Ken Burgess

Netanyahu visits wounded soldier

Here's Prime Minister Netanyahu visiting IDF officer Ziv Shilon who was critically injured when a bomb exploded alongside the Gaza security fence last week. This is something that Netanyahu does regularly. As a former soldier who was wounded in action, he realizes how much this means to the troops. Unlike the leader of one of our largest allies...

BUSTED!!!!!

The Shin Bet has broken up the beautiful downtown Ramallah branch of Hamas and has arrested its 30 members. As a bonus, it turns out that two of them were participants in the lynching of two IDF reservists (pictured above) in October 2000. 

The men set up a headquarters for Hamas in the West Bank city traditionally seen as a Fatah stronghold, and operated in the areas of the Binyamin region of the West Bank, according to security forces.

"During questioning of suspects by the Shin Bet, it emerged that the headquarters sought to renew Hamas's activities and rebuilt the organization in the Ramallah area… ahead of the future elections in the Palestinian Authority" security forces said.

The Shin Bet identified Murad Muhammad Khaled Abu Baha as the head of the cell, naming several regional subordinates. Maher Ayoub Abd Dalashiya was named as the alleged money man.

A man named Matzav Muhammad Ahmed Sarur was responsible for recruiting students, security forces added.

The recruitment drive involved the setting up of Hamas student cells in West Bank universities, in the Ramallah and Abu Dis areas.

Hamas transferred large funds through student bodies, and some of the money was earmarked for Hamas prisoners and their families, according to the Shin Bet.

The suspects also tried to set up student cells in Hebron and Bethlehem, though those efforts were interrupted by the arrests.

...

Two of the suspects confessed to taking part in the October 2000 lynch of two IDF reservists who mistakenly entered Ramallah and were beaten to death by a frenzied Palestinian mob.

And you still wonder why almost no Jews in this country want to turn control of Judea and Samaria over to the 'Palestinian Authority'?

The Lehi Fighter and Kever Rachel (Video) In 1945, Yaffa Tevuah was a 22-year old Lehi fighter imprisoned by the British in the women's prison in Bethlehem. Seeking courage when facing her British interrogators, she drew strength from Rachel Imeinu and comfort from her sense of returning home.

The 11th of Marcheshvan marks the traditional anniversary of the passing of Rachel Imeinu (the Matriarch Rachel). For centuries, Jews have prayed in Bethlehem at Kever Rachel (Rachel’s Tomb), a symbol of the Biblical promise of the Jewish return to their homeland. In 1945, Yaffa Tevuah was a 22-year old Lehi fighter imprisoned by the British in the women’s prison in Bethlehem. While being taken back and forth to Jerusalem for questioning at the British Police headquarters, she passed by Kever Rachel and recognized the landmark from pictures that hung in her home as a child in Moldavia. Seeking courage when facing her British interrogators, she drew strength from Rachel Imeinu and comfort from her sense of returning home.

Toldot Yisrael (‪http://www.toldotyisrael.org‬) presents its latest firsthand account from Israel's founding generation. 

In 1945, Yaffa Tevuah was a 22 year old Lehi fighter imprisoned by the British in the women's prison in Bethlehem. While being taken back and forth to Jerusalem for questioning at the Russian Compound, the British Police headquarters in Mandatory Palestine, she passed by Kever Rachel (Rachel's Tomb) and recognized the landmark from pictures that hung in her home as a child in Moldavia. Seeking courage when facing her British interrogators, she drew strength from Rachel Imeinu (Mother Rachel) and comfort from her sense of returning home.

Produced by Toldot Yisrael in cooperation with the iCenter and the Jim Joseph Foundation.
Cinematography and editing: Eitan Wetzler
Interviewer: Peleg Levy

דצמבר 1945 יפה תבואה, לוחמת לח"י מספרת על הדרך מכלא הנשים בבית לחם אל מגרש הרוסים לחקירה, בדרך בחלוף על פני קבר רחל מזהה יפה את הקבר על פי תמונה שהייתה בביתה בבסרביה
אני כאן אני שייכת..
"מתוך פרויקט "תולדות ישראל 
צלם ועורך איתן וצלר מראיין פלג לו

More Jews Are Ascending the Temple Mount and More People Are Noticing

When was a wee lad I learned that Jews may not go anywhere past the Kotel for fear that we would we trespassing on the Temple Mount in our permanent state of ritual impurity. This was an unchallenged assertion for most of my life. Jews simply did not enter the Temple Mount. I remember being somewhat outraged that a Jewish leader like Ariel Sharon would publicly flout Jewish law and ascend the Temple Mount.

I do remember hearing about a fringe group, led by a rabbi I knew from Monsey as a friend and advisor of my father, Rabbi Moshe Tendler ascending the Temple Mount. That was my first exposure to any Torah authority permitting Jews to go up there.

In recent years, more and more orthodox Jews have been going to the Temple Mount with rabbinic approval or rabbinic chaperones to ensure that they do not step in a place that they are not allowed to go under Jewish law. People are noticing.

