UK: HSBC Shuts Down Islamist Bank Accounts

by Samuel Westrop

By closing the bank accounts of these groups, HSBC appears to be acting where governments and parliamentarians have failed. The authorities have not, in fact, just failed; they have colluded.
The bank simply stated that to continue providing services would be outside the bank's "risk appetite."

In late July, HSBC, a British multinational bank, closed the bank accounts of Anas Al-Tikriti, a prominent British Islamist activist, and his family. HSBC also closed down the bank accounts of the Cordoba Foundation, of which Tikriti is the Director, and the Finsbury Park Mosque.

In response to enquiries, the bank simply stated that to continue providing services would be outside the bank's "risk appetite."

This latest round of bank account closures has come as a surprise to counter-terrorism experts and much of the media, who note that the Cordoba Foundation and the Finsbury Park Mosque have enjoyed strong political support in the past.

Just a few weeks previously, HSBC also closed the accounts of the Ummah Welfare Trust, a leading British Islamist charity that has previously partnered with the Al Salah Islamic Association, described by the U.S. Treasury Department as "one of the largest and best-funded Hamas charitable organisations in the Palestinian territories." Senior Hamas officials have confirmed that Al Salah is "identified with us."

Anas Al-Tikriti, a senior member of the Muslim Brotherhood in Britain, had his bank account, along with that of his wife and two children, shut down by HSBC. Tikriti has been described as "one of the shrewdest UK-based Brotherhood activists … [who] has sought to persuade Western governments that they should fund Brotherhood groups as moderate alternatives to al-Qaeda."

Tikriti is also a vocal supporter of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, and he has regularly hosted a program on the Arab TV satellite station, Al-Hiwar, founded by Azzam Tamimi, Hamas's "special envoy" to the UK. Tamimi, in 2004, told the BBC that he would become a suicide bomber if he "had the opportunity," and described self-sacrifice for Palestine as "a noble cause."

Anas Al Tikriti (far left), a vocal supporter of Hamas, meets with President Obama.

In an interview with the Muslim Brotherhood's official website after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Tikriti affirmed "the right of the Iraqis to engage in legitimate resistance against foreign occupation." He also has stated that the decision by the Muslim Council of Britain to boycott Holocaust Memorial Day was a "principled stand."

Anas Al-Tikriti (right) with Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh.

In response to HSBC's closure of his bank account, Tikriti claimed that, "HSBC has targeted my family because of my activity in defence of Gaza against the barbaric aggression of the Zionists" and because of his efforts to "oppose the military coup in Egypt."

While many would dispute Tikriti's conclusions, his instincts might be right. The one thing that connects Tikriti with the Cordoba Foundation, the Finsbury Park Mosque and the Ummah Welfare Trust is evidence of their support for the Muslim Brotherhood and the designated terrorist group, Hamas.

The Cordoba Foundation, which Tikriti heads, has been described by Prime Minister David Cameron, as a "political front for the Muslim Brotherhood." In 2009, Cordoba co-sponsored an event organized by Cageprisoners, a pro-jihadist group, which featured as a guest speaker Anwar Al-Awlaki, who later became a senior leader of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, before he was killed in a U.S. drone-strike in 2011.

The Cordoba Foundation also works closely with the Emirates Centre for Human Rights, whose website was originally registered to Tikriti's wife, Malath Shakir, whose bank account was also shut down by HSBC. According to UAE media, the Emirates Centre for Human Rights is part of the global Muslim Brotherhood network.

The most surprising organization to be shut out by HSBC, however, is the Finsbury Park Mosque. The loss of its bank accounts has sparked anger from leading British Muslims and sympathetic parliamentarians.

The Finsbury Park Mosque was once a much easier target for criticism. Ten years ago, the hook-handed Imam of the mosque, Abu Hamza -- recently found guilty of eleven terrorism charges after a five-week trial in New York -- was arrested on terrorism charges.

After his arrest, however, the British government, eager to rid the Finsbury Park Mosque of its pro-terror reputation, passed control of the institution to the Muslim Association of Britain [MAB], one of the better-known Muslim Brotherhood fronts in the UK, and one with which Anas Al-Tikriti was once closely involved. Tikriti's lobbying efforts for the government to embrace Muslim Brotherhood groups as "moderate" alternatives to more overtly terrorist organizations appeared to have paid off.

The government seemed oblivious, perhaps wilfully so, that the MAB's founder, Kemal Helbawi, has proclaimed:

"Oh honoured brothers, the Palestinian cause is not a struggle on borders or on land only. Rather, it is an absolute clash of civilisations: a satanic programme led by the Jews and those who support them and a divine programme carried by Hamas and the Islamic Movement in particular and the Islamic peoples in general."

To run the Finsbury Park Mosque, the MAB appointed directors such as Mohammed Sawalha, a Hamas official described by a Brotherhood website as being "responsible for the political unit of the international Muslim Brotherhood in the UK." Sawalha is also "said to have masterminded much of Hamas's political and military strategy" out of London, as reported by the BBC.

Mohammed Sawalha (middle) with Anas Al Tikriti (to his left).

