And again: 'Palestinian' stabs Christian British student to death on Jerusalem tram
A 23-year old Christian British woman was murdered by a 'mentally unstable' (is there any other kind?) 'Palestinian' terrorist on the Jerusalem tram this afternoon. The terrorist was a 57-year old (so much for 'only' letting 'over-50 Palestinians' move around freely) resident of Ras-al-Amud, the area near the Mount of Olives. The stabbing took place as the tram rounded the corner at IDF Square, just outside Jerusalem's Old City.
Another woman, who is pregnant, was injured when the train stopped, and a man was hurt while trying to flee the assailant. They are both lightly hurt, MDA said.
The assailant has been identified as Gamil Tamimi, 57, a Palestinian resident of Ras al-Amud in East Jerusalem who was recently released from a psychiatric hospital, according to the police said.
Probably related to this Tamimi - at least distantly. Israel is holding this paragon of virtue - at least until the next Terrorists for X exchange.
The Shin Bet said that Tamimi had tried to commit suicide by swallowing a razorblade while hospitalized. In 2011, he was convicted of molesting his daughter.
"This is yet another case of a Palestinian suffering from personal, mental or moral distress choosing to commit an act of terror to escape his problems," the Shin Bet says.
So in 'Palestinian society' you can save your 'family honor' by murdering a Jew. Murder a Jew and and molesting your daughter is forgiven.
Greetings from Boston, where I landed yesterday morning. A brief post and then back to work.
The Washington Post is reporting that the entire senior executive level at the State Department has resigned, apparently out of fear of what might happen in a Trump administration. Keeping in mind that most of the senior echelon in the State Department is Arabist, this may be good for Israel, notwithstanding reporter Josh Rogin's obvious discomfort with it.
[Secretary of State Rex] Tillerson was actually inside the State Department’s headquarters in
Foggy Bottom on Wednesday, taking meetings and getting the lay of the
land. I reported Wednesday morning that the Trump team was narrowing its search
for his No. 2, and that it was looking to replace the State
Department’s long-serving undersecretary for management, Patrick
Kennedy. Kennedy, who has been in that job for nine years, was actively
involved in the transition and was angling to keep that job under
Tillerson, three State Department officials told me.
Then
suddenly on Wednesday afternoon, Kennedy and three of his top officials
resigned unexpectedly, four State Department officials confirmed.
Assistant Secretary of State for Administration Joyce Anne Barr,
Assistant Secretary of State for Consular Affairs Michele Bond and
Ambassador Gentry O. Smith, director of the Office of Foreign Missions,
followed him out the door. All are career foreign service officers who
have served under both Republican and Democratic administrations.
Kennedy will retire from the foreign service at the end of the month,
officials said. The other officials could be given assignments
elsewhere in the foreign service.
In addition, Assistant
Secretary of State for Diplomatic Security Gregory Starr retired Jan.
20, and the director of the Bureau of Overseas Building Operations,
Lydia Muniz, departed the same day. That amounts to a near-complete
housecleaning of all the senior officials that deal with managing the
State Department, its overseas posts and its people.
“It’s the
single biggest simultaneous departure of institutional memory that
anyone can remember, and that’s incredibly difficult to replicate,” said
David Wade, who served as State Department chief of staff under
Secretary of State John Kerry. “Department expertise in security,
management, administrative and consular positions in particular are very
difficult to replicate and particularly difficult to find in the
private sector.”
All I can think of when I hear about the State Department securing diplomats is Benghazi, although that was clearly Hillary Clinton's and Barack Obama's fault, and not that of the State Department bureaucrats.
More encouraging is the fact that 'Palestinian' chief negotiator bottle washer Saeb Erekat is expressing 'shock' at President Trump's silence on Israeli 'settlement building.'
On Tuesday, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman announced the approval of 2,500 housing units
in Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, in order to accommodate the
housing needs of the residents and to return their daily routine to
normal.