The LA Times is reporting that there is some political tension that is being caused by these increased visits to the Temple Mount. Some Muslims, and apparently some members of the media, view this is a provocation designed to instigate attacks against Jews thus justifying counter-attacks by Israel. I bet there are some people who go up there as activists and hope to start up with Muslims. There are idiots everywhere. But I think it is ludicrous to propose that the increase in Temple Mount visits has anything to do with Muslims. For thousands of years, Jews have yearned to ascend the Temple Mount once again. If we have the opportunity and the halachic framework to do so, Jews will want to go. It has been a collective dream of ours to pray on the Temple Mount for two thousand years. That is why people want to go to pray on the Temple Mount.  Who else is up there is completely irrelevant.

I find the suggestion that Jews are going up the Temple Mount as a provocation a serious accusation. It is an accusation that lack substance because there is a much more reasonable explanation.

Getting Hoodwinked by Christians in the Holy Land

Sometimes best intentions don't quite work out all that well.  Someone I know visiting from the states had a Tallit on her shopping list for a grandson's upcoming Bar Mitzvah.  Like most Jews, she's not an expert in these things.  In all honesty,Tallitot aren't my expertise either. In a city up north, Tiberias, if I got it correct, she stepped into what seemed to be a lovely Judaica store.  Here's the card:

No doubt, some of you like those who keep up with Jewish Israel know the place.

It was only once she got back to her hotel she noticed something unusual and asked around:

Her tour guide, who obviously knows Hebrew, told her that the blessing on it wasn't the right one:

This is a Messianic Christian faux Tallit.

These are "Christians" who refer to themselves as "messianic Jews". They use Jewish rituals and traditions to dress up their belief in Jesus. By feigning Judaism, messianic Christians hope to blur the lines and break down the theological wall between Judaism and Christianity so that there will be one religion under jesus.
It’s important to let your readership know that the fish/menorah/star of David symbol (see attached) is a messianic Christian symbol. The fish symbol, like the cross, is a Christian icon. Many Jews are unaware of this and mistakenly purchase these items in "Judaica" stores - thinking it is a "good eye" or "fertility sign". Wearing or hanging this icon in one's home would be the equivalent to displaying a Christian cross.

Yes, there are many of this sect/religion in Israel and they try to pass as Jews to trick and proselytize Jews.  One must be very careful.  It can be confusing, because they frequently dress like Torah observant Jews. I once even found myself giving a tour to a group of them at Tel Shiloh.  I was totally confused by the Tel's description of "Christian Zionists" and the very Jewish dress of the participants until I realized the truth about them.

Simply put: 

Belief in jesus is not Jewish.  We Jews only believe in G-d as a G-d.

The Rabbi Gold Interview Eretz Yisrael & the Geula

The Rabbi Wein Interview Eretz Yisrael & the Geula

Belz Rebbe Trip to Barditchev, Ukraine 1995

Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach - Eulogy for Lubavitcher Rebbe.mov

Tormenting Israel BY DAVID SUISSA

I’ve never understood why the world goes absolutely bonkers when Jews try to build homes in Jewish neighborhoods of Jerusalem. Take the latest brouhaha about the announcement by Israel’s Interior Ministry that it had approved a planning stage — the fourth out of seven required — for the eventual construction of 1,600 units in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo.

Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the Palestinian Authority, is not known for being too accommodating during negotiations. And yet, when negotiating a two-state solution two years ago with Ehud Olmert, Abbas agreed that several neighborhoods in Jerusalem would stay in Israeli hands in any final settlement. And guess which neighborhood was on that list?

That’s right — Ramat Shlomo, a neighborhood made up mostly of religious Jews with big families and a shortage of housing. Abbas was surely aware that, as analyst Evelyn Gordon wrote March 14 in a Commentary blog post, “Its location in no way precludes the division of Jerusalem, which is what both Washington and Europe claim to want: Situated in the corner formed by two other huge neighborhoods to its west and south, it [Ramat Shlomo] does not block a single Arab neighborhood from contiguity with a future Palestinian state.”

Nevertheless, Israel was crucified when its Interior Ministry made the Ramat Shlomo announcement last week during Vice President Joe Biden’s visit to Israel — presumably because the timing was highly embarrassing. But really, what timing would have been more appropriate? An announcement two weeks later, when Israel would have been accused of being sneaky and deceitful during Biden’s visit?

After all, Israel had nothing to hide: It was in strict compliance with the 10-month settlement freeze, which specifically excluded East Jerusalem and which the Obama administration fully supported and even characterized as “unprecedented.”

In any case, Vice President Biden made a rare public condemnation of Israel’s announcement, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded with an explanation and a rare public apology that Biden accepted. Normally, that is more than enough contrition to resolve misunderstandings.

But not in this case. The following day, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton berated Netanyahu on the phone for close to 45 minutes and followed that with public condemnation and demands for more Israeli concessions. 