In addition, the current Imam of Finsbury Park Mosque, Sheikh Rajab Zaki, was a key speaker at rallies in support of Mohamed Morsi, the former Muslim Brotherhood President of Egypt.

Mohammad Kozbar (far-right), another MAB-appointed trustee of Finsbury Park Mosque, meets with senior Hamas official Mohammad Al-Zahar (centre), who has called for the killing of Jewish children

Finsbury Park Mosque continues to promote the Muslim Brotherhood preacher, Jamal Badawi, who has described suicide bombers and Hamas terrorists as "freedom fighters" and "martyrs." Badawi also advocates the right for men to beat their wives, if they show "disregard for [their] marital obligations."

Badawi has also shared a platform with Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, and he is a director of the International Association of Muslim Scholars, which, in 2004, issued a fatwa authorizing the murder of American troops in Iraq. In addition, during the U.S. terror-financing trial of the Holy Land Foundation in 2007, Badawi was named as an unindicted co-conspirator.

By closing the bank accounts of these groups, HSBC appears to be acting where governments and parliamentarians have failed. The authorities have not, in fact, just failed; they have colluded.

Finsbury Park Mosque still enjoys strong support from the local Council and the Metropolitan Police, both of which have sponsored events at the mosque with the support of the World Association of Muslim Youth [WAMY], a Saudi group that is a prolific publisher of anti-Jewish and anti-Shia material. WAMY is accused by a number of governments of funding terrorism.

Both the police and the local government body have provided several tens of thousands of pounds in grants to the mosque.

Kozbar, far-Left, stands next to a British police officer at an event in the Finsbury Park Mosque. Both are in front of a poster advertising WAMY, a Saudi group accused of financing of terrorism, which sponsored the event.

Likewise, the Ummah Welfare Trust has enjoyed the support of MPs; and the Cordoba Foundation has also received government funding through the Prevent scheme, a fund established by the previous Labour government to combat extremism.

As for Anas Al-Tikriti, in January 2014, he was invited by President Obama to the White House, as part of a delegation led by Iraqi politician Osama Al-Nujaifi, who leads the Mutahidoun bloc, a coalition of Iraqi political parties, the leading member body of which, according to Al Monitor, is the Islamic Party, the Iraqi branch of the Muslim Brotherhood.

The biggest question now about HSBC's actions is "why?" Some observers have suggested that the HSBC's decision in 2012 to hire Stuart Levey, the former under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, might have something to do with it. Others have suggested the possibility that the British government's review into the Muslim Brotherhood, which the Prime Minister is due to hear during the summer recess, might be already having some effect.

On the face of it, it seems unlikely that the government would pressure HSBC to shut down Muslim Brotherhood bank accounts while allowing the British police to fund and sponsor Finsbury Park Mosque, one of the Brotherhood's most important institutions.

But the coalition government, much like the Labour government that preceded it, seems always to have embraced a contradictory approach in its efforts to confront British Islamism. The present government, for instance, managed to declare the Islamic Shakhsiyah Foundation a "Hizb ut-Tahrir front" and at the same time provide it with £70,000 of taxpayer monies.

In addition, after the announcement of the Muslim Brotherhood review in March 2014, the Foreign Office revealed that its advisory group on "freedom of religion" was to include a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Tariq Ramadan, as a board member.

Regardless of these apparent contradictions, HSBC's decision to close down these bank accounts is welcome. For far too long, Muslim Brotherhood groups in Britain have escaped censure in spite of their promotion of extremism and their connections to terrorism. Even if the government is dithering, at least the private sector is acting.


Samuel Westrop

Source: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4566/islamist-hsbc-banking

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

MH 17 Versus TWA 800

by Hugh McInnish

On the 17^th of July,  Malaysia Airlines Flight MH-17 crashed in Ukraine, near the Russian border, killing all 298 aboard.  The cause of the crash was announced within hours by several governments: it had been shot down by a surface-to-air missile.

Usually it takes months to make such a determination.  The pieces of aircraft wreckage are typically removed to a large hanger and used to reconstruct the plane so far as it is possible.  Then an array of forensic experts are brought in to probe every minutiae imaginable.  Months later, a report is published that gives the “most probable cause” of the crash.

How, then, could any government leader, or anyone else, for that matter, know the cause so quickly?  How could it be that, almost in an instant, the crash was known not to be due to, say, a bomb on board, or the explosion of a fuel tank?  How was it that other causes were summarily ruled out?

The answer seems to be because witnesses saw the airplane, saw the ascent of the missile, saw the missile intercept the plane, saw the explosion of the missile’s warhead, and then saw the tragic downward plunge of the aircraft.  And all this was consistent with radar data.

Now let us flash back to July 17, 1996.  That evening, at 8:19, TWA Flight 800, a Boeing 747, was cleared for takeoff at New York’s JFK Airport.  The pilot wheeled the jumbo aircraft into position on Runway 13R, opened his four throttles, accelerated smoothly down the runway, lifted off, and took up a course for Paris.  Twelve minutes later, TWA 800 exploded,  the parts raining down in the Atlantic ten miles south of Long Island.