The announcement followed the approval earlier this week of 566 new housing units in the Jerusalem neighborhoods of Ramat Shlomo, Ramot and Pisgat Ze'ev.
While the United Nations and the European Union were quick to condemn the new construction, White House spokesman Sean Spicer on Tuesday declined to express a position on Israeli construction when asked about it in his daily press briefing.
"Israel continues to be a huge ally of the United States," Spicer
said, when asked about Trump's perspective on the Israeli plan to
implement the construction plans.
"He wants to grow closer to Israel to make sure it gets the full
respect in the Middle East," he continued. "We'll have a conversation
with the prime minister."
Responding on Wednesday to the White House refusing to comments, Erekat told AFP,
"We used to hear condemnations, we used to hear American positions
saying '(Israel) should stop settlement activities, it's an obstacle to
peace.'"
"Not commenting, does that mean that President Trump is
encouraging... settlement activities? We need an answer from the
American administration," he added.
Life has sure changed for the 'Palestinians,' hasn't it? If they don't get to the table and negotiate (for real) soon without preconditions, there's not likely to be much left to negotiate about. This whiny series of diagrams regarding future Israeli building plans in Jerusalem appeared in Israel's Hebrew 'Palestinian' daily (HaAretz). If all of these plans go through, Jerusalem will thankfully be surrounded with Jewish children.
All of this follows on the heels of yesterday's news that the first act of the Trump-Tillerson State Department was to place a hold on the $221 million parting gift that former President Hussein Obama attempted to give the 'Palestinians' and that one of President Trump's first executive orders would suspend aid to the United Nations or any of its agencies if they recognize a 'Palestinian state.'
Much of this is, of course, a reversal of Obama administration policy implemented during the last administration's first days in office. But if it lasts, the world will be a very different place four or eight years from now.
In the Washington Post, Charles Krauthammer explains what was different about that UN Security Council resolution, and how the Obama administration stabbed Israel in the back by allowing its passage.
An ordinary Israeli who lives or works in the Old City of Jerusalem
becomes an international pariah, a potential outlaw. To say nothing of
the soldiers of Israel’s citizen army. “Every pilot and every officer
and every soldier,” said a confidant of Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, “we are waiting for him at The Hague,” i.e. the International Criminal Court.
Moreover,
the resolution undermines the very foundation of a half-century of
American Middle East policy. What becomes of “land for peace” if the
territories that Israel was to have traded for peace are, in advance,
declared to be Palestinian land to which Israel has no claim?
The peace parameters
enunciated so ostentatiously by Secretary of State John Kerry on
Wednesday are nearly identical to the Clinton parameters that Yasser
Arafat was offered and rejected in 2000 and that Abbas was offered by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in 2008. Abbas, too, walked away.
Kerry
mentioned none of this because it undermines his blame-Israel
narrative. Yet Palestinian rejectionism works. The Security Council just
declared the territories legally Palestinian — without the Palestinians
having to concede anything, let alone peace. What incentive do the
Palestinians have to negotiate when they can get the terms — and
territory — they seek handed to them for free if they hold out long
enough?
Indeed. The Post can look back at this column from 2009 and realize that the 'Palestinians' were correct.
Yet
on Wednesday afternoon, as he prepared for the White House meeting in a
suite at the Ritz-Carlton in Pentagon City, Abbas insisted that his
only role was to wait. He will wait for Hamas to capitulate to his
demand that any Palestinian unity government recognize Israel and swear
off violence. And he will wait for the Obama administration to force a
recalcitrant Netanyahu to freeze Israeli settlement construction and
publicly accept the two-state formula.
Until Israel meets his
demands, the Palestinian president says, he will refuse to begin
negotiations. He won't even agree to help Obama's envoy, George J.
Mitchell, persuade Arab states to take small confidence-building
measures. "We can't talk to the Arabs until Israel agrees to freeze
settlements and recognize the two-state solution," he insisted in an
interview. "Until then we can't talk to anyone."