Ambassador Michael Oren has reportedly called this the biggest crisis between the United States and Israel since 1975. And why all this madness? Because Israel had this crazy idea to allow a zoning permit for housing units in a Jewish neighborhood of its capital city.

One wonders: What would have happened if Israel had done something really bad while Biden was in Israel? Like, say, announce a zoning permit for construction of a national memorial to a terrorist?

Well, it turns out that while the Obama administration was heaping abuse on Israel, the Palestinians were in fact dedicating a memorial to the mastermind of the worse terrorist attack in Israeli history. Now tell me, which act does more to undermine trust and the atmosphere for peace: a zoning permit for apartments or a memorial to terrorism?

The funny thing is, no administration official ever mentioned the terrorist memorial. As Barry Rubin, professor at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, reminds us: “Even though the Palestinian Authority has refused to negotiate for 14 months; made President Obama look very foolish after destroying his publicly announced September plan to have negotiations in two months; broke its promise not to sponsor the Goldstone report in the U.N.; and rejected direct negotiations after months of pleading by the Obama White House, not a single word of criticism has ever been offered by any administration official regarding the P.A.’s continuous and very public sabotage of peace- process efforts.”

Obama’s single-minded condemnations of Israel have done more than push Israel away; they’ve also emboldened the Palestinians to dig in their heels and pushed them even further away from peace talks of any kind.

My friend Yossi Klein Halevi, an author and political analyst who lives in Jerusalem, has a “strong sense that Obama was looking for a pretext. He’s turned an incident into a crisis.”

He adds: “If Obama thinks he’s going to win friends in the Israeli public by treating Israel more harshly than any other country aside from Iran, he’s going to have an even tougher learning curve than he’s had in this last year of failed Middle East diplomacy.”

According to Noah Pollak of Commentary, Obama’s priority is to stop Israel from attacking Iran: “Obama’s only option for restraining an Israeli attack is the one that we’re seeing unfold before our eyes: a U.S. effort to methodically weaken the relationship; provoke crises; consume the Netanyahu government with managing this deterioration; and most important, create an ambience of unpredictability by making the Israelis fear that an attack on Iran would not just be met with American disapproval but also a veto and perhaps active resistance.”

If Pollak is correct, then, the Ramat Shlomo crisis has clarified the stakes: The issue of Iran trumps everything.

Israelis understand that, compared to the threat of a nuclear Iran, an issue like building permits in Ramat Shlomo is a farce. By tormenting the Jews over such an issue, Obama is not just emboldening Israel’s enemies, he’s setting back the very peace process he so cherishes.

David Suissa is the founder of OLAM magazine and OLAM.org. You can read his daily blog atsuissablog.com
and e-mail him at suissa@olam.org.

Rabbi Shalom Arush teaches us that positive thoughts are all truth, while negative thoughts are all lies. Happiness is the greatest mitzvah, but sadness is the worst transgression, to be avoided at all costs.

American Muslim Group Features Imam with Ties to Hamas The Imam was an unindicted co-conspirator in a 2008 case involved a charity which transferred money to Hamas.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, founded in 1994 by operatives from Hamas, this month continued its tradition of embracing individuals with ties to terrorist organizations, such as Mousa Abu Marzouk and Yusuf al Qaradawi, by featuring, as the speaker for the annual banquet of its Florida chapter, Kifah Mustapha, an imam from Chicago, whom the U.S. government has named a party to Hamas financing.

In November 2008, a federal jury found the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) and five of its leaders guilty of “providing material support and resources to a terrorist organization.” That organization was Hamas, and the money raised for it by HLF was in the millions. HLF was shut down by the FBI in December 2001.

Besides the five persons found guilty in the HLF trial, the U.S. Justice Department listed a number of other individuals who had been considered involved in the conspiracy but whom the government chose not to indict (“unindicted co-conspirators”), among whom was Kifah Mustapha.

At the time of the trial, Mustapha was an imam at the Mosque Foundation, a Chicago-area Mosque, itself a hub for Palestinian terror-related activity. A Hamas operative and one of the founders of CAIR, Rafiq Jaber, has acted as president and spokesman of the Mosque Foundation. The mosque has held fundraisers for different terrorist conduits, including the HLF and Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s [PIJ] co-founder, Sami al-Arian, indicted in 2003 for “contributing services” for the benefit of a “specially designated terrorist” organization, PIJ. Mustapha is still an imam at the Mosque, as well as being the Mosque’s associate director.

Also at the time of the trial, Mustapha was listed as the Registered Agent of the Illinois corporation of HLF – as he still is today.

None of this has seemed to faze CAIR, which was also named a co-conspirator in that trial. CAIR had told people on the homepage of its official website to donate money to HLF. The group appeared more than happy to have Mustapha participate at its 12th annual South Florida banquet held on October 6, 2012.