The essences of the MH 17 and TWA 800 accidents are identical: a large passenger aircraft is cruising along high above.  Observers on the ground watching it see an object rise from the ground and intercept it.  An explosive fireball follows.  Radar observations are consistent with the reports of the ground observers.

But here the parallel ends.  The investigation of TWA 800 required four years, after which it was announced that the “most probable cause” of the disaster was the explosion, triggered by an electrical spark, in the fuel-air vapor in one of the aircraft’s fuel tanks.  Thus ended the most costly air-disaster investigation in U.S. history. 

This explanation seemed plausible, and, at least at first, there were good reasons to believe it based on historical analogies – some of them quite surprising.

As an example, take flour – the ordinary kind you have in your pantry.   If flour dust should accumulate in an enclosed volume – say, an empty silo – and if it becomes mixed with the right quantity of air with a component of  20 percent oxygen, and further, if a spark from some source should occur within this mixture, an explosion can occur. 

And just such explosions have occurred, with loss of life and property.  Thus, flour, the main component of "the staff of life," can become the critical ingredient of an implement of death.  Nor is flour the only bizarre "explosive" we have.  In a class with flour, as examples, are sawdust, sugar, and powdered milk.  

Nor have weapons scientists of the world overlooked how this phenomenon can be used in their trade.  Consider our BLU-96: a 2,000-pound bomb dropped by an aircraft.  It contains the fuel for the main explosion plus two small conventional explosives.  The first bursts the container of the fuel for thermobaric reaction, and the second ignites the bomb itself – that is, the fuel-air mixture.  To see a graphic demonstration of the destructive power of this weapon, look here.

Now, Boeing, the designer of the 747 that was Flight TWA 800, is highly staffed with bright scientists who undoubtedly know well these phenomena, and who took them into consideration in the design of their aircraft.  It is unthinkable that they would design an airplane vulnerable to destruction as described by government investigators.  This diminishes the plausibility of the government's story.

And there is another negating factor that looms large: of all the thousands of aircraft that have ever flown, there has never been an instance of an accident resulting  from a fuel tank explosion without an external cause.  Michael Barr, Director of Aviation Safety at the University of Southern California, disbelieves the government's story.  He says, "These planes just don't blow up.  There's too many firewalls, too many checks and balances."

Taken together, these two points cast the government's story into serious doubt.  It seems unlikely that the crash was due to any endogenous cause.   Where, then, does that leave us?

American Thinker writer Jack Cashill proposes an exogenous cause, and I believe he has the answer.  He has written extensively about TWA 800.   Read him here, here, and here.

In these articles, Cashill persuasively makes the following salient points:

-There were 270 eyewitnesses who said they saw what looked like a missile strike the aircraft.

-The testimony of these witnesses was corroborated by radar data.

-The investigators ignored all these witnesses.

-The government fabricated witnesses' statements, simply recording interviews that never took place.

-The expert personnel from the NTSB, those experienced in aircraft accident investigations, were overwhelmed by interference from the FBI and the CIA, whose personnel lacked pertinent experience.

-Chemical tests showed evidence of explosive residue on parts of the aircraft wreckage.

In sum, the evidence is strong that TWA 800 was brought down by a missile.

How could it be that two accidents so similar in nature could be reacted to so utterly differently?  The answer lies in politics.  For MH 17, there are powerful political leaders who want the plane to have been shot down, since it will help their side in the never-ending Mid East wars.  The controversy is not whether it was shot down, but rather by whom it was shot down.

But in the case of TWA 800, the politics are drastically different.  If the plane were downed by terrorists, or if it were brought down by a tragic error of our own forces, this, in either case, would be a monumental embarrassment to our government.

This our leaders couldn’t possibly allow to be the conclusion.  Hence the bizarre and shameful “investigation” that ensued.

As I see it, the facts before us justify the conclusion that the preponderance of evidence points to a missile having caused the crash of TWA 800.  I would add that if a congressional investigation were made, with its authority to put witnesses under oath, and with its power of subpoena, proof beyond reasonable doubt – the level of proof required to hang a man – could easily be reached.

Jack Cashill calls for such an investigation.  I join him in that plea.

Hugh McInnish

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/2014/07/mh_17_versus_twa_800.html

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

Photo: Packages to IDF soldiers organized by the Druze village of Pekiin

No need for words here --





Except for this: THANKS! to these loyal citizens of Israel!!

Kerry Trying To Save Hamas, Restore Muslim Brotherhood

by Khaled Abu Toameh

There is growing concern in Ramallah, Cairo, Riyadh and Dubai that the U.S. Administration is working to prevent the collapse of Hamas.
"The Americans mistakenly think that moderate political Islam, which is represented by the Muslim Brotherhood, will be able to combat radical Islam. The Americans are trying to bring the Muslim Brotherhood back to the region." — Palestinian official, Ramallah.
The Iranians, with whom the U.S. is now negotiating on nuclear weapons -- amid fears in the Middle East that the U.S. will capitulate to Tehran's demands if it has not effectively capitulated to them already -- have now joined Qatar and Turkey in opposing any attempt to confiscate Hamas's weapons.
The Paris conference was actually a spit in the face to the anti-Hamas forces in the Arab world. By failing to invite the Palestinian Authority to the conference, Kerry indicated that he does not see any role for Abbas and his loyalists in a post-Hamas Gaza Strip.