And what the Post doesn't mention is that Netanyahu is reported to have offered even more in 2013.
If Hillary Clinton had won November's election, Israel would now have its back to the wall. Fortunately, Donald Trump won the election, and if he is willing to go to the wall in Israel's defense, perhaps this disgraceful resolution can be mitigated.
Joe Biden gets his revenge on Netanyahu by forcing Ukraine to vote against Israel
YNet is reporting that serial groper Joe Biden got his revenge for being 'humiliated' by Prime Minister Netanyahu six years ago by pressuring Ukraine to vote in favor of a Security Council resolution calling Israeli 'settlements' 'illegal' on Friday.
Ukraine’s decision to vote in favor of the resolution appears to
demonstrate the extent to which US President Barack Obama was behind the
decision.
According to officials in Israel, Ukrainian Prime Minister
Volodymyr Groysman, a Jew who is thought of as one of Israel’s main
supporters, wanted that his country not be involved in the consultations
held on the resolution.
However, Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko decided to vote in
favor of its passage following a telephone conversation with US Vice
President Joe Biden.
"The text of the resolution is balanced," Kiev asserted. "It
calls for taking measures necessary for peaceful solution from both
Israeli and Palestinian sides: Israel should stop its settlement
activities while Palestinian authorities – to take effective measures
toward fighting against terrorism."
"Our country consistently advocates the respect for the
international law by everyone and everywhere as has experienced itself
the tragic consequences brought by its violation," the Ukrainian Foreign
Ministry added.
Perhaps this is why one of the first places in which the Netanyahu government has announced that it will build in response to the United Nations is the scene of Biden's 'humiliation,' RamatShlomo.
Obama claims Peres and Rabin aren't buried in Israel
Shavua tov, a good week to everyone.
Here's a screen shot of the text of President Obama's speech at Shimon Peres' Friday funeral:
For the record, Mount Herzl is located in 'West' Jerusalem (the part that was ruled by Jews between 1948-67) so he doesn't have that excuse either. This is from Tom Gross via email:
What many Israelis and others don’t find amusing is that the White House – eager to stick with its fiction that (west) Jerusalem is not part of Israel – issued a press release correcting their previous press release which had stated that Peres’s funeral was in Israel. (See screenshot above.)
It is preposterous that Barack Obama, having just given a speech that many Israelis welcomed in which he appeared to show some real empathy for Zionism, and having firmly implied that he was giving the speech in Israel, should then allow his press aides to remove the word “Israel” from the White House press material sent out to hundreds of journalists.
Even journalists not normally sympathetic to Israel said they were surprised at the White House’s actions.
Obama was speaking at Mount Herzl nearby Yad Vashem in west Jerusalem. Shimon Peres’ coffin was laid to rest next to that of Yitzhak Rabin. Is it really the position of the White House that Rabin and Peres are not buried in Israel?
Why anyone thinks Obama has any empathy for Israel is simply beyond me. He cannot be gone from office soon enough.
Exposed: Terror cell planned to assassinate Netanyahu
Last night, Israelis found out that the Prime Minister who is an expert on terrorism was the target of a terror plot himself.
According to the report, the plot was made public with the Attorney
General’s indictment last month of two of the terrorists, including the
head of the cell, a 25-year-old from Kfar Yassuf in the West Bank who
had rented an apartment in the Abu Dis neighborhood of east Jerusalem.
Ahmed Azzam was in the advanced stages of establishing Hamas
infrastructure in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, with funding and
direction from Hamas in Gaza, the indictment said. To this end, he had
purchased chemical materials and rented the apartment in east Jerusalem,
where he set up an explosives lab. Also, according to the indictment,
Azzam recruited the terrorist who was tasked with transporting the bombs
beyond the Green Line.
It was this terrorist, Hazam Sanduka — nicknamed “the mechanic” for
his intimate knowledge of cars — who had determined that Netanyahu would
be the main target.