In addition, the Chicago chapter of CAIR has had Mustapha participate at a number of its functions, as well, including joint events with the Mosque Foundation. However, as CAIR and the Mosque Foundation have close relations, it makes perfect sense for CAIR to invite Kifah Mustapha to give a speech at its banquet.

Further, according to CAIR-Florida’s Facebook page, one of the attendees to the banquet was Bassem Alhalabi, a director of a radical mosque in Boca Raton, Florida. In June 2003, Alhalabi was found guilty by the U.S. Commerce Department of illegally shipping military equipment to Syria.

One would think that CAIR would be concerned about its group featuring someone named in a Hamas fundraising trial to help raise money at its annual banquet. What kind of message is CAIR sending to the community, Muslim and non-Muslim alike?

As CAIR’s joint co-founder, Omar Ahmad, put it, “Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant.” [Encyclopedia of Islam in the United States, Vol. 1, p. 167].

The West’s Deaf Ears for the Real Moderate Arabs But, alas, the Ibrahims are the rarity, men given too little honor in their own old societies and far too little in the West.

One of my most fun professional memories was when I walked endlessly, circling round and round and round that hall in Algeria in November 1988 with a burly, no-nonsense, and brilliant newspaper correspondent named Youssef Ibrahim, who was then working for the New York Times.

Friendly, funny, sarcastic, and with absolutely no illusions or romanticism about the absurdities of Arab politics and the idiocies of Arab political ideology, Ibrahim’s only shortcoming is that there are not one thousand more exactly like him. If he was the kind of person leading Arab countries and people they would be far more prosperous, peaceful, happier and democratic.

But, alas, the Ibrahims are the rarity, men given too little honor in their own old societies and far too little in the West. The genuine moderates accept no excuses but comprehend precisely why the West has succeeded and the Middle East has not. Often seen as sell-outs, they are the most noble and courageous of people, far more concerned about their own people’s welfare than are the dictators, demagogues, and bloodthirsty academics.

These thoughts are prompted by an article he once wrote, presented below. I include the text because I want you to read every word. It is all completely sensible. Many will find it encouraging. It makes me want to cry.

Why?

First, because it all could have been written 10 or 20 or 30 years ago, indeed it is pretty much what he told me as we circled endlessly around the convention center way out on an isolated Algerian beach (there’s Arafat, surrounded by his coterie; there’s that moronic American Jewish Peace Now guy who is explaining to the PLO gunmen thugs why they really really want to make peace with Israel but just don’t know it; here come the sycophantic journalists…)

And it was published in 2006 and in six years and a half years there has been no advance on one single word of its text. Of course, the spread of revolutionary Islamism has revived the unwillingness to listen to Ibrahim, though the fate of Syria–the one Arab country he said still took the conflict seriously–should give pause to radical regimes who think this gambit solves all of their problems.

Second, because nobody in the Arab world listens to Ibrahim or to brilliant scholars like Fouad Ajami, which is their tragedy for preferring the demagogues.

Third, because it was published—of course—not in an Arabic publication (who would dare?) but in an American Jewish one, a group that includes all too many who think the fault is on their own side and don’t get what Youssef is saying.

Fourth, because if I were to have written these truths I would have been denounced with a hundred different insults.

Fifth, because if anything things are worse today than back then. (Can you imagine this essay of his being presented and discussed in a university course on the Middle East?)

And sixth because it’s now 2012 and we still have to be saying things like this! No, it’s worse: in 2012 the Middle East is starting a whole new round of the old madness. The Islamists tell the masses that the only reason their predecessors didn’t win total victory is that they failed to hit their head against the stone wall long and hard enough!

Here’s his open letter:

To my Arab brothers: The War with Israel Is Over — and they won. Now let’s finally move forward.

By Youssef M. Ibrahim

Jewish World Review, July 12, 2006

Dear Palestinian Arab brethren:

The war with Israel is over.

You have lost. Surrender and negotiate to secure a future for your children.

We, your Arab brothers, may say until we are blue in the face that we stand by you, but the wise among you and most of us know that we are moving on, away from the tired old idea of the Palestinian Arab cause and the “eternal struggle” with Israel.

Dear friends, you and your leaders have wasted three generations trying to fight for Palestine, but the truth is the Palestine you could have had in 1948 is much bigger than the one you could have had in 1967, which in turn is much bigger than what you may have to settle for now or in another 10 years. Struggle means less land and more misery and utter loneliness.

At the moment, brothers, you would be lucky to secure a semblance of a state in that Gaza Strip into which you have all crowded, and a small part of the West Bank of the Jordan. It isn’t going to get better. Time is running out even for this much land, so here are some facts, figures, and sound advice, friends.

You hold keys, which you drag out for television interviews, to houses that do not exist or are inhabited by Israelis who have no intention of leaving Jaffa, Haifa, Tel Aviv, or West Jerusalem.

You shoot old guns at modern Israeli tanks and American-made fighter jets, doing virtually no harm to Israel while bringing the wrath of its mighty army down upon you.