The U.S. Administration's main objective in cease-fire talks is clearly to empower Muslim Brotherhood and its Palestinian branch, Hamas.

This is how the Palestinian Authority [PA] sees the recent efforts of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to achieve a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas.

It is no secret that the PA, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates would like to see an end to Hamas's rule over the Gaza Strip. Moreover, they seem to support the idea of disarming Hamas as part of any agreement to end the current crisis.

PA President Mahmoud Abbas, who has been issuing strong condemnations of the Israeli "aggression" on the Gaza Strip over the past few weeks, is hoping that the war will result in the return of his loyalists to control the Gaza Strip or, at least to the Rafah border crossing with Egypt.

Abbas and his Arab allies are not going to shed a tear if Hamas is removed from power and the Gaza Strip is demilitarized at the end of the war.

There is growing concern in Ramallah, Cairo, Riyadh and Dubai, however, that the U.S. Administration is now working to prevent the collapse of Hamas.

This concern was reinforced by Secretary of State John Kerry's recent tour of the region. His trip ended with last week's Paris meeting to discuss the Israel-Hamas war.

That Kerry chose to invite Qatar and Turkey -- the only two countries that support Hamas -- to the conference was received with anger and shock by the Palestinian Authority and its Arab allies.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry shares a laugh with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and Qatari Foreign Minister Khalid Al Attiyah during cease-fire negotiations in Paris, on July 26, 2014. (Image source: U.S. State Department)

The Paris conference was actually a spit in the face of anti-Hamas forces in the Arab world.
By failing to invite the PA to the conference, Kerry indicated that he does not see any role for Abbas and his loyalists in a post-Hamas Gaza Strip. Kerry chose to conduct indirect negotiations with Hamas through their patrons in Doha and Ankara.

By ignoring Egypt, which considers Hamas a threat to its national security and has been conducting its own war against the Islamist movement over the past year, Kerry sent a message to the Arabs and Muslims according to which the U.S. Administration is on the side of the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies.

"Kerry is exploiting the war to restore the influence of Muslim Brotherhood in the region," charged a Palestinian official in Ramallah. "The Americans mistakenly think that moderate political Islam, represented by Muslim Brotherhood, would be able to combat radical Islam. The Americans are trying to bring the Muslim Brotherhood back to the region."

Another Palestinian official accused President Barack Obama and Kerry of organizing a "Friends of Hamas" conference in Paris. "How can you hold such a conference without inviting representatives of the Palestinian Authority and Egypt?" he asked. "Qatar and Turkey are happy to see the Obama Administration help them in their effort to save Hamas and embolden Muslim Brotherhood."

Alarmed by Kerry's alliance with Qatar and Turkey, Abbas flew earlier this week to Jeddah for emergency talks with Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdel Aziz.

According to a senior Abbas advisor, the Palestinian Authority president urged the Saudi monarch to exert pressure on the Obama Administration to keep Qatar and Turkey out of the picture.

The advisor said that Saudi Arabia voiced support for demands to demilitarize the Gaza Strip as part of any cease-fire agreement. "Demilitarizing the Gaza Strip would mean the end of Hamas," the advisor said. "The Egyptians, Saudis and other Arab countries also share this view. They are also upset with Kerry's effort to rely on Qatar and Turkey to solve the crisis. These two countries are interested in keeping Hamas in power."

Abbas and the PA continue to insist that any solution to the current crisis be achieved only through Egypt, which is interested in seeing an end to Hamas' rule over the Gaza Strip.

But the Obama Administration obviously does not share this view. It has chosen a different path -- one that would result in keeping Hamas in power and empowering the Muslim Brotherhood at the expense of moderate, pro-Western Arabs and Muslims.

Palestinian officials in Ramallah made it clear this week that they no longer trust the US Administration because of Kerry's attempt to "appease" Qatar and Turkey at the expense of the Palestinian Authority and Egypt.

"Someone needs to remind Kerry that Qatar is not the sole and legitimate representative of the Palestinians," said a senior Palestinian official in Ramallah.

Another official, Ahmed Majdalani, warned that the Palestinians and Egyptians wouldn't allow Kerry to "bypass" their leaders and meddle in the internal affairs of the Palestinian people.

By siding with Qatar and Turkey, the Obama Administration is effectively expressing its opposition to the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip. Moreover, the Obama Administration now finds itself on the same side with Iran, which is also vehemently opposed to disarming Hamas.

By turning its back on the Palestinian Authority, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, the Obama Administration has paved the way for Iranian intervention in the conflict.

The Iranians, with whom the U.S. is negotiating on nuclear weapons -- amid fears in the Middle East that the U.S. will capitulate to Tehran's demands if it has not effectively capitulated to them already -- have now joined Qatar and Turkey in opposing any attempt to confiscate Hamas's weapons.

On Wednesday, a senior Iranian military official, Gen. Qassem Slimani, issued an unprecedented warning against any attempt to disarm Hamas and other terror groups in the Gaza Strip.