The 22-year-old resident of east Jerusalem and a student of Arabic at
Abu Dis University was recruited in November by Azzam, who was looking
for a Jerusalem resident to aid in the preparation of terrorist attacks.
To me, the following is the most incredible part of the story. Sanduka is interviewed. Look where Sanduka was employed:
Interrogator: Did you plan where to carry out terror attacks?
Sanduka: After discussing with Azzam the possibility
of kidnappings, suicide attacks or bombings, I began to think about the
most suitable place to carry them out. Since I worked for a security
company in Jerusalem, I thought the most appropriate places were the
Malha shopping mall, the Jerusalem [sports] Arena and the Great
Synagogue, because many people frequent those places, including Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Interrogator: What was your job at the security company?
Sanduka: My job was to conduct security checks at
the Arena and the Great Synagogue… After purchasing the (chemicals) in
Abu Gosh, I drove to Jaffa to check out whether I was being followed and
if there was a good place there for a terror attack… I saw that there
was, at the Jaffa Port and on the beach, where many restaurants are
located, so it is filled with people.
Can someone please tell me what a 22-year old terrorist - or anyone who is studying Arabic at Abu Dis (an Arab neighborhood near Mount Scopus) - is going working in 'security' in the Jewish populated parts of Jerusalem? Huh?
By the way, the cell was sponsored by Hamas, and not by ISIS as previously thought.
'Palestinian' terrorists getting younger every day
Good evening from Boston, where my new computer is up and running, but has some kinks to be worked out. For starters, the mouse apparently thinks I'm a lefty but of course I'm a righty. Anyone who can help me fix that will be greatly appreciated.
There were three terror attacks in Israel today, highlighted by this one on the Jerusalem trolley system in Pisgat Zev. As in the attack a couple of weeks ago, this one was perpetrated by two children - this time ages 11 and 12.
Let's go to the videotape.
SHOCKING VIDEO: Moments of 2 Arab terrorist children stabbing attack, on Jerusalem light rail, wounding Israeli man. pic.twitter.com/TPvl0WiOhx
2. These kids were caught. Why have they not been removed from their parents' custody as juvenile delinquents as would happen in any other civilized country in the world?
3. Since this is the second terror attack in the last month carried out by 'youths' in Pisgat Zev, maybe it's time to look at which Arabs are living in this Jewish neighborhood and consider sending some of them back over the fence.
Shocking video of one of today's terror attacks in Jerusalem
It's been a difficult, painful day here in Jerusalem, as we have gone back into intifada mode (2000-04).
Here's video of one of today's terror attacks in the city. This took place at a bus stop on Malchei Yisrael Street in the city's Geula neighborhood - a major thoroughfare that I usually walk down at least once a week. In fact, at least two of my children were there yesterday!
Let's go to the videotape.
SHOCKING FOOTAGE: Moment of Arab terrorist ramming his car into bus stop then stabbing Israelis before being shot. pic.twitter.com/c4AAomN4xr
The terrorist - like all of the terrorists involved in today's five terror attacks around the country - was an Arab resident of 'east' Jerusalem, which means that he could roam around freely without hitting any army checkpoints. He was an employee of Bezeq, Israel's national phone carrier, and used his company-issued truck to carry out the attack. His job at Bezeq? Repairing home phone lines.
There is now talk of placing checkpoints outside Arab neighborhoods to prevent terrorists from leaving or imposing a curfew on them altogether.
Last night, I had to take (because we are trying to minimize bus trips - there was a bus attacked today as well) one of my children to a place near where there were two terror attacks during the day yesterday. There were police on every corner and that is likely to be supplemented with army units. That is why police have been on the scene of each attack quickly and casualties have been minimized.
The good news is that the security forces believe that the attacks were coordinated, which would mean that these are not lone wolves and that there is a terror cell behind them that can be broken.
Keep praying for us - living like this is quite stressful....