You fire ridiculously inept Kassam rockets that cause little destruction and delude yourselves into thinking this is a war of liberation. Your government, your social institutions, your schools, and your economy are all in ruins.

Your young people are growing up illiterate, ill, and bent on rites of death and suicide, while you, in effect, are living on the kindness of foreigners, including America and the United Nations.

Every day your officials must beg for your daily bread, dependent on relief trucks that carry food and medicine into the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, while your criminal Muslim fundamentalist Hamas government continues to fan the flames of a war it can neither fight nor hope to win.

In other words, brothers, you are down, out, and alone in a burnt-out landscape that is shrinking by the day.

What kind of struggle is this? Is it worth waging at all? More important, what kind of miserable future does it portend for your children, the fourth or fifth generation of the Arab world’s have-nots?

We, your Arab brothers, have moved on.

Those of us who have oil money are busy accumulating wealth and building housing, luxury developments, state-of-the-art universities and schools, and new highways and byways. Those of us who share borders with Israel, such as Egypt and Jordan, have signed a peace treaty with it and are not going to war for you any time soon.

Those of us who are far away, in places like North Africa and Iraq, frankly could not care less about what happens to you.

Only Syria continues to feed your fantasies that someday it will join you in liberating Palestine , even though a huge chunk of its territory, the entire Golan Heights, was taken by Israel in 1967 and annexed. The Syrians, my friends, will gladly fight down to the last Palestinian Arab.

Before you got stuck with this Hamas crowd, another cheating, conniving, leader of yours, Yasser Arafat, sold you a rotten bill of goods — more pain, greater corruption, and millions stolen by his relatives — while your children played in the sewers of Gaza .

The war is over. Why not let a new future begin?

Visit Rubin Reports.

Arabs for Israel - X-Muslims for Israel - Hamas leader's son

Mosab Hassan Yousuf, son of Hamas leader of West Bank Sheik Hassan Yousuf talks on T.V and as an Palestinian Arab Muslim claims he supports Israel because he is righteous and knows through his religion and history whose land it really belongs to, the Israelis. He exposes all Arab lies against Israel and criticizes Islam for the hatred it teaches since he experienced it when he was a young boy. He very well admits the Arabs don't want peace, just hate, war and fight while Israelis are striving for peace. Thank you Mus'ab Hassan Yousuf you are a righteous Arab and are respected for spreading the truth, not Paliwood lies.

Hamas Terrorists Firing Rockets on Israel from Houses in Gaza

The terror group Hamas benefits from using its own people as human shields. When the IDF refrains from firing into densely populated areas, such as neighborhoods or suburbs, the terror organization becomes less vulnerable by default. Most of Hamas' military infrastructure is purposely placed in the middle of Gaza City and scattered throughout crowded refugee camps, further putting civilians in the direct line of fire. In this video, uploaded online by Hamas only two days ago, you can see rockets being fired from urban living areas in the Gaza Strip. These are the same areas Hamas operatives convert to terror sites and weapon caches.

Egyptian child preacher calls for destruction of Israel Child preacher appears on Egyptian Al-Rahma television station, says martyrdom is a religious duty for Muslim believers and refers to "the accursed Sharon, Bush and Obama," according to translation provided by MEMRI.

A child preacher identified as Ibrahim Adham called for the destruction of Israel on the Egyptian Al-Rahma television station this month, according to a translation provided by the Middle East Media Research Institute.  "Oh Islamic nation, oh all Muslims ... martyrdom on the path of Allah is a religious duty incumbent upon you, oh believers," the child said. "It is your path for salvation in the eyes of the Lord ... Pray: Oh Allah, destroy Israel. May Jerusalem live on until the Day of Judgment."

The child also later referred to "the accursed Sharon, Bush and Obama."

A robed man is also seen in the clip, telling the child, "You are such a beautiful boy, by Allah!"

Earlier this month, the Simon Wiesenthal Center issued a strongcondemnation of Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, after Morsi attended a sermon where the preacher called for the "destruction and dispersal of the Jews."

A video emailed by the center showed Morsi at a mosque in the Mediterranean town of Marsa Matruh, where the congregation, including Morsi, answers "amen" to a cleric who recites a list of prayers in a traditional ritual.

In one of the prayers, the cleric asked God to "destroy the Jews and their supporters and disperse them, rend them asunder." Morsi is then seen continuing to say "amen." The prayers were aired on state TV and caught on video by MEMRI.

Christians rally in support of Israel, Jewish people

Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, delivers the keynote speech during "A Night to Honor Israel," Sunday, Oct. 28, 2012, at Cornerstone Church in San Antonio. Photo: Darren Abate, Darren Abate/For The Express-New / SA

Pastor John Hagee took the stage of his megachurch Sunday night with his 5,000-seat worship center nearly packed for what has become his signature event, a rally with speeches and music to express Christian support for the nation of Israel and the Jewish people.

