore, it is arguable that Obama is indeed following the precedent of one (1) US President, Bill Clinton...a precedent which collapsed in blood and chaos.

Bush II

Finally, we have the 2^nd Bush Administration. There has already been a lot of discussion about George W. Bush's letter of April 14, 2004, to Ariel Sharon, essentially endorsing the annexation of "already existing major Israeli population centers," which has been studiously ignored by Obama & Co. Secondly, it is important to note that the same letter placed as precedent to any Israel compromises the following conditions for the Palestinians:

Palestinians must undertake an immediate cessation of armed activity and all acts of violence against Israelis anywhere, and all official Palestinian institutions must end incitement against Israel. The Palestinian leadership must act decisively against terror, including sustained, targeted, and effective operations to stop terrorism and dismantle terrorist capabilities and infrastructure. Palestinians must undertake a comprehensive and fundamental political reform that includes a strong parliamentary democracy and an empowered prime minister.

Needless to say, every single one of those conditions have gone wretchedly unfulfilled.

But there's more. Just as the new Turkey/Iran axis requires an entirely new calculation for both Israel and the US, so the 2005 Israeli withdrawal from Gaza (16 months after the Bush letter), which has resulted in a Hamastan-Gaza serving as a missile-firing range requires yet another calculation.

And that's not all: the post-2006 buildup of Lebanon with Iranian missiles (estimated to be at least 60,000) has to result in yet another calculation. And neither of those calculations can result in greater demands of Israel, unless they are in fact blatantly hostile demands.

So, what else can go wrong since 1967? Ohhhhh, I don't know...How 'bout the overthrow of the one neighbor (Mubarak's Egypt) with which Israel had a relatively solid peace treaty, and its replacement with a Muslim Brotherhood-dominated government? Does that development call for greater pressure on and territorial compromise from Israel?

But wait, there's more. I haven't even mentioned Iran's nuclear missile program, and its openly proclaimed plan of genocide against Israel, have I?

And I haven't even mentioned the recent Fatah/Hamas alliance, the prevention of which was the central and explicit objective of the Rabin/Clinton strategy since 1993. (A strategy which had drearily failed, on other grounds, long ago.)

Is there any small country on earth that should face such a crescendo of deadly threats and be pressured to give up its territory? What kind of "friend" would do such a thing? If Hussein Obama had even a trace of sympathy for Israel, he'd be threatening the new Egyptian government every single day that, should they abrogate the Camp David Accords, the United States will materially support Israel's recapture of the Sinai, not to mention cutting off our billions in aid to Egypt.

"Nothing new," says Obama, and his brain-wiped bootlickers like the Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg join the chorus. Well, in fact the entire region has had so many new -- and purely hostile -- changes since 1979, that it qualifies as nothing less than malicious madness to pretend that a "let bygones be bygones" approach will lead to more peace, security, and justice.

It is beyond crystal-clear: for Israel to even approximate the 1967 border lines will give such encouragement, high terrain and favorable borders to its bloodthirsty enemies that Neville Chamberlain's work "on behalf of" Czechoslovakia will be re-examined as wildly successful in comparison.

Nothing new? To quote the great Herman Cain: Obama is treating us as if we're stupid. Well, are we?

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/05/obamas_revisionist_history.html

Philip Averbuck

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Geert Wilders's Anti-Islam Show Trial "Must Go On"

by Soeren Kern

A court in Amsterdam has ordered the anti-Islam hate-speech trial of the Freedom Party MP Geert Wilders to resume after Dutch appeals judges on May 23 rejected his claim that the court is biased against him.

The Wilders trial, which has turned into a two-year legal odyssey, represents a landmark case that will establish the limits of free speech in a country where the politically correct elite routinely seek to silence public discussion about the escalating problem of Muslim immigration.

The single-minded determination with which the court has pursued the case against Wilders -- contrary to the advice of the prosecutors -- has led many to condemn the proceedings as a show trial.

Dutch prosecutors, in June 2008, had initially refused to bring charges against Wilders, arguing that he was protected by the right to free speech. They have also argued that Wilders had spoken out not against Muslims per se, but against the threat to Dutch society posed by the growing assertiveness of Islam in Dutch political and social life.

Ironically, for more than two years, the prosecutors have said there is no case against Wilders. But the judges have ignored the prosecutors, dismissed all of the prosecutors' recommendations out of hand, and are insisting on holding the trial at all costs.

In January 2009, the prosecutors were overruled by an appeals court led by Judge Tom Schalken, who ordered that Wilders be charged for "sowing hatred."

Wilders's lawyer, Bram Moszkowicz, argued that the court had overstepped its authority by agreeing to prosecute Wilders after the Public Prosecutor's Office had decided against it.

He had also previously sought to have the judges removed on the opening day of the trial after one of them passed comment on Wilders's decision to make use of his right to remain silent during the proceedings. But that complaint was dismissed.

Although begun in Amsterdam on October 4, and scheduled to end on October 22 with the verdict from the panel of three judges due on November 5, the trial unexpectedly collapsed in disarray on its final scheduled day of hearings after Dutch newspapers reported that Tom Schalken, one of the judges who ordered Wilders to stand trial, had dinner with Hans Jansen, a leading Dutch expert on Islam who also happens to be a defense witness. Jansen said that Schalken had improperly tried "to convince me of the correctness of the decision to take Wilders to court." (An English-language translation of Jansen's accusations can be found here.)