It's been a very difficult day in Jerusalem, one best symbolized by this bicycle, belonging to 13-year old Naor ben Rut, who was stabbed today while riding it in Jerusalem's Pisgat Zev neighborhood, and who is now fighting for his life at a local hospital.
Naor was stabbed by one of two brothers who went on a stabbing spree together.
Two brothers, Ahmad and Muhamad Manasra, 13&15 years old are the ones who did the terror attack today in Pisgat Zeev. From Bet Hanina
It seems like they're all terrorists. But they're not. The problem is that their leadership is made up of terrorists, who are abetted by the Israeli and international Left.
Over dinner tonight, Mrs. Carl described an Israel Radio interview last week with an Arab woman who teaches in an Israeli school in Bnei Brak of all places. The interviewer kept trying to get the woman - whose husband teaches in an Arab school - to say something horrible about Israelis and/or Jews.
But the woman wasn't biting. She said that she would never say or advocate for such foolish things, because she wishes to live in Israel and in peace with Jews. She doesn't need or want a 'Palestinian state' and her husband feels the same way.
Unfortunately, there's a family in Beit Hanina that feels differently. They taught their two sons to murder Jews, and one of them is now dead.
Meanwhile, a Jewish boy from Pisgat Zev fights for his life.
Breaking: Terror attack in 'east' Jerusalem - UPDATED x3
BREAKING: Terror attack suspected in A-Tur, East Jerusalem; two policemen reported hurt after being rammed by car
— Haaretz.com (@haaretzcom) April 25, 2015
Developing....
UPDATE 11:13 PM
There are now three police officers hurt. Here are more details.
According to Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld, one of the officers is in
moderate-to-serious condition, while the other two are in
light-to-moderate condition. All three were treated at the scene by
Magon David Adom paramedics before being rushed to an area hospital, he
said.
As of 11 p.m. he said the suspect has not been apprehended.
"Police have blocked off roadways in A-Tur and are actively searching for the suspect," he said.
Last
week an Palestinian from east Jerusalem was arrested for for running
over and killing Shalom Yohai Cherki, 25, and seriously injuring a young
woman in the capital.
Under investigation the suspect told police that he was intent on “seeking out Jews to murder.”
The driver apparently fled the scene. The JPost article has a picture of the car.
UPDATE 11:29 PM
But give them a 'state' and they'll stop behaving like this.
SICKENING: Arab terrorist throws stones on Medical forces and officers arriving on scene of run-over terror attack in East Jerusalem.
— Israel News Feed (@IsraelHatzolah) April 25, 2015
UPDATE 11:37 PM
20-year old woman moderately wounded, two other people lightly wounded.
Greetings once again from... London Heathrow, where I've found a hiding place where most of my adoring fans won't be able to find me :-) Yes, I'm on my way home....
Unfortunately, there's been another terror attack in Jerusalem. Luckily, no one seems to have been hurt. Here's the latest:
JERUSALEM - TERROR: 3 fire-bombs thrown by Arabs towards house in Maale Zeitim exploded, no injuries, PD searching. pic.twitter.com/1D4VcU7CxO
— Israel News Feed (@IsraelHatzolah) January 1, 2015
Nice people. Just give them a 'state' and I'm sure they'll stop committing war crimes and let us live in peace. /sarc
By the way, Maaleh Zeitim happens to be adjacent to the Mount of Olives, which is the oldest Jewish cemetery in the world.
The State of Israel released for burial on Thursday the bodies of the two terrorist cousins who carried out the Har Nof massacre five weeks ago. Although we have not been told who demanded their release and why they were released, the 'supreme court' ordered that the two scumbags be buried in the 'West Bank,' which may mean that the court also ordered their release in the first place. That would be in character.
The Israeli government has been withholding
the bodies of cousins Uday and Ghassan Abu Jamal, who were shot dead by
police after killing four worshipers and a cop in an attack during
morning services on November 18.