With rabbis, Christian ministers and Israeli leaders in ample supply, the atmosphere highlighted the fervor of Christian Zionists whose cause has re-intensified through Hagee's initiatives in recent years.

He founded Christians United for Israel six years ago, declaring the issue of Israel as singularly critical to the future agenda of evangelical Christians. Today, he counts more than 1 million members in the nonprofit organization, which lobbies federal lawmakers and has gradually secured support from much of the U.S. Jewish community.

Sunday's “Night to Honor Israel” marked the 31st year for the noted TV evangelist to hold this event at Cornerstone Church on the North Side. And as in past years, the event brought out a mix of theological and political one-liners: The Bible mandates the defense of Israel as a Jewish homeland and the U.S.-Israeli bond gives the world its greatest chance at stability and peace in the Middle East.

“The day America turns its back on Israel, that day God will turn his back on the United States of America,” Hagee told the audience.

Some waved U.S. and Israeli flags, cheering and clapping at the frequent calls for rejecting candidates for U.S. office who haven't held Israel's enemies — especially Iran — accountable for seeking the nation's destruction.

“This year, O Lord, help America choose the candidate who seems most likely to stop Iran,” said San Antonio Rabbi Aryeh Scheinberg, in the invocation.

The national anthems for both countries were sung along with a variety of Israeli-inspired songs paying tribute to the land as historically belonging to the Jewish people and Jerusalem as a God-ordained capital city.

Toward the end of the night, it was announced that nearly $3 million was given to Jewish and Israeli charities, adding to Hagee's long record of raising funds for such causes.

Such donations and commitment to seek favorable political leadership are reasons to hope, said Meir Shlomo, consul general of Israel to the Southwest.

“We all know you have our back covered,” he said, prompting a prolonged standing ovation.

The real Israeli apartheid

The picture above is the real apartheid that's here in Israel - the fact that it is dangerous for (Jewish) Israeli citizens to go anywhere near any Arab village. But you won't hear that in any of the media outside of Israel. And yes, these signs exist all over Judea and Samaria (and probably ought to exist in many of the 'Israeli Arab' villages within the 1949 armistice lines). But for more on the lie that's conventionally referred to as 'Israeli apartheid' go here. 

How Romney plans to deal with Iran

Jeffrey Goldberg publishes an email he received from Mitt Romney in which the candidate answers questions about how he would deal with Iran as President. 

“I have always talked about the diplomatic process,” he wrote. “I will not rule out diplomatic options, so long as we would not be rewarding bad behavior and so long as the Iranian leadership was truly cornered and ready to change its behavior. A crumbling economy is not enough. Because even with a crumbling economy, the Iranian leadership is still racing towards a bomb right now.”

Romney went out of his way to suggest that the Obama administration plans to spring some sort of late-November surprise on America’s Middle East allies, citing a recentNew York Times report that Iran and the White House had agreed to face-to-face negotiations after the election (a report denied by the White House). “Our closest allies, likeIsrael, will not learn about our plans from the New York Times,” Romney wrote. “And I’ll be clear with the American people about where I’m heading. I won’t be secretly asking the Ayatollahs for more flexibility following some future election.”

...

He also denied that his new emphasis on negotiations means that he would accept less than a complete halt to Iran’s nuclear work: “To be clear, the objective of any strategy will be to get Iran to stop spinning centrifuges, stop enriching uranium, shut down its facilities. Full stop. Existing fissile material will have to be shipped out of the country.”

I asked Romney to name the biggest mistake he thinks Obama has made on Iran. “President Obama has sent the Ayatollahs mixed messages throughout the past four years,” he wrote. “That’s why he has lost credibility on the negotiating track. Round after round after round of talks and nothing to show for them. Iran continues to race to a nuclear weapons capability and continues to become more brazen in its support of terrorism around the world, including a terror plot in Washington, D.C.,” a reference to a thwarted plot, hatched in Tehran, to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador to the U.S.

Romney went on: “What do I mean by mixed messages? In the first year of his administration, the President said he would sit down with Ahmadinejad without pre-conditions, and President Obama deliberately remained silent during the Green Revolution, signaling to the Ayatollahs that Iran’s dissident movement would not have America’s support. President Obama also pursued a policy of creating ‘daylight’ -- his word -- between the U.S. and Israel. And through the end of the third year of his administration, the president fought congressional efforts -- bi-partisan congressional efforts -- to pass crippling sanctions on Iran’s Central Bank. This all happened against the backdrop of the president’s top advisors and cabinet secretaries broadcasting the risks of the military option, therefore conveying to Iran’s leadership that the threat is simply not real. Add all of this together, one can understand why Iran’s leaders are not taking the United States very seriously these days.”

 I would add a couple of other points. I believe that Romney would be less likely to leave Israel hanging out to dry if it were to decide to go it alone against Iran. And I believe that Romney would be more amenable to reducing Israel's risks by acting sooner against Iran than would Obama. And I believe that Israel would be more willing to let Romney take the lead than would be the case with Obama, who is not trusted by much of this country's population, including most of its politicians.