"Disarming the (Palestinian) resistance groups is an illusion and it will not happen," he said.

Such a warning would not have been issued had the Iranians not sensed weakness on the part of the Obama Administration. Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood and their patrons in Qatar, Turkey and Iran are clearly satisfied with the way the Obama Administration is handling the conflict.


Khaled Abu Toameh

Source: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4557/john-kerry-hamas

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

IDF Soldiers Killed in Booby-trapped UN Building

by Karin McQuillan

Why are US taxpayers sending a quarter billion dollars a year to a United Nations agency that shows every sign of cooperating with Hamas to kill soldiers of our ally Israel? Israel National News reports:

The three IDF soldiers who were killed on Wednesday in Gaza, were killed when explosives detonated within a booby-trapped UN building in Khan Younis,Breitbart reports.
An elite IDF tunnel unit was in the process of uncovering an opening to a Hamas tunnel located at an UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency) health clinic when all of a sudden the explosives detonated, causing the entirety of the building to fall on top of the soldiers.
Neither the UN nor UNRWA have commented on the incident that resulted in the deaths of three Israeli soldiers, according to Breitbart.

This latest incident comes in the wake of the discovery of Hamas rockets in three UNWRA schools, only to have UNWRA give the rockets back to Hamas. The UN is demonstrating clear support for Hamas in many ways.  For example, the UN immediately joined the propaganda war by blaming Israel for a strike on a Gaza hospital, which it was later reported was from misfired HAMAS rocket. 


UNWRA and the UN also failed to comment on the loss of Israeli life at the booby-trapped, missile stock pile they allowed in their school.


UNRWA -- the UN Agency dedicated solely to helping Palestinian “refugees” -- has 30,000 employees; all but 200 are Palestinian.  And we, the U.S. taxpayer, support them with almost a quarter of a billion dollars a year!  We pay for food, education and housing, and all sorts of other services like personal loans, irrespective of financial need.  We have perpetuated a welfare monster – an entire terrorist mini-state on the U.S. dole. 


Since there are only 30,000 Palestinians alive today who were displaced by the Arab war against Israeli in 1948, that’s a one to one staff to refugee ratio.  Of course, for the Palestinians there’s a special definition of being a refugee and qualifying for money -- no it’s not for life, it’s for the generations, and it makes no matter if you become the citizen of another country. (2 million Palestinian ‘refugees” became citizens of Jordan.)  It doesn’t matter how much you earn, or if you own a mansion. 


We are now supporting the fourth generation of Palestinians.  They need only have one-eighth of a connection to Israel, that is, one great-grandparent who once worked in Israel (not lived there, worked there – and part time counts). They are still entitled to your money.  The U.N. even defines Palestinians as refugees who always lived on the Arab side of the 1949 armistice line.  There are supposedly 5 million Palestinians whom we owe.   


In contrast, U.N. international staffing for all other refugee services in the world is less than 6,000 people – that’s for  126 countries such as Sudan, Somalia, Syria, and in Africa – where there are genuine refugees in need of emergency food and housing.  The most staff any one country gets is 437.  Yes, 437 compared to 29,800 for Palestinians.  Other people only get to be called refugees until they are resettled somewhere.


Where are our fiscal hawks?  Where is Ted Cruz’s golden tongue?  Senator Rand Paul, this is a case for you.  Here’s a beautiful example of international involvement we could do without.


The festering sore of the Palestinian grievance industry could not exist without American dollars.  We pay for their schools and their housing. Gaza lives on American welfare.  It is time to cut them off.

Karin McQuillan

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2014/07/idf_soldiers_killed_in_boobytrapped_un_building.html

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

Time for Hamas's Hollywood Sympathizers to Snap out of It!

by Dan Gordon

I love actors. Honestly -- that wasn't sarcasm. I started out as an actor before I began writing for a living. I shared my life with an actress who was/is a wonderful artist and woman. As they used to say about Jews And African Americans some of my best friends ... actors and writers, directors, musicians, artists of every type are the most empathetic people on earth. We have to be. It's not just a job, for the ones who are serious about it, it's our calling. When we say, "I feel your pain," we mean it. Because we must feel the pain of every character we portray or create. We feel the pain of that part of our own soul that corresponds to that of the character.

And no writer, actor or director ever plays, creates or directs a villain. Each character we create is the hero of his own story, and we find the humanity in each, no matter how villainous the character's actions may be.

That is even more so with the truly great artists like Javier Bardem, Penelope Cruz and Pedro Almadovar. Their work, collectively and individually, is an alter at which, I, as a screenwriter, playwright and novelist, worship often. They are my artistic Rabbis and teachers. They feel others' pain, no matter how villainous the character.

Bardem portrayed a chilling mass murderer in No Country For Old Men, and deservedly won the Academy Award for it. His portrayal was riveting, not because he portrayed the character's villiany, but because he somehow managed to convey his humanity, despite the fact that the character was a heartless serial killer who murdered, or not, depending on the outcome of the toss of a coin. That makes for great acting.

Unfortunately it can, and does, cloud both the moral and intellectual compass of many artists like the truly wonderful Bardem, Cruz, Almadovar et al.