Under an Israeli court order, the two
terrorists will be buried in the West Bank and not in Jerusalem, where
they resided, and only 40 people will be allowed to attend the funeral,
the Palestinian Ma’an News Agency reported.
It was not immediately clear why Israel had decided to release the bodies, which it had been holding as a punitive measure.
Nadia Abu Jamal, the widow of slain terrorist Ghassan Abu Jamal, has been ordered deported to Judea and Samaria, and her Jerusalem-born children have been denied health insurance coverage as an inducement for her to leave. We can only hope and pray that Jamal is in fact expelled. In the meantime, demolition orders against the terrorists' homes have been stayed by the 'supreme court' and have not been carried out.
Maan News reports that those present at the funeral were to have been limited to 40 relatives and that the burial was to have taken place within 90 minutes of the bodies having been released. It doesn't look like that happened.
Israel notified the families of Uday and Ghassan Abu Jamal that their
bodies must by buried within 90 minutes of being returned at the
cemetery of al-Sawahira al-Sharqiyya, lawyer Muhammad Mahmoud told
Ma'an.
Only 40 relatives were to be allowed at the funeral, he added.
The family was forced to deposit 20,000 shekels ($5,000) to guarantee they would adhere to the stipulations.
"After
they have been laid to rest, we will feel some relief after some very
hard days following the martyrdom of Ghassan and Uday," a relative said.
...
Around 300 mourners joined the funeral procession, raising Palestinian flags and chanting patriotic slogans.
Someone please tell me that the government kept the NIS 20,000 and will give them to the families of the terror attack victims.... Somehow, I'm sure that won't be the case.
Nadia Abu Jamal, the wife of 31-year old Har Nof terrorist Ghassan Abu Jamal, is protesting her expulsion from Jerusalem back to her home in the 'Palestinian Authority.' She had a residence permit to live in Jerusalem because her late husband lived there.
Referring to her three children, Nadia Abu Jamal told Channel 2 News: "As if it is not enough that they lost their father, now they will also lose the home they live in.”
...
"They told us, the day after the (synagogue) attack, that they had
revoked my residency rights in Jerusalem and that the house will be
razed to the ground," Nadia Abu Jamal told AFP.
"If we'd known that my husband was planning an attack, of course we
would have stopped him," she claimed. "I heard it on the radio, I heard
that the man I loved had done such a thing."
MK Rabbi Eli Ben Dahan (Jewish Home) has no pity for Abu Jamal.
"The wife of the terrorist who murdered five innocent people and left
25 orphans is crying over the fact that following a decision by the
Interior Minister, her children will lose their home after they 'lost'
their father,” wrote Ben-Dahan on Facebook.
"It is interesting that she does not exhibit a single drop of mercy
to the 25 children whose fathers were murdered by the terrorist in cold
blood," wrote Ben Dahan. "Shocking."
Jerusalem police won't return Har Nof terrorists' bodies
The Jerusalem police have announced that they will not return the bodies of the terrorists (pictured) who murdered four Jews this morning. They will be buried in secret, without a ceremony and without any family members present. (Link in Hebrew). Both terrorists were 'Israeli Arabs' from Jerusalem (link in Hebrew again).
Hopefully they will be coated in lard before they are buried (not part of the article - my idea).
This is the FIRST TIME the police have not returned bodies of terrorists to the families (unbelievable), although the IDF regularly keeps bodies of terrorists to exchange for soldiers.
The police have announced that they will inspect everyone leaving the Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem (waiting for the 'supreme court' to decide this is 'discrimination' in 5... 4... 3... 2...) and that the terrorists' houses will be destroyed.
The terrorists' families should be expelled to Syria too (my idea - not in the article).
Video: Israel police arrest 15-year old 'Palestinians' for throwing stones at cars
Imagine if you were driving one of the cars in this video.