But it doesn't sound like Goldberg asked him about any of that.

Ronald Reagan on Israel

IAF training in Greece

The IAF is training in Greece.

"In Israel we know every hill and every mountain and are less preoccupied with the elements of flying. We're not preoccupied with navigational orientation, which is an important component of flying", says Lieutenant Colonel Gadi, Commander of the "Rolling Sword" squadron and commander of the temporary squadron in Greece that includes Blackhawk and Apache-Longbow pilots. "Within two or three years, the average helicopter pilot has flown through the area so many times that he's not surprised anymore. Here we have no idea. I don't know the place and I need to study the territory extensively". 

But it wasn't only for the element of surprise that the helicopters flew over to the other side of the Mediterranean Sea. It's very difficult not to bow your head in respect when standing at the foot of the 2,900 meter Olympus Mountain. Major Gad: "Flying through high mountains is more complicated and requires more power. There are winds, powerful whirlwinds, and it's difficult to maneuver the helicopter".

In the adjacent line, the combat helicopter formation is also watching the home of Zeus. "The higher the helicopter climbs, the more difficult it is for it", says Captain Or, Deputy Commander of the "Hornet" squadron. "That said, we were pleasantly surprised: The helicopter functioned a lot better than we expected and we must've been well prepared for the exercise and learned how to not to push ourselves into corners. Regardless, the helicopter makes it easier for you. It knows how to respond when it's crunch time. It tells you how much power you need, what you need in order to fly, and what it limits are at that time".

Along with the helicopters are members of Israel's unit 669 - the search and rescue teams.  

Kneeling close to the ground, Unit 669 Search & Rescue combat teams are scattered in the backyard of the base. The crews are in the grove near by the Squadron's building and are training together with their Greek counterparts - Unit 31. 

The training in the grove is just the warm-up. Not much time passes until the real-deal arrives: rescue and evacuation sorties performed by integrated crews of Greeks and Israelis. The "ride" was mixed as well: one performed by an Israeli Uh-60 Blackhawk, the other by a Greek UH-1.

"Flying in a different aircraft is a little weird", says First Sergeant Yinon, Commander of the 669 crew, "there are technical differences between the helicopters: the seating arrangements and the way the equipment is organized. The flying is different mostly because of the communication with the pilots. We're used to understanding where we're going and knowing what's going to happen. On the Greek helicopters only the in-flight mechanics hear the signal operator and we have no idea what's going on".

Helicopter crews training for search and rescue missions in mountainous terrain? Hmmm.

PMW: Palestinian Arab mother proudly places suicide belt on her son

From Palestinian Media Watch: The Facebook page for Fatah in Lebanon has posted this picture of a mother dressing her young son with a suicide belt. This picture was posted on the Fatah site together with an imaginary conversation between the son who is being sent to his death and the mother encouraging it.

"My mother dressed me in a strange belt (i.e., a suicide belt).
I asked her: 'What is this, mother?'
She said: 'I will put it on you and you will go to your death!'
I said to her: 'Mother, what have I done that you want me to die?'
She shed a tear that hurt my heart and said: 'The homeland needs you, son. Go and blow up the sons of Zion.'
I said to her: 'Why me and not you?'
She said: 'I will stay in order to give birth to more children for the sake of Palestine.'
I kissed her hand and said to her: 'Keep it up, mother, for you and for Palestine I will kill the impure and the damned.'"

[Fatah-Lebanon's Facebook page,

posted Sept. 3, 2012, accessed Oct. 28, 2012]

That photo has been going around the Internet for a couple of years; not sure where it originally came from.  PMW gives lots of other examples of encouraging children to kill themselves for the cause.

12 Year-Old Boy Stands Trial for Murdering Neo-Nazi Father Opening statements in trial of a 12-year-old boy accused of murdering his neo-Nazi father are set to begin Tuesday in Riverside, California.

Opening statements in the trial of a 12-year-old boy accused of murdering his neo-Nazi father are set to begin Tuesday in Riverside, California.

Then only ten years-old, Joseph Hall deliberately shot his father, who was a rising figure in Nationalist Socialist movement, using a snub-nose revolver at his family’s Riverside home.

“What he did, had it been done by anybody older, there would be no doubt that it was a murder,” said prosecutor Michael Soccio, according to The New York Times. “It’s planned. It’s premeditated. It was carried out in a cold, killing fashion. It is a murder.”

Joseph was present at neo-Nazi gatherings hosted by his parents and was taught at a young age how to use a firearm, but Riverside County prosecutors say the boy’s exposure to white supremacist culture probably won’t play a big role at trial.

Joseph’s public defender, Matthew J. Hardy, says his client has neurological and psychological problems, compounded by exposure to neo-Nazi “conditioning” and physical abuse in the home, the Times reported.

“He’s been conditioned to violence,” Mr. Hardy said, adding, “You have to ask yourself: Did this kid really know that this act was wrong based on all those things?”