They look at pictures of Palestinians, who truly are suffering in this war, which Hamas and its terrorist army have perpetrated against Israel and our civilian population, and they "feel their pain" or as close as you can get to doing that in Madrid or Malibu.

Palestinian homes are being destroyed. Israel is the one shelling them, as they rightly state, by land, air and sea. Therefore Israel, a white European Colonial transplant persecuting a brown skinned indigenous people, are the villains in this reality show watched by millions on TV. Therefore Israel must be condemned, damned, censured and stopped by the international community!

They have signed a letter stating," Palestinian homes are being destroyed!"

That is indeed true. The reason for that, my brothers and sisters in Cinema, are the actions of Hamas, a murderous and cynical terrorist organization which seized power, not from Israel but from the Government of the Palestinian Authority of Mahmoud Abbas!

They lined up their fellow Palestinian brothers against walls and machine gunned them to death. If you have the stomach for it the videos are still on YouTube. They blindfolded and bound their Palestinian Brothers and pushed them off multiple storied buildings to horrific deaths.

That's Hamas. That's how they seized power.

Those were their crimes against their fellow Palestinians.

With the greatest respect, Javier, Penelope and Pedro, from one who admires your artistic achievements more than words can express, did you write any letters of outrage and condemnation then? Did you call on the international community to end the suffering then?

Well, but the deaths were only in the hundreds then, not over a thousand like now, and besides that was a Palestinian internal affair, one, which I'm sure, you felt uncomfortable in condemning.

But what Israel is doing is clear-cut.

It's genocide!

Is it really?

We're all visual artists at the end of the day, creating images for the screen. Look, then, at the picture below.

I can get you literally hundreds more just like it. I'd be happy to. Just ask. The picture is of the entrance to a terrorist tunnel that was uncovered in the tiny space between two Palestinian homes. The tunnel to which it connects goes underneath the internationally recognized borders of Israel, the borders you demand we return to  put a pin in that thought for a moment). The tunnel, and scores of others like it, then comes up next to and in some cases inside Israeli civilian farming communities. One tunnel came up in the communal dining hall of a farming village where as many as eight hundred people would have been gathered for holiday meals in normal times. Terrorists armed with anti tank missiles, machine guns, hand grenades, thousands of rounds of ammunition, handcuffs and tranquilizers then come up out of those tunnels with the intent of murdering, maiming and kidnapping hundreds of Israeli men, women and children. That's not in theory. Hamas terrorists have tried to do that almost half a dozen times in the last few weeks.

Well, but you say, no such killings of hundreds of Israelis have taken place!

Meanwhile the poor Palestinian people are suffering from Israeli bombardment.

My dear friends, no such killings of hundreds of Israeli civilians have taken place because of Israeli bombardment.

They have not taken place because my brothers and sisters in arms watch the border diligently, and when necessary, lay down their lives to protect our men, women and children from the terrorists who entered those tunnels next to, and many times from within, those very Palestinian homes whose destruction you rightly bemoan, as by the way do I, and, oddly, most other Israelis.

Those Palestinian homes are being destroyed because Hamas is committing a war crime under the Geneva accords, which you cite, against their own people, by launching their rockets, hiding their terrorist tunnel entrances and missiles, rockets mortars and machine guns, inside those homes, thus turning their own people's dwellings into Military targets . Why in the name of all that is holy, don't you at least acknowledge, let alone condemn, that clear and cruel war crime, not just against Israeli civilians but Palestinian civilians?

In your letter you state, "they (the Palestinians) are being denied.. electricity and free movement to their hospitals, schools and fields while the international community does nothing."

My friends, Hamas has fired from, launched rockets from, put terrorist tunnel entrances in, and hidden weapons inside, not just people's homes, but inside their schools and mosques and hospitals. Hamas has hidden their rockets in UN operated schools! That's not a wicked Zionist lie, that's a UN finding, against which they have, albeit weakly, protested.

I personally have been in Gaza as an Israeli soldier and have had Palestinian farmers come up to me, personally, because I wear an officer's rank, and demand of me that we, the Israel Defense Forces, not stop until we have killed all the Hamas operatives. Those aren't my words. They were the words of Palestinian farmers in El Atatra, and the reason they made that demand of us was because Hamas had confiscated the fields that had once supported them and their family by growing sunflowers, and now used them as rocket launching sites aimed at Israeli civilians.

Why in the name of the humanity I know you treasure, are you not condemning that?

That was a rhetorical question.

I know why you're not condemning that.

It's because they look weak and we look strong. And one always roots for the underdog in the movies. Except this isn't a movie. There's no one to say "cut" when the terrorist comes up out of the tunnel or the rocket or mortar is hurtling toward you.

It's not even a reality show though I know many in the media try to milk the ratings by presenting it as such.

But we're not Honey Boo Boo or The Housewives of whatever.

We're a country that was attacked, that said calm would be answered with calm and was answered instead with thousands of rocket attacks aimed almost exclusively at Israeli civilians while hiding behind Palestinian civilians. Hamas is committing war crimes against both our peoples not only while the international community dies nothing, but while well-meaning, empathetic people like you enable them like a well-meaning friend turning a blind eye to a junkie's addiction. Except in this case the junkie is a terrorist organization as wicked as any on earth.  Don't you see that your misguided enabling is killing both our peoples?