After the allegations about Judge Schalken's behavior came to light, Moszkowicz, asked the court to summon Jansen, but Moszkowicz was refused. In response, Moszkowicz formally protested that the judges were biased against the defendant and should be dismissed; he also called Schalken's contact with Jansen "scandalous."

For these reasons, many people have called the proceedings a "show trial," and Wilders has said that the trial is attacked against him.

A separate review panel was then convened to consider Moszkowicz's complaint, which it upheld by ordering a retrial with new judges. Judge G. Marcus said the panel understood Wilders' "fear that the court's decision displays a degree of bias ... and under those circumstances accepts the appeal." At the time, Wilders -- who has called the trial a farce, a disgrace and an assault on free speech -- welcomed the decision, saying: "This gives me a new chance with a new fair trial."

Wilders has articulated what is at stake in this case: "I am being prosecuted for my political convictions. The freedom of speech is on the verge of collapsing. If a politician is not allowed to criticize an ideology anymore, this means that we are lost, and it will lead to the end of our freedom."

In a March 2009 interview with Jeff Jacoby of the Boston Globe, Wilders summed up his views about Islam: "I have nothing against the people. I don't hate Muslims. But Islam is a totalitarian ideology. It rules every aspect of life -- economics, family law, whatever. It has religious symbols, it has a God, it has a book -- but it's not [only] a religion. It can be compared with totalitarian ideologies like Communism or fascism. There is no country where Islam is dominant where you have a real democracy, a real separation between church and state. Islam is totally contrary to our values."

On May 23, however, presiding judge Marcel van Oosten rebuffed calls for the case to be dropped, saying Wilders' "right to presumption of innocence has not been violated." Van Oosten said Schalken had not attempted to tamper with the witness and that the court's independence had been demonstrated. In a hearing broadcast online by NOS Dutch public television, van Oosten said: "It isn't plausible that Schalken tried to influence Jansen. We cannot conclude that the defendant's rights were violated. The request is denied. The trial must go on."

The closely-watched trial of Wilders -- who is accused of "making statements insulting to Muslims" -- was halted in October 2010 after it emerged that one of the judges attempted to influence an expert witness before the trial. A verdict is now expected in mid-June, although no date has yet been fixed.

Wilders is facing five counts of inciting racial and religious hatred against Muslims for remarks which include equating Islam with fascism and others calling for a ban on the Koran and a tax on Muslim headscarves. The allegations against Wilders arise partly from the 2008 short film "Fitna" which mixes Koranic verses with footage of extremist attacks. The film led to 61 complaints being filed with the police.

On October 15, midway through the trial, the Dutch Public Prosecutor's office argued that there was no case against Wilders and that he should be acquitted. Amsterdam public prosecutors Birgit van Roessel and Paul Velleman testified in court that Wilders was not guilty of discrimination against Muslims and inciting hatred against them.

Van Roessel and Velleman said that "comments about banning the Koran can be discriminatory, but because Wilders wants to pursue a ban along democratic lines, there is no question of incitement to discrimination 'as laid down in law.'" Regarding Wilder's comparison of the Koran with Adolf Hitler's book Mein Kampf, the prosecutors called it "crude, but that did not make it punishable." In any event, they said, the comparison did not originally come from Wilders, but from the late Italian writer Oriana Fallaci.

During the trial, Moszkowicz rejected the accusations of hate speech against Wilders and urged judges not to "shoot the messenger." He told the court that Wilders is a straight-talking politician seeking to prevent Koran-inspired violence. "Regardless of the danger to his own life, he speaks about the dangers he sees around him that result from immigration," Moszkowicz told the court. "In his eyes, Islam is a totalitarian ideology."

Moszkowicz cited the right to freedom of speech: "Wilders's conscience dictates that he does not close his eyes ... dictates that he places this discussion on the political agenda. As a politician, Wilders does not have to be silent." Wilders "has criticism, and expresses that criticism. Regardless of the danger to his own life, he speaks about the dangers he sees around him that result from immigration."

Moszkowicz also countered accusations by critics who say that Wilders's call for banning the Koran is inconsistent with his defense of the freedom of speech. He told the court that Article 132 of the Dutch Penal Code prohibits books that "incite to violence." He asked if books such as Mein Kampf can be banned under that article, why not another book that manifestly incites its readers to violence and hatred? Moszkowicz said that as long as the Netherlands has such laws, Dutch authorities should apply them consistently and not selectively based on politically correct considerations.

Reacting to the court's decision to order a new trial, Wilders said: "I am confident that I can only be acquitted because I have broken no law but spoke the truth and nothing but the truth, and exercised my freedom of speech in an important public debate about the dangerous totalitarian ideology called Islam."

Wilders' Freedom party has seen a surge in popularity in recent years, coming third in last year's election. Wilders offers parliamentary support to the right-leaning Dutch coalition and actively campaigns to "stop the Islamization of the Netherlands."

If he is found guilty, Wilders faces up to one year in prison and/or a fine of €7,600 ($11,000).

But that is hardly what is at stake.

Source: http://www.hudson-ny.org/2150/geert-wilders-anti-islam-show-trial

Soeren Kern

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.