Court documents reveal that the child was prone to violent outbursts and was frequently the target of his father’s drunken rages. The boy reportedly told police he killed his father to stop the abuse.

California’s penal code also states that children under 14 cannot be charged with a crime without clear proof that “they knew its wrongfulness.” The judge said she could make a ruling in the case as early as next week.

If convicted, Joseph Hall could remain in custody until the age of 25, providing he doesn’t commit any crimes while incarcerated.

Shloime Daskal Singing "Al Taslicheini & Vzakeinu" An Aaron Teitelbaum Production

Here's an interesting depiction and description of the London Beth Din as it functioned in 1926. It is titled "The World's Oldest Tribunal, Dating From Moses, The Beth Din, Or Court of the Chief Rabbi."

Tens of Thousands Celebrate at Rachel's Tomb Tens of thousands of people arrived at Rachel’s Tomb on Saturday night for the annual celebration of her life.

Tens of thousands of people arrived at Kever Rachel (Rachel’s Tomb) on Saturday night for the annual celebration of her life, which takes place on the anniversary of her passing.

From the Arutz Sheva article on the Matriarch Rachel: Because of the many obstacles and sorrows she faced, her quiet way of confronting challenges and her showing us the way to do the same, Rachel Imeinu, Mother or Mame Rochel to the Jewish people, is remembered in Jewish hearts for over 3600 years. Women, especially, feel that her life echoes their challenges and sorrows.

Mother Rachel saved her elder sister Leah the humiliation of being found out when their father Laban had Leah married to Jacob instead of her, suffering in silence and not telling her beloved betrothed, who had worked for her for seven years, about the deception - even to the point of giving Leah tips that would prevent Jacob from realizing that his veiled bride was someone other than the one he had chosen . She later married Jacob and was the wife he loved, but was barren, and when she finally was able to conceive, died giving birth to her second son, so that she did not even raise her longed-for children.

Rachel, who died on the way back to the Promised Land, was buried on the wayside in Bethelehem, not next to Jacob who is in the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hevron. When Jacob lay dying in Egypt decades later, he told his son Joseph, still feeling the heavy loss: "And on my way from Padan Aram, Rachel left me." 

The Jewish people have always prayed at her grave, and when exiled to Babylon, passed it and called for her to pray for their redemption. The midrash says that she showed the Almighty how she helped her sister and asked Him to forgive the slights His people caused him in the same fashion as she did. Jeremiah gives the answer in Chapter 31, as G-d tells her not to cry for her sons, because they will one day return.

About 13,000 people had arrived at the compound from Thursday evening to Friday afternoon. A total of about 70 thousand people are expected by Sunday.

This year the anniversary of the matriarch Rachel’s passing fell on the Sabbath, when observant Jews do not travel. Those marking the anniversary compensated by moving celebrations of her life to the days immediately before and after.

As part of the preparations for the celebrations, volunteers from the Ichud Hatzalah organization, including doctors and paramedics, were deployed starting on Thursday afternoon at Rachel's Tomb. As of Saturday night they treated 13 people, including three who were evacuated to hospital. Most of the casualties suffered bruises andinjuries as a result of the crowding in the area.

The Egged bus company, which had been providing transportation to the compound, could not handle the large number of visitors, and, as can be seen in the following video, on Saturday night tens of thousands of people began marching on foot from Jerusalem's Gilo neighborhood to the compound.

“Israel Is The Cancer In Foreign Affairs”

No, I am not quoting Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but rather Irish TV presenter Vincent Browne.

A renowned Irish broadcaster has referred to Israel as a “cancer”.

Speaking about the US presidential debates on Tuesday night, Vincent Browne lamented the lack of discussion of American support for Israel. “Israel is the cancer in foreign affairs,” he said, adding: “It’s a massive injustice — they stole the land from the Arabs.”

The comments were made on Mr Browne’s show on Ireland’s TV3 channel, Tonight with Vincent Browne.

Defending his remarks, Mr Browne said that by calling Israel a cancer “I didn’t mean it should be eliminated. It was an infelicitous use of the word.

They stole the land from the Arabs

“The reality is the Israeli state was founded by confiscation of land previously occupied by Arabs. That injustice is at the centre of the conflict.”

Israel’s deputy ambassador to Ireland Nurit Tinari-Modai said: “My grandparents were brutally murdered on European soil during the Holocaust. I would have never believed that the day would come when a presenter on Irish TV station would make racist, antisemitic remarks,” she claimed.

“We today received phone calls and emails from outraged Irish people who intend to complain about Mr. Brown’s ongoing hateful comments towards the Jewish people and the Jewish state.”

Ms Tinari-Modai said that the embassy had approached TV3 and offered a pro-Israeli guest to appear on Tuesday’s show “but regrettably the show declined.”

Responding to the deputy ambassador’s criticism, Mr Browne insisted: “I’m not antisemitic and will not be blackmailed.

“We have said we will accommodate that person in the near future.”