I know it takes more effort to understand something than to simply emotionally react with whatever the bumper sticker mentality if the day is. But honestly, both the Palestinian people and we deserve better of you.

But you may excuse Hamas's terrorist tactics because they don't have an air force or tanks and thus is the only way they can fight back against a wicked force of Zionists who have invaded" the Palestinian territories instead of returning to the 1967 borders."

Friends, there's no excuse for not getting the facts straight -- you can Google them. With regard to Gaza, which is, after all, where the war is, Israel unilaterally withdrew to the 1967 borders almost ten years ago!!

In that time Hamas had launched three wars against us. There was no air campaign against Hamas until they began firing hundreds of rockets a day against us.

Because of the Iron Dome anti-missile system we developed, the rockets caused no loss if life on our side and so when Egypt proposed a cease fire and the Palestinian President and the Arab League endorsed it...we accepted it. I know history is a bore but this was only two weeks ago!

That's when Hamas launched its first terrorist tunnel attack against our civilians. Had we not intercepted and killed and driven back the terrorist force, it would have resulted in the worst terrorist attack, the highest loss of civilian life, in Israel's history .

That's when we had no choice but to begin the ground operation … after Israel, Egypt, the Arab League and the President of the Palestine Authority all agreed to end the violence, stop the killing And destruction and try to create a cycle of peace. It Is Hamas that has brought about this awful cycle of death.

I wrote a movie called The Hurricane that Norman Jewison directed. It gave me an opportunity to complement what I thought was one if the best scenes he had ever directed. The scene is in Moonstruck between Cher And Nicholas Cage, in which an emotional Nick Cage prattled on about his endless love blah, blah, blah.

Cage is pitch perfect the sincere, emotive lover. But he's just spewing so much nonsense that Cher hauls off and slaps him so hard his grandchildren probably felt it. She then shouts the same two words that, with the greatest respect, we who are suffering from Hamas' dual war crimes, have every right to demand of you, and every other armchair enabler, snap out of it!


Dan Gordon is a captain in the IDF (Res)

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/2014/07/time_for_hamass_hollywood_sympathizers_to_snap_out_of_it.html

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

Mordechai Kedar: Why Hamas is Still Holding Out

by Mordechai Kedar

There are six differences between Israel and Hamas that have a role to play in addition to the bravery and initiative of the IDF.

Translated by Arutz 7

Before the start of Operation Protective Edge, an entire bevy of so-called "experts" appeared on Israeli media informing  us of the weak state of  Hamas, how its oxygen supply is cut off because the smuggling tunnels from the Sinai are closed and Egypt has turned against it, as has Saudi Arabia, it cannot pay salaries, it wants to preserve the state it has created in Gaza at all costs - and so one and so forth.

Because of that, they concluded, its power of resistance is limited and since we have the Iron Dome to protect us, our decision makers can act judiciously, using our military power – particularly from the air – which is immeasurably more massive than that of Hamas. Even the world is on our side, they said, and surprisingly, supports us.

Now, after four weeks of air attacks and two weeks of a ground operation, Gaza has seen over 1200 of its people killed and 7000 wounded, and has not capitulated, has not raised a white flag, continues to launch rockets to Tel Aviv and the south and the Gazan population has not rebelled. Just imagine what would happen to Israel's government if something like that, G-d forbid, happened here. It has suddenly become clear that all the "weakness factors" attributed to Hamas – the closed smuggling tunnels that Sisi sealed, Saudi Arabia, money and state – do not have the effect the "experts" predicted for the organization. Perhaps Hamas is not exactly the organization these "experts" painted for us.

Unfortunately, our mistakes result from continuing to look at the enemy through our own cultural lenses: we need money, a strong army, protection from rockets, friends in the region and international approval, and we think that if Hamas has none of these, it will be as weak as we would be if we lacked them. There is no greater error than that line of thought, because Hamas is the product of a vastly different culture where the strength and weakness factors are totally different from ours.

1. The Spiritual Element
The basic and most deep-seated difference between us is that Hamas depends on a "power player" in the form of Allah, who dwells on high. The organization's raison d'etre is a plan whose end goal is Allah's reign over the entire world and Hamas' activity is aimed at succeeding in that Jihad for Allah. Hamas fighters are filled with fervor and the bandanna on their heads says the "Shahada", the testimony that there is no deity besides Allah and that Mohammed is his prophet.

Our army is fighting valiantly for our nation, people and land, all of which are human and tangible, and if a commander dares to write his soldiers something with an allusion to religion, he is attacked by the thought police of Haaretz, and defamed along with the Jewish message he was trying to put forward. (An allusion to IDF Brigadier General Winter, who wrote his soldiers a letter of encouragement using biblical expressions from the fight of David and Goliath and was attacked by anti-religious coercion advocates). Many of us have distanced ourselves from the "Power Player" who dwells on high and have erased the concept from our cultural experience. Hamas continues to stick to spiritual goals and in this regard, has the advantage.