Here's a video of Israeli police arresting four 15-year old 'Palestinians' who were on a footbridge throwing stones outside their school in Beit Hanina - a neighborhood in Jerusalem.
The cars (and buses) at which they were throwing the stones are headed for Pisgat Zev and Neve Yaakov, which are also neighborhoods in Jerusalem.
This is about a five-minute drive from my home, and yes, I have driven this road dozens of times.
Let's go to the videotape.
For the record, one car and one bus were damaged and the 'children' confessed. Maybe their parents should be spending some time in jail too?
Of course: Security Council to hold 'emergency session' over Israeli construction in Jerusalem
The massacre of hundreds of thousands of Syrians - first by Assad and then by Islamic State - doesn't merit a Security Council meeting. The massacre of thousands of Kurds by Islamic State doesn't merit one either. Nor does Iran's unwillingness to accept any limitations on its burgeoning nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missiles program. But 1,000 Jewish apartments in Jerusalem - that's something for the Security Council to call an 'emergency.'
The UN Security Council will hold an "emergency meeting" on Wednesday
to discuss Israeli plans to build more Jewish homes in Jerusalem,
diplomats said.
The "urgent" talks were requested by Jordan following a letter from
Palestinian Authority envoy Riyad Mansour who called on the 15-member
council to "address this crisis situation in occupied east Jerusalem."
The announcement follows harsh criticism by senior Israeli officials
of the negative international response to building projects for Jews in
Jerusalem.
Contrary to Mansour's statement, the building plans announced include
neighborhoods throughout Jerusalem, and not just in its eastern sector.
"East Jerusalem" is a euphemism for parts of the capital liberated from
Jordanian forces, when Jerusalem was reunited by Israeli forces after
the 1967 Six Day War.
If there were a Republican in power, the US would announce in advance an intention to veto any anti-Israel resolution, and that might even thwart the meeting in its tracks. But with Obama and Power, you know this is going to come down to the last minute, and Israel may be condemned or worse.
Netanyahu, at a ground-breaking ceremony for a new port in Ashdod, said
Israel would continue to build new ports, pave roads, lay rail road
tracks and “continue to build in our eternal capital.”
“I heard
the claim that our building in Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem makes
peace more distant, but it is the criticism itself that makes peace more
distant,” Netanyahu said of criticism that poured in following his
announcement of plans to develop 660 more units in Ramot Shlomo in the
northern part of the city and 400 in the southern neighborhood of Har
Homa.
This criticism, he said, is “detached from reality” and feeds false Palestinian hopes.
...
Netanyahu said the international community remains quiet when
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas “incites to the murder of
Jews in Jerusalem,” but strongly condemns Israel when it builds in
Jerusalem.
“I don't accept that double standard,” he said. “We
built in Jerusalem, we build in Jerusalem, and we will continue to build
in Jerusalem.”
"The French build in Paris, the English build in London - that's the
same as Israel building in Jerusalem," he concluded. "We will continue
to build in Jerusalem and will continue to build here in Ashdod."
"Building in Jerusalem is not something to be done under the table or under the cover of night," Edelstein told Arutz Sheva.
"It has been part of the policy of every Israeli government and
anyone who even thinks that in a peace agreement we will need to
evacuate (the Jerusalem neighborhoods) Gilo, Talpiot and Pisgat Ze'ev
apparently doesn't understand what they're talking about," added the MK.
...
The Knesset Chairman emphasized that currently there are more than
350,000 Jews living in Judea and Samaria, and "the overwhelming majority
of them are people of action who are dedicated to the state, and there
is no reason to discriminate between them and others."
"Just as the north and the south must be developed, and Jerusalem and
Tel Aviv - so too there is room for student villages and neighborhoods
in Samaria, Gush Etzion (in Judea) and Har Homa (in Jerusalem)," added
Edelstein.
Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, meanwhile, decried the move in an Israel
Radio interview, saying these types of steps will make it more difficult
for Israel to thwart Palestinian efforts in the UN Security Council .