2. Culture and Ethos
Our culture sanctifies life, health, education, progress and economic, scientific and civil success. Death negates all of these and therefore, naturally, we ty to prevent it when it comes to our lives and also those of our enemies.  The terror organizations in our region, on the other hand, sanctify death for Allah, and even mothers rejoice when their sons go out to die.

This difference explains the fact that the over 1200 dead do not bring Hamas to ask for a ceasefire. As long as the dead are called "shaheeds", they are considered not dead, according to the Koran: "Do not think that those who have been killed for Allah are dead; they are alive and nourished by the hand of Allah (Chap. 3, v. `69).

Hamas terrorists are proud of their often-used slogan: "The Jews wish for life and we wish for death."

This is the reason for their using human shields, for even if those "shields" are killed, they are not really dead, so their death is not seen as something bad. In general, in the Middle East there is no dividing line between citizens and combatants, everyone is considered "the enemy".

3. Attitude to the Media
The media has a critical role to play in wartime, as it has direct influence on large audiences worldwide and determines the public's  opinion of the operation.

Public opinion has immediate influence on politicians, who try to act in accordance with their voter's inclinations. Israel adheres to journalistic ethics and limits its announcements to the media, refraining from showing bodies, body parts and other horrors that can influence viewers. Hamas, on the other hand, does not care about causing people to  be shocked by horrible pictures of the dead and wounded, and supplies photographs that are intended to create a sympathetic audience.

4. Legal Restrictions
Israel is a country based on law, it limits military actions to the strictures of international law. Soldiers and officers can find themselves facing the Israeli courts or international ones. Hamas is not a state, does not act like one and does not limit its activities to the accepted laws of warfare.

The obvious example: Israel attempts to prevent harm to non-involved citizens, while Hamas intentionally launches deadly rockets to heavily populated Israeli areas.

5. International Support
We have been hearing that "the world understands us" from the beginning of hostilities and therefore, that it supports our actions.  However, this is a highly fragile support, easily shaken by one picture of a rocket – even a Hamas rocket – hitting a school.

The change in America's position is a gigantic plug for Hamas' steadfastness, for even the US president has adopted Hamas conditions for cease fire, first among them removing the sea blockade of Gaza, although at the beginning of the operation he supported Israel and its right to defend itself.

Hamas enjoys unlimited and unquestioning outside support from Qatar and Turkey. Despite the losses and destruction in Gaza, those two countries will stream material and financial aid to Gaza, including building materials that will allow it to rehabilitate the organization, its weapons arsenals and rockets, enlist new soldiers, train and equjip them as well as dig more tunnels so as to infiltrate Israel and sow death.  

6. Consensus from Within
There was wall-to-wall consensus in Israel at the beginning of the ground operation aimed at destroying the tunnels Hamas had built in order to attack civilian targets in Israel. As the number of losses grows, support is declining somewhat and criticism – almost non existent at first – is being voiced. Hamas has no internal critics, as anyone who has lived in Gaza for the seven years during which Hamas has ruled the area, knows well what will happen to he who dares to criticize Hamas.

In conclusion, these six differences create an assymetrical combat reality. We will say that we have won, but Hamas will say the same. Even if most of its people are dead or taken prisoner, all its weapons confiscated and all its tunnels blown up, the organization's leader will come up out of his underground shelter wearing a blood-soaked bandage, stand on the ruins of a home and raise his fingers in  a "V" salute. The rest of us may find it infuriating, delusionary, weird and grotesque, but he  knows the truth: within a year at most, he will enlist thousands and train them, within three years, he will rearm and resupply his rockets and missiles arsenal completely  and therefore, he sees the victory as his.

He feels that the future is his because he is fighting the battle of Allah and Allah has come to his aid. He is not afraid to die and the lives of citizens mean nothing to him.  He takes cynical advantage of international and national law, manipulates world opinion using a compliant media.

Hamas leaders have a new goal and it is to have the war continue for 33 days, the number of days of the Second Lebanon War. It wants to prove that it can hold on longer than Hezbollah. This is part of the Sunni (Hamas) i-Shiite (Hezbollah) rivalry played on the backdrop of the war in Syria. The competition also explains the fact that Hezbollah has not launched rockets from the north. It has no desire to help Hamas, which did not come to Assad's aid against Syrian rebel forces. It is hard to predict if the schism between them will continue to hold fast.

That's the situation in Gaza. These are the reasons for it. Let us hope for the best.


Mordechai Kedar

Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/15428#.U9ojdGMYjLM

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

VIDEO: IDF Finds Terror Tunnel in Gaza Mosque

by Arutz Sheva Staff

Hamas does not only use schools to store weapons and launch rockets, as the IDF discovered.

Gaza’s Hamas terrorist rulers do not only use schools to store weapons and launch rockets towards Israel.

On Wednesday, a joint IDF task force uncovered a tunnel entrance on the ground floor of a mosque that had been used by Hamas terrorists to attack Israeli soldiers.

The following video released by the IDF shows aerial footage of the tunnel’s demolition:




Arutz Sheva Staff

Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/183544#.U9pTj2MYjLN

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