Livni
said while she feels that Israel has the right to build in Jerusalem,
these announcements not only hurt Israel diplomatically, but also worsen
the volatile security situation in the capital.
Indeed, many have argued that the solution to the current housing crisis in
Israel lies precisely in the development of Judea and Samaria, a region
which according to some estimates is over 90% unpopulated.
Instead, Netanyahu has until now imposed a covert freeze on Jewish
construction. The newest announcements still leave much room for doubt
as to whether they constitute a policy change, or are merely a case of
political maneuvering giving the upcoming Likud primaries. Many similar announcements in the past have not actually led to any physical construction.
Video: IDF soldiers forced to cower in position in 'east' Jerusalem
A video taped from inside an IDF position in eastern Jerusalem and uploaded by 0404 news Wednesday shows how frustrating being an IDF soldier is, these days.The soldiers are caged in inside their fortified position, and do nothing but watch as Arab rioters hurl rocks and fireworks at them.The person who is in radio contact with the soldier inside the position tells him not to worry because the attackers are unable to harm him. The soldier inside the position says the event is being documented. IDF soldiers are rarely given permission to fire at rioters who attack them, due to extreme pressure from far-left NGOs and left-wing legislators.
Let's go to the videotape.
Some deterrence, eh? Disgraceful. Simply disgraceful.
'Abu Mazen's Fatah finds another hero' or 'what a difference it makes when your house might be destroyed'
'Moderate' 'Palestinian' President Mahmoud AbbasAbu Mazen's 'moderate' Fatah terror organization has found a new terrorist to celebrate: Abdelrahman Shaludeh, the 21-year old terrorist who murdered three-month-old Chaya Ziseel Braun HY"D (May God Avenge her blood) on Wednesday.
Shaludi, a nephew of slain Hamas explosives expert Mohiyedine Sharif, was believed to be a Hamas supporter
based on his militant Facebook posts. But the new Fatah poster may
indicate an organizational affiliation with the rival Palestinian
organization.
The Palestinian Authority issued no official
comment on the incident, but Fatah Central Committee member Sultan
Abu-Aynayn dubbed Shaludi “a hero” in Facebook comments posted Thursday,
citing his time spent in Israeli prisons, the watchdog Palestinian
Media Watch said.
Given that the IDF recently reinstated the policy of destroying terrorists' homes, Shaludeh's family is being slightly more discreet:
Shaludi’s body — he was shot by police while
attempting to flee the scene and subsequently died in hospital — was
transferred to the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute on Thursday for an
autopsy against his family’s will, Palestinian news agency Ma’an
reported. The assailant’s mother claimed that the incident was a car
accident, and that her son was “killed in cold blood.”
The Palestinian youth spent the past two years
in and out of Israeli prisons. Shaludi’s mental state had deteriorated
following his release after three weeks in Jerusalem’s Russian Compound
prison, where he was interrogated by the Shin Bet security service
earlier this year, his mother added. Just hours before the attack she
had taken him to a doctor, who referred him to a psychiatrist.
“The occupation forces continued harassing him
following his release by summoning him for questioning time and again,”
she told Ma’an. “They would always threaten him and curse at him,
telling him once: ‘We will not let you continue with your life; you will
not study or work.'”
Yeah sure. The 'occupation forces' drove him to suicide and he decided to take as many people as possible with him. Does anyone else not buy that one? I sure don't.
In any event, Fatah, Hamas.... What difference does it make?
An amazing Twitter exchange between Northwestern University law professor Eugene Kontorovich and Haaretz US editor Chemi Shalev in which Shalev justifies Wednesday night's terror attack and the murder of three-month-old Chaya Zissel Braun HY"D (May God Avenge her blood).
@EVKontorovich Possibly. Do you think there might be some relation to Silwan? Temple Mount? 47 years of occupation? No? It's all Abbas?
— Chemi Shalev (@ChemiShalev) October 23, 2014
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
